Sick, our nature demanded to be healed; fallen, to be raised up; dead, to rise again... Closed in the darkness, it was necessary to bring us the light; captives, we awaited a Savior... Are these things minor or insignificant? Did they not move God to descend to human nature and visit it, since humanity was in so miserable and unhappy a state?

It is impossible that one who has turned to the world and feels its anxieties, and engages his heart in the wish to please men, can fulfill that first and great commandment of the Master, 'You shall love God with all your heart and with all your strength' (Mt. 22:37).

We are not entitled to such licence, I mean that of affirming what we please; we make the Holy Scriptures the rule and the measure of every tenet; we necessarily fix our eyes upon that, and approve that alone which may be made to harmonize with the intention of those writings

For virtue is a light and buoyant thing, and all who live in her way fly like clouds as Isaiah says, and as doves with their young ones; but sin is a heavy affair, as another of the prophets says, sitting upon a talent of lead.

Since with all my soul I behold the face of my beloved, therefore all the beauty of his form is seen in me.

The silent painting speaks on the walls and does much good.

For truly barren is profane education, which is always in labor but never gives birth. For what fruit worthy of such pangs does philosophy show for being so long in labor? Do not all who are full of wind and never come to term miscarry before they come to the light of the knowledge of God, although they could as well become men if they were not altogether hidden in the womb of barren wisdom?