To seek the greatest good is to live well, and to live well is nothing other than to love God with the whole heart, the whole soul, and the whole mind: It is therefore obvious that this love must be kept whole and uncorrupt, that is temperance; it should not be overcome with difficulties, that is fortitude, it must not be subservient to anything else, that is justice; it must discriminate among things so as not to be deceived by falsity or fraud, that is prudence.
Saint AugustineIf you would attain to what you are not yet, you must always be displeased by what you are. For where you are pleased with yourself there you have remained. Keep adding, keep walking, keep advancing.
Saint AugustineFind out how much God has given you and from it take what you need; the remainder is needed by others.
Saint AugustineOur Lord reserved to Himself certain things which He would do in due time in a manner outside the course and order of nature, so that they would wonder and be astonished at seeing not great but unusual things, who are unmoved by things daily seen. For the government of the world is a greater miracle than feeding five thousand men from five loaves; yet at the former no one wonders, the latter astonishes all men: not as a greater wonder, but as a rarer.
Saint AugustineOften the contempt of vainglory becomes a source of even more vainglory, for it is not being scorned when the contempt is something one is proud of.
Saint AugustineO eternal truth and true love and beloved eternity! You are my God; to you I sigh by day and by night. And when I first knew you, you raised me up so that I could see that there was something to see and that I still lacked the ability to see it. And you beat back the weakness of my sight, blazing upon me with your rays, and I trembled in love and in dread.
Saint Augustine