You have found that you were more secure before you accumulated so much. See what greed has imposed on you: You have filled your house and now you fear burglars. You have hoarded money and lost sleep. See what greed has commanded you: "Do this!" And you did it.

If by fate anyone means the will or power of God, let him keep his meaning but mend his language; for fate commonly means a necessary process which will have its way apart from the will of God and men.

I inquired what wickedness is, and I didn't find a substance, but a perversity of will twisted away from the highest substance - You, O God - towards inferior things, rejecting its own inner life and swelling with external matters.

We judge all things according to the divine truth.

Only He who made man makes man happy.

To my God a heart of flame; To my fellow man a heart of love; To myself a heart of steel.

The peace of the celestial city is the perfectly ordered and harmonious enjoyment of God, and of one another in God. (City of God, Book 19)