Wine was given us by God, not that we might be drunken, but that we might be sober. It is the best medicine when it has the best moderation to direct it. Wine was given to restore the body's weakness, not to overturn the soul's strength.

A friend is more to be longed for than the light; I speak of a genuine one. And wonder not: for it were better for us that the sun should be extinguished, than that we should be deprived of friends; better to live in darkness, than to be without friends

For if you change from inhumanity to alms giving, you have stretched fourth the hand that was withered. If you withdraw from theaters and go to church, you have cured the lame foot. If you draw back your eyes from a harlot ... you have opened them when they were blind ... These are the greatest miracles.

It is certainly a greater and more wonderful work to change the minds of enemies, bringing about a change of soul, than to kill them.

God asks little, but He gives much.

It brings comfort to have companions in whatever happens.

Just as those who are deprived of light cannot walk straight, so also those who do not behold the ray of the Holy Scriptures must necessarily sin, since they walk in the deepest darkness.