Always be quite simple and sincere and ask God to grant me those two virtues.

One beautiful diamond is worth more than a mountain of stones, and one virtuous act of acquiescence and submission is better than an abundance of good works done for others.

The most powerful weapon to conquer the devil is humility. For, as he does not know at all how to employ it, neither does he know how to defend himself from it.

We must hold as an irrefutable maxim that the difficulties we have with our neighbor arise more from our immortified moods than from anything else.

. . . Practice teaching catechism and preaching. Missionaries must apply themselves to these tasks and although they do not accomplish them as successfully as others do, according to the opinion of men, it must be enough for them that they are doing the Will of God and perhaps producing more real fruit.

...a great good is worth being long desired.

Use gentle methods to get whatever good you can from priests and monks who are slaves, as well as from merchants and captives. Resort to severe measures only in extreme cases, for fear lest the hardship they are already enduring in their state of captivity, joined to the strictness you might want to exercise in virtue of your authority, drive them to despair. . . . It is not light they need, but strength, and strength permeates through the external balm of words and good example.