Robert Hugh Benson

Robert Hugh Benson (18 November 1871 – 19 October 1914) was an English Catholic priest and writer.

• Ignorance may be bliss, but it certainly is not freedom, except in the minds of those who prefer darkness to light, and chains to liberty. The more true information we can acquire, the better for our enfranchisement.
  • "Intellectual Slavery" (January 1904); Papers of a Pariah (Longmans, Green & Co., 1907), p. 34

    Cf. Gray, "Ode on a Distant Prospect of Eton College", st. 10

• I agree that your troubles are real enough. But all the better. ... I think that the Authorities are pleased sometimes 'to give us something to cry for.' ... Most of us cry without anything. ... And I think that the insane desire one has sometimes to bang and kick grumblers and peevish persons, is a Divine instinct. ... Ergo. ... Therefore thank Them that you have something to cry for. One doesn't get far without it.
  • Reported in C. C. Martindale, The Life of Monsignor Robert Hugh Benson (Longmans, Green & Co., 1916), vol. 2, p. 239

New York: Benziger Bros.

• It is strange, sometimes, to find that some silent old lady has a power for sounding human character, which far shrewder persons lack.
  • Pt. 1, ch. 5 (p. 61)

• She has been taught to hold herself in, and not to show her feelings; and that, I think, is as much a drawback sometimes as wearing the heart upon the sleeve.
  • Pt. 1, ch. 7 (p. 84)

• He pictured the peace of the ransomed soul, that knows itself safe in the arms of God; that rejoices, even in this world, in the Light of His Face and the ecstasy of His embrace; that dwells by waters of comfort and lies down in the green pastures of the Heavenly Love; while, round this little island of salvation in an ocean of terror, the thunders of wrath sound only as the noise of surge on a far-off reef.
  • Pt. 1, ch. 11 (p. 130)

• Surely the King of Love needed no herald when Himself was here.
  • Pt. 1, ch. 11 (p. 137)

• The development of a nation is strangely paralleled by the development of an individual. There comes in both a period of adolescence, ... and there is a curious mingling of refinement and brutality, stupidity and tenderness.
  • Pt. 2, ch. 1 (p. 152)

• A growing lad, while he is clumsier, yet manages to leap higher than a year ago.
  • Pt. 2, ch. 1 (pp. 152–3)

• To say 'Hail Mary, Hail Mary,' is the best way of telling her how much we love her. And then this string of beads is like Our Lady's girdle, and her children love to finger it, and whisper to her. And then we say our paternosters, too; and all the while we are talking she is shewing us pictures of her dear Child, and we look at all the great things He did for us, one by one; and then we turn the page and begin again.
  • Pt. 2, ch. 2 (p. 176)

• Perhaps that is the reason that I think I see it all so plainly; just because I want to see it plainly.
  • Pt. 2, ch. 2 (p. 181)

• Whenever your soul begins to be disturbed and anxious, put yourself in His Hands, and refuse to decide for yourself. It is so easy, so easy.
  • Pt. 2, ch. 2 (p. 182)

• Cast away Authority, and authority shall forsake you.
  • Pt. 2, ch. 3 (p. 196)

• Every man may err, but not the whole gathered together; for the whole hath a promise, but so hath not every particular man.
  • Pt. 2, ch. 5 (p. 230)

• Forward and backward all in one; that is the way she loves to be wooed. She is a woman, remember that.
  • Pt. 2, ch. 9 (p. 289)

• Speak from your heart...Be bold, yet not overbold.
  • Pt. 2, ch. 9 (p. 295)

• Philosophers tell us that the value of existence lies not in the objects perceived, but in the powers of perception.
  • Pt. 2, ch. 11 (p. 313)

• The tragedy of a child over a broken doll is not less poignant than the anguish of a worshipper over a broken idol, or of a king over a ruined realm.
  • Pt. 2, ch. 11 (p. 313)

• Nothing is so bad as not trusting God.
  • Pt. 2, ch. 11 (p. 323)

• It is scarcely likely that men on fire with success, whether military or commercial, will be patient of the restraints of religion.
  • Pt. 2, ch. 12 (p. 336)

• In these days, when there is so much enterprise, money has become, as it were, a living thing that grows; or at the least a tool that can be used.
  • Pt. 2, ch. 13 (p. 354)

• The sense of home-coming was stronger than all else — that strange passion for a particular set of inanimate things — or, at the most, for an association of ideas — that has no parallel in human emotions.
  • Pt. 3, ch. 3 (p. 405)

New York: Benziger Bros. Co-authored with Reginald Balfour and Charles Ritchie

• Saint Augustine went to Angleland for Pope Saint Gregory,
  And converted our poor ancestors to Christianity;
  And that is why both you and I are Christians, don't you see?
  • G (St Gregory the Great)

• "Praise the Lord, and love His creatures, birds and beasts as well as men."
  Sweet Saint Francis of Assisi, would that he were here again!
  • F (St Francis of Assisi)

• Z or Saint Zita, the good kitchen-maid;
  She prayed, and she prayed, and she prayed, and she prayed.
  • Z (St Zita)

London: Sir Isaac Pitman & Sons, Ltd.

• It was ever his doctrine that we lose nothing of what is good and sweet in the past, and that we suck out of all things a kind of essence that abides with us always, and that every soul that loves is a treasure-house of all that she has ever loved. It is only the souls that do not love that go empty in this world and in saecula saeculorum.
  • Ch. 3 (p. 59)

• It is marvellous how our Lord sets His seal upon all that we do, if we will but attend to His working, and not think too highly upon what we do ourselves.
  • Ch. 14 (p. 236)

London: Sir Isaac Pitman & Sons, Ltd.

• It is perfectly true that Protestantism is dead. Men do recognise at last that a supernatural Religion involves an absolute authority, and that Private Judgment in matters of faith is nothing else than the beginning of disintegration. And it is also true that since the Catholic Church is the only institution that even claims supernatural authority, with all its merciless logic, she has again the allegiance of practically all Christians who have any supernatural belief left. There are a few faddists left, especially in America and here; but they are negligible.
  • Prologue (pp. 9–10)

• Now, we Catholics, remember, are losing; we have lost steadily for more than fifty years. I suppose that we have, nominally, about one-fortieth of America now—and that is the result of the Catholic movement of the early twenties. In France and Spain we are nowhere; in Germany we are less. We hold our position in the East, certainly; but even there we have not more than one in two hundred—so the statistics say—and we are scattered. In Italy? Well, we have Rome again to ourselves, but nothing else; here, we have Ireland altogether and perhaps one in sixty of England, Wales and Scotland; but we had one in forty seventy years ago. Then there is the enormous progress of psychology—all clean against us for at least a century. First, you see, there was Materialism, pure and simple—that failed more or less—it was too crude—until psychology came to the rescue. Now psychology claims all the rest of the ground; and the supernatural sense seems accounted for. That’s the claim. No, father, we are losing; and we shall go on losing, and I think we must even be ready for a catastrophe at any moment.
  • Prologue (pp. 10–11)

• "Until our Lord comes back," he thought to himself; and for an instant the old misery stabbed at his heart. How difficult it was to hold the eyes focussed on that far horizon when this world lay in the foreground so compelling in its splendour and its strength!
  • Prologue (p. 15)

• The one condition of progress and the building of Jerusalem, on the planet that happened to be men’s dwelling place, was peace, not the sword which Christ brought or that which Mahomet wielded; but peace that arose from, not passed, understanding; the peace that sprang from a knowledge that man was all and was able to develop himself only by sympathy with his fellows. To Oliver and his wife, then, the last century seemed like a revelation; little by little the old superstitions had died, and the new light broadened; the Spirit of the World had roused Himself, the sun had dawned in the west; and now with horror and loathing they had seen the clouds gather once more in the quarter whence all superstition had had its birth.
  • Prologue (pp. 26–7)

• He stood a moment or two at the door after his wife had gone, drinking in reassurance from that glorious vision of solid sense that spread itself before his eyes: the endless house-roofs; the high glass vaults of the public baths and gymnasiums; the pinnacled schools where Citizenship was taught each morning; the spider-like cranes and scaffoldings that rose here and there; and even the few pricking spires did not disconcert him. There it stretched away into the grey haze of London, really beautiful, this vast hive of men and women who had learnt at least the primary lesson of the gospel that there was no God but man, no priest but the politician, no prophet but the schoolmaster.
  • Bk. 1, ch. 1, sec. 2 (p. 32)

• In the ages of faith a very inadequate grasp of religion would pass muster; in these searching days none but the humble and the pure could stand the test for long, unless indeed they were protected by a miracle of ignorance. The alliance of Psychology and Materialism did indeed seem, looked at from one angle, to account for everything; it needed a robust supernatural perception to understand their practical inadequacy.
  • Bk. 1, ch. 2, sec. 1 (p. 44)

• He began, as his custom was in mental prayer, by a deliberate act of self-exclusion from the world of sense. Under the image of sinking beneath a surface he forced himself downwards and inwards, till the peal of the organ, the shuffle of footsteps, the rigidity of the chair-back beneath his wrists—all seemed apart and external, and he was left a single person with a beating heart, an intellect that suggested image after image, and emotions that were too languid to stir themselves. Then he made his second descent, renounced all that he possessed and was, and became conscious that even the body was left behind, and that his mind and heart, awed by the Presence in which they found themselves, clung close and obedient to the will which was their lord and protector. He drew another long breath, or two, as he felt that Presence surge about him; he repeated a few mechanical words, and sank to that peace which follows the relinquishment of thought.
  • Bk. 1, ch. 2, sec. 2 (p. 49)

• You say Christianity is absurd and impossible. Now, you know, it cannot be that! It may be untrue,— I am not speaking of that now, even though I am perfectly certain that it is absolutely true—but it cannot be absurd so long as educated and virtuous people continue to hold it. To say that it is absurd is simple pride; it is to dismiss all who believe in it as not merely mistaken, but unintelligent as well.
  • Bk. 1, ch. 2, sec. 1 (pp. 44–5)

• It is understood now, by fanatic barbarians as well as by civilised nations, that the reign of War is ended. 'Not peace but a sword,' said Christ; and bitterly true have those words proved to be. 'Not a sword but peace' is the retort, articulate at last, from those who have renounced Christ’s claims or have never accepted them. The principle of love and union learned however falteringly in the West during the last century, has been taken up in the East as well. There shall be no more an appeal to arms, but to justice; no longer a crying after a God Who hides Himself, but to Man who has learned his own Divinity. The Supernatural is dead; rather, we know now that it never yet has been alive. What remains is to work out this new lesson, to bring every action, word and thought to the bar of Love and Justice; and this will be, no doubt, the task of years. Every code must be reversed; every barrier thrown down; party must unite with party, country with country, and continent with continent. There is no longer the fear of fear, the dread of the hereafter, or the paralysis of strife. Man has groaned long enough in the travails of birth; his blood has been poured out like water through his own foolishness; but at length he understands himself and is at peace.
  • Bk. 2, ch. 1, sec. 1 (pp. 118–9)

• His emotions had been stormed, his intellect silenced, his memory of grace obscured, a spiritual nausea had sickened his soul, yet the secret fortress of the will had, in an agony, held fast the doors and refused to cry out and call Felsenburgh king.
  • Bk. 2, ch. 2, sec. 1 (p. 139)

• Friendliness took the place of charity, contentment the place of hope, and knowledge the place of faith.
  • Bk. 2, ch. 2, sec. 4 (p. 157)

• Persecution was not to be feared. It would no doubt cause apostasies, as it had always done, but these were deplorable only on account of the individual apostates. On the other hand, it would reassure the faithful, and purge out the half-hearted. Once, in the early ages, Satan’s attack had been made on the bodily side, with whips and fire and beasts; in the sixteenth century it had been on the intellectual side; in the twentieth century on the springs of moral and spiritual life. Now it seemed as if the assault was on all three planes at once.
  • Bk. 2, ch. 2, sec. 4 (pp. 158–9)

• Outside the walls the confusion was indescribable. If the city represented a carved miniature of the world, the suburbs represented the same model broken into a thousand pieces, tumbled in a bag and shot out at random. ... Here were the great manufactories, the monster buildings of the new world, the stations, the schools, the offices, all under secular dominion, yet surrounded by six millions of souls who lived here for love of religion. It was these who had despaired of modern life, tired out with change and effort, who had fled from the new system for refuge to the Church, but who could not obtain leave to live in the city itself.
  • Bk. 2, ch. 3, sec. 1 (p. 164)

• For his own religion he no longer feared; he knew, as absolutely as a man may know the colour of his eyes, that it was secure again and beyond shaking. During those weeks in Rome the cloudy deposit had run clear and the channel was once more visible. Or, better still, that vast erection of dogma, ceremony, custom and morals in which he had been educated, and on which he had looked all his life (as a man may stare upon some great set-piece that bewilders him), seeing now one spark of light, now another, flare and wane in the darkness, had little by little kindled and revealed itself in one stupendous blaze of divine fire that explains itself.
  • Bk. 2, ch. 3, sec. 2 (p. 172)

• Huge principles, once bewildering and even repellent, were again luminously self-evident; he saw, for example, that while Humanity-Religion endeavoured to abolish suffering the Divine Religion embraced it, so that the blind pangs even of beasts were within the Father’s Will and Scheme; or that while from one angle one colour only of the web of life was visible—material, or intellectual, or artistic—from another the Supernatural was as eminently obvious. Humanity-Religion could only be true if at least half of man’s nature, aspirations and sorrows were ignored. Christianity, on the other hand, at least included and accounted for these, even if it did not explain them. This ... and this ... and this ... all made the one and perfect who. There was the Catholic Faith, more certain to him than the existence of himself: it was true and alive. He might be damned, but God reigned. He might go mad, but Jesus Christ was Incarnate Deity, proving Himself so by death and Resurrection, and John his Vicar. These things were as the bones of the Universe—facts beyond doubting—if they were not true, nothing anywhere was anything but a dream.
  • Bk. 2, ch. 3, sec. 2 (pp. 172–3)

• Men have thought—led astray by seducers—that the unity of nations was the greatest prize of this life, forgetting the words of our Saviour, Who said that He came to bring not peace but a sword, and that it is through many tribulations that we enter God’s Kingdom. First, then, there should be established the peace of man with God, and after that the unity of man with man will follow. Seek ye first, said Jesus Christ, the kingdom of God—and then all these things shall be added unto you.
  • Bk. 2, ch. 3, sec. 3 (p. 182) Acts 14:22; Matthew 6:33

• The Three Evangelical Counsels shall be the foundation of the Rule, to which we add a fourth intention, namely, that of a desire to receive the crown of martyrdom and a purpose of embracing it.
  • Bk. 2, ch. 3, sec. 3 (p. 185)

• We offer no rewards except those which God Himself has promised to those that love Him, and lay down their life for Him; no promise of peace, save of that which passeth understanding; no home save that which befits pilgrims and sojourners who seek a City to come; no honour save the world’s contempt; no life, save that which is hid with Christ in God.
  • Bk. 2, ch. 3, sec. 3 (pp. 186–7)

• The Holy Father was attended at the altar by the usual sovereigns; and Percy from his place watched the heavenly drama of Christ’s Passion enacted through the veil of His nativity at the hands of His old Angelic Vicar. It was hard to perceive Calvary here ; it was surely the air of Bethlehem, the celestial light, not the supernatural darkness, that beamed round the simple altar. It was the Child called Wonderful that lay there beneath the old hands, rather than the stricken Man of Sorrows.
  • Bk. 2, ch. 5, sec. 2 (p. 219)

• Might not this mystic Birth once more do what it had done before—bring into subjection through the might of its weakness every proud thing that exalts itself above all that is called God? It had drawn wise Kings once across the desert, as well as shepherds from their flocks. It had kings about it now, kneeling with the poor and foolish, kings who had laid down their crowns, who brought the gold of loyal hearts, the myrrh of desired martyrdom, and the incense of a pure faith. Could not republics, too, lay aside their splendour, mobs be tamed, selfishness deny itself, and wisdom confess its ignorance?
  • Bk. 2, ch. 5, sec. 2 (p. 220)

• The car was now ascending rapidly towards the pass up across the huge tumbled slopes, ravines, and cliffs that lie like outworks of the enormous wall. Seen from this great height they were in themselves comparatively insignificant, but they at least suggested the vastness of the bastions of which they were no more than buttresses.
  • Bk. 2, ch. 6, sec. 3 (p. 237)

• Their nakedness was their armour, their slow tongues their persuasiveness, their weakness demanded God’s strength, and found it.
  • Bk. 3, ch. 1, sec. 3 (p. 294)

• The human race was now a single entity with a supreme responsibility towards itself; there were no longer any private rights at all, such as had certainly existed, in the period previous to this. Man now possessed dominion over every cell which composed His Mystical Body, and where any such cell asserted itself to the detriment of the Body, the rights of the whole were unqualified.
  • Bk. 3, ch. 3, sec. 1 (p. 319)

• Christians...deliberately severed themselves from that Body of which by human generation they had been made members. They were as mortified limbs yielding themselves to the domination of an outside force other than that which was their only life, and by that very act imperilled the entire Body. This madness, then, was the one crime which still deserved the name. Murder, theft, rape, even anarchy itself, were as trifling faults compared to this monstrous sin, for while these injured indeed the Body they did not strike at its heart—individuals suffered, and therefore those minor criminals deserved restraint; but the very Life was not struck at. But in Christianity there was a poison actually deadly. Every cell that became infected with it was infected in that very fibre that bound it to the spring of life. This, and this alone, was the supreme crime of High Treason against man—and nothing but complete removal from the world could be an adequate remedy.
  • Bk. 3, ch. 3, sec. 1 (p. 320)

• "Well, what they call the Incarnation is really the point. Everything else flows from that. And, once a man believes that, I must confess that all the rest follows—even down to scapulars and holy water."
  "Mr. Francis, I don’t understand a word you’re saying."
  He smiled indulgently.
  "Of course not," he said; "it is all incredible nonsense. But, you know, I did really believe it all once."
  "But it’s unreasonable," she said.
  He made a little demurring sound.
  "Yes," he said, "in one sense, of course it is—utterly unreasonable. But in another sense——"
  • Bk. 3, ch. 3, sec. 3 (p. 329)

St Louis, MO: B. Herder

• Religion always is and always has been at the root of every world-movement.
  • Pt. 1, ch. 2, sec. 1 (p. 31)

• There is no such thing, of course, really as Irreligion — except by a purely conventional use of the word: the 'irreligious' man is one who has made up his mind either that there is no future world, or that it is so remote, as regards effectivity, as to have no bearing upon this. And that is a religion — at least it is a dogmatic creed — as much as any other.
  • Pt. 1, ch. 2, sec. 1 (pp. 31–2)

• The State can only give for economic reasons, however conscientious and individually charitable statesmen may be; while the Church gives for the Love of God, and the Love of God never yet destroyed any man's self-respect.
  • Pt. 1, ch. 2, sec. 1 (p. 42)

• The Socialist saw plainly the rights of the Society; the Anarchist saw the rights of the Individual. How therefore were these to be reconciled? The Church stepped in at that crucial point and answered, By the Family — whether domestic or religious. For in the Family you have both claims recognized: there is authority and yet there is liberty. For the union of the Family lies in Love; and Love is the only reconciliation of authority and liberty.
  • Pt. 1, ch. 2, sec. 1 (pp. 42–3)

• You see, when competition ceases, effort ceases. Human nature is human nature, after all. The Socialists forgot that.
  • Pt. 1, ch. 3, sec. 2 (p. 81)

• Remember human nature, Monsignor. After all, it was only intense self-importance that used to make men say that they were independent of exterior beauty. It's far more natural and simple to like beauty. Every child does, after all.
  • Pt. 1, ch. 4, sec. 1 (p. 85)

• So long as there is Sin in the world, so long must there be Penance.
  • Pt. 1, ch. 4, sec. 2 (p. 99)

• Honors and privileges are worth nothing if every one has them. If we all wore crowns, the kings would go bareheaded.
  • Pt. 1, ch. 4, sec. 4 (p. 109)

• Democracy doesn't give the Average Man any real power at all. It swamps him among, under his friends — that is to say, it kills his individuality; and his individuality is the one thing he has which is worth anything.
  • Pt. 1, ch. 6, sec. 1 (p. 133)

• A great deal depends on the temper of the court. Facts depend for their interpretation upon the point of view.
  • Pt. 2, ch. 2, sec. 2 (p. 211)

• Man must have liberty — he was made for it; but what liberty would that be which he has not learned to use?
  • Pt. 3, ch. 4, sec. 5 (p. 397)

London: Longmans, Green & Co.

• It is a good deal more fashionable, and considered a great deal more 'spiritual,' to stand outside creeds and churches than within them.
  • Pt. 2, ch. 1 (p. 46)

• Just as in social things the essential bourgeois is one who, being tolerably well off, is completely complacent with his position—unlike the lowest class which has no position to be complacent about, and the highest class which does not think about it at all either way; so in matters of mind. 'How hardly shall they who trust in riches,' says our Lord, 'enter into the Kingdom of Heaven.'
  • Pt. 2, ch. 1 (p. 49)

• Complacency is the one obstacle to progress, in finance, in art, in intellect, and in the things of the spirit.
  • Pt. 2, ch. 1 (p. 49)

• To-day as in Bethlehem, the bourgeois sits at home and discusses the Census, while Shepherds and Kings adore in the Stable.
  • Pt. 2, ch. 5 (p. 107)

• The whole of Nature exists on the principle of vicarious suffering; and to reject Christianity because of the doctrine of the Atonement is to reject Nature itself on the same account.
  • Pt. 3, ch. 1 (p. 113)

• The moment a soul recognises that there may be a Joy in Pain which is absent from Pleasure, she has taken the first step towards the practical solution of the Problem of Pain.
  • Pt. 3, ch. 2 (pp. 120–1)

• Divine Truth always must be extreme—it must, so to speak, always overlap at both ends, just because it is Divine, and therefore much too big for this world.
  • Pt. 3, ch. 2 (p. 126)

• Each soul is as great as the world, and in each soul there is room for all the tragedies of the world to be re-enacted, as every puddle is great enough to hold the sun.
  • Pt. 3, ch. 3 (p. 133)

• To each soul Christ comes, all trusting as a friend, and in each soul He is betrayed over and over again.
  • Pt. 3, ch. 3 (p. 133)

• If a soul lives long enough on the plane of sensuality or of ambition, she finds that Christ is worth less than nothing there.
  • Pt. 3, ch. 3 (p. 134)

• Remorse is easy enough, but repentance means love; and a soul that has lost her Lover has lost her own power of loving.
  • Pt. 3, ch. 3 (p. 134)

• The Cross is the symbol of absolutely endless expansion; it is never content; it points for ever and ever to four indefinitely receding points.
  • Pt. 3, ch. 4 (p. 137)

• If God be Truth, and God be Love, is it not absolutely inevitable that the Love of God should bring the Truth of God down to the level of the very simplest?
  • Pt. 3, ch. 5 (p. 149)

• The man who says, 'Unless I feel, I will not believe,' is as narrow and foolish as the man who says, 'Unless I understand, I will not believe.'
  • Pt. 3, ch. 6 (p. 157)

• Religion...must at least touch the will; for however small our will may be, it is always large enough to be united to the Will of God.
  • Pt. 3, ch. 6 (p. 158)

• We all win from God exactly what we deserve. We all get from God exactly what we really want of Him.
  • Pt. 3, ch. 6 (p. 159)

• Man’s highest life does not consist in self-expression, but in self-sacrifice.
  • Pt. 3, ch. 7 (p. 168)

• Real love seeks not to possess, but to be possessed; not, so to speak, to devour the beloved, to satisfy self with the beloved, but the exact contrary—to be devoured and to satisfy.
  • Pt. 4, ch. 1 (p. 184)

• Real love...is a continual emptying and slaying of self, a continual immolation of self on the altar of the beloved. ... It is exactly this that distinguishes it from its caricature—its antichrist—from lust or liking. Lust and liking desire to acquire and to win; love to be acquired and to be won.
  • Pt. 4, ch. 1 (p. 184)

London: Longmans, Green & Co.

• While friendship itself has an air of eternity about it, seeming to transcend all natural limits, there is hardly any emotion so utterly at the mercy of time. We form friendships, and grow out of them. It might almost be said that we cannot retain the faculty of friendship unless we are continually making new friends.
  • Pt. 1, ch. 1 (pp. 4–5)

• There is no obstinacy like religious obstinacy; for the spiritual man encourages himself in his wrong course, by a conviction that he is following Divine guidance.
  • Pt. 2, ch. 6 (p. 56)

• Conscience illuminated by the Presence of Jesus Christ in the heart must be the guide of every man.
  • Pt. 2, ch. 6 (p. 57)

• Humility, obedience, simplicity — these are the virtues on which the Divine Friendship, as well as mere human friendships, alone can thrive.
  • Pt. 2, ch. 6 (p. 63)

• Charity, it has been said, is the pardoning of the unpardonable and the loving of the unlovable.
  • Pt. 2, ch. 12, sec. 6 (p. 146)

• In Christ’s Name, let us begin. For Christ has finished.
  • Pt. 2, ch. 12, sec. 6 (p. 149)

New York: P. J. Kenedy & Sons

• A broken heart and God's will done would be better than that God's will should be avoided and her own satisfied.
  • Pt. 1, ch. 5, sec. 3

• For where men have made the earth that is trodden underfoot, and have largely veiled the heavens themselves, it is but natural that they should think that they have made everything, and that it is they who rule it.
  • Pt. 2, ch. 3, sec. 3

• Robin felt a strange thrill of glory at the thought that he bore with him, in virtue of his priesthood only, so much consolation. He faced for the first time that tremendous call of which he had heard so much in Rheims—that desolate cry of souls that longed and longed in vain for those gifts which a priest of Christ could alone bestow.
  • Pt. 3, ch. 3, sec. 2

London: R. & T. Washbourne

• Men must have facts first and explanations afterwards.
  • Preface (p. x)

• Men are once more acting along the lines which are, after all, those sanctioned by our Blessed Lord Himself in the words, "By their fruits you shall know them."
  • Preface (p. x)

• Those who most confidently appeal to Reason are usually the very persons most controlled by Imagination.
  • Preface (p. x)

Longmans, Green & Co.

• You can love a person deeply and sincerely whom you do not like. You can like a person passionately whom you do not love.
  • p. 82

• It seems to me probable that any one who has a series of intolerable positions to put up with must have been responsible for them to some extent:—not that it was simply 'their fault'—I don’t mean that—but that they contributed to it by un-patience, or intolerance, or brusqueness—or some provocation.
  • p. 86

• But ah, dear Saviour, human-wise,
  I yearn to pierce all mysteries,
  To catch Thine Hands, and see Thine Eyes
       When evening sounds begin.
  There, in Thy white Robe, Thou wilt wait
  At dusk beside some orchard gate,
  And smile to see me come so late,
       And, smiling, call me in.
  • "A Halt", st. 4 (p. 30)

• Great One in Three, of Whom are named
     All families in earth and heaven,
  Hear us, who have Thy promise claimed,
     And let a wealth of grace be given;
  Grant them in life and death to be
  Each knit to each, and both to Thee.
  • "Wedding Hymn", st. 4 (p. 56)

London: R. & T. Washbourne, Ltd.

London: Catholic Truth Society

• The individual saves his life by losing it, and realises the meaning of his own identity only by merging it in the commonwealth.

• Individuals cannot cohere closely unless they sacrifice something of their individuality.

• Competition, founded upon the conflicting interests of individuals, is in reality far less productive of wealth and enterprise than co-operation, involving though it does the constant apparent sacrifice of the individual to the common interests.

• One can do no more than gather the straws that float on the surface, and try to trace the course and meaning of their movements.

• To assimilate blindfold will sooner or later end in poisoning.

• The Church, like her Master and His ordinances, must have an earthly as well as a divine nature, if she is to do His work.

• Since God is approaching man, it is not a degradation, but a triumph of His love, that He should come so far down to meet him.

• The real and only satisfactory motive for submission does not lie in superficial things, but in the deep, still current of faith that comes from God direct, and bears the soul along.

• Growth means the unfolding of interior capacities through the assimilation of external substances.

• The process of digestion in every organism separates the healthy and useful from the harmful and useless elements.