Flowers from a Puritan's Garden, Annotated and Illustrated.

by Charles Haddon Spurgeon

He who is not godly every day is not godly any day.

Sin will be our death if we do not put it to death.

Thus, I may judge of my nature by my inclination. What delights me? For where my delight is my heart is.

Yes, life is not to be measured by mere lapse of time, but by the real headway which a man makes.

Many of the trials of our spiritual life are preventable: if we indulge a sin, we invite a sorrow. Others are curable: if we refuse a remedy, we rivet a disease. All that we can do for ourselves we are bound to do.

“We must get away from temptation, and not sit near the fire and complain of the heat.

—Ye all desire to be happy, he had said right. Everyone may find this disposition in his own heart, every man desireth happiness.” No doubt this is true, and it is equally true that the notion of happiness is as varied as the wish for it is universal.

as I am sure to seek after that which I desire, and am sure to desire that which I conceive to be happiness, it is clear that my conception of happiness will largely regulate my whole course of life.

Remember this, O my soul, and take good heed that thou seek not happiness apart from holiness, nor rest apart from Jesus, no...

like freezing water, which at first will not bear a pin, but afterward it freezes, and freezes, till it bear a cart-load. Some men lose their tender sense of sin by frequency of sinning.”

‘It is not ours to improve the gospel, but to repeat it when we preach, and obey it when we hear.

However fully restored, the fallen professor seldom loses the memory of impurity, and does not easily regain his injured influence. He is always weak in those points which led to his former fall, and, for the most part, weaker all round.

Ours is a joy unspeakable, and yet an agony unutterable.

This is a great marvel. Men are as free as if there were no predestination, and predestination is accomplished as surely as if there were no free agents in the universe. We are full of wonder at this, but it is true.

One might be sure of the value of that transparent morsel if he would but look around and see what skill and labor were being expended upon it. God has laid out for the good of a soul the watchfulness of angels, the providence of this world, the glory of the next, the councils of eternity, himself, and all that he hath, the Holy Spirit and all his divine influences—yea, he spared not his only Son.

We may not rest in what we are, we must hasten on to what we ought to be.

To be engrossed in a pursuit is the readiest way to success in it.

When God and heaven bear our thoughts away, it is good evidence that we are preparing for eternal felicity; for he must needs be soon in heaven who already hath heaven in him.

When heavenly things take up our souls, our souls will soon be taken up to heaven.

“In full and glad surrender we give ourselves to thee, thine utterly, and only, and evermore to be! O Son of God, who lovest us, we will be thine alone, and all we are, and all we have, shall henceforth be thine own!”

We ought as naturally to seek after the Lord from day to day as the spark seeks the sun, or the river the ocean, or the sheep its pasture, or the bird its nest.

If we do not live in all seriousness for a noble object, the probability is that we shall industriously trifle our lives away in doing nothing.

Deliver me from whims and hobbies, and nerve me for the infinite possibilities which are opening up before me!

Thy name is my passport, and secures me access; thy name is my plea, and secures me answer; thy name is my honor, and secures me glory.

Blessed name, thou art honey in my mouth, music in my ear, heaven in my heart, and all in all to all my being!

It would seem that there is no worse abuse of a good thing than to abstain from its use. While it lies idle it lies ill. Grace must be exercised toward God in devout contemplation, wrestling prayer, or adoring praise; and it must be exercised among men in patience, zeal, charity, and holy example; or, like an arm which has long been bound by a man’s side, it will become withered.

Oh, that this little parable might meet some careless eye, and through the eye pierce the heart!

Of old, converted Israelites cast their idols to the moles and to the bats—away from sight with the moles, away from light with the bats. Our detestation must lead us to put sin among the dead and the forgotten.

When a man dreams that he is perfect, and therefore ceases to fight against his secret sins, all seems well; but let him look into the depths of his heart, and behold the corruptions which slumber there, and let him seek to expel them; and a battle ‘will begin, compared with which the strife of the warrior and the garments rolled in blood are as nothing.

If I had the option of my condition in life, I would rather have less earth and more heaven than more earth and less heaven.

at the last day all must fall into eternal ruin which has not its own foundation on the rock.

We have read that when Bernard visited a monastery of ascetic monks, they were shocked because the saddle on which he rode was most sumptuously adorned. They thought that this ill became his profession as a meek and lowly man. Judge of their surprise and satisfaction when he told them that he had never so much as noticed what it was whereon, he sat. The fact was, that the horse and saddle were not his own, but had been lent to him by his uncle, and their nature had not been perceived by him during the whole of his journey. This is the way to use all earthly treasure, making small account whether we have it or not;

Yea, Lord, my portion tastes of love, for thy hand has sweetened it. A sacred perfume is on my raiment and in my chamber, for thou hast prepared both for me. And this would be true if I wore rags, and lay in a dungeon, in sore sickness. What a heritage is-mine!

Hard arguments are best couched in soft language; the force of the lightning is not increased by the thunder.

to be faithful to truth, we need not be wrathful toward opponents.

Ships may return all the more quickly because they have a slender lading; and a prayer may be all the longer on its voyage because it is bringing us a heavier freight of blessing.

A thoroughly useful life is multum in parvo: it is necessarily little, for it is but a span; but how much may be crowded into it for God, our souls, the Church, our families, and our fellows! We cannot afford wide blanks of idleness; we should not only live by the day but by the twenty minutes, as Wesley did. He did not keep a diary, but a horary; and each hour was divided into three parts. So scanty is our space that we must condense, and leave out superfluous matter; giving room only to that which is weighty, and of the first importance.

Lord, whether I live long or not, I leave to thee; but help me to live while I live, that I may live much.

He who would behold the sun at his rising must not look to the west. He that would see God to his delight must look God-ward.

Love makes labor light.

No doubt by praying we learn to pray,

Prayer is good, the habit of prayer is better, but the spirit of prayer is the best of all.

Perseverance in prayer is necessary to prevalence in prayer.

We must pray to pray, and continue in prayer that our prayers may continue.

“The hearer’s life is the preacher’s best commendation.

Surely there can be no greater farce than dull, lifeless preaching. As by taking the soul out of a man we cause him to become a loathsome and offensive corpse, so has the doctrine of the gospel, when it has been divorced from the affection of the minister, become a heartless creed, bringing more of bondage to men’s intellects than of sustenance to their souls.

If I be not •eloquent, yet let me be affectionate; if I cannot speak with the wisdom of a father, yet let me speak with the heart of a brother.

If all were truly good who are occasionally good, good men would not be scarce.

Lord, let me never be what I cannot be forever.

One would fancy from the talk of the wiseacres of the period that God did not know his own mind when he wrote the Scriptures, or that, like an old almanac, divine revelation is out of date, and superseded by “modern thought.”