William > William's Quotes

“Day after day, day after day,
We stuck, nor breath nor motion;
As idle as a painted ship
Upon a painted ocean.”
― Samuel Taylor Coleridge, The Rime of the Ancient Mariner

“The more we know of God, the more unreservedly we will trust him; the greater our progress in theology, the simpler and more child-like will be our faith”
― J. Gresham Machen

“What I need first of all is not exhortation, but a gospel, not directions for saving myself but knowledge of how God has saved me. Have you any good news? That is the question that I ask of you. I know your exhortations will not help me. But if anything has been done to save me, will you not tell me the facts?”
― J. Gresham Machen, The Christian Faith in the Modern World

“It is not the bee's touching of the flower that gathers honey, but her abiding for a time upon the flower that draws out the sweet. It is not he that reads most, but he that meditates most, that will prove the choicest, sweetest, wisest and strongest Christian.”
― Thomas Brooks

“A truly humble man is sensible of his natural distance from God; of his dependence on Him; of the insufficiency of his own power and wisdom; and that it is by God's power that he is upheld and provided for, and that he needs God's wisdom to lead and guide him, and His might to enable him to do what he ought to do for Him.”
― Jonathan Edwards

“Self is the only oil that makes the chariot-wheels of the hypocrite move in all religious concerns.”
― Thomas Brooks, The Secret Key to Heaven: The Vital Importance of Private Prayer

“ It was a precept of Pythagoras, that when we enter into the temple to worship God , we must not so much as speak or think of any worldly business, lest we make God's service an idle ,perfunctory, and lazy recreation. The same I may say of closet prayer.”
― Thomas Brooks, The Privy Key of Heaven

“[I]t is not hasty reading--but serious meditating upon holy and heavenly truths, that make them prove sweet and profitable to the soul. It is not the bee’s touching of the flower, which gathers honey--but her abiding for a time upon the flower, which draws out the sweet. It is not he who reads most--but he who meditates most, who will prove the choicest, sweetest, wisest and strongest Christian.”
― Thomas Brooks, Precious Remedies Against Satan's Devices

“A great lady(Queen Elizabeth )of England , on her dying bed cried out ,"call time again , call time again; a world of wealth for an inch of time !"but time past was never nor could never be recalled.”
― Thomas Brooks, The Privy Key of Heaven

“I cannot come to thee but by thee, I never come from thee without thee”
― Bernard

“A people religiously right, will not long remain politically wrong.”
― William Arnot, Studies in Proverbs: Laws from Heaven for Life on Earth

“‎"Measure not God's love and favour by your own feeling. The sun shines as clearly in the darkest day as it does in the brightest. The difference is not in the sun, but in some clouds which hinder the manifestation of the light thereof.”
― Richard Sibbes

“She stared at the castle. She had actually been summoned to a castle. A week before Christmas.”
― Fern Michaels, Secret Santa

“Whatever man may stand, whatever he may do, to whatever he may apply his hand - in agriculture, in commerce, and in industry, or his mind, in the world of art, and science - he is, in whatsoever it may be, constantly standing before the face of God. He is employed in the service of his God. He has strictly to obey his God. And above all, he has to aim at the glory of his God.”
― Abraham Kuyper

“Alas! can we think that the reformation is wrought, when we cast out a few ceremonies, and changed some vestures, and gestures, and forms! Oh no, sirs’! it is the converting and saving of souls that is our business. That is the chiefest part of reformation, that doth most good, and tendeth most to the salvation of the people.”
― Richard Baxter, The Reformed Pastor

“The prayer that prevails is not the work of lips and fingertips. It is the cry of a broken heart and the travail of a stricken soul.”
― Samuel Chadwick

“The one concern of the Devil is to keep the saints from praying. He fears nothing from prayer-less studies, prayer-less work, prayer-less religion. He laughs at our toil, mocks at our wisdom, but trembles when we pray.”
― Samuel Chadwick

“Come, Lord Jesus, put an end to this state of sin, sorrow, and temptation;”
― Matthew Henry, Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible

“One line of the Bible is worth more than all the learning of men.”
― Hugh Binning

“Self is the only oil that makes the chariot-wheels of the hypocrite move in all religious concernments.”
― Thomas Brooks, Private Prayer: The Secret Key of Heaven

“The power of religion and godliness lives, thrives, or dies, as closet prayer lives, thrives, or dies. Godliness never rises to a higher pitch than when men keep closest to their closets, etc.”
― Thomas Brooks, The Secret Key to Heaven: The Call to Closet Prayer

“He who puts on a religious demeanor abroad to gain himself a great name among men, and at the same time lives like an atheist at home, shall at the last be unmasked by God, and presented before all the world for a most detestable hypocrite.”
― Thomas Brooks, The Secret Key to Heaven: The Call to Closet Prayer

“Had many men spent but half that time in secret prayer, that they have spent in seeking after the philosopher’s stone, how happy might they have been!”
― Thomas Brooks, Private Prayer: The Secret Key of Heaven

“The vigour, and power, and comfort of our spiritual life depends on the mortification of the deeds of the flesh.”
― John Owen, The Mortification of Sin

“Mortification is the soul’s vigorous opposition to self, wherein sincerity is most evident.”
― John Owen, The Mortification of Sin

“John's bearing record, points out his faithfulness according to the Charge and Commission given him; what is given him to deliver, he keeps not up; what he receives in charge, he discharges.”
― James Durham, A commentary on Revelation

“In his Kingly Office, The Prince of the Kings of the Earth: which Title sets out Christ not only to be God, equal with the Father, but as Mediator, King of his Kirk. He is called, Prince of the Kings of the Earth; not as if Kings, and all great Men, or others, were in the same Manner Subjects to him in the Relation that Believers are, (in which respect his Kingly Office extendeth no further, nor his Priestly and Prophetical Office) but though so he have not such a near Relation to them, nor they to him; yet he is King over them, to refrain them that they prejudge not his Kirk; and to judge them for any Wrongs or Prejudice they do to them, and to inflict temporal Judgments on them here, and eternal hereafter, when he shall be their Judge, and the Books shall be opened at the great Day.”
― James Durham, A commentary on Revelation

“Observe the great Advantage and Benefit, the Privilege and Prerogative that Christ's Servants have beyond all others; Christ writes his Letters to them; there is not a word written to Kings and great Men; but it is to shew his Servants things to come to pass”
― James Durham, A commentary on Revelation

“There is an unsearchableness in this mystery of the Godhead, in the mystery of God becoming Man; in the mystery of the Mediator his taking on these offices , to exercise them in our nature; and in speaking or thinking of them, there is a necessity to silence that which our curiosity would propose, for satisfactionabout them; as, namely ., how there are or can be three Persons in the Godhead , and yet but one God. How one of these persons can be man? and how it is , that by Him we have access to God the Father , Son , and Holy Ghost? There is silence required in the how of these things.”
― James Durham

“Godly character is what you are when you've been tried and proven. It is not what you say you are, or what people think you are but, instead, it is what shines through after you have suffered and have endured. It is the proof of your genuineness.”
― Robin Bertram