Holy Living and Dying Quotes

“Never talk with any man, or undertake any trifling employment, merely to pass the time away; for every day well spent may become a “day of salvation,” and time rightly employed is an “acceptable time.” And remember, that the time thou triflest away, was given thee to repent in, to pray for pardon of sins, to work out thy salvation, to do the work of grace, to lay up against the day of judgment a treasure of good works, that thy time may be crowned with eternity.”
― Jeremy Taylor, Holy Living and Dying with Prayers

“In the morning, when you awake, accustom yourself to think first upon God, or something in order to his service; and at night also, let him close thine eyes and let your sleep be necessary and healthful, not idle and expensive of time, beyond the needs and conveniences of nature;”
― Jeremy Taylor, Holy Living and Dying with Prayers

“Idleness is the greatest prodigality in the world it throws away that, which is invaluable in respect of its present use, and irreparable when it is past, being to be recovered by no power of art or nature”
― Jeremy Taylor, Holy Living and Dying with Prayers

“I acknowledge, dear God, that I have deserved the greatest of thy wrath and indignation; and that, if thou hadst dealt with me according to my deserving, I had now, at this instant, been desperately bewailing my miseries in the sorrows and horrors of a sad eternity. But thy mercy triumphing over thy justice and my sins, thou hast still continued to me life and time of repentance; thou hast opened to me the gates of grace and mercy, and perpetually callest upon me to enter in, and to walk in the paths of a holy life, that I might glorify thee, and be glorified of thee eternally.”
― Jeremy Taylor, Holy Living and Dying

“Man is a bubble, and all the world is a storm.”
― Jeremy Taylor, Holy Living and Dying: With Prayers Containing the Whole Duty of a Christian

“Natural necessity and the example of St. John, who recreated himself with sporting with a tame partridge, teach us, that it is lawful to relax and unbend our bow, but not to suffer it to be unready or unstrung. 17.”
― Jeremy Taylor, Holy Living and Dying

“5. Avoid the company of drunkards and busybodies, and all such as are apt to talk much to little purpose; for no man can be provident of his time that is not prudent in the choice of his company; and if one of the speakers be vain, tedious, and trifling, he that hears, and he that answers in the discourse, are equal losers of their time.”
― Jeremy Taylor, Holy Living and Dying

“And, indeed, if we consider how much of our lives is taken up by the needs of nature; how many years are wholly spent, before we come to any use of reason; how many years more before that reason is useful to us to any great purposes, how imperfect our discourse is made by our evil education, false principles, ill company, bad examples, and want of experience; how many parts of our wisest and best years are spent in eating and sleeping, in necessary businesses and unnecessary vanities, in worldly civilities and less useful circumstances, in the learning arts and sciences, languages, or trades; that little portion of hours that is left for the practices of piety and religious walking with God, is so short and trifling, that, were not the goodness of God infinitely great, it might seem unreasonable or impossible for us to expect of him eternal joys in heaven, even after the well spending those few minutes which are left for God and God’s service, after we have served ourselves and our own occasions.”
― Jeremy Taylor, Holy Living and Dying

“to a busy man, temptation is fain to climb up together with his business, and sins creep upon him only by accidents and occasions; whereas, to an idle person, they come in a full body, and with open violence and the impudence of a restless importunity.”
― Jeremy Taylor, Holy Living and Dying with Prayers

“Gabriel Simeon: “Our life is very short; beauty is a cozenage; money is false and fugitive; empire is adious, and hated by them that have it not, and uneasy to them that have; victory is always uncertain, and peace, most commonly, is but a fraudulent bargain; old age is miserable, death is the period, and is a happy one, if it be not sorrowed by the sins of our life: but nothing continues but the effects of that wisdom which employs the present time in the acts of a holy religion and a peaceable conscience.” For they make us to live even beyond our funerals, embalmed in the spices and odours of a good name, and entombed in the grave of the holy Jesus, where we shall be dressed for a blessed resurrection to the state of angels and beatified spirits.”
― Jeremy Taylor, Holy Living and Dying