The Rosemary Tree Quotes

“In a world where thrushes sing and willow trees are golden in the spring, boredom should have been included among the seven deadly sins.”
― Elizabeth Goudge, The Rosemary Tree

“The way God squandered Himself had always hurt her; and annoyed her too. The sky full of wings and only the shepherds awake. That golden voice speaking and only a few fishermen there to hear; and perhaps some of the words He spoke carried away on the wind or lost in the sound of the waves lapping against the side of the boat. A thousand blossoms shimmering over the orchard, each a world of wonder all to itself, and then the whole thing blown away on a southwest gale as though the delicate little worlds were of no value at all. Well, of all the spendthrifts, she would think and then pull herself up. It was not for her to criticize the ways of Almighty God; if He liked to go to all that trouble over the snowflakes, millions and millions of them, their intricate patterns too small to be seen by human eyes, and melting as soon as made, that was His affair and not hers. All she could do about it was to catch in her window, and save from entire waste, as much of the squandered beauty as she could.”
― Elizabeth Goudge, The Rosemary Tree

“It's not your business to decide if a woman you love should, or should not, marry you. It's her business. Tell her all about yourself and leave the decision to her. God knows it's trouble enough having to make one's own decisions in life without having to make other people's too.”
― Elizabeth Goudge, The Rosemary Tree

“Bringing up children, she thought, was like pouring ginger beer into a tumbler. All went well up to a certain point, and then it all frothed over the top.”
― Elizabeth Goudge, The Rosemary Tree

“She knew little about herself and consequently little about others.”
― Elizabeth Goudge, The Rosemary Tree

“The God who had thrust him through in the darkness with probings of dread and shame was the same God who now held out the sword and shield.”
― Elizabeth Goudge, The Rosemary Tree

“Insufficient nourishment in the early morning leads to pessimism and doubts.”
― Elizabeth Goudge, The Rosemary Tree

“When the spirit of praise had been poured into a man he forgot what he was; he was like a cheap ugly glass made beautiful by the golden wine which filled it. Empty, he knew his ugliness. In prayer, for those as undisciplined and inexperienced as himself, there were times when one scarcely seemed the same person for five minutes together. He took grip on himself and knelt upright, clinging to his belief that one was not the same being; one was the self that one was now in all the disturbance and agitation of weakness, and the self that one would be when the compass needle had once and for all steadied to the north. His hands gripping the sides of the stall, he pronounced in words his belief that even for such as he, if he could endure to the end, eventual perfections was not only possible but certain through the grace of God, his conviction that despair was sin. The prayer of words was all he had now. The discipline of words must hold him up until the desert was crossed and the Seraph could sing again.”
― Elizabeth Goudge, The Rosemary Tree

“Proud folk separate themselves from others, judging them... To criticize others we must hold them from us, at arm's length so to speak. And then before you know where you are you've pushed them away and you're the poorer.”
― Elizabeth Goudge, The Rosemary Tree

“A well-trained dog is like religion, it sets the deserving at their ease and is a terror to evildoers.”
― Elizabeth Goudge, The Rosemary Tree

“You should have no fear," said Harriet. "There's no sense in fear."

"I've been afraid all my life, Harriet," said Michael.

"Nonsensical all your life, you mean," said Harriet. "But a person being nonsensical through the first half of his life is no reason to my way of thinking why he should be nonsensical through the second half too. It's nice to have a bit of change.”
― Elizabeth Goudge, The Rosemary Tree

“I don't fly to the classics for comfort, as Giles does. I'm too frivolous. Worthy people always read the classics when things are difficult.”
― Elizabeth Goudge, The Rosemary Tree

“If I can't laugh at the fool I am I'll despair at the beast I am. You must laugh at yourself, Michael."

"I expect you're right," he said. "One must come out on the other side of despair before one can find that stony sanctuary."

"And laughing at yourself gives you freedom."

"From what?" asked Michael grimly.

"From hating yourself. One can be just as self-engrossed in self-hatred as self-love, and either way be as blind to the quality of those about you...”
― Elizabeth Goudge, The Rosemary Tree

“I don't think fear that you share with the whole world warps you. It's personal fears that do that.”
― Elizabeth Goudge, The Rosemary Tree

“There are some people who don't realize what it is they are doing to others until they are paid back in their own coin. But those are not the worst. The worst are those whose unkindness is calculated.”
― Elizabeth Goudge, The Rosemary Tree

“Is a man less of a man, because he's learned to hold his tongue?”
― Elizabeth Goudge, The Rosemary Tree

“Illness was admirable training in the creative art of grateful acceptance. Pain accepted was just pain, and heavy, but Harriet believed that pain gladly accepted took wings, went somewhere and did something.”
― Elizabeth Goudge, The Rosemary Tree

“Since she had had to lead this shut-in invalid life she had found illness involved suffering almost as much from the tyranny of painful thoughts as from physical pain”
― Elizabeth Goudge, The Rosemary Tree

“Progress in evil was quick and easy; Apollyon was not a chap who hid himself and he gave every assistance in his power. The growth in goodness was so slow, at times so flat, so dull, and like the White Queen one had to run so fast to stay where one was, let alone progress; and there were few men who dared to say they had found God. It was easy to be a clever sinner, for the race to an earthly visible goal was short to run, so impossibly hard to be a wise saint, with the goal set at so vast a distance from this world and clouded with such uncertainty.”
― Elizabeth Goudge, The Rosemary Tree

“I mean, you may cause others a spot of bother by your weaknesses, perhaps, but coping with you may possibly increase their strength and sympathy. But if you sin deliberately, even if it seems only against yourself--well--you won't be the only one to suffer. You may even be the one who suffers least.”
― Elizabeth Goudge, The Rosemary Tree

“Remember it," he said to himself. "Remember this room, the mist upon the field and the evening star, the thrush singing and the voice of the river below the hill. Remember the flames of the candles, the books and the white page under your hand. When you go back you can take this with you. Remember it. Nothing is lost that is stamped upon memory. You may lose it for the time being, you may go mad and curse and rave, but what has once entered into memory is never effaced. Madness passes, memory does not. It is one of the things which is given back to be your heaven or hell. Take this and be thankful, for there will be plenty of hell for you in the place of judgment. That's what judgment is; memory. You remember every shameful thing you ever did, every cruel word you ever spoke . . . . That's hell, and you'll not endure it and live if there's not a sweetness in the air from another's forgiveness and your own remorse, and the hills in the distance touched with this light of beauty recognized, accepted and adored.”
― Elizabeth Goudge, The Rosemary Tree

“No," said Miss Giles. "I've become embittered. One can admit no worse failure than that can one?"

"I think so," said John. "Embitterment shows a failure of humor, of humility, but not necessarily of tenacity. If you still know how to hold on you can still redeem what's lost.”
― Elizabeth Goudge, The Rosemary Tree

“You're a sick woman. In a state of physical weakness it's so much easier to function in the groove you know. It seems to hold you together.”
― Elizabeth Goudge, The Rosemary Tree

“Shame could wrench just as fear did. Thinking how other men would have behaved in his place was the most searching form of humiliation that he knew; and he knew a good many.”
― Elizabeth Goudge, The Rosemary Tree

“On a morning like this the whole world seemed spun out of a rainbow. The clouds were mere breaths of rosy smoke away in the immensity of light where a single invisible lark was singing. The trees, the flowers and the very earth were so etherealized by the quality of light that they looked as though they might at any moment vanish, like mist drawn up by the sun, and John, soaked in the same light, lost all sense of heaviness in body, mind or soul. While they lasted such moments could make the whole drab stretch of painful years seem well worth while, leading to such freedom.”
― Elizabeth Goudge, The Rosemary Tree

“In old age, she thought, how it all falls away. Your good opinion of yourself, all the virtues you had thought you had, your beauty, your wealth.”
― Elizabeth Goudge, The Rosemary Tree

“Sarcasm doesn't grow on the same stalk as humility.”
― Elizabeth Goudge, The Rosemary Tree

“Her pain came from inside herself, from her resentment of the contrariness and frustration of life, while his came most often from outside himself, growing inevitably from his compassion. It was a simplification of the difference between them to say that to the selfish comfort comes from the external things, while to the selfless consolation comes interiorly, but that was the way Daphne put it to herself.”
― Elizabeth Goudge, The Rosemary Tree

“Perhaps faith is hard to come by when your're alone, Harriet," he said. "Until now I've been alone."
"We're never alone," said Harriet. "That's the mistake so many make. There'd be less fear if folk knew how little alone they are.”
― Elizabeth Goudge, The Rosemary Tree

“It is when children start to question their happiness that they lose it and grow up.”
― Elizabeth Goudge, The Rosemary Tree