c2p-cmd/Good-Quotes-Authors huggingface dataset:
The sea is everything. It covers seven-tenths of the terrestrial globe. Its breath is pure and life-giving. It is an immense desert place where man is never lonely, for he senses the weaving of Creation on every hand. It is the physical embodiment of a supernatural existence... For the sea is itself nothing but love and emotion. It is the Living Infinite, as one of your poets has said. Nature manifests herself in it, with her three kingdoms: mineral, vegetable, and animal. The ocean is the vast reservoir of Nature.
— Jules Verne, Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea
My home is in Heaven. I'm just traveling through this world.
— Billy Graham
Who is it who decides that one man should live and another should die? My life wasn't worth any more than his, but he's the one who's buried, while I get to enjoy at least a few more hours above the ground. Is it chance, random and cruel, or is there some purpose or pattern to all this, even if it lies beyond our ken?
— Christopher Paolini, Inheritance
The battle over flesh and blood cannot compare to the battle for the heart.
— Ted Dekker, White: The Great Pursuit
God gave us minds to think with and hearts to thank with. Instead we use our hearts to think about the world as we would like it to have been, and we use our minds to come up with rationalizations for our ingratitude. We are a murmuring, discontented, unhappy, ungrateful people. And because we think we want salvation from our discontents...
— Douglas Wilson
No ideology can help to create a new worldor a new mind or a new human being --because ideological orientation itselfis the root cause of all the conflicts and all the miseries.Thought creates boundaries, thought creates divisions and thought creates prejudices; thought itself cannot bridge them. That's why all ideologies fail.Now man must learn to live without ideologiesreligious, political or otherwise. When the mind is not tethered to any ideology, it is free to move to new understandings. And in that freedom flowers all that is good and all that is beautiful.
— Osho
The person with a secular mentality feels himself to be the center of the universe. Yet he is likely to suffer from a sense of meaninglessness and insignificance because he knows he’s but one human among five billion others - all feeling themselves to be the center of things - scratching out an existence on the surface of a medium-sized planet circling a small star among countless stars in a galaxy lost among countless galaxies. The person with the sacred mentality, on the other hand, does not feel herself to be the center of the universe. She considers the Center to be elsewhere and other. Yet she is unlikely to feel lost or insignificant precisely because she draws her significance and meaning from her relationship, her connection, with that center, that Other.
— M. Scott Peck, A World Waiting to Be Born: Civility Rediscovered
Through the reciprocation of energy, always, and every time, we will get exactly what we put out there to others. Like Karma, whatever we do will indefinitely come back to us in some way shape or form.When goodness is given, it is likely to returned.When you support someone, you will be supported.When you Love, you will be Loved.If you give someone your last dollar, someone will help you equally.This is the law of the universe. What selfless characteristics do you portray to benefit your reality? Expand.
— Will Barnes, The Expansion of The Soul
There is no greater good in all the world than motherhood. The influence of a mother in the lives of her children is beyond calculation.
— James E. Faust
That whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have eternal life.
— Anonymous, Holy Bible: King James Version
Unfortunately, most people never observe the natural cycle of birth and death. They do not realize that for one living thing to survive, another living thing must die.
— Temple Grandin, Thinking in Pictures: My Life with Autism
They never opened the door which leads to the soul.
— Henry Miller
Do not despair. Do not give up. Look for the sunlight through the clouds.
— Gordon B. Hinckley
Usually, we believe that our pain is a misfortune that needs to be fixed, but in fact, all pain (physical, mental, and emotional) is a necessary step towards becoming conscious.
— Mada Eliza Dalian
Our conduct has a direct influence on how people think about the gospel. The world doesn't judge us by our theology
—  the world judges us by our behavior. People don't necessarily want to know what we believe about the Bible. They want to see if what we believe makes a difference in our lives. Our actions either bring glory to God or misrepresent His truth.
Lead by example, not by instruction.
— Jared Matthew Kessler
Great spiritual teachers throughout the ages have stated that orgasm is the closest some people come to a spiritual experience because of the momentary loss of self. Why is this true? Because with spiritual sex, you move beyond orgasm into a connection with yourself, your partner, and the divine — recognizing them all as one.
— Alexandra Katehakis, Erotic Intelligence: Igniting Hot, Healthy Sex While in Recovery from Sex Addiction
Perhaps the most "spiritual" thing any of us can do is simply to look through our own eyes, see with eyes of wholeness, and act with integrity and kindness.
— Jon Kabat-Zinn, Wherever You Go, There You Are: Mindfulness Meditation in Everyday Life
Listen, O drop, give yourself up without regret,and in exchange gain the Ocean.Listen, O drop, bestow upon yourself this honor,and in the arms of the Sea be secure.Who indeed should be so fortunate?An Ocean wooing a drop!In God's name, in God's name, sell and buy at once!Give a drop, and take this Sea full of pearls.
— Jalaluddin Rumi
The little space within the heart is as great as the vast universe. The heavens and the earth are there, and the sun and the moon and the stars. Fire and lightening and winds are there, and all that now is and all that is not.
— Prabhavananda, The Upanishads: Breath from the Eternal
If a man crosses a riverand an empty boat collides with his own skiff,Even though he be bad tempered manHe will not become very angry. But if he sees a man in the boat,He will shout at him to steer clear.If the shout is not heard, he will shout again, and yet again, and begin cursing.And all because someone is in the boat.Yet if the boat were empty,He would not be shouting, and not angry.If you can empty your own boatCrossing the river of the world,No one will oppose you, No one will seek to harm you
— Zhuangzi
We wait for God to bless us while God waits for us to accept the blessing.
— Betsy Otter Thompson, Walking Through Illusion
Where there is no love, put love -- and you will find love.
— San Juan de la Cruz
A wise woman knows when to stay silent. However, a wiser woman of faith knows that sometimes words can win the battle, when all odds stand against her.
— Shannon L. Alder
Teachers can be a living example to their students. Not that teachers should look for students to idealize them. One who is worth idealizing does not care whether others idealize them or not. Everyone needs to see that you not only teach human values but you live them. It is unavoidable sometimes you will be idealized -- it is better for children to have a role model, or goal, because then the worshipful quality in them can dawn.
— Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
It's the same questions we ask of our existence, and the answer is always the same. The mystery lies not in the question nor the answer, but in the asking and answering themselves, over and over again, and the end is engendered in the beginning. 
— Jacqueline Carey, Kushiel's Avatar
It is hard to remember that you are a cherished spiritual being when you're burping up apple fritters and Cheetos.
— Anne Lamott, Grace (Eventually): Thoughts on Faith
many women do noble things, but you surpass them all. charm is deceptive, beauty is fleeting; but a woman who fears the Lord, she shall be praised
— Anonymous, Holy Bible: New International Version
We pay for sins we do not remember, and seek to do a will we can scarce fathom. That is what it is, to be a god's chosen. 
— Jacqueline Carey, Kushiel's Avatar
As long as I live, so long do I learn.
— Ramakrishna
Consider the holiness of your hands. They are how you do your work on this earth; they are a microcosm of the hands of the Goddess, and can change the world as easily as hers can.
— Dianne Sylvan, The Body Sacred
Often, people build stories in their mind which have no basis in the contours of reality. Those which build these images, are building such images which are based on their relatively limited sense of understanding about the particular subject or person. This is a "fill in the blank" reality, which often manifests itself into the hearts and the minds of those who have a "fill in the blank" mindset, not the person with the here said reality.The universe is designed in a way that reflects itself, just like a mirror, showing you exactly who you are to yourself, not who others are. Your largest and most concealed insecurities have their way of presenting themselves to you in a fashion that is relative to your self designed way of communication.This short writing is a reminder that your preconceived notions on a particular subject or person, are a construct of your inner mind and emotional-relational well being and not of others. This is one of the largest fundamental truths in which you must have large insight to carefully watch who and what you massacre with your personal thoughts.Having a keen sense of control on this subject will lead you to enlightenment in many platforms of life.
— Will Barnes, The Expansion of The Soul
You don't have to place your hand on Mary's heart to get strength and consolation and rescue, and all the other things we need to get through life. You can place it right here on your own heart. Your own heart.
— Sue Monk Kidd, The Secret Life of Bees
The sacred is discovered in what moves and touches us, in what makes us tremble.
— Sam Keen
Take your well-disciplined strengths, stretch them between the two great opposing poles, because inside human beings is where God learns.
— Rainer Maria Rilke
Treading along in this dreamlike, illusory realm,Without looking for the traces I may have left;A cuckoo's song beckons me to return home;Hearing this, I tilt my head to seeWho has told me to turn back;But do not ask me where I am going,As I travel in this limitless world,Where every step I take is my home.
— Dōgen
You know how they say the path to hell is paved with good intentions? Well, maybe the path to heaven is paved with bad ones.
— Jake Coburn, LoveSick
Il bel far niente means 'the beauty of doing nothing'... [it] has always been a cherished Italian ideal. The beauty of doing nothing is the goal of all your work, the final accomplishment for which you are most highly congratulated. The more exquisitely and delightfully you can do nothing, the higher your life's achievement. You don't necessarily need to be rich in order to experience this, either.
— Elizabeth Gilbert, Eat, Pray, Love
A person knows when they’re in darkness, even when they can’t see. -Nightblood
— Brandon Sanderson, Warbreaker
Unless, of course, there's no such thing as chance;...in which case, we should either-optimistically-get up and cheer, because if everything is planned in advance, then we all have a meaning and are spared the terror of knowing ourselves to be random, without a why; or else, of course, we might-as pessimists-give up right here and now, understanding the futility of thought decision action, since nothing we think makes any difference anyway, things will be as they will. Where, then, is optimism? In fate or in chaos?
— Salman Rushdie, Midnight's Children
I hunger for filling in a world that is starved.
— Ann Voskamp, One Thousand Gifts: A Dare to Live Fully Right Where You Are
I always encourage them to practice in a way that will help them go back to their own tradition and get re-rooted. If they succeed at at becoming reintegrated, they will be an important instrument in transforming and renewing their tradition. ...When we respect our blood ancestors and our spiritual ancestors, we feel rooted. If we find ways to cherish and develop our spiritual heritage, we will avoid the kind of alienation that is destroying society, and we will become whole again. ... Learning to touch deeply the jewels of our own tradition will allow us to understand and appreciate the values of other traditions, and this will benefit everyone.
— Thich Nhat Hanh, Living Buddha, Living Christ
A moment later Jonathan’s body wavered in the air, shimmering, and began to go transparent. “Don’t let them spread silly rumors about me, or make me a god. O.K., Fletch? I’m a seagull. I like to fly, maybe…
— Richard Bach, Jonathan Livingston Seagull
The last scud of day holds back for me, It flings my likeness after the rest and true as any on the shadow'd wilds, It coaxes me to the vapor and the dusk.I depart as air, I shake my white locks at the runaway sun, I effuse my flesh in eddies, and drift it in lacy jags.I bequeath myself to the dirt to grow from the grass I love, If you want me again look for me under your boot-soles.You will hardly know who I am or what I mean, But I shall be good health to your nevertheless,And filter and fibre your blood.Failing to fetch me at first keep encouraged,Missing me one place, search another,I stop somewhere waiting for you.
— Walt Whitman
But, someone, please give me—who is born again but still so much in need of being born anew—give me the details of how to live in the waiting cocoon before the forever begins?
— Ann Voskamp, One Thousand Gifts: A Dare to Live Fully Right Where You Are
We can see the Divine in each speck of dust, but that doesn't stop us from wiping it away with a wet sponge. The Divine doesn't disappear; it's transformed into the clean surface.
— Paulo Coelho, The Witch Of Portobello
Begin again as often as you need to in order to stay on track spiritually...
— Elizabeth Funderbirk, Love Torn Asunder
For where thy treasure is, there also will thy heart be.
— Anonymous, Holy Bible: King James Version
Man lives only to learn. And if he learns it is because it is the nature of his lot, for good or bad.
— Carlos Castañeda
In the voyage of your worldly existence, the sails at which your life float upon, are tethered by the thoughts and emotions that which you harbor. Expand.
— Will Barnes, The Expansion of The Soul
Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.
— Anonymous, Holy Bible: New International Version
I never thought it would be easy to serve God," she said. "I just didn't think it would be this hard.
— Frank Herbert, God Emperor of Dune
To commit herself to becoming "an apostle of Joy" when humanly speaking she might have felt at the brink of despair, was heroic indeed. She could do so because her joy was rooted in the certitude of the ultimate goodness of God's loving plan for her. And though her faith in this truth did not touch her soul with consolation, she ventured to meet the challenges of life with a smile. Her one lever was her blind trust in God.
— Brian Kolodiejchuk, Mother Teresa: Come Be My Light: The Private Writings of the "Saint of Calcutta"
...she is careful who she sleeps with, because only those willing totreat her witht he same reverence are worthy of her attention....you are the Goddess, and "all acts of love and pleasure" are your rituals
— Dianne Sylvan
I think commercialism helps Christmas and I think that the more capitalism we can inject into the Christmas holiday the more spiritual I feel about it 
— Craig Ferguson
She knew full well the enormity of her offense, but because her desires were stronger than the code she was breaking, she persisted in breaking it. 
— Harper Lee
The degree of panic activity in my life is equal to the degree of my lack of personal spiritual experience.
— Oswald Chambers
Feed my lambs, shepherd my sheep.
— Anonymous, Holy Bible: King James Version
Either the day must come when joy prevails and all the makers of misery are no longer able to infect it, or else, for ever and ever, the makers of misery can destroy in others the happiness they reject for themselves.
— C.S. Lewis, The Great Divorce
In order to approach a creation as sublime as the Bhagavad-Gita with full understanding it is necessary to attune our soul to it.
— Rudolf Steiner
There is a life behind the personality that uses personalities as masks. There are times when life puts off the mask and deep answers unto deep.
— Dion Fortune, The Goat-Foot God
There is a connection between heaven and earth. Finding that connection gives meaning to everything, including death. Missing it makes everything meaningless, including life. 
— John H. Groberg, The Other Side of Heaven
You will never know everything. Knowledge unfolds as we move forward. Sitting back and waiting to know everything before we do anything is a waste of life.~ I Am Another You
— Priya Kumar
All earthly desires are but streams, but God is the ocean. 
— Jonathan Edwards
The smile that covered a "multitude of pains" was no hypocritical mask. She was trying to hide her sufferings - even from God! - so as not to make others, especially the poor, suffer because of them. When she promised to do "a little extra praying & smiling" for one of her friends, she was alluding to an acutely painful and costly sacrifice: to pray when prayer was so difficult and to smile when her interior pain was agonizing.
— Brian Kolodiejchuk, Mother Teresa: Come Be My Light: The Private Writings of the "Saint of Calcutta"
Integrity is the sound follow through of your heart, and an important part in the process of manifesting what it is that you aspire to. If you say that you are going to do something, do it. If you fail to complete the task at hand, or fulfill a promise you made, you are not operating at the right frequency. Don't lie to yourself and to others, follow through. Complete yourself, Expand your consciousness.
— Will Barnes, The Expansion of The Soul
namaste - it means, roughly translated, "I honor the Deity within you." that is precisely what we do when we open our hearts to another; we honor the fact that he or she, like us, is a child or the same loving Father, worthy of all respect and careful attention.
— Virginia H. Pearce
There is so much deep contradiction in my soul. Such deep longing for God - so deep that it is painful - a suffering continual - and yet not wanted by God - repulsed - empty - no faith - no love - no zeal. Souls hold no attraction - Heaven means nothing - to me it looks like an empty place - the thought of it means nothing to me and yet this torturing longing for God. Pray for me please that I keep smiling at Him in spite of everything. For I am only His - so He has every right over me. I am perfectly happy to be nobody even to God. . . .Your devoted child in J.C.M. Teresa
— Brian Kolodiejchuk, Mother Teresa: Come Be My Light: The Private Writings of the "Saint of Calcutta"
The circumstance of the mind is equivalent to the circumstance of your reality and a pure sign of the justification of the universe. Positive energy equals a positive well being and the manifestation of positive things thereof.Do you have the wherewithal to be positive? Do you hold the key to your destiny or the barrier to your dismay? Insightful are those with an open ear and an open heart to these principles. Are you on the right track? Whether you say yes or no to this question, your reality is a direct reflection.
— Will Barnes, The Expansion of The Soul
The human spirit will not invest itself in a compromise.
— Robert Fritz, The Path of Least Resistance: Learning to Become the Creative Force in Your Own Life
Thou art a manGod is no moreThy own humanityLearn to adore
— William Blake
You are equipped with strong bodies and educated minds. Add to these an unshakable faith in a divine providence and you have the tools by which you may build a successful life. Make each day your masterpiece and live so nobly that you may witness honestly each day: Whatever came to your hands this day, you did it to the best of your ability
— Harold B. Lee, The Teachings of Harold B. Lee
God is our final say in who and what's negative and who and what's positive in our lives. It is best not to have this so over-simplified as the illusioned superstitionists have it; an infinite being's tests may not always be so flowery, and the things we may see as positive are in many cases simply desires of our sinful nature. We are to protect our spirit without falling into the narcissistic mistake of trying to protect our selfish emotions, which the latter, in turn, is more than unlikely to bring peace and happiness. But rather guilt and emptiness. When one walks around constantly, in his mind, attempting to separate positive versus negative people, he is already controlled by something even worse than those he calls the 'negative people', and that is before he spots it soon enough to avoid it as he hypocritically tries to avoid them.
— Criss Jami, Killosophy
let us thank God for having made us this gift of death, so that life is to have meaning; of night, that day is to have meaning; silence, that speech is to have meaning; illness, that health is to have meaning; war, that peace is to have meaning. Let us give thanks to Him for having given us weariness and pain, so that rest and joy are to have meaning. Let us give thanks to him, whose wisdom is infinite.
— Amin Maalouf, Leo Africanus
It is has been a long time since I have written one of my statuses about life. I have been very busy trying to promote my Fan page, Friends and services, and my books. However, I can tell you all one thing for certain. I am not a Quitter. I will not stop writing books. I will not stop pushing myself to succeed. I will not stop being who I am.I am a winner. Winning is an attitude. You take the good with the bad and you keep on going. It gets hard, you get tired and sometimes burnt out but you keep on going anyway, because you can.Winners have setbacks, but winners learn tighten their belts and go on. Winner look at what has gone wrong and instead of complaining they find ways of doing it better. Winners know that Rome was not built in a day and take every day as it comes.Winners do not whine, they roar.
— Alexander Stone
I move in the university of the waves.
— Pablo Neruda
The wind of God is always blowing... but you must hoist your sail.
— François Fénelon
Life is not a fairground, but a school. -- Franz Bardon
— Franz Bardon
And now, I, Moroni would speaksomewhatconcerning these things; I would show unto the world that faith is things which are hoped for and not seen; wherefore, dispute not because ye seenot, for ye recieve no witness until after the trial of your faith.For it was by Faith that Christ showed himself unto our fathers after he had risen from the dead; and he showed not himself unto them until after they had fiath in him; wherefore, it must needs be that some had faith in hime, for he showed himself not unto the world.
— The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Book of Mormon Stories
I would never speak about faith, but speak about the Lord himself - not theologically, as to the why and wherefore of his death - but as he showed himself in his life on earth, full of grace, love, beauty, tenderness and truth. Then the needy heart cannot help hoping and trusting in him, and having faith, without ever thinking about faith. How a human heart with human feelings and necessities is ever to put confidence in the theological phantom which is commonly called Christ in our pulpits, I do not know. It is commonly a miserable representation of him who spent thirty-three years on our Earth, living himself into the hearts and souls of men, and thus manifesting God to them.
— George MacDonald
Such excessive preoccupation with his faults is not a truly spiritual activity but, on the contrary, a highly egoistic one.The recognition of his own faults should make a man humbler, when it is beneficial, not prouder, which the thought that he ought to have been above these faults makes him.
— Paul Brunton, The Notebooks of Paul Brunton
There are many differing viewpoints on nature versus nurture, and there are those who believe that bad behavior can be excused and understood if a person doesn't know better. The theory that someone who has been abused as a child will go on to abuse their own children, and so on, because they don't know differently is widely held. But children know. We all know.Learned behavior. When a child is abused, he or she knows, even as it is happening, that it is wrong. I knew. I was abused. When a child is treated unfairly in any way, he or she knows that it is wrong. I knew. I was treated unfairly. And when a child is treated with love and affection, he or she knows that it is right. I knew. I saw how other kids were treated with love and affection by their parents. I knew. My soul cried out to me and told me so. We all know. We all know right from wrong. Our souls cry out to us and tell us so. And we decide, we make our choices, and we are responsible for those choices. We, no one else but we, decide.Anger, hurt, pain, humiliation, fear, dread, confusion-all these emotions we choose. De we hold on to our anger, our pain and humiliation, and hit back, or do we strive to understand that we can do better?
— Rosemary Altea, Soul Signs: An Elemental Guide to Your Spiritual Destiny
Ultimately, we can really forgive people only because Christ rose from the dead; his Resurrection is the guarantee that God can cure every wrong and every hurt.
— Jacques Philippe, Interior Freedom
Spirit does not exist in just one location; rather it is all encompassing, living within and amongst us in each moment, thought and action. I believe that Spirit is raised to it's highest level, when individuals gather with wisdom, compassion and a discerning desire to provide service to humanity". We are all One, One Energy, from One Light. Let us band together as Humans, with love for all of humanity, living each day in harmony as we explore our spirit.
— Kala Ambrose
When your heart burns with passion, and your faith is at it's peak, it is then when you have your life by the horns, and now when the preconceived desires in your dreams materialize. Believe beyond your minds eye and see the light, the energy that will fill your half full cup to the brim, and overflow with joyous life experiences. Think it, see it, and live it. Expand....
— Will Barnes, The Expansion of The Soul
The voice that U hear is the alchemy of Ur mind.
— Prince
The ordinary man is aware of his surroundings, first, by naming and labelling them; second, by linking them with past memory of them; and third, by relating them to his own personal self. The illumined egoless man is simply aware of them, without any of these other added activities.
— Paul Brunton, The Notebooks of Paul Brunton
It was your body....that danced at your first drum circle; it was your body that gave birth to your child; it was your body that got down and dirty in the back seat of your dad's station wagon; it was your body that shivered, sweated, clasped its hands, fell to its knees, wept, and laughed the first time you felt the presence of the goddess in your life.
— Dianne Sylvan, The Body Sacred
I thank you, God, who lives always, and Who, as i awaken, has in mercy returned my soul to me; we can ever trust in you.
— Priscilla Warner, The Faith Club: A Muslim, A Christian, A Jew--Three Women Search for Understanding
There are times that people can be so blinded by what they want IT to be, that whatever reality they perceieve it SHOULD be, they lose.
— Jared Matthew Kessler
How little we understandof the gifts we have been givenor the shape of the pathwe took to reach our salvation.
— Harley King, What I Was Meant To Forget
Gratitude and love are always multiplied when you give freely. It is an infinite source of contentment and prosperous energy.
— Jim Fargiano, The Spoken Words of Spirit: Lessons from the Other Side
I do not understand what I do....It is no longer I myself who do it, but it is sin living in me...For what I do is not the good I want to do; no, the evil I do not want to do - this I keep on doing...I find this law at work: when I want to do good, evil is right there with me...I delight in God's law; but I see another law at work in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin...I myself in my mind am a slave to God's law, but in the sinful nature a slave to the law of sin.
— Anonymous, Holy Bible: New International Version
Look up, and lift up your heads; for your redemption draweth nigh.
— Anonymous, Holy Bible: King James Version
The idea that each of us can be directly spiritual is radical. Most religions are based not on teaching adherents to be directly spiritual, but in persuading them to trust in the intercession of ministers or priests. The problem with this approach is that we cannot gain access to spirituality except through the medium of a fallible human being. If we want to see Tao, we need only open our eyes and trust what we see.
— Ming-Dao Deng
If I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am become sounding brass, or a clanging cymbal. And if I have the gift of prophecy, and know all mysteries and all knowledge; and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. And if I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and if I give my body to be burned, but have not love, it profiteth me nothing.
— Anonymous
In ordinary perception, the senses send an overwhelming flood of information to the brain, which the brain then filters down to a trickle it can manage for the purpose of survival in a highly competitive world. Man has become so rational, so utilitarian, that the trickle becomes most pale and thin. It is efficient, for mere survival, but it screens out the most wondrous parts of man's potential experience without his even knowing it. We're shut off from our own world. Primitive man once experienced the rich and sparkling flood of the senses fully. Children experience it for a few months-until "normal" training, conditioning, close the doors on this other world, usually for good. Somehow, the drugs opened these ancient doors. And through them modern man may at last go, and rediscover his divine birthright...
— Tom Wolfe
Beauty when unadorned is adorned the most.
— Jerome
The holiest of all the spots on earth is where an ancient hatred has become a present love
— Helen Shucman
What are we doing to keep the light shining in our own eyes and countenances
—  Much of that light comes from our discipline dedication and consecration.
It's a power that I can't explain. As it flows and it grows and it shapes my faith. There've been hundreds of moments I can't deny. When it brushe against the fire or dwelt in the Fire of God.
— Kenneth Copeland
Once you can let go of illusion and draw upon a more universal source of motivation then you will re connect with your true purpose on Earth.
— Gary Markwick
Generosity is the most natural outward expression of an inner attitude of compassion and loving-kindness.
— Dalai Lama XIV
One guy, seeing that I was hungry, insisted on buying me a huge lunch and when I thanked him for his kindness, he simply said, 'Pass it on.' I liked this selfless concept - repay me by rewarding someone else entirely with a generous dollop of goodwill.
— Tony Hawks, Round Ireland with a Fridge
In his creative work the artist is dependent on sources and resources deriving from the spiritual unconscious.
— Viktor E. Frankl, Man's Search for Ultimate Meaning
Please always see the bright side of everything.
— P.R. Sarkar (Shrii Shrii A’nandamu’rti)
No wonder of it: sheer plod makes plough down sillionShine, and blue-bleak embers, ah my dear, Fall, gall themselves, and gash gold-vermilion.
— Gerard Manley Hopkins
Mastery of self is the endless battle in which we must pursue our consciousness straight forward, and head over heels transmute all our focus on what it is ailing our immediate reality. Question yourself without pride and ego, step out of your shoes and look from the outside it. What do you see? What do you hear? This is the reflection our your energy, your absolute control source. Does it benefit you?
— Will Barnes, The Expansion of The Soul
What mattered to her was that she loved God, whether or not He granted her the consolation and joy of His felt presence.
— Brian Kolodiejchuk, Mother Teresa: Come Be My Light: The Private Writings of the "Saint of Calcutta"
But whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst
—  but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life.
Greed kills us all.
— Kentetsu Takamori, Something You Forgot...Along the Way: Stories of Wisdom and Learning
To live in joy and fully manifest our true potential, we must let go of our desires and attachment to the past and the future and be excited about living in the unknown.
— Mada Eliza Dalian
There is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth out fear: because fear hath torment. He that feareth is not made perfect in love. (1 John 4:18) I came from a family of wonderful people who nevertheless struggled with how to be happy. There were many things we didn't know about living in peace. We mixed our love with fear. What I experienced in my childhood family seemed to color my life with confusion. I joined the Church at nineteen. Though my conversion was real, many of my emotions continued to be out of harmony with gospel teachings, and I didn't know what to do about them. I was not at rest. As a young mother I felt that I was only barely keeping my distress from leaking out. But it did leak out. I struggled to be cheerful at home. I was too often tense with my children, especially as their behavior reflected negatively on me. I was perfectionistic. I was irritable and controlling. But I was also loving, patient, appreciative, happy; I frequently felt the Spirit of the Lord, and I did many parenting things well, but so inconsistently. Sooner or later the crisis comes for good people who live in ignorance and neglect of spiritual law. The old ways don't work anymore, and it may feel as though the foundations of life are giving way. If we don't learn consistent, mature love in our childhood homes we often struggle to learn it when we become marriage partners and parents. 
— M. Catherine Thomas
It’s not enough to hear or think about the truth, we must experience it for ourselves if we are to truly know it.
— Mada Eliza Dalian
Poverty is spiritual halitosis.
— George Orwell, Keep the Aspidistra Flying
Centered, open, and diverse, the universes correspondence to your hopes and dreams is the deliverance of your foremost thoughts and actions. Energetically you can create and destroy your immediate set of circumstances under the same laws. Posed as friends and foes, you will have obstacles, ones in which you must go through, over, under and aside sometimes to overcome. These are the stepping stones to your future reality. Overcome that which has weakened your state of mind and conquer the thoughts and actions that you have let lead your life.
— Will Barnes, The Expansion of The Soul
A temple, first of all, is a place ofprayer; and prayer is communion with God. It is the 'infinite in manseeking the infinite in God.' Where they find each other, there is holysanctuary--a temple.
— B.H. Roberts
Eventually, all that one has learnt will have to be forgotten.
— Ramana Maharshi
When spiritual seeking becomes too complicated, its exercies too elaborated, its doctrines too esoteric, it becomes also too artificial and the resulting achievements too fabricated. It is the beginners and intermediates who carry this heavy and unnecessary burden, who involve themselves to the point of becoming neurotics.
— Paul Brunton, The Notebooks of Paul Brunton
His argument runs like this: there is no goodness without free will. Without the ability to freely choose-or reject-the good, an individual possesses no control over his own soul, and without that control, there is not possibility of attaining grace. In the language of Christianity, a beliver cannot be saved unless the choice to follow Christ is freely made, unless the option not to follow him genuinely exists. Compelled belief is no belief at all.
— Thomas C. Foster, How to Read Literature Like a Professor: A Lively and Entertaining Guide to Reading Between the Lines
The burning zeal....that had led her to India had apparently vanished. At the same time....she clung steadfastly to the faith she professed, and without a drop of consolation, labored wholeheartedly in her daily service....of the poor.
— Brian Kolodiejchuk, Mother Teresa: Come Be My Light: The Private Writings of the "Saint of Calcutta"
When you weep, Jesus weeps with you. And together you enter into the dance of tears. The dance of tears with Jesus is a precious intimacy He shares only with those who have known deep suffering. In the dance of tears, Jesus shares your pain. He carries your deep sorrows in His everlasting arms. And He ultimately turns your mourning into dancing. He revives and saves your crushed spirit. What a blessed comfort in our deepest darkness to know the One who shares the depth of every pain and loss, every joy and gladness. Jesus, He is the One.
— Catherine Martin, A Woman's Heart That Dances: Keeping in Step with God's Design for You
When you combine desire and faith to that it is in which you aspire to, you send an proactive force into the universe that creates a wave of energy, thus activating energy particles which then begin the manifestation process, kind of like a magnet to iron. The bigger the desire equaled with faith, the higher likeliness of materializing what it is you strive for. Stop living a life in which you are not in control of and join forces with the universe in which we are all a part of. Expand your consciousness and be grateful for every instance in the physical plane, it is what you must decide if you want to live the life that you want.
— Will Barnes, The Expansion of The Soul
When the world turns and and we operate at our own personal vibration, it is in our power to withhold our dignity and integrity at the highest possible frequency, with this as an active force, we can command our reality in the physical realm. Justly, we shall take all the opportunity that manifests itself in arms reach. To be one, and to have and do what we dream is concurrent only on a high wavelength, and operative to those who seek a higher sense of self. Are you ready to expand to these levels of operation? Have you taken the steps? Step forward and release all your fears.
— Will Barnes, The Expansion of The Soul
The more that science unravels about the wonder of life and the universe, the more i am in are of it. the beauty and wonder of the universe and all that surrounds us offers proof of God. I like that idea
— Ranya Tabari Idliby, The Faith Club: A Muslim, A Christian, A Jew--Three Women Search for Understanding
It is always easier to take the words of a Jesus, a Gandhi, a Marx, or a Confucius as constituting Holy Writ. This involves less reading, less study, less thought, less conflict, and less independent searching, but it also means less growth toward maturity.
— William Coperthwaite, A Handmade Life: In Search of Simplicity
whoever approaches his goal dances
— Cormac McCarthy, Blood Meridian, or the Evening Redness in the West
you must achieve liberation during your life time.Even if you fail to do it during your lifetime, you must think of god at least at the time of death, since one becomes what he thinks of at the time of death. But unless all your life you have been thinking of God, unless you have accustomed yourself to dhyana of 'Godalways during life, it would not at all be possible for you think of God at the time of death.
— Ramana Maharshi
By the grace of the Lady, whose face mirrors my own, may I ever remember I am made in her image, blessed and beautiful.
— Dianne Sylvan, The Body Sacred
And every nation which shall war against thee, O house of Israel, shall be turned one against another, and they shall fall into the pit which they digged to ensnare the people of the Lord. And all that fight against Zion shall be destroyed, and that great whore, who hath perverted the right ways of the Lord, yea, that great and abomniable church, shall tumble to the dust and great shall be the fall of it.
— Anonymous
Want to know something wonderful? Even when we at times are faithless Jesus remains faithful. 
— Raven
Animal fight to defend their bodies. Humans curse to defend their imagination of themselves.
— Devdutt Pattanaik
Persons desiring to know what love is might benefit more if they were able to understand what love is not.
— Floyd Henderson
It has been my experience that those who claim to be the most spiritual are usually the least so.
— Steve Maraboli
Low states are a like a poison to the psyche. Millions of people throughout the world take tranquillizers each day to combat depression, but this does not tackle its root cause, which is found in the basic state of the internal energies of the psyche.Basically the energy of the psyche needs to change, from low states to spiritual ones. It requires inner observation, the destruction of the egos, and alchemical transformation.
— Belsebuub, Self-Knowledge for Spiritual Awakening
To pluck a flower means to take possession of it, and it also means to kill it.
— Anthony Bloom, Beginning to Pray
Feed Everyone
— Neem Karoli Baba
Excerpt from "The Long Road from Perdition" for the day:"...I've always been drawn to the ocean. It is here that I now feel peaceful and can lose my thoughts while immersed in the deafening sounds of waves crashing around me. The spray and mist of the ocean's past seem to be a living, breathing yet wounded animal. The fury of the waves never settled and the spew of the foam touched all that dared to sit near it.There is no reason to flinch as the waves spray and crash against the shore. It is a natural progression I have learned to endure. However, it is the rescinding of the waves and fluid release of fury that I struggle to understand and coexist with peacefully. I hope one day to master it.
— J.R. Stone
Let the wet earth embrace you firmly, soundly. She needs to be revived, she needs to beat like a heart full of adrenaline inside a chest.
— V.S. Atbay
Even religious people are vulnerable to this longing. Those who belong to communities of faith have acquired a certain patience with what is sometimes called organized religion. They have learned to forgive themselves. They do not expect their institutions to stand in for God, and they are happy to use inherited maps for some of life's journeys. They do not need to walk off every cliff all by themselves. Yet they too can harbor the sense that there is more to life that they are being shown. Where is the secret hidden? Who has the key to the treasure box of More?
— Barbara Brown Taylor
Just as the light of a candle has the power to dispel darkness in a room, so also the light developed in one man can help dispel darkness in several others.
— Sayagyi U Ba Khin
You are not as insignificant as you have often been told, nor are you any more significant than you have often told yourself.
— Maureen Moss
A good story conveys a message that strengthens our values.
— Ronald R. Cooke
One man may read the Bhagavata by the light of a lamp, and another may commit a forgery by that very light; but the lamp is unaffected. The sun sheds its light on the wicked as well as on the virtuous.
— Ramakrishna, Sayings of Sri Ramakrishna
Enjoy life with the woman whom you love all the days of your fleeting life which He has given to you under the sun; for this is your reward"...Ecclesiastes 9:9 (NASB)
— Anonymous, The Holy Bible: New American Standard Version, NASB
There is one power in the Universe and we can all use it.
— Ernest Holmes, The Science of Mind: The Definitive Edition
God has revealed to me that only the Paramatman, whom the Vedas describe as the Pure Soul, is as immutable as Mount Sumeru, unattached, and beyond pain and pleasure. There is much confusion in this world of His maya. One can by no means say that 'this' will come after 'that' or 'this' will produce 'that'.
— Ramakrishna, Sayings of Sri Ramakrishna
I often wonder if we were all characters in one of God's dreams.
— Muriel Spark
Imitation is the greatest form of flattery, but worship is the greatest form of adoration.
— Jayce O'Neal
The cause of all our personal problems and nearly all the problems of the world can be summed up in a single sentence:Human life is very deep, and our modern dominant lifestyle is not.
— Bo Lozoff
Forgiveness is the fastest way to a spiritual path and inner peace of mind
— Muhaya Haji Mohamad
Every new day is a sacred gift with new sacred grace.
— Lailah Gifty Akita
If you could know how happy I am, as Jesus' little spouse. No one....could I envy, because I am enjoying my complete happiness, even when I suffer something for my beloved Spouse.
— Brian Kolodiejchuk, Mother Teresa: Come Be My Light: The Private Writings of the "Saint of Calcutta"
I continue to grow beautifully on my inside while the wrinkles take care of my outside’’ – Binduu Chopra
— Binduu Chopra, A Quest...Beyond the Visible
as you think, so is your reality
— Swami Sadashiva Tirtha
If you do pratikraman of a tiger, then even the tiger will do as you ask it to. There is no difference between a tiger and a human being. The difference is in your vibrations! That is why he gets affected.
— Dada Bhagwan
The devil can only enter your mind only through whisperings . A silent heart is a fortress unassailable A pure heart is a fortress unassailable.
— Hazur Maharaj Sawan Singh
If you let go something today In Shaa Allah Allah will also let go something for you....
— Adil Adam Memon
I'm not going to do it again," Lena Marquez whispered to the red purse across the hall from her nestle of blankets. "Never again.
— Aaron Michael Ritchey, The Never Prayer
Earth should suspect a man who has no tears of compassion and eject into the outer space until he learns humility. Outer space and death might be of the same origin, where one chances upon egolessness just before lifelessness. Earth only asks for egolessness.
— Adam Kovacevic
churchgoing is not synonymous with personal spirituality. There are some people who get so busy in church worship and projects that they become insensitive to the pressing human needs that sourround them, contradicting the very precepts they profess to believe deeply.
— Stephen R. Covey, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People: Powerful Lessons in Personal Change
Harry Potter is one boy in a long line of mythical heroes who have reminded the human race that we are so much more than we think we are, so much more powerful than we seem to know. Jesus said that we would someday do even greater works than He; should we not take Him at His word? And should not 'someday' be today? It's time for us to start working miracles, if indeed we have the capacity within us to do so.
— Marianne Williamson, Everyday Grace: Having Hope, Finding Forgiveness And Making Miracles
God exists outside of time, and since we are within time, there is no way we will ever totally grasp that concept.
— Francis Chan, Crazy Love: Overwhelmed by a Relentless God
Standing DeerAs the house of a personin age sometimes grows clutteredwith what istoo loved or too heavy to part with,the heart may grow cluttered.And still the house will be emptied,and still the heart.As the thoughts of a personin age sometimes grow sparer,like the great cleanness come into a room, the soul may grow sparer;one sparrow song carves it completely.And still the room is full,and still the heart.Empty and filled,like the curling half-light of morning,in which everything is still possible and so why not.Filled and empty,like the curling half-light of evening,in which everything now is finished and so why not.Beloved, what can be, what was,will be taken from us.I have disappointed.I am sorry. I knew no better.A root seeks water.Tenderness only breaks open the earth.This morning, out the window,the deer stood like a blessing, then vanished.
— Jane Hirshfield
Perhaps her faults and follies, the unhappiness she had suffered, were not entirely vain if she could follow the path that now she dimly discerned before her, not the path that kind funny old Waddington had spoken of that led nowhither, but the path those dear nuns at the convent followed so humbly, the path that led to peace.
— W. Somerset Maugham, The Painted Veil