People demand freedom of speech as a compensation for the freedom of thought which they seldom use.

How absurd men are! They never use the liberties they have, they demand those they do not have. They have freedom of thought, they demand freedom of speech.

Anxiety is the dizziness of freedom.

God creates out of nothing. Wonderful you say. Yes, to be sure, but he does what is still more wonderful: he makes saints out of sinners.

Prayer does not change God, but it changes him who prays.

If I am capable of grasping God objectively, I do not believe, but precisely because I cannot do this I must believe.

The function of prayer is not to influence God, but rather to change the nature of the one who prays.

Just as in earthly life lovers long for the moment when they are able to breathe forth their love for each other, to let their souls blend in a soft whisper, so the mystic longs for the moment when in prayer he can, as it were, creep into God.

Far from idleness being the root of all evil, it is rather the only true good.

Because of its tremendous solemnity death is the light in which great passions, both good and bad, become transparent, no longer limited by outward appearences.