A collection of scriptural meditations from Saints and Fathers of the Church.
Nothing is better for rendering the heart penitent and the soul humble than wise solitude and complete silence.
Nothing so fills the heart with contrition and humbles the soul as solitude embraced with self-awareness, and utter silence.
Every man that loves God loves a quiet life.
A fish swiftly escapes a hook and a sensual soul shuns solitude.
The arrows of the enemy cannot touch one who loves quietness; but he who moves about in a crowd will often be wounded.
Sorrows cleanse and polish a person.
As too many sticks often choke a fire and put it out, while making a lot of smoke, so excessive sorrow often makes the soul smoky and dark, and dries the stream of tears.
Most people desire and seek after prosperity in this life, and they strive to avoid sorrows. While that seems very good and pleasant, constant prosperity and good fortune do a person harm. He falls into a variety of passions and sins, and angers the Lord, while those who live a life of sorrow come closer to the Lord and more readily attain unto salvation, for the Lord called the life of happiness the broad path. The wide gates and the broad way lead to destruction, and many there be who take that way (Matthew 7:13). It is the narrow way and the strait gate which lead to life eternal, and few there be who find it (Matthew 7:14). Thus, according to His love for us, seeing the possible benefit [of sorrows] to those who are worthy, the Lord moves many off the broad road and puts them on the narrow, sorrowful path, so that in [their] patient endurance of sickness and sorrow, He might effect their salvation and grant them life eternal.
Without sorrows there is no salvation. On the other hand, the Kingdom of God awaits those who have patiently endured. And all the glory of the world is nothing in comparison.
If the soul is vigilant and withdraws from all distraction and abandons its own will, then the spirit of God invades it and it can conceive because it is free to do so.
Do not give to the body only; give the soul its share.
Every day you provide your bodies with good to keep them from failing. In the same way your good works should be the daily nourishment of your hearts. Your bodies are fed with food and your spirits with good works. You aren’t to deny your soul, which is going to live forever, what you grant to your body, which is going to die.
A man’s soul takes on qualities according to its activity.
Outward acts show the inner disposition of the man.
You would not use a dirty cup, but yet you come to the altar with a dirty soul?
Our soul is simple as thought, and rapid as thought or lightning. In an instant it can be wounded by sin and become attached to corruptible things; in an instant it can fall away from the love of God and its neighbor through a single unrighteous thought, through a single passionate desire, through a single malevolent thought, and, therefore, we must constantly watch our heart, lest it should incline to words or thoughts of evil, and must ever strive to preserve it in God’s simplicity and purity, and in the love of God and its neighbor.
When the flesh flourishes, the soul fades; when the flesh has full liberty, the soul is straitened; when the flesh is satiated, the soul hungers; when the flesh is adorned, the soul is deformed; when the flesh overflows with laughter, the soul is surrounded by misfortune; when the flesh is in the light, the soul is in darkness…
The body can neither love nor hate. Neither can a body fall in love with a body. The capability for love belongs to the soul. When the soul is in love with the body, that is not love but desire, lust. When the soul is in love with the soul, but not through God, that is either admiration, or pity. However, when the soul, through God loves the soul, without consideration for the appearance of the body – beauty or ugliness – that is love. That is true love. For in love is life.
After a man has decided to abandon his wrong ways and actually does abandon them, the first task of the enemy is to clear a space for an unhampered field of action against him. He succeeds in this by suggesting to a man, who has entered the right path, that he should act on his own, and not go for advice and guidance to the teachers of righteous life, who are always attached to the Church. A man who follows their guidance and verifies all his actions, both inner and outer, by the good judgement of his teachers – priests in their parishes in the case of laymen, experienced startzi in monasteries – cannot be approached by the enemy. Whatever he may suggest, the experienced eye will at once see where he is driving and will warn his pupil. In this way all his wiles are defeated. But if a man turns away from his teachers, the enemy will at once confuse him and lead him astray … There are many possibilities, which do not look evil; and those he suggests… the novice, who,...