Famous Quotes & Sayings

Henry Vaughan

Dear Night! this world's defeat; The stop to busy fools; care's check and curb; The day of spirits; my soul's calm retreat Which none disturb! Christ's progress, and His prayer-time; The hours to which high Heaven cloth chime.

Henry Vaughan

Prayer is The world in tune, A spirit-voyce, And vocall joyes, Whose Eccho is heaven's blisse.

Henry Vaughan

Yet never sleep the sun up. Prayer shou'd Dawn with the day. There are set, awful hours 'Twixt heaven and us. The manna was not good After sun-rising; far day sullies flowres. Rise to prevent the sun; sleep doth sin glut, And heaven's gate opens when the world's is shut.

Henry Vaughan

When first thy eyes unveil, give thy soul leave To do the like; our bodies but forerun The spirit's duty. True hearts spread and heave Unto their God, as flow'rs do to the sun. Give him thy first thoughts then; so shalt thou keep Him company all day, and in him sleep.

Henry Vaughan

The skin and shell of things Though fair are not Thy wish nor prayer but got My meer despair of wings.

Henry Van Dyke

Religion? Yes, I know it well; I've heard its prayers and creeds, And seen men put them all to shame with poor, half-hearted deeds. They follow Christ, but far away; they wander and they doubt. I'll serve him in a better way, and live his precepts out.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

What discord should we bring into the universe if our prayers were all answered! Then we should govern the world, and not God. And do you think we should govern it better?

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Our hearts, our hopes, our prayers, our tears, our faith triumphant o’er our fears, are all with thee – are all with thee!

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

I am weary of your quarrels, Weary of your wars and bloodshed, Weary of your prayers for vengeance, Of your wranglings and dissensions

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Prayer is innocence's friend; and willingly flieth incessant 'twist the earth and the sky, the carrier-pigeon of heaven.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

What discord we should bring into the universe if our prayers were all answered. Then we should govern the world and not God. And do you think we should govern it better? It gives me only pain when I hear the long, wearisome petitions of people asking for they know not what. . . . Thanks-giving with a full heart-and the rest silence and submission to the divine will!

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

The prayer of Ajax was for light.

Henry Ward Beecher

Prayer is often an argument of laziness: "Lord, my temper gives me a vast deal of inconvenience, and it would be a great task for me to correct it; and wilt thou be pleased to correct it for me, that I may get along easier?" If prayer was answered under such circumstances, independent of action of natural laws, it would be paying a premium on indolence.

Charles Caleb Colton

God will excuse our prayers for ourselves whenever we are prevented from them by being occupied in such good works as to entitle us to the prayers of others.

Charles Studd

Prayer is good; but when used as a substitute for obedience, it is nothing but a blatant hypocrisy... Don't hedge! Time flies! ... Enlist!

Charles Stanley

[Prayer] is the link between God's inexhaustible resources and people’s needs...God is the source of power, but we are the instrument He uses to link the two together.

Charles Stanley

Stop for a minute and think about how you typically interact with God. If prayer time is dominated by your own talking, some adjustments may be in order. Just as the Lord spoke to David, God also has many things to say to you, if you'll simply let Him speak.

Charles Stanley

God will never tell us to do something that gratifies the flesh.

Charles Spurgeon

Prayer irrigates the fields of life with the waters which are stored up in the reservoirs of promise.

Charles Spurgeon

True prayer is the trading of the heart with God.

Charles Spurgeon

All our perils are nothing, so long as we have prayer.

Charles Spurgeon

What manner of men should ministers be? They should thunder in preaching, and lighten in conversation; they should be flaming in prayer, shining in life, and burning in spirit.

Charles Spurgeon

Prayer is the slender nerve that moves the muscle of omnipotence.

Charles Spurgeon

Prayer sweeps the battlefield, slays the enemy, and buries the bones.

Aiden Wilson Tozer

Prayer is the most sacred occupation a person could engage in.

Aiden Wilson Tozer

Nobody ever got anything from God on the grounds that he deserved it. Haven fallen, man deserves only punishment and death. So if God answers prayer it's because God is good. From His goodness, His lovingkindness, His good-natured benevolence, God does it! That's the source of everything.

Chris Bohjalian

The world is filled with human toxins -- not the darkness that we all occasionally crave, but actually people who are so unwilling to bask in the angelic light that is offered us all that they grow poisonous -- and you can pray for their eventual recovery and healing. And sometimes those prayers will be answered. But sometimes these individuals have been vaccinated against goodness and against angels and they are so unwilling to give an inch to their God that often they never (and I use this expression absolutely literally) see the light.

Pursuing prayer is prayer on a mission. It is diligent, fervent, constant, persevering, determined, and convinced.

David Brainerd

The idea that everything would happen exactly as it does regardless of whether we pray or not is a specter that haunts the minds of many who sincerely profess belief in God. It makes prayer psychologically impossible, replacing it with dead ritual at best.

Beryl Bainbridge

The vital accessories to my work are my reference books, such as the complete Shakespeare and a prayer book, and a large refuse bin.

Benjamin Harrison

Prayer steadies one when he is walking in slippery places - even if things asked for are not given.

Charles Simeon

Excess of trouble may, for a time, distract and overwhelm the soul. Our Lord himself seems to have experienced somewhat of this. Our prayers, perhaps, are never more acceptable, than when they are offered in broken accents, in sighs, and groans.

Bernard of Clairvaux

Prayer is a virtue that prevaileth against all temptations.