Joseph Hall
Joseph Hall
Joseph Hallwas an English bishop, satirist and moralist. His contemporaries knew him as a devotional writer, and a high-profile controversialist of the early 1640s. In church politics, he tended in fact to a middle way...
NationalityEnglish
ProfessionClergyman
Date of Birth1 July 1574
men world might
If religion might be judged of according to men's intentions, there would scarcely be any idolatry in the world.
men way fields
This field is so spacious that it were easy for a man to lose himself in it; and if I should spend all my pilgrimage in this walk, my time would sooner end than my way.
hate men sin
Not only commission makes a sin. A man is guilty of all those sins he hateth not. If I cannot avoid all, yet I will hate all.
ears mouths slander
There would not be so many open mouths if there were not so many open ears.
christian men evil
Christian society is like a bundle of sticks laid together, whereof one kindles another. Solitary men have fewest provocations to evil, but, again, fewest incitations to good. So much as doing good is better than not doing evil will I account Christian good-fellowship better than an hermitish and melancholy solitariness.
soul atmosphere society
Society is the atmosphere of souls; and we necessarily imbibe from it something which is either infectious or healthful.
people wealth rich
Rich people should consider that they are only trustees for what they posses, and should show their wealth to be more in doing good than merely in having it.
vanity together mets
I have seldom seen much ostentation and much learning met together.
men devil laziness
The idle man is the devil's cushion.
mind scythes dull
Recreation is intended to the mind as whetting is to the scythe, to sharpen the edge of it, which otherwise would grow dull and blunt,--as good no scythe as no edge.
happiness cutting men
God loves to see his creatures happy; our lawful delight is His; they know not God that think to please Him with making themselves miserable. The idolaters thought it a fit service for Baal to cut and lance themselves; never any holy man looked for thanks from the true God by wronging himself.
procrastination purpose deathbed
Our good purposes foreslowed are become our tormentors upon our deathbed.
wind may pairs
As you see in a pair of bellows, there is a forced breath without life, so in those that are puffed up with the wind of ostentation, there may be charitable words without works.
running weed men
The best ground untilled, soonest runs out into rank weeds. A man of knowledge that is negligent or uncorrected, cannot but grow wild and godless.