SO GOOD QUOTES

Category: JUDGMENT

  • The parable about the talents offers the thought that life is a time for trading.

    That means that it is necessary to hasten to use this time as a person would hurry to a market to bargain for what he can. Even if one has only brought bast shoes, or only bast, (very inexpensive, unsophisticated items) he does not sit with his arms folded, but contrives to call over buyers to sell what he has and then buy for himself what he needs.

    No one who has received life from the Lord can say that he does not have a single talent—everyone has something, and not just one thing; everyone, therefore, has something with which to trade and make a profit.

    Do not look around and calculate what others have received, but take a good look at yourself and determine more precisely what lies in you and what you can gain for that which you have, and then act according to this plan without laziness.

    At the Judgment you will not be asked why you did not gain ten talents if you had only one, and you will not even be asked why you gained only one talent on your one, but you will be told that you gained a talent, half a talent or a tenth of its worth.

    And the reward will not be because you received the talents, but because you gained.

    There will be nothing with which to justify yourself—not with nobleness, nor poverty, nor lack of education. When this is not given, there will be no question about it.
    But you had hands and feet. You will be asked, what did you gain with them?

    You had a tongue, what did you gain with it?
    In this way will the inequalities of earthly states be leveled out at God’s judgment.

    —St. Theophan the Recluse, Thoughts for Each Day of the Year: According to the Daily Church Readings from the Word of God

  • “When the day of judgement comes, we shall be examined about what we have done, not about what we have read.”

    —Thomas à Kempis

  • One of the best ways to lose grace – if you want a guaranteed loss of grace – judge people.

    —Fr. Antony Paul

  • But underneath all our emphasis on successful action, many of us suffer from a deep-seated, low self-esteem and are walking around with the constant fear that someday someone will unmask the illusion and show that we are not as smart, as good, or as lovable as the world was made to believe.

    —Henri Nouwen, Out of Solitude: Three Meditations on the Christian Life

  • “No man is despised by another unless he is first despised by himself.”

    — Seneca, On the Shortness of Life: Life Is Long if You Know How to Use It

  • “You cannot think worse of me than I do of myself.”

    ―Robert Burton, The Anatomy of Melancholy

  • Do not be this person, who does not have the grace of God. Do not be the person who embitters those around him, causing trouble in the community.

    Do not be the person by whom others become defiled, through a thought of judging someone, a thought of / anger, a thought of revenge, and so on. Do not be this character.

    —H.E. Metropolitan Youssef, How to Endure Injustice

  • Your past and present torments and sufferings are poured down upon you to test your faith and steel it; they also work to curb your lusts and passions. Humble yourself. God succours the humble. Judgment of others, insistence on their shortcomings, can only increase the bitterness of your sorrow. Choose the better part.

    Letters of Elder Macarius of Optina

  • We cannot consent to be judged by someone who has suffered less than ourselves. And since each of us regards himself as an unrecognized Job . . .

    —Emil Cioran, The Trouble with Being Born

  • “If we only could realize that there is no evil in a person that is not at the same time a suffering in this person.”

    — Met. Anthony Bloom