Ambition is a gilded misery, a secret poison, a hidden plague, the engineer of deceit, the mother of hypocrisy, the parent of envy, the original of vices, the moth of holiness, the blinder of hearts, turning medicines into maladies, and remedies into diseases.
Interpretation
Ambition can lead to negative consequences, corrupting one's morals and causing distress.
This quote by Thomas Brooks reflects on the darker side of ambition, suggesting that while it is often seen as a driving force for success, it can also lead to various vices like deceit, hypocrisy, and envy. Brooks portrays ambition as a double-edged sword that can transform good intentions into harmful outcomes, highlighting the importance of being mindful of one's aspirations and their potential impact on morality and well-being.
In practice
In a discussion about the nature of ambition in a career development seminar.
Remember this-all the sighing, mourning, sobbing, and complaining in the world, does not so undeniably evidence a man to be humble, as his overlooking his own righteousness, and living really and purely upon the righteousness of Christ.
Grace and glory differ very little; the one is the seed, the other is the flower; grace is glory militant, glory is grace triumphant.
He is the best preacher, not that tickles the ear, but that breaks the heart.
Ah! sinner, remember this, there is no way on earth effectually to be rid of the guilt, filth, and power of sin, but by believing in a Saviour. It is not resolving, it is not complaining, it is not mourning, but believing, that will make thee divinely victorious over that body of sin that to this day is too strong for thee, and that will certainly be thy ruin, if it be not ruined by a hand of faith.
Self is the only oil that makes the chariot-wheels of the hypocrite move in all religious concerns.
Humility can weep over other men's weaknesses, and joy and rejoice over their graces.
He found himself still with too many questions and not enough answers.
There have been men before now who got so interested in proving the existence of God that they came to care nothing for God Himself.
Sweet to think on it, that when we are last weary of all this world there is the rising sun
The seventeenth century is everywhere a time in which the state's power over everything individual increases, whether that power be in absolutist hands or may be considered the result of a contract, etc. People begin to dispute the sacred right of the individual ruler or authority without being aware that at the same time they are playing into the hands of a colossal state power.
If you want to be a grocer, or a general, or a politician, or a judge, you will invariably become it; that is your punishment. If you never know what you want to be, if you live what some might call the dynamic life but what I will call the artistic life, if each day you are unsure of who you are and what you know you will never become anything, and that is your reward.
..This is why the ultimate reason of things must lie in a necessary substance, in which the differentiation of the changes only exists eminently as in their source; and this is what we call God.
Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.