Attentiveness is the natural prayer of the Soul.
Nicolas MalebrancheRead
You will not dishonor the divine perfections by judgments unworthy of them, provided you never judge of Him by yourself, provided you do not ascribe to the Creator the imperfections and limitations of created beings.
Interpretation
The quote suggests that one should not judge the divine based on human imperfections and limitations.
In this quote, Nicolas Malebranche emphasizes the importance of perceiving divine perfection without projecting human flaws onto it. He warns against evaluating the Creator through the lens of human experiences and shortcomings, promoting an understanding that the divine operates beyond human comprehension and limitation.
In practice
In a philosophical discussion about the nature of God and human perception, this quote can highlight the distinction between human and divine qualities.
Attentiveness is the natural prayer of the Soul.
Our soul is not united to our body in the ordinary sense of these terms. It is immediately and directly united to God alone.
As our bodies live upon the earth and find sustenance in the fruits which it produces, so our minds feed on the same truths as the intelligible and immutable substance of the divine Word contains.
Just as our eyes need light in order to see, our minds need ideas in order to create.
We are here and it is now. Further than that, all human knowledge is moonshine.
The poison of skepticism becomes, like alcoholism, tuberculosis, and some other diseases, much more virulent in a hitherto virgin soil.
Americans have always been able to handle austerity and even adversity. Prosperity is what is doing us in.
There is a wonderful ancient Sufi saying which I'm going to paraphrase slightly. It says, 'When the heart weeps for what it has lost,' in this case 'heart' means 'ego,' 'when the heart weeps for what it has lost, the spirit rejoices for what it has found.'
Only great souls know the grandeur there is in charity.
Commerce is of trivial import; love, faith, truth of character, the aspiration of man, these are sacred.
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