Suffering so unbolts the door of the heart, that the Word hath easier entrance.
Richard BaxterRead
This life was not intended to be the place of our perfection, but the preparation for it.
Interpretation
Life is a journey of growth rather than a pursuit of perfection.
Richard Baxter's quote suggests that our existence is not meant to be a flawless experience but rather a process of preparation for something greater. It emphasizes the importance of learning and evolving throughout life, understanding that imperfections are a natural part of the human experience.
In practice
During a motivational speech about personal development.
Suffering so unbolts the door of the heart, that the Word hath easier entrance.
It is as hard a thing to maintain a sound understanding, a tender conscience, a lively, gracious, heavenly spirit, and an upright life in the midst of contention, as to keep your candle lighted in the greatest storms.
It is a contradiction to be a sanctified man, or a true christian, and not humble.
Use sin as it will use you; spare it not, for it will not spare you; it is your murderer, and the murderer of the world: use it, therefore, as a murderer should be used. Kill it before it kills you.
Be careful how you spend your time: Spend your time in nothing which you know must be repented of.
That which once was, will be no more. Yesterday will never come again. To-day is passing, and will not return. You may work while it is day; but when you have lost that day, it will not return for you to work in. While your candle burns, you may make use of its light, but when it is done, it is too late to use it.
Christ has no body now on earth but yours, no hands, no feet but yours. Yours are the eyes with which Christ looks out his compassion to the world. Yours are the feet with which he is to go about doing good. Yours are the hands with which he is to bless us now.
"Do you know," Ivan Bunin recalls Anton Chekhov saying to him in 1899, near the end of his too-short life, "for how many years I shall be read? Seven." "Why seven?" Bunin asked. "Well," Chekhov answered, "seven and a half then."
Catastrophe is the essence of the spiritual path, a series of breakdowns allowing us to discover the threads that weave all of life into a whole cloth.
Altruism itself depends on a recognition of the reality of other persons, and on the equivalent capacity to regard oneself as merely one individual among many.
The great things in life are what they seem to be. And for that reason, strange as it may sound to you, often are very difficult to interpret (understand). Great passions are for the great of souls. Great events can only be seen by people who are on a level with them. We think we can have our visions for nothing. We cannot. Even the finest and most self-sacrificing visions have to be paid for. Strangely enough, that is what makes them fine.
I do not bring forgiveness with me, nor forgetfulness. The only ones who can forgive are dead; the living have no right to forget.
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