quotations about faith
We may still say perhaps "faith governs the world"--but the faith of the present is no longer in revelation or in the priest--it is in reason and science.
HENRI-FREDERIC AMIEL
Journal Intime
Faith, like a jackal, feeds among the tombs, and even from these dead doubts she gathers her most vital hope.
HERMAN MELVILLE
Moby Dick
Faith has not lost its power. The soul still enjoys this privilege of receiving inspiration from above. It is not the special prerogative of a few saints. It is the common right of all. It is not an occasional, exceptional gift. It is constant, continuous, the law of our being. It is not a miracle, interfering with the operations of the human soul. It is the condition of our soul's true life.
LYMAN ABBOTT
Old Testament Shadows of New Testament Truths
Faith is an orientation of the total person, giving purpose and goal to one's hopes and strivings, thoughts and actions.
JAMES W. FOWLER
Stages of Faith
Faith is a gift of God, which man can neither give nor take away by promise of rewards or menace of torture.
THOMAS HOBBES
Leviathan
To follow, under all circumstances, the highest promptings within you; to be always true to the divine self; to rely upon the inward Voice, the inward Light, and to pursue your purpose with a fearless and restful heart, believing that the future will yield unto you the need of every thought and effort; knowing that the laws of the universe can never fail, and that your own will come back to you with mathematical exactitude -- this is faith and the living of faith.
JAMES ALLEN
Morning and Evening Thoughts
Noble faith, thou giant power,
Leading men to action high,
Source of every grand endeavor,
And the deeds that deify--
May you stand throughout the ages
Towering o'er the wrecks of time,
Bearing fruit of thy inspiring
In the deeds that are sublime.
WILLIAM HENRY SMITH
Ornithoidichnites
The discoveries of science have proved that the opinions concerning a firmament above, and a flat earth beneath, are completely inaccurate; but faith delights more in sublimity than truth; it soars far above science in its discoveries, and holds accuracy in contempt.
ETHAN ALLEN
Reason: The Only Oracle of Man
I believe faith is a human universal. We are endowed at birth with nascent capacities for faith. How these capacities are activated and grow depends to a large extent on how we are welcomed into the world and what kinds of environments we grow in. Faith is interactive and social; it requires community, language, ritual and nurture. Faith is also shaped by initiatives from beyond us and other people, initiatives of spirit or grace. How these latter initiatives are recognized and imaged, or unperceived and ignored, powerfully affects the shape of faith in our lives.
JAMES W. FOWLER
introduction, Stages of Faith
Faith I have, in myself, in humanity, in the worthwhileness of the pursuits in entertainment for the masses. But wide awake, not blind faith, moves me.
WALT DISNEY
The Gospel According to Disney
Faith comes in different tempers: there's the hard, brittle faith that shatters when it meets an obstacle it can't cut through, and the tough, springy faith that bounces off unchipped.
K. J. PARKER
Devices and Desires
If faith ever rises to manly vigour, it must be by enlarging the mind's acquaintance with the whole extent of saving truth. Believers who would be strong and healthy, must not be detained upon the milk of babes, but must aspire to strong meat, and go on unto perfection. For faith to be strong and conquering, we must have variety of food. The entire truths of religion must enter into the regimen.
JAMES WADDEL ALEXANDER
Faith
I have learned that faith means trusting in advance what will only make sense in reverse.
PHILIP YANCEY
Finding God in Unexpected Places
Faith is like a floodlight that lights our path and provides illumination to our dark world.
MEL CURTISS
Inkspirations: Devotions for a Lifetime
However logical our induction, the end of the thread is fastened upon the assurance of faith.
E. H. CHAPIN
Living Words
In the isolation of his clear, cold intellect, the sceptic abides in a glacial and spectral universe. No glow from the affections lights up the frost and shadow of the grave. He feels no prophecy in the thrill of the human heart--in the incompleteness of nature. He believes merely in things tangible, and sees only in the daytime. He will not confess the authenticity of that paler light of faith which was meant to shine when the sunshine of reason falls short, and the firmament of mystery is over our heads.
E. H. CHAPIN
Living Words
As a reason is superior to sense, so faith has the preeminence over reason. Be reason reverenced in matters that fall within her sphere; but when she ventures into deeps of God, the seas where faith has all the sovereignty, when acting like herself, she lowers her sails. As sense would seem to tell us many things which reason contradicts, so faith will rectify the fond mistakes of reason: nor ought she to be dissatisfied. Faith only shuts the eye of reason, not picks it out. Nor these alone submit themselves before this noble grace; even others her fellow virtues do obeisance. Though, as a gracious quality, she stands upon a level with the rest; yet, as an instrument, she far excels in glory. She cannot boast indeed of her intrinsic worth, but of the post of honor which she fills by heaven's appointment. She only is the general receiver of all the blessings of the gospel. By her we call heaven's rich unfathomable mines our own. Because she humbleth herself, therefore hath God highly exalted her, and given her a name above every grace. Even charity herself is only greater in duration: for, she abideth when faith shall fail, as to its actings; and die like Moses, in the mount. Such is her humble nature, that even the jealous God, who will not give his glory to another, even he is found to give his glory unto her. We are saved by faith; we are justified by faith. She faithfully returns the glory to her object. He has regarded the low estate of his handmaid, because himself has said, them that honor me, I will honor.
WILLIAM MCEWEN
"On Faith", Select Essays Doctrinal & Practical on a Variety of the Most Important and Interesting Subjects in Divinity
How necessary it is for our happiness now, and to come, that we possess faith. The dog has faith in its master, the child in its parent, then why have we not more childlike faith in God? Let us try and bear in mind the implicit faith of Abraham, and strive more to imitate the partriarch of old. We are too apt to put faith in man, and how often we have to bitterly regret it when too late; and man only turns to God when he has tried every other source and found it fail. Why not, from the beginning, trust in God, and God alone; for he who puts his trust in man, God help him. May God give us strength, then, to nourish in all its perfection and simplicity, the faith of the patriarchs who feared and trusted God alone.
T. AUGUSTUS FORBES LEITH
"On Faith", Short Essays
It is evident that there are three means for the formation of faith in man: the first is, approaching the Lord; the second, learning truths from the Word; and the third, living in conformity to them. Now these three means being each distinct from the other, it follows that they may be separated; as for instance, a person may approach the Lord, and yet be acquainted with no truths concerning God and the Lord, except such as are historical; so another may be acquainted with abundance of truths derived from the Word, and yet not live in conformity with them; but in such cases, where the three means are separated, that is, where one is without the other, there can be no faith profitable to salvation.
EMANUEL SWEDENBORG
The True Christian Religion: Containing the Universal Theology of the New Church
That mysterious stone on which Jacob reposed was faith. Let us, too, sleep on its breast, and our future greatness will be revealed to us.
MADAME SWETCHINE
"Airelles," The Writings of Madame Swetchine