Most of us tend to belittle all suffering except our own,” said Mary. “I think it’s fear. We don’t want to come too near in case we’re sucked in and have to share it.

The function of the educator is to discover in each individual child the gifts implanted in her by Almighty God and to develop and dedicate them to His service.

He supposed he was one of those unfortunates born with a great capacity for suffering…. He opened his eyes a moment and they were dark with fear, for only one race was run as yet...

Don’t waste hate on pink geranium.

Progress in evil was quick and easy; Apollyon was not a chap who hid himself and he gave every assistance in his power. The growth in goodness was so slow, at times so flat, so...

She realized with deep respect that this woman had always done what she had to do and faced what she had to face. If many of her fears and burdens would have seemed unreal to...

Because of course she had known she must go. She always did the thing because in obedience lay the integrity that God asked of her. If anyone had asked her what she meant by integrity...

Water, wind and birdsong were the echoes in this quiet place of a great chiming symphony that was surging around the world. Knee-deep in grasses and moon daisies, Stella stood and listened, swaying a little...

We all of us need to be toppled off the throne of self, my dear,” he said. “Perched up there the tears of others are never upon our own cheek.

I think it will last,” said Grandfather. “In my experience when people once begin to read they go on. They begin because they think they ought to and they go on because they must. Yes....

In the utter peace and stillness the world seemed holding its breath, a little apprehensively, drawing near to the fire to warm itself. There was none of that sense of urgeful, pushing life that robs...

Lovely phrases had lit candles in her mind, one after the other, till she felt intoxicated with the brightness.

The very old and the very young have something in common that makes it right that they should be left alone together. Dawn and sunset see stars shining in a blue sky; but morning and...

Nothing living should ever be treated with contempt. Whatever it is that lives, a man, a tree, or a bird, should be touched gently, because the time is short. Civilization is another word for respect...

For it was one of the special mercies of Providence, Lucilla was apt to say, that beauty and shabbiness are quite compatible. The great thing, she would tell her grandchildren, was to start well. A...

In the old days he had clutched life with such violence that the juice of it ran out between his fingers and was lost, but now he would touch it delicately, thankful for the good...

In what he suffered, as in all true suffering and in true joy, there was the quality of eternity. He could not believe it would ever end.

Jean was visited by one of her rare moments of happiness, one of those moments when the goodness of God was so real to her that it was like taste and scent; the rough strong...

What would normal people think if they knew what went on in a writer’s mind below the surface? They’d think him even more around the bend than they had previously supposed if they could see...

Rachell believed passionately in the value of beauty. If she was pressed for time she considered the filling of her bowl with flowers more important for her family’s welfare than the making of a cake...

…this blessing of loneliness was not really loneliness. Real loneliness was something unendurable. What one wanted when exhausted by the noise and impact of physical bodies was not no people but disembodied people; all those...

For a few minutes the anxiety that tormented him had vanished, leaving his mind as serene as the beauty he looked at. Very lovely, he thought, are the sudden moments of relief that come in...

One is seldom unchanged by the death of those one loves. It gives me a deeper knowledge of them, and so of oneself in regard to them.

In my opinion, too much attention to weather makes for instability of character.

You’re mad, you missionaries,’ ejaculated Tai Haruru angrily. ‘What good do you think you do, crawling out to the extremities of all the different world’s ends and dying there like lizards spiked on sticks?’Brother Balaam...

So this blessing of loneliness was not really loneliness. Real loneliness was something unendurable. What one wanted when exhausted by the noise and impact of physical bodies was not no people but disembodied people; all...

It was not the size of things that mattered but their perfection, it was not what one had that was important, but what one made.

These black times go as they come and we do not know how they come or why they go. But we know that God controls them, as he controls the whole vast cobweb of the...

…there began to come to her a first dim realization of God’s humility. Rejected by the proud in His own right by what humble means He chose to succor them; through the spirit of a...

In a world where thrushes sing and willow trees are golden in the spring, boredom should have been included among the seven deadly sins.

There had come to him one of those moments of quiet despair that lie in wait for even the happiest. Stealthy-footed they leap upon us, as we walk along the street, as we sit at...

…those who break the law should be loved more and not less for their sin, for if we do not forgive then is sin added to sin and the end is death.

What is the scent of water?””Renewal. The goodness of God coming down like dew.

Cousin Mary hoped her journey through periods of dark and light was like that of a Swiss train toiling up the mountainside, in and out of tunnels but always a little farther up the hill...

There always comes, I think, a sort of peak in suffering at which either you win over your pain or your pain wins over you, according as to whether you can, or cannot, call up...

A well-trained dog is like religion, it sets the deserving at their ease and is a terror to evildoers.

He had discovered that the choice between self-love or love of something other than self offers no escape from suffering either way, it is merely a choice between two woundings, of the pride or of...

The sun is still there… even if clouds drift over it. Once you have experienced the reality of sunshine you may weep, but you will never feel ice about your heart again.

I had not known before that love is obedience. You want to love, and you can’t, and you hate yourself because you can’t, and all the time love is not some marvelous thing that you...

Peace….Henrietta was not quite sure what it was but she knew it was very important. If one wanted it, Grandfather had told her once, one must not hit back when fate hit hard but must...

She knew that pleasure, to be pleasure, must come to an end.

I loathe, detest, hate and abominate the block, the gibbet, the rack, the pillory and the faggots with equal passion,” said the old man vehemently. “Not only are they devilishly cruel but they are not...

The years stretched before her, a long and dusty way, yet if she could walk humbly along it she might find that life, unfolding slowly, keeps its best secrets till the end.

The way God squandered Himself had always hurt her; and annoyed her too. The sky full of wings and only the shepherds awake. That golden voice speaking and only a few fishermen there to hear;...

…whatever happens I’ll not be afraid again; for, when you’ve once pushed through the place of torment to the peace beyond, you know that you can do it again. You know there’s a strength somewhere...

Yet surely that story she had imagined was a real thing? If you created a story with your mind surely it was just as much there as a piece of needlework that you created with...

I mean, you may cause others a spot of bother by your weaknesses, perhaps, but coping with you may possibly increase their strength and sympathy. But if you sin deliberately, even if it seems only...

…The simple little words came easily, fitting themselves to the tune that had come out of the harpsichord. It didn’t seem to her that she made them up at all. It seemed to her that...

Ferranti’s thoughts had been his. As before he had understood his remorse so now he understood the mental chains that had imprisoned him. The poor wretch could not move. Misery had become apathy and apathy...

It seemed to them dreadfully dangerous to put it into words like that, for lately the things they didn’t want to happen were the things that happened and the logic of this was that if...