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There are who mistake the spirit of pugnacity for the spirit of piety, and thus harbor a devil instead of an angel.

John Lancaster Spalding

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John Lancaster Spalding
Age: 76 †
Born: 1840
Born: June 2
Died: 1916
Died: August 25
Author
Biographer
Catholic Priest
Lebanon
Kentucky
Instead
Mistake
Spirit
Harbor
Harbors
Piety
Thus
Angel
Devil

More quotes by John Lancaster Spalding

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The innocence which is simply ignorance is not virtue.
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The able have no desire to appear to be so, and this is part of their ability.
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What we love to do we find time to do.
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As we can not love what is hateful, let us accustom ourselves neither to think nor to speak of disagreeable things and persons.
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Language should be pure, noble and graceful, as the body should be so: for both are vestures of the Soul.
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If a state should pass laws forbidding its citizens to become wise and holy, it would be made a byword for all time. But this, in effect, is what our commercial, social, and political systems do. They compel the sacrifice of mental and moral power to money and dissipation.
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Be watchful lest thou lose the power of desiring and loving what appeals to the soul this is the miser's curse this the chain and ball the sensualist drags.
John Lancaster Spalding
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Those who believe in our ability do more than stimulate us. They create for us an atmosphere in which it becomes easier to succeed.
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The doctrine of the utter vanity of life is a doctrine of despair, and life is hope.
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The highest strength is acquired not in overcoming the world, but in overcoming one's self. Learn to be cruel to thyself, to withstand thy appetites, to bear thy sufferings, and thou shalt become free and able.
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There are few things it is more important to learn than how to live on little and be therewith content: for the less we need what is without, the more leisure have we to live within.
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The important thing is how we know, not what or how much.
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In giving us dominion over the animal kingdom God has signified His will that we subdue the beast within ourselves.
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As a brave man goes into fire or flood or pestilence to save a human life, so a generous mind follows after truth and love, and is not frightened from the pursuit by danger or toil or obloquy.
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What we enjoy, not what we possess, is ours, and in labouring for the possession of many things, we lose the power to enjoy the best.
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There are faults which show heart and win hearts, while the virtue in which there is no love, repels.
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If thou wouldst be interesting, keep thy personality in the background, and be great and strong in and through thy subject.
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To cultivate the memory we should confide to it only what we understand and love: the rest is a useless burden for simply to know by rote is not to know at all.
John Lancaster Spalding
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The doubt of an earnest, thoughtful, patient and laborious mind is worthy of respect. In such doubt may be found indeed more faith than in half the creeds.
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If we attempt to sink the soul in matter, its light is quenched.
John Lancaster Spalding