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The bread you store up belongs to the hungry the cloak that lies in your chest belongs to the naked the gold you have hidden in the ground belongs to the poor.

Saint Basil

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Saint Basil
Bishop
Catholic Deacon
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Caesarea Mazaca
Saint Basil the Great
Basilius Magnus
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More quotes by Saint Basil

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When someone steals a person's clothes, we call him a thief. Should we not also give the same name to the one who could clothe the naked but does not?
Saint Basil
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If every man took only what was sufficient for his needs, leaving the rest to those in want, there would be no rich and no poor.
Saint Basil
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Science which is acquired unwillingly, soon disappears that which is instilled into the mind in a pleasant and agreeable manner, is more lasting.
Saint Basil
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Do not despise the fish because they are absolutely unable to speak or to reason, but fear lest you may be even more unreasonable than they by resisting the command of the Creator. Listen to the fish, who through their actions all but utter this word: 'We set out on this long journey for the perpetuation of our species.
Saint Basil
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Indulging in unrestrained and immoderate laughter is a sign of intemperance, of a want of control over one's emotions, and of failure to repress the soul's frivolity by a stern use of reason.
Saint Basil
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If everyone would take only according to his needs and would leave the surplus to the needy, no one would be rich, no one poor, no one in misery.
Saint Basil
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Reprimand and rebuke should be accepted as healing remedies for vice and as conducive to good health. From this it is clear that those who pretend to be tolerant because they wish to flatter---those who thus fail to correct sinners---actually cause them to suffer supreme loss and plot the destruction of that life which is their true life.
Saint Basil
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What is the mark of love for your neighbor? Not to seek what is for your own benefit, but what is for the benefit of the one loved, both in body and in soul.
Saint Basil
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Strive to attain to the greater virtues, but do not neglect the lesser ones. Do not make light of a fall even if it be the most venial of faults rather, be quick to repair it by repentance, although many others may commit a large number of faults, slight and grievous, and remain unrepentant.
Saint Basil
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Do not, as is usually the case, thrust the care of the common weal upon your neighbor then, as each one in his own thoughts makes light of the matter, all find to their surprise that they have drawn upon themselves by their neglect a personal misfortune.
Saint Basil
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Resolve to treat the things in your possession as belonging to others.
Saint Basil
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Do not measure your loss by itself if you do, it will seem intolerable but if you will take all human affairs into account you will find that some comfort is to be derived from them.
Saint Basil
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What is the benefit of fasting in our body while filling our souls with innumerable evils? He who does not play at dice, but spends his leisure otherwise, what nonsense does he not utter? What absurdities does he not listen to? Leisure without the fear of God is, for those who do not know how to use time, the teacher of wickedness.
Saint Basil
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We should not think that we achieve success in preaching through our own devices, but we should rely entirely on God.
Saint Basil
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Good masters teach good doctrine, but that taught by evil masters is wholly evil.
Saint Basil
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I reckon silence more profitable than speech, for? in the words of the Preacher, 'The words of wise men are heard in quiet' (Eccles. 9:17).
Saint Basil
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The human being is an animal who has received the vocation to become God.
Saint Basil
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As the pilot of a vessel is tried in the storm as the wrestler is tried in the ring, the soldier in the battle, and the hero in adversity: so is the Christian tried in temptation.
Saint Basil
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It is impious to say that evil has its origin from God, because naught contrary is produced by the contrary. Life does not generate death, nor is darkness the beginning of light, nor is disease the maker of health, but in the changes of conditions there are transitions from one condition to the contrary.
Saint Basil
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You can see that a city is prosperous by the wealth of goods for sale in the market. Land too we call prosperous if it bears rich fruit. And so also the soul may be counted prosperous if it is full of good works of every kind.
Saint Basil