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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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Saint Basil
Bishop
Catholic Deacon
Catholic Priest
Philosopher
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Theologian
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Caesarea Mazaca
Saint Basil the Great
Basilius Magnus
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Speech
Quiet
Silence
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More quotes by 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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Among irrational animals the love of the offspring and of the parents for each other is extraordinary because God, who created them, compensated for the deficiency of reason by the superiority of their senses.
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
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Many a man curses the rain that falls upon his head, and knows not that it brings abundance to drive away the hunger.
Saint Basil
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While we try to amass wealth, make piles of money, get hold of the land as our real property, overtop one another in riches, we have palpably cast off justice, and lost the common good. I should like to know how any man can be just, who is deliberately aiming to get out of someone else what he wants for himself.
Saint Basil
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We should not accept in silence the benefactions of God, but return thanks for them.
Saint Basil
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In truth, to know oneself seems to be the hardest of all things. Not only our eye, which observes external objects, does not use the sense of sight upon itself, but even our mind, which contemplates intently another's sin, is slow in the recognition of its own defects.
Saint Basil
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Just as we would have no need of the farmer's labor and toil if we were living amid the delights of paradise, so also we would not require the medical art for relief if we were immune to disease, as was the case, by God's gift, at the time of Creation before the Fall.
Saint Basil
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He who plants kindness gathers love.
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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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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The hairsplitting difference between formed and unformed makes no difference to us. Whoever deliberately commits abortion is subject to the penalty for homicide.
Saint Basil
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Beside each believer stands an Angel as protector and shepherd, leading him to life.
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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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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The sun penetrates crystal and makes it more dazzling. In the same way, the sanctifying Spirit indwells in souls and makes them more radiant. They become like so many powerhouses beaming grace and love around them.
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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Drunkenness, the ruin of reason, the destruction of strength, premature old age, momentary death.
Saint Basil
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The bread which you use is the bread of the hungry the garment hanging in your wardrobe is the garment of him who is naked the shoes you do not wear are the shoes of the one who is barefoot the acts of charity that you do not perform are so many injustices that you commit.
Saint Basil
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Lust hath these three companions: the first, blindness of understanding the second, hardness of heart the third, want of grace.
Saint Basil