Evelyn Underhill Quotes

Recollection, the art which the practical man is now invited to learn, is in essence no more and no less than the subjection of the attention to the control of the will.

It is a lonely and arduous excursion, a sufficient test of courage and sincerity: for most men prefer to dwell in comfortable ignorance upon the lower slopes, and there to make of their obvious characteristics a drapery which shall veil the naked truth.

Contemplation does not mean abject surrender to every "mystical" impression that comes in. It is no sentimental aestheticism or emotional piety to which you are being invited: nor shall the transcending of reason ever be achieved by way of spiritual silliness.

True contemplation can only thrive when defended from two opposite exaggerations : quietism on the one hand, and spiritual fuss upon the other.

Wisdom is the fruit of communion; ignorance the inevitable portion of those who "keep themselves to themselves," and stand apart, judging, analysing the things which they have truly never known.

No nation is truly defeated which retains its spiritual self-possession. No nation is truly victorious which does not emerge soul unstained.

Meekness and temperance or as we may quite properly translate, Humility and Moderation, - the graces of the self forgetful soul - manifest not in some peculiar and supernatural spiritual manner, but in ordinary human nature.

As to the most prudent logicians might venture to deduce from a skein of wool the probable existence of a sheep; so you, from the raw stuff of perception, may venture to deduce a universe which transcends the reproductive powers of your loom.

Hence the most scientific classification is a rough-and-ready business at the best.

I have merely attempted to put the view of the universe and man's place in it which is common to all mystics in plain and untechnical language: and to suggest the practical conditions under which ordinary persons may participate in their experience.

Going forth into the bareness and darkness of this unwalled world of high contemplation, you will find stored for you, and at last made real, all the highest values, all the dearest and noblest experiences of the world of growth and change.

The redeeming character of Franciscan enthusiasm-it's ability to change, brace and expand the most unlikely spirits and impel them to exacting discipline and selfless work-are fully shown in her. (Angela of Fogligno).

The deeper your realisation of the plant in its wonder, the more perfect your union with the world of growth and change, the quicker, the more subtle your response to its countless sugestions; so much more acute will become your craving for Something More.

Even the power which lurks in every coal scuttle, shines in the electric lamp, pants in the motor-omnibus, declares itself in the ineffable wonders of reproduction and growth, is supersensual.

The mystics aim (Union with Reality) is not the suppression of life but it's intensification,