Jeremy Taylor Quotes

O holy and ever-blessed Spirit, Who didst overshadow the holy Virgin, the mother of our Lord, and caused her to conceive by a miraculous and mysterious manner, be pleased to overshadow my soul, and enlighten my spirit, that I may conceive the holy Jesus in my heart, and may bear Him in my mind, and may grow up to the fulness of the stature of Christ, to be a perfect man in Christ Jesus. Amen.

The first things that hinders the prayer of a good man from obtaining its effects is a violent anger, and a violent storm in the spirit him who prayers.

...for there is some virtue or other to be exercised, whatever happens...

Let no man appropriate to his own use what God, by a special mercy, or the republic, hath made common; for that is both against justice and charity too; and by miraculous accidents, God hath declared his displeasure against such enclosure.

Upon the wings of fasting and alms holy prayer infallibly mounts up to heaven.

God is pleased with no music from below so much as in the thanksgiving songs of relieved widows, of supported orphans, of rejoicing, and comforted, and thankful persons.

God is in the bowels of thy brother; refresh them, when he needs it, and then you give your alms in the presence of God, and to God; and He feels the relief which thou providest for thy brother.

He that is choice of his time will be choice of his company, and choice of his actions.

Love is the greatest thing that God can give us; for himself is love; and it is the greatest thing we can give to God; for it will also give ourselves and carry with it all that is ours.

Her heart was a passion-flower, bearing within it the crown of thorns and the cross of Christ.

The sacraments and ceremonies of the gospel operate not without the concurrent actions and moral influences of the suscipient.

The Holy Ghost is certainly the best preacher in the world, and the words of Scripture the best sermons.

...since God has appointed one remedy for all the evils in the world and that is a contented spirit.

By a daily examination of our actions we shall the easier cure a great sin, and prevent its arrival to become habitual. For to examine we suppose to be a relative duty, and instrumental to something else. We examine ourselves, that we may find out our failings and cure them; and therefore if we use our remedy when the wound is fresh and bleeding, we shall find the cure more certain and less painful.

But exhortations must prevail with their own proper weight, not by the passion of the speaker.