Ambrose
Let your door stand open to receive Him, unlock your soul to Him, offer Him a welcome in your mind, and then you will see the riches of simplicity, the treasures of peace, the joy of grace. Throw wide the gate of your heart, stand before the sun of the everlasting light.Collection: God
No one heals himself by wounding another.Collection: Hurt
When we speak about wisdom, we are speaking about Christ. When we speak about virtue, we are speaking about Christ. When we speak about justice, we are speaking about Christ. When we speak about peace, we are speaking about Christ. When we speak about truth and life and redemption, we are speaking about Christ.Collection: Life
The devil tempts that he may ruin; God tests that he may crown.Collection: Devil
Prayer is the wing wherewith the soul flies to heaven, and meditation the eye wherewith we see God.Collection: Spiritual
Our own evil inclinations are far more dangerous than any external enemies.Collection: Faith
As in paradise, God walks in the Holy Scriptures, seeking man.Collection: Men
The rich man who gives to the poor does not bestow alms but pays a debt.Collection: Men
If someone offends you, don't tell anyone about it except your elder, and you will be peaceful. Bow to everyone, paying no attention whether they respond to your bow or not. You must humble yourself before everyone and consider yourself the worst of all. If we have not committed the sins that others have, perhaps this is because we did not have the opportunity - the situation and circumstances were different. In each person there is something good and something bad; we usually see only the vices in people and we see nothing that is good.Collection: Humble
Love is like a shadow, one can only catch it by falling into it.Collection: Love
And let them remember that prayer should accompany the reading of Sacred Scripture, so that God and man may talk together; for "we speak to Him when we pray; we hear Him when we read the divine saying."Collection: Prayer
The Lord was Baptized, not to be cleansed Himself, but to cleanse the waters, so that those waters, cleansed by the flesh of Christ which knew no sin, might have the power of Baptism.Collection: Water
In some causes silence is dangerous.Collection: Silence
The devil's snare does not catch you, unless you are first caught by the devil's bait.Collection: Devil
What is impossible to God? Not that which is difficult to His power, but that which is contrary to His nature.Collection: Saint
Do not desert a friend in time of need, nor forsake him nor fail him, for friendship is the support of life. Let us then bear our burdens as the Apostle has taught (cf. Gal. 6:2): for he spoke to those whom the charity of the same one body had embraced together. If friends in prosperity help friends, why do they not also in times of adversity offer their support? Let us aid by giving counsel, let us offer our best endeavors, let us sympathize with them with all our heart.Collection: Christian
If you have two shirts in your closet, one belongs to you and the other to the man with no shirt.Collection: Men
When we find ouselves in some grave danger we must not lose courage but firmly trust in God, for where there is the greatest danger, there is also the greatest help from Him who wants to be called our 'Help' in times of peace and in times of tribulation.Collection: Temptation
True repentance is to cease from sin.Collection: Sin
Remember, then, that you received a spiritual seal, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of knowledge and reverence, the spirit of holy fear. Keep safe what you received. God the Father sealed you, Christ the Lord strengthened you and sent the Spirit into your hearts as the pledge of what is to come.Collection: Spiritual
It is easier to look wise than to talk wisely.Collection: Wise
Your soul must hold fast to Him, you must follow after Him in your thoughts, you must tread His ways by faith, not in outward show.Collection: Faith
The Church's foundation is unshakable and firm against the assaults of the raging sea. Waves lash at the Church but do not shatter it. Although the elements of this world constantly batter and crash against her, she offers the safest harbor of salvation for all in distress.Collection: Sea
Law is twofold -- natural and written. The natural law is in the heart, the written law on tables. All men are under the natural law.Collection: Heart
When in Rome, do as the Romans do.Collection: Rome
... these three witnesses are one, as John said: 'The water, the blood, and the Spirit' (I Jn. 5:8). One in the mystery, not in nature. The water, then, is a witness of burial, the blood is a witness of death, the Spirit is a witness of life. If, then, there be any grace in the water, it is not from the nature of water, but from the presence of the Holy Spirit.Collection: Christian
But if these beings guard you, they do so because they have been summoned by your prayers.Collection: Prayer
The prime objective of all Initiatory music in the Temples of Antiquity was to bring about physical purification and renewal, mental stimulation and alertness, spiritual exhilaration and Illumination.Collection: Spiritual
It is ingrained in all living creatures, first of all, to preserve their own safety, to guard against what is harmful, to strive for what is advantageous.Collection: Safety
... the Apostle Paul says that we are sealed in the Spirit (cf. Eph. 1:13); since we have in the Son the image of the Father, and in the Spirit the seal of the Son. Let us, then, sealed by this Trinity, take more diligent heed, lest either levity of character or the deceit of any unfaithfulness unseal the pledge which we have received in our hearts.Collection: Christian
The emperor is in the Church, not about the Church.Collection: Government
The body should be bedecked naturally and without affectation, with simplicity, with neglect rather than nicety, not with costly and dazzling apparel, but with ordinary clothes, so that nothing be lacking to honesty and necessity, yet nothing be added to increase its beauty.Collection: Honesty
We do not innovate anything ... How is it that novelties are introduced which were never even thought of by our predecessors?Collection: Catholic
What will you do if your product still further increases next year? You should then destroy again the warehouses which you are now preparing to build, and build bigger. For the reason why God has given you fruitful harvests is that He might either overcome your avarice or condemn it; wherefore you can have no excuse. But you keep for yourself what He wished to be produced through you for the benefit of many - nay, rather, you rob even yourself of it, since you would better preserve it for yourself if you distributed it to others.Collection: Years
When I am at Rome I fast as the Romans do; when I am at Milan I do not fast. So likewise you, whatever church you come to, observe the custom of the place, if you would neither give offence to others, nor take offence from them.Collection: Rome
... the Apostle Peter declared that the Church was built by the Holy Spirit. For you read that he said: 'God, Who knows the hearts of men, bore witness, giving them the Holy Spirit, even as was given to us; and He made no distinction between us and them, purifying their hearts by faith' (Acts 15:8-9). In which is to be considered, that as Christ is the Cornerstone, Who joined together both peoples into one, so, too, the Holy Spirit made no distinction between the hearts of each people, but united them.Collection: Christian
Dice have their laws, which the courts of justice cannot undo.Collection: Law
When you are at Rome, live as Romans live.Collection: Rome
When in Rome, live in the Roman way.Collection: Rome
The wise man does nothing but what can be done openly and without falseness, nor does he do anything whereby he may involve himself in any wrong-doing, even where he may escape notice. For he is guilty in his own eyes before being so in the eyes of others; and the publicity of his crime does not bring him more shame than his own consciousness of it.Collection: Wise
... the Lord Jesus said, 'To those who are in bonds, Come out, and to those who are in prison, Go forth' (Isa. 49:9); so your sins are forgiven. All, then, are forgiven, nor is there any one whom He has not loosed. For thus it is written, that He has forgiven 'all transgressions, doing away with the handwriting of the ordinance that was against us' (Col. 2:13-14). Why, then, do we hold the bonds of others, while we enjoy our own remission? He, who forgave all, required of all that what every one remembers to have been forgiven to himself, he also should forgive others.Collection: Christian
It is not the ambassador, it is not the messenger, but the Lord Himself that saveth His people. The Lord remaineth alone, for no man can be partner with God in forgiving sins; this office belongs solely to Christ, who taketh away the sins of the world.Collection: Men
Just as riches are an impediment to virtue in the wicked, so in the good they are an aid of virtue.Collection: Wicked
For how can we adopt those things which we do not find in the holy Scriptures?Collection: Scripture
When I go to Rome, I fast on Saturday, but in Milan I do not. Do you also follow the custom of whatever church you attend, if you do not want to give or receive scandal.Collection: Rome
Unless a man be born again of water and the Holy Spirit he cannot enter the kingdom of God. No one is excepted, not [even] the infant.Collection: Men
It is Peter himself that He says, 'You are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my Church.' Where Peter is, there is the Church. And where the Church, no death is there, but life eternal.Collection: Rocks
...Now since you are celebrating the holy Pascha, you should know, brethren, what the Pascha is. Pascha means the crossing-over, and so the Festival is called by this name. For it was on this day that the Children of Israel crossed over out of Egypt, and the Son of God crossed over from this world to His Father. What gain is it to celebrate unless you imitate Him Whom you worship; that is, unless you cross over from Egypt, that is, from the darkness of evildoing to the light of virtue, from the love of this world to the love of your heavenly home?Collection: Children
Stephen prayed for his persecutors, who had not been able even to listen to the Name of Christ, when he said of those very men by whom he was being stoned: "Lord, lay not this sin to their charge" And we see the result of this prayer in the case of the Apostle, for Paul, who kept the garments of those who were stoning Stephen, not long after became an apostle by the grace of God, having before been a persecutor.Collection: Prayer