Thomas Merton Quotes — Page 25

TM

Writer, Monk

Creative

“The peculiar grace of a Shaker chair is due to the fact that it was made by someone capable of believing that an angel might come and sit on it.”

Believe Angel Grace

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TM

Thomas Merton

Writer, Monk

Philosophical

“I would call the attention of the reader to the difference between "reason" and "reasoning." Reason is a light, reasoning a process. Reason is a faculty, reasoning an exercise of that faculty. Reasoning proceeds from one truth to another by means of argumentation. This generally involves the whole mind in labor and complexity. But reason does not exist merely in order to engage in reasoning. The process is a means to an end. The true fulfillment of reason as a faculty is found when it can embrace the truth simply and without labor in the light of single intuition.”

Mean Light Exercise

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Love

“Love is its own reward.”

Love Is Love You

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Funny

“Advertising treats all products with the reverence and the seriousness due to sacraments.”

Treats Advertising

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Love

“A tree gives glory to God by being a tree. For in being what God means it to be it is obeying [God]. It “consents,” so to speak, to [God's] creative love. It is expressing an idea which is in God and which is not distinct from the essence of God, and therefore a tree imitates God by being a tree”

Mean Wisdom Essence

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Spiritual

“Ultimately faith is the only key to the universe. The final meaning of human existence, and the answers to the questions on which all our happiness depends cannot be found in any other way.”

Keys Answers Finals

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Creative

“The least of the work of learning is done in classrooms.”

Done Learning

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Creative

“Charity is without fear: having given all that it has, it has nothing left to lose.”

Given Charity

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Philosophical

“Contradictions have always existed in the soul of [individuals]. But it is only when we prefer analysis to silence that they become a constant and insoluble problem. We are not meant to resolve all contradictions but to live with them and rise above them and see them in the light of exterior and objective values which make them trivial by comparison.”

Soul Light Silence

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Spiritual

“My God, I pray better to you by breathing and walking than by talking, just as in choir I sing best when I am thinking about something else, or better still, praying.”

Talking Praying Breathing

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Spiritual

“To desire Him to be merciful to us is to acknowledge Him as God. To seek His pity when we deserve no pity is to ask Him to be just with a justice so holy that it knows no evil and shows mercy to everyone who does not fly from Him in despair.”

Evil Wisdom Acknowledge Him

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Calm

“When you expect the world to end at any moment, you know there is no need to hurry. You take your time, you do your work well.”

World Needs Wisdom

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