“SPIRITUAL EXERCISES whereby to conquer oneself, and order one’s life, without being influenced in one’s decision by any inordinate affection.”

Occupy yourself in beholding and bewailing your own imperfections rather than contemplating the imperfections of others.

If, one day, I should offend God in any way, or grow remiss, though ever so little, in that which concerns His holy service and glory, I solemnly implore Him, rather let me die.

Whatever you are doing, that which makes you feel the most alive…that is where God is.

The principal end both of my father and of myself in the conquest of India has been the propagation of the holy Catholic faith.

So with that will prompt and prepared to serve all those whom I perceive to be servants of my Lord, I will speak of three things with simplicity and love as if I were speaking to my own soul.

True, I am in love with suffering, but I do not know if I deserve the honor.

Love ought to show itself in deeds more than in words.

Receive, Lord, all my liberty, my memory, my understanding and my whole will.

For those who believe, no proof is necessary. For those who disbelieve, no amount of proof is sufficient.

It is not hard to obey when we love the one whom we obey.

One must wage war against his predominant passion and not retreat until, with God’s help, he has been victorious.

God inclines to shower His graces upon us, but our perverted will is a barrier to His generosity.

Laugh and grow strong.

If anyone asks you for something that you believe would be injurious to him, refuse, but in such a manner as not to lose his good-will.

All the things in this world are gifts of God, created for us, to be the means by which we can come to know him better, love him more surely, and serve him more faithfully.

For those who love, nothing is too difficult, especially when it is done for the love of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Though the human heart may have to pause for rest when climbing the heights of affection it rarely stops on the slippery slope of hatred.

The most affectionate creature in the world is a wet dog.

Dogs are indeed the most social, affectionate, and amiable animals of the whole brute creation.

All our “most sacred affections ” are merely prosaic habit.

Four sweet lips, two pure souls, and one undying affection, – these are love’s pretty ingredients for a kiss.

It is the passion that is in a kiss that gives to it its sweetness; it is the affection in a kiss that sanctifies it.

We give our best affections to the beautiful, only our second best to the useful.

We need truth to grow in the same way that we need vitamins, affection and love.