At the heart of every being lies creation’s dream of a principle that will one day give organic form to its fragmented treasures. God is unity.
PIERRE TEILHARD DE CHARDINAt the heart of every being lies creation’s dream of a principle that will one day give organic form to its fragmented treasures. God is unity.
PIERRE TEILHARD DE CHARDINI greatly enjoyed the Hawaiian Islands. They are a real little paradise in spite of the influx of Americans who have made it one of their most pleasant ‘centers of resort’.
PIERRE TEILHARD DE CHARDINThe problem of evil, that is to say the reconciling of our failures, even the purely physical ones, with creative goodness and creative power, will always remain one of the most disturbing mysteries of the universe for both our hearts and our minds.
PIERRE TEILHARD DE CHARDINFor ninety per cent of those who view him from outside, the Christian God looks like a great landowner administering his estates, the world. Now this conventional picture, which is too well justified by appearances, corresponds in no way to the dogmatic basis or point of view of the Gospels.
PIERRE TEILHARD DE CHARDINThe profoundly ‘atomic’ character of the universe is visible in everyday experience, in raindrops and grains of sand, in the hosts of the living, and the multitude of stars; even in the ashes of the dead.
PIERRE TEILHARD DE CHARDINFor me, the real earth is that chosen part of the universe, still almost universally dispersed and in course of gradual segregation, but which is little by little taking on body and form in Christ.
PIERRE TEILHARD DE CHARDINNeither the Christian attitude of love for all mankind nor humane hopes for an organized society must cause us to forget that the ‘human stratum’ may not be homogeneous.
PIERRE TEILHARD DE CHARDINIs evolution a theory, a system, or an hypothesis? It is much more: it is a general condition to which all theories, all hypotheses, all systems must bow and which they must satisfy henceforward if they are to be thinkable and true.
PIERRE TEILHARD DE CHARDINEverywhere on Earth, at this moment, in the new spiritual atmosphere created by the appearance of the idea of evolution, there float, in a state of extreme mutual sensitivity, love of God and faith in the world: the two essential components of the Ultra-human.
PIERRE TEILHARD DE CHARDINDeep down, there is in the substance of the cosmos a primordial disposition, sui generis, for self-arrangement and self-involution.
PIERRE TEILHARD DE CHARDINHow great is the mystery of the first cells which were one day animated by the breath of our souls! How impossible to decipher the welding of successive influences in which we are forever incorporated! In each one of us, through matter, the whole history of the world is in part reflected.
PIERRE TEILHARD DE CHARDINHowever far back I go into my childhood, nothing seems to me more characteristic of, or more familiar in, my interior economy than the appetite or irresistible demand for some ‘Unique all-sufficing and necessary reality.’
PIERRE TEILHARD DE CHARDINWe have but one permanent home: heaven – that’s still the old truth that we always have to re-learn – and it’s only through the impact of sad experiences that we assimilate it.
PIERRE TEILHARD DE CHARDINMan the individual consoles himself for his passing with the thought of the offspring or the works which he leaves behind.
PIERRE TEILHARD DE CHARDINIf there is one thing I fear less than everything else, it is, I believe, persecution for my opinions.
PIERRE TEILHARD DE CHARDINThe world is round so that friendship may encircle it.
PIERRE TEILHARD DE CHARDIN