“So far from being able to answer for my sins, I cannot even answer for my righteousness!”

Love is alone sufficient by itself, it pleases by itself and for it’s own sake. It is itself a merit, and itself it’s own recompense. It seeks neither cause, nor consequences beyond itself. It is its own fruit, its own object and usefulness. I love because I love you, I love that I may love.

Prostrate, see Thy cross I grasp,And Thy pierced feet I clasp;Gracious Jesus, spurn me not;On me, with compassion fraught.

I have no other masters than the beeches and the oaks.

Let Thy glances fall.Thy cross of agony,My Beloved, look on me;Turn me wholly unto Thee;”Be thou whole,” say openly:”I forgive thee all.

It is no great thing to be humble when you are brought low; but to be humble when you are praised is a great and rare attainment.

It is a fault, not a virtue, to wish your humility recognized and applauded.

Believe one who has tried, you shall find a fuller satisfaction in the woods than in the books. The trees and the rocks will teach you that which you cannot hear from the masters.

Vines and trees will teach you that which you will never learn from masters.

Inordinate love for the flesh is cruelty, because under the appearance of pleasing the body, we kill the soul.

Learn first to love yourself, and then you can love me.

God will become visible as God’s image is reborn in you.

Love me, love my dog.

For I have learnt for a fact that nothing so effectively obtains, retains and regains grace, as that we should always be found not high-minded before God, but filled with holy fear.

Therefore gird yourselves manfully and take up joyful arms for the name of God.

If anyone makes himself his own master in the spiritual life, he makes himself scholar to a fool.

He won me over entirely by giving Himself entirely to me.

The central bank needs to be able to make policy without short term political concerns.

I want to still be able to garden while I can bend over.

The Bible’s purpose is to show you how God’s grace breaks into your life against your will and saves you from the sin and brokenness otherwise you would never be able to overcome…

I have never been able to understand why perfectly sensible people waste time being wittily obscure instead of just saying what they want and going on about their business.

When you realise that ugly typography never effaces itself, you will be able to capture beauty as the wise men capture happiness by aiming at something else.

Putting a label [homosexual] on myself was a big step forward…once I said, ‘Yes, that’s me, that’s what I am,’ I was able to work with it.

If all we are allowed is hours, minutes, I want to be able to etch each of them on to my memory with exquisite clarity so that I can recall them at moments like this, when my very soul feels blackened.

Once you start rewriting, you’re not able to stop. With each draft the fundamental banality and worthlessness of the material becomes more evident even as its vitality and spontaneity are drained from it.