American clergyman (1813-1887)
If we are like Christ, we shall seek, not to absorb, but to reflect the light which falls upon others, and thus we shall become pure and spotless.
HENRY WARD BEECHER
Life Thoughts
Sin is sweet in the mouth and bitter in digestion. It lies hard on the stomach.
HENRY WARD BEECHER
Proverbs from Plymouth Pulpit
Our virtues are like crystals hidden in rocks. No man shall find them by any soft ways, but by the hammer and by fire.
HENRY WARD BEECHER
Proverbs from Plymouth Pulpit
It takes a man to make a devil.
HENRY WARD BEECHER
Proverbs from Plymouth Pulpit
It is defeat that turns bone to flint, gristle to muscle, and makes men invincible.
HENRY WARD BEECHER
Proverbs from Plymouth Pulpit
The mischiefs of anarchy have been equaled by the mischiefs of government.
HENRY WARD BEECHER
Proverbs from Plymouth Pulpit
When a nation's young men are conservative, its funeral-bell is already rung.
HENRY WARD BEECHER
Proverbs from Plymouth Pulpit
The poor man with industry is happier than the rich man in idleness.
HENRY WARD BEECHER
Proverbs from Plymouth Pulpit
There is in youth a purity of character which, when once touched and defiled, can never be restored; a fringe more delicate than frost-work, and which, when torn and broken, can never be re-embroidered.
HENRY WARD BEECHER
Proverbs from Plymouth Pulpit
Some men think that the globe is a sponge that God puts into their hands to squeeze for their own garden or flower-pot.
HENRY WARD BEECHER
Proverbs from Plymouth Pulpit
In friendship your heart is like a bell struck every time your friend is in trouble.
HENRY WARD BEECHER
Proverbs from Plymouth Pulpit
A lie always needs a truth for a handle to it, else the hand would cut itself which sought to drive it home upon another. The worst lies, therefore, are those whose blade is false, but whose handle is true.
HENRY WARD BEECHER
Life Thoughts
A week filled up with selfishness, and the Sabbath stuffed full of religious exercises, will make a good Pharisee, but a poor Christian. There are many persons who think Sunday is a sponge with which to wipe out the sins of the week. Now, God's altar stands from Sunday to Sunday, and the seventh day is no more for religion than any other. It is for rest. The whole seven are for religion, and one of them for rest.
HENRY WARD BEECHER
Life Thoughts
God does not refuse to make himself known to man. He only will not do it by the symbolism of matter. He comes to us at once by the most natural course. We are in a transient state; our bodies are accidental, and God comes to us by that which is higher and truer--the intuitions of the soul.
HENRY WARD BEECHER
Life Thoughts
I am suspicious of that church whose members are one in their beliefs and opinions. When a tree is dead, it will lie any way; alive, it will have its own growth. When men's deadness is in the church, and their life elsewhere, all will be alike. They can be cut and polished any way. When they are alive, they are like a tropical forest--some shooting up, like the mahogany tree; some spreading, like the vine; some darkling, like the shrub; some lying, herb-like, on the ground; but all obeying their own laws of growth--a common law of growth variously expressed in each--and so contributing to the richness and beauty of the wood.
HENRY WARD BEECHER
Life Thoughts
Life is a plant that grows out of death.
HENRY WARD BEECHER
Proverbs from Plymouth Pulpit
It is not the going out of port, but the coming in, that determines the success of a voyage.
HENRY WARD BEECHER
Proverbs from Plymouth Pulpit
There are crimes that, like frost on flowers, in one single night destroy character and reputation.
HENRY WARD BEECHER
Proverbs from Plymouth Pulpit
Well-married, a man is winged--ill-matched, he is shackled.
HENRY WARD BEECHER
Proverbs from Plymouth Pulpit
The mind has no kitchen to do its dirty work in while the parlor remains clean.
HENRY WARD BEECHER
Proverbs from Plymouth Pulpit