quotations about the soul
No soul that aspires can ever fail to rise; no heart that loves can ever be abandoned. Difficulties exist only that in overcoming them we may grow strong, and only those who have suffered are able to save.
ANNIE BESANT
Some Problems of Life
Taken as a whole, the universe is absurd. There seems an unalterable contradiction between the human mind and its employments. How can a soul be a merchant? What relation to an immortal being have the price of linseed, the fall of butter, the tare on tallow, or the brokerage on hemp? Can an undying creature debit "petty expenses," and charge for "carriage paid"?
WALTER BAGEHOT
Literary Studies
The attributes of the spirit which we term the soul, bear a perfect correspondence to the physical senses of the body. That is, the soul bears exactly the same relation to the spirit as the physical senses to the human brain. Thus we have the physical and the spiritual senses. The physical are simply a reflection of the spiritual; they are two halves of the same attribute--the internal and the external. We see the intelligence, the mind, which at the back of the senses utilizes and tabulates the impressions it has received as the outer world, the world which it is itself powerless to penetrate. The mind is something above and beyond the senses, though it is absolutely dependent upon them. It is the same with the soul and the spirit. Evolve the states from within and without will take care of itself. Let us remember that the material life of man is only one second of his existence, and that it is one of the most unprofitable things in the world to be selfish. Purity is the great touchstone, and as Jesus has truly observed, "Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God."
WALTER MATTHEWS
"The Soul", Human Life from Many Angles
What use do I put my soul to? It is a serviceable question this, and should frequently be put to oneself. How does my ruling part stand affected? And whose soul have I now? That of a child, or a young man, or a feeble woman, or of a tyrant, of cattle or wild beasts.
MARCUS AURELIUS
Meditations
Every soul is a battlefield.
LYMAN ABBOTT
Problems of Life: Selections from the Writings of Rev. Lyman Abbott
For our soul is so preciously loved of him that is highest, that it over-passeth the knowing of all creatures.
JULIAN OF NORWICH
Sixteen Revelations of Divine Love
Reincarnation is essential to enable the soul to evolve to its Divine right.
R. F. GOUDEY
Reincarnation: A Universal Truth
There are apartments in the soul which have a glorious outlook; from whose windows you can see across the river of death, and into the shining city beyond; but how often are these neglected for the lower ones, which have earthward-looking windows.
HENRY WARD BEECHER
Life Thoughts
To sell your soul is the easiest thing in the world. That's what everybody does every hour of his life. If I asked you to keep your soul -- would you understand why that's much harder?
AYN RAND
The Fountainhead
And more than once in the course of time, the same theme reappears: among the mystics of the fifteenth century, it has become the motif of the soul as a skiff, abandoned on the infinite sea of desires, in the sterile field of cares and ignorance, among the mirages of knowledge, amid the unreason of the world -- a craft at the mercy of the sea's great madness, unless it throws out a solid anchor, faith, or raises its spiritual sails so that the breath of God may bring it to port.
MICHEL FOUCAULT
Madness & Civilization
I'm a lost soul. We do wail.
ROGER ZELAZNY
Jack of Shadows
It is only God who can satisfy the soul.
HENRY WARD BEECHER
Proverbs from Plymouth Pulpit
Life is real! Life is earnest!
And the grave is not its goal;
Dust thou art, to dust returnest,
Was not spoken of the soul.
HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW
"A Psalm of Life"
Look how much the soul is better than the body; so much more grievous are the diseases of the soul than the griefs of the body.
DIOGENES
attributed, Day's Collacon
The soul is often hungrier than the body, and no shops can sell it food.
HENRY WARD BEECHER
Proverbs from Plymouth Pulpit
Dear Night! this world's defeat;
The stop to busy fools; care's check and curb;
The day of spirits; my soul's calm retreat
Which none disturb!
Christ's progress, and His prayer-time;
The hours to which high Heaven doth chime.
HENRY VAUGHAN
Silex Scintillans
I don't deserve a soul, yet I still have one. I know because it hurts.
DOUGLAS COUPLAND
The Gum Thief
The living soul of man, once conscious of its power, cannot be quelled.
HORACE MANN
Thoughts
The soul is the connecting link between God and man, and between the spirit and the flesh, and has its earthly abode in the blood or life.
VAN BRUNT WYCKOFF
attributed, Day's Collacon
We must never stop dreaming. Dreams provide nourishment for the soul, just as a meal does for the body.
PAULO COELHO
The Pilgrimage