Our misery is that we thirst so little for these sublime things, and so much for the mocking trifles of time and space.
Interpretation
We often desire trivial things instead of pursuing deeper, more meaningful experiences.
This quote highlights the paradox of human nature where individuals frequently seek temporary pleasures and superficial pursuits, neglecting the profound and sublime aspects of life that can provide true fulfillment and joy. It calls for a reevaluation of our priorities, encouraging us to yearn for deeper values rather than being distracted by insignificant, worldly matters.
In practice
In a motivational speech about personal growth and focusing on what truly matters.
Amusement should be used to do us good “like a medicine”: it must never be used as the food of the man...Many have had all holy thoughts and gracious resolutions stamped out by perpetual trifling. Pleasure so called is the murderer of thought. This is the age of excessive amusement: everybody craves for it, like a babe for its rattle.
When you see no present advantage, walk by faith and not by sight. Do God the honor to trust Him when it comes to matters of loss for the sake of principle.
It is far easier to fight with sin in public than to pray against it in private.
You will never glory in God till first of all God has killed your glorying in yourself.
After faith comes repentance, or, rather, repentance is faith's twin brother and is born at the same time.
["All the paths of the Lord are mercy and truth unto such as keep his covenant."] The original Hebrew word that has been translated "paths" means "well-worn roads' or "wheel tracks," such ruts as wagons make when they go down our green roads in wet weather and sink in up to the axles. God's ways are at times like heavy wagon tracks that cut deep into our souls, yet all of them are merciful.
Nothing puts a greater obstacle in the way of the progress of knowledge than thinking that one knows what one does not yet know.
When I examine myself and my methods of thought, I come to the conclusion that the gift of fantasy has meant more to me than any talent for abstract, positive knowledge.
In South Korea, they believe that when you turn 60, you've become a baby again and the rest of your life should be totally about joy and happiness, and people should leave you alone, and I just think that that's the height of intelligence.
Readers no longer need novelists to tell us what it's like to cross the world on a ship or fight a war. In the twenty-first century, we get that information in other ways. The thing that's still a mystery to us is the human heart. What we want is to understand people, what they're doing, and why they're doing it.
The Bible does not thrill; the Bible nourishes. Give time to the reading of the Bible and the recreating effect is as real as that of fresh air physically.
When we finally give up the struggle to find fulfillment "out there," we have nowhere to go but within. It is at this moment of total surrender that a new light begins to dawn.
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