He who has felt his own ruin will not imagine the case of any to be hopeless; nor will he think them too fallen to be worthy his regard.
Interpretation
Acknowledging one's own failures allows for empathy towards others' struggles.
This quote by Charles Spurgeon emphasizes that having experienced personal failure enables an individual to recognize that others, no matter how low they may seem to have fallen, are still deserving of hope and compassion. It speaks to the value of humility and understanding, suggesting that one's own trials can inform a deeper connection to the hardships faced by others.
In practice
In a motivational speech to inspire those who have faced setbacks.
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.
If a person's basic state of mind is serene and calm, then it is possible for this inner peace to overwhelm a painful physical experience. On the other hand, if someone is suffering from depression, anxiety, or any form of emotional distress, then even if he or she happens to be enjoying physical comforts, he will not really be able to experience the happiness that these could bring.
Why should we be in such desperate haste to succeed, and in such desperate enterprises? If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer.
Scarcely any degree of judgment is sufficient to restrain the imagination from magnifying that on which it is long detained
All makers must leave room for the acts of the spirit. But they have to work hard and carefully, and wait patiently, to deserve them.
Thinking cannot be clear until it has had expression-we must write, or speak, or act our thoughts, or they will remain in half torpid form. Our feelings must have expression, or they will be as clouds, which, till they descend in rain, will never bring up fruit or flowers. So it is with all the inward feelings; expression gives them development-thought is the blossom; language is the opening bud; action the fruit behind it.
How lucky Adam was. He knew when he said a good thing, nobody had said it before.
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