Lightness, jesting, and joking, can only be indulged at the expense of barrenness of soul, and the loss of the favor of God.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
All earthly delights are sweeter in expectation than in enjoyment; but all spiritual pleasures more in fruition than in expectation.
All the dark, malevolent Passions of the Soul are roused and exerted; its mild and amiable affections are suppressed; and with them, virtuous Principles are laid prostrate.
Unless we form the habit of going to the Bible in bright moments as well as in trouble, we cannot fully respond to its consolations because we lack equilibrium between light and darkness.
Thoughtful lightness can make frivolity seem dull and heavy.
It is better to light a candle than curse the darkness.
In faith there is enough light for those who want to believe and enough shadows to blind those who don't.
Help us to be ever faithful gardeners of the spirit, who know that without darkness nothing comes to birth, and without light nothing flowers.
Every Christian who strives for holiness of life experiences dryness of soul. It is to most people a heart-rending experience. It is a paradox, for the soul becomes confused when it realizes the harder it strives the further away Jesus seems to be.
A man can no more diminish God's glory by refusing to worship Him than a lunatic can put out the sun by scribbling the word, 'darkness' on the walls of his cell.
Now, God be praised, that to believing souls gives light in darkness, comfort in despair.