Howe'er it be, it seems to me 'Tis only noble to be good; And simple faith than Norman blood. The test of a strong, simple sermon is results, not the Sunday praise of the auditors, but their bettered lives during the week. People who pray on their knees on Sunday and prey on their neighbours on Monday, need simplicity in their faith. William George Jordan. Full apt are we to set before ourselves as the essence of life's bliss, the great things, the showy things, the noteworthy things, but therein are we beguiled, therein are we blinded. Greatness hath little to do with happiness. Malcolm J. McLeod. Methinks I love all common things, Save love; and will not that repay For all else fortune tears away? Bryan Waller Procter. Simplicity consists in a just medium, in which we are neither too much excited, nor too sedate; the soul is not carried away by external things, so as to be unable to reflect; neither does it make those continual references to self, which a jealous sense of its own excellence multiplies to infinity. That freedom of the soul which looks straight onward in its path, losing no time to reason upon its steps, to study them, or to dwell upon those which it has already taken, is true simplicity. Fénelon. Oh! could the faith of childhood's days, Oh! could its simple, joyous trust Be re-created from the dust That lies around a wasted life, The fruit of many a bitter strife! I pray the Lord my soul to keep." Eugene Henry Pullen. The true friend of truth and good loves them under all forms, but he loves them most under the most simple form. Lavater. Who is there that sets himself to the task of steadily watching his thoughts for the space of one hour, with the view of preserving his mind in a simple, humble, healthful condition, but will speedily discern in the multiform, self-reflecting, self-admiring emotions, which, like locusts, are ready to "eat up every green thing in his land," a state as much opposed to simplicity and humility as night is to day? M. A. Kelty. Her presence breathed in sweet excess A simple beauty in her face, And in her form a simple grace. She was so perfect and so fair, So like a vision, and so rare, The air that touched her seemed to me 1. Edgar Jones. If thou hadst simplicity and purity, thou wouldst be able to comprehend all things without error, and behold them without danger. The pure heart safely pervades not only heaven, but hell. Thomas à Kempis. Happy those early days, when I Before I taught my tongue to wound O how I long to travel back, And tread again that ancient track! |