The Practice of the Presence of God, Brother Lawrence

“When I apply myself to prayer, I feel all my spirit and all my soul lift itself up without any care or effort of mine, and it continues as it were suspended and firmly fixed in God, as in its center and place of rest.”

“There is not in this world a kind of life more sweet and delightful than that of a continual conversation with God. Those only can comprehend it who practice and experience it.”

“When we are faithful to keep ourselves in His holy presence, and set Him always before us, this not only hinders our offending Him and doing anything that may displease Him, at least willfully, but it also begets in us a holy freedom, and, if I may so speak, a familiarity with God, wherewith we ask, and that successfully, the graces we stand in need of.”

“Let us think often that our only business in this life is to please God, and that all besides is but folly and vanity.”

“We are to be pitied, who content ourselves with so little. God has infinite treasure to bestow, but we hinder God and stop the current of His graces….We often stop this torrent by the little value we set upon it.”

“Since by His mercy He gives us still a little time, let us begin in earnest; let us repair the lost time; let us return with a full assurance to the Father of mercies, who is always ready to receive us affectionately.”

“Above all, get a habit of entertaining yourself often with God, and forget Him the least you can.”

“After having given myself wholly to God, that He might take away my sin, I renounced, for the love of Him, everything that was not He, and I began to live as if there was none but He and I in the world.”

“I do not say that we must put any violent constraints upon ourselves. No, we must serve God in a holy freedom; we must do our business faithfully, without trouble or disquietude, recalling our mind to God mildly, and with tranquility, as often as we find it wandering from Him.”

“Accustom yourself, then, by degrees thus to worship Him, to beg His grace, to offer Him your heart from time to time in the midst of your business, even every moment, if you can. Do not scrupulously confine yourself to certain rules, or particular forms of devotion, but act with a general confidence in God, with love and humility.”

“If we do what we can on our parts, we shall soon see the change in us we aspire after.”

“Let all our employment be to know God; the more one knows Him, the more one desires to know Him.”

“We must know before we can love. In order to know God, we must often think of Him; and when we come to love Him, we shall also think of Him often, for our heart will be with our treasure.”