Certain Quotes (page 83)
Thomas Aquinas said of suffering, as Aristotle had said of shame, that it was a thing not good in itself; but a thing which might have a certain goodness in particular circumstances. That is to say, if evil is present, pain at recognition of the evil, being a kind of knowledge, is relatively good.
C. S. Lewis
The door of the jail being flung open, the young woman stood fully revealed before the crowd. It seemed to be her first impulse to clasp the infant closely to her bosom that she might conceal a certain token which was wrought or fastened to her dress. In a moment, however, wisely judging that one token of her shame would but poorly serve to hide another, she took the baby on her arm, and, with a burning blush and yet a haughty smile, looked around at her townspeople and neighbors. On the...
Nathaniel Hawthorne
In sorting out my feelings and beliefs, there is, however, one piece of moral ground of which I am absolutely certain: if I were to be murdered I would not want my murderer executed. I would not want my death avenged. Especially by government--which can't be trusted to control its own bureaucrats or collect taxes equitably or fill a pothole, much less decide which of its citizens to kill.
Helen Prejean
Just curious. Like James and Victoria had been curious in the beginning? The thought of Victoria made me tremble, thought the one thing they seemed certain of was that it had not been her. Not this time. She would stick to her obsessed pattern. This was just someone else, a stranger.
Stephenie Meyer
The question of love is one that cannot be evaded. Whether or not you claim to be interested in it from the moment you are alive you are bound to be concerned with love because love is not just something that happens to you: It is a certain special way of being alive. Love is in fact an intensification of life a completeness a fullness a wholeness of life.
Thomas Merton
What is reasoning? It is the result of doing away with the vital distinction which separates subjectivity and objectivity. As a form of abstract thought reasoning is not profoundly dialectical enough; as an opinion and a conviction it lacks full-blooded individuality. But where mere scope is concerned, reasoning has all the apparent advantage; for a thinker can encompass his science, a man can have an opinion upon a particular subject and a conviction as a result of a certain view of life,...
Soren Kierkegaard
it was not a matter of miracles. It was not an expectation of miracles, frivolous in its impatience. Alyosha did not need miracles then for the triumph of certain convictions (it was not that at all), nor so that some sort of former, preconceived idea would quickly triumph over another...Again, it was not miracles he needed, but only a "higher justice," which, as he believed, had been violated--it was this that wounded his heart so cruelly and suddenly...it was justice, justice he thirsted...
Fyodor Dostoevsky