quotations about God
Man from his own existence knows the existence of a Creator; from his own attributes, he knows the attributes of his maker; from the control which he has over his own kingdom, he knows the control that God exercises over all the world.
MUHAMMAD AL-GHAZALI
The Alchemy of Happiness
He who looks for the worst in men will not be without belief in a personal devil; he who looks for the best in men will not be without faith in a personal God.
LYMAN ABBOTT
Seeking After God
These are thy glorious works Parent of Good,
Almighty, thine this universal Frame,
Thus wondrous fair; thy self how wondrous then!
Unspeakable, who sitst above these Heavens
To us invisible or dimly seen
In these thy lowest works, yet these declare
Thy goodness beyond thought, and Power Divine:
Speak ye who best can tell, ye Sons of light,
Angels, for ye behold him, and with songs
And choral symphonies, Day without Night,
Circle his Throne rejoicing, ye in Heav'n,
On Earth join all ye Creatures to extoll
Him first, him last, him midst, and without end.
JOHN MILTON
Paradise Lost
The Divinity is so great, and of such a character, that He both sees and hears all things, is omnipotent, and attends to all things at once.
XENOPHON
attributed, Day's Collacon
Gods die when they are forgotten.
NEIL GAIMAN
American Gods
God is a witness that cannot be sworn.
SAMUEL BECKETT
Watt
The life of God -- the life which the mind apprehends and enjoys as it rises to the absolute unity of all things -- may be described as a play of love with itself; but this idea sinks to an edifying truism, or even to a platitude, when it does not embrace in it the earnestness, the pain, the patience, and labor, involved in the negative aspect of things.
GEORG WILHELM FRIEDRICH HEGEL
The Phenomenology of Spirit
Man creates both his god and his devil in his own image. His god is himself at his best, and his devil himself at his worst.
ELBERT HUBBARD
The American Bible
But if God was in a continual vigilance, either there was something wanting to make him happy, or else his beatitude was perfectly complete; but according to neither of these can God be said to be blessed; not according to the first, for if there be any deficiency there is no perfect bliss; not according to the second, for, if there be nothing wanting to the felicity of God, it must be a needless enterprise for him to busy himself in human affairs. And how can it be supposed that God administers by his own providence human concerns, when to vain and trifling persons prosperous things happen, to great and high adverse?
PLUTARCH
"What is God?", Essays & Miscellanies
For the existence of any religion there must be a belief that there is, somewhere in the universe, an intelligence of a higher order than man's, and that this intelligence possesses a power superior to what we call the ordinary powers of nature. And religion is simply the condition or adjustment of the relations between each individual human soul and that higher intelligence, call it by what name you will.
ROSSITER JOHNSON
"The Whispering Gallery"
Try to comprehend the unity of all; there is one God, and all are one in Him. If we can but bring home to ourselves the unity of that Eternal Love, there will be no more sorrow for us; for we shall realize, not for ourselves alone but for those whom we love, that whether we live or die, we are the Lord's, and that in Him we live and move and have our being, whether it be in this world or in the world to come.
C. W. LEADBEATER
The Science of the Sacraments
All your Western theologies, the whole mythology of them, are based on the concept of God as a senile delinquent.
TENNESSEE WILLIAMS
The Night of the Iguana
To seek God within ourselves avails us far more than to look for Him amongst creatures.
TERESA OF AVILA
The Interior Castle
God, wishing His elect to realize their own misery, often temporarily withdraws His favours: no more is needed to prove to us in a very short time what we really are.
TERESA OF AVILA
The Interior Castle
If I were granted omnipotence, and millions of years to experiment in, I should not think Man much to boast of as the final result of all my efforts.
BERTRAND RUSSELL
Religion and Science
It makes a great deal of difference what sort of God men believe in.
HENRY WARD BEECHER
Proverbs from Plymouth Pulpit
Religion is ... being as much like God as man can be.
BENJAMIN WHICHCOTE
Moral and Religious Aphorisms
Each man enters into God so much as God enters into him.
HENRI-FREDERIC AMIEL
Journal Intime
God is able to do more than man can understand.
THOMAS À KEMPIS
Imitation of Christ
In reality, each thought we have carries with it a little spiritual power, a tug toward or away from God. No thought is purely neutral.
JOHN ORTBERG
God Is Closer Than You Think