Quotes by "John Henry Newman"

God has created me to do Him some definite service. He has committed some work to me which He has not committed to another. I have my mission. I may never know it in this life, but I shall be told it in the next. I am a link in a chain, a bond of connection between persons. He has not created me for naught. I shall do good; I shall do His work. I shall be an angel of peace, a preacher of truth in my own place, while not intending it if I do but keep His commandments. Therefore, I will trust Him, whatever I am, I can never be thrown away. If I am in sickness, my sickness may serve Him, in perplexity, my perplexity may serve Him. If I am in sorrow, my sorrow may serve Him. He does nothing in vain. He knows what He is about. He may take away my friends. He may throw me among strangers. He may make me feel desolate, make my spirits sink, hide my future from me. Still, He knows what He is about.

Good is never accomplished except at the cost of those who do it, truth never breaks through except through the sacrifice of those who spread it.

I shall drink to the Pope, if you please, still, to conscience first, and to the Pope afterwards.

If then a practical end must be assigned to a University course, I say it is that of training good members of society... It is the education which gives a man a clear, conscious view of their own opinions and judgements, a truth in developing them, an eloquence in expressing them, and a force in urging them. It teaches him to see things as they are, to go right to the point, to disentangle a skein of thought to detect what is sophistical and to discard what is irrelevant.

Let us act on what we have, since we have not what we wish.

In this world no one rules by love; if you are but amiable, you are no hero; to be powerful, you must be strong, and to have dominion you must have a genius for organizing.

We can believe what we choose. We are answerable for what we choose to believe.

Calculation never made a hero.

To live is to change, and to be perfect is to have changed often.

If we insist on being as sure as is conceivable... we must be content to creep along the ground, and never soar.

Evil has no substance of its own, but is only the defect, excess, perversion, or corruption of that which has substance.

A great memory does not make a mind, any more than a dictionary is a piece of literature.

A great memory is never made synonymous with wisdom, any more than a dictionary would be called a treatise.

Let us take things as we find them: let us not attempt to distort them into what they are not... We cannot make facts. All our wishing cannot change them. We must use them.

From the age of fifteen, dogma has been the fundamental principle of my religion: I know no other religion; I cannot enter into the idea of any other sort of religion; religion, as a mere sentiment, is to me a dream and a mockery.

Men will die upon dogma but will not fall victim to a conclusion.

If we are intended for great ends, we are called to great hazards.

The love of our private friends is the only preparatory exercise for the love of all men.

It is very difficult to get up resentment towards persons whom one has never seen.

There is such a thing as legitimate warfare: war has its laws; there are things which may fairly be done, and things which may not be done.