'In order to preserve holy purity it is necessary to love it much, to distrust one's self, to be cautious with all-in a word, it is necessary to fear and to fly.'

St. Paul of the Cross

'Impurity of soul lies in its not functioning in accordance with nature. It is because of this that impassioned thoughts are produced in the intellect. The soul functions in accordance with nature when its passible aspects - that is, its incensive power and its desire - remain dispassionate in the face of provocations both from things and from the conceptual images of these things.
Impurity of body consists in the actual committing of sin.'

St. Maximos the Confessor

'The human ideal of continence, I mean that which is set forth by Greek philosophers, teaches that one should fight desire and not be subservient to it so as to bring it to practical effect. But our ideal is not to experience desire at all. Our aim is not that while a man feels desire he should get the better of it, but that he should be continent even respecting desire itself. This chastity cannot be attained in any other way except by God's grace. That was why he said "Ask and it shall be given you." This grace was received even by Moses, though clothed in his needy body, so that for forty days he felt neither thirst nor hunger. Just as it is better to be in good health than for a sick man to talk about health, so to be light is better than to discuss light, and true chastity is better than that taught by the philosophers. Where there is light there is no darkness. But where there is inward desire, even if it goes no further than desire and is quiescent so far as bodily action is concerned, union takes place in thought with the object of desire, although that object is not present.'

St. Clement of Alexandria

The pure soul is disengaged from matter, from earthly things, and from itself. . . That is why the saints ill-treated their body, that is why they did not grant it what it required, not even to rise five minutes later, to warm themselves, to eat anything that gave them pleasure. . . For what the body loses the soul gains, and what the body gains the soul loses.'

St. Jean Marie Baptiste Vianney

'The Virgin Mother, all pure and all white, will make her servants pure and white.'

St. Alphonsus Maria de Liguori

'A sacrifice is an action in which we offer to God some creature that is immolated, that is, destroyed in one manner or another to pay God the honor due to him and to recognize his sovereign dominion over all creatures. The thing immolated and destroyed in the sacrifice, called the victim, or host, is sacrificed and offered to God.'

St. Jean Baptiste de la Salle

'I am very pleased that you sometimes practice mortification of the mind and of the senses, but you must do so whenever occasions present themselves.'

St. Jean Baptiste de la Salle

'A Christian during the whole course of his life should, like unto Jesus, be on the cross. It would be an act of rashness to descend therefrom, since Jesus Christ did not descend, even when the Jєωs offered to believe in Him. The time for driving out the nails of His cross was only after death, there is then no time to extract the nails whilst we live, -- we must wait until our sacrifice is consummated: Non est tempus evellendi clavos."

St. Augustine

'To abstain from sinful actions is not sufficient for the fulfillment of God's law. The very desire of what is forbidden is evil.'

St. Jean-Baptiste de la Salle


Inspirational Quotes from the Saints