Thomas Merton Quotes

Quotes about:

• The beginning of love is to let those we love be perfectly themselves, and not to twist them to fit our own image. Otherwise we love only the reflection of ourselves we find in them.

  Thomas Merton

  Relationship, Spiritual, Inspirational Love

  318 Copy quote

• Our job is to love others without stopping to inquire whether or not they are worthy. That is not our business and, in fact, it is nobody's business. What we are asked to do is to love, and this love itself will render both ourselves and our neighbors worthy.

  Thomas Merton

  Love, Spiritual, Wisdom

  Thomas Merton (1976). “The Power and Meaning of Love”

  241 Copy quote
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  The greatest need of our time is to clean out the enormous mass of mental and emotional rubbish that clutters our minds

  Thomas Merton

  Wisdom, Emotional, Mind

  Thomas Merton (2009). “Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander”, p.72, Image

  183 Copy quote

• My Lord God, I have no idea where I am going. I do not see the road ahead of me. I cannot know for certain where it will end. Nor do I really know myself, and the fact that I think that I am following Your Will does not mean that I am actually doing so. But I believe that the desire to please You does in fact please You. And I hope I have that desire in all that I am doing.

  Thomas Merton

  Faith, Believe, Inspiration

  Thomas Merton (2009). “Dialogues with Silence: Prayers & Drawings”, p.8, Harper Collins

  346 Copy quote

• You do not need to know precisely what is happening, or exactly where it is all going. What you need is to recognize the possibilities and challenges offered by the present moment, and to embrace them with courage, faith and hope.

  Thomas Merton

  Moving On, Faith, Courage

  Thomas Merton (2009). “Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander”, p.206, Image

  264 Copy quote

• In a world of noise, confusion and conflict it is necessary that there be places of silence, inner discipline and peace. In such places love can blossom.

  Thomas Merton

  Discipline, Confusion, Silence

  168 Copy quote

• To be grateful is to recognize the Love of God in everything He has given us - and He has given us everything. Every breath we draw is a gift of His love, every moment of existence is a grace, for it brings with it immense graces from Him. Gratitude therefore takes nothing for granted, is never unresponsive, is constantly awakening to new wonder and to praise of the goodness of God. For the grateful person knows that God is good, not by hearsay but by experience. And that is what makes all the difference.

  Thomas Merton

  Faith, Gratitude, Grateful

  182 Copy quote

• Nothing has ever been said about God that hasn't already been said better by the wind in the pine trees.

  Thomas Merton

  Wind, Tree, Forests

  109 Copy quote

• The rush and pressure of modern life are a form, perhaps the most common form, of contemporary violence. To allow oneself to be carried away by a multitude of conflicting concerns, to surrender to too many demands, to commit oneself to too many projects, to want to help everyone in everything, is to succumb to violence. The frenzy of our activity neutralizes our work for peace. It destroys our own inner capacity for peace. It destroys the fruitfulness of our own work, because it kills the root of inner wisdom which makes work fruitful.

  Thomas Merton

  Roots, Demand, Want

  94 Copy quote

• In Silence God ceases to be an object and becomes an experience.

  Thomas Merton

  Silence, Objects, Cease

  104 Copy quote

• People may spend their whole lives climbing the ladder of success only to find, once they reach the top, that the ladder is leaning against the wrong wall.

  Thomas Merton

  Wall, Climbing, People

  153 Copy quote

• When you see God in everyone, then they see God in you.

  Thomas Merton

  Grace

  52 Copy quote

• No one is so wrong as the man who knows all the answers.

  Thomas Merton

  Men, Answers, He Man

  Thomas Merton (2012). “On Eastern Meditation”, p.16, New Directions Publishing

  18 Copy quote

• Love is our true destiny. We do not find the meaning of life by ourselves alone - we find it with another.

  Thomas Merton

  Love, Valentines Day, Fate

  Thomas Merton (1979). “Love and Living”, p.32, Macmillan

  191 Copy quote

• We are not converted only once in our lives but many times and this endless series of conversions and inner revolutions leads to our transformation.

  Thomas Merton

  Revolution, Transformation, Endless

  41 Copy quote

• Let us come alive to the splendor that is all around us and see the beauty in ordinary things.

  Thomas Merton

  Ordinary, Alive, Ordinary Things

  47 Copy quote

• ‎"Our job is to love others without stopping to inquire whether or not they are worthy.

  Thomas Merton

  Jobs, Stopping, Worthy

  Thomas Merton (1976). “Disputed Questions”, p.143, Macmillan

  178 Copy quote

• The sky is my prayer, the birds are my prayer, the wind in the trees is my prayer, for God is all in all.

  Thomas Merton

  Prayer, Wind, Sky

  Thomas Merton (2011). “Thoughts In Solitude”, p.107, Macmillan

  20 Copy quote

• Before we can realize who we really are, we must become conscious of the fact that the person we think we are, here and now, is at best an impostor and a stranger.

  Thomas Merton

  Thinking, Awakening, Facts

  "The New Man".

  62 Copy quote

• Do not look for rest in any pleasure, because you were not created for pleasure: you were created for joy. And if you do not know the difference between pleasure and joy you have not yet begun to live.

  Thomas Merton

  Journey, Differences, Joy

  Thomas Merton (2007). “New Seeds of Contemplation”, New Directions Publishing

  75 Copy quote

• To say that I am made in the image of God is to say that love is the reason for my existence, for God is love. Love is my true identity. Selflessness is my true self. Love is my true character. Love is my name.

  Thomas Merton

  Love, Life, Wisdom

  Thomas Merton (2007). “New Seeds of Contemplation”, p.60, New Directions Publishing

  51 Copy quote

• Instead of hating the people you think are war-makers, hate the appetites and disorder in your own soul, which are the causes of war. If you love peace, then hate injustice, hate tyranny, hate greed - but hate these things in yourself, not in another.

  Thomas Merton

  Peace, Hate, War

  245 Copy quote

• Pride makes us artificial and humility makes us real.

  Thomas Merton

  Inspirational, Wisdom, Fake People

  Thomas Merton (2005). “No Man is an Island”, p.119, Shambhala Publications

  74 Copy quote

• Our real journey in life is interior.

  Thomas Merton

  Real, Journey, Conformity

  Thomas Merton (1975). “The Asian Journal of Thomas Merton”, p.296, New Directions Publishing

  18 Copy quote

• When we are alone on a starlit night, when by chance we see the migrating birds in autumn descending on a grove of junipers to rest and eat; when we see children in a moment when they are really children, when we know love in our own hearts; or when, like the Japanese poet, Basho, we hear an old frog land in a quiet pond with a solitary splash - at such times the awakening, the turning inside out of all values, the "newness," the emptiness and the purity of vision that make themselves evident, all these provide a glimpse of the cosmic dance.

  Thomas Merton

  Life, Children, Heart

  42 Copy quote

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