Henry Ward Beecher Quotes - Page 9

• Theology is but a science of applied to God. As schools change theology must necessarily change. Truth is everlasting, but our ideas of truth are not. Theology is but our ideas of truth classified and arranged.

  Henry Ward Beecher

  School, Ideas, Truth Is

  Henry Ward Beecher (1866). “Royal truths”, p.53

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• We sleep, but the loom of life never stops, and the pattern which was weaving when the sun went down is weaving when it comes up in the morning.

  Henry Ward Beecher

  Life, Good Morning, Time

  Henry Ward Beecher (1887). “Beecher : Christian Philosopher, Pulpit Orator, Patriot and Philantropist: A Volume of Representative Selections from the Sermons, Lectures, Prayers, and Letters of Henry Ward Beecher”

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• It is defeat that turns bone to flint; it is defeat that turns gristle to muscle; it is defeat that makes men invincible. Do not then be afraid of defeat. You are never so near to victory as when defeated in a good cause.

  Henry Ward Beecher

  Writing, Men, Victory

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• A man's character is the reality of himself; his reputation, the opinion others have formed about him; character resides in him, reputation in other people; that is the substance, this is the shadow.

  Henry Ward Beecher

  War, Character, Reality

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• A thoughtful mind, when it sees a Nation's flag, sees not the flag only, but the Nation itself; and whatever may be its symbols, its insignia, he reads chiefly in the flag the Government, the principles, the truths, the history which belongs to the Nation that sets it forth.

  Henry Ward Beecher

  Patriotic, Thoughtful, Government

  Henry Ward Beecher (1887). “Patriotic Addresses in America and England from 1850 to 1885, on Slavery, the Civil War and the Development of Civil Liberty in the United States”

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• The cynic is one who never sees a good quality in a man, and never fails to see a bad one. He is the human owl, vigilant in darkness and blind to light, mousing for vermin, and never seeing noble game.

  Henry Ward Beecher

  Failure, Men, Light

  Henry Ward Beecher (1845). “Lectures to Young Men, on Various Important Subjects”, p.113

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• When a man says that he is perfect already, there is only one of two places for him, and that is heaven or the lunatic asylum.

  Henry Ward Beecher

  Men, Two, Perfect

  Henry Ward Beecher (1871). “The Plymouth pulpit. Sermons preached in Plymouth church, Brooklyn”, p.310

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• Success is full of promise till one gets it, and then it seems like a nest from which the bird has flown.

  Henry Ward Beecher

  Success, War, Bird

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• I can forgive, but I cannot forget, is only another way of saying, I will not forgive. Forgiveness ought to be like a cancelled note - torn in two, and burned up, so that it never can be shown against one.

  Henry Ward Beecher

  Forgiveness, Spiritual, Two

  Henry Ward Beecher, Edna Dean Proctor (1860). “Life Thoughts: Gathered from the Extemporaneous Discourses of Henry Ward Beecher”, p.108

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• Badgered, snubbed and scolded on the one hand; petted, flattered and indulged on the other-it is astonishing how many children work their way up to an honest manhood in spite of parents and friends. Human nature has an element of great toughness in it.

  Henry Ward Beecher

  Children, Hands, Parent

  Henry Ward Beecher (1862). “Eyes and Ears”, p.78

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• That is true culture which helps us to work for the social betterment of all.

  Henry Ward Beecher

  Culture, Helping, Social Justice

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• Christianity works while infidelity talks. She feeds the hungry, clothes the naked, visits and cheers the sick, and seeks the lost, while infidelity abuses her and babbles nonsense and profanity. 'By their fruits ye shall know them.'

  Henry Ward Beecher

  Cheer, Clothes, Sick

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• It is not when the cable lies coiled up on the deck that you know how strong or how weak it is; it is when it is put to the test.

  Henry Ward Beecher

  Strength, Strong, Lying

  Henry Ward Beecher (1866). “Royal truths”, p.111

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• You are not called to be a canary in a cage. You are called to be an eagle, and to fly sun to sun, over continents.

  Henry Ward Beecher

  Opportunity, Eagles, Sun

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• Nothing dies so hard, or rallies so often as intolerance.

  Henry Ward Beecher

  War, Tolerance, Dies

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• Next to victory, there is nothing so sweet as defeat, if only the right adversary overcomes you.

  Henry Ward Beecher

  Sweet, Victory, Next

  Henry Ward Beecher (1858). “Life Thoughts”, p.62

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• The methods by which men have met and conquered trouble, or been slain by it, are the same in every age. Some have floated on the sea, and trouble carried them on its surface as the sea carries cork. Some have sunk at once to the bottom as foundering ships sink. Some have run away from their own thoughts. Some have coiled themselves up into a stoical indifference. Some have braved the trouble, and defied it. Some have carried it as a tree does a wound, until by new wood it can overgrow and cover the old gash.

  Henry Ward Beecher

  Running, Men, Sea

  "Life Thoughts, Gathered from the Extemporaneous Discourses of Henry Ward Beecher, by One of His Congregation". Book edited by Edna Dean Proctor, 1859.

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• Involved sentences, crooked, circuitous, and parenthetical, no matter how musically they may be balanced, are prejudicial to a facile understanding of the truth.

  Henry Ward Beecher

  Understanding, May, Matter

  Henry Ward Beecher (1872). “Lectures on preaching. 2. Author's ed”, p.251

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• It is a very good world for the purposes for which it was built; and that is all anything is good for.

  Henry Ward Beecher

  Purpose, World, Very Good

  Henry Ward Beecher (1866). “Royal truths”, p.20

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• As long as society is absolutely divided as milk is, the cream being at the top and the impoverished milk at the bottom, so long will society be unbalanced, and liable to be thrown into convulsions out of which will spring wars. A circulation throughout keeps it in health.

  Henry Ward Beecher

  Spring, War, Long

  Henry Ward Beecher, William Drysdale (1887). “Proverbs from Plymouth Pulpit”

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• Life would be a perpetual flea hunt if a man were obliged to run down all the innuendoes, inveracities, and insinuations and misrepresentations which are uttered against him.

  Henry Ward Beecher

  Running, Attitude, War

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• Love without faith is as bad as faith without love.

  Henry Ward Beecher

  Love, Without Love

  Henry Ward Beecher (1880). “Golden Gleams: From Rev. Henry Ward Beecher's Words and Works : Being a Choice Collection of Over 350 Extracts from the Latest Writings, Sermons, and Lectures of the Celebrated American Preacher and Author”

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• The best lessons a man ever learns are from his mistakes. It is not for want of schoolmasters that we are still ignorant.

  Henry Ward Beecher

  Mistake, Men, Ignorant

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• The cynic puts all human actions into two classes - openly bad and secretly bad.

  Henry Ward Beecher

  Class, Two, Action

  Henry Ward Beecher (1856). “Lectures to young men: on various important subjects”, p.115

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• It is not merely cruelty that leads men to love war, it is excitement.

  Henry Ward Beecher

  Love, War, Men

  Henry Ward Beecher (1873). “The Sermons of Henry Ward Beecher in Plymouth Church, Brooklyn”, p.111

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