Charles Williams Quotes

• Many promising reconciliations have broken down because while both parties come prepared to forgive, neither party come prepared to be forgiven.

  Charles Williams

  Forgiveness, Party, Broken

  56 Copy quote

• The strong hands of God twisted the crown of thorns into a crown of glory; and in such hands we are safe.

  Charles Williams

  Strong, Hands, Crowns

  24 Copy quote

• You can have money piled to the ceiling but the size of your funeral is still going to depend on the weather.

  Charles Williams

  Baseball, Rainy Day, Weather

  13 Copy quote

• The famous saying 'God is love', it is generally assumed, means that God is like our immediate emotional indulgence, not that the meaning of love ought to have something of the 'otherness' and terror of God

  Charles Williams

  Love, Mean, Emotional

  Charles Williams (2016). “He Came Down From Heaven”, p.11, Wipf and Stock Publishers

  11 Copy quote

• I think in order to move forward into the future, you need to know where you've been

  Charles Williams

  Moving, Thinking, Order

  12 Copy quote

• Unless devotion is given to the thing which must prove false in the end, the thing that is true in the end cannot enter.

  Charles Williams

  Devotion, Ends, Given

  Charles Williams (2016). “He Came Down From Heaven”, p.25, Wipf and Stock Publishers

  16 Copy quote

• It may be a movement towards becoming like little children to admit that we are generally nothing else.

  Charles Williams

  Children, Movement, May

  Charles Williams (2016). “Descent Into Hell”, p.50, Wipf and Stock Publishers

  9 Copy quote

• It is easier often to forgive than to be forgiven; yet it is fatal to be willing to be forgiven by God and to be reluctant to be forgiven by men

  Charles Williams

  Men, Forgiving, Easier

  Charles Williams (2016). “The Image of the City and Other Essays”, p.141, Wipf and Stock Publishers

  8 Copy quote

• Love was even more mathematical than poetry. It was the pure mathematics of the spirit.

  Charles Williams

  Spirit, Mathematics, Mathematical

  Charles Williams (2016). “Descent Into Hell”, p.65, Charles Williams

  8 Copy quote

• An hour's conversation on literature between two ardent minds with a common devotion to a neglected poet is a miraculous road to intimacy.

  Charles Williams

  Two, Mind, Literature

  Charles Williams (2016). “War in Heaven”, p.121, Wipf and Stock Publishers

  11 Copy quote

• Play and pray; but on the whole do not pray when you are playing and do not play when you are praying.

  Charles Williams

  Play, Praying, Whole

  13 Copy quote

• To forgive and to be forgiven are the two points of holy magnificence and holy modesty; round these two centres the whole doctrine of largesse revolves.

  Charles Williams

  Two, Forgiving, Doctrine

  Charles Williams (2016). “The Image of the City and Other Essays”, p.141, Wipf and Stock Publishers

  11 Copy quote

• The beginning of Christendom, is, strictly, at a point out of time. A metphysical trigonometry finds it among the spiritual Secrets, at the meeting of two heavenward lines, one drawn from Bethany along the Ascent of the Messias, the other from Jerusalem against the Descent of the Paraclete. That measurement, the measurement of eternity in operation, of the bright cloud and the rushing wind, is, in effect, theology.

  Charles Williams

  Spiritual, Clouds, Wind

  Charles Williams (2016). “The Descent of the Dove: A Short History of the Holy Spirit in the Church”, p.1, Wipf and Stock Publishers

  12 Copy quote

• It’s said that the shuffling of the cards is the earth, and the pattering of the cards is the rain, and the beating of the cards is the wind, and the pointing of the cards is the fire. That’s of the four suits. But the Greater Trumps, it’s said, are the meaning of all process and the measure of the everlasting dance.

  Charles Williams

  Rain, Fire, Wind

  Charles Williams (2016). “The Greater Trumps”, p.21, Wipf and Stock Publishers

  10 Copy quote

• The Divine Thing that made itself the foundation of the Church does not seem, to judge by his comments on the religious leadership of his day, to have hoped much from officers of a church.

  Charles Williams

  Leadership, Religious, Judging

  Charles Williams (2016). “Essential Writings in Spirituality and Theology”, p.86, Wipf and Stock Publishers

  5 Copy quote

• How can one bargain for anything that is worth while? And what else is worth bargaining for?

  Charles Williams

  Bargaining, Bargains

  Charles Williams (2016). “War in Heaven”, p.193, Charles Williams

  7 Copy quote

• The telephone bell was ringing wildly, but without result, since there was no-one in the room but the corpse.

  Charles Williams

  Bells, Rooms, Telephones

  Charles Williams (2016). “War in Heaven”, p.7, Wipf and Stock Publishers

  4 Copy quote

• It is as pleasant as it is unusual to see thoroughly good people getting their deserts.

  Charles Williams

  People, Desert, Unusual

  10 Copy quote

• The most he would do was to promise that the gates of hell should not prevail against it. It is about all that, looking back on the history of the Church, one can feel that they have not done.

  Charles Williams

  Promise, Church, Done

  Charles Williams (2016). “Essential Writings in Spirituality and Theology”, p.86, Wipf and Stock Publishers

  5 Copy quote

• You will all know that in the Middle Ages there were supposed to be various classes of angels. these hierarchized celsitudes are but the last traces in a less philosophical age of the ideas which Plato taught his disciples existed in the spiritual world.

  Charles Williams

  Spiritual, Plato, Philosophical

  Charles Williams (2016). “The Place of the Lion”, p.31, Wipf and Stock Publishers

  7 Copy quote

• Every contrition for sin is apt to encourage a not quite charitable wish that other people should exhibit a similar contrition.

  Charles Williams

  People, Wish, Quitting

  4 Copy quote

• "Nought usually comes at the beginning," Ralph said. "Not necessarily," said Sibyl. "It might come anywhere. Nought isn't a number at all. It's the opposite of number." Nancy looked up from the cards. "Got you, aunt," she said. "What about ten? Nought's a number there - it's part of ten." "Well, if you say that any mathematical arrangement of one and nought really makes ten - " Sibyl smiled. "Can it possibly be more than a way of representing ten?"

  Charles Williams

  Aunt, Opposites, Numbers

  4 Copy quote

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