Deities Quotes - Page 4

• A sacred pride should grip us of not being satisfied with the mediocre but to strive (for we can do it, if we want to) with the exertion of all our strength to attain the highest. Let us scorn what is of this earth, let us ignore what is of heaven, let us leave absolutely everything worldly behind us in order to hasten to the abode out of this world, in the proximity of the sublime deity. We do not need to think of stepping back. Of being satisfied with second rank, let us strive for dignity and glory. To attain the highest.

  Giovanni Pico della Mirandola

  Pride, Thinking, Order

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• For the Deist ... prayer is calling across a void to a distant deity. This lofty figure may or may not be listening. He, or it, may or may not be inclined, or even able, to do very much about us and our world, even if he (or it) wanted to ... all you can do is send off a message, like a marooned sailor scribbling a note and putting it in a bottle, on the off-chance that someone out there might pick it up. That kind of prayer takes a good deal of faith and hope. But it isn't Christian prayer.

  N. T. Wright

  Christian, Prayer, Our World

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• The Old Testament teems with prophecies of the Messiah, but nowhere is it intimated that that Messiah is to stand as a God to be worshipped. He is to bring peace on earth, to build up the waste places--to comfort the broken-hearted, but nowhere is he spoken of as a deity.

  Olympia Brown

  Broken, Comfort, Earth

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• Self-righteousness and presumptive moral judgments pose a great danger in the political arena. To become convinced of the divine infallibility of one's personal predilections on a secular political issue is to play God, to assume to oneself the attributes of deity. It cultivates an arrogant intolerance of dissenting viewpoints and relegates one's political adversaries to the category of evil per se.

  Jim Wright

  Self, Play, Issues

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• I know that in many things I am not like others, but I do not know what I really am like. Man cannot compare himself with any other creature; he is not a monkey, not a cow, not a tree. I am a man. But what is it to be that? Like every other being, I am a splinter of the infinite deity, but I cannot contrast myself with any animal, any plant or any stone. Only a mythical being has a range greater than man's. How then can man form any definite opinions about himself?.

  Carl Jung

  Animal, Men, Tree

  Carl Gustav Jung (1973). “Memories, dreams, reflections”, Random House Inc

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• The explanation of types of structure in classes - as resulting from the will of the Deity, to create animals on certain plans - is no explanation. It has not the character of a physical law and is therefore utterly useless. It foretells nothing because we know nothing of the will of the Deity, how it acts and whether constant or inconstant like that of man.

  Charles Darwin

  Character, Men, Animal

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• When chaos is the god of an era, clamorous music is the deity's chief instrument.

  Ben Okri

  Eras, Chaos, Chiefs

  Ben Okri (2015). “Stars Of The New Curfew”, p.71, Random House

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• While brother Joseph was referring to the provinces of God, I was led to reflect that there is no act, no principle, no power belonging to the Deity that is purely philosophical. The birth of the Saviour was as natural as are the births of our children; it was the result of natural action. He partook of flesh and blood - was begotten of his Father, as we were of our fathers.

  Brigham Young

  Jesus, Brother, Children

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• The principle of love within us is an attribute of the Deity, and it is placed within us to be dispensed independently according to our own will.

  Brigham Young

  Principles, Attributes

  Brigham Young (1861). “Journal of Discourses”, p.16

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• As I toiled up the Mount of Olives, in the very footsteps of Christ, panting with the heat and the difficult ascent, I found it utterly impossible to conceive that the Deity, in human form, had walked there before me.

  Bayard Taylor

  Ascent, Olives, Heat

  Bayard Taylor (2015). “The Lands of the Saracen: Pictures of Palestine, Asia Minor, Sicily, and Spain”, p.67, The Floating Press

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• We should worship as though the deity were present.

  Confucius

  Worship, Should

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• Unbroken Evolution under uniform conditions pleased every one -- except curates and bishops; it was the very best substitute for religion; a safe, conservative practical, thoroughly Common-Law deity.

  Henry Adams

  Law, Bishops, Unbroken

  Henry Adams (2015). “The Education of Henry Adams”, p.222, Booklassic

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• Our hearts seemed safe in our breasts and sang to the Light The marrow in the bone We dreamed was safe. . . the blood in the veins, the sap in the tree Were springs of Deity.

  Edith Sitwell

  Spring, Heart, Light

  Dame Edith Sitwell (1952). “Selected Poems”

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• Blasphemy: a law to protect an all-powerful, supernatural deity from getting its feelings hurt.

  Ricky Gervais

  Hurt, Powerful, Law

  FaceBook post by Ricky Gervais from Jan 07, 2015

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• If God is watching us, as some believers suggest, as though we were a television show and God had a lot of free time, the deity would surely be bemused by how dumbed-down devotion has sometimes become in this so-called modern era. How might an omnipotent being with the long view of history respond to those who visit the traveling exhibit of a grilled-cheese sandwich, sold on eBay, that is said to bear the image of the Virgin Mary? It certainly argues against intelligent design, or at least intelligent design in humans.

  Anna Quindlen

  Intelligent, Cheese Sandwiches, Views

  "Frankincense In Aisle Five!". www.newsweek.com. December 25, 2005.

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• See, here's a shadow found; the human nature Is made th' umbrella to the Deity, To catch the sunbeams of thy just Creator; Beneath this covert thou may'st safely lie.

  Francis Quarles

  Lying, Shadow, May

  Francis Quarles (1777). “Emblems”, p.87

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• Music religious heat inspires, It wakes the soul, and lifts it high, And wings it with sublime desires, And fits it to bespeak the Deity.

  Joseph Addison

  Music, Religious, Wings

  Joseph Addison (1837). “The Tatler. The Guardian. The Freeholder. The Whig-examiner. The lover. Dialogues upon the usefulness of ancient medals. Remarks on several parts of Italy, etc. The present state of the war. The late trial and conviction of Count Tariff. The evidences of the Christian religion. Essay on Virgil's Georgics. Poems on several occasions. Translations from Ovid's Metamorphoses. Notes on some of the foregoing stories in Ovid's Metamorphoses. Poemata. Rosamond. Cato. The drummer”, p.425

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• If ever you come upon a grove of ancient trees which have grown to an exceptional height, shutting out a view of sky by a veil of pleached and intertwining branches, then the loftiness of the forest, the seclusion of the spot and your marvel at the thick unbroken shade in the midst of the open spaces, will prove to you the presence of deity.

  Seneca the Younger

  Space, Views, Sky

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• It is by far the most elegant worship, hardly excepting the Greek mythology. What with incense, pictures, statues, altars, shrines, relics, and the real presence, confession, absolution, - there is something sensible to grasp at. Besides, it leaves no possibility of doubt; for those who swallow their Deity, really and truly, in transubstantiation, can hardly find any thing else otherwise than easy of digestion.

  Lord Byron

  Real, Greek, Doubt

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• Only the gospel can truly save you. The gospel doesn't make good people good; it makes dead people alive. That's the difference between the gospel of Jesus Christ and every other world religion. All the others exhort their followers to save themselves by being good, by conforming their lives to whatever their worshiped deity is. But the gospel is God's acceptance of us based on what Christ has done, not on what we can do.

  Tullian Tchividjian

  Jesus, Acceptance, World Religions

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• There Is No God. This negation must be understood solely to affect a creative Deity. The hypothesis of a pervading Spirit co-eternal with the universe remains unshaken.

  Percy Bysshe Shelley

  Creative, Spirit, Hypothesis

  Percy Bysshe Shelley, Donald H. Reiman, Neil Fraistat (2004). “The Complete Poetry of Percy Bysshe Shelley”, p.263, JHU Press

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• Physical science has taught us to associate Deity with the normal rather than with the abnormal.

  William Edward Hartpole Lecky

  Taught Us, Abnormal, Physical Science

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• Of all the major religions, or lack thereof, the atheist's is one of the best pretenders: his foundation for all existences, as well as moral behaviors for the permanent good of mankind, begins at science but ends at himself, the Napoleon complex of both intelligence and imagination. On the other hand the anti-theist wouldn't survive without a deity beyond himself to hunt. He doesn't pretend, he simply nullifies his own position.

  Criss Jami

  Atheist, Hands, Moral Behavior

  Criss Jami (2015). “Killosophy”, p.74, Criss Jami

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• Hubbard set up the Church of Scientology in Hollywood in 1954 for a reason. He understood that celebrity was increasingly a feature of American public life, and celebrities themselves were going to be worshipped as minor deities were in the ancient world. The idea was: if you could get them, think how many people would follow.

  Lawrence Wright

  Thinking, Ideas, People

  "Renowned journalist throws the book at Scientology". Interview with Daniel Burke, www.washingtonpost.com. January 31, 2013.

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• So when we call pain a problem, we claim we do not deserve it. We are even prepared to scuttle God to maintain our own innocence. We will say that God is not able to do what He would like, or He would never permit persons such as ourselves to suffer. That puffs up our egos and soothes our griefs at the same time. "How could God do this to me?" is at once an admission of pain and a soporific for it. It reduces our personal grief by eradicating the deity. Drastic medicine, indeed, that only a human ego, run wild, could possibly imagine.

  John Gerstner

  Running, Pain, Grief

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