Pious Quotes

• When people come to you for help, do not turn them off with pious words, saying, 'Have faith and take your troubles to God.' Act instead as though there were no God, as though there were only one person in the world who could help -- only yourself.

  Martin Buber

  People, World, Have Faith

  191 Copy quote

• Plenty of people want to be pious, but no one yearns to be humble.

  Francois de La Rochefoucauld

  Humble, People, Want

  8 Copy quote

• Volumes might be written upon the impiety of the pious.

  Herbert Spencer

  Might, Volume, Written

  Herbert Spencer (2016). “First Principles: Great Philosopher”, p.97, 北戴河出版

  10 Copy quote

  Show source

• With devotion's visage and pious action we do sugar o'er the devil himself.

  Thomas Fuller

  Hypocrisy, Devil, Hamlet And Ophelia

  9 Copy quote

• He was one of those men who, even in the years of peace, would have advised his congregation that while God may well be honored by the inflexibility of the pious, he might also be honored by the flexibility of the sensible.

  Thomas Keneally

  Men, Years, May

  Thomas Keneally (1993). “Schindler's List”, p.207, Simon and Schuster

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• Piety is not a goal but a means to attain through the purest peace of mind the highest culture.

  Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

  Mean, Goal, Mind

  17 Copy quote

• Not all human souls but only the pious ones are divine.

  Georg Hermes

  Soul, Divine, Humans

  7 Copy quote

• If you are unable to compete with the pious in their good
  deeds, compete with the sinful in their repentance.

  Ibn Rajab

  Religious, Islamic, Competition

  79 Copy quote

• The real problem is not why some pious, humble, believing people suffer, but why some do not.

  C. S. Lewis

  Pain, Real, Believe

  13 Copy quote

• A tyrant must put on the appearance of uncommon devotion to religion. Subjects are less apprehensive of illegal treatment from a ruler whom they consider god-fearing and pious. On the other hand, they do less easily move against him, believing that he has the gods on his side.

  Aristotle

  Atheist, Believe, Moving

  "Politics". Book by Aristotle. Book V, 1314b.39,

  27 Copy quote

  Show source

• Some persons think they have to look like a hedgehog to be pious.

  Billy Sunday

  Thinking, Looks, Hedgehogs

  "Billy Sunday, the Man and His Message: With His Own Words which Have Won Thousands for Christ".

  99 Copy quote

  Show source

• I write about situations that are common, universal might be more correct, in which my characters are involved and from which only faith can redeem them, though often the actual manner of the redemption is not immediately clear. They sin, but there is no limit to God's mercy and because this is important, there is a difference between not confessing in fact, and the complacent and the pious may not realize it.

  Graham Greene

  Character, Writing, Differences

  Graham Greene, Henry J. Donaghy (1992). “Conversations with Graham Greene”, p.38, Univ. Press of Mississippi

  8 Copy quote

  Show source

• Bernard always had a few prayers in the hall and some whiskey afterwards as he was rather pious.

  Daisy Ashford

  Prayer, Whiskey, Halls

  'The Young Visiters' (1919) ch. 3

  7 Copy quote

  Show source

• In every loving woman there is a priestess of the past - a pious guardian of some affection, of which the object has disappeared.

  Henri Frederic Amiel

  Love, Past, Affection

  53 Copy quote

• Incidentally, why was it that none of all the pious ever discovered psycho-analysis? Why did it have to wait for a completely godless Jew?

  Sigmund Freud

  Waiting, Analysis, Psycho

  Sigmund Freud, Oskar Pfister (1963). “Psycho-analysis and Faith: The Letters of Sigmund Freud & Oskar Pfister”

  9 Copy quote

  Show source

• But love, like the sun that it is, sets afire and melts everything. what greed and privilege to build up over whole centuries the indignation of a pious spirit, with its natural following of oppressed souls, will cast down with a single shove.

  Jose Marti

  Greed, Soul, Sun

  7 Copy quote

• Pious XII was too neutral to mention the gas chambers; decent people like my own family were turned into devils by crude Christianity.

  Lionel Blue

  People, Devil, Good Christian

  9 Copy quote

• My atheism, like that of Spinoza, is true piety towards the universe and denies only gods fashioned by men in their own image, to be servants of their human interests.

  George Santayana

  Atheist, Men, Insightful

  Soliloquies in England and Later Soliloquies "On My Friendly Critics" (1922)

  61 Copy quote

  Show source

• Piety does not mean that a man should make a sour face about things, and refuse to enjoy in moderation what his Maker has given.

  Thomas Carlyle

  Mean, Men, Doe

  Thomas Carlyle (1866). “On the Choice of Books. The inaugural address of Thomas Carlyle, Lord Rector of the University of Edinburgh. Reprinted from “the Times,” with additional articles, a memoir of the author, etc”, p.30

  7 Copy quote

  Show source

• Christian piety annihilates the egoism of the heart; worldly politeness veils and represses it.

  Blaise Pascal

  Christian, Heart, Veils

  8 Copy quote

• Man can and must prevent the tragedy of famine in the future instead of merely trying with pious regret to salvage the human wreckage of the famine, as he has so often done in the past.

  Norman Borlaug

  Regret, Past, Men

  Norman Ernest Borlaug (1971). “Mankind and Civilization at Another Crossroad”

  22 Copy quote

  Show source

• Love is swift, sincere, pious, joyful, generous, strong, patient, faithful, prudent, long-suffering, courageous, and never seeking its own; for wheresoever a person seeketh his own, there he falleth from love.

  Thomas a Kempis

  Love, Strong, Long

  9 Copy quote

• It is impossible for the man of pious reflection not to perceive in it [the Constitution] a finger of that Almighty hand which has been so frequently and signally extended to our relief in the critical stages of the revolution.

  James Madison

  Reflection, Men, Hands

  Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, John Jay (1842). “The Federalist, on the New Constitution, Written in the Year 1788”, p.166

  8 Copy quote

  Show source

• O my God, what must a soul be like when it is in this state! It longs to be all one tongue with which to praise the Lord. It utters a thousand pious follies, in a continuous endeavor to please Him who thus possesses it.

  Teresa of Avila

  Humility, Soul, Tongue

  Teresa of Avila (2004). “The Life of St Teresa of Avila by Herself”, p.131, Penguin UK

  11 Copy quote

  Show source

• There are a good many pious people who are as careful of their religion as of their best service of china, only using it on holy occasions, for fear it should get chipped or flawed in working-day wear.

  Douglas William Jerrold

  People, Religion, Good Man

  9 Copy quote