François Fénelon Quotes

63 Sourced Quotes

Do not men die fast enough without being destroyed by each other? Can any man be insensible of the brevity of life? and can he who knows it, think life too long?

François Fénelon
Prayer is so necessary, and the source of so many blessings, that he who has discovered the treasure cannot be prevented from having recourse to it, whenever he has an opportunity.

François Fénelon
Sordid and infamous sensuality, the most dreadful evil that issued from the box of Pandora, corrupts every heart, and eradicates every virtue. Fly! wherefore dost thou linger? Fly, cast not one look behind thee; nor let even thy thought return to the accursed evil for a moment.

François Fénelon
There were some who said that a man at the point of death was more free than all others, because death breaks every bond, and over the dead the united world has no power.

François Fénelon
Blessed are the poor in spirit." Blessed are they who are stripped of every thing, even of their own wills, that they may no longer belong to themselves.

François Fénelon
We are not to choose the manner in which our blessings shall be bestowed.

François Fénelon
Let us pray God that He would root out of our hearts every thing of our own planting, and set out there, with His own hands, the tree of life, bearing all manner of fruits.

François Fénelon
The art of cookery is the art of poisoning mankind, by rendering the appetite still importunate, when the wants of nature are supplied.

François Fénelon
God would behold in you a simplicity which will contain so much the more of His wisdom as it contains less of your own.

François Fénelon
Let me follow in Thy footsteps, O Jesus ! I would imitate Thee, but cannot without the aid of Thy grace! O humble and lowly Saviour, grant me the knowledge of the true Christian, and that I may willingly despise myself; let me learn the lesson so incomprehensible to the mind of man, that I must die to myself by an abandonment that shall produce true humility.

François Fénelon
The great point is to renounce your own wisdom by simplicity of walk, and to be ready to give up the favor, esteem, and approbation of every one, whenever the path in which God leads you passes that way.

François Fénelon
As to our friend, I pray God to bestow upon him a simplicity that shall give him peace. Happy are they indeed who can bear their sufferings in the enjoyment of this simple peace and perfect acquiesence in the will of God.

François Fénelon
On this earth all is temptation. Crosses tempt us by irritating our pride, and prosperity by flattering it. Our life is a continual combat, but one in which Jesus Christ fights for us. We must pass on unmoved, while temptations rage around us, as the traveler, overtaken by a storm, simply wraps his cloak more closely about him, and pushes on more vigorously toward his destined home.

François Fénelon
The youth who, like a woman, loves to adorn his person, has renounced all claim to wisdom and to glory; glory is due to those only who dare to associate with pain, and have trampled pleasure under their feet.

François Fénelon
Alas! how many souls there are full of self, and yet desirous of doing good and serving God, but in such a way as to suit themselves; who desire to impose rules upon God as to His manner of drawing them to Himself. They want to serve and possess Him, but they are not willing to be possessed by Him.

François Fénelon
This poor world, the object of so much insane attachment, we are about to leave; it is but misery, vanity, and folly; a phantom, — the very fashion of which "passeth away."

François Fénelon
We are never less alone than when we are in the society of a single, faithful friend; never less deserted than when we are carried in the arms of the All-Powerful.

François Fénelon
A cross borne in simplicity, without the interference of self-love to augment it, is only half a cross. Suffering in this simplicity of love, we are not only happy in spile of the cross, but because of it; for love is pleased in suffering for the Well Beloved, and the cross which forms us into His image is a consoling bond of love.

François Fénelon
O Lord! take my heart, for I cannot give it; and when Thou hast it, O! keep it, for I cannot keep it for Thee; and save me in spite of myself, for Jesus Christ's sake.

François Fénelon
All the human kind is but one family, dispersed over the face of the whole earth; all men are brothers, and ought to love each other as such.

François Fénelon
Peace treaties signed by the vanquished are not freely signed. Men sign with a knife at their throat, they sign in spite of themselves, in order to avoid still greater losses; they sign as men surrender their purse when it is a case of your money or your life.

François Fénelon
As a general rule, those truths which we highly relish, and which shed a degree of practical light upon the things which we are required to give up for God, are leadings of Divine grace, which we should follow without hesitation.

François Fénelon
Men are very much to be pitied in that they are to be governed by a king who is but a man like them; for it would require Gods to reform men. But kings are not less to be pitied, since being but men, that are weak and imperfect, they are to govern this innumerable multitude of corrupt and deceitful men.

François Fénelon
O God, the creature knows not to what end Thou hast made Him; teach him, and write in the depths of his soul that the clay must suffer itself to be shaped at the will of the potter.

François Fénelon
As the reflections of our pride upon our defects are bitter, disheartening, and vexatious, so the return of the soul towards God is peaceful and sustained by confidence. You will find by experience how much more your progress will be aided by this simple, peaceful turning towards God, than by all your chagrin and spite at. the faults that exist in you.

François Fénelon
The presence of God calms the soul, and gives it quiet and repose.

François Fénelon
Pure love is in the will alone; it is no sentimental love, for the imagination has no part in it; it loves, if we may so express it, without feeling, as faith believes without seeing.

François Fénelon
God's treasury where He keeps His children's gifts will be like many a mother's store of relics of her children, full of things of no value to others, but precious in His eyes for the love's sake that was in them.

François Fénelon
The kingdom of God which is within us consists in our willing whatever God wills, always, in every thing, and without reservation; and thus His kingdom comes; for His will is then done as it is in heaven, since we will nothing but what is dictated by His sovereign pleasure.

François Fénelon
Carefully purify your conscience from daily faults; suffer no sin to dwell in your heart; small as it may seem, it obscures the light of grace, weighs down the soul, and hinders that constant communion with Jesus Christ which it should be your pleasure to cultivate.

François Fénelon