Richard Baxter Quotes

70 Sourced Quotes

Suffering so unbolts the door of the heart, that the Word hath easier entrance.

Richard Baxter
Keep up a humble sense of your own faults, and that will make you compassionate to others

Richard Baxter
Holiness is nothing else but the habitual and predominant devotion and dedication of soul, and body, and life, and all that we have to God; and esteeming, and loving, and serving, and seeking Him, before all the pleasures and prosperity of the flesh.

Richard Baxter
A little love has made me willingly study, preach, write, and even suffer...

Richard Baxter
In my library I have profitably and pleasantly dwelt among the shining lights, with which the learned, wise, and holy men of all ages have illuminated the world.

Richard Baxter
The longer you delay, the more your sin gets strength and rooting. If you cannot bend a twig, how will you be able to bend it when it is a tree?

Richard Baxter
In necessary things, unity; in doubtful things, liberty; in all things, charity.

Richard Baxter
We are ignorant of things necessary, because we learn things superfluous and unnecessary

Richard Baxter
A holy and heavenly life is a continual pain to the consciences of sinners around you and continually solicits them to change their course.

Richard Baxter
Keep company with the more cheerful sort of the Godly; there is no mirth like the mirth of believers.

Richard Baxter
It is past all question, and agreed on by all sides, that no religion will save a man who is not serious, sincere, and diligent in it. If thou be of the truest religion in the world, and are not true thyself to that religion, the religion is good, but it is none of thine.

Richard Baxter
The very design of the gospel doth tend to self-abasing; and the work of grace is begun and carried on in humiliation. Humility is not a mere ornament of a Christian, but an essential part of the new creature: it is a contradiction to be a sanctified man, or a true Christian, and not humble.

Richard Baxter
And therefore you must know that you can forfeit the grace and help of God by your willful sinning or negligence, though you cannot, without grace, turn to God. If you will not do what you can, it is just with God to deny you that grace by which you might do more.

Richard Baxter
The more perfect the sight is the more delightful the beautiful object. The more perfect the appetite, the sweeter the food. The more musical the ear, the more pleasant the melody. The more perfect the soul, the more joyous the joys of heaven, and the more glorious that glory.

Richard Baxter
Death is half disarmed when the pleasures and interests of the flesh are first denied.

Richard Baxter
Special mercy arouses more gratitude than universal mercy.

Richard Baxter
All are making haste towards hell, until by conviction, Christ brings them to a halt, and then, by conversion, turns their hearts and lives sincerely to himself.

Richard Baxter
To be the people of God without regeneration, is as impossible as to be the children of men without generation.

Richard Baxter
God takes men's hearty desires and will, instead of the deed, where they have not power to fulfill it; but he never took the bare deed instead of the will.

Richard Baxter
Study hard, for the well is deep, and our brains are shallow.

Richard Baxter
I remember myself, that when I was young, I had sometime the company of one ancient godly minister, who was of weaker parts than many others, but yet did profit me more than most; because he would never in prayer or conference speak of God, or the life to come, but with such marvelous seriousness and reverence, as if he had seen the majesty and glory which he talked of.

Richard Baxter
Sinners, hear and consider, if you wilfully condemn your souls to bestiality, God will condemn them to perpetual misery.

Richard Baxter
As the fire doth mount upwards, and the needle that is touched with the loadstone still turneth to the north, so the converted soul is inclined to God. Nothing else can satisfy him, nor can he find any content and rest but in his love. In a word, all that are converted do esteem and love God better than all the world; and the heavenly felicity is dearer to them than their fleshly prosperity.

Richard Baxter
If life be long I will be glad, that I may long obey; if short, yet why should I be sad to welcome to endless day?

Richard Baxter
You will cast away your cards and dice when you find the sweetness of youthful learning.

Richard Baxter
It is not the reading of many books which is necessary to make a man wise or good, but the well-reading of a few, could he be sure to have the best. And it is not possible to read over many on the same subject without a great deal of loss of precious time.

Richard Baxter
I take the love of God and self-denial to be the sum of all saving grace and religion.

Richard Baxter
I must confess, as the experience of my own soul, that the expectation of loving my friends in heaven principally kindles my love to them while on earth.

Richard Baxter
It pleased the great Creator of the world to make three sorts of living creatures. Angels he made pure spirits, without flesh, and therefore he made them only for heaven and not to dwell on earth. Beasts were made flesh, without immortal souls, and therefore they were made only for the earth and not for heaven: Man is of a middle nature between both, as partaking of both flesh and spirit, so is he made for earth, but as his passage or way to heaven, and not that this should be his home or happiness. The blessed state that man was made for was to behold the glorious majesty of the Lord and to praise him among his holy angels; and to love him, and to be filled with his love forever.

Richard Baxter
I tell you again, God hath not ordinarily decreed the end without the means; and if you will neglect the means of salvation, it is a certain mark that God hath not decreed you to salvation. But you shall find that He hath left you no excuse, because He hath not thus predestined you.

Richard Baxter