Top 217 Quotes & Sayings by John Wesley - Page 4

God would first, by this inspiration of his Spirit, have wrought in our hearts that holy love without which none can enter into glory.

Preach 90% Law and 10% grace.

I could scarcely reconcile myself at first to this strange way of preaching in the fields, of which Whitfield set me an example on Sunday; having been all my life (till very lately) so tenacious of every point relating to decency and order, that I should have thought the saving of souls almost a sin, if it had not been done in a church.

In returning I read a very different book, published by an honest Quaker , on that execrable sum of all villanies, commonly called the Slave-trade.

The wicked will gnaw their tongues for anguish and pain; they will curse God and look upwards. There the dogs of hell, pride, malice, revenge, rage, horror, despair, continually devout them.

Give me 100 men that hate nothing but sin, and love Jesus Christ, and we'll shake England for God.

Gay and costly apparel directly tends to create and influence lust.... The fact is plain and undeniable, it has the effect both on the wearer and beholder. You kindle a flame, which, at the same time consumes both yourself and your admirers.

To slay the sinner is then the first use of the Law, to destroy the life and strength wherein he trusts and convince him that he is dead while he lives; not only under the sentence of death, but actually dead to God, void of all spiritual life, dead in trespasses and sins.

They say I killed six or seven men for snoring. Well, it ain't true. I only killed one man for snoring.

Giving up witchcraft is, in effect, giving up the Bible.

Men of learning began to set experiments aside...to form theories...and to substitute these in the place of experiments.

A constant attention to the work which God entrusts us with is a mark of solid piety.

No circumstances can make it necessary for a man to burst in sunder all the ties of humanity.

I resolved to dedicate all my life to God, all my thoughts, and words, and actions; being thoroughly convinced, there was no medium; but that every part of my life (not some only) must either be a sacrifice to God, or myself, that is, in effect, to the devil. Can any serious person doubt of this, or find a medium between serving God and serving the devil?

I believe there is no liturgy in the world, either in ancient or modern language, which breathes more of a solid, scriptural, rational piety, than the Common Prayer of the Church of England. And though the main of it was compiled considerably more than two hundred years ago, yet is the language of it, not only pure, but strong and elegant in the highest degree.

Lord, is it not Thy word, if any man lack wisdom, let him ask of God? Thou givest liberally, and upbraidest not. Thou hast said, if any be willing to do Thy will, he shall know. I am willing to do, let me know Thy will.

The glories and the beauties of form, color and sound unite in the Grand Canyon - forms unrivaled even by the mountains, colors that vie with sunsets, and sounds that span the diapason from tempest to tinkling raindrop; from cataract to bubbling fountain.

It is the Spirit that sheds the love of God abroad in their hearts, and the love of all mankind; thereby purifying their hearts from the love of the world, from the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eye, and the pride of life. It is by Him they are delivered from anger and pride, from all vile and inordinate affections.

Let it be observed, that slovenliness is no part of religion; that neither this, nor any text of Scripture, condemns neatness of apparel. Certainly this is a duty, not a sin. Cleanliness is indeed next to godliness.

We should constantly use the most common, little, easy words which our language affords.

Read the most useful books, and that regularly and constantly.

Any 'Christians' who take for themselves any more than the plain necessaries of life, live in an open habitual denial of the Lord. They have gained riches and hell-fire.

I see the necessity of preaching a full and present salvation from all sin.

Consider that all these torments of body and soul are without intermission. Be their suffering ever so extreme, be their pain ever so intense, there is no possibility of their fainting away, no, not for one moment ... They are all eye, all ear, all sense. Every instant of their duration it may be said of their whole frame that they are 'Trembling alive all o'er, and smart and agonize at every pore.' And of this duration there is no end ... Neither the pain of the body nor of soul is any nearer an end than it was millions of ages ago.

And now run the race which is set before thee, in the royal way of universal love.

They (the creatures) encourage us to imitate Him whose mercy is over all His works. It may enlarge our hearts toward these poor creatures to reflect that not one of them is forgotten in the sight of our Father which is in heaven.

[When I die] if I leave behind me ten pounds...you and all mankind [may] bear witness against me, that I have lived and died a thief and a robber.

I cannot help leaving my books behind me whenever God calls me hence; but in every other respect, my own hands will be my executors.

At four in the afternoon, I submitted to be more vile and proclaimed in the highways the glad tidings of salvation.

When Poetry thus keeps its place as the handmaiden of piety, it shall attain not a poor perishable wreath, but a crown that fadeth not away.

The giving up of (a belief in) witchcraft is in effect the giving up of (a beilief in) the Bible.

The best helps to growth in grace are the ill usage, the affronts, and the losses which befall us. We should receive them with all thankfulness, as preferable to all others, were it only on this account, that our will has no part therein.

Thou hidden love of God, whose height, Whose depth unfathomed no man knows, I see from far thy beauteous light, Only I sigh for thy repose.

I believe that He was made man, joining the human nature with the divine in one person; being conceived by the singular operation of the Holy Ghost, and born of the blessed Virgin Mary, who, as well after as before she brought Him forth, continued a pure and unspotted virgin.

The readiest way which God takes to draw a man to himself is, to afflict him in that he loves most, and with good reason; and to cause this affliction to arise from some good action done with a single eye; because nothing can more clearly show him the emptiness of what is most lovely and desirable in the world.

If we suffer persecution and affliction in a right manner, we attain a larger measure of conformity to Christ, by a due improvement of one of these occasions, than we could have done merely by imitating his mercy, in abundance of good works.

As theories increased, simple medicines..were forgotten, at least in the politer nations. ...Medical books, were immensely multiplied,...(towards) an abstruse science, quite out of reach of ordinary men.