C.N. Douglas, comp. Forty Thousand Quotations: Prose and Poetical. 1917.
Piety
Piety softens all that courage bears.
Let us learn upon earth those things which can call us to heaven.
Earth has nothing more tender than a woman’s heart when it is the abode of piety.
Our piety must be weak and imperfect if it do not conquer our fear of death.
Christian piety annihilates the egotism of the heart; worldly politeness veils and represses it.
We must labor unceasingly to render our piety reasonable, and our reason pious.
The affectation of sanctity is a blotch on the face of piety.
Let us carry only in this life that perfection which we have given to our soul.
Reverence the highest; have patience with the lowest. Let this day’s performance of the meanest duty be thy religion.
Piety and virtue are not only delightful for the present, but they leave peace and contentment behind them.
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.
We may learn by practice such things upon earth as shall be of use to us in heaven. Piety, unostentatious piety, is never out of place.
True piety hath in it nothing weak, nothing sad, nothing constrained. It enlarges the heart; it is simple, free, and attractive.
Let it not be imagined that the life of a good Christian must necessarily be a life of melancholy and gloominess; for he only resigns some pleasures, to enjoy others infinitely greater.
A good man regards the root; he fixes the root, and all else flows out of it. The root is filial piety; the fruit brotherly love.
Piety is the necessary Christian virtue proportioned adequately to the omniscience and spirituality of that Infinite Deity.
Among the many strange servilities mistaken for piety, one of the least lovely is that which hopes to flatter God by despising the world and villifying human nature.
John Wesley quaintly observed that the road to heaven is a narrow path, not intended for wheels, and that to ride in a coach here and to go to heaven hereafter, was a happiness too much for man.
I do not doubt but that genuine piety is the spring of peace of mind; it enables us to bear the sorrows of life, and lessens the pangs of death: the same cannot be said of hypocrisy.
In theory, piety is reverence and love for God; and in practice, it is the exercise of all our powers in obedience to the Divine will. Combining the theory and practice, we have the richest treasure known on earth—love for God shown in obedience to God.
Piety is not an end, but a means of attaining the highest degree of culture, by perfect peace of mind. Hence it is to be observed that those who make piety an end and aim in itself for the most part become hypocrites.
It is impossible for the mind which is not totally destitute of piety, to behold the sublime, the awful, the amazing works of creation and providence; the heavens with their luminaries, the mountains, the ocean, the storm, the earthquake, and the volcano; the circuit of the seasons and the revolutions of empires; without marking in them all the mighty hand of God, and feeling strong emotions of reverence toward the Author of these stupendous works.
Piety is indifferent whether she enters at the eye or at the ear. There is none of the senses at which she does not knock one day or other. The Puritans forgot this, and thrust Beauty out of the meeting-house and slammed the door in her face.
Piety is the only proper and adequate relief of decaying man. He that grows old without religious hopes, as he declines into imbecility, and feels pains and sorrows incessantly crowding upon him, falls into a gulf of bottomless misery, in which every reflection must plunge him deeper and deeper.
Piety raises and fortifies the mind for trying occasions and painful events. When our country is threatened by dangers and pressed by difficulties who are the best bulwarks of its defence? Not the sons of dissipation and folly, not the smooth-tongued sycophants of a court, nor sceptics and blasphemers, from the school of infidelity; but the man whose moral conduct is animated and sustained by the doctrines and consolations of religion. Happy is that country where patriotism is sustained and sanctified by piety; where authority respects and guards freedom, and freedom reveres and loves legitimate authority; where truth and mercy meet together, righteousness an peace embrace each other.
We are surrounded by motives to piety and devotion, if we would but mind them. The poor are designed to excite our liberality; the miserable, our pity; the sick, our assistance; the ignorant, our instruction; those that are fallen, our helping hand. In those who are vain, we see the vanity in the world; in those who are wicked, our own frailty. When we see good men rewarded, it confirms our hope; and when evil men are punished, it excites our fear.