Quotes from Henry Ward Beecher

Many people are afraid to embrace religion, for fear they shall not succeed in maintaining it.

Fear is a kind of bell or gong which rings the mind into quick life and avoidance upon the approach of danger. It is the soul's signal for rallying.

God asks no man whether he will accept life. That is not the choice. You must take it. The only question is how

A coat that is not used, the moths eat; and a Christian who is hung up so that he shall not be tempted-the moths eat him; and they have poor food at that.

Truths are first clouds; then rain, then harvest and food.

There is an ugly kind of forgiveness in this world--a kind of hedgehog forgiveness, shot out like quills.

The glory of Christianity is to conquer by forgiveness. It is easier to forgive an enemy than to forgive a friend.

God pardons like a mother who kisses the offense into everlasting forgetfulness.

The unthankful heart... discovers no mercies but the thankful heart... will find in every hour some heavenly blessings.

Not another flag has such an errand, carrying everywhere, the world around, such hope for freedom such glorious tidings.

Laugh at your friends, And if your friends are sore; So much the better, You may laugh the more.

No man is such a conqueror as the man who has defeated himself.

To spend several days in a friend's house and hunger for something to read, while you are treading on costly carpets, and sitting upon luxurious chairs and sleeping upon down, is as if one were bribing your body for the sake of cheating your mind

One might as well attempt to calculate mathematically the contingent forms of the tinkling bits of glass in a kaleidoscope as to look through the tube of the future and foretell its pattern.

There is no slave out of heaven like a loving woman; and, of all loving women, there is no such slave as a mother.

Now comes the mystery.

Young love is a flame; very pretty, often very hot and fierce, but still only light and flickering. The love of the older and disciplined heart is as coals, deep-burning, unquenchable.

There is tonic in the things that men do not love to hear. Free speech is to a great people what the winds are to oceans ... and where free speech is stopped miasma is bred, and death comes fast.

Love cannot endure indifference. It needs to be wanted. Like a lamp, it needs to be fed out of the oil of another's heart, or its flame burns low.

Love is the river of life in the world.