Bernard Of Clairvaux Quotes

The reason for our loving God is God.

Hell is full of good wishes or desires.

I know by myself how incomprehensible God is, seeing I cannot comprehend the parts of my own being.

Death is the gate of life.

A pretext is never lacking to him who would break with a friend.

God will become visible as God's image is reborn in you.

To serve Mary is a mark of eternal salvation to come.

Love of Mary and devotion to her are a sure sign of obtaining eternal salvation.

Learn first to love yourself, and then you can love me.

The more I contemplate God, the more God looks on me. The more I pray to him, the more he thinks of me too.

Nothing can work me damage except myself. The harm that I sustain I carry about with me, and never am a real sufferer but by my own fault.

Whether we live or whether we die, we are the Lord's.

Humility is, of all graces, the chiefest when it does not know itself to be a grace at all.

For I have learnt for a fact that nothing so effectively obtains, retains and regains grace, as that we should always be found not high-minded before God, but filled with holy fear.

What I know of the divine science and holy scripture, I learnt in the woods and fields.

Our King [Jesus] is accused of treachery; it is said of him [by the Muslims] that he is not God, but that he falsely pretended to be something he was not.

Prayer is a wine which makes glad the heart of man

The tears of those repenting are the wine of angels.

Humility in furs is better than pride in tunics.

God has aroused the spirit of kings and princes to root up from the earth the enemies of the Christian name. Therefore gird yourselves manfully and take up joyful arms for the name of Christ.

Let us then cast ourselves at the feet of this good Mother, and embracing them let us not depart until she blesses us, and accepts us for her children.

Have death always before your eyes as a salutary means of returning to God.

A truly obedient man does not discriminate between one thing and another, since his only aim is to execute faithfully whatever may be assigned to him.

Pride causes us to use our gifts as though they came from ourselves, not benefits received from God, and to usurp our benefactor's glory.

There are three distinct comings of the Lord of which I know: His coming to men, His coming into men, and His coming against men.

Persecution shows who is a hireling, and who a true pastor.

What of the souls already released from their bodies? We believe that they are overwhelmed in that vast sea of eternal light and of luminous eternity

I have no other masters than the beeches and the oaks.

So far from being able to answer for my sins, I cannot even answer for my righteousness!

What does God hate or punish except self-will? Let self-will cease, and there will be no hell. On what does that fire feed except on self-will?

Understanding is the sure and clear knowledge of some invisible thing.

From the best bliss that earth imparts, we turn unfilled to Thee again.

It is a misery to be born a pain to live a trouble to die.

Qui me amat, amet et canem meum. (Who loves me will love my dog also.)

Bring a mirror and let a dirty face recognize itself.

I have ascended to the highest in me, and look, the Word is towering above that. I have descended to explore my lowest depths, and I found Him deeper still.

It is in the perfect union of two hearts that complete and total marriage consists.