Method is like packing things in a box; a good packer will get in half as much again as a bad one.
—Richard Cecil
The religion of a sinner stands on two pillars; namely, what Christ did for us in the flesh, and what he performs in us by his Spirit. Most errors arise from an attempt to separate these two.
—Richard Cecil
Topics: Religion
The joy of religion is an exorcist to the mind; it expels the demons of carnal mirth and madness.
—Richard Cecil
Topics: Religion
When a founder has cast a bell he does not presently fix it in the steeple, but tries it with his hammer, and beats it on every side to see if there be any flaw in it. So Christ doth not, presently after he has converted a man, convey him to heaven; but suffers him first to be beaten upon by many temptations, and then exalts him to his crown.
—Richard Cecil
Topics: Trials
There are but two classes of the wise; the men who serve God because they have found him, and the men who seek him because they have found him not. All others may say, “Is there not a lie in my right hand?”
—Richard Cecil
Topics: Wisdom
Self-will is so ardent and active, that it will break a world to pieces, to make a stool to sit on.
—Richard Cecil
Topics: Will, Willpower, Will Power
Metaphysicians can unsettle things, but they can erect nothing. They can pull down a church, but they cannot build a hovel.
—Richard Cecil
The world looks at preachers out of church to know what they mean in it.
—Richard Cecil
Topics: Preaching, Evangelism
He who sows, even with tears, the precious seed of faith, hope, and love, shall doubtless come again with joy, bringing his sheaves with him, because it is the very nature of that seed to yield a joyful harvest.
—Richard Cecil
The very heart and root of sin is an independent spirit.—We erect the idol self, and not only wish others to worship, but worship it ourselves.
—Richard Cecil
Topics: Selfishness
God denies a Christian nothing but with a design to give him something better.
—Richard Cecil
Topics: Prayer
There are three things which the true Christian desires in respect to sin: Justification, that it may not condemn; sanctification, that it may not reign; and glorification, that it may not be.
—Richard Cecil
Topics: Sin
Every man is an original and solitary character.—None can either understand or feel the book of his own life like himself.
—Richard Cecil
Topics: Originality
The union of Christians to Christ, their common head, and by means of the influence they derive from him, one to another, may be illustrated by the loadstone. It not only attracts the particles of iron to itself by the magnetic virtue, but by this virtue it unites them one to another.
—Richard Cecil
He has seen but little of life who does not discern everywhere the effect of early education on men’s opinions and habits of thinking. Children bring out of the nursery that which displays itself throughout their lives.
—Richard Cecil
Topics: Education
If a minister takes one step into the world, his hearers will take two.
—Richard Cecil
Nothing can be proposed so wild or so absurd as not to find a party, and often a very large party to espouse it.
—Richard Cecil
Topics: Party
I could write down twenty cases wherein I wished that God had done otherwise than he did, but which I now see, if I had had my own way, would have led to extensive mischief.
—Richard Cecil
Topics: Wishes
As a man loves gold, in that proportion he hates to be imposed upon by counterfeits; and in proportion as a man has regard for that which is above price and better than gold, he abhors that hypocrisy which is but its counterfeit.
—Richard Cecil
Topics: Hypocrisy
A man who puts aside his religion because he is going into society, is like one taking off his shoes because he is about to walk upon thorns.
—Richard Cecil
Topics: Religion
The way of every man is declarative of the end of every man.
—Richard Cecil
Topics: Man
To have too much forethought is the part of a wretch; to have too little is the part of a fool.
—Richard Cecil
Topics: Forethought
Every year of my life I grow more convinced that it is wisest and best to fix our attention on the beautiful and the good, and dwell as little as possible on the evil and the false.
—Richard Cecil
Topics: Beauty, Focus, Concentration
Wisdom prepares for the worst, but folly leaves the worst for the day when it comes.
—Richard Cecil
Topics: Wisdom
Aversion from reproof is not wise. It is a mark of a little mind. A great man can afford to lose; a little, insignificant fellow is afraid of being snuffed out.
—Richard Cecil
Appointments once made, become debts. If I have made an appointment with you, I owe you punctuality; I have no right to throw away your time, if I do my own.
—Richard Cecil
Topics: Punctuality
The Christian will find his parentheses for prayer even in the busiest hours of life.
—Richard Cecil
Topics: Prayer
An exquisite watch went irregularly, though no defect could be discovered in it. At last it was found that the balance wheel had been near a magnet; and here was all the mischief. If the soundest mind be magnetized by any predilection, it must act irregularly.
—Richard Cecil
Topics: Mind
The only instance of praying to saints, mentioned in the Bible, is that of the rich man in torment calling upon Abraham; and let it be remembered, that it was practised only by a lost soul and without success.
—Richard Cecil
Topics: Prayer
The nurse of infidelity is sensuality.
—Richard Cecil
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