James Martineau
James Martineau
James Martineau was an English religious philosopher influential in the history of Unitarianism...
NationalityEnglish
ProfessionPhilosopher
Date of Birth21 April 1805
heart pride rooms
There is no room in the universe for the least contempt or pride; but only for a gentle and a reverent heart.
children bishops priests
The pinafore of the child will be more than a match for the frock of the bishop and the surplice of the priest.
men christ incarnation
The incarnation is true, not of Christ exclusively, but of Man universally, and God everlastingly.
past mind world
All that is noble in the world's past history, and especially the minds of the great and the good, are never lost.
memories grief bereavement
Grief is only the memory of widowed affections.
men nameless highest
Every man's highest, nameless though it be, is his 'living God'.
christian power baptized-in
There is no surer mark of a low and unregenerate nature than this tendency of power to loudness and wantonness instead of quietness and reverence. To souls baptized in Christian nobleness the largest sphere of command is but a wider empire of obedience, calling them, not to escape from holy rule, but to its full impersonation.
selfishness suffrage meanness
We can neither change nor overpower God's eternal suffrage against selfishness and meanness.
men voice looks
If it is permitted to the enlightened but baffled Statesman, when deserted and fallen from his place, to appeal from the voices of the moment to the judgment of more impartial times, with what right can we call in question the loftier form of the same prophetic trust which looks to a present God rather than to future men?
angel sacrifice sorrow
To Him let us but cleave in all ouv strife; and the Tempte1 will flee; the wilderness will be desolate no more; angels will come and minister unto us; and when we pass from them to the ministry of life, be it to the glory of a transfiguration, the sorrows of a Gethsemane, or the sacrifice of the cross, the tran- quilizing peace of God will never be far from us.
blessed visits-you soul
When the blessed Spirit, that bloweth where it listeth, visits you and stirs the plumage of the soul, seek no cowardly shelter from it, but fling yourself upon it, and, though its sweep be awful, you shall be sustained. Only do this, do all, not in presumptuous daring, but in divine submission; in dependence, not on any strength that can be spent, but on the ever-living stay of all that trust in Him.
hands remembrance faithful
We cannot embrace His cross, and yet refuse our own. We cannot raise the cup of His remembrance to our lips, without a secret pledge to Him, to one another, to the great company of the faithful in every age that we, too, hold ourselves at God's disposal, that we will ask nothing on our own account, that we will pass simply into the Divine hand to take us whither it will.
spiritual lonely art
All spiritual strength for ourselves, all noble ties to one another, have their real source in that inner sanctuary where God denies His lonely audience to none. Its secrets are holy; its asylum, inviolate; its consolations, sure; and all are open to the simple heart-word, "Thou art my hiding-place.
character temptation battle
Human character is never found "to enter into its glory," except through the ordeal of affliction. Its force cannot come forth without the offer of resistance, nor can the grandeur of its free will declare itself, except in the battle of fierce temptation.