Julian Of Norwich Quotes

He [Jesus] did not say, 'You will never have a rough passage, you will never be over-strained, you will never feel uncomfortable,' but he did say, 'You will never be overcome.

God is all that is good, as to my sight, and the goodness that each thing hath, it is He.

We have got to realise the littleness of creation and to see it for the nothing that it is before we can love and possess God who is uncreated. This is the reason why we have no ease of heart or soul, for we are seeking our rest in trivial things which cannot satisfy, and not seeking to know God, almighty, all-wise, all-good. He is true rest. It is His will that we should know Him, and His pleasure that we should rest in Him. Nothing less will satisfy us. [...] We shall never cease wanting and longing until we possess Him in fullness and joy. Then we shall have no further wants. Meanwhile His will is that we go on knowing and loving until we are perfected in heaven. [...] The more clearly the soul sees the blessed face by grace and love, the more it longs to see it in its fullness.

Pray inwardly, even if you do not enjoy it. It does good, though you feel nothing. Yes, even though you think you are doing nothing.

Between God and the soul there is no between.

See that I am God. See that I am in everything. See that I do everything. See that I have never stopped ordering my works, nor ever shall, eternally. See that I lead everything on to the conclusion I ordained for it before time began, by the same power, wisdom and love with which I made it. How can anything be amiss?

Love and Dread are brethren, and they are rooted in us by the Goodness of our Maker, and they shall never be taken from us without end. We have of nature to love and we have of grace to love: and we have of nature to dread and we have of grace to dread.

If any such lover be in earth which is continually kept from falling, I know it not: for it was not shewed me. But this was shewed: that in falling and in rising we are ever preciously kept in one Love.

We need to fall, and we need to be aware of it; for if we did not fall, we should not know how weak and wretched we are of ourselves, nor should we know our Maker's marvellous love so fully ...

In God's sight we do not fall: in our own we do not stand.

Grace transforms our failings full of dread into abundant, endless comfort ... our failings full of shame into a noble, glorious rising ... our dying full of sorrow into holy, blissful life. ... . Just as our contrariness here on earth brings us pain, shame and sorrow, so grace brings us surpassing comfort, glory, and bliss in heaven ... And that shall be a property of blessed love, that we shall know in God, which we might never have known without first experiencing woe.

All that is contrary to love and peace is of the Fiend and of his part.

Anything less then God, ever me wanteth.

Any time we look at our Maker with love, our importance in our own eyes diminishes, and we are filled with awe and humility and love for others.

Greatly ought we to rejoice that God dwells in our soul; and more greatly ought we to rejoice that our soul dwells in God. Our soul is created to be God's dwelling place, and the dwelling of our souls is God, who is uncreated. It is a great understanding to see and know inwardly that God, who is our Creator, dwells in our soul, and it is a far greater understanding to see and know inwardly that our soul, which is created, dwells in God in substance, of which substance, though God, we are what we are.

God, of thy goodness, give me Thyself; for Thou art enough for me, and I can ask for nothing less that can be full honor to Thee. And if I ask anything that is less, ever Shall I be in want, for only in Thee have I all.

For here we are so blind and foolish that we never seek God until he, of his goodness, shows himself to us. It is when we do see something of him by his grace that we are stirred by that same grace to seek him, and with earnest longing to see still more of his blessedness. So I saw him and sought him; I had him and wanted him. It seems to me that this is and should be an experience common to us all.

Lord, let not our souls be busy inns that have no room for thee or thine,
But quiet homes of prayer and praise, where thou mayest find fit company,
Where the needful cares of life are wisely ordered and put away,
And wide, sweet spaces kept for thee; where holy thoughts pass up and down
And fervent longings watch and wait thy coming.

A great thing shall I make hereof in Heaven of endless worship and everlasting joys.

For I saw no wrath except on man's side, and he forgives that in us, for wrath is nothing but a perversity and an opposition to peace and to love.

This is our Lord's will ... that our prayer and our trust be, alike, large.

We are kept all as securely in Love in woe as in weal, by the Goodness of God.

It is most impossible that we should beseech mercy and grace, and not have it.

The love that made Him to suffer passeth as far all His pains as Heaven is above Earth.

Because of the Shewing I am not good but if I love God the better: and in as much as ye love God the better, it is more to you than to me.

We are in God and God whom we do not see is in us.

That love of God is hard and marvelous. It cannot and will not be broken because of our sins.

The greatest honor we can give Almighty God is to live gladly because of the knowledge of his love.

God is everything that is good, she writes. All life's pleasures and comforts are sacramental; they are God's hands touching us.

God willeth to be seen and to be sought: to be abided and to be trusted.

God, of your goodness, give me yourself; you are enough for me, and anything less that I could ask for would not do you full honor. And if I ask anything that is less, I shall always lack something, but in you alone I have everything'.

Wherefore me behoveth needs to grant that all-thing that is done, it is well-done: for our Lord God doeth all.

The goodness of God is the highest object of prayer and it reaches down to our lowest need.

We give our intent to love and meekness, by the working of mercy and grace we are made all fair and clean.

It is easy to understand that the best deed is well done: and so well as the best deed is done - the highest - so well is the least deed done; and all thing in its property and in the order that our Lord hath ordained it to from without beginning. For there is no doer but He.

God loved us before he made us; and his love has never diminished and never shall.

If there is anywhere on earth a lover of God who is always kept safe, I know nothing of it, for it was not shown to me. But this was shown: that in falling and rising again we are always kept in that same precious love.

Until I am essentially united with God, I can never have full rest or real happiness.

For in the Third Showing when I saw that God does all that is done, I saw no sin: and then I saw that all is well. But when God showed me for sin, then said He: All SHALL be well.

Wouldst thou learn thy Lord's meaning in this thing? Learn it well: Love was His meaning. Who shewed it thee? Love. What shewed He thee? Love. Wherefore shewed it He? For Love. Hold thee therein and thou shalt learn and know more in the same. But thou shalt never know nor learn therein other thing without end. Thus was I learned that Love was our Lord's meaning.

Peace and love are ever in us, being and working; but we be not alway in peace and in love.

The ground of mercy is love, and the working of mercy is our keeping in love. And this was shewed in such manner that I could not have perceived of the part of mercy but as it were alone in love; that is to say, as to my sight.

All shall be well, and all shall be well and all manner of thing shall be well.

Cheerful givers do not count the cost of what they give. Their hearts are set on pleasing and cheering the person to whom the gift is given.

It is easier for us to get to know God than to know our own soul...God is nearer to us than our soul, for He is the ground in which it stands...so if we want to know our own soul, and enjoy its fellowship, it is necessary to seek it in our Lord God.

For we are so preciously loved by God that we cannot even comprehend it.

Some of us believe that God is almighty, and can do everything; and that he is all wise, and may do everything; but that he is all love, and will do everything - there we draw back.

All shall be well.

I saw full surely that ere God made us He loved us; which love was never slacked, nor ever shall be. And in this love He hath done all His works; and in this love He hath made all things profitable to us; and in this love our life is everlasting. In our making we had beginning; but the love wherein He made us was in Him from without beginning: in which love we have our beginning. And all this shall we see in God, without end.

Deeds are done which appear so evil to us and people suffer such terrible evils that it does not seem as though any good will ever come of them; and we consider this, sorrowing and grieving over it so that we cannot find peace in the blessed contemplation of God as we should do; and this is why: our reasoning powers are so blind now, so humble and so simple, that we cannot know the high, marvelous wisdom, the might and the goodness of the Holy Trinity. And this is what he means where he says, 'You shall see for yourself that all manner of things shall be well', as if he said, 'Pay attention to this now, faithfully and confidently, and at the end of time you will truly see it in the fullness of joy.

Jesus wants us to understand four things: First, that He Himself is our ground, the soil from which we grow, the foundation on which we are built. Second, that He guards us and keeps us safe when we are in the midst of sin, when our own choices allow our enemies to surround us, when we do not even realize our own need. Third, that He guards us with care and kindness, showing us where we have gone astray. And fourth, that His presence is always with us, and His loving gaze never wavers, for He wants us to turn back to Him and become united with Him in love, as He is with us. When

He willeth to be perceived; and His appearing shall be swiftly sudden; and He willeth to be trusted. For He is full gracious and homely: Blessed may He be!

God is our clothing, that wraps, clasps and encloses us so as to never leave us.

He shall appear suddenly and blissfully to all that love Him.

Also in this He shewed me a little thing, the quantity of an hazel-nut, in the palm of my hand; and it was as round as a ball. I looked thereupon with eye of my understanding, and thought: What may this be? And it was answered generally thus: It is all that is made. I marvelled how it might last, for methought it might suddenly have fallen to naught for little[ness]. And I was answered in my understanding: It lasteth, and ever shall [last] for that God loveth it. And so All-thing hath the Being by the love of God.

Here saw I a great oneing betwixt Christ and us, to mine understanding: for when He was in pain, we were in pain.

When I was thirty years old and a half, God sent me a bodily sickness, in which I lay three days and three nights; and on the fourth night I took all my rites of Holy Church, and weened not to have lived till day.

Glad and merry and sweet is the blessed and lovely demeanour of our Lord towards our souls, for he saw us always living in love-longing, and he wants our souls to be gladly disposed toward him ... by his grace he lifts up and will draw our outer disposition to our inward, and will make us all at unity with him, and each of us with others in the true, lasting joy which is Jesus.

Our Savior is our true Mother in whom we are endlessly born and out of whom we shall never come.

He said not 'Thou shalt not be tempested, thou shalt not be travailed, thou shalt not be dis-eased'; but he said, 'Thou shalt not be overcome.

Our Lord God shewed that a deed shall be done, and Himself shall do it, and I shall do nothing but sin, and my sin shall not hinder His Goodness working.

Love was without beginning, is, and shall be without ending.

It needeth us to have knowing of the littleness of creatures and to hold as nought all-thing that is made, for to love and have God that is unmade.

The Enemy is overcome by the blessed Passion and Death of our Lord Jesus Christ.

He wills that we take ourselves with great strength to the faith of holy Church and find there our most precious mother in comfort and true understanding with the whole communion of blessed ones. For a person by himself can frequently be broken, as it seems to himself, but the whole body of holy Church was never broken and never shall be, without end. Therefore it is a sure thing, a good thing, and a gracious thing to will meekly and powerfully to be fastened and joined to our mother, holy Church - that is Christ Jesus.

As truly as God is our Father, so truly God is our Mother.

The fruit and the purpose of prayer is to be oned with and like God in all things.

For our soul is so preciously loved of him that is highest, that it over-passeth the knowing of all creatures.

For this is the Great Deed that our Lord shall do, in which Deed He shall save His word and He shall make all well that is not well. How it shall be done there is no creature beneath Christ that knoweth it, nor shall know it till it is done;

As we know, our own mother bore us only into pain and dying. But our true mother, Jesus, who is all love, bears us into joy and endless living. Blessed may he be.

My, how busy we become when we lose sight of how God loves us.

AND thus our good Lord answered to all the questions and doubts that I might make, saying full comfortably: I may make all thing well, I can make all thing well, I will make all thing well, and I shall make all thing well; and thou shalt see thyself that all manner of thing shall be well.