Frederick William Herschel Quotes

Herschel removed the speckled tent-roof from the world and exposed the immeasurable deeps of space, dim-flecked with fleets of colossal suns sailing their billion-leagued remoteness. ~ Mark Twain

Devotion to the Blessed Sacrament is the queen of all devotions. It is the central devotion of the Church. All others gather round it, and group themselves there as satellites; for others celebrate his mysteries; this is Himself. It is the universal devotion. No one can be without it, in order to be a Christian. How can a man be a Christian who does not worship the living Presence of Christ? ~ Frederick William Faber

There is rest in this world nowhere except in Christ, the manifested love of God. Trust in excellence, and the better you become, the keener is the feeling of deficiency. Wrap up all in doubt, and there is a stern voice that will thunder at last out of the wilderness upon your dream. ~ Frederick William Robertson

I will tell you what to hate. Hate hypocrisy, hate cant, hate indolence, oppression, injustice; hate Pharisaism; hate them as Christ hated them with a deep, living, godlike hatred. ~ Frederick William Robertson

If our love were but more simple, We should take Him at His word; And our lives would be all sunshine In the sweetness of the Lord. ~ Frederick William Faber

The world is growing old;Who would not be at rest and freeWhere love is never cold? ~ Frederick William Faber

The humblest occupation has in it materials of discipline for the highest heaven. ~ Frederick William Robertson

The difference of the degrees in which the individuals of a great community enjoy the good things of life has been a theme of declaration and discontent in all ages. ~ William Herschel

Humility is that simple, inner life of real greatness, which is indifferent to magnificence, and, surrounded by it all, lives far away in the distant country of a Father's home, with the cross borne silently and self-sacrificingly in the heart of hearts. ~ Frederick William Robertson

Never does a man know the force that is in him till some mighty affliction or grief has humanized the soul. ~ Frederick William Robertson

There is a power in the soul, quite separate from the intellect, which sweeps away or recognizes the marvelous, by which God is felt. Faith stands serenely far above the reach of the atheism of science. It does not rest on the wonderful, but on the eternal wisdom and goodness of God. The revelation of the Son was to proclaim a Father, not a mystery. No science can sweep away the everlasting love which the heart feels, and which the intellect does not even pretend to judge or recognize. ~ Frederick William Robertson

To turn water into wine, and what is common into what is holy, is indeed the glory of Christianity. ~ Frederick William Robertson

God's truth is too sacred to be expounded to superficial worldliness in its transient fit of earnestness. ~ Frederick William Robertson

Seeing is in some respect an art, which must be learnt. ~ William Herschel

Religious controversy does only harm. It destroys humble inquiry after truth, and throws all the energies into an attempt to prove ourselves right-a spirit in which no man gets at truth. ~ Frederick William Robertson

When it comes to cleverness, I'm afraid that I was limited to alternate tuesdays ... ~ William Frederick

Sorrow is a sanctuary as long as self is kept outside. [ ... ] let us not foster, embrace, rekindle and indulge our grief. For then our sorrow is a selfish and luxurious fiction, a ground in which the Holy Spirit will not dig. ~ Frederick William Faber

Holiness is an unselfing of ourselves. ~ Frederick William Faber

That prayer which does not succeed in moderating our wishes
in changing the passionate desire into still submission, the anxious, tumultuous expectation into silent surrender
is no true prayer, and proves that we have not the spirit of true prayer. ~ Frederick William Robertson

The one who will be found in trial capable of great acts of love is ever the one who is always doing considerate small ones. ~ Frederick William Robertson

Good is that darkening of our lives,
Which only God can brighten;
But better still that hopeless load,
Which none but God can lighten. ~ Frederick William Faber

The Blessed Sacrament is the magnet of souls. There is a mutual attraction between Jesus and the souls of men. Mary drew Him down from heaven. Our nature attracted Him rather than the nature of angels. Our misery caused Him to stoop to our lowness. Even our sins had a sort of attraction for the abundance of His mercy and the predilection of His grace. Our repentance wins Him to us. Our love makes earth a paradise to Him; and our souls lure Him as gold lures the miser, with irresistible fascination ~ Frederick William Faber

The man whom society will not forgive nor restore is driven into recklessness. ~ Frederick William Robertson

It is not by change of circumstances, but by fitting our spirits to the circumstances in which God has placed us, that we can be reconciled to life and duty. ~ Frederick William Robertson

Exactness in little things is a wonderful source of cheerfulness. ~ Frederick William Faber

Women and God are the two rocks on which a man must either anchor or be wrecked. ~ Frederick William Robertson

In the fabulous ages of ancient times the appellations of Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn were given to the planets as being the names of their principal heroes and divinities. In the present more philosophical era, it would hardly be allowable to have recourse to the same method, and call on Juno, Pallas, Apollo, or Minerva for a name to out new heavenly body ... I cannot but wish to take this opportunity of expressing my sense of gratitude, by giving the name Georgium Sidus, to a star [Uranus], by which (with to respect to us) first began to shine under His auspicious reign. ~ William Herschel

Let a man begin in earnest with "I ought," and he will end, by God's grace, if he persevere, with "I will." Let him force himself to abound in all small offices of kindliness, attention, affectionateness, and all these for God's sake. By and by he will feel them become the habit of his soul. ~ Frederick William Robertson

The rumor that the state of my health will necessitate my resignation is entirely unfounded. ~ Frederick William Borden

Love is not a union merely between two creatures, it is a union between two spirits. ~ Frederick William Robertson

Never permit failure to become a habit. ~ William Frederick Book

The Christian life is not knowing or hearing, but doing. ~ Frederick William Robertson

I have tried to improve telescopes and practiced continually to see with them. These instruments have play'd me so many tricks that I have at last found them out in many of their humours. ~ William Herschel

No one can be great, or good, or happy except through the inward efforts of themselves. ~ Frederick William Robertson

I have looked farther into space than ever a human being did before me. ~ William Herschel

In these two things the greatness of man consists, to have God dwelling in us as to impart His character to us, and to have Him dwelling in us, that we recognize His presence, and know that we are His, and He is ours. The one is salvation; the other, the assurance of it. ~ Frederick William Robertson

Read a work on the "Evidences of Christianity," and it may become highly probable that Christianity, etc., are true. This is an opinion. Feel God. Do His will, till the Absolute Imperative within you speaks as with a living voice, "Thou shalt, and thou shalt not;" and then you do not think, you know that there is a God. ~ Frederick William Robertson

In God's world, for those who are in earnest, there is no failure. No work truly done, no word earnestly spoken, no sacrifice freely made, was ever made in vain. ~ Frederick William Robertson

Mourning after an absent God is an evidence of a love as strong, as rejoicing in a present one. ~ Frederick William Robertson

Every natural longing has its natural satisfaction. If we thirst, God has created liquids to gratify thirst. If we are susceptible of attachment, there are beings to gratify that love. If we thirst for life and love eternal, it is likely that there are an eternal life and an eternal love to satisfy that craving. ~ Frederick William Robertson