The Graces Quotes

I was trying to discover examples of a living restoration, trying to go beyond discussions about correct historic colors, materials, and techniques.
I looked to the past for guidance, to find the graces we need to save. I want to be an importer. This is not nostalgia; I am not nostalgic. I am not looking for a way back. "From where will a renewal come to us, to us who have devastated the whole earthly globe?" asked Simone Weil. "Only from the past if we love it."
What I am looking for is the trick of having the same ax twice, for a restoration that renews the spirit, for work that transforms the worker. We may talk of saving antique linens, species, or languages; but whatever we are intent on saving, when a restoration succeeds, we rescue ourselves.
Howard Mansfield, The Same Ax Twice: Restoration and Renewal in a Throwaway Age ~ Howard Mansfield

Your love in a cottage is hungry,
Your vine is a nest for flies-
Your milkmaid shocks the Graces,
And simplicity talks of pies!
You lie down to your shady slumber
And wake with a bug in your ear,
And your damsel that walks in the morning
Is shod like a mountaineer. ~ Nathaniel Parker Willis

True belief and true repentance are twins: it would be idle to attempt to say which is born first. All the spokes of a wheel move at once when the wheel moves, and so all the graces commence action when regeneration is wrought by the Holy Ghost. Repentance, however, there must be. ~ Charles Spurgeon

The Graces was a great experience; it's great working with women, but we weren't put together in an organic way, and I think that's why we didn't stay together. There wasn't that natural friendship. ~ Meredith Brooks

I don't know who it is who lives or dies, who rests or wakes, but it is your heart that distributes all the graces of the daybreak in my breast. ~ Pablo Neruda

Not simply the righteousness of our Saviour, not simply the beauty of His holiness or the graces of His character, are we to put on as a garment. The Lord Himself is our vesture. Every Christian is not only a Christ bearer, but a Christ wearer. We are so to enter into Him by communion, to be so endued with His presence, and imbued with His Spirit that men shall see Him when they behold us, as they see our garments when they look upon our bodies. ~ Adoniram Judson Gordon

When I look back upon my own religious experience," says Andrew Murray, "or round upon the Church of Christ in the world, I stand amazed at the thought of how little humility is sought after as the distinguishing feature of the discipleship of Jesus. In preaching and living, in the daily intercourse of the home and social life, in the more special fellowship with Christians, in the direction and performance of work for Christ - alas! how much proof there is that humility is not esteemed the cardinal virtue, the only root from which the graces can grow, the one indispensable condition of true fellowship with Jesus. ~ D.L. Moody

The Fates and Furies, as well as the Graces and Sirens, glide with linked hands over life. ~ Jean Paul Friedrich Richter

Giving someone the benefit of the doubt is not so simple as it sounds. What it means, in fact, is being charitable--which, as the vicar is fond of pointing out, is the most difficult of the graces to master. Faith and hope are a piece of cake but charity is a Pandora's box: the monster in the cistern which, when the lid is opened, comes swarming out to seize you by the throat. ~ Alan Bradley

How could you give me life, and take from me all the inappreciable things that raise it from the state of conscious death? Where are the graces of my soul? Where are the sentiments of my heart? What have you done, oh, Father, What have you done with the garden that should have bloomed once, in this great wilderness here? Said louisa as she touched her heart. ~ Charles Dickens

The graces are restless today. They pweet and muss, shuddering their wings so that the feathers stick out at defensive angles. I feel that restlessness too. When the sea is fractious like this – when it chutters and schwaks against the moorings, when it won't talk but only mumbles – it's difficult to think. ~ Kirsty Logan

The number of guests at dinner should not be less than the number of the Graces nor exceed that of the Muses, i.e., it should begin with three and stop at nine. ~ Marcus Terentius Varro

[Jesus] did not say, 'Simon, son of Jonas, fearest thou me.' He did not say, 'Dost thou admire me? Dost thou adore me?' Nor was it even a question concerning his faith. He did not say, 'Simon, son of Jonas, believest thou in me?' but he asked him another question, 'Lovest thou me?' I take it, that is because love is the very best evidence of godliness. Love is the brightest of all the graces; and hence it becomes the best evidence. ~ Charles Haddon Spurgeon

I suspect anyone self-satisfied enough to refuse lawful pleasures: we are not sufficiently rich in our separate resources to reject the graces of the universe when offered ... ~ Freya Stark

Beauty of scene; stateliness of movement; sweetness of sound - these are the graces that seem to reward the mind that seeks enjoyment purely for its own sake. ~ Virginia Woolf

For as a city which has been once besieged and not sacked will ever after be more strong to hold out if it be assaulted by the like danger ... so those who are besieged and assaulted by their spiritual enemies will ever after more carefully arm themselves against them with the graces of God's Spirit, that they may not be overcome nor foiled by them. ~ George Downame

Love is the first cause of all the graces we desire; it warms the heart, and sweetly and powerfully influences our affections to delight in, and to walk in love with such an exceedingly gracious and merciful God. ~ Elyse M. Fitzpatrick

What were any of us but a handful of weeds. Who was to say what our value was? What was the value of for Vietnam vets playing poker every afternoon in front of the Spanish market on Glendale boulevard, making their moves with a great deck missing a written and a five? Maybe the world depended on them, maybe they were the Fates, or the Graces. ~ Janet Fitch

Someone has beautifully analyzed the fruit of the Spirit in Gal. 5: 22, and shown that all the graces there mentioned are but various forms of love itself. The apostle is not speaking of different fruits, but of one fruit, the fruit of the Spirit, and the various words that follow are but phrases and descriptions of the one fruit, which is love itself. Joy, which is first mentioned, is love on wings; peace, which follows, is love folding its wings, and nestling under the wings of God; longsuffering is love enduring; gentleness is love in society; goodness is love in activity, faith is love confiding; meekness is love stooping; temperance is true self-love, and the proper regard for our own real interests, which is as much the duty of love, as regard for the interests of others. ~ A.B. Simpson

With a perversity of judgement, which must be attributed to his not having by Nature a very strong head, the Graces, the Spirit, the Sagacity, and the Perseverance, of the Villain of the Story outweighed all his absurdities and all his Atrocities with Sir Edward. With him, such Conduct was Genius, Fire and Feeling. It interested and inflamed him; and he was always more anxious for its Success and mourned over its Discomfitures with more Tenderness than could ever have been contemplated by the Authors. ~ Jane Austen

Beautiful surroundings, the society of learned men, the charm of noble women, the graces of art, could not make up for the loss of those light-hearted mornings of the desert, for that wind that made one a boy again. He had noticed that this peculiar quality in the air of new countries vanished after they were tamed by man and made to bear harvests. Parts of Texas and Kansas that he had first known as open range had since been made into rich farming districts, and the air had quite lost that lightness, that dry, aromatic odour. The moisture of plowed land, the heaviness of labour and growth and grain-bearing, utterly destroyed it; one could breathe that only on the bright edges of the world, on the great grass plains or the sage-brush desert. ~ Willa Cather

The ancients recommended us to sacrifice to the Graces, but Milton sacrificed to the Devil. ~ Voltaire

Humility is the only soil in which the graces root; the lack of humility is the sufficient explanation of every defect and failure. Humility is not so much a grace or virtue along with others; it is the root of all, because it alone takes the right attitude before God, and allows Him as God to do all. ~ Andrew Murray

Those who are truly humble will never presume to judge and condemn others, even when they see them committing very serious wrongs. They will say to themselves, "Who knows how much more grievously I would sin if I were exposed to the same temptations as these persons?" or, "Who can tell how much better these persons would be than I am if they had received from God the graces that have been granted to me? ~ F.J. Remler

Wrap thyself in the decent veil that the arts or the graces weave for thee, O human nature! It is only the statue of marble whose nakedness the eye can behold without shame and offence! ~ Edward Bulwer-Lytton, 1st Baron Lytton

There is no doubt that God will never be wanting to us, provided that He finds in us that humility which makes us worthy of His gifts, the desire of possessing them, and the promptitude to co-operate industriously with the graces He gives us. ~ Ignatius Of Loyola

Virtue, without the graces, is like a rich diamond unpolished
it hardly looks better than a common pebble; but when the hand of the master rubs off the roughness, and forms the sides into a thousand brilliant surfaces, it is then that we acknowledge its worth, admire its beauty, and long to wear it in our bosoms. ~ Jane Porter

The thing is," he [Fenrin] said softly, "we're all going to die...But the first time you realize it...how do you get over that?" ... "You don't, I think," I [River] said, finally. "You never get over it. The rest of your life is spent knowing it, over you shoulder."
"Are you okay with it?"
"No. But sometimes yes. And then no, again. Sometimes it's okay. Like now. We're drunk. We feel good. But tomorrow...life crowds in again. And then you find another way to block out the truth, just so you can get through the day. If we let ourselves see too much truth, it scares us. You have to block it out, or you'd never get anything done. You'd just wander around being perpetually depressed or amazed...That doesn't mean we shouldn't want to see the truth. It's just that maybe we have to see it in stages to be able to understand it. ~ Laure Eve

God won't permit temptation beyond your strength. It is true that temptations come to all, but God will give you the graces you need to withstand them, if you ask him to and if you are willing to cooperate with his grace ... In God's presence, consider: Do I put up a fight when temptations beset me, or do I give up quickly and surrender myself to them without a struggle? Do I rely on God's grace to conquer temptations, or am I conquered by them? ~ Patrick Madrid

All the public inscriptions in the town were painted alike, in severe characters of black and white. The jail might have been the infirmary, the infirmary might have been the jail, the town-hall might have been either, or both, or anything else, for anything that appeared to the contrary in the graces of their construction. Fact, fact, fact, everywhere in the material aspect of the town; fact, fact, fact, everywhere in the immaterial. The M'Choakumchild school was all fact, and the school of design was all fact, and the relations between master and man were all fact, and everything was fact between the lying-in hospital and the cemetery, and what you couldn't state in figures, or show to be purchaseable in the cheapest market and saleable in the dearest, was not, and never should be, world without end, Amen. A ~ Charles Dickens

Come to Me now with humble hearts. Because until you do this, you cannot benefit from My Mercy or receive the graces I long to provide you with. My Voice is calling out now to all non-believers to accept the existence of My Eternal Father. ~ Maria Divine Mercy

Dionysus, as the God of Wine, suggested that the occasion should be turned into a magnificent orgiastic event, with the Muses & the Graces dancing to the music of Apollo, Hermes & Pan as well as that of the Maenads & Bacchantes.
So the venue that Dionysus suggested was agreed upon even before the main players, the King of the Gods & the Goddess of Love, had agreed to mate. ~ Nicholas Chong

I remember only images, snapshots burned into me, bleeding into each other until I no longer knew the order in which they had happen. ~ Laure Eve

We must put up with our clothes as they are - they have their reason for existing. They are on us to expose us - to advertise what we wear them to conceal. They are a sign; a sign of insincerity; a sign of suppressed vanity; a pretense that we desire gorgeous colors and the graces of harmony and form; and we put them on to propagate that lie and back it up. ~ Mark Twain

It was these calamities that transformed my people into slavers, Galazza Galare had told her, at the Temple of the Graces. And I am the calamity that will change these slavers back into people, Dany had sworn to herself. ~ George R R Martin

I tried to do that very difficult thing, imagine old people young again and invested with the graces of youth. But ~ Charles Dickens

The Golden Court, the country town's elegant inn, was crowded and noisy. The guests, locals and visitors, were mostly engaged in activities typical for their nation or profession. Serious merchants argued with dwarves over the price of goods and credit interest. Less serious merchants pinched the backsides of the girls carrying beer, cabbage and beans. Local nitwits pretended to be well-informed. Harlots were trying to please those who had money while discouraging those who had none. Carters and fishermen drank as if there were no tomorrow. Some seamen were singing a song which celebrated the ocean waves, the courage of captains and the graces of mermaids, the latter graphically and in considerable detail. ~ Andrzej Sapkowski

I can understand the ignorant masses loving to soak themselves in drink - oh, yes, it's very shocking that they should, of course - very shocking to us who live in cozy homes, with all the graces and pleasures of life around us, that the dwellers in damp cellars and windy attics should creep from their dens of misery into the warmth and glare of the public-house bar, and seek to float for a brief space away from their dull world upon a Lethe stream of gin. But think, before you hold up your hands in horror at their ill-living, what "life" for these wretched creatures really means. Picture the squalid misery of their brutish existence, dragged on from year to year in the narrow, noisome room where, huddled like vermin in sewers, they welter, and sicken, and sleep; where dirt-grimed children scream and fight and sluttish, shrill-voiced women cuff, and curse, and nag; where the street outside teems with roaring filth and the house around is a bedlam of riot and stench. Think what a sapless stick this fair flower of life must be to them, devoid of mind and soul. The horse in his stall scents the sweet hay and munches the ripe corn contentedly. The watch-dog in his kennel blinks at the grateful sun, dreams of a glorious chase over the dewy fields, and wakes with a yelp of gladness to greet a caressing hand. But the clod-like life of these human logs never knows one ray of light. From the hour when they crawl from their comfortless bed to the hour when they lounge back into it agai ~ Jerome K. Jerome

Let us touch the dying, the poor, the lonely and the unwanted according to the graces we have received and let us not be ashamed or slow to do the humble work. ~ Mother Teresa

The tragedy of life, Mitchell, happens because you can never have everything and because you will even lose the graces you have once possessed. ~ Noha Alaa El-Din

All the graces of Christianity always go together. They so go together that where there is one, there are all, and where one is wanting, all are wanting. Where there is faith, there are love, and hope, and humility; and where there is love, there is also trust; and where there is a holy trust in God, there is love to God; and where there is a gracious hope, there also is a holy fear of God. ~ Jonathan Edwards

In Italy, almost at every step, history and poetry add to the graces of nature, sweeten the memory of the past, and seem to preserve it in eternal youth. ~ Madame De Stael

Prayer is the noble supplication which we lift up to the throne of the Most High. It is the most efficient means to obtain from God the graces which we need. ~ Pier Giorgio Frassati

Two goddesses now must Cyprus adore; The Muses are ten, and the Graces are four; Stella's wit is so charming, so sweet her fair face, She shines a new Venus, a Muse, and a Grace. ~ Callimachus

People could be built far greater in the Lord and be more wonderfully established if they would move out sometimes and think over the graces of the Lord. ~ Smith Wigglesworth

An agreeable figure and winning manner, which inspire affection without love, are always new. Beauty loses its relish, the graces never, after the longest acquaintance, they are no less agreeable than at first. ~ Henry Home, Lord Kames

But what has America to boast? What are the graces or the virtues which distinguish its inhabitants? What are their triumphs in war, or their inventions in peace? ~ Thomas Day

It is indeed a misfortune for a woman to be without beauty, as with men the eye is the chief arbiter of qualities in the sex. Her beauty is her capital
her worth in the market matrimonial depends upon it. With her the Virtues are less reverenced when unaccompanied by the Graces. The sex understand this very well; and hence they seek mainly to make captive the eye, knowing the mind and heart will follow as a matter of course. ~ Christian Nestell Bovee

When we have read a book or poem so often that we can no longer find any amusement in reading it by ourselves, we can still take pleasure in reading it to a companion. To him it has all the graces of novelty. ~ Adam Smith

It must be owned, that the Graces do not seem to be natives of Great Britain; and I doubt, the best of us here have more of rough than polished diamond. ~ Lord Chesterfield

The more I reflect on the graces I have received, the more they astonish me and make me tremble. ~ Rose Philippine Duchesne

What does the Spirit do? His works are ineffable in majesty, and innumerable in quantity. How can we even ponder what extends beyond the ages? What did He do before creation began? How great are the graces He showered on creation? What power will He wield in the age to come? He existed; He pre-existed; He co-existed with the Father and the Son before the ages. Even if you can imagine anything beyond the ages, you will discover that the Spirit is even further before. ~ Basil The Great

A man may as well hew marble without tools, or paint without colors or instruments, or build without materials, as perform any acceptable service without the graces of the Spirit, which are both the materials and instruments in the work. ~ Joseph Alleine

Good preservation is a life preserver thrown to us in a shipwreck. Good preservation keeps us in touch with the graces of this life. It's bricks and mortar, yes. It's arguments about true colors and authenticity and representation. But true preservation is like the hand that shelters a fire from the wind. It protects the spark of life.
Howard Mansfield, The Same Ax, Twice ~ Howard Mansfield

Complaisance, though in itself it be scarce reckoned in the number of moral virtues, is that which gives a lustre to every talent a man can be possessed of. It was Plato's advice to an unpolished writer that he should sacrifice to the graces. In the same manner I would advise every man of learning, who would not appear in the world a mere scholar or philosopher, to make himself master of the social virtue which I have here mentioned. ~ Joseph Addison

Plato used to say to Xenocrates the philosopher, who was rough and morose, Good Xenocrates, sacrifice to the Graces. ~ Plutarch

Every man of any education would rather be called a rascal, than accused of deficiency in the graces. ~ Lyndon B. Johnson

The slave of the belly ponders the menu with which to celebrate the feast. The servant of God, however, thinks of the graces that may enrich him. ~ John Climacus

Legends told that in the Dark Days, when the Graces walked the earth and inspired humanity to rise up and fight back against the Demons who ruled over them, the Grace of Luck would sometimes appear at people's doors in disguise - be their homes ever so humble or ever so proud - and beg for food or shelter. Those who offered hospitality were rewarded with Her blessing, and received great fortune; and as such, on the Night of Masks, every household must offer hospitality to any masked reveler who showed up at their door.
This custom had, naturally, evolved in Raverra to the throwing of lavish masquerades, made all the more exciting by the possibility that anyone could turn up at one's party, from the doge himself to a notorious jewel thief. So long as they wore an acceptable mask, they could join the festivities. Most Raverrans flitted from ball to ball throughout the night, and the revelry poured out into the streets and canals. It was a day of mysteries and surprises, of charity and cunning, of terrible mistakes to be regretted the next morning and wondrous coincidences to transform one's life. A night of intrigue and enchantment, of romance and adventure. ~ Melissa Caruso

When sonneteering Wordsworth re-creates the landing of Mary Queen of Scots at the mouth of the Derwent -
Dear to the Loves, and to the Graces vowed,
The Queen drew back the wimple that she wore
- he unveils nothing less than a canvas by Rubens, baroque master of baroque masters; this is the landing of a TRAGIC Marie de Medicis.
Yet so receptive was the English ear to sheep-Wordsworth's perverse 'Enough of Art' that it is not any of these works of supreme art, these master-sonnets of English literature, that are sold as picture postcards, with the text in lieu of the view, in the Lake District! it is those eternally, infernally sprightly Daffodils. ~ Brigid Brophy

Beauty loses its relish; the graces never. ~ Henry Home, Lord Kames

Fate seems to scourge some people with her furies, while it ravishes others with her graces with none having done absolutely nothing to suffer the furies or merit the graces. ~ Bangambiki Habyarimana

Poverty, chastity, and obedience are extremely difficult. But there are always the graces if you will pray for them. ~ Kathryn Hulme

Mike Topp is a disablingly funny writer
a miniaturist of nervous precisions, our supreme abridger of metropolitan startlement and inner fidgetry. He dazes and graces us. ~ Gary Lutz

Their sighing, canting, grace-proud faces, their three-mile prayers, and half-mile graces. ~ Robert Burns

I swear I've never met a man who has your knack for lack of social grace. If you weren't naturally charming, someone would have stabbed you by now. ~ Patrick Rothfuss

Humility can weep over other men's weaknesses, and joy and rejoice over their graces. ~ Thomas Brooks

Cocoon

Wrap yourself in a cocoon of warmth where loving thoughts reside with tender graces. Create your own peace. Hold to it fast. Always. ~ Ron Cooper

Well, most people would have said `thank you' after they'd been given help, and then I would have responded to that with `you're welcome'. I figured we'd skip straight to my part since social graces aren't your forte. ~ Heather James

This fair world, compounded of uncountable beauties and enchantments and graces, inspired in me only one abiding fear, which was that I might live in it too long. ~ Dean Koontz

Jane looped her arm through Grace's. "Come. Let us seek out two things that never fall short of our expectations."
"Books and cakes?"
"Precisely. ~ Eva Leigh

Everyday Graces: A Child's Book of Good Manners, written by Karen Santorum.[73] ~ James C. Dobson

She was a Canadian and had all their easy social graces. ~ Ernest Hemingway,

My life is war and peace and love and heartache all mixed into a bowl and packed into a jar labeled Grace's Believe It or Not. –Grace Tainted Book 2 of Fey Court Trilogy ~ Cyndi Goodgame

Gifts are things we do, but spiritual fruit or graces are things we are ~ Timothy J. Keller

graces were never yet given to any one man."A verse ~ Michel De Montaigne

How cheering a thought that Jesus can find comfort in our poor feeble graces. Can ~ Charles Haddon Spurgeon

How many gifts and graces You have given me! How many favors You have fed me from your hand! I look for your love in all directions, then suddenly its blessing burns in me. ~ Rabia Basri

There is a compound of grace in contentment: there is faith, and there is humility, and love, and there is patience, and there is wisdom, and there is hope; almost all graces are compounded. [ ... ] In one action that you do you may exercise one grace especially, but in contentment you exercise a great many graces at once. ~ Jeremiah Burroughs

In Springtime, O Dionysos,
To thy holy temple come,
To Elis with thy Graces,
Rushing with thy bull-foot, come,
Noble Bull, Noble Bull ~ Plutarch

I saw her point, but trying to reason with Vaughn by being butthurt was like trying to worm your way into a serial killer's good graces by running naked in an empty field after handing him a machete. ~ L.J. Shen

Virtue and genuine graces in themselves speak what no words can utter. ~ William Shakespeare

Why can she not influence him more, when she is privileged to draw
so near to him?" I asked myself. "Surely she cannot truly like him, or not
like him with true affection! If she did, she need not coin her smiles so
lavishly, flash her glances so unremittingly, manufacture airs so elaborate,
graces so multitudinous. ~ Charlotte Bronte

O, then, what graces in my love do dwell, That he hath turn'd a heaven unto a hell! ~ William Shakespeare

May Wisdom's light bespoke my mind,
May Grace's charity provoke my care;
May Heaven's bounty sustain my soul;
May Godly Reason make calm myself."

Prayer of St Francis - Azlander/Second Chances ~ Gabriel Brunsdon

Each given of life comes to us trailing many graces. ~ David Richo

Time be thine,
And thy best graces spend it at thy will. ~ William Shakespeare

Patience and perseverance are never more thoroughly Christian graces than when features of prayer. ~ Samuel I. Prime

Take heed that thou gloriest not in thy graces, but let all thy glorying and confidence be in Christ and his strength, for only so canst thou be kept from falling. ~ Charles Haddon Spurgeon

There's a certain pattern that exists with geniuses - an eccentricity, a lack of social graces and an inability to really communicate with mere mortals. ~ John Noble

To some kind of men their graces serve them but as enemies. ~ William Shakespeare

God inclines to shower His graces upon us, but our perverted will is a barrier to His generosity. ~ Ignatius Of Loyola

If we had to choose one American Idol to go out to dinner with, it would be Fantasia. There are no airs and graces about her ... I like her. ~ Simon Cowell