The Will Quotes

Those Christians who are very strict in their observances, think a good deal more of the Sabbath than of man, a great deal more of the Bible than of the truth, and ten times more of their creed than of the will of God. Of course, if they heard anyone utter such words as I have just written, they would say he was and atheist. ~ George MacDonald

He asked that God remember those who had died and he asked that the living gathered together here remember that the corn grows by the will of God and beyond that will there is neither corn nor growing nor light nor air nor rain nor anything at all save only darkness. Then they ate. ~ Cormac McCarthy

Courage must come from the soul within; the man must furnish the will to win. So figure it out for yourself, my lad. You were born with all that the great have had. ~ Edgar Guest

Anything allowed in the heart which is contrary to the will of God, let it seem ever so insignificant, or be ever so deeply hidden, will cause us to fall before our enemies. Any root of bitterness cherished towards another, any self-seeking, any harsh judgments indulged in, any slackness in obeying the voice of the Lord, any doubtful habits or surroundings, any one of these things will effectually cripple and paralyze our spiritual life. I believe our blessed Guide, the indwelling Holy Spirit, is always secretly discovering these things to us by continual little twinges and pangs of conscience, so that we are left without excuse. ~ Hannah Whitall Smith

I then greet and cordially thank you all, dear friends belonging to other religious traditions; first of all the Muslims, who worship the one God, living and merciful, and call upon Him in prayer, and all of you. I really appreciate your presence: in it I see a tangible sign of the will to grow in mutual esteem and cooperation for the common good of humanity. ~ Pope Francis

But surely the will to create was a form of the will to live...? ~ Ryunosuke Akutagawa

If God is your coach, you score the most amazing and unbelievable goals ~ Ernest Agyemang Yeboah

There are moments when the future looks so black that one is afraid to let one's thoughts dwell on it, refuses to let one's mind function and tries to convince oneself that the future will not be, and the past has not been. At such moments, when the will is not governed or modified by reflection and the only incentives that remain in life are our physical instincts, I can understand how a child, being particularly prone owing to lack of experience to fall into such a state, may without the least hesitation or fear, with a smile of curiosity deliberately set fire to his own house - and then fan the flames where is brothers, his father an his mother, all of who he loves dearly, are sleeping. ~ Leo Tolstoy

On Dec. 1, 1948, after the triumph of the revolution, which insured the final victory of the will of the people expressed through elections, President Jose Figueres abolished the army in my country. ~ Oscar Arias

Believing that war is contrary to the will of God and to common sense, and feeling that the way of peace is the way of love, I shall work for peace by using the way of love myself, by helping any group I am part of to use it, by helping the nation of which I am a citizen to use it, by helping the United Nations to use it, and by praying that the way of love be used all over the world. ~ Peace Pilgrim

I want to see us to explore outer space. But I want to do it safely, without the loss of human life, and democratically: where is the free-wheeling debate on this question? Only one force can stop this mission: the will of the American people. They have not been asked. Do they want to endanger their loved ones, their industry with this launch? One force is more powerful than plutonium, the spirit of the American people united. ~ Michio Kaku

The Will I fell in love with, she almost said."And be Will," she finished instead. "Or I shall hit you with my umbrella. ~ Cassandra Clare

Everyone has got the will to win; it's only those with the will to prepare that do win. ~ Mark Cuban

Age should fly concourse, cover in retreat defects of judgment, and the will subdue; walk thoughtful on the silent, solemn shore of that vast ocean it must sail so soon. ~ Edward Young

Well, on some level, it's similar to the psychological phenomenon of helplessness, where the will to try is lost. You get to the point where you just assume that your spontaneous call to a friend will go to voicemail or an assistant, and you decide not to bother. ~ Zack Love

The will to live that possesses us to create medicine, to become firefighters or teachers, is the same will to live that is woven into all living beings. ~ Ian Somerhalder

But first of all we must will, for the will is master of the heart. ~ A.W. Tozer

The will of God will not take us where the grace of God cannot sustain us. ~ Billy Graham

Love is a flame to set the will on fire ~ John Masefield

[S]ervants of darkness had no lasting joy in their service. In all of them the will for darkness was a perversion of the will for the light. In all but a few maniacs the satisfaction of the will for darkness was at all times countered by a revulsion which the unhappy spirit either dared not confess even to itself, or else rejected as cowardly and evil. ~ Olaf Stapledon

Someone has said that no theology is worth believing that cannot be preached standing in front of the gates of Auschwitz. I, for one, could not stand at those gates and preach a version of God's sovereignty that makes the extermination of six million Jews, including many children, a part of the will and plan of God such that God foreordained and rendered it certain.18 I want young Calvinists (and others) to know and at least come to terms with the inevitable and unavoidable consequences of what this radical form of Reformed theology teaches. And I want to give their friends and relatives and Spiritual mentors ammunition to use in undermining their sometimes overconfidence in the solidity of their belief system. ~ Roger E. Olson

On the bottom staff - the taste of earth, worms, and dust; the smell of dead leaves and frankincense. On the top - the luminosity of awareness making sense of transience and predestination. Three quiet major chords marked the moment of death, because death was sweet. It was our true home, the home we'd left and been trying to get back to. It's what we had passed through before and would pass through again, a moment of truth that suspended the weight of thought, the weight of the will to inhabit a dead universe. ~ Nikolai Grozni

we, as a species, now stand at a crossroads. We can face the possibility of our own extinction and work to avert it, or we can follow the more traditional path of earth's organisms and fall blindly over the edge. If there's one trait that characterizes human beings, it's the will to survive. This, I believe, will motivate us to work with the natural world rather than oppose it, which is all we need to do to give the children of earth - of all species - the opportunity to thrive. ~ Alexandra Morton

The will is conceived as a faculty of determining oneself to action in accordance with the conception of certain laws. And such a faculty can be found only in rational beings. ~ Immanuel Kant

Jesus made this diagnosis a long time ago when talking about temptation. "The spirit" - notice the language again - "is willing, but the flesh [the body] is weak." This is very true and largely ignored and forgotten in our day. Habits eat willpower for breakfast. So there is the will, there is the mind, and there is the body. They are working badly, sometimes in ways that are kind of humorous to us, but often in ways that are horrible and unspeakably tragic. ~ John Ortberg

There is something servile in the interpretation of sin as crime which infringes the will of God and calls for legal proceedings on the part of God. Sin is dividedness, a state of deficiency, incompleteness, dissociation, enslavement, hatred, but it is not disobedience and not formal violation of the will of God. ~ Nikolai Berdyaev

Purity both of the body and the soul rests on the steadfastness of the will strengthened by God's grace, and cannot be forcibly taken from an unwilling person. ~ Augustine Of Hippo

You can't resist the will of God and receive the grace of God at the same time. ~ Andy Stanley

Real love is intentional, an act of the will. ~ Barbara Hughes

It's easy to be kind to friends who return your smiles and happily lend a helping hand. But the true test of good character is finding the will and desire to be kind and charitable to those who give us absolutely no motivation to do so. ~ Richelle E. Goodrich

The way is open to everybody who has the will, the ambition, the respect for work, and the IT. ~ Elsa Schiaparelli

I had no destination, just the will to go, and I went fast. ~ Siri Hustvedt

Brokenness is the shattering of my self-will - the absolute surrender of my will to the will of God. It is saying "Yes, Lord!" - no resistance, no chafing, no stubbornness - simply submitting myself to His direction and will in my life. ~ Nancy Leigh DeMoss

Crisis either causes regress or progress depending on the will of the people. ~ Abhijit Naskar

Unless Caesar Augustus is unwittingly complying with the will of God, if it is true that in His divine wisdom He has ordained that Joseph and Mary should go to Bethlehem at this time. ~ Jose Saramago

For that thought to be strong, however, it must be free of doubt, for doubt weakens the will, weakens the response of the universe, and slows the manifestation of desire. ~ Stephen Richards

Traditional marriage between a man and a woman has been a cornerstone of our society for generations. If we are going to change that, it ought to be done by the will of the people. ~ Steve Chabot

KEEP THE BODY, TAKE THE MIND! In other words, break the will to resist. ~ Willie Lynch

What is the city in which we sit here, but an aggregate of incongruous materials, which have obeyed the will of some man? ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

All warfare is based on deception. For years, the West hypocrisy has made the world a battlefield. The corrupt talk while our brothers and sons spill their own blood. But deceit cuts both ways. The bigger the lie, the more likely people will believe it, and when a nation cries for vengeance, the lie spreads like a wildfire. The fire builds, devouring everything in its path. Our enemies believe that they alone dictate the course of history, and all it takes is the will of a single man. ~ Vladimer Makarov

I can promise you that God wills for us to walk out the depth and breadth of our lives with dignity and security. Neither God nor you have anything to gain by your persistent insecurity. When it comes to dignity and security, we have the golden opportunity to know in advance that we are praying the will of God into our lives. And we need to cash in that request posthaste. We can count on the answer being as sure as the appeal. In fact, if your willing to exercise the boldness that excites the heart of God, you can go right ahead and thank Him in advance because you know what you've asked is as good as done. Sometimes we see or sense the evidence immediately. Other times God lets it amass bit by bit. ~ Beth Moore

It is natural for the mind to believe, and for the will to love; [47] so that, for want of true objects, they must attach themselves to false. ~ Blaise Pascal

My fellow Americans, people all over the world, we need to solve the climate crisis, it's not a political issue, it's a moral issue. We have everything we need to get started, with the possible exception of the will to act, that's a renewable resource, let's renew it. ~ Al Gore

I'm not ashamed of heroic ambitions. If man and woman can only dance upon this earth for a few countable turns of the sun ... let each of us be an Artemis, Odysseus, or Zeus ... Aphrodite to the extent of the will of each one. ~ Roman Payne

And Peter Lake knew that these things were nothing in themselves but the means by which to remember those he had loved, and to remind him that the power of the love he had known was repeated a million times a million times over, from one soul to another--all worthy, all holy, none ever lost. He glided through the illusions that flashed bravely on the smoke, and he was touched very deeply by the will of things to live in the light. ~ Mark Helprin

You tell your kids that no matter what, you set your goals and you go for them. Whatever it is you achieve, never give up. You want your kids to have that good attitude, the confidence, and the will power to believe in themselves. ~ Joel Parkinson

Yoga is about the will, working with intelligence and self-reflexive consciousness, can free us from the inevitability of the wavering mind and outwardly directed senses. ~ B.K.S. Iyengar

Beyond imagination and insight, the most important component of talent is perseverance - the will to write and rewrite in pursuit of perfection. Therefore, when inspiration sparks the desire to write, the artist immediately asks: Is this idea so fascinating, so rich in possibility, that I want to spend months, perhaps years, of my life in pursuit of its fulfillment? Is this concept so exciting that I will get up each morning with the hunger to write? Will this inspiration compel me to sacrifice all of life's other pleasures in my quest to perfect its telling? If the answer is no, find another idea. Talent and time are a writer's only assets. Why give your life to an idea that's not worth your life? ~ Robert McKee

The ways of God "Be ye perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect."1 Holy Scripture never orders and never counsels us to do the impossible. By these words, then, the Lord Jesus does not command us to accomplish the very works and ways of God, which no one can attain in perfection. But He invites us to model ourselves on them, as much as is possible, by applying ourselves to imitate them. We can do this with the help of grace and we should do so. And as the Bishop John said, nothing is more suitable to man than to imitate his Creator, and to carry out, to the degree that he is able, the will of God. ~ Thomas Aquinas

Suicide, I had understood, is an act not of body against itself but of the will against the body ~ J.M. Coetzee

If I only have the will to be grateful, I am so. ~ Seneca The Younger

Let a man set his heart only on doing the will of God and he is instantly free. If we understand our first and sole duty to consist of loving God supremely and loving everyone, even our enemies, for God's dear sake, then we can enjoy spiritual tranquility under every circumstance. ~ Aiden Wilson Tozer

Conversion requires an alteration of the will, and an alteration which, in the last resort, does not occur without the intervention of the supernatural. ~ C.S. Lewis

It is a happy moment when our desire crosses with the will of Heavenly Father. ~ C.S. Lewis

Anger, jealousy, unbelief, discontent, fear and envy, are within your reach of thoughts and feelings. All of that is under your control and not the will of others. That is why people always want to be understood, tolerated by others but it is difficult to do the opposite ~ Titon Rahmawan

Military and absolutist regimes are undoubtedly well fitted to get the jump on an unsuspecting or unprepared enemy; but the history of modern warfare proves that they cannot win over representative governments in the long run, provided that people behind those governments have the heart to sustain initial punishment, and both the will and the resources to fight back. ~ Samuel Eliot Morison

Through all my years
enslaved,
I've listened to
ancestral voices
echoing through
my weariness,
giving me strength
to withstand injustice,
to believe in myself
and survive.

May our songs and stories
keep alive in us
the will to grow in learning.
The longing to be free! ~ Ashley Bryan

Arminian notion of Liberty of the Will, consisting in the will's Self-determination, is repugnant to itself, and shuts itself wholly out of the world. ~ Jonathan Edwards

The will of God is revealed as you listen to the Spirit of God in the Word of God. The precepts and promises of the Bible teach us what to pray. They teach us what grace to ask for and for what work we need strength. On every page of the Bible there is subject matter for prayer. B. F. Westcott, a renowned nineteenth-century English Bible scholar, observed: "The petitions of true disciples are echoes (so to speak) of Christ's words. As He has spoken so they speak. Their prayer is only some fragment of His teaching transformed into a supplication, and so it will necessarily be heard."[50] One way to pray more effectively is to echo God's Word back to Him as you pray. We align our hearts with His heart as we pray His Words from our hearts. ~ Archie Parrish

We return to face our superiors, our kindred, our friends--- those whom we obey, and those whom we love; but even they who have neither, the most free, lonely, irresponsible and bereft of ties, --- even those for whom home holds no dear face, no familiar voice, --- even they have to meet the spirit that dwells within the land, under its sky, in its air, in its valleys, and on its rises, in its fields, in its waters and its tress--- a mute friend, judge, and inspirer.
Say what you like, to get its joy, to breathe its peace, to face its truth, one must return with a clear conscience.
All this may seem to you sheer sentimentalism; and indeed very few of us have the will or capacity to look consciously under the surface of familiar emotions.
There are the girls we love, the men we look up to, the tenderness, the friendships, the opportunities, the pleasures! But the fact remains that you must touch your reward with clean hands, lest it turn to dead leaves, to thorns, in your grasp. ~ Joseph Conrad

The will to do, the soul to dare. ~ Walter Scott

That lesson suggests that in the end, we can only find peace in our human lives by accepting the will of the universe. ~ Stephen King

Surely, I must at all times attempt to obey the law of the state. But when the will of God and the will of the state conflict, I am compelled to follow the will of God. ~ Bayard Rustin

Research seems to indicate that there is a third and better alternative: We can recognize the in love experience for what it was - a temporary emotional high - and now pursue "real love" with our spouse. That kind of love is emotional in nature but not obsessional. It is a love that unites reason and emotion. It involves an act of the will and requires discipline, and it recognizes the need for personal growth. Our most basic emotional need is not to fall in love but to be genuinely loved by another, to know a love that grows out of reason and choice, not instinct. I need to be loved by someone who chooses to love me, who sees in me something worth loving.
That kind of love requires effort and discipline. It is the choice to expend energy in an effort to
benefit the other person, knowing that if his or her life is enriched by your effort, you too will find a sense of satisfaction - the satisfaction of having genuinely loved another ~ Gary Chapman

Yet some men say in many parts of England that King Arthur is not dead, but had by the will of our Lord Jesu into another place; and men say that he shall come again, and he shall win the holy cross. ~ Thomas Malory

The commander of the forces of a large State may be carried off, but the will of even a common man cannot be taken from him. ~ Confucius

To deny the freedom of the will is to make morality impossible. ~ James Anthony Froude

When the will defies fear, when duty throws the gauntlet down to fate, when honor scorns to compromise with death - that is heroism. ~ Robert Green Ingersoll

But experience has taught me that you cannot value dreams according to the odds of their coming true. Their real value is in stirring within us the will to aspire. That will, wherever it finally leads, does at least move you forward. And after a time you may recognize that the proper measure of success is not how much you've closed the distance to some far-off goal but the quality of what you've done today. ~ Sonia Sotomayor

The power of protest depends not only on how many turn out, but also on what legislative, judicial, and civil society institutions exist to enact the will of those marching in the streets. ~ Cynthia P. Schneider

No one, however strong he may feel his obligations, will ever be man
enough to fulfill them except that he be a Christian-that is,one who,
like Christ, cares first for the will of the Father. ~ George MacDonald

I am here by the will of the Great Spirit, and by his will I am chief. ~ Sitting Bull

The wisdom of the flesh is a judgement that the ordinary ends of our natural appetites are the goods to which the whole of man's life are to be ordered. Therefore it inevitably inclines the will to violate God's law. ~ Thomas Merton

Self-seeking is the gate by which a soul departs from peace; and total abandonment to the will of God, that by which it returns. ~ Jeanne Marie Bouvier De La Motte Guyon

Sing, goddess, the anger of Peleus' son Achilleus and its devastation, which put pains thousandfold upon the Achaians, hurled in their multitudes to the house of Hades strong souls of heroes, but gave their bodies to be the delicate feasting 5 of dogs, of all birds, and the will of Zeus was accomplished ~ Homer

The next day the Indian told me their name for this light,
artoosoq',
and on my inquiring concerning the will-o'-the-wisp, and the like phenomena, he said that his "folks" sometimes saw fires passing along at various heights, even as high as the trees, and making a noise. I was prepared after this to hear of the most startling and unimagined phenomena, witnessed by "his folks"; they are abroad at all hours and seasons in scenes so unfrequented by white men. Nature must have made a thousand revelations to them which are still secrets to us. ~ Henry David Thoreau

If missions languish, it is because the whole life of godliness is feeble. The command to go everywhere and preach to everybody is not obeyed until the will is lost by self-surrender in the will of God. Living, praying, giving and going will always be found together. ~ Arthur Tappan Pierson

Freedom of the will is a psychological fiction. ~ Louis Berkhof

A system of metaphor (pointing to a higher power) that one takes inside oneself as the truth and through its rules one aligns ones inner and outer behavior, submitting ones ego or will to the will of a higher power. ~ Mason Jennings

Asceticism is an antidote to the poison of self-centeredness common in our culture, which teaches us that satisfying our own desires is the key to the good life. The ascetic knows that true happiness can be found only by living in harmony with the will of God, and ascetical practices train body and soul to put God above self. ~ Rob Dreher

Anything that will enable us to express greater life, greater happiness, greater power
so long as it does not harm anyone
must be the Will of God for us. ~ Ernest Holmes

The integral part of being a star is having the will to win. All the champions have it. ~ Betty Cuthbert

Because these wings are no longer wings to fly
But merely vans to beat the air
The air which is now thoroughly small and dry
Smaller and dryer than the will
Teach us to care and not to care
Teach us to sit still ~ T. S. Eliot

If someone asks,
But what is Love?
Answer,
Dissolving the will. ~ Rumi

Your personal will is the web your disease sits and spins in. The will you call your own ceased to be yours as of who knows how many Substance-drenched years ago. ~ David Foster Wallace

Now comes the threat of climate crisis - a threat that is real, rising, imminent, and universal. Once again, it is the 11th hour. The penalties for ignoring this challenge are immense and growing, and at some near point would be unsustainable and unrecoverable. For now we still have the power to choose our fate, and the remaining question is only this: Have we the will to act vigorously and in time, or will we remain imprisoned by a dangerous illusion? ~ Al Gore

Astrology is a fact, in most instances. But astrological aspects are but signs, symbols. No influence is of greater value or of greater help than the will of an individual ... Do not attempt to be guided by, but use the astrological influences as the means to meet or to overcome the faults and failures, or to minimize the faults and to magnify the virtues in self. ~ Edgar Cayce

Nothing worthwhile was ever accomplished without the will to start, the enthusiasm to continue and, regardless of temporary obstacles, the persistence to complete ~ Waite Phillips

His chest heaved once, as if his large heart, weary of despotic constriction, had expanded, despite the will, and made a vigorous bound for the attainment of liberty. ~ Charlotte Bronte

Be free from vanity and pride. Be free from belief, disbelief, convictions, and parties. Be free from habit. Be free from ambition and greed. Be free from family and surroundings. Be free from fanaticism. Be free from fate; be master of your own life. Be free from death; life depends on the will of others, but death on our own will. ~ Sarah Bakewell

Fortitude is the marshal of thought, the armor of the will, and the fort of reason. ~ Francis Bacon

All religions have based morality on obedience, that is to say, on voluntary slavery. That is why they have always been more pernicious than any political organization. For the latter makes use of violence, the former - of the corruption of the will. ~ Alexander Herzen

Let the will embrace the highest ideals freely and with infinite strength, but let action first take hold of what lies closest. ~ Franz Grillparzer

There is a driving force more powerful than steam, electricity and nuclear power: the will. ~ Albert Einstein

Alla intuitionb is intellectual. For without the understanding it would never come to intuition, to perceptionc, apprehensiond of objects; rather, it would remain as mere sensation,e which at most could have significance with regard to the will as pain or comfort, but would otherwise be a change of meaningless states and ~ Arthur Schopenhauer

Eva is a story of repetition. It is a story where our protagonist faces the same situation many times over and determinedly picks himself back up again. It is a story of the will to move forward, even if only a little. It is a story of the resolve to want to be together, even though it is frightening to have contact with others and endure ambiguous loneliness. I would be most gratified if you found enjoyment in these four parts as it takes the same story and metamorphoses it into something different. ~ Hideaki Anno

The sovereign people, legislators, and reformers, see in public offices, to speak plainly, only opportunities for pecuniary advancement. And, because it regards them as a source of profit, it decrees the eligibility of citizens. For of what use would this precaution be, if there were nothing to gain by it? No one would think of ordaining that none but astronomers and geographers should be pilots, nor of prohibiting stutterers from acting at the theatre and the opera. The nation was still aping the kings: like them it wished to award the lucrative positions to its friends and flatterers. Unfortunately, and this last feature completes the resemblance, the nation did not control the list of livings; that was in the hands of its agents and representatives. They, on the other hand, took care not to thwart the will of their gracious sovereign. ~ Pierre-Joseph Proudhon

A fundamentalist is someone who wants to substitute what he believes for what you believe," Max said. "And someone who thinks he knows the will of God better than anyone else. ~ Robin Wasserman

Outrun the people who quit when they feel discomfort, outrun the people who stop because of despair, outrun the people who are delayed because of prejudice, outrun the people who surrender to failure, and outrun the opponent who loses sight of the goal. Because if you want to win, the will can never retire, the race can never stop, and faith can never weaken. ~ Muhammad Ali

I understood something about myself as well, even if I didn't have the will to examine it just then. ~ Rachel Hartman