Quotes from Thomas Merton
The purpose of our lives is to find the purpose of our lives.
- Thomas Merton
Love in fact is the spiritual life, and without it all the other exercises of the spirit, however lofty, are emptied of content and become mere illusions.
- Thomas Merton
One of the strange laws of the contemplative life is that in it you do not sit down and solve problems: you bear with them until they somehow solve themselves. Or until life solves them for you.
- Thomas Merton
Life is this simple: we are living in a world that is absolutely transparent and the divine is shining through it all the time. This is not just a nice story or a fable, it is true.
- Thomas Merton
You are made in the image of what you desire.
- Thomas Merton
A life is either all spiritual or not spiritual at all. No man can serve two masters. Your life is shaped by the end you live for. You are made in the image of what you desire.
- Thomas Merton
For perfect hope is achieved on the brink of despair, when instead of falling over the edge, we find ourselves walking on air.
- Thomas Merton
What can we gain by sailing to the moon if we cannot cross the abyss that separates us from ourselves?
- Thomas Merton
Every one of us is shadowed by an illusory person: a false Self. We are not very good at recognizing illusions, least of all the ones we cherish about ourselves.
- Thomas Merton
We stumble and fall constantly even when we are most enlightened. But when we are in true spiritual darkness, we do not even know that we have fallen.
- Thomas Merton
On Pride: This sickness is most dangerous when it succeeds in looking like humility. When a proud man thinks he is humble his case is hopeless.
- Thomas Merton
The goal of fasting is inner unity.
- Thomas Merton