John Climacus Quotes

Do not be surprised that you fall every day; do not give up, but stand your ground courageously. And assuredly, the angel who guards you will honour your patience.

Fire and water do not mix, neither can you mix judgment of others with the desire to repent. If a man commits a sin before you at the very moment of his death, pass no judgment, because the judgment of God is hidden from men. It has happened that men have sinned greatly in the open but have done greater deeds in secret, so that those who would disparage them have been fooled, with smoke instead of sunlight in their eyes.

Humility is the only virtue that no devil can imitate. If pride made demons out of angels, there is no doubt that humility could make angels out of demons.

An angel fell from Heaven without any other passion except pride, and so we may ask whether it is possible to ascend to Heaven by humility alone, without any other of the virtues.

Humility is constant forgetfulness of one's achievements.

Repentance lifts a man up. Mourning knocks at heaven's gate. Holy humility opens it.

Obedience is the burial of the will and the resurrection of humility.

Forgetting offences is a sign of sincere repentance. If you keep the memory of them, you may believe you have repented but you are like someone running in his sleep. Let no one consider it a minor defect, this darkness that often clouds the eyes even of spiritual people.

The lover of silence draws close to God. He talks to Him in secret and God enlightens him.

When a man has found the Lord, he no longer has to use words when he is praying, for the Spirit Himself will intercede for him with groans that cannot be uttered.

When you are depressed, bear in mind the Lord's command to Peter to forgive a sinner seventy times seven (cf. Mt. 18:22). And you may be sure that He Who gave this command to another will Himself do very much more.

Holy love has a way of consuming some. This is what is meant by the one who said, 'You have ravished our hearts' (Sg. Of Sgs. 4:9). And it makes others bright and overjoyed. In this regard it has been said: 'My heart was full of trust and I was helped, and my flesh has revived' (Ps. 27:7). For when the heart is cheerful, the face beams (cf. Prov. 15:13), and a man flooded with the love of God reveals in his body, as if in a mirror, the splendor of his soul, a glory like that of Moses when he came face to face with God (cf. Ex. 34:29-35).

Everyone who asks something of God and does not receive it doubtless does not receive it for one of these reasons: either because they ask before the time, or they ask unworthily, or out of vainglory, or because if they received what they asked they would become proud or fall into negligence.

A servant of the Lord stands bodily before men, but mentally he is knocking at the gates of heaven with prayer.

Confession is like a bridle that keeps the soul which reflects on it from committing sin, but anything left unconfessed we continue to do without fear as if in the dark.

Humility is the only thing that no devil can imitate.

The offspring of virtue is perseverance. The fruit and offspring of perseverance is habit and child of habit is character.

Those who submit to the Lord with simple heart will run the good race. If they keep their minds on a leash, they will not draw the wickedness of the demons onto themselves.

A characteristic of those who are still progressing in blessed mourning is temperance and silence of the lips; and of those who have made progress - freedom from anger and patient endurance of injuries; and of the perfect - humility, thirst for dishonors, voluntary craving for involuntary afflictions, non- condemnation of sinners, compassion even beyond one's strength. The first are acceptable, the second laudable; but blessed are those who hunger for hardship and thirst for dishonor, for they shall be filled with the food whereof there can be no satiety.

Become aware of God, in whose presence you are while you pray . . . Then take a formula of prayer and recite it with perfect attention both to the words you are saying and to the Person to whom you are saying them.

Fight to escape from your own cleverness. If you do, then you will find salvation and uprightness through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Whoever has become a servant of the Lord fears only his Master. But whoever is without the fear of God is often afraid of his own shadow. Fearfulness is the daughter of unbelief. A proud soul is the slave of fear; hoping in itself, in comes to such a state that it is startled by a small noise, and is afraid of the dark.

As long as anger lives, it continues to be the fruitful parent of many unhappy children.

The friend of silence comes close to God. In secret he converses with him and receives his light.

Everything is possible for the believer. I have watched impure souls mad for physical love but turning what they know of such love into a reason for penance and transferring that same capacity for love to the Lord. I have watched them master fear so as to drive themselves unsparingly toward the love of God. That is why, when talking of that chaste harlot, the Lord does not say, 'because she feared,' but rather, 'because she loved much' she was able to drive out love with love (Lk. 7:47).

The friend of silence comes close to God.

Just as the winds whip up the sea, so does anger stir confusion in the mind.

Often the Lord heals vainglory by dishonor.

You wish, or rather, have decided, to remove a splinter from someone? Very well, but do not go after it with a stick instead of a lancet for you will only drive it deeper. Rough speech and harsh gestures are the stick, while even-tempered instruction and patient reprimand are the lancet. 'Reprove, rebuke, exhort,' says the Apostle (II Tim. 4:2), not 'batter'.

I know a man who, when he saw a woman of striking beauty, praised the Creator for her. The sight of her lit within him the love of God.

Do not regard the feelings of a person who speaks to you about his neighbor disparagingly, but rather say to him: "Stop, brother! I fall into graver sins every day, so how can I criticize him? In this way you will achieve two things; you will heal yourself and your neighbor with one plaster. This is one of the shortest ways to the forgiveness of sins; I mean, not to judge. `Judge not, and ye shall not be judged."

Meekness is an unchanging state of mind, which both in honor and dishonor remains the same. Meekness consists in praying sincerely and undisturbedly in the face of afflictions from one's neighbor. Meekness is a cliff rising from the sea of irritability, against which all the that waves that strive against it break, but which is itself never broken.

Do not make judgments, and you will travel no quicker road to the forgiveness of your sins. 'Judge not, so that you may not be judged' (Lk. 6:37).

Pride is the utter poverty of soul disguised as riches, imaginary light where in fact there is darkness.

It is not the self -critical who reveals his humility ( for does not everyone have some how to put up with himself? ). Rather, it is the man who continues to love the person who has criticized him.

As fire does not give birth to snow, so those who seek honor here will not enjoy it in heaven... As those who climb a rotten ladder are in danger, so all honor, glory, and power are opposed to humility.

Simplicity is an enduring habit within a soul that has grown impervious to evil thoughts.

The first stage of this tranquility consists in silencing the lips when the heart is excited. The second, in silencing the mind when the soul is still excited. The goal is a perfect peacefulness even in the middle of the raging storm.

Someone who is elated with wine speaks the truth on all subjects, even without meaning to. In the same way, anyone who is inebriated with the spirit of penitence will never be able to tell lies.

Ascend, my brothers, ascend eagerly. Let your hearts' resolve be to climb. Listen to the voice of the one who says: 'Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of our God' (Isa. 2:3), Who makes our feet to be like the feet of the deer, 'Who sets us on the high places, that we may be triumphant on His road' (Hab. 3:19).

Our inhuman enemy inspires the thought that God loves mankind, and that He quickly forgives this sin. But when we observe the guile of demons, then we see that after the commission of the sin, they suggest to us that God is a righteous and implacable Judge. The first they say in order to lead us to sin, the second, in order to weigh us down in despair.

Do not be surprised if you fall every day and do not surrender. Stand your ground bravely and you may be sure that your guardian angel will respect your endurance. A fresh, warm wound is easier to heal than those that are old, neglected, and festering, and that need extensive treatment, surgery, bandaging and cauterization. Long neglect can render many of them incurable. However, all things are possible with God

He does not show humility who accuses himself (for who will not accept rebukes from himself?), but he who, being rebuked by another, does not decrease his love toward him.

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.

When the soul betrays itself and loses the blessed and longed-for fervor, let it carefully investigate the reason for losing it. And let it arm itself with all its longing and zeal against whatever caused this. For the former fervor can return only through the same door through which it was lost.

We know the utility of prayer from the efforts of the wicked spirits to distract us during the divine office; and we experience the fruit of prayer in the defeat of our enemies.

The man who pets a lion may tame it, but the man who coddles the body makes it ravenous.

It happens, I do not know how, that most of the proud never really discover their true selves. They think they have conquered their passions and they find out how poor they really are only after they die.

A discerning man, when he eats grapes, takes only the ripe ones and leaves the sour. Thus also the discerning mind carefully marks the virtues which he sees in any person. A mindless man seeks out the vices and failings ... Even if you see someone sin with your own eyes, do not judge; for often even your eyes are deceived.

When people begin to praise us, let us hurry to remember the multitude of ours transgressions, and we will see that we are truly unworthy of that which they say and do in our honor.