“The mystical trend of our time, which shows itself particularly in the rampant growth of the so-called Theosophy and Spiritualism, is for me no more than a symptom of weakness and confusion. Since our inner experiences consist of reproductions, and combinations of sensory impressions, the concept of a soul without a body seem to me to be empty and devoid of meaning.

“For example, when the preacher in a service tells the audience to open to a certain passage of Scripture, we love to open our Bible and be proud of how we have it marked up in all different colors. We may have Scriptures underlined, with handwritten notes beside them. We secretly hope the people around us will notice and think well of us because we appear to have studied quite a lot. We want people to think we are spiritual, but we must realize that God is not impressed with how many Scriptures we have underlined.

“We never really own anything during our brief stay on earth. God just loans the earth to us while we’re here. It was God’s property before you arrived, and God will loan it to someone else after you die. You just get to enjoy it for a while.”

“PHILIPPIANS 4:6 6 Be careful for nothing; but in every thing by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God.”

“At the moment that we persuade a child, any child, to cross that threshold, that magic threshold into a library, we change their lives forever, for the better.”

“Several years ago Dr. Maxwell Maltz’s book, Psycho-Cybernetics, was one of the most popular books on the market. Dr. Maltz was a plastic surgeon who often took disfigured faces and made them more attractive. He observed that in every case, the patient’s self-image rose with his and her physical improvement. In addition to being a successful surgeon, Dr. Maltz was a great psychologist who understood human nature. A wealthy woman was greatly concerned about her son, and she came to Dr. Maltz for advice. She had hoped that the son would assume the family business following her husband’s death, but when the son came of age, he refused to assume that responsibility and chose to enter an entirely different field. She thought Dr. Maltz could help convince the boy that he was making a grave error. The doctor agreed to see him, and he probed into the reasons for the young man’s decision. The son explained, “I would have loved to take over the family business, but you don’t understand the relationship I had with my father. He was a driven man who came up the hard way. His objective was to teach me self-reliance, but he made a drastic mistake. He tried to teach me that principle in a negative way. He thought the best way to teach me self-reliance was to never encourage or praise me. He wanted me to be tough and independent. Every day we played catch in the yard. The object was for me to catch the ball ten straight times. I would catch that ball eight or nine times, but always on that tenth throw he would do everything possible to make me miss it. He would throw it on the ground or over my head but always so I had no chance of catching it.” The young man paused for a moment and then said, “He never let me catch the tenth ball—never! And I guess that’s why I have to get away from his business; I want to catch that tenth ball!”

“We make men without chests and expect from them virtue and enterprise. We laugh at honor and are shocked to find traitors in our midst.”

“Measured against eternity, our time on earth is just a blink of an eye, but the consequences of it will last forever.”

“I can patiently wait for the things I want in life, trusting God to bring them in His timing.”

“Anytime I see a rainbow, what comes into my mind is how skillful and talented someone was to create an ark that didn't leak through a prolong period of flood. We must work our talents out and work them out skillfully and then our rainbow of excellence will show.”

“Renewal is brought by the Holy Spirit. Believers will learn what it means to minister to one another and build each other up. No longer will our lives seem ordinary and indistinguishable from the rest of the world.”

“The student is half afraid to meet one of the great philosophers face to face. He feels himself inadequate and thinks he will not understand him. But if he only knew, the great man, just because of his greatness, is much more intelligible than his modern commentator. The simplest student will be able to understand, if not all, yet a very great deal of what Plato said; but hardly anyone can understand some modern books on Platonism.”

“An infant is born with a clenched fist; a man dies with an open hand. Life has a way of prying free the things we think are so important.”

“A leader without a clear vision and plans only abuses his power because visions, dreams and plans are the fulcrum along which the loads of success will spine by your own efforts. And where power is abused, there is manipulation instead of inspiration.”

“But you can wake a man only if he is really asleep; no effort that you may make will produce any effect upon him if he is merely pretending sleep. That”