Best Hearts Quotes & Sayings

The best hearts are ever the bravest. — Laurence Sterne

I appeal to the contemptible speech made lately by Sir Robert Peel to an applauding House of Commons. 'Orders of merit,' said he, 'were the proper rewards of the military' (the desolators of the world in all ages). 'Men of science are better left to the applause of their own hearts.' Most learned Legislator! Most liberal cotton-spinner! Was your title the proper reward of military prowess? Pity you hold not the dungeon-keys of an English Inquisition! Perhaps Science, like creeds, would flourish best under a little persecution. — John Joseph Griffin

Libraries are a force for good. They wear capes. They fight evil. They don't get upset when you don't send them a card on their birthdays. (Though they will charge you if you're late returning a book.) They serve communities. The town without a library is a town without a soul. The library card is a passport to wonders and miracles, glimpses into other lives, religions, experiences, the hopes and dreams and strivings of ALL human beings, and it is this passport that opens our eyes and hearts to the world beyond our front doors, that is one of our best hopes against tyranny, xenophobia, hopelessness, despair, anarchy, and ignorance. Libraries are the torch of the world, illuminating the path when it feels too dark to see. We mustn't allow that torch to be extinguished. — Libba Bray

Let us not expect too much from our own hearts here below. At our best we shall find in ourselves daily cause for humiliation, and discover that we are needy debtors to mercy and grace every hour. — J.C. Ryle

Children's books: Every time you find the right, the necessary, book for a child - a book about sadness overcome, unfairness battled, hearts mended - you perform the best kind of magic ... every time you give just the right book to just the right child, you're saying, "You, my friend, have potential." That is a gift. That is a miracle. And that is what you do, each of you, every single day. — Katherine Applegate

I've met men I would trust in the mouth of hell. Byrne or Douglas. I would trust them to breathe for me, to pump my blood with their hearts."
"Did you love them best? Would they be the ones you'd choose?"
"To die with? No. The one time I've felt what you describe was with a woman."
"A lover, you mean?" said Jack. "Not your own flesh and blood?"
"I think she was my own flesh and blood. I truly believe she was. — Sebastian Faulks

I won't wax poetic about the land in a perfectionist sense: we work hard out here, and things constantly threaten the tiny equilibrium we've established in the market garden. Whatever peace we find is often hard won. But I stand firmly with Berry and Kingsolver and so many other writers who possess a deep need to step outside the city to find a place of calm. I don't like the word "authentic"; at best, it's divisive and antagonistic, implying one way of being is intrinsically better than another. But I do very much favour the notion of alignment. I'm convinced that at the heart of the matter lies a desire to draw what we do into alignment with how we live. Some of us aren't in a place where we can live consistently on the land that holds our hearts, but come mishaps or miracles, we're bound and determined to make that land as much a part of who we are as humanly possible. — Jenna Butler

The best part of touring, still, is touching people's hearts and igniting my band and igniting the people into what you call a spiritual revelation is sound and emotion. — Carlos Santana

We make the best choices when we have invested all of our energies, our hearts, and our souls into a course of action that leads to the accomplishment of goals we are passionate about. — Stedman Graham

When people pass on we must choose how to remember them. While our loved ones sleep for eternity we must carry on with our daily toil. We can elect to harbor adoration and love in our precious memories or cling to animosity and detestation. We can kindly remember our ancestors or continue to feel embedded enmity towards people who no longer walk this earth. Regardless the human frailties of the recently departed, it seems that we should aspire to clutch the best part of our ancestors being fast to our hearts. A book encapsulating a departed person's life has many pages; we must choose which chapters to treasure and what chapters to disregard or downplay. — Kilroy J. Oldster

They never had a better computer. They never had better lights. They never had better communication apparatus. They never had the finest tools. They never had the best transport system. They never had a perfect comfort. They never had all people loving them and their works. They never had all the financial resources. They never had the best garments. They never had the best and the most of all things. They never had all that they needed but they had ideas. They had a vision. Their hearts were filled with reasons to move. Their minds were pregnant with great thoughts and they wanted to prove what was in them. They took bold steps in wisdom and they were able to do distinctive things with what they had, and they left distinctive marks on minds before they left. — Ernest Agyemang Yeboah

I knew that no matter what door you knock on in a Cretan village, it will be opened for you. A meal will be served in your honor, and you will sleep between the best sheets in the house. In Crete, the stranger is still the unknown god. Before him, all doors and all hearts are opened. — Nikos Kazantzakis

But in your hearts set apart Christ as Lord. Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect. 1 Peter 3:15 When you're challenged or asked about your faith, you shouldn't respond arrogantly. You shouldn't be defiant or forceful, as if you were tearing trees out of the ground. Rather, you should respond with fear and humility, as if you were standing before God and answering him. If you were summoned before kings and princes and had prepared yourself well in advance with Scripture, you might think, "Just wait; I'll answer correctly." But the devil will grab the sword out of your hands and give you a shove. You will be disgraced and find out you put your armor on in vain. He can even take your best verses from your hands so that you can't use them, even though you have them memorized. God allows this to happen to subdue your arrogance and make you humble. — Martin Luther

They are hypocrites, they think the Church is a cage to keep God in, so he will stay locked up there and not go wandering about the earth during the week, poking his nose into their business, and looking in the depths and darkness and doubleness of their hearts, and their lack of true charity; and they believed they need only be bothered about him on Sundays when they have their best clothes on and their faces straight, and their hands washed and their gloves on, and their stories all prepared. — Margaret Atwood

A writer is someone who analyses the society, people and the world around him or her. Simply a writer is someone who pays attention to the utmost simple things happening around him or her. I believe the best things about being a writer is, you are going to live forever through your work, in your books, in the hearts of your readers, in your characters. — Ama H. Vanniarachchy

We return to you, O earth, the things which you have given us willingly and most graciously; with our hearts, hands and minds, in the best way we know how. — Taj Mahal

For some people the past is so vicious that it creates a loop of bad memories that runs constantly inside their hearts. A loop so bad that sometimes it reaches out to those capable of seeing it to let us know to take extra care of the ones who were hurt. It tells us to let them know that just because the world is eat up with mean, it doesn't mean we all are. That even though the past hurt them, it doesn't have to destroy their future. Give as many smiles away as you can. They're free and make the world a much prettier place. You may not have the best clothes or the latest in shoes, but everyone has a unique designer smile that is worth millions, especially for those who need its warmth. — Sherrilyn Kenyon

Our best feelings, which God himself has planted in our hearts, instinctively revolt against the thought that a God of infinite love and justice should create millions of immortal beings in his own image - probably more than half of the human race - in order to hurry them from the womb to the tomb, and from the tomb to everlasting doom! — Philip Schaff

The essence of true love is mutual recognition-two individuals seeing each other as they really are. We all know that the usual approach is to meet someone we like and put our best self forward, or even at times a false self, one we believe will be more appealing to the person we want to attract. When our real self appears in its entirety, when the good behavior becomes too much to maintain or the masks are taken away, disappointment comes. All too often individuals feel, after the fact-when feelings are hurt and hearts are broken-that it was a case of mistaken identity, that the loved one is a stranger. They saw what they wanted to see rather than what was really there. — Bell Hooks

Is important that we get still to wait on God. And it is best that we get alone, preferably with our Bible outspread before us. Then if we will we may draw near to God and begin to hear Him speak to us in our hearts. — A.W. Tozer

You grab a bit of connection wherever you can to survive. You have no idea how strong the pull to feel worthwhile is. It's more basic than food. You go to these people who make you feel lovely for an hour that one time, and that's all you get. You're probably not compatible with them for anything long term, but right this minute they can make you feel powerful and valuable. It does not matter what will happen in a month. Whatever happens in a month is probably going to be just about as indifferent as whatever happened today or last week. None of it matters. We don't plan long term because if we do we'll just get our hearts broken. It's best not to hope. You just take what you can get as you spot it. I am not asking for sympathy. I am just trying to explain, on a human level, how it is that people make what look from the outside like awful decisions. — Linda Tirado

You also know you're surrendered when you don't react to criticism and rush to defend yourself. Surrendered hearts show up best in relationships. You don't edge others out, you don't demand your rights, and you aren't self-serving when you're surrendered. — Rick Warren

Six months
It been six months since you passed
How long must these feelings of loss last ?
It's been six months since you died,
on the surface it appears I never really cried.
I hide away my tears, my sorrow, my fears.
They say time heals all wounds
Wounds may heal, but scars remain.
No one really sees the pain
that hides behind my eyes.
A heart of gold stopped beating
two twinkling eyes closed to rest
God broke our hearts that day to prove he only took the best
Never a day goes by that you're not in our hearts, our minds and in our souls.
We miss you dad. — Michael Tianias

Nearly all our associations are determined by chance or necessity; and restricted within a narrow circle. We cannot know whom we would; and those whom we know, we cannot have at our side when we most need them. All the higher circles of human intelligence are, to those beneath, only momentarily and partially open ... there is a society continually open to us, of people who will talk to us as long as we like, whatever our rank or occupation; - talk to us in the best words they can choose, and of the things nearest their hearts. And this society, because it is so numerous and so gentle, and can be kept waiting around us all day long, - kings and statesmen lingering patiently, not to grant audience, but to gain it! - in those plainly furnished and narrow ante-rooms, our bookcase shelves, - we make no account of that company, - perhaps never listen to a word they would say, all day long! — John Ruskin

Joy and patience are far above our strength ... We must persevere in prayer that he may not permit our hearts to faint ... Prayer and perseverance are necessary in our daily conflicts. The best remedy to the weariness is diligence in prayer. — John Calvin

In the eulogy by the graveside, I told everyone how my sister and I used to sing to each other on our birthday. I told them that, when I thought of my sister, I could still hear her laughter, sense her optimism, and feel her faith. I told them that my sister was the kindest person I;ve ever known, and that the world was a sadder place without her in it. And finally, I told them to remember my sister with a smile, like I did, for even though she was being buried near my parents, the best parts of her would always stay alive, deep within our hearts. — Nicholas Sparks

Amity Gaige has written a flawless book. It does not contain a single false note. Playful and inventive, SCHRODER movingly depicts the ways we confound our own hearts
how even with the best intentions, we fail to love those closest to us as well as we wish we could. Eric Schroder should take his place among the most charismatic and memorable characters in contemporary fiction, and Amity Gaige her place among the most talented and impressive writers working today. — David Bezmozgis

It's said that prayer can move mountains. Well, it's certainly moved the hearts and minds of Americans in their times of trial and helped them to achieve a society that, for all its imperfections, is still the envy of the world and the last, best hope of mankind. — Ronald Reagan

sura 3.28 of the Koran that, "We smile in the face of some people although our hearts curse them." And, of course, there was sura 3.54, which declared that the best deceiver of all was Allah himself. — William R. Forstchen

I believe certain doctrines because God says they are true; and the only authority I have for their truth is the Word of God. I receive such and such doctrines, not because I can prove them to be compatible with reason, not because my judgment accepts them, but because God says they are true. Now this is one of the best services we can render to God,-to submit ourselves to him in our belief of what he has revealed, and ask him to fix his truths in our hearts, and make us obey them. — Charles Spurgeon

When people follow a leader because they have to, they will do only what they have to. People don't give their best to leaders they like least. They give reluctant compliance, not commitment. They may give their hands but certainly not their heads or hearts. — John C. Maxwell

It was called 'We Wear the Mask', by Paul Laurence Dunbar. I transcribed the first stanza and then started jotting down my reaction to it.

We wear the mask that grins and lies,
It hides our cheeks and shades our eyes, -
This debt we pay to human guile;
With torn and bleeding hearts we smile,
And mouth with myriad subtleties.

I used to wear masks so subtle I barely noticed them. A compliment to my mother after a dismal meal, a smile at my best friend when she sang out of tune, a forced laugh at my uncle's bad jokes. I wore small masks that came and went, like fleeting expressions.

I am stuck inside the mask I wear now. I want to rip it off. I want to show my scars to the world, to unveil the ugliness that breathes inside me. I want to be unashamed. I want to be unafraid. But every day the mask gets tighter, and I suffocate a little more.

I stopped writing. — Catherine Doyle

[I] am reading No Ordinary Joes. Should have had a medical checkup before I started it. Colton makes us fall in love with these guys, then puts our hearts in harm's way. It's lovely and ghastly and extremely powerful. His best yet. — Katherine Dunn

There was a lot of things about love that you could only learn after you'd faced the real kind. The best kind wasn't this soft, sweet thing of hearts and picnics. It wasn't flowery and divine. Real love was gritty. The real kind of love never quit. Someone who loved you would do what's best for you; they'd stand up for you and sacrifice. Someone who loved you would face any inconvenience willingly. You didn't know what love was until someone was willing to give up what they loved the most for you. But it was also never letting them make that choice, either. — Mariana Zapata

If your words touch the hearts, that's good; if your words touch the minds, that's better and if your words touch both the hearts and the minds, that is the best! — Mehmet Murat Ildan

America today is in danger of drifting from its best traditions. We have allowed false prophets of selfishness to obscure our vision. We have grown numb to a creeping cynicism about progress and public life. We crave human connection yet hide behind walls. We worship the money chase yet decry the toll it exacts on us. We allow the market to dominate our lives, relationships, yearnings and aspirations. We indulge in nostalgia and irony and addictive entertainment, then purge from our hearts any true idealism or passion, any notion that being American should mean something more than "everyday low prices" or "every man for himself." In the midst of this dislocation and disorientation, so many Americans today yearn for higher purpose, for calling
for some assurance that life matters. We wish to believe there is more to our days than is revealed on our screens. Make no mistake: this is a spiritual crisis. — Eric Liu

It's not what we eat or don't eat that makes us good people; it's how we treat one another. As you grow older, you'll find that people of every religion think they're the best, but that's not true. There are good and bad people in every religion. Just because someone is Muslim, Jewish, or Christian doesn't mean a thing. You have to look and see what's in their hearts. That's the only thing that matters, and that's the only detail God cares about. — Firoozeh Dumas

Kyle Idleman's Not a Fan is a crucial message for our time. It's a powerful call to commitment and to following Jesus with all our hearts that has challenged me in the best of ways! — Jud Wilhite

This is what happened: we were completely abandoned. No one had the courage to attempt the impossible. We were slaves without honor. We were strangers in our own land. Then one man stood up. A nameless man, without any money, without a crown. One among millions. He lifted our hearts up to the stars. We followed him and swore him allegiance. The best of us died for him. We all would die for him. If he unfurls the flag we are ready to march against hell for him and for Germany. A — Anna Rosmus

The job facing American voters ... in the days and years to come is to determine which hearts, minds and souls command those qualities best suited to unify a country rather than further divide it, to heal the wounds of a nation as opposed to aggravate its injuries, and to secure for the next generation a legacy of choices based on informed awareness rather than one of reactions based on unknowing fear. — Aberjhani

The World Trade Center site will forever hold a special place in our city, in our hearts. But we would be untrue to the best part of ourselves and who we are as New Yorkers and Americans if we said no to a mosque in lower Manhattan. — Michael Bloomberg

In times of stress, the best thing we can do for each other is to listen with our ears and our hearts and to be assured that our questions are just as important as our answers. — Fred Rogers

We must with boldness and reverence challenge the covenant of grace; for this is the covenant that God hath made with us, to give us tender hearts, hearts of flesh, as Ezek. xi. 19, 'I will give them one heart, and put a new spirit within their bowels; I will take away the stony hearts out of their bodies, and I will give them a heart of flesh. Now seeing this is a covenant God hath made, to give as fleshly hearts and to take away our stony, let us challenge him with his promise, and go to him by prayer. Entreat him to give thee a fleshly heart; go to him, wait his time, for that is the best time. Therefore wait though he do not hear at first. These are the means to bring tenderness of heart. Now, — Richard Sibbes

The danger of delusion was made worse, by the love of delusion. What's best for me and what is worst for me, the thing I most ought to do and the thing I most ought not to do, look very much alike. In my heart of hearts I may know which is which - but then a spirit of perversity makes me want to choose wrongly. Great psychic perturbation always surrounds great beauty — Mark Booth

Christians are to be fully engaged at work as whole persons, giving their minds, hearts, and bodies fully to doing the best job possible on the task at hand. — Timothy Keller

My Dearest Allie. I couldn't sleep last night because I know that it's over between us. I'm not bitter anymore, because I know that what we had was real. And if in some distant place in the future we see each other in our new lives, I'll smile at you with joy and remember how we spent the summer beneath the trees, learning from each other and growing in love. The best love is the kind that awakens the soul and makes us reach for more, that plants a fire in our hearts and brings peace to our minds, and that's what you've given me. That's what I hope to give to you forever. I love you. I'll be seeing you. Noah — Nicholas Sparks

You know the saying that nothing can last forever? It's partly true. Feelings can stop, people can leave us, but regardless, a piece of them is always with us, in some way. Maybe it's in a song, or a forgotten note, a picture. Even when you no longer love someone or can't be with them, you still remember them, you still remember good parts of them, and you smile. Why worry about it lasting or not? Even if it doesn't, you'll still have a part of him. And he'll still have a part of you. And isn't that what's really important? Holding the best pieces of someone in our hearts so that the love never really fades, so that we don't forget that we once knew them, and they were special to us. — Lindy Zart

When pain and suffering hit, the heart does one of two things: opens or closes. Those who keep their hearts open after experiencing pain are some of the most loving, kind people you will ever meet. They do their best to alleviate the suffering of others, because they know how it feels. Those who shut their hearts away become cold; their pain turns to ice; bitterness and resentment rule them. They'll often inflict pain on others without remorse - and they are some of the most dangerous people you will ever know. — Sarah Brownlee

Bloody noses had made them friends, but giving sound to the bruised places in their hearts made them brothers. — Gloria Naylor

Certain coincidence is wonderful. Certain meetings are memorable. Sometimes you meet some people for just a moment and they leave indelible footprints on your mind. They give you the reasons to ponder over and over. They become your food for thought. Though they go, their presence is felt within the innermost of the heart and the soul; especially when such people were a reason for a smile, or they were a perfect fit for a vacuum or probably they were a heavenly sent or maybe they were an epitome of a great union; when their light could shine to brighten the dark side of our lives; when they knew how to arouse interest even in the face of dull atmosphere; when they did understand silence and know the value and power of words; when even their absence is felt more than their presence. You can't just forget about such people. Though they leave, they live within our hearts, mind, body and soul. — Ernest Agyemang Yeboah

Words said can never be recalled. So it is best, oftimes, not to speak too quickly. Yet words left unsaid are worse. We wear them like weights around our hearts. — Ann Rinaldi

I started a deli when I was 19 years old. Kevin O's. The sandwiches at Kevin O's were a little like Subway before Subway - fresh baked bread. My best seller was turkey with cream cheese and artichoke hearts. I just made it up. — Kevin McCarthy

There are loyal hearts, there are spirits brave, There are souls that are pure and true; Then give the world the best you have, And the best will come back to you. Madeline Bridges — Ben Carson

I love God, whoever he is, and I'd really like to get closer to him. I've been thinking about how one of the simplest ways to get close to a woman is to be good to her children. To be kind and gentle and to pay close attention to the things that make them special. To try to see her children the way she sees her children. And how God made us in his image. How he is the mother and father of all of us. So I wonder if that would be the best way to get closer to him too. By being kind and gentle to his children and noticing all of the things that make them special. So many of us spend our time trying to find God in books, but maybe the simplest way to God is directly through the hearts of his children. — Glennon Doyle Melton

As life goes on, they become not two compatible beings who have learned to live together through self-suppression and patience, but one new and richer being, fused in the fires of God's love and tempered of the best of both. One by one, the veils of life's mysteries have been lifted. The flesh, they found, was too precocious to reveal its own mystery; then came the mystery of the other's inner life, disclosed in the raising of young minds and hearts in the ways of God; — Fulton J. Sheen

These dogs are not machines, goddamnit. They are alive! They are living, feeling, warm-blooded creatures of God, and they will love you with all their hearts! They will love you when your wives and husbands sneak behind your backs. They will love you when your ungrateful misbegotten children piss on your graves! They will see and witness your greatest shame, and will not judge you! These dogs will be the truest and best partners you can ever hope to have, and they will give their lives for you. And all they ask, all they want or need, all it costs YOU to get ALL of that, is a simple word of kindness. — Robert Crais

He knew himself a villain - but he deem'd
The rest no better than the thing he seem'd;
And scorn'd the best as hypocrites who hid
Those deeds the bolder spirit plainly did.
He knew himself detested, but he knew
The hearts that loath'd him, crouch'd and dreaded too.
Lone, wild, and strange, he stood alike exempt
From all affection and from all contempt — George Gordon Byron

was the sort of anger that comes to a slow boil inside the hearts of good men who want justice, and finding it out of their grasp, decide vengeance is the next best thing. I — Patrick Rothfuss

God takes everyone he loves through a desert. It is his cure for our wandering hearts, restlessly searching for a new Eden ...
The best gift of the desert is God's presence ... The protective love of the Shepherd gives me courage to face the interior journey. — Paul E. Miller

You are told a lot about your education, but some beautiful, sacred memory, preserved since childhood, is perhaps the best education of all. If a man carries many such memories into life with him, he is saved for the rest of his days. And even if only one good memory is left in our hearts, it may also be the instrument of our salvation one day. — Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Do yourself the ultimate favor ... Go out and make the rest of your life the best of your life. — Timothy Pina

Political power intoxicates the best hearts. No man is wise enough, nor good enough, to be trusted with much political power. — Hans F. Sennholz

Communing with God is communing with our own hearts, our own best selves, not with something foreign and accidental. Saints and devotees have gone into the wilderness to find God; of course they took God with them, and the silence and detachment enabled them to hear the still, small voice of their own souls, as one hears the ticking of his own watch in the stillness of the night. — John Burroughs

Always treat your employees exactly as you want them to treat your best customers. You can buy a person's hand, but you can't buy his heart; his heart is where his enthusiasm is. You can buy his back, but you can't buy his brain. That's where his creativity is. Treat employees as volunteers just as you treat customers as volunteers, because that's what they are. They volunteer the best parts - their hearts and minds. — Stephen Covey

I'm sorry. I don't know how many times to tell you this for you to know it," I continued. "Francesca ... the night you stayed with me was the best night of my life. I've never felt more alive, more loved, happier, than when I hold you in my arms. Seeing your face makes my heart beat faster, in a good way, and I feel this calmness come over me. I don't know why, but it's always been this way with you. I understand if you can't forgive me, and I know you could do better, but I'm going to try my damnedest to make it up to you when I get out of here. I don't care if it takes a year, or ten, or even twenty. I will make you see how much I care. — Felicia Tatum

Enchantment is the purest form of sales. Enchantment is all about changing people's hearts, minds and actions because you provide them a vision or a way to do things better. The difference between enchantment and simple sales is that with enchantment you have the other person's best interests at heart, too. — Guy Kawasaki

Most of the members of the convent were old-fashioned Satanists, like their parents and grandparents before them. They'd been brought up to it, and weren't, when you got right down to it, particularly evil. Human beings mostly aren't. They just get carried away by new ideas, like dressing up in jackboots and shooting people, or dressing up in white sheets and lynching people, or dressing up in tie-dye jeans and playing guitars at people. Offer people a new creed with a costume and their hearts and minds will follow. Anyway, being brought up as a Satanist tended to take the edge off it. It was something you did on Saturday nights.
And the rest of the time you simply got on with life as best you could, just like everyone else. — Terry Pratchett

To put up with people, to keep open house with one's heart - that is liberal, but that is merely liberal. One recognizes those hearts which are capable of noble hospitality by the many draped windows and closed
shutters, they keep their best rooms empty. Why? Because they expect guests with whom one does not "put up. — Friedrich Nietzsche

A good writer reveals beauty in the mundane and truth in tragedy. Words are a tool; a currency of the mind, and the best writers weave passages into our hearts that our bones remember. — Maria Reeves

We all of us carry the seed of evil in our hearts and souls," she told him. "Even the purest, even the most holy. It is part of the human condition, born into us. We cannot root it out. All we can do - at best - is prevent it from germinating. — David Gemmell

There are places in the world where real life is still happening, far away from here, in a pre-Hitler Europe, where hundreds of lights are lit every evening, ladies and gentlemen gather to drink coffee with cream in oak-panelled rooms, or sit comfortably in splendid coffee-houses under gilt chandeliers, stroll arm in arm to the opera or the ballet, observe from close-up the lives of great artists, passionate love affairs, broken hearts, the painter's girlfriend falling in love with his best friend the composer, and going out at midnight bareheaded in the rain to stand alone on the ancient bridge whose reflection trembles in the river. * — Amos Oz

Our job as mothers is to do the best we can to teach our children that life is better and friendships are richer when we treat others with kindness, when we remember to share, and when we use nice words. To remember that every person we come in contact with may have a few cracks in their hearts even if we can't see them and that love is always the best response. But — Melanie Shankle

The first pressure of sorrow crushes out from our hearts the best wine; afterwards the constant weight of it brings forth bitterness, the taste and stain from the lees of the vat. — Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Natalie Lyalin is writing some of the best poems in the world. There is an evil in her gorgeous poem-hearts. She must have sold her heart to the devil to write like this - so beautiful, so funny and so strange. Her images stack and stack down the page without spilling, each line such a bombshell you'll start reading backward to the first line. These poems are like babies - they will pop out of trees. — Zachary Schomburg

Good will is a power that can be used every day of the year and every hour of the day. It is instantly available. By continuously practicing good will we cultivate a deep subconscious habit of good will. It becomes a pattern of our response in all situations. Good will works as silently as the sun and with as much power. It thaws the ice and snow of resistance and indifference. It warms and wins human hearts. It draws forth the best in others as flowers are drawn from the soil. It stimulates growth. — Wilferd Peterson

I lost my voice and my best friend too
On swift, fierce winds and wings of blue,
The cold rain fell where beams had shone,
So I wrapped up tight and safe. Alone.

But I missed my friend, I missed my voice,
And my heart still whispered of another choice
To break out of my binding, safe, and warm,
And see what the world looked like after the storm.

So I struggled free and was greeted by
Colorful brushstrokes across the sky,
The melody of the summer breeze
And blue wings like mine in hazel trees.

On the soft, sweet air of the mountain glade,
We gathered together in cool, green shade,
And told our stories, beginnings to ends,
And found our song in the hearts of new friends. — Elaine Vickers

The lesson taught us by these kindly commentators on my present experience is that dogmatic faith compels the best minds and hearts to narrowness and insolence. — Harriet Martineau

Electronic brains may help us to use our heads but will not excuse us from that duty, and as to our hearts-cardiograms cannot diagnose what may be most ill about them, or confirm what may be best. The faithful woman and the versatile brave man, the wakeful intelligence open to inspiration or grace-these are still exemplary for our kind, as they always were and always will be. — Robert Fitzgerald

I do not know who coined the statement "an idle mind is the devil's playground," but it is true. When camping in dangerous places, it is often recommended that you keep a campfire going to keep the predators away. When we set our hearts on fire, demonic predators stay out of our camp, which is my main point in this chapter. The apostle Paul put it best: "Love never fails" (see 1 Corinthians 13:8). We have spent several chapters talking about how to win spiritual battles in our own lives and in the lives of others. But when all else fails, remember this: Love cannot be defeated. — Kris Vallotton

The Gospel of Jesus Christ is unrelenting in seeking to convert every area of our hearts and lives. The Gospel is all-encompassing. It is in fact the only source of godliness. Search anywhere else, and you have nothing more than self-reform at best and idolatry at its worst. — Barbara Hughes

July had come, and haying begun; the little gardens were doing finely and the long summer days were full of pleasant hours. The house stood open from morning till night, and the lads lived out of doors, except at school time. The lessons were short, and there were many holidays, for the Bhaers believed in cultivating healthy bodies by much exercise, and our short summers are best used in out-of-door work. Such a rosy, sunburnt, hearty set as the boys became; such appetites as they had; such sturdy arms and legs, as outgrew jackets and trousers; such laughing and racing all over the place; such antics in house and barn; such adventures in the tramps over hill and dale; and such satisfaction in the hearts of the worthy Bhaers, as they saw their flock prospering in mind and body, I cannot begin to describe. — Louisa May Alcott

The things we share with each other are deeply felt from within our hearts that neither of us will ever forget. For the gifts that are priceless are the ones that are heartfelt; their roots are within our soul. They are the greatest gifts, of all. — Ellen J. Barrier

Lord, lead me not into temptation, and when there leave me not there; for unless thou hold me fast I feel I must, I shall decline, and prove an apostate after all. There is enough tinder in the hearts of the best men in the world to light a fire that shall burn to the lowest hell, unless God should quench the sparks as they fall. There is enough corruption, depravity, and wickedness in the heart of the most holy man that is now alive to damn his soul to all eternity, if free and sovereign grace does not prevent. — Charles Haddon Spurgeon

If I so do my best, may this story be recorded and printed and zipped and zapped into hands and eyes and ears and minds and hearts everywhere, and may it no longer be my story but belong to each reader who drinks it in, to make them bigger or smaller as needed; to fill in those tiny holes and smooth over the rough places; to make them sigh and laugh and dream and wonder; to pass a lonely afternoon or enliven a dull evening; to in every regard do just what a story is supposed to do, which is become whatever each reader needs most at that moment. — Shannon Hale

The proverb has it that Hunger is the best cook. The Law makes afflicted consciences hungry for Christ. Christ tastes good to them. Hungry hearts appreciate Christ. Thirsty souls are what Christ wants. He invites them: "Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." Christ's benefits are so precious that He will dispense them only to those who need them and really desire them. — Martin Luther

I've stolen a lot. Let me think about the best thing I've stolen. Stolen a lot of hearts. — Rob Huebel

If God has given you but a small portion of the world, yet if you are godly He has promised never to forsake you (Heb. 13:5). Providence has ordered that condition for you which is really best for your eternal good. If you had more of the world than you have, your heads and hearts might not be able to manage it to your advantage. — John Flavel

The worst isn't the last thing about the world. It's the next to the last thing. The last thing is the best. It's the power from on high that comes down into the world, that wells up from the rock-bottom worst of the world like a hidden spring. Can you believe it? The last, best thing is the laughing deep in the hearts of the saints, sometimes our hearts even. Yes. You are terribly loved and forgiven. Yes. You are healed. All is well. — Frederick Buechner

The best fathers have the softest, sweetest hearts. In other words, great dads are real marshmallows. — Richelle E. Goodrich

All this I am projecting, of course. I'll never know for sure. We can't fully understand what plagues each other's hearts, much less our own at times. Ultimately even our best friends are unknowable to us. — Don Lee

It is quite beyond me how anyone can believe God speaks to us in books and stories. If the world does not directly reveal to us our relationship to it, if our hearts fail to tell us what we owe ourselves and others, we shall assuredly not learn it from books, which are at best designed but to give names to our errors. — Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

Of course you're afraid of being judged and condemned. Some people will judge and condemn you, but most won't. Our minds are small, but our hearts are big. Just about every one of us has fucked up at one point or another. You're in a pickle. You did things you didn't hope to do. You have not always been your best self. This means that you're like the rest of us. — Anonymous

Heavy hearts, like heavy clouds in the sky, are best relieved by the letting of a little water. — Christopher Morley

I can remember when I was a bit of an ETA fan myself. It was in 1973, when a group of Basque militants assassinated Adm. Carrero Blanco. The admiral was a stone-faced secret police chief, personally groomed to be the successor to the decrepit Francisco Franco. His car blew up, killing only him and his chauffeur with a carefully planted charge, and not only was the world well rid of another fascist, but, more important, the whole scheme of extending Franco's rule was vaporized in the same instant. The dictator had to turn instead to Crown Prince Juan Carlos, who turned out to be the best Bourbon in history and who swiftly dismantled Franco's entire system. If this action was 'terrorism,' it had something to be said for it. Everyone I knew in Spain made a little holiday in their hearts when the gruesome admiral went sky-high. — Christopher Hitchens

Simpson, the student of divinity, it was who arranged his conclusions probably with the best, though not most scientific, appearance of order. Out there, in the heart of unreclaimed wilderness, they had surely witnessed something crudely and essentially primitive. Something that had survived somehow the advance of humanity had emerged terrifically, betraying a scale of life monstrous and immature. He envisaged it rather as a glimpse into prehistoric ages, when superstitions, gigantic and uncouth, still oppressed the hearts of men: when the forces of nature were still untamed, the Powers that may have haunted a primeval universe not yet withdrawn. To this day he thinks of what he termed years later in a sermon 'savage and formidable Potencies lurking behind the souls of men, not evil perhaps in themselves, yet instinctively hostile to humanity as it exists.'
("The Wendigo") — Algernon Blackwood

God has created us and poured love into our hearts so that we may do our best to alleviate the suffering that is around us. — Dada Vaswani

Friends come into our lives and friends leave our lives. But friends never leave our hearts. And best friends always get to stay in the best places in our hearts. — John M. Simmons

Lovers are the coolest their hearts beat the best & they kiss magic as hell — Mark Leidner

Do you ever think about it? About nothingness. I do, I think about it all the time. Because of course it's nothingness that awaits us. Of course it is. If it weren't why would our hearts keep pumping any longer than they had to? Why wouldn't we all emerge into the world pure and innocent, and then before we had a chance to get in any trouble, before we had a chance to take our first oily shit, just immediately shut down our systems and head straight to the hereafter? If there were a better life after death, why bother getting fitter for survival's sake? Why would evolution even be a thing? Why fight for something second best? If death was really awesome, in a life or death situation, our bodies wouldn't muscle up with epinephrine and cortisol. Our brains would hit us up instead with sloppy, sleepy happy love. Hannibal Lecter would be our Mickey Mouse. No, there's fuckall to look forward to. Our bodies understand this. The real problem is, it's unbearable to know this. So we cope. — Elizabeth Little

Had our hearts really become so numb that we needed dead bodies in order to feel the beat of compassion in our chests? Who am I if I need to be shocked back into my best self? — Jason Reynolds