35 Quotes & Sayings By Phillips Brooks

Phillips Brooks was a Unitarian minister and writer of prose and poetry. He was one of the most influential Christians in American culture and is widely considered one of the 20th century's finest poets. He served as president of Union Theological Seminary from 1885 to 1914 and taught there from 1882 to 1909.

1
Do not pray for easy lives. Pray to be stronger men. Do not pray for tasks equal to your powers. Pray for powers equal to your tasks. Then the doing of your work shall be no miracle, but you shall be the miracle. Phillips Brooks
2
Pray the largest prayers. You cannot think a prayer so large that God, in answering it, will not wish you had made it larger. Pray not for crutches but for wings. Phillips Brooks
3
Do not pray for easy lives; pray to be stronger men! Do not pray for tasks equal to your powers; pray for powers equal to your tasks! Then the doing of your work shall be no miracle. But you shall be a miracle. Every day you shall wonder at yourself, at the richness of life which has come in you by the grace of God. Phillips Brooks
4
If man is man and God is God, to live without prayer is not merely an awful thing: it is an infinitely foolish thing. Phillips Brooks
5
Dreadful will be the day when the world becomes contented, when one great universal satisfaction spreads itself over the world. Sad will be the day for every man when he becomes absolutely contented with the life that he is living, with the thoughts that he is thinking, with the deeds that he is doing, when there is not forever beating at the doors of his soul some great desire to do something larger which he knows that he was meant and made to do because he is a child of God. Phillips Brooks
6
0 little town of Bethlehem How still we see thee lie! Above thy deep and dreamless sleep The silent stars go by. Phillips Brooks
7
Tomb thou shalt not hold Him longer Death is strong but Life is stronger Stronger than the dark the light Stronger than the wrong the right Faith and Hope triumphant say Christ will rise on Easter Day. Phillips Brooks
8
As you emphasize your life you must localize and define it... you cannot do everything. Phillips Brooks
9
Happiness is the natural flower of duty. Phillips Brooks
10
The truest help we can render an afflicted man is not to take his burden from him but to call out his best energy that he may be able to bear the burden. Phillips Brooks
11
Do not pray for easy lives pray to be stronger men. Do not pray for tasks equal to your powers pray for powers equal to your tasks. Phillips Brooks
12
Prayer in its simplest definition is merely a wish turned God-ward. Phillips Brooks
13
A prayer in its simplest definition is merely a wish turned heavenward. Phillips Brooks
14
Everything keeps its best nature only by being put to its best use. Phillips Brooks
15
Bad will be the day for every man when he becomes absolutely contented with the life he is living when there is not forever beating at the doors of his soul some great desire to do something larger. Phillips Brooks
16
Very strange is this quality of our human nature which decrees that unless we feel a future before us we do not live completely in the present. Phillips Brooks
17
To keep clear of concealment to keep clear of the need of concealment to do nothing that he might not do out on the middle of Boston Common at noonday -I cannot say how more and more that seems to me to be the glory of a young man's life. It is an awful hour when the first necessity of hiding anything comes. The whole life is different thenceforth. When there are questions to be feared and eyes to be avoided and subjects that must not be touched then the bloom of life is gone. Put off that day as long as possible. Put if off forever if you can. Phillips Brooks
18
The ideal life is in our blood and never will be still. Phillips Brooks
19
The earth has grown old with its burden of care, but at Christmas it always is young, the heart of the jewel burns lustrous and fair, and its soul full of music breaks the air, when the song of angels is sung. Phillips Brooks
20
The true way to be humble is not to stoop until you are smaller than yourself, but to stand at your real height against some higher nature that will show you what the real smallness of your greatness is. Phillips Brooks
21
Be patient and understanding. Life is too short to be vengeful or malicious. Phillips Brooks
22
Christianity helps us face the music even when we don't like the tune. Phillips Brooks
23
No man or woman can be strong, gentle, pure, and good, without the world being better for it and without someone being helped and comforted by the very existence of that goodness. Phillips Brooks
24
Do not pray for tasks equal to your powers. Pray for powers equal to your tasks. Phillips Brooks
25
A man who lives right, and is right, has more power in his silence than another has by his words. Phillips Brooks
26
Let every man and woman count himself immortal. Let him catch the revelation of Jesus in his resurrection. Let him say not merely, 'Christ is risen, ' but 'I shall rise.' Phillips Brooks
27
To say, 'well done' to any bit of good work is to take hold of the powers which have made the effort and strengthen them beyond our knowledge. Phillips Brooks
28
Character may be manifested in the great moments, but it is made in the small ones. Phillips Brooks
29
Forgive, forget. Bear with the faults of others as you would have them bear with yours. Phillips Brooks
30
Sad will be the day for any man when he becomes contented with the thoughts he is thinking and the deeds he is doing - where there is not forever beating at the doors of his soul some great desire to do something larger which he knows he was meant and made to do. Phillips Brooks
31
Set yourself earnestly to see what you are made to do, and then set yourself earnestly to do it. Phillips Brooks
32
It is while you are patiently toiling at the little tasks of life that the meaning and shape of the great whole of life dawn on you. Phillips Brooks
33
It does not take great men to do great things it only takes consecrated men. Phillips Brooks
34
Charity should begin at home, but should not stay there. Phillips Brooks