If nothing that can be seen can either be God or represent Him to us as He is, then to find God… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
To enter into the realm of contemplation one must in a certain sense die: but this death is in fact the entrance… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
“I have my own way to walk and for some reason or other Zen is right in the middle of it wherever… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
Those who think they 'know' from the beginning will never in fact come to know anything. — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
Our destiny is to live out what we think, because unless we live what we know, we do not even know it. — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
There is not true intimacy between souls who do not know how to respect one another's solitude. — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
After all, what is your personal identity? It is what you really are, your real self. None of us is what he… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
The grateful person knows that God is good, not by hearsay but by experience. And that is what makes all the difference. — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
It is not humility to insist on being someone that you are not. It is as much as saying that you know… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
What does it mean to know and experience my own “nothingness?” It is not enough to turn away in disgust from my… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
The camera does not know what it takes; it captures materials with which you reconstruct, not so much what you saw as… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
We cannot find Him unless we know we need Him. We forget this need when we take a self-sufficient pleasure in our… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
Learn how to meditate on paper. Drawing and writing are forms of meditation. Learn how to contemplate works of art. Learn how… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
My Lord God, I have no idea where I am going. I do not see the road ahead of me. I cannot… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
True encounter with Christ liberates something in us, a power we did not know we had, a hope, a capacity for life,… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
My Lord God, I have no idea where I am going. I do not see the road ahead of me...you will lead… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
As long as I am content to know that He is infinitely greater than I, and that I cannot know Him unless… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
Do not look for rest in any pleasure, because you were not created for pleasure: you were created for joy. And if… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
I believe we are going to have to prepare ourselves for the difficult and patient task of outgrowing rigid and intransigent nationalism,… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
I have learned that one cannot truly know hope unless he has found out how like despair hope is. — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
We must be true inside, true to ourselves, before we can know a truth that is outside us. But we make ourselves… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
We know when we are following our vocation when our soul is set free from preoccupation with itself and is able to… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
... but any fool knows that you don't need money to get enjoyment out of life. — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
Paradoxically, I have found peace because I have always been dissatisfied. My moments of depression and despair turn out to be renewals,… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
“Let no one hope to find in contemplation an escape from conflict, from anguish or from doubt. On the contrary, the deep, inexpressible certitude… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
If nothing that can be seen can either be God or represent Him to us as He is, then to find God we must… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
It is almost impossible to overestimate the value of true humility and its power in the spiritual life. For the beginning of humility is… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
We are not perfectly free until we live in pure hope. For when our hope is pure, it no longer trusts exclusively in human… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
The desire to kill is like the desire to attack another with an ingot of red -hot iron: I have to pick up the… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
To enter into the realm of contemplation one must in a certain sense die: but this death is in fact the entrance to a… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
The mission of Christian humility in social life is not merely to edify, but to keep minds open to many alternatives. The rigidity of… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
Peace cannot be built on exclusivism, absolutism, and intolerance. But neither can it be built on vague liberal slogans and pious programs gestated in… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
Things that are good are good, and if one is responding to that goodness one is in contact with a truth from which one… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
The logic of worldly success rests on a fallacy: the strange error that our perfection depends on the thoughts and opinions and applause of… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
“The wisdom of the flesh is a judgement that the ordinary ends of our natural appetites are the goods to which the whole of… — Thomas Merton Copy Share Image
