Suggestion is generally better than Definition. There is a seeming dogmatism about Definition that is often repellent, while Suggestion, on the contrary, disarms suspicion and summons to co-operation and experiment. Definition provokes discussion. Suggestion provokes to love and good works.… — Maltbie Davenport Babcock Copy Share Image
Be strong! It matters not how deep entrenched the wrong, how hard the battle goes, the day how long, faint not, fight on! Tomorrow… — Maltbie Davenport Babcock Copy Share Image
Opportunities do not come with their values stamped upon them… To face every opportunity of life thoughtfully, and ask its meaning bravely and earnestly,… — Maltbie Davenport Babcock Copy Share Image
The only test of possession is use. The talent that is buried is not owned. The napkin and the hole in the ground are far more truly the man's property, because they are accomplishing something for him, slothful and shameful though it be. And what is a lost soul? Is it not one that God cannot use, or one that… — Maltbie Davenport Babcock Copy Share
The tests of life are to make, not break us. Trouble may demolish a man's business but build up his character. The blow at the outward man may be the greatest blessing to the inner man. If God, then, puts or permits anything hard in our lives, be sure that the real peril, the real trouble, is that we shall… — Maltbie Davenport Babcock Copy Share
Pay little attention to discouragement as possible. Plough ahead as a steamer does, rough or smooth - rain or shine. To carry your cargo… — Maltbie Davenport Babcock Copy Share Image
Salvation is not putting a man into heaven but putting heaven into a man. — Maltbie Davenport Babcock Copy Share Image
Lord, let me make this rule To think of life as school, And try my best To stand each test, And do my work, And nothing shirk. Should someone else outshine This dullard head of mine, Should I be sad? I will be glad. To do my best Is Thy behest. Some day the bell will sound, Some day my… — Maltbie Davenport Babcock Copy Share
You are not responsible for the disposition you are born with, but you are responsible for the one you die with. — Maltbie Davenport Babcock Copy Share Image
Spirituality is best manifested on the ground, not in the air. Rapturous day-dreams, flights of heavenly fancy, longings to see the Invisible, are less expensive and less expressive than the plain doing of duty. To have bread excite thankfulness and a drink of water send the heart to God is better than sighs for the unattainable. To plow a straight… — Maltbie Davenport Babcock Copy Share
Loyalty to God is alone fundamental. Feelings, words, deeds, must be beads strung on the string of duty. Let the world tell you in a hundred ways what your life is for. Say you ever and only, "Lo, I come to do Thy will, O my God." Out of that dutiful root grows the beautiful life, the life radically and… — Maltbie Davenport Babcock Copy Share
Prayer must mean something to us, if it is to mean anything to God. — Maltbie Davenport Babcock Copy Share Image
I agree with you that the communion with the invisible saints must be more of a dream than a reality. But we have a… — Maltbie Davenport Babcock Copy Share Image
