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Silence Quotes by Thomas Merton

45 Silence quotes by Thomas Merton

All Silence quotes Thomas Merton’s page

Thomas Merton writes about opening the heart to the infinite silence that lives inside us. He describes how a quiet forest lets the imagination rest and the soul hear deeper truths. He also says that true love grows when we listen in silence rather than speak loudly.

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Whose silence are you?

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The speech of God is silence. His Word is solitude.

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In Silence God ceases to be an object and becomes an experience.

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One might say I have decided to marry the silence of the forest. The sweet dark warmth of the whole world will…

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Music is pleasing not only because of the sound but because of the silence that is in it: without the alternation of…

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If we have not silence, God is not heard in our music. If we have no rest God, does not bless our…

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But there is greater comfort in the substance of silence than in the answer to a question.

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In a world of noise, confusion and conflict it is necessary that there be places of silence, inner discipline and peace. In…

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One opens the inner doors of one's heart to the infinite silences of the Spirit, out of whose abysses love wells up…

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Solitude and silence teach me to love my brothers for what they are, not for what they say.

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May we all grow in grace and peace and not neglect the silence that is printed in the center of our being.…

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I suppose what makes me most glad is that we all recognize each other in this metaphysical space of silence and happening,…

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The silence of the forest is my bride and the sweet dark warmth of the whole world is my love, and out…

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Let me rest in Your will and be silent. Then the light of Your joy will warm my life. Its fire will…

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Not only does silence give us a chance to understand ourselves better, to get a truer and more balanced perspective on our…

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“Those who love their own noise are impatient of everything else. They constantly defile the silence of the forests and the mountains…

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We thank Him less by words than by the serene happiness of silent acceptance. It is our emptiness in the presence of…

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“I should be able to return to solitude each time as to the place I have never described to anybody, as the…

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To be alone by being part of the universe-fitting in completely to an environment of woods and silence and peace. Everything you…

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Silence has many dimensions. It can be a regression and an escape, a loss of self, or it can be presence, awareness,…

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“Leaving Things Alone (excerpt) The wise man, then, when he must govern, knows how to do nothing. Letting things alone, he rests…

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There is in all visible things an invisible fecundity, a dimmed light, a meek namelessness, a hidden wholeness. This mysterious unity and…

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Words stand between silence and silence: between the silence of things and the silence of our own being. Between the silence of…

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The silence of the spheres is the music of a wedding feast. The more we persist in misunderstanding the phenomena of life,…

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My own personal task is not simply that of poet and writer (still less commentator, pseudo-prophet); it is basically to praise God…

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Contradictions have always existed in the soul of [individuals]. But it is only when we prefer analysis to silence that they become…

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For language to have meaning, there must be intervals of silence somewhere, to divide word from word and utterance from utterance. He…

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It is in deep solitude and silence that I find the gentleness with which I can truly love my brother and sister.

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“Possibly, what is required of some of us, and chiefly of me, is a solitary and personal response in the form of…

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When I am liberated by silence, when I am no longer involved in the measurement of life, but in the living of…

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“It is not speaking that breaks our silence, but the anxiety to be heard. The words of the proud man impose silence…

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Not all of us are called to be hermits, but all of us need enough silence and solitude in our lives to…

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Pardon all runners, All speechless, alien winds, All mad waters. Pardon their impulses, Their wild attitudes, Their young flights, their reticence. When…

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When your tongue is silent, you can rest in the silence of the forest. When your imagination is silent, the forest speaks…

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If there is no silence beyond and within the many words of doctrine, there is no religion, only a religious ideology. For…

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“For language to have meaning there must be intervals of silence somewhere, to divide word from word and utterance from utterance. He…

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It is in deep solitude that I find the gentleness with which I can truly love my brothers. The more solitary I…

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Are they moved by a sense of human need for silence, for reflection, for inner seeking? So they want to get away…

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“He is heard only when we hope to hear Him, and if, thinking our hope to be fulfilled, we cease to speak,…

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If nothing that can be seen can either be God or represent Him to us as He is, then to find God…

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More by Thomas Merton

“Let no one hope to find in contemplation an escape from conflict, from anguish or from doubt. On the contrary, the deep, inexpressible certitude…

If nothing that can be seen can either be God or represent Him to us as He is, then to find God we must…

It is almost impossible to overestimate the value of true humility and its power in the spiritual life. For the beginning of humility is…

We are not perfectly free until we live in pure hope. For when our hope is pure, it no longer trusts exclusively in human…

The desire to kill is like the desire to attack another with an ingot of red -hot iron: I have to pick up the…

To enter into the realm of contemplation one must in a certain sense die: but this death is in fact the entrance to a…

The mission of Christian humility in social life is not merely to edify, but to keep minds open to many alternatives. The rigidity of…

Peace cannot be built on exclusivism, absolutism, and intolerance. But neither can it be built on vague liberal slogans and pious programs gestated in…

Things that are good are good, and if one is responding to that goodness one is in contact with a truth from which one…

Love winter when the plant says nothing.

The logic of worldly success rests on a fallacy: the strange error that our perfection depends on the thoughts and opinions and applause of…

“The wisdom of the flesh is a judgement that the ordinary ends of our natural appetites are the goods to which the whole of…

I will no longer wound myself with the thoughts and questions that have surrounded me like thorns: that is a penance You do not…

If you write for God you will reach many men and bring them joy. If you write for men--you may make some money and…

“Contemplation means rest, suspension of activity, withdrawal into the mysterious interior solitude in which the soul is absorbed in the immense and fruitful silence…