“Here we must take account of one of St. Thomas's conceptual distinctions, which at first seems like unnecessary caviling. It is the… — Josef Pieper Copy Share Image
“Material things have closed boundaries; they are not accessible, cannot be penetrated, by things outside themselves. But one's existence as a spiritual… — Josef Pieper Copy Share Image
... the greatest menace to our capacity for contemplation is the incessant fabrication of tawdry empty stimuli which kill the receptivity of… — Josef Pieper Copy Share Image
Unchaste abandon and the self-surrender of the soul to the world of sensuality paralyzes the primordial powers of the moral person: the… — Josef Pieper Copy Share Image
...Enduring comprises a strong activity of the soul, namely, a vigorous grasping of and clinging to the good; and only from this… — Josef Pieper Copy Share Image
The delight we take in our senses is an implicit desire to know the ultimate reason for things, the highest cause. The desire for… — Josef Pieper Copy Share Image
“The vacancy left by absence of worship is filled by mere killing of time and by boredom, which is directly related to inability to… — Josef Pieper Copy Share Image
“Patience is not the indiscriminate acceptance of any sort of evil: "It is not the one who does not flee from evil who is… — Josef Pieper Copy Share Image
Contemplation does not ignore the 'historical Gethsemane', does not ignore the mystery of evil, guilt and its bloody atonement. The happiness of contemplation is… — Josef Pieper Copy Share Image
Justice is a habit (habitus), whereby a man renders to each one his due with constant and perpetual will. — Josef Pieper Copy Share Image
The happy life does not mean loving what we possess, but possessing what we love." Possession of the beloved, St. Thomas holds, takes place… — Josef Pieper Copy Share Image
The brave man uses wrath for his own act, above all in attack, 'for it is peculiar to wrath to pounce upon evil. Thus… — Josef Pieper Copy Share Image
What distinguishes - in both senses of that word - contemplation is rather this: it is a knowing which is inspired by love. "Without… — Josef Pieper Copy Share Image
Beauty, however, must here be understood in its original meaning: as the glow of the true and the good irradiating from every ordered state… — Josef Pieper Copy Share Image
Unless we regain the art of silence and insight, the ability for nonactivity, unless we substitute true leisure for our hectic amusements, we will… — Josef Pieper Copy Share Image
If God really became incarnate, and if His Incarnation can with justice compel man to change his life,then we have no alternative but to… — Josef Pieper Copy Share Image
