Thomas Merton

We do not exist for ourselves.

— Thomas Merton

The tighter you squeeze, the less you have.

— Thomas Merton

Love is an intensification of life.

— Thomas Merton

Take more time, cover less ground.

— Thomas Merton

To be a saint is to be yourself.

— Thomas Merton

The gate of heaven is everywhere.

— Thomas Merton

A daydream is an evasion.

— Thomas Merton

It might be good to open our eyes and see.

— Thomas Merton

To be grateful is to recognize the love of God in everything.

— Thomas Merton

A faith that is afraid of other people is not faith at all.

— Thomas Merton

When you see God in everyone, then they see God in you.

— Thomas Merton

To worship our false selves is to worship nothing. And the worship of nothing is hell.

— Thomas Merton

A man searching for enlightenment is like a man sitting on an Ass in search of an Ass

— Thomas Merton

“If you find God with great ease, perhaps it is not God you have found.”

— Thomas Merton

Happiness is not a matter of intensity but of balance, order, rhythm and harmony.

— Thomas Merton

To hope is to risk frustration. Make up your mind to risk frustration.

— Thomas Merton

The meaning of life is found in openness to being and "being present" in full awareness.

— Thomas Merton

“The simplest and most effective way to sanctity is to disappear into the background of ordinary everyday routine.”

— Thomas Merton

The center of our being is a point of nothingness which is untouched by sin and by illusion, a point of pure…

— Thomas Merton

We are not converted only once in our lives but many times and this endless series of conversions and inner revolutions leads…

— Thomas Merton

Actions are the doors and windows of being. Unless we act, we have no way of knowing what we are.

— Thomas Merton

“We only know Him in so far as we are known by Him, and our contemplation of Him is a participation in…

— Thomas Merton

Be still: There is no longer any need of comment. It was a lucky wind That blew away his halo with his…

— Thomas Merton

It is a glorious destiny to be a member of the human race, though it is a race dedicated to many absurdities…

— Thomas Merton

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

— Thomas Merton

From the moment you put a piece of bread in your mouth you are part of the world. Who grew the wheat?…

— Thomas Merton

The man who lives in division is living in death. He cannot find himself because he is lost; he has ceased to…

— Thomas Merton

There is only one problem on which all my existence, my peace, my happiness depend: to discover myself in discovering God. If…

— Thomas Merton

No matter how ruined man and his world may seem to be, and no matter how terrible man's despair may become, as…

— Thomas Merton

“It is as if in creating us God asked a question, and in awakening us to contemplation He answered the question, so…

— Thomas Merton

We assume that others are receiving the kind of appreciation we want for ourselves, and we proceed on the assumption that since…

— Thomas Merton

We are so obsessed with doing that we have no time and no imagination left for being. As a result, men are…

— Thomas Merton

“Means and Ends The purpose of a fish trap Is to catch fish, And when the fish are caught The trap is…

— Thomas Merton

“Zašto bih ja trebao biti bogat kada si ti bio siromašan? Zašto bih ja želio biti slavan i moćan u očima ljudi…

— Thomas Merton

But it certainly is a wonderful thing to wake up suddenly in the solitude of the woods and look up at the…

— Thomas Merton

“The Kingly Man My master said: That which acts on all and meddles in none - is heaven . . . The…

— Thomas Merton

The deepest level of communication is not communication, but communion. It is wordless. It is beyond words, and it is beyond speech,…

— Thomas Merton

“The Christ we find in ourselves is not identified with what we vainly seek to admire and idolize in ourselves—on the contrary,…

— Thomas Merton

“BUT as long as you pretend to live in pure autonomy, as your own master, without even a god to rule you,…

— Thomas Merton

First of all, although men have a common destiny, each individual also has to work out his own personal salvation for himself…

— Thomas Merton