Puritan Quotes

“God is the highest good of the reasonable creature. The enjoyment of him is our proper; and is the only happiness with which our souls can be satisfied. To go to heaven, fully to enjoy God, is infinitely better than the most pleasant accommodations here. Better than fathers and mothers, husbands, wives, or children, or the company of any, or all earthly friends. These are but shadows; but the enjoyment of God is the substance. These are but scattered beams; but God is the sun. These are but streams; but God is the fountain. These are but drops, but God is the ocean.”
― Jonathan Edwards, The Works of Jonathan Edwards, Vol. 17: Sermons and Discourses, 1730-1733

“It is said that in some countries trees will grow, but will bear no fruit because there is no winter there.”
― John Bunyan

“Till men have faith in Christ, their best services are but glorious sins.”
― Thomas Brooks

“As God delights in his own beauty, he must necessarily delight in the creature's holiness which is a conformity to and participation of it, as truly as [the] brightness of a jewel, held in the sun's beams, is a participation or derivation of the sun's brightness, though immensely less in degree.”
― Jonathan Edwards

“[Concerning the Word preached:] Do we prize it in our judgments? Do we receive in into our hearts? Do we fear the loss of the Word preached more than the loss of peace and trade? Is it the removal of the ark that troubles us? Again, do we attend to the Word with reverential devotion? When the judge is giving the charge on the bench, all attend. When the Word is preached, the great God is giving us his charge. Do we listen to it as to a matter of life and death? This is a good sign that we love the Word.”
― Thomas Watson

“...the Puritans compressed whatever mirth and public joy they deemed allowable to human infirmity; thereby so far dispelling the customary cloud, that, for the space of a single holiday, they appeared scarcely more grave than most other communities at a period of general affliction.”
― Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Scarlet Letter

“God will try our faith before he satisfies our sight.”
― William Bates

“Self is the only oil that makes the chariot-wheels of the hypocrite move in all religious concerns.”
― Thomas Brooks, The Secret Key to Heaven: The Vital Importance of Private Prayer

“He had sprung from a rigid Puritan stock, and had been brought up to think much more intently of the duties of this life than of its privileges and pleasures.”
― Henry James, Roderick Hudson

“The gospel brings tidings, glad tidings indeed,
To mourners in Zion, who want to be freed,
From sin and Satan, and Mount Sinai’s flame,
Good news of salvation, through Jesus the Lamb.

What sweet invitations, the gospel contains,
To men heavy laden, with bondage and chains;
It welcomes the weary, to come and be blessed,
With ease from their burdens, in Jesus to rest.

For every poor mourner, who thirsts for the Lord,
A fountain is opened, in Jesus the Word;
Their poor parched conscience, to cool and to wash,
From guilt and pollution, from dead works and dross.

A robe is provided, their shame now to hide,
In which none are clothed, but Jesus' bride;
Though it be costly, yet is the robe free,
And all Zion’s mourners, shall decked with it be.”
― William Gadsby

“People will have their excitements, and a good rousing persecution used to stir things like the burning of Chicago or a Presidential election in our day.”
― Edward Payson Roe, Works of E. P. Roe, The: V4

“Press on when growth seems slow.”
― Laura Booz, Expect Something Beautiful: Finding God's Good Gifts in Motherhood

“When the doctrine is clear and the culture is beautiful, that church will be powerful.”
― Ray Ortlund, The Gospel: How the Church Portrays the Beauty of Christ (Building Healthy Churches)

“When you and I look in the mirror, I hope we don’t expect to see a seed. I hope we expect to see God at work in the garden of our souls.”
― Laura Booz, Expect Something Beautiful: Finding God's Good Gifts in Motherhood

“The same principle applies to God’s Word. The way we read and respond to God’s Word makes all the difference in producing growth.”
― Laura Booz, Expect Something Beautiful: Finding God's Good Gifts in Motherhood

“Whether motherhood feels exciting or exhausting, God is with you.”
― Laura Booz, Expect Something Beautiful: Finding God's Good Gifts in Motherhood

“Truth without grace is harsh and ugly. Grace without truth is sentimental and cowardly.”
― Ray Ortlund, The Gospel: How the Church Portrays the Beauty of Christ (Building Healthy Churches)

“When we sin, we feel guilty. It is straightforward.”
― Jim Wilson, How to be Free from Bitterness

“Bitterness is based on sin that somehow relates to you.”
― Jim Wilson, How to be Free from Bitterness

“True wisdom consists in two things: Knowledge of God and of Ourselves.”
― Institutes of the Christian, John Calvin Religion,

“True wisdom consists in two things: Knowledge of God and of Ourselves.”
― Institutes of the Christian Religion, John Calvin

“There is only one master we should obey in spiritual matters, and He is in heaven. We must not allow any other person to rule over our conscience, and we should not obey anyone in the absolute sense in which we obey the Lord Jesus Christ. This is what it means to be free from obeying men.”
― Christian Freedom, Samuel Bolton

“When you are anxious, remember that your God is guarding you with His peace.”
― Overcoming Anxiety: Relief for Worried People, David Powlison

“For whenever men begin the superstitious practice of worshipping God with their own fictions, all the laws enacted for this purpose forthwith degenerate into those gross abuses.”
― Institutes of the Christian Religion, John Calvin

“Let us beware, therefore, of yielding to indulgence, seeing we are assured that the curse of God lies on every man and woman cohabiting without marriage.”
― Institutes of the Christian Religion, John Calvin

“The local church is also one of the Lord Jesus’s agents, and He gave it an authority that you and I as individual Christians do not have.”
― Church Membership: How the World knows Who represents Jesus, Jonathan Leeman

“There is no school for learning contentment that can be compared with the foot of the Cross.”
― The Cross, J. C. Ryle

“The love of God from which the atonement springs is not a distinctionless love; it is a love that elects and predestinates. God was pleased to set His invincible and everlasting love upon a countless multitude and it is the determinate purpose of this love that the atonement secures.”
― Redemption Accomplished and Applied, John Murray

“Meditation without reading is erroneous; reading without meditation is barren.”
― Thomas Watson, How We May Read Scriptures with Most Spiritual Profit

“Our sleeping time is Satan's tempting time.”
― Thomas Watson, Heaven Taken by Storm