When thou attackest the roots of sin, fix thy thought more upon the
God whom thou desirest than upon the sin which thou abhorrest.
Walter Hylton: Scale of Perfection.
We know no Gospel without salvation from sin.
John Wesley.
And he cometh unto the disciples, and findeth them asleep, and saith unto Peter, What, could ye not watch with me one hour?
Matthew 26:40
The Christian, even though he is asleep with his eyes, ought to
lie awake with his heart, as it is written in the person of the Church
speaking in the Song of Songs: 'I sleep, yet my heart waketh.'
St. Cyprian: On the Lord's Prayer.
Watch and pray, that ye enter not into temptation: the spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak.
Matthew 26:41
Too little doth he love thee who loves anything with thee which he loves not for thee.
St. Augustine: Confessions.
Men perish with whispering sins, nay with silent sins, sins that
never tell the conscience they are sins, as often as with crying sins:
and in hell there shall meet as many men that never thought what was
sin, as that spent all their thoughts in the compassing of sin.
John Donne: Sermons.
He went away again the second time, and
prayed, saying, O my Father, if this cup may not pass away from me,
except that I drink it, thy will be done.
Matthew 26:42
The originator of this cup is also one with him who drank it.
St. Augustine: Lectures on St. John.
Jesus in his passion endures the torments men inflict on him; but
in the Agony he endures the torments of he inflicts on himself; 'he
groaned in himself and was troubled' [St. John, xi. 33]. This is a
suffering from no human, but an almighty hand, for he must be almighty
to bear it.
