Charles Williams : The New Christian Year

12th Thursday after Trinity

We repeat the Scriptures with our mouth, and we go though the Psalms of David in our service, but that which God requireth, and which is necessary, we have not, that is to say, a good word for each other.

The Paradise of the Fathers.

Do not despise or think lightly of him that standeth before thee, for thou knowest not whether the Spirit of God is in thee or in him, though thou callest him who standeth before thee him that ministereth unto thee.

The Paradise of The Fathers.

12th Wednesday after Trinity

Abba Agathon used to say to himself, whensoever he saw any act or anything which his thought wished to judge or condemn, "Do not commit the thing thyself," and in this manner he quieted his mind, and held his peace.

The Paradise of the Fathers.

Vex not yourselves with trivialities; ye were not made for things, and the glory of the world is but a travesty of truth, only a heresy of happiness.

Eckhart: Sayings.

12th Tuesday after Trinity

Even one unruly desire, though not a mortal sin, sullies and deforms the soul, and indisposes it for the perfect union with God, until it be cast away.

St. John of the Cross: Ascent of Mount Carmel.

Our souls may lose their peace and even disturb other people's if we are always criticising trivial actions which often are not real defects at all, but we construe them wrongly through ignorance of their motives.

St. Teresa of Avila: The Interior Castle.

12th Monday after Trinity

Virtue is nought else but an ordered and a measured affection, plainly directed unto God for himself.  For why, he in himself is the clean cause of all virtues: insomuch, that if any man be stirred to any virtue by any other cause mingled with him—yea, though he be the chief—yet that virtue is then imperfect.  As thus for example, may be seen in one virtue or two instead of all the other; and well may these two virtues be meekness and charity.  For whoso might get these two clearly, he needeth no more: for why, he hath all.

The Cloud of Unknowing.

Eleventh Sunday after Trinity

Every thing that works in nature and creature, except sin, is the working of God in nature and creature.  The creature has nothing else in its power but the free use of its will; and its free will has no other power but that of concurring with or resisting the working of God in nature.  The creature with its free will can bring nothing into being nor make any alteration in the working of nature, it can only change its own state or place in the working of nature, and so feel and find something in its state that it did not feel or find before.

William Law: The Spirit of Love.

11th Saturday after Trinity

For all other creatures and their works—yea, and the works of God himself—may a man through grace have fullness of knowing, and well came he think of them; but of God himself can no man think.  And therefore I would leave all that thing that I can think, and choose to my love that thing I cannot think.  For why, he may well be loved but not thought.  By love may he be gotten and holden; but by thought never.

The Cloud of Unknowing.

Although it be good to think upon the kindness of God, and to love him and praise him for it: yet it is far better th think upon the naked being of him, and to love him and praise him for himself.

The Cloud of Unknowing.