If something has become deeply united with your soul, you should not only regard it as your possession in this life, but believe that it will accompany you into the life to come. If it is something good, rejoice and give thanks to God in your mind; if it is something bad, grieve and sigh, and strive to free yourself from it while you are still in the body.
–Saint Isaac of Syria (Seventh Century)
At the time of darkness, more than anything else kneeling is helpful.
— Saint Isaac of Syria (Seventh Century)
A small affliction borne for God’s sake is better before God than a great work performed without tribulation, because affliction willingly borne brings to light the proof of love. But a work of leisure proceeds from a self-satisfied conscience. That is why the saints were proved by tribulations for Christ’s love, and not by ease. For good works accomplished without toil are the righteousness of those in the world, who do righteous deeds with their possessions but not their bodies, thus gaining nothing within themselves. But you, O struggler, taste within yourself Christ’s suffering, that you may be deemd worthy of tasting His glory. For if we suffer with Him, then we are glorified with Him (cf. Rom. 8:17).
–Saint Isaac of Syria (Seventh Century)
As a handful of sand thrown into the ocean, so are the sins of all flesh as compared with the mind of God.
–Saint Isaac of Syria (Seventh Century)
If God is slow in answering your request, and you ask but do not promptly receive anything, do not be upset, for you are not wiser than God. When you remain as you were before, without anything happening, it is either because your behavior is not worthy of your request, or because the paths in which your heart was traveling were far removed from the aim of your prayer, or because your interior condition is far too childish, when compared with the magnitude of the thing for which you have asked.
–Saint Isaac of Syria (Seventh Century
Let us love silence till the world is made to die in our hearts. Let us always remember death, and in this thought draw near to God in our heart–and the pleasures of this world will have our scorn.
–Saint Isaac of Syria (Seventh Century)
