The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and all science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer pause to wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead: his eyes are closed.
— Albert Einstein (1879-1955)
Place your mind before the mirror of eternity! Place your soul in the brilliance of glory! And transform your entire being into the image of the Godhead Itself through contemplation.
–Saint Clare of Assisi (1194-1253)
The birds are the saints, who fly to heaven on the wings of contemplation, who are so removed from the world that they have no business on earth. They do not labor, but by contemplation alone they already live in heaven.
–Saint Anthony of Padua (1195-1231)
The pursuit of the contemplative life is something for which a great and sustained effort on the part of the powers of the soul is required: an effort to rise from earthly to heavenly things, an effort to keep one’s attention fixed on spiritual things, an effort to pass beyond and above the sphere of things visible to the eyes of flesh.
–Saint Gregory the Great (c. 540-604)
Look, look on Jesus, poor and crucified, look on this Holy One, who for your love has died, and remember as you contemplate the sacred mysteries, this Jesus whom you gaze upon, loves you most tenderly.
–Saint Clare of Assisi (1194-1253)
[N]one comes to contemplation save through penetrating meditation, holy conversation, and devout prayer.
–Saint Bonaventure (1221-1274)
