Meditation

“ Thus meditation is a certain inquisitive power of the mind, sagaciously striving to look into the obscure and unravel the perplexed. Contemplation is that acumen of intelligence which, keeping all things open to view, comprehends all with clear vision. ”

“ And thus with every error, every selfish desire, every human weakness; by the power of meditation is it overcome, and as each sin, each error is thrust out, a fuller and clearer measure of the Light of Truth illumines the pilgrim soul. ”

“ I thought about the meaning of meditation. To meditate, I supposed, was to concentrate and reflect on thoughts, images, or phenomena. It was to work in a garden or stand in a subway and listen to currents of the mind. It was to lose track of time completely, absorbed in memories of a friend. It was to gaze down the highway of light where the sun lit into the sea. There were as many ways to meditate, it seemed, as there were facets on the jewel of the human condition.
It occurred to me that I had meditated on the first day of the bike trip at Walden Pond. ”

“ "What is meditation? What is leaving one's body? What is fasting? What is holding one's breath? It is fleeing from the self, it is a short escape of the agony of being a self, it is a short numbing of the senses against the pain and the pointlessness of life. ”

“ Meditation is the blessed furnace in which the holy fire of divine love is kindled. Make mental prayer every day, meditate on the passion of Jesus Christ, and doubt not but you too shall burn with this blessed flame. ”

“ The meditation they urged on us has been explained as "the inexpressible yearning of the inner man to go out into the infinite." But that Infinite we would enter is living. It is the ultimate being of us. Meditation is a fiery brooding on that majestical Self. We imagine ourselves into Its vastness. We conceive ourselves as mirroring Its infinitudes, as moving in all things, as living in all beings, in earth, water, air, fire, æther. ”

“ Meditation holds reason and faith to their work, and blows the fire till it thoroughly burns. To run a few steps will not get a man heat, but walking an hour may; and though a sudden, occasional thought of heaven will not raise our affections to any spiritual heat, yet meditation can continue our thoughts till our hearts grow warm. Thus you see the powerful tendency of consideration to produce this great elevation of the soul in heavenly contemplation. ”

“ Meditation is the soul's perspective glass, whereby, in her long removes, she discerns God as if he were near at hand. It is thinking, not growth, that makes the perfect man or woman. Hence life may be said to have commenced when the mind learns to meditate upon its nature, its powers, and its possibilities. ”

“ Moreover, as your meditation becomes deeper it will defend you from the perpetual assaults of the outer world. You will hear the busy hum of that world as a distant exterior melody, and know yourself to be in some sort withdrawn from it. ”

“ Although I cannot deny, but after some pious action, the mind is better disposed for meditation, for as dried wood quickly burneth, so the mind that is well disposed, is sooner kindled with this celestial fire. ”

“ Meanwhile an activity, which leads us not inwards, has taken place of that tranquil retiring meditation on the things of the unseen world which formed the deep, absorbing, contemplative, piety of our forefathers ”

“ Long and profound meditation had spread out the past before him like a map, on which he could trace every fluctuation in the stream of events with something like the skill of a diviner. Men, past or present, may be interpreted by meditation, if we comprehend the science of human nature. ”

“ Prayers, ceremonials, and all the other forms of worship are simply kindergartens of meditation. You pray, you offer something. A certain theory existed that everything raised one's spiritual power. The use of certain words, flowers, images, temples, ceremonials like the waving of lights brings the mind to that attitude, but that attitude is always in the human soul, nowhere else. [People] are all doing it; but what they do without knowing it, do knowingly. That is the power of meditation. ”

“ The use of meditation is the acquirement of a knowledge of eternal principles, and the power which results from meditation is the ability to rest upon and trust those principles, and so become one with the Eternal. The end of meditation is, therefore, direct knowledge of Truth, God, and the realization of divine and profound peace. ”

“ Whatever the soul demands of itself it obtains.” But how are you to learn the secret of assiduous meditation, to acquire the habit of retaining difficulties in mind, to be considered and reconsidered, to be taken up at the leisure moment, and laid down as deferred but not abandoned? ”

“ In mental prayer, meditation (the exercise of the intellect) is only a means to the end, which is the elevation of the soul to God — conversation with God. When thinking and reflecting the soul speaks to itself, reasons with itself; in prayer that follows it speaks to God. It is plain that mental prayer or meditation is something more than mere spiritual reading. ”

“ But meditation, to be fruitful, must go deeper than the mind; the heart, too, must be waked to action. The mind should minister to the heart as does a nurse to a little child, collecting and preparing food for meditation, and masticating it herself before feeding it to her charge. ”

“ Frequent meditation engenders science and knowledge of a man's self and of God knowledge engenders affections of compunction for our sins and miseries; compunction awakens affections of devotion towards God for His greatness and mercies; and devotion perfects prayer, making our spirit to join itself lovingly to Almighty God, and to ask of Him things decent and fitting, and in such manner as is convenient. ”

“ The second reason is that the soul at this season has now both the substance and the habit of the spirit of meditation. For it must be known that the end of reasoning and meditation on the things of God is the gaining of some knowledge and love of God, and each time that the soul gains this through meditation, it is an act; and just as many acts, of whatever kind, end by forming a habit in the soul, just so, many of these acts of loving knowledge which the soul has been making one after another from time to time come through repetition to be so continuous in it that they become habitual. ”

“ I believe that that meditation will beget within you a feeling of gratitude for God’s word, a greater appreciation of it, and, therefore, a more careful study of it and a more diligent adherence unto it. ”

“ Meditation teaches us to know God and ourself; it lays open to us our faults and vices, their source and fatal consequences and the arms we should employ to combat them. Finally, meditation contributes most efficiently to form our minds and purify our hearts, to fortify the will and develop in us the habit of reflecting. ”

“ You can gain happiness, health, peace of mind, and long life. By thought and meditation you can make for yourself a world of harmony, a consciousness which excludes everything that is ugly and painful and jarring. ”

“ Or a small portion of a book, or an epistle, or a gospel, through which we go regularly for meditation, may be considered every day, without, however, suffering oneself to be brought into bondage by this plan.
Learned commentaries I have found to store the head with many notions, and often also with the truth of God; but when the Spirit teaches, through the instrumentality of prayer and meditation, the heart is affected. ”

“ Let your quiet endeavour be to draw yourself into affections of the heart, rather than into reflections of the mind. Reflection is the means only, affection the end. Not only commence your meditation with recollection and peace, but without anxiety or superfluous fears of distraction. ”

“ In your meditations, therefore, let your heart grow and expand with ever-broadening love, until, freed from all hatred, and passion, and condemnation, it embraces the whole universe with thoughtful tenderness. ”

“ For what can be more perfect and sublime than for the recollection of God to be embraced in so brief a meditation, and for it, dwelling on a single verse, to escape from all the limitations of things visible, and to comprise in one short word the thoughts of all our prayers. ”

“ The reason lies here, and it must be fully understood. Whose meditation is real and effective? Who can really resign himself to the Will of God? Who can utter with power irresistible, like that of a thunderbolt, the name of the Lord? ”

“ If in holy meditation thou get near to Christ, and warm thy heart with the fire of love, and then come {250} but seldom, thy former coldness will soon return; especially as the work is so spiritual, and against the bent of depraved nature. It is true, the intermixing of other duties, especially secret prayer, may do much to the keeping thy heart above; but meditation is the life of most other duties, and the view of heaven is the life of meditation. ”

“ "The first meditation is the meditation of love, in which you so adjust your heart that you long for the weal and welfare of all beings, including the happiness of your enemies.
"The second meditation is the meditation of pity, in which you think of all beings in distress, vividly representing in your imagination their sorrows and anxieties so as to arouse a deep compassion for them in your soul.
"The third meditation is the meditation of joy, in which you think of the prosperity of others, and rejoice with their rejoicings.
"The fourth meditation is the meditation of impurity, in which you consider the evil consequences of corruption, the effects of sin and diseases. ”

“ Meditation is the intense dwelling, in thought, upon an idea or theme, with the object of thoroughly comprehending it, and whatsoever you constantly meditate upon you will not only come to understand, but will grow more and more into its likeness, for it will become incorporated into your very being, will become, in fact, your very self. ”

“ As, by the power of meditation, you grow in wisdom, you will relinquish, more and more, your selfish desires which are fickle, impermanent, and productive of sorrow and pain; and will take your stand, with increasing steadfastness and trust, upon unchangeable principles, and will realize heavenly rest. ”

“ When you are praying and reading, there are the graces of faith, desire, love, repentance, &c. to be exercised there: when you are alone, meditation may help to actuate any grace as you find most needful: when you are conferring with others, you must exercise love to them, and love to that truth about which you do confer, and other graces as the subject shall require: when you are provoked or under suffering you have patience to exercise. ”

“ Meditation again evokes images and pictures which are akin to its subject and our mood and serve in illustration of it. Once, when I was considering the play of arcane forces in the body, a book appeared before me, a coloured symbol on each page. ”

“ The process of meditation is the act of comparing facts, deducing conclusions, analyzing compounds, and tracing the chain of cause and effect. Knowledge is the material with which it works; and, in proportion to its accuracy and extent, will be the value and greatness of our elaborations. ”

“ To meditate means in general nothing else than to reflect seriously on some subject. Meditation, as mental prayer, is a serious reflection on some religious truth or event, united wit!? reference and application to ourselves, in order thereby to excite in us certain pious sentiments, such as contrition, humility, faith, hope, charity, etc., and to move our will to form good resolutions conformable to these pious sentiments. Such an exercise has naturally a beneficial influence on our soul and greatly conduces to enlighten our mind and to move our will to practise virtue. ”

“ Hence meditation is an exercise of the faculties of our soul — memory, understanding, and will."
"Meditation, as a part of mental prayer" says St. Francis of Sales, "is an attentive thought voluntarily repeated or entertained in the mind to excite the will to holy and salutary affections and resolutions" It differs from mere study in its object. We study to improve our minds and to store up information; we meditate to move the will to pray and to embrace what is good. We study that we may know; we meditate that we may pray. ”

“ Meditation is the assiduous and sagacious revision of cogitation, and strives to explain the involved, and penetrate the hidden. Contemplation is the mind’s perspicacious and free attention, diffused everywhere throughout the range of whatever may be explored. There is this difference between meditation and contemplation: meditation relates always to things hidden from our intelligence; contemplation relates to things made manifest, either according to their nature or our capacity. Meditation always is occupied with some one matter to be investigated ”

“ But we can easily turn our spiritual reading into a meditation, as, for instance, when we read only a few lines at a time from "The Following of Christ"; then meditate, reflect, consider our own conduct in connection with the subject treated, make devout acts and pious resolutions, and finally pray to God for His grace that we may conquer our wicked inclinations, practise" some particular virtue, and lead a holy life. ”

“ Poetical composition results from two intellectual phenomena, meditation and inspiration. Meditation is a faculty ; inspiration is a gift. All men, to a certain degree, can meditate; very few are inspired. Spiritus flat ubi vult. In meditation, the spirit acts; in inspiration, it oheys ; because the first is of men, the second comes from a higher source. He who gave us this power is stronger than we. These two processes of thoughts are intimately linked in the soul of the poet. The poet invites inspiration by meditation, as the prophets raised themselves to ecstacies by prayer. ”