Prodigal

“ How triumphantly the poor prodigal, to whom Providence has given the fairest prospects, and whose steps are guarded by love and kindness, can vindicate his own instincts against all the virtuous force of circumstance surrounding him, and go to destruction in its very face! ”

“ When the prodigal has once returned to the odour of sanctity we are quite sure that he will never desire change of air; we understand that he will always be just as good and peaceful as we leave him on the last page. ”

“ Who ate the fatted calf? Not the man who raised it, but the man who had lost all claim upon the fruits of his brother's or father's toil. Is this the way to encourage virtue? Rob the honest son who has not shirked labor—who has been faithful, devoted and frugal—to feast the prodigal, who has already consumed one fortune and is now begging for another? Begging, I say, for the idea of earning one is very disagreeable to prodigals. As long as there is a "father" who is willing to treat his prodigal son better than the worthy son, prodigals will not be wanting in the world. ”

“ And like the prodigal, in the time of his sorest misery, found in his father's heart the greatest mercy, so you and I may come to God knowing that in the day of our dire distress He is always willing to love us and to forgive us as His own dear children. Let us be careful not to sin against Him, and then we shall not have the humiliation and the sorrow of coming back, like this poor prodigal, when he returned in rags and poverty to his father's house. Never make the mistake of going away from your God and then you will not have the remorse which will bring you back in sorrow and shame. ”

“ The unfortunate prodigal, driven forth from the home of his early years by his own imprudence, and reduced to absolute want, wandered about for some time in a state of almost unconscious despair, meditating self-destruction, till he at last sat down upon a hill which overlooked the fertile fields that he once called his own. ”

“ We say that we must find Christ; but where, and how, shall we find this Mighty Lord, Who comes out from the Father to meet the Prodigal? Must we study in ecclesiastical colleges, travel to distant lands, visit holy places, kneel on celebrated sacred ground, kiss stones, attend ceremonies, look at bones? ”

“ So you see God is tender—just like the prodigal son’s father—only with this difference, that God has millions of prodigals, and never gets tired of going out to meet them and welcome them back, every one as if he were the only prodigal son He had ever had. There’s a father indeed! ”

“ The parable of the Prodigal Son is the most beautiful story of its kind ever told and is based on an experience through which nearly every person passes, but few of whom, fortunately, carry the spirit of rebellion to the point of leaving home. ”

“ Did you notice that he knew the Prodigal when he was afar off, and ran to meet him? So God sees when we wish to do right, though nobody about us may guess it, and He is ready to welcome us to His love. Is it not strange that the Holy God should love us so tenderly? ”

“ There in the fifth round the avaricious and the prodigal, who bent their thoughts alike to the gross things of earth and lost all power of good, lie with their faces in the dust and their backs turned to heaven, pinioned and helpless. ”

“ In so doing, the Prodigal himself has been conceived, not as of a naturally brutish and depraved disposition,--a view taken by many commentators, with apparently little knowledge of human nature, and no recollection of their own youthful impulses,--but rather as a buoyant, restless youth, tired of the monotony of home, and anxious to see what lay [293] beyond the narrow confines of his father's farm, going forth in the confidence of his own simplicity and ardor, and led gradually away into follies and sins which at the outset would have been as distasteful as they were strange to him. ”

“ The prodigal has struck a bargain for all the enjoyments with which life teems abundantly, at the price of his own death, like the mythical persons in legends who sold themselves to the devil for the power of doing evil. ”

“ Everything is with the returned prodigal—the more so if he be of the notorious Vaufontaines, who were ever saints turned sinners, or sinners turned saints. Tell me, my good friend, where is room for pride in me? I am getting far more out of life than I deserve; it is not well that you and others should think better of me than I do of myself. ”

“ Thirdly, because prodigality is easily cured. For not only is the prodigal on the way to old age, which is opposed to prodigality, but he is easily reduced to a state of want, since much useless spending impoverishes him and makes him unable to exceed in giving. Moreover, prodigality is easily turned into virtue on account of its likeness thereto. ”

“ It is not the "elder brother" who stays at home that can best appreciate the divine order; but the prodigal who has gone forth into the world of experience to acquire knowledge for himself at first hand. ”

“ For no children but the prodigal are capable of quibbling in this manner with their father and protector; of exercising to the utmost length of severity any claims they may have, and of seizing all they may think themselves entitled to. ”

“ The prodigal who has gone into a far country has a long journey to retrace, and he comes back with many swinish tastes and habits of thought which he masters, if at all, by most persistent, prayerful and painful efforts. ”

“ So we must not blame the divinity-student, if he was overcome by those yearnings of human sympathy which predominate so much more in the sermons of the Master than in the writings of his successors, and which have made the parable of the Prodigal Son the consolation of mankind, as it has been the stumbling-block of all exclusive doctrines. ”

“ I answer that, Prodigality considered in itself is a less grievous sin than covetousness, and this for three reasons. First, because covetousness differs more from the opposite virtue: since giving, wherein the prodigal exceeds, belongs to liberality more than receiving or retaining, wherein the covetous man exceeds. Secondly, because the prodigal man is of use to the many to whom he gives, while the covetous man is of use to no one, not even to himself, as stated in Ethic. ”

“ Faster and faster they fell—wonderful multitudes of delicate crystals, adhering in shapes of beauty which outvied all that jeweller could invent or execute of ethereal, starry forms, structures of evanescent yet prodigal loveliness—till the whole air was obscured by them, and night came on, hastened by an hour, from the gathering of their white darkness. ”

“ The prodigal is not the absolute owner of his goods, but a steward who is held to administer them according to reason. But his sin is not grave, since it does not injure others and the goods of which he deprives himself are of the lowest kind. ”

“ It is an ungrateful thing in a servant, but what is very common, to behave insolently because he has been used tenderly. The humble prodigal thinks himself unworthy to be called a son, and is content to be a servant; the pampered slave thinks himself too good to be called a servant, and will be a son at the length, will take his ease and liberty, will be on a par with his master, and perhaps pretend to the inheritance. ”

“ The penitent, like the prodigal in the Gospel, forms the resolution to arise from his state of wretchedness, and he is enabled through grace to put his resolution into practice: he arises, brings forth fruit meet for repentance, ceasing to do evil and learning to do well. ”

“ And if we, with the prodigal son, look into ourselves and rightly rue our condition from past sins, and in true repentance resolve, with the prodigal son, to return to the Father and say: “Father, I have sinned against heaven, and in Thy sight, and am not worthy to be called Thy son ”

“ Only when the prodigal repented, did he "come to himself," and begin to act normally. Under the influence of the Spirit, God's holiness reveals to man his sin, and God's love leads him to the feet of Jesus. ”

“ He was covetous of other men's property, and prodigal of his own. ”

“ In another point of view the parable of the prodigal son is sometimes felt to inculcate the ignoring of failure in life, and the permitting of follies to have no25 effect on the position of a person. The prodigal son among us is too often allowed to go on draining the resources on which his brethren rightfully have a claim. But the father in the parable, who had divided the family property already, was not intending to give anything more to the prodigal, however penitent he might be ”

“ A certain divine—or perhaps we should say an un-certain divine—preaching a sermon from the parable of the prodigal son, took as his text the words, “And when he came to himself,” and gave a reading of the passage at once unique and original. “We have here, brethren,” said he, “an instance of the wonderful depth of meaning there is in Scripture. We see how low this unprincipled young man had fallen. ‘When he came to himself’—what does it mean? Well, look at home. What do we do when our money’s gone and we’ve no credit? What do we turn to? The pawnshop. So did he. First, his coat would go ”

“ The prodigall is sayd to come to himselfe, when he was first heat with this fire. Wee may well answer the world as old men doe young: You thinke us Christians to bee madd that follow heaven so eagerly; but we know you to bee madd, that run a-madding so after vanity. ”

“ Prodigals, who are foolishly free of what they have, will have many hangers-on who will cry them up as long as it lasts, but will leave them when it is done. Those that are prudently generous make an interest by it which may stand them in good stead ”

“ God pours out lavishly the abundance of His omnipotence and love. Prodigality is a characteristic of all the divine works. We cannot meditate on the countless multitude of the angels without astonishment. ”

“ They who do not believe them, ought not to believe any prodigies; for these would not be called prodigies did they not happen out of the ordinary course of nature. But, is it possible that anything should happen in vain, however hidden be its cause, in so grand a government of divine providence? One of the sacred Psalmists says, "Come, behold the works of the Lord, what prodigies He hath wrought in the earth." ”

“ I have even done what would seem impossible, since, by an unheard of prodigy, and which has no example, except in regard of God, not only have I corresponded with Thy benefits only by outrages, but I have also, if I dare say it, almost made the greatness of my treachery, and of my ingratitude towards Thee, equal the greatness of Thy goodness and mercy for me. ”

“ Those who say that to find out the cause of a prodigy is in effect to destroy its supposed signification as such, do not take notice that, at the same time, together with divine prodigies, they also do away with signs and signals of human art and concert, as, for instance, the clashings of quoits, fire-beacons, and the shadows on sun-dials, every one of which things has its cause, and by that cause and contrivance is a sign of something else. ”

“ When showers of stones descend, lightnings are darted from the heavens, and animals give birth to monsters, you consider these things as prodigies. This is a prodigy which can be expiated by no victims, by no supplications, without the blood of those men who have dared to commit so great a crime. ”

“ One might almost be excused who should exclaim, 'Here, surely, is something like a miracle!' Nevertheless, when we give over idle wonder, and begin to examine the seeming prodigy critically, we find it no prodigy at all, much less a miracle. ”

“ There should always be a monument to those who have achieved a prodigy. What greater prodigy than to have bequeathed in such mixed elements, to have principally made up of them, the affirmation of an unprecedented intensity of life? For though this intensity was one that broke down in each proposed exhibition the general example remains, incongruously, almost the best we can cite. And all we can say is that this brings us back once more to the large manner, the exceptional energy and well-nigh monstrous vitality, of the individual concerned. ”

“ We but too probably break down, I have ever reasoned, when we attempt the prodigy, the appeal to mystification, in itself ; with its ‘objective’ side too emphasised the report (it is ten to one) will practically run thin. We want it clear, goodness knows, but we also want it thick, and we get the thickness in the human consciousness that entertains and records, that amplifies and interprets it. That indeed, when the question is (to repeat) of the ‘supernatural’, constitutes the only thickness we do get; here prodigies, when they come straight, come with an effect imperilled ”

“ It suffices not to him to be virtuous, to merit the esteem of his fellow-creatures: it is necessary that he should be a prodigy;—that he should work miracles. This consideration, which is so mortifying to all those whom fortune has wronged in the unequal distribution of her favours, is to the philosopher a source of flattering and consolatory meditations. ”

“ We now come to consider the crowning glory of all the glorious supernatural attributes wherewith God will clothe our bodies on the last day. I say it is the crowning glory. For the splendor of form, the vigor of youth, and the complete perfection of our human nature—which are all included in the promise of rising conformable to the glorified body of Jesus Christ—would scarcely be worth working for or possessing, unless they were accompanied with the promise of incorruptibility. ”

“ The prodigy grown to manhood, who now recognises the arithmetical artifices which he used unconsciously as a boy, resembles the hypnotic subject trained by suggestion to remember in waking hours the events of the trance. ”

“ At the same time that our divines emphatically expatiate upon the goodness of Providence, while they exhort us to repose our confidence in her, do we not hear them, at the sight of unforeseen catastrophes, exclaim, that Providence sports with the vain projects of man, that she frustrates their designs, that she laughs at their efforts, that profound wisdom delights to bewilder the minds of mortals? But, shall we put confidence in a malignant Providence, who laughs at, and sports with mankind? How will one admire the unknown ways of a hidden wisdom, whose manner of acting is inexplicable? ”