Top 100 Quotes About Aquinas
#1. As Aquinas, the quintessential theologian, says: "The notion of form is most fully realized in existence itself. And in God existence is not acquired by anything, but God is existence itself subsistent. It is clear, then, that God himself is both limitless and perfect."28
Rudy Rucker
#2. The most blessed result of prayer would be to rise thinking "But I never knew before. I never dreamed ... " I suppose it was at such a moment that Thomas Aquinas said of all his own theology, "It reminds me of straw.
C.S. Lewis
#3. Even when I feared and detested Christianity, I was struck by its essential unity, which, in spite of its divisions, it has never lost. I trembled on recognizing the same unmistakable aroma coming from the writings of Dante and Bunyan, Thomas Aquinas and William Law.
C.S. Lewis
#4. What the jogger's face shows is not boredom but contemplation, which Thomas Aquinas described as man's highest activity save one - contemplation plus putting the fruits of that contemplation into action.
George Sheehan
#5. According to Aquinas, effort may not be the best measure of our virtue.
Jen Pollock Michel
#6. Here (in Thomas Aquinas) is the mind that prepared the way for the scientific and industrial revolutions. Here is the mind that was Catholic enough to embrace any good idea, from wherever it came.
John Mark Reynolds
#7. Perhaps Aquinas's notably soft line on gluttony may have had something to do with the fact that the saint was said to have had what today we might call a weight problem.
Francine Prose
#8. It was even possible for the most venerated patriarchs of the Church, like St. Augustine and St. Thomas Aquinas, to conclude that heretics should be tortured (Augustine) or killed outright (Aquinas).
Sam Harris
#9. To put it in the terms of St. Thomas Aquinas: An unjust law is a human law that is not rooted in eternal law and natural law.
Martin Luther King Jr.
#10. Wonder is defined by Thomas [Aquinas] in the Summa Theologiae [I-II, Q. 32, a. 8], as the desiderium sciendi, the desire for knowledge, active longing to know.
Josef Pieper
#11. Evangelicals have largely misinterpreted Aquinas, and they have placed on him views that he did not hold.
Norman Geisler
#13. Heaven help me! I used to be fairly good at thinking. I could paraphrase any page in Aquinas once.
G.K. Chesterton
#14. St. Thomas Aquinas taught that water has been a natural sacrament since the dawn of creation. In the age of nature - from Adam through the patriarchs - water refreshed and cleansed humankind.
Scott Hahn
#15. Thus, for Aquinas, the New Law goes beyond the Sermon on the Mount and the other teachings of Jesus. It is nothing less than divine grace - divine life and power. Grace is the New Law that enables us to keep the commandments in a way that we as children of Adam couldn't on our own.
Scott Hahn
#16. Discrimination against Jews can be read in Thomas Aquinas, and insults against Jews in Martin Luther.
Lionel Blue
#17. Leading Christian theologians such as Augustine and Aquinas were not what today might be called 'strict constructionists.' Rather, they celebrated reason as the means to gain greater insight into divine intentions.
Rodney Stark
#18. Aquinas was a superior servant; he betrayed little reaction to the news that there was a corpse in the chapel. He merely blinked once, slowly, and then crossed himself.
Deanna Raybourn
#19. There is little of the true philosophic spirit in Aquinas. He does not, like the Platonic Socrates, set out to follow wherever the argument may lead.
Bertrand Russell
#20. In the past some of the most influential Jewish, Christian and Muslim theologians, such as Maimonides, Aquinas and Ibn Sina, made it clear that it was very difficult to speak about God, because when we confront the ultimate, we are at the end of what words or thoughts can do.
Karen Armstrong
#21. You will remain theologically uneducated until you study carefully Athanasius, Augustine and Aquinas.
Thomas C. Oden
#22. Aquinas was once asked, with what compendium a man might become learned? He answered By reading of one book.
Jeremy Taylor
#23. Clearly, imagining cannot be expected to mean exactly the same thing today as it did in the Middle Ages or antiquity. For one thing, Aristotle and Aquinas never watched television.
Richard Kearney
#24. I can't tell you how Aquinas has enriched and changed my life, my thought. He has helped me to be a better evangelical, a better servant of Christ, and to better defend the faith that was delivered, once for all, to the saints.
Norman Geisler
#25. University of Chicago is a Baptist school, where atheist professors teach Jewish students about St. Thomas Aquinas.
Martin Gardner
#26. Robert's problem was familiar to Aquinas. He called it ignorantia affectata, cultivated ignorance.
Greg Bear
#27. The first-cause and prime-mover argument, brilliantly proffered by St. Thomas Aquinas in the fourteenth century (and brilliantly refuted by David Hume in the eighteenth century), is easily turned aside with just one more question: Who or what caused and moved God?
Michael Shermer
#28. Leave to every one the care of what belongs to him, and disturb not thyself with what is said or done in the world. - ST. THOMAS AQUINAS.
Various
#29. Facts in our day are not the same as the facts in the time of Aristotle or Thomas Aquinas. But the principles by which these facts are interpreted have not changed, for common sense remains essentially the same throughout the ages.
Fulton J. Sheen
#30. Thomas Aquinas states parenthetically, as something entirely obvious, that men are more rational than women. For my part, I see no evidence of this.
Bertrand Russell
#31. Thomas Aquinas said of suffering, as Aristotle had said of shame, that it was a thing not good in itself; but a thing which might have a certain goodness in particular circumstances. That is to say, if evil is present, pain at recognition of the evil, being a kind of knowledge, is relatively good.
C.S. Lewis
#32. Aquinas called prudence the queen of virtues, saying that she gently guides all the rest.
Jonathan V. Last
#33. To a recognizably Christian culture, like Shakespeare's, Jesus Christ is the Logos incarnate, the Word made flesh. He exemplifies the good of having a body. In the long run, that is why Aquinas could baptize Aristotle and why the West could produce Shakespeare and Michelangelo.
William Shakespeare
#34. Saint Thomas Aquinas explains how, with the gifts of the Holy Spirit, a person's whole spiritual being becomes responsive to God's light, not only the light of knowledge but also the inspiration of love. I have prayed for the gifts of the Holy Spirit since my youth and I continue to do so.
Pope John Paul II
#35. Aquinas brought an Aristotelian view of reason back into European culture, and lighted the way toward the Renaissance.
Ayn Rand
#36. The 'words' of Augustine, Origen, Clement of Alexandria, St. John of Damascus, St. Thomas Aquinas, et al, may not have carried the weight of Canon, however they were neither paper-like nor mere 'pellets'."
~R. Alan Woods [2012]
R. Alan Woods
#37. But no moral philosopher, from Aristotle to Aquinas, to John Locke and Adam Smith, divorced economics from a set of moral ends or held the production of wealth to be an end in itself; rather it was seen as a means to the realization of virtue, a means of leading a civilized life.
Daniel Bell
#38. Thomas Aquinas put forward the basis of modern just war theory, suggesting that war cannot be fought for personal gain and must be waged by a legitimate body, and that the overriding motive must be to secure peace.
DK Publishing
#39. If somebody is going to try to paste a person's view on epistemology to me, then give me Thomas Aquinas. Don't give me Ayn Rand.
Paul Ryan
#40. [To Aquinas] the senses are what we have in common with dumb animals ... Our better part [is] the mind ... and [its] intellectual contemplation.
Anthony John Patrick Kenny
#41. Professors of Greek forget or are unaware that Thomas Aquinas, who did not know Greek, was a better interpreter of Aristotle than any of them have proved to be, not only because he was smarter but because he took Aristotle more seriously.
Allan Bloom
#42. Again, I hear almost everyday from atheists who write off religion as primitive, premodern nonsense. I summon Aquinas, Augustine, Paul [of Tarsus], Teresa of Avila, Joseph Ratzinger, and Edith Stein-in all their intellectual rigor-as allies in the the struggle against this dismissive atheism.
Robert Barron
#43. We don't lock up books in this house," Philippe said, "only food, ale, and wine. Reading Herodotus or Aquinas seldom leads to bad behavior.
Deborah Harkness
#44. Commentators who today talk of 'The Dark Ages' when faith instead of reason was said to ruthlessly rule, have for their animadversions only the excuse of perfect ignorance. Both Aquinas' intellectual gifts and his religious nature were of a kind that is no longer commonly seen in the Western world.
David Berlinski
#45. Even theologians, even the great theologians of the thirteenth century, even Saint Thomas Aquinas himself did not trust to faith alone, or assume the existence of God.
Henry Adams
#46. A just law is a man-made code that squares with the moral law or the law of God. An unjust law is a code that is out of harmony with the moral law. To put it in the terms of Saint Thomas Aquinas, an unjust law is a human law that is not rooted in eternal and natural law.
Martin Luther
#47. The test of the artist does not lie in the will with which he goes to work, but in the excellence of the work he produces.
Thomas Aquinas
#48. The celebration of Holy Mass is as valuable as the death of Jesus on the cross.
Thomas Aquinas
#49. Thus the sun which possesses light perfectly, can shine by itself; whereas the moon which has the nature of light imperfectly, sheds only a borrowed light.
Thomas Aquinas
#50. Again, it is self-evident that truth exists. For truth exists if anything at all is true, and if anyone denies that truth exists, he concedes that it is true that it does not exist, since if truth does not exist it is then true that it does not exist.
Thomas Aquinas
#52. Theology is taught by God, teaches God, and leads to God.
Thomas Aquinas
#54. In a false person, sacraments do not produce any effect.
Thomas Aquinas
#55. Peace is the work of justice indirectly, in so far as justice removes the obstacles to peace; but it is the work of charity (love) directly, since charity, according to its very notion, causes peace.
Thomas Aquinas
#56. Man should not consider his material possessions as his own, but as common to all, so as to share them without hesitation when others are in need
Thomas Aquinas
#57. Angels transcend every religion, every philosophy, every creed.
In fact Angels have no religion as we know it ...
Their existence precedes every religious system that has ever
existed on Earth ...
Thomas Aquinas
#58. Mistakes are made on two counts: an argument is either based on error or incorrectly developed.
Thomas Aquinas
#60. A man should remind himself that an object of faith is not scientifically demonstrable, lest presuming to demonstrate what is of faith, he should produce inconclusive reasons and offer occasion for unbelievers to scoff at a faith based on such ground.
Thomas Aquinas
#61. By nature all men are equal in liberty, but not in other endowments.
Thomas Aquinas
#62. There is nothing to unify God and the soul but the Cross.
Louis De Wohl
#63. Further, nothing, except sin, is contrary to an act of virtue. But war is contrary to peace. Therefore war is always a sin.
Thomas Aquinas
#64. When the devil is called the god of this world, it is not because he made it, but because we serve him with our worldliness.
Thomas Aquinas
#65. BEDE. (ubi sup.) Repent, therefore, and believe; that is, renounce dead works; for of what use is believing without good works? The merit of good works does not, however, bring to faith, but faith begins, that good works may follow.
Thomas Aquinas
#66. It is necessary for the perfection of human society that there should be men who devote their lives to contemplation.
Thomas Aquinas
#67. Love works in a circle, for the beloved moves the lover by stamping a likeness, and the lover then goes out to hold the beloved inreality. Who first was the beginning now becomes the end of motion.
Thomas Aquinas
#68. Any time you feel the desire to eat a pint of Cherry Garcia ice cream, commit adultery,
avoid confessing your sins, or hate your boss, your concupiscible passions are stirring.
Taylor R. Marshall
#69. The study of truth requires a considerable effort - which is why few are willing to undertake it out of love of knowledge - despite the fact that God has implanted a natural appetite for such knowledge in the minds of men.
Thomas Aquinas
#70. I cannot go on ... All that I have written seems to me like so much straw compared to what I have seen and what has been revealed to me.
Thomas Aquinas
#71. Man is closer to God according to his existence in grace than he is according to his existence in nature.
Thomas Aquinas
#72. Arrive at knowledge over small streamlets, and do not plunge immediately into the ocean, since progress must go from the easier to the more difficult.
Thomas Aquinas
#74. An angel can illumine the thought and mind of man by strengthening the power of vision and by bringing within his reach some truth which the angel himself contemplates.
Thomas Aquinas
#75. It is requisite for the relaxation of the mind that we make use, from time to time, of playful deeds and jokes.
Thomas Aquinas
#76. While injustice is the worst of sins, despair is the most dangerous; because when you are in despair you care neither about yourself nor about others.
Thomas Aquinas
#77. The world tempts us either by attaching us to it in prosperity, or by filling us with fear of adversity. But faith overcomes this in that we believe in a life to come better than this one, and hence we despise the riches of this world and we are not terrified in the face of adversity.
Thomas Aquinas
#78. A scrap of knowledge about sublime things is worth more than any amount about trivialities.
Thomas Aquinas
#80. Hence it is predicated chiefly of the virtuous; then of the pleasant; and lastly of the useful.
Thomas Aquinas
#81. Because philosophy arises from awe, a philosopher is bound in his way to be a lover of myths and poetic fables. Poets and philosophers are alike in being big with wonder.
Thomas Aquinas
#83. Now in matters of action the reason directs all things in view of the end:
Thomas Aquinas
#84. There is nothing on this earth more to be prized than true friendship.
Thomas Aquinas
#85. Thus Angels' Bread is made The Bread of man today: The Living Bread from Heaven With figures doth away: O wondrous gift indeed! The poor and lowly may Upon their Lord and Master feed.
Thomas Aquinas
#86. Every truth without exception- and whoever may utter it- is from the Holy Spirit.
Thomas Aquinas
#87. Grant me, O Lord my God, a mind to know you, a heart to seek you, wisdom to find you, conduct pleasing to you, faithful perseverance in waiting for you, and a hope of finally embracing you. Amen.
Thomas Aquinas
#88. Locus ab auctoritate est infirmissimus. [The argument from authority is the weakest.]
Thomas Aquinas
#89. One aspect of neighbourly love is that we must not merely will our neighbours good, but actually work to bring it about.
Thomas Aquinas
#90. It is only God who creates. Man merely rearranges.
Thomas Aquinas
#91. The truth can be perceived only through thinking, as is proven by Augustine.
Thomas Aquinas
#93. Better to illuminate than merely to shine to deliver to others contemplated truths than merely to contemplate.
Thomas Aquinas
#94. Concerning perfect blessedness which consists in a vision of God.
Thomas Aquinas
#96. To one who has faith, no explanation is necessary. To one without faith, no explanation is possible.
Thomas Aquinas
#99. Wonder was the motive that led people to philosophy ... wonder is a kind of desire in knowledge. It is the cause of delight because it carries with it the hope of discovery.
Thomas Aquinas
#100. In the old law, God was praised both with musical instruments, and human voices. But the church does not use musical instruments to praise God, lest she should seem to judaize.
Thomas Aquinas
