Quotessence
Home / Quotes / Quote by Thomas Merton

Quote by Thomas Merton

“And it is in this darkness, when there is nothing left in us that can please or comfort our own minds, when we seem to be useless and worthy of all contempt, when we seem to have failed, when we seem to be destroyed and devoured, it is then that the deep and secret selfishness that is too close to us for us to identify is stripped away from our souls. It is in this darkness that we find liberty. It is in this abandonment that we are made strong. This is the night which empties us and makes us pure.”

Quote by Thomas Merton

Create image

Author

Thomas Merton
Thomas Merton

Thomas Merton (January 31, 1915 - December 10, 1968) was an American writer, poet, social critic, and mystic. His works covered a wide range of topics including philosophy, religion, and social justice, and were highly appreciated by readers. more

You May Also Like

“If nothing that can be seen can either be God or represent Him to us as He is, then to find God we must pass beyond everything that can be seen and enter into darkness. Since nothing that can be heard is God, to find Him we must enter into silence. Since God cannot be imagined, anything our imagination tells us about Him is ultimately a lie and therefore we cannot know Him as He really is unless we pass beyond everything that can be imagined and enter into an obscurity without images and without the likeness of any created thing.”

IfsKnowsLyingImaginationSilenceDarknessHeardObscurity
Book:New Seeds of Contemplation
Create image

“The friends of Job appear on the scene as advisers and "consolers," offering Job the fruits of their moral scientia. But when Job insists that his sufferings have no explanation and that he cannot discover the reason for them through conventional ethical concepts, his friends turn into accusers, and curse Job as a sinner. Thus, instead of consolers, they become torturers by virtue of their very morality, and in so doing, while claiming to be advocates of God, they act as instruments of the devil.”

ReasonJobsSufferingTurnsMoralVirtueMoralitySceneDevilConceptsInstrumentsFruitCurseExplanationSinnerEthicalOfferingConventionalAdviserAccusers
Author:Thomas Merton
Create image

“It is not humility to insist on being someone that you are not. It is as much as saying that you know better than God who you are and who you ought to be. How do you expect to arrive at the end of your own journey if you take the road to another man's city? How do you expect to reach your own perfection by leading somebody else's life? His sanctity will never be yours; you must have the humility to work out your own salvation in a darkness where you are absolutely alone.”

IfsKnowsMenEndsCitiesDarknessJourneyHumilityOughtPerfectionSalvationWho You AreWork OutWhere You AreAnother ManSanctity
Book:New Seeds of Contemplation
Create image

“But there is no substance under the things I have gathered together about me. I am hollow, and my structure of pleasures and ambitions has no foundation. I am objectified in them. But they are all destined by their very contingency to be destroyed. And when they are gone there will be nothing left of me but my own nakedness and emptiness and hollowness, to tell me that I am a mistake.”

TogetherLeftMy OwnPleasureMistakeGoneAmbitionFoundationStructureDestroyedSubstanceEmptinessDestinedHollowContingencyHollowness
Author:Thomas Merton
Create image