Henry David Thoreau Quotes

It is a presumption on the part of man when he demands in words an explanation of God.

If we go on explaining we shall cease to understand one another.

Man thinks, God directs.

Never ascribe to malice that which is adequately explained by incompetence.

Men were not intended to work with the accuracy of tools, to be precise and perfect in all their actions.

Man proposes, but God disposes.

Man is imperfect. The reality he creates is always endangered by man.

Man appoints, and God disappoints.

The mistake is to imagine that perfection is possible when the very idea is unthinkable.

Our sin is exactly the presumption that we can know God or ourselves through our own capacities.

I want to know all Gods thoughts; all the rest are just details.

When I'm explaining something to you, if I'm being long-winded, and twisty in a non-productive way, I could make you feel vaguely insulted. And you'd have a right to be.

I mean, you know, God knows everything, but I'm not quite that good. Every once in a while, something will slip by me.

I cannot be understood in three minutes.

I do have faith. I don't have faith that a God exists, nor do I have faith that one does not; I have absolute faith that I do not know, cannot know, am only human, am an infinitesimal creature packed onto a cramped planet crowded with seven billion bodies, and as many yearning hearts, and as many questioning minds.

Every day I run into people who don't know what I do. And even after I explain it they still don't know what I do. So now I can just say, 'Pick up the Locas book!' And that tells them all.

All men are born with a nose and five fingers, but no one is born with a knowledge of God.

Men are not flattered by being shown that there is a difference of purpose between the Almighty and them.

any system, in which the final decisions are referred to human beings, and in which the source of all authority are human, is doomed to failure because it deifies human beings by designating others than God as lords over men.

I never expect to see a perfect work from imperfect man.

As the possessor of complete knowledge, God is not mistaken about people's experiences as people are mistaken about each others' experiences.

Incompetence is a better explanation than conspiracy in most human activity.

It's an honest place to be if you don't understand someone else's experience, but there's no way for the other to understand if a conversation or an explanation isn't made.

God in his wisdom circumscribed man's vision, and rightly too, for otherwise man's conceit would know no bounds.

Explanations are a substitute for trust.