Inspirational Quotes by Francois Fenelon
“There is more danger in the risk of resisting God than in the heaviest of other sorrows. Crosses borne with quiet endurance, lowliness, simplicity, and self-denial unite us to Jesus Christ crucified, and work untold good. But crosses that we reject through thinking too highly of ourselves and through self-will separate us from him, contract the heart, and by degrees dry up the fountain of grace. Yield humbly, therefore, without trusting yourself, mere broken reed that you are, and say, “To him nothing is impossible.” He asks only one “Yes,” spoken in pure faith.”
― Francois Fenelon ,
from The Complete Fenelon
“The youth who, like a woman, loves to adorn his person, has renounced all claim to wisdom and to glory; glory is due to those only who dare to associate with pain, and have trampled pleasure under their feet.”
“For, Simmias and Cebes, I should be wrong not to resent dying if I did not believe that I should go first to other wise and good gods, and then to men who have died and are better than men are here. Be assured that, as it is, I expect to join the company of good men. This last I would not altogether insist on, but if I insist on anything at all in these matters, it is that I shall come to gods who are very good masters. That is why I am not so resentful, because I have good hope that some future awaits men after death, as we have been told for years, a much better future for the good than for the wicked.”
“I am afraid that other people do not realize that the one aim of those who practice philosophy in the proper manner is to practice for dying and death. Now if this is true, it would be strange indeed if they were eager for this all their lives and then resent it when what they have wanted and practiced for a long time comes upon them.”
“In this way, as it seems to me, he said: "One might make the same argument about harmony, lyre and strings, that a harmony is something invisible, without body, beautiful and divine in the attuned lyre, whereas the lyre itself and its strings are physical, bodily, composite, earthy and akin to what is mortal. Then if someone breaks the lyre, cuts or breaks the strings and then insists, using the same argument as you, that the harmony must still exist and is not destroyed because it would be impossi- ble for the lyre and the strings, which are mortal, still to exist when the strings are broken, and for the harmony, which is akin and of the same nature as the divine and immortal, to be destroyed before that which is mortal; he would say that the harmony itself still must exist and that the wood and the strings must rot before the harmony can suffer. And indeed Socrates, I think you must have this in mind, that we really do suppose the soul to be something of this kind; as the body is stretched and held together by the hot and the cold, the dry and the moist and other such things, and OUR soul is a mixture and harmony of those things when they are mixed with each other rightly and in due measure.”
“So in the first place, such things show clearly that the philosopher more than other men frees the soul from association with the body as much as possible?”
“In short, what ought to help most to open their eyes serves only to close them faster;”
“There is the explanation that is put in the language of the mysteries, that we men are in a kind of prison, and that one must not free oneself or run away. That seems to me an impressive doctrine and one not easy to understand fully. However, Cebes, this seems to me well expressed, that the gods are our guardians and that men are one of their possessions. Or do you not think so? I do, said Cebes.”
“Τι εγώ δα ζητάω, το ξέρεις, και ότι κατά τη γνώμη μου μας συμφέρει, αν αυτό γίνει, το έχεις ακούσει. Και παρακαλώ να μη στερηθώ εκείνο που ζητάω, εξαιτίας που δεν είμαι εραστής σου. Γιατί οι εραστές μετανιώνουν για το καλό που θα κάνουν μόλις σβήσει η επιθυμία τους, ενώ εκείνοι που δεν κατέχονται από έρωτα δεν θα έρθει ποτέ η στιγμή να αλλάξουν γνώμη. Γιατί δεν είναι η ανάγκη που τους πιέζει αλλά με τη θέλησή τους σκέφτονται τα ζητήματά τους, όπως είναι το καλύτερο, και κάνουν το καλό κατά τη δύναμη που έχουν.”
“It is a small matter, say they; true, but it is of amazing consequence to you; it is a matter that you love well enough to refuse to give it up to God; a matter which you sneer at in words, that you may have a pretence to retain it; a small matter, but one that you withhold from your Maker, and which will prove your ruin.”
“Despondency is not a state of humility. On the contrary, it is the vexation and despair of a cowardly pride; nothing is worse. Whether we stumble, or whether we fall, we must only think of rising again and going on in our course.”
topics: Pride
“I would have every minister of the Gospel address his audience with the zeal of a friend, with the generous energy of a father, and with the exuberant affection of a mother.”
“Trouble and perplexity drive me to prayer, and prayer drives away perplexity and trouble.”
topics: Prayer
“Even if no command to pray had existed, our very weakness would have suggested it.”
“The true genius that conducts a state is he, who doing nothing himself, causes everything to be done; he contrives, he invents, he foresees the future; he reflects on what is past; he distributes and proportions things; he makes early preparations; he incessantly arms himself to struggle against fortune, as a swimmer against a rapid stream of water; he is attentive night and day, that he may leave nothing to chance.”
“Speak, move, act in peace, as if you were in prayer. In truth, this is prayer.”
“Resign every forbidden joy; restrain every wish that is not referred to God's will; banish all eager desires, all anxiety; desire only the will of God; seek him alone and supremely, and you will find peace.”
topics: Peace
“Peace does not dwell in outward things, but within the soul; we may preserve it in the midst of the bitterest pain, if our will remains firm and submissive. Peace in this life springs from acquiescence to, not in an exemption from, suffering.”
topics: Peace
“It is only imperfection that complains of what is imperfect. The more perfect we are, the more gentle and quiet we become toward the defects of others.”
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Francois Fenelon (1651 - 1715)
He was inducted into the Acadmie Francaise in 1693 and named Archbishop of Cambrai in 1695. During his time as the educator and teacher of the Duke, Fenelon wrote several entertaining and educational works, including the extensive novel Les Aventures de Telemaque, fils d'Ulysse (The Adventures of Telemachus, son of Ulysses), which depicted the ideal of a wise king. When this novel began circulating anonymously among the court, having been fragmentarily published in 1699 without his knowledge, Louis XIV, who saw many criticisms of his absolutistic style of rule in Telemaque, stopped the printing and banned Fenelon from court. Fenelon then retreated to his bishopric in Cambrai, where he remained active writing theological and political treatises until his death on January 17, 1715.In Church history, Fenelon is known especially for his part in the Quietism debate with his earlier patron Bossuet. In his work Explication des maximes des Saints sur la vie interieure (Explanation of the Adages of the Saints on the Inner Life) in 1697, he defended Madame du Guyon, the main representative of Quietistic mysticism. He provided proof that her "heretical" teachings could also be seen in recognized saints. In 1697, Fenelon called on the pope for a decision in the Quietism debate. After long advisement, the Pope banned the Explication in 1699. Fenelon complied with the pope's decision immediately and allowed the remaining copies of his book to be destroyed.
Francois de Salignac de la Mothe-Fenelon, more commonly known as Francois Fenelon, was a French Roman Catholic theologian, poet and writer. He today is remembered mostly as one of the main advocates of quietism and as the author of The Adventures of Telemachus, a scabrous attack on the French monarchy, first published in 1699.
Francois Fenelon (specifically Francois de Salignac de la Motte-Fenelon) was born on August 6, 1651, at Fenelon Castle in Perigord. Fenelon studied at the seminary Saint-Sulpice in Paris, where he was ordained as a priest. Fenelon published his pedagogical work Traite de l'education des filles (Treatise on the Education of Girls) in 1681, which brought him much attention, not only in France, but abroad as well. At this time, he met Jacques Benigne Bossuet, Bishop of Meaux, who soon became his patron and through whose influence Fenelon was contracted by Louis XIV to carry out the re-conversion of the Hugenots in the provinces of Saintonge and Poitou in 1686 and was appointed in 1689 as educator of his grandson and potential successor, the Duc de Bourgogne. Because of this position, he gained much influence at the court.
He was inducted into the Academie Francaise in 1693 and named Archbishop of Cambrai in 1695. During his time as the educator and teacher of the Duke, Fenelon wrote several entertaining and educational works, including the extensive novel Les Aventures de Telemaque, fils d'Ulysse (The Adventures of Telemachus, son of Ulysses), which depicted the ideal of a wise king. When this novel began circulating anonymously among the court, having been fragmentarily published in 1699 without his knowledge, Louis XIV, who saw many criticisms of his absolutistic style of rule in Telemaque, stopped the printing and banned Fenelon from court. Fenelon then retreated to his bishopric in Cambrai, where he remained active writing theological and political treatises until his death on January 17, 1715.
In Church history, Fenelon is known especially for his part in the Quietism debate with his earlier patron Bossuet. In his work Explication des maximes des Saints sur la vie interieure (Explanation of the Adages of the Saints on the Inner Life) in 1697, he defended Madame du Guyon, the main representative of Quietistic mysticism. He provided proof that her "heretical" teachings could also be seen in recognized saints. In 1697, Fenelon called on the pope for a decision in the Quietism debate. After long advisement, the Pope banned the Explication in 1699. Fenelon complied with the pope's decision immediately and allowed the remaining copies of his book to be destroyed.