Francis de Sales was a Bishop of Geneva and is honored as a saint in the Catholic Church. He became noted for his deep faith and his gentle approach to the religious divisions in his land resulting from the Protestant Reformation. He is known also for his writings on the topic of spiritual direction and spiritual formation, particularly the Introduction to the Devout Life and the Treatise on the Love of God. These Saint Francis de Sales quotes will motivate you.
Best Saint Francis de Sales Quotes
- “Do not look forward to what may happen tomorrow; the same everlasting Father who cares for you today will take care of you tomorrow and every day. Either He will shield you from suffering, or He will give you unfailing strength to bear it. Be at peace, then, put aside all anxious thoughts and imaginations, and say continually: ‘The Lord is my strength and my shield; my heart has trusted in Him and I am helped. He is not only with me but in me and I in Him.'” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “Have patience with all things – but first with yourself. Never confuse your mistakes with your value as a human being. You are perfectly valuable, creative, worthwhile person simply because you exist. And no amount of triumphs or tribulations can ever change that.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “What we need is a cup of understanding, a barrel of love, and an ocean of patience.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
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“Great occasions for serving God come seldom, but little ones surround us daily.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “Anxiety is the greatest evil that can befall a soul, except sin. God commands you to pray, but He forbids you to worry.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “Half an hour’s meditation each day is essential, except when you are busy. Then a full hour is needed.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “Do everything calmly and peacefully. Do as much as you can as well as you can. Strive to see God in all things without exception, and consent to His will joyously. Do everything for God, uniting yourself to him in word and deed. Walk very simply with the Cross of the Lord and be at peace with yourself.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “Do not look forward to the changes and chances of this life in fear; rather look to them with full hope that, as they arise, God, whose you are, will deliver you out of them. He is your keeper. He has kept you hitherto. Do you but hold fast to his dear hand, and he will lead you safely through all things; and, when you cannot stand, he will bear you in his arms. Do not look forward to what may happen tomorrow. Our Father will either shield you from suffering, or he will give you strength to bear it.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
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“Faith is like a bright ray of sunlight. It enables us to see God in all things as well as all things in God.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “Don’t get upset with your imperfections. It’s a great mistake because it leads nowhere – to get angry because you are angry, upset at being upset, depressed at being depressed, disappointed because you are disappointed. So don’t fool yourself. Simply surrender to the Power of God’s Love, which is always greater than our weakness.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “God will either shield you from suffering or give you unfailing strength to bear it.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “It is not those who commit the least faults who are the most holy, but those who have the greatest courage, the greatest generosity, the greatest love, who make the boldest efforts to overcome themselves, and are not immediately apprehensive about tripping.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
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“Be who you are and be that well.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “Don’t sow your desires in someone else’s garden; just cultivate your own as best you can; don’t long to be other than what you are, but desire to be thoroughly what you are. Direct your thoughts to being very good at that and to bearing the crosses, little or great, that you will find there. Believe me, this is the most important and least understood point to the spiritual life. We all love according to what is our taste; few people like what is according to their duty or to God’s liking. What is the use of building castles in Spain when we have to live in France?” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “I have made a pact with my tongue, not to speak when my heart is disturbed.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
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“A judicious silence is always better than truth spoken without charity.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “Those who pray from the heart do not think about the prayer they are saying, but about the God to whom they pray.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “God takes pleasure to see you take your little steps; and like a good father who holds his child by the hand, He will accommodate His steps to yours and will be content to go no faster than you. Why do you worry?” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “Never be in a hurry; do everything quietly and in a calm spirit. Do not lose your inner peace for anything whatsoever, even if your whole world seems upset.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “The enemy often tries to make us attempt and start many projects so that we will be overwhelmed with too many tasks, and therefore achieve nothing and leave everything unfinished. Sometimes he even suggests the wish to undertake some excellent work that he foresees we will never accomplish. This is to distract us from the prosecution of some less excellent work that we would have easily completed. He does not care how many plans and beginnings we make, provided nothing is finished.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
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“Nothing is so strong as gentleness, nothing so gentle as real strength.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “It is right that you should begin again every day. There is no better way to complete the spiritual life than to be ever beginning it over again.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “Have patience to walk with short steps until you have wings to fly.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “We shall steer safely through every storm, so long as our heart is right, our intention fervent, our courage steadfast, and our trust fixed on God. If at times we are somewhat stunned by the tempest, never fear. Let us take breath, and go on afresh.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
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“There is nothing small in the service of God.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “Let us think only of spending the present-day well. Then when tomorrow shall have come, it will be called today, and then we will think about it.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “Truly it is a blessed thing to love on earth as we hope to love in Heaven, and to begin that friendship here which is to endure forever there.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “Be patient with everyone, but above all with yourself. I mean do not be disheartened by your imperfections, but always rise up with fresh courage. How are we to be patient in dealing with our neighbor’s faults if we are impatient in dealing with our own? He who is fretted by his own failings will not correct them. All profitable correction comes from a calm and peaceful mind.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “A heart-memory is better than a mere head-memory. Better to carry away a little of the love of Christ in our souls, than if we were able to repeat every word of every sermon we ever heard.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
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“Have patience with all things, But, first of all with yourself.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “The Prayer of the sick person is his patience and his acceptance of his sickness for the love of Jesus Christ. Make sickness itself a prayer, for there is none more powerful, save martyrdom!” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “To lose ourselves in God is simply to give up our own will to Him. When a soul can truly say Lord I have no other will than Thine it is truly lost in God and united to Him.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “Be not miserable about what may happen tomorrow. The same everlasting Father, who cares for you today, will care for you tomorrow.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “Without a doubt, one of the things which keeps us from attaining perfection is our tongue. When one has reached the point of no longer committing faults in speech, he has surely reached perfection, as was said by the Holy Spirit. The worst defect in talking is talking too much. Hence, in speech be brief and virtuous, brief and gentle, brief and simple, brief and charitable, brief and amiable.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
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“Let God be the air in which your heart breathes at ease.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “We must never undervalue any person. The workman loves not that his work should be despised in his presence. Now God is present everywhere, and every person is His work.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “There are many who want me to tell them of secret ways of becoming perfect and I can only tell them that the sole secret is a hearty love of God, and the only way of attaining that love is by loving. You learn to speak by speaking, to study by studying, to run by running, to work by working; and just so you learn to love God and man by loving. Begin as a mere apprentice and the very power of love will lead you on to become a master of the art.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “Never be hurried in anything. Do all things calmly and in a spirit of repose. Do not lose your inward peace even if everything seems to be going wrong. What is anything in life compared to peace of soul?” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
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“Doing little things with a strong desire to please God makes them really great.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “When you encounter difficulties and contradictions, do not try to break them, but bend them with gentleness and time.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “Do not wish to be anything but what you are, and try to be that perfectly.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “Every morning prepare your soul for a tranquil day.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “Where there is peace and meditation, there is neither anxiety nor doubt.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “We have freedom to do good or evil; yet to make choice of evil, is not to use, but to abuse our freedom.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “Let the enemy rage at the gate; let him knock, pound, scream, howl; let him do his worst. We know for certain that he cannot enter our soul except by the door of our consent.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “The highest degree of meekness consists in seeing, serving, honoring, and treating amiably, on occasion, those who are not to our taste, and who show themselves unfriendly, ungrateful, and troublesome to us.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
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“The Lord delights in every little step you take.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “God is present everywhere, and every person is His work.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “It is to those who have the most need of us that we ought to show our love more especially.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “You can attract more bees with a spoonful of sugar than a cupful of vinegar.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “It matters little how one begins, provided that he be resolved to go on well, and to end well.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “Have patience with all things, but chiefly have patience with yourself. Do not lose courage in considering your own imperfections but instantly set about remedying them — every day begin the task anew.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “Oh what remorse we shall feel at the end of our lives, when we look back upon the great number of instructions and examples afforded by God and the Saints for our perfection, and so carelessly received by us! If this end were to come to you today, how would you be pleased with the life you have led this year?” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
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“Do not lose courage in considering your own imperfections.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “For every great temptation, there will be many small ones. Wolves and bears are more dangerous than flies, but we are bothered most by flies.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “Be patient with everyone, but above all with yourself.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales quotes
- “We do not very often come across opportunities for exercising strength, magnanimity, or magnificence; but gentleness, temperance, modesty, and humility, are graces which ought to color everything we do. There may be virtues of a more exalted mold, but… these are the most continually called for in daily life.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “There is no better means of attainment to the spiritual life Than by continually beginning again.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
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“The greatest method of praying is to pray the Rosary.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “The merit of the cross does not consist in its heaviness, but in the manner in which we carry it. I would even say that it is sometimes more virtuous to carry a cross of straw than a heavy cross because we have to be more attentive for fear of losing it.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “To live according to the spirit is to love according to the spirit.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “One single act done with aridity of spirit is worth more than many done with feelings of devotion.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “Fear is a greater evil than evil itself.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “You learn to speak by speaking, to study by studying, to run by running, to work by working; and just so, you learn to love by loving. All those who think to learn in any other way deceive themselves.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
- “Whatever happens, abide steadfast in a determination to cling simply to God.” ~ Saint Francis de Sales
