John of Kronstadt

"Mercy is to love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, to those who assault you, to those who persecute you, to protect the persecuted, and so on."

"The name of the Savior, invoked with faith, works miracles, casts out demons, extinguishes passions, and heals diseases."

"A neighbor is a being equal to me, the same human as I, the very image of God."

"At night, our soul is free from worldly vanity, and therefore the spiritual world can freely act upon it, and it can freely accept its impressions."

"One of the most powerful deceits of the devil is the weakening of the heart with laziness, and with it, all spiritual and physical forces; faith, hope, and love dry up in the heart, and you become faithless, despondent, and insensible to God and to people—like salt that has lost its savor."

"Orthodox Christians are like a family, the children of Yessou Christ, and in a good family, the mother is always highly respected (the Mother of God), just as older brothers are respected and honored by the younger ones, and these latter imitate the former."

"Often, prayer is called something that is not prayer at all: a person went to church, stood there, looked at the icons, or first at the people, at their faces, their outfits, and says: I prayed to God; stood at home in front of an icon, nodded his head, said memorized words without understanding or sympathy, and says: I prayed to God."

"The Orthodox Church with its divine service educates us to be citizens of heaven by teaching us every virtue, which is exemplified by the life of the Mother of God and all the saints, and by cleansing, sanctifying, and deifying us in the sacraments."

"Pride is a demon; malice is the same demon; envy is the same demon; lewd filth is the same demon; forced blasphemy is the same demon; forced doubt in the truth is a demon; despondency is a demon; there are various passions, but in all of them one Satan acts; various passions, but together they are the barking of Satan in various ways, and a person becomes one, one spirit with Satan."

"A person subject to passions, what do you need? Life, you say. Why are you striving? For life. But are you living a true life? Reason and experience compel me to say no. So, what constitutes your life? Faith, hope, and love—reason and experience tell me. The life of our soul is God, a living faith in Him, and love for Him, love for people like me—they are the peace and breadth of my heart, without them I am a martyr of sin, a slave, a captive of passions; my life passes in sorrow and distress."

"A priest, as a physician of souls, must himself be free from soul ailments, i.e., from passions, in order to heal others."

"Praying without sincere feeling is hypocrisy."

"The rays from our Sun reach the Earth in eight minutes."

"The ringing of bells is a call to a conversation with God, a call of children to the Father, a call to appear before Him."

"Respect yourself as the image of God."

"To repent means to feel in your heart the falsehood, madness, and guilt of your sins—it means to realize that you have offended your Creator, Lord, Father, and Benefactor, who is infinitely holy and infinitely disgusted by sin—it means to desire with all your soul to correct and atone for them."

"Reason is the servant of the heart."

"Sins are secret snakes gnawing at the heart of a person and his entire being; they give him no peace, incessantly sucking his heart; sins are sharp thorns constantly piercing the soul; sins are spiritual darkness."

"To sin is a great disadvantage and madness."

"A state or any society is a body."

"The science of sciences is to conquer the sin that lives in us."

"Superficial prayer is hypocrisy, blasphemy, vain prayer."

"Send your petition to God or the saints by the telegraph of faith, and you will immediately receive an answer."

"The soul is a house, passions are fire."

"The soul of the first person is from God, and from Him are all the souls of subsequent people; all are the breath of His Divine Spirit."

"The soul of animals, upon separation from the body, evaporates like vapor, for it is not fastened with the higher, powerful cement of the spirit, which animals do not have."

"Sorrows are a great teacher."

"Sweets, money—are worse than ordinary dust, sweepings, because they clutter the soul, while ordinary sweepings only clutter the body, clothing, or a room."

"Word is the expression of truth, the very truth, being, action."

"Thought in God corresponds to the Father, words to the Son, and deeds to the Holy Spirit, who completes everything."

"Theater and church are opposites. The former is a temple of the world, and the latter is a temple of God; the former is a shrine of the devil, and the latter is a temple of the Lord."

"Theater puts Christian life to sleep, destroys it, giving Christian life the character of pagan life."

"Theater is the adversary of Christian life; it is the offspring of the spirit of this world, and not of the Spirit of God. True children of the Church do not attend it."

"To spend the entire day in a perfectly holy, peaceful, and sinless manner, the only means is the most sincere, fervent prayer in the morning after waking from sleep. It will bring Yessou with the Father and the Holy Spirit into our heart and thus give strength and fortitude to the soul against the attacks of evil; one just needs to guard one's heart."

"The uneducated are infants in Christ, to whom the Lord sometimes reveals His secrets."

"What is our life? The burning of a candle: it is only necessary for the One who gave it to blow—and it is extinguished. What is our life? The journey of a traveler: he has reached a certain limit—the gates are opened for him, he abandons his traveler's clothing (the body) and staff and enters his house. What is our life? A long, bloody war for the possession of a true homeland and for true freedom. The war is over—you are a victor or a vanquished, you are recalled from the place of struggle to the place of recompense, and you receive from the Rewarder either eternal reward, eternal glory, or eternal punishment, eternal shame."

"The world is in a state of slumber, a sinful sleep. God awakens it with wars, plagues, fires, destructive storms, earthquakes, floods, and crop failures."

"Whatever passions the enemies fight you with, endure without despondency, without bitterness, with meekness and humility, and do not let the movements of impatience, malice, murmuring, and blasphemy into your heart."

"The world is a mirror of God’s goodness, reason, wisdom, and power."

"The youth of the 19th century, in its second half, is characterized by self-worship, self-legislation (autonomy), materialism in life, and spiritual skepticism (unbelief)."