Matthew Simpson Quotations

We ourselves can die with comfort and even with joy if we know that death is but a passport to blessedness, that this intellect, freed from all material chains, shall rise and shine.

Angels are spirits, flames of fire; they are higher than man, they have wider connections.

We know the past and its great events, the present in its multitudinous complications, chiefly through faith in the testimony of others.

Not in purity or in holiness merely, for in Paradise man was holy, and he shall be holy when redeemed through the sacrifice of Christ and made an heir of heaven.

If you live for pleasure, your ability to enjoy it may pass away and your senses grow dim.

Washington and the elder Napoleon. Both were brave men; both were true men; both loved their country and dared to expose their lives for their country's cause.

If, then, knowledge be power, how much more power to we gain through the agency of faith, and what elevation must it give to human character.

If you live for any joy on earth, you may be forsaken; but, oh, live for Jesus, and he will never forsake you!

Another principle is, the deepest affections of our hearts gather around some human form in which are incarnated the living thoughts and ideas of the passing age.

Human nature is the same now as when Adam hid from the presence of God; the consciousness of wrong makes us unwilling to meet those whom we have offended.

There is a contest old as Eden, which still goes on - the conflict between right and wrong, between error and truth. In this conflict every human being has a part.

If an honest man is the noblest work of God, then Mr. Lincoln's title to high nobility is clear and unquestioned.

If you live for your children, they may be smitten down and leave you desolate, or, what is far worse, they may desert you and leave you worse than childless in a cold and unfeeling world.

I do not purpose to discuss faith in its dogmatic sense today.

If I know that I shall be as an angel, and more; if I shall behold all God has made; if he shall own me for his son and exalt me to honor in his presence, I shall not fear to die, nor shall I dread the grave where Christ once lay.

Mr. Lincoln's elevation shows that in America every station in life may be honorable; that there is no barrier against the humblest; but that merit, wherever it exists, has the opportunity to be known.

Passing into practical life, illustrations of this fact are found everywhere; the distant, or the unseen, steadies and strengthens us against the rapid whirl of things around us.

We shall see our friends again. We can lay them in the grave; we know they are safe with God.

It is a principle of our nature that feelings once excited turn readily from the object by which they are excited to some other object which may for the time being take possession of the mind.

The realm of immediate or personal knowledge is a narrow circle in which these bodies move; the realm of knowledge derived through faith is as wide as the universe, and old as eternity.

Nor was it only from the millions of slaves that chains had been removed; the whole nation had been in bondage; free speech had been suppressed.

If you live for fame, men may turn against you.

If, then, faith widens the connections, it elevates the man.

Man wants to be reconciled to God; wants to know that the past is forgiven.

It is my title to a place in heaven; and there, when earth shall have passed and its events shall have closed, I shall have a home forever.

We are assured, however, in Scripture that though the forces against us may be many, they that be for us are more than they that be against us.

Of history, how little do we know by personal contact; we have lived a few years, seen a few men, witnessed some important events; but what are these in the whole sum of the world's past.

Sanctification is not regeneration.

The name of Abraham Lincoln is imperishable.

I rejoice that the reign of Christ is such, while it thrills the soul with emotions, and opens before the highest intellect the most ooundless conceptions, we are left at the same time ready, though our hearts be thrilled, to have our hands filled for deeds of benevolence and love. The happiest moments may be the busiest moments.

Wherever public worship has been established and regularly aintained, idolatry has vanished from the face of the earth. There is not now a temple to a heathen god where the word of God is read.

Wherever God's word is circulated, it stirs the hearts of the people, it prepares for public morals. Circulate that word, and you find the tone of morals immediately changed. It is God peaking to man.

The temptations to wrong are many; they spring out of a corrupt nature.

Glory to God in highest heaven, Who unto man His Son hath given; While angels sing with tender mirth, A glad new year to all the earth. Martin Luther If this is to be a Happy New Year, a year of usefulness, a year in which we shall live to make this earth better, it is because God will direct our pathway. How important then, to feel our dependence upon Him!

Taking it in its wider and generic application, I understand faith to be the supplement of sense; or, to change the phrase, all knowledge which comes not to us through our senses we gain by faith in others.

Napoleon was probably the equal at least of Washington in intellect, his superior in education. Both of them were successful in serving the state.

His throne is the pulpit. He stands in Christ's stead. His message is the Word of God. Around him are immortal souls. The Savior, unseen, is beside him. The Holy Spirit broods over the congregation. Angels gaze upon the scene, and heaven and hell await the issue. What associations and what vast responsibility!

If we look at the realm of knowledge, how exceedingly small and limited is that part acquired through our own senses; how wide is that we gain from other sources.