More Islip Collyer
December 12, 1999
Dear Friends:
A few weeks ago, I started sharing some of my favorite quotes from Islip Collyer’s book, Conviction and Conduct. Here are a few more gems to get you started on a great week.
On Self Examination
“This work is necessarily an individual matter, and herein lies the difficulty. A man is his own accuser, his own defender, and his own judge. With the most complete facilities for knowing the full measure of his guilt, he unites a most unjudicial bias in favor of the accused. He perhaps possesses all the knowledge necessary to draw up an unanswerable indictment; but his talent is mainly employed to find extenuating circumstances. He has all the skills of a defending counsel to raise a false issue, but lacks the impartiality of a judge to expose the pretense.”
On Feigned Purity
“Close observers of mankind always feel rather suspicious of those who make a profession of superhuman purity. When frail human nature pretends to have grown more refined than God originally made it, we generally find that the profession is a mere cloak to cover exceptional depravity. Those who have been most successful in subduing the flesh have always been the most honest in describing it.”
On Intents
“We shall not have the praise of God simply for good thoughts which we have instantly dismissed, neither shall we be condemned for evil thoughts, which we have instantly repudiated. But a solid intention to perform a good work is counted for well doing, even though circumstances should prevent the consummation; and, on the other hand, a deliberate harbouring of evil thoughts is counted for sin, even though lack of opportunity prevents the sinful act.”
On Motives
“It is possible for even the noblest work to be spoiled by an improper motive at the foundation. We have no right to judge the motives of others, but it is a duty to judge our own.”
On Joy
“The most genuine joy is to be found among the servants of God, and the most complete misery and discontent is to be found among the most thorough servants of sin.”
On Suffering
“…the whole history of mankind does not constitute a fraction of eternity. The realisation of this fact helps us to see something of God’s point of view, and we can understand why that which seems like the most awful suffering to us can be described as a ‘light affliction which endureth but for a moment.’”
On Our Thoughts
“Every deliberate act is the outcome of deliberate thought, and it therefore follows that control of thought must be the mainspring of every virtue right up to that bridling of the tongue which is placed by an apostle as the supreme test of a man.”
Have a great week!
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