quotations about zeal
Zeal is very blind, or badly regulated, when it encroaches upon the rights of others.
PASQUIER QUESNEL
attributed, A Dictionary of Thoughts
There is no pestilence in a state like a zeal for religion, independent of morality.
JEREMY BENTHAM
The Works of Jeremy Bentham
To disarm a zealot, teach him truth by precept, and mildness by example.
AL-KENDI
attributed, Day's Collacon
True zeal is connected with a holy life. It is remarkable how often the greatest zealots for God, the Church, and sound doctrine (as they regard it), have been unholy and even immoral in their lives.
CHARLES HODGE
Princeton Sermons: Outlines of Discourses, Doctrinal and Practical
Nothing hath wrought more prejudice to religion, or brought more disparagement upon truth, than boisterous and unseasonable zeal.
ISAAC BARROW
attributed, Day's Collacon
Blindfolded zeal can only do harm.
LICHTWER
attributed, Day's Collacon
Zeal is charismatic, and it is hard to not wish these individuals success.
JOSEPH NICOLLS
"A Local Battle For The Radical Soul", The Stanford Review, January 21, 2016
When you are laboring for others, let it be with the same zeal as if it were for yourself.
CONFUCIUS
attributed, Pebbles, Pearls and Gems of the Orient
Zeal is twin-brother to faith.
A. C. URCEUS
attributed, Day's Collacon
Undeniably bad examples of zeal ... do not establish that all zeal is bad, but only that not all zeal is good--which is not in dispute.
DAVID A. HORNER & DAVID R. TURNER
"Zeal", Being Good: Christian Virtues for Everyday Life
Zeal is accompanied with the direct sanction of Heaven. O Christian! it is thy God, that says -- 'Be zealous' -- all Nature repeats the sound, all Nature rebukes thy negligence.
JOSEPH HUGHES
Christian Zeal: A Sermon
False zeal is every day bringing true zeal into disrepute.
CHARLES TOMLINSON
Essays Old and New
We want to be sure that our zeal is for the right purpose.
DARRELL PINKERTON
"Lamp Unto Our Feet", The Pike County News Watchman, January 4, 2016
But the most general excess which runs, so to speak, in the blood of Christian ethics, arises from the overflow of zeal without knowledge, at one time boiling over in floods of the most savage intolerance, at another ossified into the rigid features of the most unrelenting bigotry. This is an evil which springs naturally from the connexion of morality with religion; and it is an evil of so enormous a magnitude that it seems in some sort to supply an excuse for those inadequate ethical systems of recent growth which take no cognisance of the reverential and devout instincts of human nature, and, after the model of Aristotle, would build up an architecture of Ethics without piety.
JOHN STUART BLACKIE
Four Phases of Morals
True zeal is a heavenly flame.
W. YATES
attributed, Day's Collacon
May we not say, that true zeal is not mostly charitable, but wholly so? That is, if we take charity in St. Paul's sense, for love; the love of God and our neighbour. For it is a certain truth, (although little understood in the world), that Christian zeal is all love. It is nothing else.
JOHN WESLEY
Sermons on Several Occasions
It would seem that zeal is not an effect of love. For zeal is a beginning of contention.
THOMAS AQUINAS
Summa Theologica
Too much zeal spoils all.
DIOCLETIAN
attributed, Day's Collacon
Zeal in the service of God is no miraculous gift, no extraordinary prerogative of some peculiar favorite of heaven, but the natural and inseparable property of a will-confirmed habit of holiness.
R. LUCAS
attributed, Day's Collacon
Zeal is an ardent and vehement love, it requires guidance; otherwise it can become excessive.
SAINT FRANCIS DE SALES
Treatise on the Love of God