30 phrases of Saint Thomas Aquinas that talk about faith and reason

Humility is the first step to wisdom.

The one who teaches does not cause the truth, but causes the student to know the truth. The propositions that are taught are true before they are known, because the truth does not depend on our science, but on the existence of things.

An individual, living in society, constitutes in a certain way a part or a member of that society. Therefore, whoever does something for the good or ill of one of its members thus affects the whole of society.

The scholar is the one who takes to others what he has understood: the truth.

Show yourself too intimate to no one, for excessive familiarity breeds contempt.

Give me, Lord, keenness to understand, ability to retain, method and faculty to learn, subtlety to interpret, grace and abundance to speak.

A good intention does not justify doing something wrong.

No man truly possesses joy unless he lives in love.

Just as Christ accepted bodily death to give us spiritual life, so he also endured temporal poverty to give us spiritual riches.

Not opposing error is approving it, not defending the truth is denying it.

Pay attention not to who says, but what good is said and keep it in memory.

Truth is the adequacy between the thing and the intellect.

I pray to God as if I expected everything from Him, but I work as if He expected everything from me.

If a captain’s main goal was to preserve his boat, he would keep it in port forever.

Love is the loved one’s desire for eternity.

A friend is better than honor, and a loved one is better than being honored.

Three things are necessary for man’s salvation: to know what to believe, to know what to desire, to know what to do.

Whoever tells the truth, loses friendships.

Each and every real thing possesses the truth of its nature insofar as it imitates the knowledge of God.

Inordinate self-love is the cause of all sins.

Playing is necessary for human life.

Humility makes man capable of God.

Keep away from me the double obscurity in which I was born: sin and ignorance.

Where true friendship is, there is the same wanting and the same not wanting, the more pleasant the more sincere.

Give me, Lord, right when I begin, direction when I progress, and perfection when I finish.

Beauty is the mark of what is well done, be it a universe or an object.

Envy is a sadness for the glory of another.

There is nothing in the intellect that has not previously passed through the senses.

The most specific act of the fortress, rather than attacking, is to bear, that is, to remain immobile in the face of danger.

Beware of the one-book man.