quotations about forgiveness
For there are two kinds of forgiveness in the world: the one you practice because everything really is all right, and what went before is mended. The other kind of forgiveness you practice because someone needs desperately to be forgiven, or because you need just as badly to forgive them, for a heart can grab hold of old wounds and go sour as milk over them.
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE
The Fairyland Series
But remember that forgiveness too is a power. To beg for it is a power, and to withhold or bestow it is a power, perhaps the greatest.
MARGARET ATWOOD
The Handmaid's Tale
I know forgiveness is a man's duty, but, to my thinking, that can only mean as you're to give up all thoughts o' taking revenge: it can never mean as you're t' have your old feelings back again, for that's not possible.
GEORGE ELIOT
Adam Bede
He who forgives readily only invites offense.
PIERRE CORNEILLE
Cinna
He that cannot forgive others breaks the bridge over which he must pass himself; for every man had need to be forgiven.
LORD HERBERT
The Life of Edward Lord Herbert of Cherbury
Forgiveness is the only way to reverse the irreversible flow of history.
HANNAH ARENDT
attributed, Aspects of Love: An Exploration of 1 Corinthians 13
Forgiveness is like catching a little fish. You reel it in, and you make a decision to keep it or let it go. With the little ones, you take the hook out of its mouth and throw it back in. The scar from the hook doesn't go away and the fish ought to remember not to repeat the mistake. But the fish is back in the creek and free to do whatever fish do. The purpose of forgiveness is freedom, like being thrown back into the creek.
DAVID RYDER
The Hound of Tooty River
Forgiveness is a gift we give ourselves that allows us to get on with our lives instead of being trapped in the past by resentment.
RICK WARREN
Ladies Home Journal, Dec. 2008
Forgive us our sins, for we also forgive everyone who sins against us.
JESUS
Luke 11:4
Willingness to forgive frees the soul to laugh and cry and be The Beloved.
GITA BELLIN
The Flourishing Mind
When you forgive, you love. And when you love, God's light shines upon you.
JON KRAKAUER
Into the Wild
When our anger turns to bitterness it becomes like a weed in the garden of our heart. If we pull the weeds, our garden can stay healthy and alive. But if we allow bitter weeds to grow, eventually our garden becomes ugly and weeds choke the life out of the vegetables in our garden. Forgiveness is like pulling out the weeds.
MICHAEL E. MCCULLOUGH
To Forgive Is Human: How to Put Your Past in the Past
There is an ugly kind of forgiveness in this world--a kind of hedgehog forgiveness, shot out like quills.
HENRY WARD BEECHER
Proverbs from Plymouth Pulpit
There comes a day when, for someone who has persecuted us, we feel only indifference, a weariness at his stupidity. Then we forgive him.
CESARE PAVESE
This Business of Living
The willingness to forgive is a sign of spiritual and emotional maturity. It is one of the great virtues to which we all should aspire. Imagine a world filled with individuals willing both to apologize and to accept an apology. Is there any problem that could not be solved among people who possessed the humility and largeness of spirit and soul to do either -- or both -- when needed?
GORDON B. HINCKLEY
Standing for Something
The truth is, unless you let go, unless you forgive yourself, unless you forgive the situation, unless you realize that the situation is over, you cannot move forward.
STEVE MARABOLI
Unapologetically You
The offender never pardons.
GEORGE HERBERT
Jacula Prudentum
Surely it is much more generous to forgive and remember, than to forgive and forget.
MARIA EDGEWORTH
"An Essay on the Noble Science of Self-Justification", Tales and Novels
Peter came to Jesus and asked, "Lord, how many times shall I forgive my brother when he sins against me? Up to seven times?" Jesus answered, "I tell you, not seven times, but seventy-seven times (or seventy times seven)."
JESUS
Matthew 18:21
Never forgive an injury or an insult so long as the offending parties have it in their power to make reparation; since, if they are able to do so, and will not, whatever they may pretend to others, they, up to that time, are only laughing at you, and triumphing in secret. If, however, they have not the power to neutralize an impertinence by explanation, or a fraud by restitution, forgive and forget either--as soon as you can.
CHARLES WILLIAM DAY
The Maxims