Notable Quote: What the Church Needs by John Henry Newman

Here is another distinctive quote by this wonderful prose writer.

 

“What we need at present for our Church's well-being, is not invention, nor originality, nor sagacity, nor even learning in our divines, at least in the first place, though all gifts of God are in a measure needed, and never can be unseasonable when used religiously, but we need peculiarly a sound judgment, patient thought, discrimination, a comprehensive mind, an abstinence from all private fancies and caprices and personal tastes,—in a word, Divine Wisdom."

 

In the first main clause he provides a list of negatives (“not, nor, etc.) of what the Church doesn’t need.  Then he pauses with a subordinate clause qualifying those negatives before he gives a second main clause providing a list of what it does need, including an “abstinence” which is another form of negation.  Then he tops it off with a summation, “Divine Wisdom.”  That is just so beautiful.