Adam Clarke Quotations

Now an infinite happiness cannot be purchased by any price less than that which is infinite in value; and infinity of merit can only result from a nature that is infinitely divine or perfect

If you be faithful, you will have that honor that comes from God: his Spirit will say in your hearts, Well done, good and faithful servants.

Prayer requires more of the heart than of the tongue.

Even papists could not see that a moral evil was detained in the soul through its physical connection with the body; and that it required the dissolution of this physical connection before the moral contagion could be removed.

Now it would be as absurd to deny the existence of God, because we cannot see him, as it would be to deny the existence of the air or wind, because we cannot see it.

To be filled with God is a great thing, to be filled with the fullness of God is still greater; to be filled with all the fullness of God is greatest of all.

Matthew being a constant attendant on our Lord, his history is an account of what he saw and heard; and, being influenced by the Holy Spirit, his history is entitled to the utmost degree of credibility.

He who is completely sanctified, or cleansed from all sin, and dies in this state, is fit for glory.

Pride works frequently under a dense mask, and will often assume the garb of humility.

If you go forward in the spirit of the original apostles and followers of Jesus Christ, trusting not in man but in the living God, he will enable you to pull down the strong holds of sin and Satan, and that work by which he is pleased will prosper in your hands.

As preachers of the gospel of Jesus, do not expect worldly honors: these Jesus Christ neither took to himself, nor gave to his disciples.

The Bible is proved to be a revelation from God, by the reasonableness and holiness of its precepts; all its commands, exhortations, and promises having the most direct tendency to make men wise, holy, and happy in themselves, and useful to one another.

This perfection is the restoration of man to the state of holiness from which he fell, by creating him anew in Christ Jesus, and restoring to him that image and likeness of God which he has lost.

To suppose more than one supreme Source of infinite wisdom, power, and all perfections, is to assert that there is no supreme Being in existence.

Few men can be said to have inimitable excellencies: let us watch them in their progress from infancy to manhood, and we shall soon be convinced that what they attained was the necessary consequence of the line they pursued, and the means they used.

Let it ever be remembered that genuine faith in Christ will ever be productive of good works; for this faith worketh by love, as the apostle says, and love to God always produces obedience to his holy laws.

Deeply consider that it is your duty and interest to read the Holy Scriptures.

It is the grace of God, that shows and condemns the sin that humbles us.

The words contained in it were inspired by the Holy Spirit into the minds of faithful men, called Prophets and Seers in the Old Testament; and Evangelists and Apostles in the New.

And hence he must be invisible; for a spirit cannot be seen by the eye of man: nor is there any thing in this principle contradictory to reason or experience.

But this Christ or Redeemer took not upon him the nature of angels, but the seed of Abraham, that is, human nature, that in the nature which sinned he might make the expiation required.

It is to be regretted that few persons who have arrived at any degree of eminence or fame, have written Memorials of themselves, at least such as have embraced their private as well as their public life.

Many talk much, and indeed well, of what Christ has done for us: but how little is spoken of what he is to do in us! and yet all that he has done for us is in reference to what he is to do in us.

As a revelation from God, they have stood the test of many ages; and as such maintained their ground against every species of enemy, and every mode of attack. Truth is mighty, and must prevail.

The Scriptures of the Old and New Testament, said an eminent scholar, have God for their Author, the Salvation of mankind for their end, and Truth without any mixture of error for their matter.

Whether the family of the Clarkes were of Norman extraction cannot be easily ascertained.

Man may be considered as having a twofold origin - natural, which is common and the same to all - patronymic, which belongs to the various families of which the whole human race is composed.

Remember that the word of God is not sent to particular persons, as if by name; and do not think you have no part in it, because you are not named there.

However, all gifts seem now to be absorbed in one and a man must be either a Preacher or nothing.

When you read, consider that it is Gods Word which you read; and that his faithfulness is pledged to fulfill both its promises and threatenings.

His soul was created in the image of God, i.e., in righteousness and true holiness: and his body was formed out of the dust of the ground.

It is strictly and philosophically true in Nature and reason that there is no such thing as chance or accident; it being evident that these words do not signify anything really existing, anything that is truly an agent or the cause of any event; but they signify merely men's ignorance of the real an immediate cause.

I have lived to know that the secret of happiness is never to allow your energies to stagnate.

Death to a good man is but passing through a dark entry, out of one little dusky room of his Father's house into another that is fair and large, lightsome and glorious, and divinely entertaining.

Multitudes of words are neither an argument of clear ideas in the writer, nor a proper means of conveying clear notions to the reader.

There is no such thing as chance or accident; the words merely signify our ignorance of some real and immediate cause.

They who pray not, know nothing of God, and know nothing of the state of their own souls.

Verse 11. (They presented unto Him gifts). The people of the east never approach the presence of kings and great personages, without a present in their hands. The custom is often noticed in the Old Testament, and still prevails in the east, and in some of the newly discovered South Sea Islands.

We communicate happiness to others not often by great acts of devotion and self-sacrifice, but by the absence of fault-finding and censure, by being ready to sympathize with their notions and feelings, instead of forcing them to sympathize with ours.

Prayer is not designed to inform God, but to give man a sight of his misery; to humble man's heart, to excite his desire, to inflame his faith, to animate his hope, to raise his soul from earth to heaven...

All abuse and waste of God's creatures are spoil and robbery on the property of the Creator.

This is the case with thousands: they appear desirous of knowing the truth, but have not patience to wait in a proper way to receive an answer to their question.

Woe to that man who runs when God has not sent him; and woe to him who refuses to run, or who ceases to run, when God has sent him.

The grand obstacle to the salvation of the scribes and Pharisees was their pride, vanity and self-love. They lived on each other's praise. If they had acknowledged Christ as the only good teacher, they must have given up the good opinion of the multitude; and they chose rather to lose their souls than to forfeit their reputation among men!

The same sun that hardens the clay softens the wax.