Top 60 Saint Basil Quotes (2025 Update)

1. “He who plants kindness gathers love.”

— Saint Basil

2. “They who sow courtesy reap friendship, and they who plant kindness gather love.”

— Saint Basil

3. “As the pilot of a vessel is tried in the storm; as the wrestler is tried in the ring, the soldier in the battle, and the hero in adversity: so is the Christian tried in temptation.”

— Saint Basil

4. “When you have become God’s in the measure he desires, then he himself will bestow you upon others; unless, to your greater glory, he chooses to keep you all to himself.”

— Saint Basil

5. “Every divine action begins from the Father, proceeds through the Son, and is completed in the Holy Spirit.”

— Saint Basil

6. “Many a man curses the rain that falls upon his head, and knows not that it brings abundance to drive away the hunger.”

— Saint Basil

7. “There is still time for endurance, time for patience, time for healing, time for change. Have you slipped? Rise up. Have you sinned? Cease. Do not stand among sinners, but leap aside.”

— Saint Basil

8. “It is not he who begins well who is perfect. It is he who ends well who is approved in God’s sight.”

— Saint Basil

9. “All of us who desire the kingdom of God are, by the Lord’s decree, under an equal and rigorous necessity of seeking after the grace of Baptism.”

— Saint Basil

10. “Just as a very little fresh water is blown away by a storm of wind and dust, in like manner the good deeds, that we think we do in this life, are overwhelmed by the multitude of evils.”

— Saint Basil

11. “We glorify the Holy Ghost together with the Father and the Son, from the conviction that He is not separated from the Divine Nature; for that which is foreign by nature does not share in the same honors.”

— Saint Basil

12. “Drunkenness, the ruin of reason, the destruction of strength, premature old age, momentary death.”

— Saint Basil

13. “If someone has repented once of a sin, and again does the same sin, this is a sign that he has not been cleansed of the causes of the sin, wherefrom, as from a root, the shoots spring forth again.”

— Saint Basil

14. “As it is impossible to verbally describe the sweetness of honey to one who has never tasted honey, so the goodness of God cannot be clearly communicated by way of teaching if we ourselves are not able to penetrate into the goodness of the Lord by our own experience.”

— Saint Basil

15. “The bread you store up belongs to the hungry; the cloak that lies in your chest belongs to the naked; the gold you have hidden in the ground belongs to the poor.”

— Saint Basil

16. “A woman who deliberately destroys a fetus is answerable for murder. And any fine distinction as to its being completely formed or unformed is not admissible amongst us.”

— Saint Basil

17. “The human being is an animal who has received the vocation to become God.”

— Saint Basil

18. “Let sleep itself be an exercise in piety, for such as our life and conduct have been, so also of necessity will be our dreams.”

— Saint Basil

19. “What is the mark of love for your neighbor? Not to seek what is for your own benefit, but what is for the benefit of the one loved, both in body and in soul.”

— Saint Basil

20. “Therefore, let God inspired Scripture decide between us; and on whichever side be found doctrines in harmony with the Word of God, in favor of that side will be cast the vote of truth.”

— Saint Basil

21. “If every man took only what was sufficient for his needs, leaving the rest to those in want, there would be no rich and no poor.”

— Saint Basil

22. “He who sows courtesy reaps friendship.”

— Saint Basil

23. “We must always be on guard lest, under the pretext of keeping one commandment, we be found breaking another.”

— Saint Basil

24. “It is right to submit to a higher authority whenever a command of God would be violated.”

— Saint Basil

25. “We should not accept in silence the benefactions of God, but return thanks for them.”

— Saint Basil

26. “If you begin to guard wealth it will not be yours. But if you begin to distribute it, you will not lose it.”

— Saint Basil

27. “You can see that a city is prosperous by the wealth of goods for sale in the market. Land too we call prosperous if it bears rich fruit. And so also the soul may be counted prosperous if it is full of good works of every kind.”

— Saint Basil

28. “All who call the Holy Ghost a creature we pity, on the ground that, by this utterance, they are falling into the unpardonable sin of blasphemy against Him.”

— Saint Basil

29. “Whatever requires an undue amount of thought or trouble or involves a large expenditure of effort and causes our whole life to revolve, as it were, around solicitude for the flesh must be avoided by Christians.”

— Saint Basil

30. “If everyone would take only according to his needs and would leave the surplus to the needy, no one would be rich, no one poor, no one in misery.”

— Saint Basil

31. “Lust hath these three companions: the first, blindness of understanding; the second, hardness of heart; the third, want of grace.”

— Saint Basil

32. “In the very nature of every human being has been sown the seed of the ability to love. You and I ought to welcome this seed, cultivate it carefully, nourish it attentively and foster its growth by going to the school of God’s commandments with help of His grace.”

— Saint Basil

33. “To lovers of the truth, nothing can be put before God and hope in Him.”

— Saint Basil

34. “Strive to attain to the greater virtues, but do not neglect the lesser ones. Do not make light of a fall even if it be the most venial of faults; rather, be quick to repair it by repentance, although many others may commit a large number of faults, slight and grievous, and remain unrepentant.”

— Saint Basil

35. “I cannot persuade myself that without love to others, and without, as far as rests with me, peaceableness toward all, I can be called a worthy servant of Jesus Christ.”

— Saint Basil

36. “Resolve to treat the things in your possession as belonging to others.”

— Saint Basil

37. “We do not accost a physician as we do any mere nobody; nor a magistrate as we do a private individual. We try to get some advantage from the skill of the one and the position of the other. Walk in the sun, and your shadow will follow you, whether you will or not.”

— Saint Basil

38. “We should even go beyond doing what is required in order to avoid scandal.”

— Saint Basil

39. “First and foremost, the monk should own nothing in this world, but he should have as his possessions solitude of the body, modesty of bearing, a modulated tone of voice, and a well-ordered manner of speech. He should be without anxiety as to his food and drink, and should eat in silence.”

— Saint Basil

40. “O sinner, be not discouraged, but have recourse to Mary in all you necessities. Call her to your assistance, for such is the divine Will that she should help in every kind of necessity.”

— Saint Basil

41. “When someone steals a person’s clothes, we call him a thief. Should we not also give the same name to the one who could clothe the naked but does not?”

— Saint Basil

42. “We need not only read Sacred Scripture, but learn it as well and grow up in it. Realize that nothing is written in Scripture unnecessarily. Not to read Sacred Scripture is a great evil.”

— Saint Basil

43. “Beside each believer stands an Angel as protector and shepherd, leading him to life.”

— Saint Basil

44. “The sun penetrates crystal and makes it more dazzling. In the same way, the sanctifying Spirit indwells in souls and makes them more radiant. They become like so many powerhouses beaming grace and love around them.”

— Saint Basil

45. “If, therefore, there is any grace in the water, it is not from the nature of water but from the Spirit’s presence there.”

— Saint Basil

46. “The bread which you use is the bread of the hungry; the garment hanging in your wardrobe is the garment of him who is naked; the shoes you do not wear are the shoes of the one who is barefoot; the acts of charity that you do not perform are so many injustices that you commit.”

— Saint Basil

47. “Every evil is a sickness of soul, but virtue offers the cause of its health.”

— Saint Basil

48. “He who is guilty of unseemliness with males will be under discipline for the same time as adulterers.”

— Saint Basil

49. “Troubles are usually the brooms and shovels that smooth the road to a good man’s fortune.”

— Saint Basil

50. “Science which is acquired unwillingly, soon disappears; that which is instilled into the mind in a pleasant and agreeable manner, is more lasting.”

— Saint Basil