“If men do not comprehend the character of God, they do not comprehend themselves.”
Joseph Smith, King Follett Discourse, (Willard Richard’s account), in
The Words of Joseph Smith, 340.
“Thy mind, O Man, if thou wilt lead a soul unto salvation, must stretch as high as the utmost Heavens, and search into and contemplate the …darkest abyss and the broad expanse [of eternity]…”
Joseph Smith, letter from Liberty Jail, in John Welch, BYU Studies 50, no, 3 (2011),66.
“We can make our minds so like still waters, that beings gather about us that they may see, it may be, their own images. And so live for a moment with a clearer, perhaps even with a fiercer life because of our quiet.”
William Butler Yeats
“At some level we want to know that what we do matters…We all want to be judged. We want to be taken seriously as moral creatures…I am convinced that every human being has an existential need for significance…We have this need for significance. We do incredible things. We go into medical research, we write books, we invent new patents to know we matter. We also do terrible things. People try to assassinate the president and commit other heinous crimes, just to know they have an impact on the world. Religion teaches that God cares about what you do.”
Rabbi Harold Kushner, speech at BYU, in BYU Magazine, February 1995, 22-29.
Genesis 9:13 “I do set my bow in the cloud, and it shall be for a token of a covenant between me and the earth.”
John 10:16 “And other sheep I have, which are not of this fold: them also I must bring, and they shall hear my voice; and there shall be one fold, and one shepherd.”
Abraham 2:12 “…Thy servant has sought thee earnestly; now I have found thee.”
D&C 93:36 “The glory of God is intelligence, or, in other words, light and truth.”
Mark 12:20 “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy MIND, and with all thy strength: this is the first commandment.”
Proverbs 16:22 “Understanding is a wellspring of life unto him that hath it…”
Proverbs 15:14 “The heart of him that hath understanding seeketh knowledge.”
3 Nephi 15:18 “And now, because of stiff-neckedness and unbelief they understood not my word; therefore I was commanded to say no more…”
3Nephi 19:33 “…and their hearts were open and they did understand in their hearts the words which he prayed…”
Proverbs 9:10 “…the knowledge of the holy is understanding.”
Hebrews 8:8,10 “…Behold the days come, saith the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah…I will put my laws into their mind, and write them in their hearts: and I will be to them a God, and they shall be to me a people.”