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[St. Anthony said] that it was more fitting for young men to hold to the ascetic life with zeal and not to seek things that enervate the body, but rather to accustom it to labors, bearing in mind the apostle's words, "When I am weak, then I am strong." For he used to say that the nous of the soul is strong when the pleasures of the body are weak....

For a man's whole life is very short when measured by the ages to come; all our time is nothing compared to eternal life. In the world everything is sold at its value and an item is exchanged for its equivalent, but the promise of eternal life is bought for a trifle....

St. Athanasius the Great of Alexandria, Saint Anthony the Great, trans. Saint Anthony’s Greek Orthodox Monastery (Florence, AZ: Saint Anthony’s Greek Orthodox Monastery Press, 2019), 12, 21.

Be it an infallible church, Book or Doctrine, all these assume that there is a spot in the world which is not fallen and thus exempt from sinfulness. But the only part of the world free from Sin and its positive correlative is Christ Jesus… and He alone is the ultimate authority....

Bonhoeffer, Dietrich. London, 1933-1935. Translated by Keith W. Clements. Vol. 13, Dietrich Bonhoeffer Works. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2007.

The quote is from student notes on a lecture Bonhoeffer gave on Karl Barth’s theology. I encountered it in Wartick, J.W. "Bonhoeffer on an infallible (or inerrant) church, book, or doctrine." Reconstructing Faith blog. July 29, 2024. Retrieved from https://jwwartick.com/2024/07/29/bonhoeffer-infallible/.

Christ is the only exit from this world; all other exits—sexual rapture, political utopia, economic independence—are but blind alleys in which rot the corpses of the many that have tried them.

Fr. Seraphim Rose, journal entry dated February 3, 1961. From Hieromonk Damascene, Father Seraphim Rose: His Life and Works (St. Herman of Alaska Brotherhood, 2003), 95.

The saint of God[, St. Agathon,] constantly and strictly attended to himself and said that without intense self-examination, no person can achieve success. This is the path to salvation. The saints of God, who constantly examined themselves, constantly found within themselves new failing, and once they found them, they plunged ever deeper into repentance that purified them and prepared them for heaven. On the contrary, evil inattentiveness and busyness are always connected with a profound ignorance concerning oneself; not surprisingly, such self-ignorance is always very self-satisfied and proud of itself. "Many delude themselves," said Blessed Theophylact, "with vain hope, thinking that they will receive the kingdom of heaven, and they in advance add themselves to the ranks of those who rose up because of their virtue, imagining great things about themselves.... Many are called, because God calls many, even all, but there are few chosen, few who are saved, few who are worthy of being chosen by God. To call is God's work, but to be chosen is ours: the Jews were called, but were not chosen, for they were not obedient to the One Who called.

St. Arsenius, who was great among monks, during the entire course of his life, whenever he did manual labor, put a kerchief on his knees because of the amount of tears that fell from his eyes. He died. Abba Pœmen, a father who was gifted with unusually profound spiritual discernment, said upon hearing of this man's death, "You are blessed, Arsenius, for you wept for yourself during this life. Whoever does not weep for himself here will weep eternally. It is impossible to run away from weeping. Either you weep here willingly, or you will weep there unwillingly, in tortures." Hearing of this death, Patriarch Theophilus of Alexandria said, "Blessed are you, Abba Arsenius! You constantly remembered the hour of your own death."

St. Ignatius Brianchaninov, "A Homily on Death" in The Threshold: Trials at the Crossroads of Eternity, trans. Nicholas Kotar, The Collected Works of St Ignatius (Brianchaninov), vol. 3 (Jordanville: Holy Trinity Publications, 2023), 88.