Saint Francis de Sales (1567–1622) was a venerated Roman Catholic priest, best known as a leader of the Counter-Reformation. This patron saint of writers and journalists (his feast day is January 24) was a Bishop of Geneva (1602–22.) The Salesian order (founded in 1859) is named in his honor.
De Sales was born to an aristocratic family of the Duchy of Savoy (composing regions of today’s Italy, France, and Switzerland.) After studying law, he decided to pursue his sense of call to a priestly vocation, much to the disappointment of his ambitious father who wanted him to engage in a political career.
At age 35, de Sales was appointed the Catholic Bishop of Geneva, just as religious divisions spread across Europe following the Protestant Reformation. Specifically, Geneva and the surrounding cantons were deeply influenced by the French theologian John Calvin. De Sales reputedly won over half of the region’s Calvinists back to Roman Catholicism through his deep faith, gentle nature, and the eloquence of his writings. His two most influential works are Introduction to the Devout Life (1609) and Treatise on the Love of God (1616.)
In Introduction to a Devout Life, de Sales challenged the contemporaneous belief that only those who withdrew from society to pursue a religious calling could realize a spiritual union with God. He declared that it could also be achieved by people busy with the ordinary affairs of the world: “It is an error, or rather a heresy, to say devotion is incompatible with the life of a soldier, a tradesman, a prince, or a married woman … . It has happened that many have lost perfection in the desert who had preserved it in the world.”
De Sales described the spiritual life as one of perpetual growth and transformation. In Introduction to a Devout Life he advises, “We must not be disturbed at our imperfections since for us perfection consists in fighting against them. How can we fight against them unless we see them, or overcome them unless we face them.”
De Sales also established the Order of the Visitation of Holy Mary (commonly called the Visitation Sisters) in collaboration with Saint Jane Frances de Chantal.
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No matter how much it has done for your mind, your education has been a failure if it has failed to open your heart.
—Francis de Sales
True progress quietly and persistently moves along without notice.
—Francis de Sales
Topics: Progress
Those who love to be feared fear to be loved, and they themselves are more afraid than anyone, for whereas other men fear only them, they fear everyone.
—Francis de Sales
Topics: Fear, Anxiety
A quarrel between friends, when made up, adds a new tie to friendship, as … the callosity formed round a broken bone makes it stronger than before.
—Francis de Sales
Topics: Friendship, Fighting
We shall steer safely through every storm, so long as our heart is right, our intention fervent, our courage steadfast, and our trust fixed on God.
—Francis de Sales
Topics: God
The elephant, not only the largest but the most intelligent of animals, provides us with an excellent example. It is faithful and tenderly loving to the female of its choice, mating only every third year and then for no more than five days, and so secretly as never to be seen, until, on the sixth day, it appears and goes at once to wash its whole body in the river, unwilling to return to the herd until thus purified. Such good and modest habits are an example to husband and wife.
—Francis de Sales
Topics: Animals
You learn to speak by speaking, to study by studying, to run by running, to work by working; in just the same way, you learn to love by loving.
—Francis de Sales
Topics: Action
It is a great imperfection to complain unceasingly of little things.
—Francis de Sales
Do not wish to be anything but what you are, and try to be that perfectly.
—Francis de Sales
There was never an angry man that thought his anger unjust.
—Francis de Sales
Topics: Anger
It is the mark of a mean, vulgar and ignoble spirit to dwell on the thought of food before meal times or worse to dwell on it afterwards, to discuss it and wallow in the remembered pleasures of every mouthful. Those whose minds dwell before dinner on the spit, and after on the dishes, are fit only to be scullions.
—Francis de Sales
Topics: Eating
We must never undervalue any person.—The workman loves not to have his work despised in his presence. Now God is present everywhere, and every person is his work.
—Francis de Sales
Topics: Appreciation
Flowers often grow more beautifully on dung-hills than in gardens that look beautifully kept.
—Francis de Sales
Topics: Perspective
God requires a faithful fulfillment of the merest trifle given us to do, rather than the most ardent aspiration to things to which we are not called.
—Francis de Sales
Topics: One Step at a Time
The many troubles in your household will tend to your edification, if you strive to bear them all in gentleness, patience, and kindness. Keep this ever before you, and remember constantly that God’s loving eyes are upon you amid all these little worries and vexations, watching whether you take them as He would desire. Offer up all such occasions to Him, and if sometimes you are put out, and give way to impatience, do not be discouraged, but make haste to regain your lost composure.
—Francis de Sales
Never be in a hurry; do everything quietly and in a calm spirit. Do not lose your inner peace for anything whatsoever, even if your whole world seems upset.
—Francis de Sales
Topics: Peace
There are no galley-slaves in the royal vessel of divine love—every man works his oar voluntarily!
—Francis de Sales
Topics: Freedom
Have patience with all things, but chiefly have patience with yourself. Do not lose courage in considering your own imperfections, but instantly set about remedying them—every day begin the task anew.
—Francis de Sales
Topics: Time Management, Acceptance, Realization, Awareness, Resilience, Realistic Expectations, Morning, Patience, Perfection, Value of Time
Friendships begun in this world will be taken up again, never to be broken off.
—Francis de Sales
Topics: Friends and Friendship
Nothing is so strong as gentleness; nothing so gentle as real strength.
—Francis de Sales
Topics: Strength, Gentleness
Friendship requires great communication.
—Francis de Sales
Topics: Friendship
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