Top 99 Ezra Taft Benson Quotes

If someone wants to marry you outside the temple, whom will you strive to please – God or a mortal? If you insist on a temple marriage, you will be pleasing the Lord and blessing the other party.

We are eternal beings. We lived as intelligent spirits before this mortal life. We are now living part of eternity. Our mortal birth was not the beginning; death, which faces all of us, is not the end.

Satan knows that youth is the springtime of life when all things are new and young people are most vulnerable.

God will have a humble people. Either we can choose to be humble, or we can be compelled to be humble.

False thinking and false ideologies, dressed in the most pleasing forms, quietly – almost without our knowing it – seek to reduce our moral defenses and to captivate our minds. They entice with bright promises of security, cradle-to-grave guarantees of many kinds.

Communism introduced into the world a substitute for true religion. It is a counterfeit of the gospel plan.

One of the trials of life is that we do not usually receive immediately the full blessing for righteousness or the full cursing for wickedness.

Constitutional government, as designed by the framers, will survive only with a righteous people.

Virtue is akin to holiness, an attribute of godliness.

When our children obey the Lord and go to the temple to receive their blessings and enter into the marriage covenant, they enter into the same order of the priesthood that God instituted in the very beginning with father Adam.

God lives. I know that He lives. I know that Jesus is the Christ and the Redeemer of the world.

Satan works through human agents.

Was it not through pride that the devil became the devil? Christ wanted to serve. The devil wanted to rule.

The greatest events of history are those which affect the greatest number for the longest periods.

Young people, you need the wisdom of age, just as some of us older ones need your enthusiasm for life.

Many a man in his hour of trial has turned to the Book of Mormon and been enlightened, enlivened, and comforted. The psalms in the Old Testament have a special food for the soul of one in distress.

Pride is a sin that can readily be seen in others but is rarely admitted in ourselves.

There are blessings in being close to the soil, in raising your own food even if it is only a garden in your yard and a fruit tree or two. Those families will be fortunate who, in the last days, have an adequate supply of food because of their foresight and ability to produce their own.

Godly sorrow is a gift of the Spirit. It is a deep realization that our actions have offended our Father and our God. It is the sharp and keen awareness that our behavior caused the Savior, He who knew no sin, even the greatest of all, to endure agony and suffering.

Great battles can make great heroes and heroines.

In a home where there is an able-bodied husband, he is expected to be the breadwinner.

Freedom can be killed by neglect as well as by direct attack.

Faithful attendance at Church meetings brings blessings you can receive in no other way.

What a gift it would be to receive at Christmastime a greater knowledge of the Lord. What a gift it would be to share that knowledge with others.

Time is on the side of truth.

In the scriptures there is no such thing as righteous pride. It is always considered as a sin.

Fear of men’s judgment manifests itself in competition for men’s approval.

With pride, there are many curses. With humility, there come many blessings.

The Saints never suffer as the sinners do.

The privilege of holding the priesthood, which is the power and authority to act in God’s name, is a great blessing and privilege and one that carries with it equally great obligations and responsibilities.

The Book of Mormon exposes the enemies of Christ. It confounds false doctrines and lays down contention.

Can human hearts be changed? Why, of course! It happens every day in the great missionary work of the Church. It is one of the most widespread of Christ’s modern miracles. If it hasn’t happened to you – it should.

Selfishness is one of the more common faces of pride. ‘How everything affects me’ is the center of all that matters – self-conceit, self-pity, worldly self-fulfillment, self-gratification, and self-seeking.

I have a vision of artists putting into film, drama, literature, music, and paintings great themes and great characters from the Book of Mormon.

The Book of Mormon is the ‘keystone’ of our religion, and the Doctrine and Covenants is the ‘capstone,’ with continuing latter day revelation. The Lord has placed His stamp of approval on both the keystone and the capstone.

The Book of Mormon Is the Word of God.

An unvirtuous citizenry tend to elect representatives who will pander to their covetous lustings.

I reverence the Constitution of the United States as a sacred document. To me its words are akin to the revelations of God, for God has placed his stamp of approval on the Constitution of this land.

Be right, and then be easy to live with, if possible, but in that order.

The United States of America has been great because it has been free.

It is mother’s influence during the crucial formative years that forms a child’s basic character. Home is the place where a child learns faith, feels love, and thereby learns from mother’s loving example to choose righteousness.

Our enmity toward God takes on many labels, such as rebellion, hard-heartedness, stiff-neckedness, unrepentant, puffed up, easily offended, and sign seekers. The proud wish God would agree with them. They aren’t interested in changing their opinions to agree with God’s.

The sacred title of ‘father’ is shared with the Almighty.

A woman whose life is involved in the righteous rearing of her children has a better chance of keeping up her spirits than the woman whose total concern is centered in her own personal problems.

Nations cannot endure in sin.

Periodic fasting can help clear up the mind and strengthen the body and the spirit.

When obedience ceases to be an irritant and becomes our quest, in that moment God will endow us with power.

Efficient spending and saving will give the family more security, more opportunities, more education, and a higher standard of living.

There is a difference between a convert who is built on the rock of Christ through the Book of Mormon and stays hold of that iron rod, and one who is not.

Young adults enrolled in universities and colleges or other postsecondary training should avail themselves of the opportunity to take institute of religion courses or, if attending a Church school, should take at least one religion course every term.

Most of us think of pride as self-centeredness, conceit, boastfulness, arrogance, or haughtiness. All of these are elements of the sin, but the heart, or core, is still missing. The central feature of pride is enmity – enmity toward God and enmity toward our fellowmen.

Years of happiness can be lost in the foolish gratification of a momentary desire for pleasure.

Inspiring music may fill the soul with heavenly thoughts, move one to righteous action, or speak peace to the soul.

A young woman who knows and loves the Book of Mormon, who has read it several times, who has an abiding testimony of its truthfulness, and who applies its teachings will be able to stand against the wiles of the devil and will be a mighty tool in the hands of the Lord.

Retirement from work has depressed many a man and hastened his death.

Faith in the Lord Jesus Christ is the foundation upon which sincere and meaningful repentance must be built. If we truly seek to put away sin, we must first look to Him who is the Author of our salvation.

The Declaration of Independence was to set forth the moral justification of a rebellion against a long-recognized political tradition – the divine right of kings.

It is a fundamental truth that the responsibilities of motherhood cannot be successfully delegated. No, not to day-care centers, not to schools, not to nurseries, not to babysitters.

You cannot help people permanently by doing for them what they can and should do for themselves.

Prayer in the hour of need is a great boon. From simple trials to our Gethsemanes, prayer – persistent prayer – can put us in touch with God, our greatest source of comfort and counsel.

Scouting teaches a boy to take care of himself and stand on his own two feet.

The undermining of the home and family is on the increase with the devil anxiously working to displace the father as the head of the home and create rebellion among the children.

With the Spirit and magnifying your call, you can do miracles for the Lord in the mission field. Without the Spirit, you will never succeed, regardless of your talent and ability.

Truly a man does not live by bread alone. A good name is still to be preferred over great riches. Especially is it to be preferred to the appearance of riches, acquired with nothing down and nothing to pay for two months.