Ten Saints by Elanor Farjeon

(Providence: Cluny, 1936/2025), 176

Ten Saints is a wonderful book of saint stories for children (and adults). The kids loved the stories, pictures, and poems.

"Nobody ever saw St. Martin of Tours angry or disturbed, lamenting or laughing. No one ever saw anything but a heavenly joy on his face. He seemed beyond the nature of men; nothing showed on his countenance but Christ. Nothing in his heart but piety, peace, and pity." (23-24)
"Hubert returned to the heart of the wild forest where holiness had been revealed to him. Here, while the ten years passed over his head, he lived a life of self-denial, mastering the things that had given him joy in the world, and finding a joy beyond them." (79)
Be like Simeon Stylites: "The God of such a man must be the true God." (105)
St. Nicholas fasting as a baby. "How else, but by divine knowledge, could he tell when Friday was come? Yet that day, when his nurse laid the baby to her breast, he turned away his head and would not suck. Not till the sun went down, and those who had fasted all day sat at their meal, would Nicholas allow a drop to pass his lips-but then he made up vigorously for lost time." (112)
Almsgiving: "Sometimes those who have too much cannot see the needs of those who have too little, as though their own gold weighed down their eyelids and kept them shut." (112)
St. Nicholas: "Nothing is ever past praying for." (113)
St. Francis on Fasting: He had made a little cave in a thorny bush, where he sat and meditated all one Lent, taking no more than two small loaves with him, and eating but the half of one of them. Yet he did not counsel others to do as he did, if by excessive fasting they hurt themselves. When he heard of a brother who fasted so that he could not sleep for hunger, Francis took bread to his cell, and sat and ate saying, "Share my supper, brother." Then, because Francis ate, the brother did likewise, giving way without shame to his hunger; and afterwards, Francis told his friends what had happened, and said: "Remember, there are due limits, even to fasting. It is our task to forget our bodies, but hunger makes us remember them as much as over-eating. Therefore, when a brother treats himself too severely, do as I did, and persuade him to eat without shame." (148)
"Care for them, or they will perish of the cold but the care of so many trouble you care for the Lord alone." (149)
St. Francis: "My children, we have promised great things to God, and been promised greater by Him. Let us observe our past, and He will His." (154-155)
St. Francis at his death: "Welcome, Sister Death!" (159)

Topic: Saints, Kid's Books

Source

Cluny

Created: 2025-12-17-Wed
Updated: 2026-02-09-Mon