“The essential thing in religion is making the heart pure; the Kingdom of Heaven is within us, but only the pure in heart can see the King. While we think of the world, it is only the world for us; but let us come to it with the feeling that the world is God, and we shall have God.”

Annie Besant Quotes

As quoted in John Clute, "Scores" http://www.strangehorizons.com/2010/20100118/clute-c.shtml, in Strange Horizons (18 January 2010)
Galileo's Dream (2009)

Poems (1866), Our Father's Business
Context: This, this is Thou. No idle painter's dream
Of aureoled, imaginary Christ,
Laden with attributes that make not God;
But Jesus, son of Mary; lowly, wise,
Obedient, subject unto parents, mild,
Meek — as the meek that shall inherit earth,
Pure — as the pure in heart that shall see God.

Source: The Beatles Anthology (2000), p. 226
Context: I don't need to go to church. I respect churches because of the sacredness that's been put on them over the years by people who do believe. But I think a lot of bad things have happened in the name of the church and in the name of Christ. Therefore I shy away from church, and as Donovan once said, "I go to my own church in my own temple once a day." And I think people who need a church should go. And the others who know the church is in your own head should visit that temple because that's where the source is. We're all God. Christ said, "The Kingdom of Heaven is within you." And the Indians say that and the Zen people say that. We're all God. I'm not a god or the God, but we're all God and we're all potentially divine — and potentially evil. We all have everything within us and the Kingdom of Heaven is nigh and within us, and if you look hard enough you'll see it.

Credo (1901)
Context: I believe in the Motherhood of God.
I believe in the Blessed Trinity of Father, Mother and Child.
I believe that God is here, and that we are as near Him now as ever we shall be.
I do not believe He started this world a-going and went away and left it to run by itself.
I believe in the sacredness of the human body, this transient dwelling place of a living soul, And so I deem it the duty of every man and every woman to keep his or her body beautiful through right thinking and right living.
I believe that the love of man for woman, and the love of woman for man is holy; And that this love in all its promptings is as much an emanation of the Divine Spirit as man's love for God, or the most daring hazards of the human mind.
I believe in salvation through economic, social, and spiritual freedom.
I believe John Ruskin, William Morris, Henry Thoreau, Walt Whitman, and Leo Tolstoy to be Prophets of God, who should rank in mental reach and spiritual insight with Elijah, Hosea, Ezekiel, and Isaiah.
I believe that men are inspired to-day as much as ever men were.
I believe we are now living in Eternity as much as ever we shall.
I believe that the best way to prepare for a Future Life is to be kind, live one day at a time, and do the work you can do best, doing it as well as you can.
I believe we should remember the Week-day, to keep it holy.
I believe there is no devil but fear.
I believe that no one can harm you but yourself.
I believe in my own divinity — and yours.
I believe that we are all sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be.
I believe the only way we can reach the Kingdom of Heaven is to have the Kingdom of Heaven in our hearts.
I believe in every man minding his own business.
I believe in sunshine, fresh air, friendship, calm sleep, beautiful thoughts.
I believe in the paradox of success through failure.
I believe in the purifying process of sorrow, and I believe that death is a manifestation of life.
I believe the Universe is planned for good.
I believe it is possible that I shall make other creeds, and change this one, or add to it, from time to time, as new light may come to me.

Heaven and Hell #445

Imaginary Magnitude" (1981), "Lecture XLIII", tr. Marc E. Heine (1984)