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Jesus is pleased with all we offer Him: prayers, alms,
good works; but He is pleased most of all with the
immolation of our self-love. (Writings 235)

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Love! This word is inexhaustible. It sums up all other
words. Without it all other words would be as cold as a
tomb. It brightens up, ennobles, and directs toward a
heavenly goal life’s pilgrimage. But this admirable word is neither
pronounced with the lips nor written with the pen; the articulation of
the tongue and the movement of the hand are of no avail without the
heart; the heart which alone makes that word vibrate; the heart which
received its first vibration from Eternal Love. (Letters 40)

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The distractions of the world tend to neutralize in us the
heavenly feeling of love. They place in its stead the
personal spirit based on the selfish instincts we inherit
from nature. Our ministry, on the contrary, keeps constantly before
our eyes the most splendid examples of self-denial and of love,
beginning with the God-Man who sacrificed Himself as a victim of
love, down to the unknown little woman who offers to God her
humble prayer of intercession for her sinful brethren. (Letters 8)

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Oh, if only we could send up a petition to our Father in Heaven that He
might drive away from the earth that ugly beast which is self-love. Then life
would really be beautiful here below. But do not worry. If God does not
allow us to kill this monster outright, He does not deny us the strength to
free ourselves, whenever he assails us, from his poisonous bite. (Letters 5)

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Whenever anyone feels irritable and in a bad mood, let
him go out of himself, enter a church, turn to the Lord,

and let him not show his feelings outwardly. (Writings 196)
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Whenever passion rumbles inside of us, we must keep
silence. (Writings 177)