Love Quote by Saint Francis de Sales

A bishop reaching for a maritime metaphor is doing more than preaching piety; he is trying to disarm a fear. Saint Francis de Sales is writing in a Counter-Reformation world where religion is often experienced as pressure: confessional scrutiny, moral accounting, obedience as proof of loyalty. So he flips the script. Divine love, he argues, is not the state galley, not a regime of chained bodies pulling in rhythm under threat of the lash. It is a “royal vessel,” a ship whose dignity comes from its captain and destination, but whose propulsion depends on consent.

The intent is pastoral and tactical. De Sales wants devotion to feel less like coerced compliance and more like chosen attachment. The phrase “no galley-slaves” names the ugly possibility directly: faith reduced to fear, duty without desire. That honesty is the hook. Then the line turns with a gentle provocation: “every man works his oar voluntarily!” Not “should,” not “must” - does. It’s a rhetorical wager that people, when shown a God worth loving, will move themselves.

The subtext is a sophisticated view of freedom. De Sales isn’t denying discipline; rowing is still labor, still repetition, still sore muscles. He’s insisting the spiritual life is strenuous in a different key: effort born from attraction, not compulsion. In an era that often tied holiness to severity, he makes a daring claim about what actually lasts. Love that has to shackle you isn’t divine; it’s just power wearing incense.