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Nothing is so easy as to deceive one’s self, for what we wish to believe, we readily believe, but such expectations are often inconsistent with the real state of things.
My third maxim was to endeavor always to conquer myself rather than fortune, and change my desires rather than the order of the world… and thus render me contented.
Good sense and good-nature are never separated, though the ignorant world has thought otherwise. Good nature, by which I mean beneficence and candor, is the product of right reason.
Scholar: “Loving master, I can no more endure anything should divert me, how shall I find the nearest way to (the Divine)?”
Master: “Where the way is hardest there walk thou, and take up what the world rejecteth; and what the world doth, that do not thou. Walk contrary to the world in all things. And then thou comest the nearest way to it.”
If you seek Truth, you will not seek to gain a victory by every possible means; and when you have found the Truth, you need not fear being defeated.
The question at stake is no common one. It is, “Are we in our right sense or are we not?”
He truly engages in battle who endeavours to surmount all the difficulties and errors which prevent him from reaching the knowledge of truth.
I am as free as Nature first made man, ere the base laws of servitude began.
Errors, like straws, upon the surface flow; he who would search for pearls must dive below.
To be possessed of an energetic mind is not enough; the first requirement is to use it correctly.
Why do you look without for that which is within you?
Oh what a tangled web we weave,
When first we practise to deceive!
The light of the body is the eye; if therefore thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light.
Watchfulness is the path of immortality; unwatchfulness is the path of death. Those who are watchful never die; those who do not watch are already as dead.
The great challenge is living your wounds through instead of thinking them through. It is better to cry than to worry, better to feel your wounds deeply than to try to understand them, better to let them enter into your silence than to talk about them. The choice you face constantly is whether you are taking your hurts to your head or to your heart.
Society everywhere is in conspiracy against the manhood of every one of its members… Self-reliance is its aversion.
Have you again forgotten? Don’t you know that a good man does nothing for the sake of appearances, only for the sake of what is right?
Inasmuch as we neither seek nor shun any object except as our understanding represents it as either good or bad, all that is necessary to right action is right judgement… and the assurance of such an acquisition cannot fail to render us contented.
There is a third silent party to all our bargains. The nature and soul of things takes on itself the guaranty of the fulfilment of every contract, so that honest service cannot come to loss. If you serve an ungrateful master, serve him the more. Put God in your debt. Every stroke shall be repaid. The longer the payment is withholden, the better for you; for compound interest on compound interest is the rate and usage of this exchequer.
A philosopher’s school is a hospital. You should feel discomfort, not pleasure, in it, for on entering, no one is well and whole. One has a disjointed shoulder, another a wound, a third suffers from a cut, and a fourth has a headache. Am I then to sit down and give you a treat of pretty words and empty sentiments, so you may applaud me and depart, with neither shoulder nor wound, cut, nor headache any better for your visit?
