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Will not a tiny speck very close to our vision blot out the glory of the world, and leave only a margin by which we see the blot? I know no speck so troublesome as self.
Steadily he approaches the point where what is unknown is not a mere blank space in a web of words but a window in the mind, a window whose name is not ignorance but wonder.
Of what use to make heroic vows of amendment, if the same old law-breaker is to keep them?
Philosophy is a modest profession; it is all reality and plain dealing. I dislike solemnity and pretence, with nothing but pride behind it.
However mean your life is, meet it and live it; do not shun it and call it hard names.
Nothing is ever really lost, or can be lost, no birth, identity, form — no object in the world, nor life, nor any visible thing; appearance must not foil, nor shifted sphere confuse thy brain. Ample are time and space — ample the fields of Nature.
We are not only enough… We are all there is.
Few people are wise enough to prefer useful reproof to treacherous praise.
The man is richest whose pleasures are the cheapest.
What to ourselves in passion we propose,
The passion ending, doth the purpose lose.
The violence of either grief or joy
Their own enactures with themselves destroy:
Where joy most revels, grief doth most lament;
Grief joys, joy grieves, on slender accident.
Always remember that the world rewards its own. The more you lie and deceive people, the more you get from this world in position and power.
Now there is but one possible way for man to attain this salvation, or life of God in the soul. There is not one for the Jew, another for a Christian, and a third for the heathen. No; God is one, human nature is one, salvation is one, and the way to it is one; and that is, the desire of the soul turned to God. When this desire is alive, and breaks forth in any creature under heaven, then the lost sheep is found, and the shepherd has it upon his shoulders.
I have earnestly endeavoured not to laugh at human actions, nor to lament them, but to understand them.
There is a divine sense higher than human sense, that enables those of pure heart to see God.
How can a soul which misunderstands itself have a sure idea of other creatures?
Eternity alone understands about compassion. If you therefore wish to learn to understand compassion, you must learn it from eternity. But if you wish to understand the eternal, then there must be quiet about you, while you absolutely center your attention on inwardness.
Happiness is your nature. It is not wrong to desire it. What is wrong is seeking it outside when it is inside.
Our thinking machine possesses the capacity to be convinced of anything you like, provided it is repeatedly and persistently influenced in the required direction. A thing that may appear absurd to start with will in the end become rationalized, provided it is repeated sufficiently often and with sufficient conviction.
Great endeavors and hard struggles await those who are converted, but afterwards inexpressible joy. If you want to light a fire, you are troubled at first by smoke, and your eyes water. But in the end you achieve your aim. Now it is written: Our God is a consuming fire. So we must light the divine fire in us with tears and struggle.
Die before you die.