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Here you will read the innermost thoughts and feelings of inspired seekers who have gone before you. Some names you may know… others you will be glad to meet!
You are freed from your own desires only when God frees you. This is not effected by your own exertion, but by the grace of God. First he brings forth in you the desire to attain this goal. Then he opens to you the gate of repentance. Then… you continue to strive and… pride yourself upon your efforts, thinking that you are advancing or achieving something; but afterward you fall into despair and feel no joy. Then you know your work is not pure but tainted. You repent of acts of devotion which you had thought were your own, and perceive that they were done by God’s grace and that you were guilty of polytheism in attributing them to your own exertion. When this becomes manifest, a feeling of joy enters your heart… God opens to you the gate of love…
But still you think “I love” and find no rest until you perceive that it is God who loves you and keeps you in the state of loving, and that this is the result of divine love and grace, not of your own endeavor. Then God opens to you the gate of unity, and causes you to know that all action depends on God Almighty. Hereupon you perceive that all is God, and all is by him, and all is his (even) this self-conceit… Then you entirely recognize that you do not have the right to say ‘I’ or “mine.” At this stage you behold your helplessness; desires fall away from you and you become free and calm. You desire what God desires; your own desires are gone, you are emancipated from your wants, and have gained peace and joy in both worlds.
First, action is necessary, then knowledge, in order that you may know that you know nothing and are no one. This is not easy to know. It is a thing that cannot be rightly learned by instruction, nor sewed on with needle nor tied on with thread. It is the gift of God.
Everyone believes in virtue, but who is virtuous?
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.
Man cannot understand more because he is in a state of inner disorganization. The quality of his consciousness is too separative and coarse. Yet he starts out in his investigations of the universe without any idea that he will be unable to penetrate beyond a certain point because he himself is an unsuitable instrument for this purpose.
Of that which belongs to a man, he cannot rid himself, even though he were to throw it away.
A mere trifle consoles us, for a mere trifle distresses us.
A heroic person walks at his ease through and out of that custom or precedent or authority that suits him not.
He that is slow to anger is better than the mighty; and he that ruleth his spirit than he that taketh a city.
The sovereign good of a man is a mind that subjects all things to itself, and is itself subject to nothing. Such a man’s pleasures are modest and reserved, and it may be a question whether he goes to heaven or heaven comes to him.
Man is the slave and prisoner of his own opinion of himself.
Man is not some simple object, nor is he cast in one pattern, but God has made to dwell in the constitution of a single creature a host of forces mingled together and with full-toned voices. We are, I think, a monstrous animal more extraordinary than the Hydra and still more many-headed. For not with the same part of our nature, of course, do we think and desire or feel pain and suffer anger, nor is our fear from the same source as our pleasure. Again you will observe how there is a male element in these organs and a female, and that there is courage and also cowardice. There are, in sooth, all kinds of opposites within us and a certain medial force of nature runs through them which we call “mind.”
Being deeply loved by someone gives you strength, while loving someone deeply gives you courage.
He who knows the Tao is sure to be well acquainted with the principles that appear in the procedures of things. Acquainted with those principles, he is sure to understand how to regulate his actions in all kinds of circumstances. Having that understanding, he will not allow things to injure him.
I am very little inclined on any occasion to say anything unless I hope to produce some good by it.
When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child, but when I became a man, I put away childish things.
Who in the world, then, is the man who has any authority to make any declaration about you?
As he advances in the idea of being detached from results and possessions, he will inevitably have to advance in the idea of being detached from concern about his own spiritual development. If he is to relinquish the ego, he will also have to relinquish his attempts to improve it. This applies just as much to its character as to its ideas.
I am quite my own master, agreeably lodged, perfectly easy in my circumstances. I am contented with my situation, and happy because I think myself so.
Every man’s nature is concealed with many folds of disguise, and covered with various veils. His brows, his eyes, and very often his countenance, are deceitful, and his speech is most commonly a lie.
Thus it is said if you know them and know yourself, your victory will not be imperiled. If you know Heaven and you know Earth, your victory can be complete.