3. This world is no mockery, nor a vale of sorrows or transition into a better, eternal world, but this world, the world wherein we now live, is one of those eternal worlds which is beautiful and full of joy, and which we not only can, but must through our efforts make still more
beautiful and filled with joy for the sake of those who live with us and for the sake of all those who will live after us.
4. To make every moment of life the best possible, no matter whether it fall to our share from either hand of fate, dispensing favor or dispensing disfavor, therein is the art of living and the true superiority of a rational being. Lichtenberg.
5. Man is unhappy, because he does not know that he is happy. Dosioyevsky.
6. It can not be said that serving God comprised the whole destination of man. The destination of man is always and always must be his blessedness. But as God desired to give blessedness to people, they must, in striving for their blessedness, do that which God desires of them, and therefore obey His will.
II.
True Blessedness is in the Present Life and Not in the Life Beyond the Tomb
1. According to the false teaching the life in this world is an evil, but blessedness is attained only in the life to come.
According to the true Christian teaching, the aim of life is blessedness, and this blessedness is attained here.
True blessedness is always in our hands. Like a shadow it follows in the wake of a good life.
2. If paradise is not in your own self you will never enter it. Angelus.
3. Do not believe that this life is but a transition into another world, and our happiness lies only in that This is untrue. We should be happy in this world right here.
And in order that we may be happy here in this world, we must only live as He desires who sent us. Nor must you say that in order that you may live well, everybody else should live well, should live according to God. This is wrong, live yourself according to God, make efforts of your own, and you will be happy, and others will also be better off rather than worse off.
4. The most common and the most harmful delusion among men is to think that they can not in this life attain all the blessedness which they desire.
5. Those who maintain that this world is a vale of sorrows, a place of trial, etc., and the other world is a world of blessedness, might as well maintain that the whole infinite world of God is beautiful, and that life in the whole world of God is beautiful, with the sole exception of the one spot and the one period of time, namely where and when we now live. That would be a strange phenomenon. Is this an3rthing else but an obvious misunderstanding of the meaning and the calling of one's life?
6. Live the true life and you will have many adversaries, but even your adversaries will love you. Life will bring you many misfortunes, but you will be happy even in them and will bless life and cause others to bless it. Dostoyevsky.
7. How odd and ridiculous to plead with God! Not begging of Him is needful, but to fulfill His law, to be as He is. The only rational attitude towards God is to be thankful to Him for the blessing which He bestowed upon me by animating me with His breath.
A master has placed his laborers into such a state that fulfilling the things he showed them they attain the highest blessing which their mind can conceive (the blessing of spiritual joy), and yet they beg things of Him.
By begging they show that they do not do that which was assigned to them.
III.
True Blessedness You Can Find Only Within
Youreelf
1. God entered into me and through mc seeks His blessedness. What then can be the blessedness of God? Only to be Himself. Angelus.
2. Л wise man remarked: I have covered the earth in my travels seeking blessedness. I searched for it day and night without ceasing. Once when I had despaired of finding this blessedness an inner voice told me: blessedness is in thyself. I obeyed the voice and found true and unchangeable blessedness.
3. What other blessedness would you, if God and the whole world be within you? Angelus.
4. Happy are the people if they call nothing their own but their soul. Happy are they even if they Hve among covetous and evil and hateful people, for none can take their happiness away from them. Buddhist teaching.
5. The better the people live the less they complain about others. And the worse a man lives the less content is he with himself and with others.
6. The wise man seeks all within himself, the madman all in others. Confucius.
IV. The True Life is the Spiritual Life 1. That which we call happiness or unhappiness of our animal "I" is outside of our will; but the blessedness
of our spiritual "I" depends only upon us, on our obedience to God.
2. All that the people regard as misfortunes or ills is due to the fact that they consider only their material personality as truly existing: John, Peter, Mary, Natalie; whereas the material personality represents merely the boundaries in which has manifested itself the really existing eternal All. This is a delusion in the nature of the puzzle pictures in which figures are traced out of nothing between the contours of tress and branches. Man may r^;ard that which is bounded by the body as himself or that All which in him is not bounded by the body. In the first instance he is a slave, powerless and subject to all sorts of misfortunes; in the second case he is free, all-powerful and knows no ills.
3. He who set the aim of his life on releasing his spiritual "I" from the body can not be discontented, because that which he desires is always accomplished.
4. The life of man, full of physical sufferings, liable to be interrupted at any instant, this life to avoid being the most cruel of mockeries must have such a significance that neither sufferings nor its duration—short or long— could affect the aim of life.
And such a significance pertains to human life. This significance is the ever increasing consciousness of God in self.
5. "My yoke is blessed.'* Men don a yoke that is un-suited to them and attempt to pull a load beyond their strength. An unsuitable yoke and an excessive load,—such is the life looking to the happiness of the body or to the material blessings for others. True blessedness is in the increasing consciousness of God in self. Only such a yoke is made to fit the strength of men and it is the one Jesus
speaks of. Try and see how pleasant and easy it is. He who would know whether I speak the truth let him try and do as I say, said Jesus.
6. Human life is a never ceasing reunion of the spiritual which is isolated by the body with that with which it is conscious of oneness. Whether man understands it or not, whether he wills it or not, this reunion is being unceasingly accomplished through the condition which we call human life. The difference between the people who do not understand their calling and do not wish to fulfill it, and those who understand it and wish to live in accordance with it, is in this: the life of those who do not understand it is a continuous suffering, but the life of those who understand their calling and are fulfilling it, is unceasing and increasing blessedness.
The former are like stubborn animals whom the master must drag by a rope attached to the neck into that refuge where the animal will find food and shelter. It is futile on the part of the animal to struggle and to choke itself in its efforts to resist the master: it will be taken to the place to which all must come.
And the latter are like the animal which having comprehended the master's will goes willingly and gladly where the master leads, knowing that nothing but good can result from obeying the will of the master.
7. Nothing proves so patently that the business of life is to perfect oneself as the fact that whatever you may crave besides perfecting yourself, be your desire ever so fully satisfied, the moment it is satisfied, the fascination of the desire is immediately destroyed.