The Way of Peace - James Allen
Reader, do you seek to realize the birth into Truth? There is only one way:
_Let self die_. All those lusts, appetites, desires, opinions, limited
conceptions and prejudices to which you have hitherto so tenaciously clung,
let them fall from you. Let them no longer hold you in bondage, and Truth
will be yours. Cease to look upon your own religion as superior to all
others, and strive humbly to learn the supreme lesson of charity. No longer
cling to the idea, so productive of strife and sorrow, that the Savior whom
you worship is the only Savior, and that the Savior whom your brother
worships with equal sincerity and ardor, is an impostor; but seek
diligently the path of holiness, and then you will realize that every holy
man is a savior of mankind.
The giving up of self is not merely the renunciation of outward things. It
consists of the renunciation of the inward sin, the inward error. Not by
giving up vain clothing; not by relinquishing riches; not by abstaining
from certain foods; not by speaking smooth words; not by merely doing these
things is the Truth found; but by giving up the spirit of vanity; by
relinquishing the desire for riches; by abstaining from the lust of
self-indulgence; by giving up all hatred, strife, condemnation, and
self-seeking, and becoming gentle and pure at heart; by doing these things
is the Truth found. To do the former, and not to do the latter, is
pharisaism and hypocrisy, whereas the latter includes the former. You may
renounce the outward world, and isolate yourself in a cave or in the depths
of a forest, but you will take all your selfishness with you, and unless
you renounce that, great indeed will be your wretchedness and deep your
delusion. You may remain just where you are, performing all your duties,
and yet renounce the world, the inward enemy. To be in the world and yet
not of the world is the highest perfection, the most blessed peace, is to
achieve the greatest victory. The renunciation of self is the way of Truth,
therefore,
"Enter the Path; there is no grief like hate,
No pain like passion, no deceit like sense;
Enter the Path; far hath he gone whose foot
Treads down one fond offense."
As you succeed in overcoming self you will begin to see things in their
right relations. He who is swayed by any passion, prejudice, like or
dislike, adjusts everything to that particular bias, and sees only his own
delusions. He who is absolutely free from all passion, prejudice,
preference, and partiality, sees himself as he is; sees others as they are;
sees all things in their proper proportions and right relations. Having
nothing to attack, nothing to defend, nothing to conceal, and no interests
to guard, he is at peace. He has realized the profound simplicity of Truth,
for this unbiased, tranquil, blessed state of mind and heart is the state
of Truth. He who attains to it dwells with the angels, and sits at the
footstool of the Supreme. Knowing the Great Law; knowing the origin of
sorrow; knowing the secret of suffering; knowing the way of emancipation in
Truth, how can such a one engage in strife or condemnation; for though he
knows that the blind, self-seeking world, surrounded with the clouds of its
own illusions, and enveloped in the darkness of error and self, cannot
perceive the steadfast Light of Truth, and is utterly incapable of
comprehending the profound simplicity of the heart that has died, or is
dying, to self, yet he also knows that when the suffering ages have piled
up mountains of sorrow, the crushed and burdened soul of the world will fly
to its final refuge, and that when the ages are completed, every prodigal
will come back to the fold of Truth. And so he dwells in goodwill toward
all, and regards all with that tender compassion which a father bestows
upon his wayward children.
Men cannot understand Truth because they cling to self, because they
believe in and love self, because they believe self to be the only reality,
whereas it is the one delusion.
When you cease to believe in and love self you will desert it, and will fly
to Truth, and will find the eternal Reality.
When men are intoxicated with the wines of luxury, and pleasure, and
vanity, the thirst of life grows and deepens within them, and they delude
themselves with dreams of fleshly immortality, but when they come to reap
the harvest of their own sowing, and pain and sorrow supervene, then,
crushed and humiliated, relinquishing self and all the intoxications of
self, they come, with aching hearts to the one immortality, the immortality
that destroys all delusions, the spiritual immortality in Truth.
Men pass from evil to good, from self to Truth, through the dark gate of
sorrow, for sorrow and self are inseparable. Only in the peace and bliss of
Truth is all sorrow vanquished. If you suffer disappointment because your
cherished plans have been thwarted, or because someone has not come up to
your anticipations, it is because you are clinging to self. If you suffer
remorse for your conduct, it is because you have given way to self. If you
are overwhelmed with chagrin and regret because of the attitude of someone
else toward you, it is because you have been cherishing self. If you are
wounded on account of what has been done to you or said of you, it is
because you are walking in the painful way of self. All suffering is of
self. All suffering ends in Truth. When you have entered into and realized
Truth, you will no longer suffer disappointment, remorse, and regret, and
sorrow will flee from you.
"Self is the only prison that can ever bind the soul;
Truth is the only angel that can bid the gates unroll;
And when he comes to call thee, arise and follow fast;
His way may lie through darkness, but it leads to light at last."
The woe of the world is of its own making. Sorrow purifies and deepens the
soul, and the extremity of sorrow is the prelude to Truth.
Have you suffered much? Have you sorrowed deeply? Have you pondered
seriously upon the problem of life? If so, you are prepared to wage war
against self, and to become a disciple of Truth.
The intellectual who do not see the necessity for giving up self, frame
endless theories about the universe, and call them Truth; but do thou
pursue that direct line of conduct which is the practice of righteousness,
and thou wilt realize the Truth which has no place in theory, and which
never changes. Cultivate your heart. Water it continually with unselfish
love and deep-felt pity, and strive to shut out from it all thoughts and
feelings which are not in accordance with Love. Return good for evil, love
for hatred, gentleness for ill-treatment, and remain silent when attacked.
So shall you transmute all your selfish desires into the pure gold of Love,
and self will disappear in Truth. So will you walk blamelessly among men,
yoked with the easy yoke of lowliness, and clothed with the divine garment
of humility.
O come, weary brother! thy struggling and striving
End thou in the heart of the Master of ruth;
Across self's drear desert why wilt thou be driving,
Athirst for the quickening waters of Truth
When here, by the path of thy searching and sinning,
Flows Life's gladsome stream, lies Love's oasis green?
Come, turn thou and rest; know the end and beginning,
The sought and the searcher, the seer and seen.
Thy Master sits not in the unapproached mountains,
Nor dwells in the mirage which floats on the air,
Nor shalt thou discover His magical fountains
In pathways of sand that encircle despair.
In selfhood's dark desert cease wearily seeking
The odorous tracks of the feet of thy King;
And if thou wouldst hear the sweet sound of His speaking,
Be deaf to all voices that emptily sing.
Flee the vanishing places; renounce all thou hast;
Leave all that thou lovest, and, naked and bare,
Thyself at the shrine of the _Innermost_ cast;
The Highest, the Holiest, the Changeless is there.
Within, in the heart of the Silence He dwelleth;
Leave sorrow and sin, leave thy wanderings sore;
Come bathe in His Joy, whilst He, whispering, telleth
Thy soul what it seeketh, and wander no more.
Then cease, weary brother, thy struggling and striving;
Find peace in the heart of the Master of ruth.
Across self's dark desert cease wearily driving;
Come; drink at the beautiful waters of Truth.
THE ACQUIREMENT OF SPIRITUAL POWER
The world is filled with men and women seeking pleasure, excitement,
novelty; seeking ever to be moved to laughter or tears; not seeking
strength, stability, and power; but courting weakness, and eagerly engaged
in dispersing what power they have.
Men and women of real power and influence are few, because few are prepared
to make the sacrifice necessary to the acquirement of power, and fewer
still are ready to patiently build up character.
To be swayed by your fluctuating thoughts and impulses is to be weak and
powerless; to rightly control and direct those forces is to be strong and
powerful. Men of strong animal passions have much of the ferocity of the
beast, but this is not power. The elements of power are there; but it is
only when this ferocity is tamed and subdued by the higher intelligence
that real power begins; and men can only grow in power by awakening
themselves to higher and ever higher states of intelligence and
consciousness.
The difference between a man of weakness and one of power lies not in the
strength of the personal will (for the stubborn man is usually weak and
foolish), but in that focus of consciousness which represents their states
of knowledge.
The pleasure-seekers, the lovers of excitement, the hunters after novelty,
and the victims of impulse and hysterical emotion lack that knowledge of
principles which gives balance, stability, and influence.
A man commences to develop power when, checking his impulses and selfish
inclinations, he falls back upon the higher and calmer consciousness within
him, and begins to steady himself upon a principle. The realization of
unchanging principles in consciousness is at once the source and secret of
the highest power.
When, after much searching, and suffering, and sacrificing, the light of an
eternal principle dawns upon the soul, a divine calm ensues and joy
unspeakable gladdens the heart.
He who has realized such a principle ceases to wander, and remains poised
and self-possessed. He ceases to be "passion's slave," and becomes a
master-builder in the Temple of Destiny.
The man that is governed by self, and not by a principle, changes his front
when his selfish comforts are threatened. Deeply intent upon defending and
guarding his own interests, he regards all means as lawful that will
subserve that end. He is continually scheming as to how he may protect
himself against his enemies, being too self-centered to perceive that he is
his own enemy. Such a man's work crumbles away, for it is divorced from
Truth and power. All effort that is grounded upon self, perishes; only that
work endures that is built upon an indestructible principle.
The man that stands upon a principle is the same calm, dauntless,
self-possessed man under all circumstances. When the hour of trial comes,
and he has to decide between his personal comforts and Truth, he gives up
his comforts and remains firm. Even the prospect of torture and death
cannot alter or deter him. The man of self regards the loss of his wealth,
his comforts, or his life as the greatest calamities which can befall him.
The man of principle looks upon these incidents as comparatively
insignificant, and not to be weighed with loss of character, loss of Truth.
To desert Truth is, to him, the only happening which can really be called a
calamity.
It is the hour of crisis which decides who are the minions of darkness, and
who the children of Light. It is the epoch of threatening disaster, ruin,
and persecution which divides the sheep from the goats, and reveals to the
reverential gaze of succeeding ages the men and women of power.
It is easy for a man, so long as he is left in the enjoyment of his
possessions, to persuade himself that he believes in and adheres to the
principles of Peace, Brotherhood, and Universal Love; but if, when his
enjoyments are threatened, or he imagines they are threatened, he begins to
clamor loudly for war, he shows that he believes in and stands upon, not
Peace, Brotherhood, and Love, but strife, selfishness, and hatred.
He who does not desert his principles when threatened with the loss of
every earthly thing, even to the loss of reputation and life, is the man of
power; is the man whose every word and work endures; is the man whom the
afterworld honors, reveres, and worships. Rather than desert that principle
of Divine Love on which he rested, and in which all his trust was placed,
Jesus endured the utmost extremity of agony and deprivation; and today the
world prostrates itself at his pierced feet in rapt adoration.
There is no way to the acquirement of spiritual power except by that inward
illumination and enlightenment which is the realization of spiritual
principles; and those principles can only be realized by constant practice
and application.
Take the principle of divine Love, and quietly and diligently meditate upon
it with the object of arriving at a thorough understanding of it. Bring its
searching light to bear upon all your habits, your actions, your speech and
intercourse with others, your every secret thought and desire. As you
persevere in this course, the divine Love will become more and more
perfectly revealed to you, and your own shortcomings will stand out in more
and more vivid contrast, spurring you on to renewed endeavor; and having
once caught a glimpse of the incomparable majesty of that imperishable
principle, you will never again rest in your weakness, your selfishness,
your imperfection, but will pursue that Love until you have relinquished
every discordant element, and have brought yourself into perfect harmony
with it. And that state of inward harmony is spiritual power. Take also
other spiritual principles, such as Purity and Compassion, and apply them
in the same way, and, so exacting is Truth, you will be able to make no
stay, no resting-place until the inmost garment of your soul is bereft of
every stain, and your heart has become incapable of any hard, condemnatory,
and pitiless impulse.
Only in so far as you understand, realize, and rely upon, these principles,
will you acquire spiritual power, and that power will be manifested in and
through you in the form of increasing dispassion, patience and equanimity.
Dispassion argues superior self-control; sublime patience is the very
hall-mark of divine knowledge, and to retain an unbroken calm amid all the
duties and distractions of life, marks off the man of power. "It is easy in
the world to live after the world's opinion; it is easy in solitude to live
after our own; but the great man is he who in the midst of the crowd keeps
with perfect sweetness the independence of solitude."
Some mystics hold that perfection in dispassion is the source of that power
by which miracles (so-called) are performed, and truly he who has gained
such perfect control of all his interior forces that no shock, however
great, can for one moment unbalance him, must be capable of guiding and
directing those forces with a master-hand.
To grow in self-control, in patience, in equanimity, is to grow in strength
and power; and you can only thus grow by focusing your consciousness upon a
principle. As a child, after making many and vigorous attempts to walk
unaided, at last succeeds, after numerous falls, in accomplishing this, so
you must enter the way of power by first attempting to stand alone. Break
away from the tyranny of custom, tradition, conventionality, and the
opinions of others, until you succeed in walking lonely and erect among
men. Rely upon your own judgment; be true to your own conscience; follow
the Light that is within you; all outward lights are so many
will-o'-the-wisps. There will be those who will tell you that you are
foolish; that your judgment is faulty; that your conscience is all awry,
and that the Light within you is darkness; but heed them not. If what they
say is true the sooner you, as a searcher for wisdom, find it out the
better, and you can only make the discovery by bringing your powers to the
test. Therefore, pursue your course bravely. Your conscience is at least
your own, and to follow it is to be a man; to follow the conscience of
another is to be a slave. You will have many falls, will suffer many
wounds, will endure many buffetings for a time, but press on in faith,
believing that sure and certain victory lies ahead. Search for a rock, a
principle, and having found it cling to it; get it under your feet and
stand erect upon it, until at last, immovably fixed upon it, you succeed in
defying the fury of the waves and storms of selfishness.
For selfishness in any and every form is dissipation, weakness, death;
unselfishness in its spiritual aspect is conservation, power, life. As you
grow in spiritual life, and become established upon principles, you will
become as beautiful and as unchangeable as those principles, will taste of
the sweetness of their immortal essence, and will realize the eternal and
indestructible nature of the God within.
No harmful shaft can reach the righteous man,
Standing erect amid the storms of hate,
Defying hurt and injury and ban,
Surrounded by the trembling slaves of Fate.
Majestic in the strength of silent power,
Serene he stands, nor changes not nor turns;
Patient and firm in suffering's darkest hour,
Time bends to him, and death and doom he spurns.
Wrath's lurid lightnings round about him play,
And hell's deep thunders roll about his head;
Yet heeds he not, for him they cannot slay
Who stands whence earth and time and space are fled.
Sheltered by deathless love, what fear hath he?
Armored in changeless Truth, what can he know
Of loss and gain? Knowing eternity,
He moves not whilst the shadows come and go.
Call him immortal, call him Truth and Light
And splendor of prophetic majesty
Who bideth thus amid the powers of night,
Clothed with the glory of divinity.
THE REALIZATION OF SELFLESS LOVE
It is said that Michael Angelo saw in every rough block of stone a thing of
beauty awaiting the master-hand to bring it into reality. Even so, within
each there reposes the Divine Image awaiting the master-hand of Faith and
the chisel of Patience to bring it into manifestation. And that Divine
Image is revealed and realized as stainless, selfless Love.
Hidden deep in every human heart, though frequently covered up with a mass
of hard and almost impenetrable accretions, is the spirit of Divine Love,
whose holy and spotless essence is undying and eternal. It is the Truth in
man; it is that which belongs to the Supreme: that which is real and
immortal. All else changes and passes away; this alone is permanent and
imperishable; and to realize this Love by ceaseless diligence in the
practice of the highest righteousness, to live in it and to become fully
conscious in it, is to enter into immortality here and now, is to become
one with Truth, one with God, one with the central Heart of all things, and
to know our own divine and eternal nature.
To reach this Love, to understand and experience it, one must work with
great persistency and diligence upon his heart and mind, must ever renew
his patience and keep strong his faith, for there will be much to remove,
much to accomplish before the Divine Image is revealed in all its glorious
beauty.
He who strives to reach and to accomplish the divine will be tried to the
very uttermost; and this is absolutely necessary, for how else could one
acquire that sublime patience without which there is no real wisdom, no
divinity? Ever and anon, as he proceeds, all his work will seem to be
futile, and his efforts appear to be thrown away. Now and then a hasty
touch will mar his image, and perhaps when he imagines his work is almost
completed he will find what he imagined to be the beautiful form of Divine
Love utterly destroyed, and he must begin again with his past bitter
experience to guide and help him. But he who has resolutely set himself to
realize the Highest recognizes no such thing as defeat. All failures are
apparent, not real. Every slip, every fall, every return to selfishness is
a lesson learned, an experience gained, from which a golden grain of wisdom
is extracted, helping the striver toward the accomplishment of his lofty
object. To recognize
"That of our vices we can frame
A ladder if we will but tread
Beneath our feet each deed of shame,"
is to enter the way that leads unmistakably toward the Divine, and the
failings of one who thus recognizes are so many dead selves, upon which he
rises, as upon stepping-stones, to higher things.
Once come to regard your failings, your sorrows and sufferings as so many
voices telling you plainly where you are weak and faulty, where you fall
below the true and the divine, you will then begin to ceaselessly watch
yourself, and every slip, every pang of pain will show you where you are to
set to work, and what you have to remove out of your heart in order to
bring it nearer to the likeness of the Divine, nearer to the Perfect Love.
And as you proceed, day by day detaching yourself more and more from the
inward selfishness the Love that is selfless will gradually become revealed
to you. And when you are growing patient and calm, when your petulances,
tempers, and irritabilities are passing away from you, and the more
powerful lusts and prejudices cease to dominate and enslave you, then you
will know that the divine is awakening within you, that you are drawing
near to the eternal Heart, that you are not far from that selfless Love,
the possession of which is peace and immortality.
Divine Love is distinguished from human loves in this supremely important
particular, _it is free from partiality_. Human loves cling to a particular
object to the exclusion of all else, and when that object is removed, great
and deep is the resultant suffering to the one who loves. Divine Love
embraces the whole universe, and, without clinging to any part, yet
contains within itself the whole, and he who comes to it by gradually
purifying and broadening his human loves until all the selfish and impure
elements are burnt out of them, ceases from suffering. It is because human
loves are narrow and confined and mingled with selfishness that they cause
suffering. No suffering can result from that Love which is so absolutely
pure that it seeks nothing for itself. Nevertheless, human loves are
absolutely necessary as steps toward the Divine, and no soul is prepared to
partake of Divine Love until it has become capable of the deepest and most
intense human love. It is only by passing through human loves and human
sufferings that Divine Love is reached and realized.
All human loves are perishable like the forms to which they cling; but
there is a Love that is imperishable, and that does not cling to
appearances.
All human loves are counterbalanced by human hates; but there is a Love
that admits of no opposite or reaction; divine and free from all taint of
self, that sheds its fragrance on all alike.
Human loves are reflections of the Divine Love, and draw the soul nearer to
the reality, the Love that knows neither sorrow nor change.
It is well that the mother, clinging with passionate tenderness to the
little helpless form of flesh that lies on her bosom, should be overwhelmed
with the dark waters of sorrow when she sees it laid in the cold earth. It
is well that her tears should flow and her heart ache, for only thus can
she be reminded of the evanescent nature of the joys and objects of sense,
and be drawn nearer to the eternal and imperishable Reality.
It is well that lover, brother, sister, husband, wife should suffer deep
anguish, and be enveloped in gloom when the visible object of their
affections is torn from them, so that they may learn to turn their
affections toward the invisible Source of all, where alone abiding
satisfaction is to be found.
It is well that the proud, the ambitious, the self-seeking, should suffer
defeat, humiliation, and misfortune; that they should pass through the
scorching fires of affliction; for only thus can the wayward soul be
brought to reflect upon the enigma of life; only thus can the heart be
softened and purified, and prepared to receive the Truth.
When the sting of anguish penetrates the heart of human love; when gloom
and loneliness and desertion cloud the soul of friendship and trust, then
it is that the heart turns toward the sheltering love of the Eternal, and
finds rest in its silent peace. And whosoever comes to this Love is not
turned away comfortless, is not pierced with anguish nor surrounded with
gloom; and is never deserted in the dark hour of trial.