January, 1942

Many modern schools place their disciplines on a time basis, but time has little place in the matter of growth. One may practice certain disciplines for ten years and still not be ready for any further enlightenment; or one may practice only a few weeks and be prepared for further instruction. The time that it requires to release the inner faculties depends upon the amount of spiritual enlightenment that has been brought forward from the previous life. It may be necessary to practice the disciplines for a number of years before the maximum results are achieved. If you are discouraged easily, or inconstant in your devotion to the subject, the benefits will be proportionately diminished.

February, 1942

Thinking is the mind's legitimate purpose. One way to begin is to study the thoughts of those who have thought well. We all have the capacity to think; what is mostly needed is gradual stimulus through exercise. All faculties become keener if they are used. If you go to work on a good book or two of philosophy, in the course of time you will think; once you start to use the mind to its legitimate end, thought will flow right along; it will be found that the more you think the better you can think.

March, 1942

Hence it is unjust to destroy animals, since they are not entirely alienated from our nature and participate of reason in common with mankind though in an inferior degree. But we, indulging in wantonness and cruelty destroy many of them in theatrical sports and in the barbarous exercise of the chase by which the brutal energies of our nature grow strong and savage desires increase.

On the the contrary, the Pythagorean exercised gentleness and clemency toward brutes as a specimen of humanity and pity.

April, 1942

Psychism adds no superiority to any individual's existence. The "gift" is not a spiritual asset so it is no gift, but a punishment. No person should be envious or jealous of a psychic in the feeling of having been slighted by God in not receiving the power too. No person has to grow with greater difficulty than does the psychic, nor take a longer time to get out of his mistakes. No intelligent person questions the fact of psychic phenomena. But the desirability of it is definitely questioned by the philosopher, even if a person is thus enabled to talk to a departed loved one. For it is always to be remembered that when you are old enough and wise enough you will know all things. Whatever you get before you are ready you cannot keep.

May, 1942

It is very interesting that foolish people make the world what it is, and wise people have to live in it. Foolish people can create disasters but they cannot endure them; wise people do not cause them, but they can endure them. One of the proofs of wisdom is the fact it can survive the shock and stress of change and the shock and stress of error. There is something immortal about wisdom because wisdom can live in an environment where stupidity cannot exist. Wisdom possesses a certain immortality. A wise person can live in a world as it is, regardless of what that world may be, regardless of the religions and philosophies, or absence of them, regardless of the intemperances and intolerances. That which is truly wise flows continuously and placidly on its way, unmoved in itself by any of the changes which affect and afflict that which is unwise.

June, 1942

It is also important to remember that nearly every personality described or discussed in the Bible is primarily a symbol and not an historical individual. It is a great mistake to believe that there is great spiritual virtue in the perpetuation of history or the worship of ancestors.

July, 1942

Cause and effect is the basis of our concept and understanding of universal justice. It is the strong and sufficient staff upon which the wise man leans his weight. The law of cause and effect declares that there is an intimate relationship between every action and its inevitable reaction; that nothing can occur in the form of action which is without appropriate consequence. The slightest deed that can be performed brings after it results like unto itself, equal in every respect to it neither more nor less. We cannot sow a little good and reap a great good; nor can we sow a great evil and reap a small evil. We must sow according to Law, and the harvest is according to the sowing. Every action produces its results, and each of these results in turn inspires to other action producing the mysterious Homeric chain that binds the world to the pinnacle of Olympus.

August, 1942

The one place where the testing comes is in time. Time weeds out imposture. In the refining and eliminating process of time is a constant power to prove or disprove statements. That which is affirmed in time must be demonstrated in time, or else it will be denied by time.

Time is eternally swallowing the charlatan; time is forever bringing to naught that which has no need to endure.

Time is also saving for us certain secrets we do not know.

September, 1942

The thing necessary is to desire a specific end, to know at least the basic principle of what you are trying to do. Then just work along on it quietly with no expectation of seeing it finished. Expect that every possible impediment will be placed in the way of what you are doing. Be much more afraid of those who understand you than those who do not. Anything that runs smoothly is worn; it will be none too smooth at first if it is new and has to find its place in the plan. Never expect cooperation; if the idea belongs to the future it will not be understood. The only people who can cooperate are the very few whose views are similar. The thing we do for tomorrow will be understood by tomorrow, misunderstood by today. The thing we understand today has already served its purpose; to re-state it is not to further the cause of progress. To say things people like to hear will make them happy; to say things they do not understand will make them better.

October, 1942

And so we subjectively realize all life's experience cannot be accident and coincidence, that nature cannot be wasting infinitudes only to ultimately prove there is no purpose in anything. We then can realize that there is something great to be achieved to justify such heroic procedure, that we must always have had a mighty destiny for nature to be so patient with us for so long a time.

November, 1942

It is imperative that we find that which has long been lost—the most profound sacred mystery of all teachings—which is that our study of great matters all comes to naught unless we have fundamentally a fixed integrity and humility within ourselves, based upon the supreme veneration of service. It is the foundation of all metaphysics; it is something to be earnestly thought about; it is the key to the Mysteries.

December, 1942

As the ancient Greek philosophers so wisely observed, the physical universe as we see it is suspended from invisible causes, supported by invisible foundations, sustained by an invisible life, and perfected through the perfection of invisible qualities in the life of human beings. Everything that is truly vital and truly real then is a mysterious, intangible overtone. We cannot actually perceive the overtone, yet its absence warns of the collapse of every value that is significant.