June Thoughts: James Allen

The incentive to self-sacrificing labor does not reside in any theory about the universe, but in the spirit of love and compassion.
The painful consequences of all self-seeking must be met and passed through.
Man is the maker of happiness and misery.

FIXED attitudes of mind determine courses of conduct, and from courses of conduct come those reactions called happinesses and unhappinesses. This being so, it follows that, to alter the reactive condition, one must alter the active thought. To exchange misery for happiness it is necessary to reverse the fixed attitude of mind and habitual course of conduct which is the cause of misery, and the reverse effect will appear in the mind and life. A man has no power to be happy while thinking and acting selfishly; he cannot be unhappy while thinking and acting unselfishly. Wheresoever the cause is, there the effect will appear. Man cannot abrogate effects, but he can alter causes. He can purify his nature; he can remould his character. There is great power in self-conquest; there is great joy in transforming oneself.

Each man is circumscribed by his own thoughts.
Men live in spheres low or high according to the nature of their thoughts.

CONSIDER the man whose mind is suspicious, covetous, envious. How small and mean and drear everything appears to him. Having no grandeur in himself, he sees no grandeur anywhere, being ignoble himself, he is incapable of seeing nobility in any being; selfish as he himself is, he sees in the most exalted acts of unselfishness only motives that are mean and base.

CONSIDER again the man whose mind is unsuspecting, generous, magnanimous. How wondrous and beautiful is his world. He sees men as true, and to him they are true. In his presence the meanest forget their nature, and for the moment become like himself, getting a glimpse, albeit confused, in that temporary upliftment of a higher order of things, of an immeasurably nobler and happier life.

Refrain from harboring thoughts that are dark and hateful, and cherish thoughts that are bright and beautiful.
The small-minded man and the large-hearted man live in two different worlds though they be neighbors.
Men, like schoolboys, find themselves in standards or classes to which their ignorance or knowledge entitles them.

Having clothed himself with humility, the first questions a man asks himself are:—

“How am I acting towards others?”
“What am I doing to others?”
“How am I thinking of others?”
“Are my thoughts of, and acts towards others prompted by unselfish love?”

As a man, in the silence of his soul, asks himself these searching questions, he will unerringly see where he has hitherto failed.

The world of things is the other half of the world of thoughts.
Things follow thoughts.
Alter your thoughts, and things will receive a new adjustment.
The perfecting of one’s own deeds is man’s highest duty and most sublime accomplishment.
External things and deeds are powerless to injure you.
The man is the all-important factor.
He who complains of his circumstances has not yet become a man.
Nothing can prevent us from accomplishing the aims of our life.
He is the good man whose habits of thought and action are good.
He becomes the master of the lower by enlisting in the service of the higher.
Habit is repetition. Faculty is fixed habit.
By thoughts man binds himself.
A changed attitude of mind changes the character, the habits, the life.
The body is the image of the mind.
Mental harmony, or moral wholeness, makes for bodily health.
Reach out into a comprehension of the Infinite.
The common ground of faith—the root and spring of all religion, the heart of Love!
The restful Reality of the Eternal Heart.

THE spirit of man is inseparable from the Infinite, and can be satisfied with nothing short of the Infinite, and the burden of pain will continue to weigh upon man’s heart, and the shadows of sorrow to darken his pathway, until, ceasing from wanderings in the dream-world of matter, he comes back to his home in the reality of the Eternal.

As the smallest drop of water detached from the ocean contains all the qualities of the ocean, so man, detached in consciousness from the Infinite, contains within himself its likeness; and as the drop of water must, by the law of nature, ultimately find its way back to the ocean and lose itself in its silent depths, so must man, by the unfailing law of his nature, at last return to his source, and lose himself in the heart of the Infinite.

To become one with the Infinite is the goal of man.
Enter into perfect harmony with the Eternal Law, which is Wisdom, Love, and Peace.
Love is universal, supreme, all-sufficing. This is the realization of selfless love.

If men only understood that their hatred and resentment slays their peace and sweet contentment, hurts themselves, helps not another, does not cheer one lonely brother, they would seek the better doing of good deeds which leaves no ruing:—

If they only understood.

If men only understood how Love conquers; how prevailing is its might, grim hate assailing; how compassion endeth sorrow, maketh wise, and doth not borrow pain of passion, they would ever live in Love, in hatred never:—

If they only understood.

When a man’s soul is clouded with selfishness in any or every form, he loses the power of spiritual discrimination, and confuses the temporal with the eternal.
The perishable in the universe can never become permanent; the permanent can never pass away.
Man cannot immortalize the flesh.
Only by realizing the God state of consciousness does man enter into immortality.
This only is true service to forget oneself in love towards all.

WHOEVER fights ceaselessly against his own selfishness, and strives to supplant it with all-embracing love, is a saint, whether he live in a cottage or in the midst of riches and influence; or whether he preaches or remains obscure.

To the worldling, who is beginning to aspire towards higher things, the saint, such as a sweet St. Francis of Assisi, or a conquering St. Anthony, is a glorious and inspiring spectacle; to the saint, an equally enrapturing sight is that of the sage, sitting serene and holy, the conqueror of sin and sorrow, no more tormented by regret and remorse, and whom even temptation can never reach; and yet even the sage is drawn on by a still more glorious vision, that of the Saviour actively manifesting His knowledge in selfless works, and rendering His divinity more potent for good by sinking Himself in the throbbing, sorrowing heart of mankind.

Only the work that is impersonal can live.

The Kingdom of Heaven is perfect trust, perfect knowledge, perfect peace. . . no sin can enter therein, no self-born thought or deed can pass its golden gates; no impure desire can defile its radiant robes. . . all may enter it who will, but all must pay the price—the unconditional abandonment of self.

Where duties, howsoever humble, are done without self-interest, and with joyful sacrifice, there is true service and enduring work.
A pure heart is the end of all religion and the beginning of divinity.
In the external universe there is ceaseless turmoil, change, and unrest; at the heart of all things there is undisturbed repose; in this deep silence dwelleth the Eternal.
Become as little children.
Hatred severs human lives, fosters persecution, and hurls nations into ruthless war.
This inward peace, this silence, this harmony, this love is the Kingdom of Heaven.
Realize the Light that never fades!
The holy place within you is your real and eternal self: it is the divine within you.
Spiritual Principles can only be acquired after long discipline in the pursuit and practice of Virtue.
Thus practice ever precedes knowledge
Even in the ordinary things of the world, and in spiritual things, in the living of the higher life, this law is rigid in its exactions.
Truth can only be arrived at by daily and hourly doing the lessons of Virtue.
Undaunted by failure, and made stronger by difficulties.
Learn the lessons of Virtue, and thus build up in the strength of knowledge, destroying ignorance and the ills of life.

WHERE Love is, God is, and where Goodness lives

There Christ abides; and he who daily strives

’Gainst self and selfishness, shaping his mind

For Truth and Purity, shall surely find

The Master’s presence in his inmost heart.

God shall be one with him (and not apart)

Who overcomes himself, and makes his life

Godlike and holy; banishing all strife

Far from him; letting hate and anger die,

And greed and pride and fleshly lusts that lie

To God and Goodness: great shall be his peace,

Happy and everlasting his release

From pain and sorrow who doth conquer sin.

To the pure heart comes God and dwells therein:

He only who the Path of Good hath trod

Hath found the Life that’s “hid with Christ in God.”

“Make pure thy heart, and thou wilt make thy life Rich, sweet, and beautiful, unmarred by strife.”
Stimulate the mind to watchfulness and reflection.
The heart must be purified of sensual and gustatory lust.
A listless mind could not achieve any kind of success.
Without exertion nothing can be accomplished.
In order to achieve the higher forms of success, a man must give up anxiety, hurry, and fussiness.

Effort, and the more effort, and then effort again, is the keynote of success. As the simple old saying has it:

“If at first you don’t succeed, Try again.”

All the precepts of successful business men are precepts of doing; all the precepts of the wise teachers are precepts of doing. To cease to do is to cease to be of any use in the economy of life. Doing means effort, exertion.

Transmute the energy that wears and breaks down into that deeper and less obtrusive kind that preserves and builds up.
The silent, calm people will manifest a more enduring form of success than those who are noisy and restless.
The root of success is in character.
The law which punishes us is the law which preserves us.
To wish to bring down the perfect to the imperfect is the crown of folly, but to strive to bring the imperfect up to the perfect is the height of wisdom.
Seers of the Cosmos do not mourn over the scheme of things.

SEERS of the Cosmos see the universe as a perfect whole, and not as an imperfect jumble of parts. The Great Teachers are men of abiding joy and heavenly peace.

The blind captive of unholy desire may cry:

“Ah! Love, could you and I with Him conspire

To grasp this sorry scheme of things entire,

Would we not shatter it to bits, and then

Remold it nearer to the heart’s desire?”

This is the wish of the voluptuary, the wish to enjoy unlawful pleasures to any extent, and not reap any painful consequences. It is such men who regard the universe as a “sorry scheme of things”. They want the universe to bend to their will and desire; want lawlessness, not law; but the wise man bends his will and subjects his desires to the Divine Order, and he sees the universe as the glorious perfection of an infinitude of parts.

To perceive it, is the beatific vision; to know it, is the beatific bliss.

 Book of Meditations
&
Thoughts for the Day
For Every Day in the Year

A combination of two books: 'Morning and Evening Thoughts' by James Allen, published 1909 and 'James Allen's Book of Meditations' published 1913.