Humanity is moving in a circle. The progress in mechanical things of the past hundred years has proceeded at the cost of losing many other things which perhaps were much more important for it.
One of the best means for arousing the wish to work on yourself is to realize that you may die at any moment. But first you must learn how to keep it in mind.
It is the same with everything else, with food, with pleasures, with sleep; with everything there is a limit to what is necessary. After this “sin” begins. This is something that must be grasped, a “sin” is something which is not necessary.
It is the greatest mistake to think that man is always one and the same. A man is never the same for long. He is continually changing. He seldom remains the same even for half an hour.
Personality in man is what is “not his own” . . . what come from outside, what he has learned, or reflects, all traces of exterior impressions left in the memory.
If a sufficient number of people who wanted to stop war really did gather together, they would first of all begin by making war upon those who disagreed with them. And it is still more certain that they would make war on people who also want to stop wars but in another way.
