Echoes

If you wish to have leisure for your mind, either be a poor man, or resemble a poor man. Study cannot be helpful unless you take pains to live simply; and living simply is voluntary poverty.

Cherish that which is within you, and shut off that which is without; for much knowledge is a curse.

It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye.

Your vision will become clear only when you can look into your own heart. Without, everything seems discordant; only within does it coalesce into unity. Who looks outside dreams; who looks inside awakes.

Therefore, this terror of the mind and the darkness must be dispelled not by the rays of the sun or the bright light of day, but by the appearance and reasoning of nature.

You will hear every day the maxims of a low prudence. You will hear, that the first duty is to get land and money, place and name. "What is this Truth you seek? What is this Beauty?" men will ask, with derision. If, nevertheless, God have called any of you to explore truth and beauty, be bold, be firm, be true. When you shall say, "As others do, so will I. I renounce, I am sorry for it, my early visions; I must eat the good of the land, and let learning and romantic expectations go, until a more convenient season." — then dies the man in you; then once more perish the buds of art, and poetry, and science, as they have died already in a thousand thousand men. The hour of that choice is the crisis of your history; and see that you hold yourself fast by the intellect. ... Bend to the persuasion which is flowing to you from every object in Nature, to be its tongue to the heart of man, and to show the besotted world how passing fair is wisdom.

Let us be silent, that we may hear the whisper of the gods.

The Tao is like a bellows: it is empty yet infinitely capable. The more you use it, the more it produces; the more you talk of it, the less you understand.

Those who are slaves to their appetites cannot preserve their reason, their memory, or their senses in their full vigour; for a full belly does not produce a fine mind.

Besides the noble art of getting things done, there is the noble art of leaving things undone. The wisdom of life consists in the elimination of non-essentials.

Beware lest you lose the substance by grasping at the shadow.

In pursuit of learning, every day something is acquired. In pursuit of Tao, every day something is dropped.

Simplicity, simplicity, simplicity! I say, let your affairs be as two or three, and not a hundred or a thousand; instead of a million count half a dozen, and keep your accounts on your thumb-nail.

He needs no library, for he has not done thinking; no church, for he is himself a prophet; no statute book, for he hath the Lawgiver; no money, for he is value itself; no road, for he is at home where he is.

Do not go by revelation; Do not go by tradition; Do not go by hearsay; Do not go on the authority of sacred texts; Do not go on the grounds of pure logic; Do not go by a view that seems rational; Do not go by reflecting on mere appearances; Do not go along with a considered view because you agree with it; Do not go along on the grounds that the person is competent; Do not go along because "the recluse is our teacher." Kalamas, when you yourselves know: These things are unwholesome, these things are blameworthy; these things are censured by the wise; and when undertaken and observed, these things lead to harm and ill, abandon them... Kalamas, when you know for yourselves: These are wholesome; these things are not blameworthy; these things are praised by the wise; undertaken and observed, these things lead to benefit and happiness, having undertaken them, abide in them.

In silence and in stillness a devout soul maketh progress, and learneth the mysteries of Holy Scripture.

Be a lamp unto yourself, be a refuge to yourself. Take yourself to no external refuge. Hold fast to the Truth as a lamp; hold fast to the Truth as a refuge.

Knowing others is intelligence; knowing yourself is true wisdom. Mastering others is strength; mastering yourself is true power.

The fashion of this world passeth away and I would fain occupy myself with the things that are abiding.

It is himself he is approaching, no other; and he should begin by turning resolutely away from all devices that are popularly believed to indicate style — all mannerisms, tricks, adornments.

To account nothing of one’s self, and to think always kindly and highly of others, this is great and perfect wisdom.

Come forth into the light of things, let Nature be your teacher.

No one can lead a happy life, or even one that is bearable, without the pursuit of wisdom, and the perfection of wisdom is what makes the happy life. Yet even the beginnings of wisdom make life bearable. But this conviction must be firmly grasped and not merely adopted in words, if we wish to draw any strength from what we know.

Everyone sees the unseen in proportion to the clarity of his heart, and that depends upon how much he has polished it. Whoever has polished it more sees more — more unseen forms become manifest to him.

I eat only what is enough to sustain my life. My food is bread, soup, an egg, and a little meat. And the amount I eat is no more than my body can easily digest.