FROM PASSION TO PEACE/PART 7
7.
Peace
WHERE
PASSION is, peace is not; where peace is, passion is not. To know this is to
master the first letter in the divine language of perfect deeds. To know that
passion and peace cannot dwell together is to be well prepared to renounce the
lesser and embrace the greater.
Men
pray for peace, yet cling to passion. They foster strife, yet pray for heavenly
rest. This is ignorance, profound spiritual ignorance. It is not to know the
first letter in the alphabet of things divine.
Hatred
and love, strife and peace, cannot dwell together in the same heart. Where one
is admitted as a welcome guest, the other will be turned away as an unwelcome
stranger. He who despises another will be despised by others. He who opposes
his fellow man will himself be resisted. He should not be surprised, and mourn,
that men are divided. He should know that he is propagating strife. He should
understand his lack of peace.
He
is brave who conquers another; but he who conquers himself is supremely noble.
He who is victorious over another may, in turn, be defeated; but he who overcomes
himself will never be subdued.
By
the way of self-conquest is Perfect Peace achieved. Man cannot understand it,
cannot approach it, until he sees the supreme necessity of turning away from
the fierce fighting of things without, and entering the noble warfare against
evils within. He who has realized that the enemy of the world is within, and
not without; that his own ungoverned thoughts are the source of confusion and
strife; that his own unchastened desires are the violators of his peace, and of
the peace of the world; such a man is already on the Saintly Way.
If a
man has conquered lust and anger, hatred and pride, selfishness and greed, he
has conquered the world. He has slain the enemies of peace, and peace remains
with him.
Peace
does not fight; is not partisan; has no blatant voice. The triumph of peace is
an unassailable silence.
He
who is overcome by force is not thereby overcome in his heart; he may be a
greater enemy than before. But he who is overcome by the spirit of peace is
thereby changed at heart. He that was an enemy has become a friend. Force and
strife work upon the passions and fears, but love and peace reach and reform
the heart.
The
pure-hearted and wise have peace in their hearts. It enters into their actions;
they apply it in their lives. It is more powerful than strife; it conquers
where force would fail. Its wings shield the righteous. Under its protection,
the harmless are not harmed. It affords a secure shelter from the heat of
selfish struggle. It is a refuge for the defeated, a tent for the lost, and a
temple for the pure.
Where
peace is practiced, and possessed, and known, then sin and remorse, grasping
and disappointment, craving and temptation, desiring and grieving—all the
turbulence and torment of the mind—are left behind in the dark sphere of the
self to which they belong, and beyond which they cannot go.
Beyond
where these dark shadows move, the radiant Plains of Divine Beatitude bask in
Eternal Light, and to these, the traveler on the High and Holy Way comes in due
time. From the blinding swamps of passion, through the thorny forests of many
vanities, across the arid deserts of doubt and despair, he travels on, not
turning back nor straying his course. He ever moves toward his sublime
destination, until at last he comes, a humble and lowly, yet strong and radiant
conqueror, to the beautiful City of Peace.
END
OF THIS BOOK.
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