| It is the natural right of every human being to be happy | | | | information that would be used with more or less skill. |
| and to escape all the miseries of life. Happiness is the | | | | The alternative idea is that the physical man, and all |
| normal condition, as natural as the landscapes and the | | | | that constitutes his life in the physical world, is a very |
| seasons. | | | | partial expression of the self. That in the ego of each |
| It is unnatural to suffer and it is only because of our | | | | there is practically unlimited power and wisdom. |
| ignorance that we do suffer. Happiness is the product | | | | These may be brought through into expression in the |
| of wisdom. To attain perfect wisdom, to comprehend | | | | physical world as the physical body and its invisible |
| fully the purpose of life, to realize completely the | | | | counterparts, which together create the complex |
| relationship of human beings to each other, is to put an | | | | vehicle of the ego's manifestation. |
| end to all suffering and to escape every ill and evil that | | | | That in exact proportion, conscious effort is given to |
| afflicts us. | | | | such self-development will spiritual illumination be |
| Why do we suffer in life? Because in the scheme of | | | | achieved and wisdom attained. Thus, the light that |
| nature we are being forced forward in evolution and | | | | leads to happiness is kindled from within and the |
| we lack the spiritual illumination that alone can light the | | | | evolutionary journey that all are making may be |
| way and enable us to move safely among the | | | | robbed of its suffering. |
| obstacles that lie before us. | | | | Why does death bring misery? Chiefly because it |
| Usually we do not even see, or suspect the presence | | | | separates us from those we love. The only other |
| of, trouble until it suddenly leaps upon us like a | | | | reason why death brings grief or fear is because we |
| concealed tiger. One day our family circle is complete | | | | do not understand it and don't comprehend the part it |
| and happy. A week later death has come and gone | | | | plays in human evolution. But the moment our |
| and joy is replaced with agony. | | | | ignorance gives way to comprehension, such fear |
| Today we have a friend. Tomorrow he will be an | | | | vanishes and a serene happiness takes its place. |
| enemy and we don't know why. A little while ago we | | | | Why do we have enemies from whose words or |
| had wealth and all material luxuries. There was a | | | | acts we suffer? Because in our limited physical |
| sudden change and now we have only poverty and | | | | consciousness we do not perceive the unity of all life |
| misery and yet we seek in vain for a reason why this | | | | and realize that our wrong thinking and doing must |
| should be. There was a time when we had health and | | | | react upon us, through other people, a situation from |
| strength; but they have both departed and no trace of | | | | which there is no possible escape except through |
| a reason appears. | | | | ceasing to think evil and then patiently awaiting the time |
| Aside from these greater tragedies of life, innumerable | | | | when the causes we have already generated are fully |
| things of lesser consequence continually bring to us | | | | exhausted. |
| little miseries and minor heartaches. We most intently | | | | When spiritual illumination comes, and we no longer |
| desire to avoid them, but we never see them until they | | | | stumble in the night of ignorance, the last enemy will |
| strike us, until in the darkness of our ignorance we | | | | disappear and we shall make no more enemies |
| stumble upon them. | | | | forever. |
| The thing we lack is the spiritual illumination that will | | | | Why do people suffer from poverty and disease? |
| enable us to look far and wide, finding the hidden | | | | Only because of our blundering ignorance that makes |
| causes of human suffering and revealing the method | | | | their existence possible for us, and because we do not |
| by which they may be avoided. | | | | comprehend their meaning and their lessons, nor know |
| If we can reach illumination, the evolutionary journey | | | | the attitude to assume toward them. |
| can be made both comfortably and swiftly. It is as | | | | If we had the wisdom to understand why they come |
| though we must pass through a long, dark room filled | | | | to people, why they are necessary factors in their |
| with furniture loosely scattered about. | | | | evolution, they wouldn't burden us any more. When |
| In the darkness our progress would be slow and | | | | nature's lesson is fully learned, these silent teachers will |
| painful and our bruises many. But if we could flip the | | | | vanish. That's the way it is with all forms of suffering |
| switch that turns on the light, we could then make the | | | | that we experience. They are at once reactions from |
| same journey quickly and with perfect safety and | | | | our ignorant mistakes and instructors that attempt to |
| comfort. | | | | point out a better way. |
| The old method of education was to store the mind | | | | When we understand the lessons they teach, they are |
| with as many facts, or supposed facts, as could be | | | | no longer necessary and disappear. It is not by the |
| accumulated and to give a certain exterior polish to the | | | | outward acquisition of facts that men become wise |
| personality. The theory was that when a man was | | | | and great. It is by developing the soul from within until it |
| born he was a completed human being and that all | | | | illuminates the brain with that flood of light called genius. |
| that could be done for him was to load him up with | | | | |