lands, exacted obeisance, were puffed up with vanity, pomp and glory.
But their glory passed like black smoke issuing from a crater and left nothing behind but a mention on the page of the chronicler.
The great, the wise, the brave, the beautiful—where are they alas? They have all mingled with the clay, and that which overtook them will overtake us also: and it will overtake those that shall come after us.
But take courage, all ye famous chiefs and true friends and faithful subjects, let us strive toward that Heaven where all is eternal and where is no corruption nor dissolution.
The darkness is the cradle of the sun, and the splendor of the stars needs the. gloom of the night.
Teizkuko Nezagual Copotl. (About fourteen centuries before the birth of Christ.)
7. Death is inevitable for all that is bom even as birth is inevitable for all that is to die. Therefore we do not sorrow because of that which is inevitable. The former state of living creatures is unknown to us, their present state is manifest, and their future state can not be known— why then worry or be agitated? Some people look upon the soul as upon a marvel, others hear and speak about it with astonishment, but no one knows anything certain about it.
The portals of Heaven are opened to you just as far as you need. Free yourself from cares and anxieties and direct your soul to the spiritual. Let your actions be guided by yourself and not by events. Be not of those whose purpose in action is the hope of a reward. Be attentive, do your duty, abandon all thoughts of consequences, so that
it be a matter of indifference to you whether things end agreeably to you or disagreeably Bahawad Hita,
8. You would be delivered from sins, and life by enfeebling your body and its passions assists you. This always gives you a longing to go ahead, to leave the body, a longing for separateness. Set your life upon deliverance from sins, and your ailments, all your bodilj ills and death itself will be blessed.
You are growing feeble and old, your body is dying, but you are gaining spiritual vigor, growth and birth.
9. We are like the passengers upon some gigantic ship, whose master has a passenger list that is unknown to us and contains the destination of the passengers. Until we are put ashore what else can we do but obey the laws of the ship, live in peace, concord and love with our fellow travelers and thus spend the time allotted to us?
10. Does transformation terrify you ? Nothing is accomplished without change. Water can not be heated without a transformation of fuel. Nourishment is impossible without a transformation of food. The whole of earthly existence is a transformation. Understand that the transformation which awaits you has the same meaning, that it also is necessary in the very nature of things. Take heed of only one thing—that you do not commit any act contrary to the true nature of man, but it is always necessary to act in all things in accordance with the indications of nature. Marcus Aurelius,
11. This would be a terrible world if suffering did not result in good. It would be a monstrous device designed for the sole purpose of tormenting people physically and spiritually. If this were so, this world that brings forth evil for no good future purpose, but idly and aimlessly, would
be inexpressibly immoral. It would seem to entice people designedly for the purpose of inflicting sufferings upon them. It chastises you from birth, it mixes bitterness with every cup of joy and renders death an unceasing threatening horror. And of course, if there be no God and immortality, the loathing of life shown by people would be perfectly intelligible. It is evoked in their hearts by the existing order, or rather disorder, by the horrible moral chaos, as we might properly name it.
But if there only is a God and an eternity ahead of us, all things are changed. We discern good in evil, light in darkness and hope dispels despair.
Which of the two suppositions has more verisimilitude: can we admit that moral creatures—human beings— could be put into the position of justly cursing the existing order of the world, while a way is open to them that would solve the contradiction? They are bound to curse the world and the day of their birth if there be no God or future life. But, if on the contrary, both exist, life becomes a blessing and the world a place of moral perfecting and of a boundless increase of happiness and holiness.
Erasmus.
12. Pascal says that if we saw ourselves when dreaming always in one position, but in waking hours in different positions, we should learn to regard dreams as a reality and reality as a dream. This is not quite accurate. Reality differs from dreams in the fact that in life we possess the capacity of acting in accordance with the demands of our morality; but in dreams we know that we frequently commit repulsive and immoral actions that are not characteristic of us and we cannot restrain them. Thus we might rather say that if we did not know a life in which we had more power of gratifying the demands of our moral na-
THE PATHWAY OF LIFE \77
ture than in our dreams, we should consider dreams as the true life, nor should we doubt that this is not the real life. Now is not all of our life, from the day of our birth until the moment of death, even with its dreams, in its turn a dream vision which we merely mistake for reality and for real life, and merely fail to doubt its reality because we do not know the life in which our freedom to follow the moral demands of our soul would be even greater than that which we enjoy now ?
13. If this tiny fragment of life is your all, take heed to make of it all you can. Said Ben Hamid.
14. "How can we live not knowing what awaits us?" say some. And yet only when we live without thinking of what awaits us, merely for the manifestation of the love within us, only then the true life begins.
15. It is frequently said: "What is the good of this to me, it is time for me to die." Whatever is no good to us because it is time for us to die, is no good to us anyway and should not be done at any time. But there is one concern which is always of importance, and the nearer we are to death, the more needful it is: it is the concern of our soul. And this concern is to bring betterment into your soul.
16. Love eliminates not only the dread of death, but even the thought of it. An old peasant woman remarked to her daughter how happy she was that she was dying in the summer time. And when the girl asked why, the dying woman answered that she was glad because it is so hard to dig a grave in the winter time and much easier to do so in the summer time. Death was easy for this old woman because to the last dying moment she was thinking of others and not of herself. Do the works of love, and there will be no death for you.
pared to drop it at any moment. Gai^ yourself to see whether you can detach yourself. Only then can you do well whatever you are doing.
The expectation of death teaches us so to act.
18. When you came to this world you wept, and all around you rejoiced. So live that when you come to leave the world all around you shall weep, white you alone are smiling.
V.
. Being Mindful of Death is a Help to Spiritual Life
1. Since man has given time to'meditation it has always been recognized that nothing so stimulates moral life as much as being mindful of physical death. But falsely directed medical skill has for its aim the deliverance of people from death, teaching them to hope for an escape from death, to banish all thoughts of physical death and thus depriving them of an important stimulus to moral life.