But if men will not forego all pre-imbibed opinions, prejudices, and conceptions of mind, however rivetted into them by traditions, custom, veneration of elders, and secular advantages, to hearken unto and receive whatever he shall speak unto them, and that with a humble, lowly frame of heart, they will never learn the truth, nor attain a "full assurance of understanding" in the mysteries of God.

Hast thou permitted worldliness, ambition, greediness of study, to eat up other duties, the duties wherein thou oughtest to hold constant communion with God, for some long season?

Nor can we be any of us delivered from this snare, at this season, without a watchful endeavour to keep and preserve our minds in the constant contemplation of things spiritual and heavenly, proceeding from the prevalent adherence of our affections unto them, as will appear in the ensuing discourse.

Read Civilization on Trial and The World and the West.

Americans have been conditioned to respect newness, whatever it costs them.

We shed skins in life, to keep living.

He] languidly went through the motions, like a disbelieving angel, misplaced in all this adult foolishness.

Failure is not Fatal, but Failure to CHANGE can be.

Reputation is what others perceive you as being, and their opinion may be right or wrong. Character, however, is what you really are, and nobody knows that but you.

Anybody who is imitating somebody else, no matter who it us, is heading in the wrong direction. It is impossible to become like somebody else. Your only hope is to become more fully yourself.

It's very important as a beginner that you understand right from the start that meditation is about befriending your thinking, about holding it gently in awareness, no matter what is on your mind in a particular moment. It is not about shutting off your thoughts or changing them in any way.

As you begin befriending your breath, you see immediately that unawareness is everywhere.