The Majesty of Calmness; individual problems and posibilities by William George Jordan
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page 5 of 40 (12%)
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wicked. It requires moral courage to see, without flinching, material
prosperity coming to men who are dishonest; to see politicians rise into prominence, power and wealth by trickery and corruption; to see virtue in rags and vice in velvets; to see ignorance at a premium, and knowledge at a discount. To the man who is really calm these puzzles of life do not appeal. He is living his life as best he can; he is not worrying about the problems of justice, whose solution must be left to Omniscience to solve. When man has developed the spirit of Calmness until it becomes so absolutely part of him that his very presence radiates it, he has made great progress in lite. Calmness cannot be acquired of itself and by itself; it must come as the culmination of a series of virtues. What the world needs and what individuals need is a higher standard of living, a great realizing sense of the privilege and dignity of life, a higher and nobler conception of individuality. With this great sense of calmness permeating an individual, man becomes able to retire more into himself, away from the noise, the confusion and strife of the world, which come to his ears only as faint, far-off rumblings, or as the tumult of the life of a city heard only as a buzzing hum by the man in a balloon. The man who is calm does not selfishly isolate himself from the world, for he is intensely interested in all that concerns the welfare of humanity. His calmness is but a Holy of Holies into which he can retire _from_ the world to get strength to live _in_ the world. He realizes that the full glory of individuality, the crowning of his self-control is,--the majesty of calmness. |
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