Speaker 1: Seeing no evil. The solid, solid universe is pervious to
love with bandaged eyes, he never errs around below above
his blinding light. His flingeth white on God's and Satan's brood,
and reconciles by mystic wiles the evil and the good. Emerson.
If thou thinkest evil, be thou sure thine acte will
bear the shadow of the stain. And if thy thought
be perfect, then thy deed will be as of the perfect,
true and pure. After Confucius, after much practice and forgiveness,
and having cultivated the spirit of forgiveness up to a
certain point, knowledge of the actual nature of good and evil,
dawns upon the mind, and a man begins to understand
how thoughts and motives are formed in the human heart,
how they develop, and how they take birth in the
form of actions. This marks the opening of a new
vision in the mind, the commencement of a nobler, higher,
diviner life, for the man now begins to perceive that
there is no necessity to resist or resent the actions
of others towards him, whatever those actions may be, and
that all along his resentment has been caused by his
own ignorance, and that his own bitterness of spirit is wrong.
Having arrived thus far, he will take himself with some
questionings as these, Why this continual retaliation and forgiveness? Why
this tormenting anger against another? And then this repentance and
forgiveness is not forgiveness the taking back of one's anger,
the giving up of one's resentment. And if anger and
resentment are good and necessary, why repent of them and
give them up? If it is so beautiful, so sweet,
so peaceful, to get rid of all feelings of bitterness
and utterly and wholly forgive, would it not still be
more beautiful and sweet and peaceful, Never to grow bitter
at all, never to no anger, never to resent as
evil the action of another, but always to live in
the experience of that calm, pure, blissful love which is
known when an act of forgiveness is done, an all
unruly passion towards another is put away. If another has
done me wrong, is not my hatred towards him wrong?
And can one wrong right another? Moreover, has he, by
his wrong really injured me? Or has he injured himself?
Am I not injured by my own wrong rather than
by his? Why then do I grow angry? Why do
I resent retaliate and engage in bitter thoughts. Is it
not because my pride is piqued, or my vanity wounded,
or my selfishness thwarted? Is it not because my blind
animal passions are around and allowed to subdue my better nature?
Seeing that I am hurt by another person's attitude towards
me because of my own pride or vanity or ungoverned
and unpurified passions, would it not be better to look to
the wrong in myself rather than the wrong in another,
to get rid of pride and vanity and passion, and
so avoid being hurt at all by such self questionings
and their elucidation in the light of mild thoughts in
dispassionate conduct, a man gradually overcoming passion and rising out
of the ignorance which gave rise to passion, will at
last reach that blessed state in which he will cease
to see evil in others, and will dwell in universal
good will and love and peace. Not that he will
cease to see ignorance and folly, Not that he will
cease to see suffering and sorrow and misery, Not that
he will cease to distinguish between acts that are pure
and impure, right and wrong, put away passion and prejudice.
He will see these things in full, clear light of knowledge,
and exactly as they are. But he will cease to
see anything, any evil power in another, which can do
him injury, which he must violently oppose and strive to crush,
and against which he must guard himself. Having arrived at
right understanding of evil by purging it away from his
own heart, he sees that it is a thing that
does not call for hatred and fear and resentment, but
for consideration, compassion, and love. Shakespeare, through one of his characters, says,
there is no darkness but ignorance. All evil is ignorance
is dense darkness of mind, and the removal of sin
from one's mind is coming out of darkness into spiritual light.
Evil is the negation of good, just as darkness is
the negation or absence of light. And what is there
in a negation to an anger or resentment when night
settles down upon the world, who is so foolish as
to rail at the darkness? The enlightened man likewise does
not accuse or condemn the spiritual darkness in men's hearts,
which is manifested in the form of sin, though by
gentle reproof he may sometimes point out where the light lies. Now,
the ignorance to which I refer as evil, or as
the source of evil, is twofold. There is wrongdoing which
is committed without any knowledge of good and evil, and
where there is no choice, this is unconscious wrongdoing. Then
there is wrongdoing which is done in the knowledge that
it ought not to be done. This is conscious wrongdoing.
But both unconscious and conscious wrongdoing arise in ignorance, that is,
ignorance of the real nature and painful consequences of the wrongdoing.
Why does a man continue to do certain things which
he feels he ought not to do if he knows
that what he is doing is wrong? Where lies the ignorance?
He continues to do those things because his knowledge of
them is incomplete. He only knows he ought not to
do them by certain precepts, without any qualms of conscience within.
But he does not fully and completely understand what he
is doing. He knows that certain acts bring him immediate pleasure,
and so, in spite of the troubled conscience which follows
that pleasure, he continues to commit them. He is convinced
that the pleasure is good and desirable and therefore to
be enjoyed. He does not know that pleasure and pain
are one, but thinks he can have the one without
the other. He has no knowledge of the law which
governs human actions. He never thinks of associating his sufferings
with his own wrongdoing, but believes they are caused by
the wrong doing of others, or are the mysterious dispensations
of providence, and therefore not to be inquired into or understood.
He is seeking happiness and does those things which he
believes will bring him most enjoyment. But he acts in
entire ignorance of the hidden and inevitable consequences which attached
to his actions. Set a man to me once, who
was the victim of a bad habit. I know the
habit is a bad one, and that it does me
more harm than good. And I said, if you know
what you are doing is bad and harmful, why do
you continue to do it? And he replied, because it
is pleasant and I like it. This man, of course,
did not really know that his habit was bad. He
had been told that it was, and he thought he
knew or believed it was, but in reality he thought
it was good, and that it was conducive to his
happiness and well being, and therefore he continued to practice it.
When a man knows by experience that a thing is bad,
and that every time he does it he in his body, mind,
or both. When his knowledge of that thing is so
complete that he is acquainted with its whole train of
baneful effects, then he cannot only not do it any longer,
he cannot even desire to do it, And even the
pleasure that was formerly in that thing becomes painful. No
man would put a venomous snake in his pocket because
it is prettily colored. He knows that a deadly sting
lurks in those beautiful markings. Nor when a man knows
the unavoidable pain and hurt which lie hidden in wrong
thoughts and actions, does he continue to think and commit them.
Even the immediate pleasure which formerly he greedily sought is
gone from them, their surface attractiveness has vanished. He is
no longer ignorant concerning their true nature. He sees them
as they are. I knew a young man who was
in business, and although a member of a church and
occupying the position a voluntary religious instructor. He told me
that it was absolutely necessary to practice lying and deception
in business, otherwise sure and certain ruin would follow. He said,
he knew lying was wrong, but while he remained in business,
he must continue to do it. Upon questioning him, I found,
of course that he never tried truth and honesty in
his business, had not even thought of trying the better way.
So firmly convinced was he that it was not possible
for him to know whether it would be productive or ruin.
Now did this young man know that lying was wrong?
There was a perceptual sense only in which he knew,
but there was a deeper and more real sense in
which he did not know. He had been taught to
regard lying as wrong. In his conscience bore out that teaching,
but he believed that it brought him profit, prosperity, and happiness,
and that honesty would bring him loss, poverty, and misery.
In a word, he regarded lying deep in his heart
as the right thing to do, and honesty as the
wrong practice. He had no knowledge whatever of the real
nature of the act of lyne, how it is on
the instant of its committal loss of character, loss of
self respect, loss of power, usefulness and influence, and loss
of blessedness, and how it unerringly leads to the loss
of reputation and loss of material profit and prosperity. Only
when such a man begins to consider happiness of others,
prefers to embrace the loss which he fears, rather than
clutch at the gain which he desires, will he obtain
that real knowledge which lofty moral conduct alone can reveal.
And then, experiencing the greater blessedness, he will see how
all along he has been deceiving and defrauding himself rather
than others, has been living in darkest ignorance and self delusion.
These two common instances of wrongdoing will serve to illustrate
and make plainer to those of my readers, who, while
searching for truth, are as yet doubtful, uncertain, and confused.
The deep truth that all sin or evil is a
condition of ignorance, and therefore to be dealt with in
a loving and not a hateful spirit. And as with
bad habits and lying, so with all sin, with lust, hatred, malice, envy, pride, vanity,
self indulgence, and selfishness in all its forms. It is
a state of spiritual darkness, the absence of the light
of truth in the heart, the negation of knowledge. Thus,
when by overcoming the wrong condition in one's heart, the
nature of evil is fully realized, and near belief gives
place to living knowledge. Evil can no longer be hatefully
condoned and violently resisted, and the wrong doer is thought
of with tender compassion. And this brings us to another
aspect of evil, namely that of individual freedom, the right
of every person to choose his own actions. Along with
the seeing of evil and others, is the desire to
convert or coerce others into one's own ways of thinking
and acting. Probably the commonest delusion in which men are
involved is that of thinking that what they themselves believe in, think,
and do is good, and all that is otherwise is evil,
and therefore to be powerfully condemned and resisted. It is
out of this delusion that all persecution springs. There are
Christians who regard all atheists as men wholly evil, as
given up to the service of an evil power. And
there are atheists who firmly believe that all Christians are
doing the greatest harm to the whole human race by
their superstitious and false doctrines. The truth is that neither
the Christian nor the atheist is ease evil, nor in
the service of evil, but each is choosing his own
way and is pursuing that course which he is convinced
is right. Let a man quietly contemplate the fact that
numbers of followers of various religions the world over are
as they ever were, engaged in condemning each other as
evil and wrong, and regarding themselves as good and right,
and it will help him to realize how all evil
is merely ignorance spiritual darkness, and earnest meditation on that
fact will be found to be one of the greatest
aids in developing greater kindness, charity, insight, and breath of mind.
The truly wise and good man sees good in all
evil in none. He has abandoned the folly of wanting
others to think and act as he thinks and acts,
for he sees men are variously constituted, are at different
points in their spiritual evolution, and must, of necessity think
and act differently. Having put away hatred, condemnation, egotism, and prejudice,
he has become enlightened, and he sees that purity, love, compassion, gentleness, patience, humility,
and unselfishness are manifestations of light and knowledge, while in
purity hatred, cruelty, passion, darkness and ignorance, and that whether
men are living in light or darkness, they are one
in all doing that which they think is necessary, are
acting in accordance with their own measure of light or darkness.
The wise man understands, and understanding he ceases from all
bitterness and accusation. Every man acts in accordance with his nature,
with his own sense of right and wrong, and is
surely gathering in the results of his own experience. There
is one supreme right which every being possesses to think
and acting as he chooses. If he chooses to think
and act selfishly, thinking of his own immediate happiness only,
and not that of others, then he will rapidly bring
upon himself, by the action of the moral law of
cause and effect, such afflictions as will cause him to
pause and consider, and so find a better way. There
is no teacher to compare with experience, no chastisement so
corrective and purifying as that which men ignorantly inflict upon themselves.
The selfish man is the ignorant man. He chooses his
own way, but it is a way which leads to suffering,
and through suffering to knowledge and bliss. The good man
is the wise man. He likewise chooses his own way,
but he chooses it in the full light of knowledge,
having passed through the stages of ignorance and suffering and
arrived at knowledge and bliss. A man begins to understand
what seeing no evil is when putting away all personal
desires in his judgments of others, so considers them from
his own standpoint, and judges their actions not from his
own standard, but from theirs. It is because men set
up arbitrary standards of right and wrong, and are anxious
that all should conform to their particular standard, that they
see evil in each other. A man is only rightly
judged when he is not judged from my standard or yours,
but from his own. And to deal with him thus
is not judgment, but it is love. It is only
when we look through the eyes of the impersonal love
that we become enlightened and see others as they really are.
And a man is approaching that love when he can
say in his heart, who am I that I should
judge another? Am I so pure and sinless that I
arraign men and pass the judgment of evil upon them? Rather,
let me humble myself and correct my own errors before
or assuming the position of supreme judge of those other men.
It was said by one of old to those who
were about to stone as evil a woman taken in
the act of committing one of the darkest sins, he
that is without sin, let him cast the first stone.
And though he who said it was without sin, yet
he took up no stone, nor passed any bitter judgment,
but said, with infinite gentleness and compassion, neither do I
condemn thee go and sin no more. In the pure
heart there is no room left where personal judgments and
hatreds can find lodgment, for it is filled to overflowing
with tenderness and love. It sees no evil. And only
as men succeed in seeing no evil in others will
they become free from sin and sorrow and suffering. No
man sees evil in himself or his own acts, except
the man who is becoming enlightened, and then he abandons
those acts which he has come to see are wrong.
Every man justifies himself in what he does, and however
evil others may regard his conduct, he himself thinks it
to be good and necessary. If he did not, he
would not and could not do it. The angry man
always justifies his anger, the covechuous man his greed, the
impure man his unchastity. The liar considers that his lying
is altogether necessary. The slanderer believes that in vilifying the
characters of those whom he dislikes and warning other people
against their evil natures, he is doing well. The thief
is convinced that stealing is the shortest and best way
to plenty, prosperity, and happiness. And even the murderer thinks
there is a ground of justification for his deed. Every
man's deeds are in accordance with the measure of his
own light or darkness, and no man can live higher
than he is or act beyond the limits of his knowledge. Nevertheless,
he can improve himself and thereby gradually increase his light
and extend the range of his knowledge. The angry man
indulges in abuse because his knowledge does not extend to
forbearance and patience not having practiced gentleness, he does not
understand it and cannot choose it, nor can he know
by its comparison with the light of gentleness the darkness
of anger. It is the same with the lire, the slanderer,
and the thief. He lives in this dark condition of
mind and action because he is limited to it by
his own immature knowledge and experience, because never having lived
in the higher conditions, he has no knowledge of them,
and it is to him as if they were non existent.
The light shineth in the darkness, and the darkness comprehendeth
it not, nor can he understand even the conditions in
which he is living, because being dark, they are necessarily
devoid of all knowledge. When a man is driven by
repeated sufferings to at last reflect upon his conduct and
comes to see that his anger are lying, or whatever
ignorant condition he may have been living in is productive
only of trouble and sorrow, he then abandons it and
commences to search for and practice the opposite and enlightened condition.
And when he is firmly established in the better way,
so that his knowledge of both conditions is complete, then
he realizes in what great darkness he has formerly lived.
This knowledge of good and evil by experience constitutes enlightenment.
When a man begins to look, as it were, through
the eyes of others, and to measure them by their
own standard and not by his, then he ceases from
seeing of evil in others, for he knows that every
man's price and standard of good and evil is different.
That there is no vice so low but some men
regarded as good, no virtue so high, but some men
regarded as evil. And what a man regards as good,
that to him is good, what he regards as evil,
that to him is evil. Nor will the purified man
who has ceased to see evil in others have any
desire to win men to his own ways or opinions,
but will rather help them in their own particular groove.
Knowing that an enlarged experience only and not merely change
of opinion, can lead to higher knowledge and greater blessedness.
It will be found that men see evil in those
who differ from them, good in those who agree with them.
The man who greatly loves himself and is enamored of
his opinions will love all those who agree with him,
and will dislike all those who disagree with him. If
ye love them that ye love ye, what reward have
ye love your enemies? Do good to them that hate you.
Egotism and vanity make men blind. Men of opposing religious
views hate and persecute each other, Men of opposing political
views fight and condemn each other. The partisan measures all
men by his own standard and sets up his judgments accordingly.
So convinced is he that he is right and others wrong,
that he at last persuades himself that to inflict cruelty
on others is both good and necessary, in order to
coerce them into his way of thinking and acting, and
so bring them to the right, his right, against their
own reason and will. Men hate, condemn, resist, and inflict
suffering upon each other, not because they are intrinsically evil,
not because they are deliberately wicked and are doing, in
the full light of truth what they know to be wrong,
but because they regard such conduct as necessary and right.
Old men are intrinsically good, but some are wiser than others,
are older in experience than others. I recently heard, in
substance the following conversation between two men whom I will
call D and E. The third person referred to as
ex as a prominent politician. E. Every man reaps the
result of his own thoughts and deeds, and suffers for
his own wrong D. If that is so, and if
no man can escape from the penalty of his evil deeds,
what an inferno some of our men in power must
be preparing for themselves. E. Whether a man is in
power or not, so long as he lives in ignorance
and sin, he will reap sorrow in suffering. D. Look
for instance at X, a man totally evil, given up
entirely to selfishness and ambition. Surely great torments are reserved
for such an other principled man. E. But how do
you know he is so evil? D by his works
his fruits. When I see a man doing evil, I
know that he is evil, and I cannot even think
of X. But I burn with righteous indignation. I am
sometimes inclined to doubt that there is an overruling power
for good. When I see such a man in a
position where he can do so much harm to others, E,
what evil is he committing? D? His whole policy is evil.
He will ruin the country if he remains in power. E.
But while there are large numbers of people who think
of X as you do. There are also large numbers,
equally intelligent, who look on him as good and able,
who admire him for his excellent qualities, and regard his
policy as beneficent and making for national progress. He owes
his position to these people. Are they all so evil? D?
They are deceived and misled? And this only makes Xes
evil all the greater, and that he can so successfully
employ his talents in deceiving others in order to gain
his own selfish ends. I hate this man. E. May
it not be possible that you are deceived? D? In
what way? E? Hatred is self deception, love is self enlightenment.
No man can see either himself or others clearly until
he ceases from hatred and practices love. D. That sounds
very beautiful, but it is impractical. When I see a
man doing evil to others and deceiving and misleading them,
I must hate him. It is right, and I should
do so. X is without a spark of conscience. E.
X may or may not be all you believe to be.
But even if he is, according to your own words,
should he be pitied and not condemned? D? How so
E you say he is without a conscience D entirely
so E, then he is a mental cripple. Do you
hate the blind because they cannot see that, dumb because
they cannot speak, or the deaf because they cannot hear?
When a captain has lost his rudder or broken his compass,
do you condemn him because he did not keep his
ship off the rocks? Do you hold him responsible for
the loss of life? If a man is totally devoid
of conscience, he is without the means of moral guidance,
and all his selfishness must perforce appear to him good
and right and proper. X may appear evil to you,
But is he evil to himself? Does he regard his
own conduct as evil? D? Whether he regards himself as
evil or not, he is evil. E. If I were
to regard you as evil because of your hatred for X,
should I be right? D? No? E? Why not D?
Because in such a case hatred is necessary, justifiable and righteous.
There is such a thing as righteous anger, righteous hatred. E.
Is there such a thing as righteous selfishness, righteous ambition?
Righteous evil? I should be quite wrong in regarding you
as evil because you are doing what you are convinced
is right, because you regard your hatred for X as
part of your duty as a man and citizen. Nevertheless,
there is a better way than that of hatred. And
it is the knowledge of this better way that prevents
me from hating X as you do, Because however wrong
his conduct might appear to me, it is not wrong
to him nor to his supporters. Moreover, all men, as
they sow D. What then, is that better way? E?
It is the way of love, the ceasing to regard
others as evil. It is a blessed and peaceful state
of heart. D. Do you mean that there is a
state which a man can reach wherein he will grow
angry when he sees people doing evil? E? No, I
do not mean that, For while a man regards others
as evil, he will continue to grow angry with them.
But I mean that a man can reach a state
of calm, insight and spotless love, wherein he sees no
evil to grow angry with, wherein he understands the various
natures of men, how they are prompted to act, and
how they reap as the harvest of their own thoughts
and deeds, the terrors of sufferings and the corn of bliss.
To reach that state is to regard all men with
compassion and love. D. The state that you picture is
a very high one. It is, no doubt a very
holy and beautiful one. But it is a state that
I should be sorry to reach, and I should pray
to be preserved from a state of mind where I
could not hate a man like X with an intense hatred. Thus,
by this conversation it will be seen that D regarded
his hatred as good. Even so, all men regard that
which they do as necessary to be done. The things
which men habitually practice are those things that they believe in.
When faith in a thing holy ceases, it ceases to
be practiced. D's individual liberty is equal to that of
other men, and he has a right to hate another
if he so wishes. Nor will he abandon his hatred
until he discovers, by the sorrow and unrest which it entails,
how wrong and foolish and blind it is, and how
by its practice he is injuring himself. A great teacher
was once asked by one of his diciples pupils to
explain the distinction between good and evil, and holding his
hand with his fingers pointing downward. He said, where is
my hand pointing? And the disciple replied, it is pointing downward.
Then turning his hand upward, the teacher asked, where is
my hand pointing? And the disciple answered, it is pointing upward. That,
said the teacher, is the distinction between evil and good.
By this simple illustration, he indicated that evil is merely
wrongly directed energy, and good rightly directed energy. And the
so called evil man becomes good by reversing his conduct.
To understand the true nature of evil, by living in
the good, is to cease to see other men as evil.
Blessed is he who, turning from the evil in others,
exerts himself in the purification of his own heart. He
shall one day become of two pure to behold evil.
Knowing the nature of evil, what does it behoove a
man to do? It behooves him to live only in
that which is good. Therefore, if a man condemned me,
I will not condemn him in return. If he revile me,
I will give him kindness. If he slander me, I
will speak of his good qualities. If he hate me,
then he greatly needs and shall receive my love with
the impatient. I will be patient with the greedy, I
will be generous, and with the violent and quarrelsome, I
will be mild and peaceable, Seeing no evil. Whom should
I hate or who should I regard as my enemy?
Were mankind, murderous or jealous upon you, my brother, my sister,
I'm so sorry for you. They are not murderous or
jealous upon me. All has been gentle with me. I
keep no account with lamentation. What have I to do
with lamentation? He who sees men as evil imagines that
behind those acts which are called wicked, there is a
corporate and substantial evil prompting those particular sins. But he
is stainless vision sees the deeds themselves as evil, and
knows that there is no evil power, no evil soul
or man behind those deeds. The substance of the universe
is good. There is no substance of evil. Good alone
is permanent. There is no fixed or permanent evil. As
brothers and sisters born of the same parents and being
of one household, love each other through all vicissitudes, see
no evil in each other, but overlook all errors and
cling together in the strong bonds of affection. Even so,
the good Man sees humanity as one spiritual family, born
of the same father and mother, being of the same
essence and making for the same goal. And he regards
all men and women as his brother's dead sisters, makes
no divisions and distinctions, seese none is evil, but is
at peace withal. Happy is he who attains to this
blessed state.