IMPORTANT
as the matter of your point of view for the facts of social life is, it is of
less moment than your viewpoint for your fellow men, for your acquaintances,
friends, relatives, your immediate family, and, most of all, yourself. You must
learn not to look upon the world as a lost and decaying thing but as a
something perfect and glorious which is going on to a most beautiful
completeness; and you must learn to see men and women not as lost and accursed
things, but as perfect beings advancing to become complete. There are no “bad” or
“evil” people. An engine, which is on the rails pulling a heavy train, is
perfect after its kind, and it is good. The power of steam, which drives it, is
good. Let a broken rail throw the engine into the ditch, and it does not become
bad or evil by being so displaced; it is a perfectly good engine, but off the
track.
The power
of steam that drives it into the ditch and wrecks it is not evil, but a
perfectly good power. So that which is misplaced or applied in an incomplete or
partial way is not evil. There are no evil people; there are perfectly good
people who are off the track, but they do not need condemnation or punishment;
they only need to get upon the rails again.
That
which is undeveloped or incomplete often appears to us as evil because of the
way we have trained ourselves to think. The root of a bulb that shall produce a
white lily is an unsightly thing; one might look upon it with disgust. But how
foolish we should be to condemn the bulb for its appearance when we know the
lily is within it. The root is perfect after its kind; it is a perfect but
incomplete lily, and so we must learn to look upon every man and woman, no
matter how unlovely in outward manifestation; they are perfect in their stage
of being and they are becoming complete.
Behold, it
is all very good.
Once we
come into a comprehension of this fact and arrive at this point of view, we
lose all desire to find fault with people, to judge them, criticize them, or
condemn them. We no longer work as those who are saving lost souls, but as
those who are among the angels, working out the completion of a glorious
heaven. We are born of the spirit and we see the kingdom of God.
We no longer see men as trees walking, but our vision is complete. We have
nothing but good words to say. It is all good; a great and glorious humanity
coming to completeness. And in our association with men this puts us into an
expansive and enlarging attitude of mind; we see them as great beings and we
begin to deal with them and their affairs in a great way.