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BYWAYS TO BLESSEDNESS 47

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 disciples to explain the distinction between good
and evil, and holding His hand with the 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 now 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 that 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 “too pure eyes to behold evil.”
Knowing the nature of evil, what does it behove a man to do? It behoves him to live only in that
which is good: therefore if a man condemn 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 regard as mine 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 of stainless vision sees the
deeds, themselves as the 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 house-hold, 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-Mother, being of the same essence and making for the same goal, and he regards all
men and women as his brothers and sisters, makes no divisions and distinctions, sees none as evil,
but is at peace with all. Happy is he who attains to this blessed state.