“The startling truth is that our best efforts for civil rights, internationalpeace, population control, conservation of natural resources, andassistance to the starving of the earth—urgent as they are—will destroyrather than help if made in the present spirit. For, as things stand, wehave nothing to give. If our own riches and our own way of life are notenjoyed here, they will not be enjoyed anywhere else. Certainly theywill supply the immediate jolt of energy and hope that methedrine, andsimilar drugs, give in extreme fatigue. But peace can be made only bythose who are peaceful, and love can be shown only by those who love.No work of love will flourish out of guilt, fear, or hollowness of heart,just as no valid plans for the future can be made by those who have nocapacity for living now.”

“Peace can be made only by those who are peaceful, and love can be shown only by those who love. No work of love will flourish out of guilt, fear, or hollowness of heart, just as no valid plans for the future can be made by those who have no capacity for living now.”

“No work or love will flourish out of guilt, fear, or hollowness of heart, just as no valid plans for the future can be made by those who have no capacity for living now.”

“For man seems to be unable to live without myth, without the belief that the routine and drudgery, the pain and fear of this life have some meaning and goal in the future. At once new myths come into being – political and economic myths with extravagant promises of the best of futures in the present world. These myths give the individual a certain sense of meaning by making him part of a vast social effort, in which he loses something of his own emptiness and loneliness. Yet the very violence of these political religions betrays the anxiety beneath them – for they are but men huddling together and shouting to give themselves courage in the dark.”

“We therefore work, notfor the work's sake, but for money—and money is supposed to get uswhat we really want in our hours of leisure and play. In the UnitedStates even poor people have lots of money compared with the wretchedand skinny millions of India, Africa, and China, while our middle andupper classes (or should we say "income groups") are as prosperous asprinces. Yet, by and large, they have but slight taste for pleasure. Moneyalone cannot buy pleasure, though it can help. For enjoyment is an artand a skill for which we have little talent or energy.”

“What is the next step, the practical application?—I will answer that theabsolutely vital thing is to consolidate your understanding, to becomecapable of enjoyment, of living in the present, and of the disciplinewhich this involves. Without this you have nothing to give.”

“Tomorrow and plans for tomorrow can have no significance at all unless you are in full contact with the reality of the present, since it is in the present and only in the present that you live. There is no other reality than present reality, so that, even if one were to live for endless ages, to live for the future would be to miss the point everlastingly.”