did you know that you are a wonderful person in your own right
that life has set a unique stamp of individuality on you
and that no one else can ever take your place in the scheme of things
no two persons have identical thumb prints
no two blades of grass are alike no two leaves of a tree
no two snowflakes ever are identical so often we single out some character in
history or some person we know and think how i wish that i might be like him and
yet this would be suicide to the real self foreign life had seen
flip to make all of us just a little
different then we do not have to be exactly like
others if two people were exactly alike one of
them would be unnecessary in the scheme of things
yes you and i are individuals but we are individuals rooted in one life
each drawing directly from it the power the imagination
and the will to live as a personality of god
and to do this in a unique and a different manner
but of course unity does not mean uniformity
we can live together in harmony and with cooperation without infringing on the
rights of others this is a real meaning of democracy and
of personal freedom if a thousand artists were painting the
same landscape no two drawings would be identical
for each would put something on his canvas
that the landscape told him that it didn't tell
anyone else so it is with everything we do
one of the great lessons of life is to learn to be yourself
to have confidence in the high impulses that come to you as an individual and to
know that a power greater than you are has willed you to be a little
different from all the rest if each is a unique
personality then it follows that all the power there
is and all the presence there is is back of every individual
there is nothing monotonous in this great scheme of things which we call
life the power to live and the intelligence
to know what to do exists at the very center of your being
and you didn't put it there and you couldn't destroy it if you try
sensible thing to do is to accept it and work in cooperation with life
it is my personal conviction that there is a spirit of the real self
that accompanies us through life but that we are only
very dimly aware of it there is an ancient
fable which says that when the gods decided to create man and make him
divine they wish to hide his divinity in some
place that would be difficult for him to
discover so they held a consultation in which one
of the gods said let us hide man's divinity in the air but
another one replied no someday he will create a machine and fly
through the air and discover his divinity yet another god suggested
that man's divinity should be hidden at the bottom of the sea
while another said no we have given man such
power and such an imagination that someday
he will make a machine that will penetrate the depths of the ocean
so after much discussion they all agreed that the best place to hide man's
divinity the place where he would be least likely
to look for it would be deep within himself deep within
man for they said he will always be looking
outside himself and he will never think that the thing
he is looking for he already has so they hid his divinity
at the very center of his being and left him alone to discover it
but always there was an urge in him feeling that there is something still
undiscovered something that could make everything
right if he knew how to find it and how to use it
and it was this divine thing within him that jesus discovered
his intimate and individual relationship to the one living spirit it was this
that gave him the power he had and all the miracles he performed
and all the wonderful signs that followed his life
were evidence enough that he had laid hold of a power
that other people knew nothing about yet they already possessed the things which
they were looking for in someone else and don't you think this must be what
jesus meant when he said that it is neither in the mountain nor at jerusalem
but within yourselves that you must discover the real kingdom
the actual spark of life the pattern of your own divinity
how true it is that we have searched everywhere
we have traveled far and near and searched high and low
to find that something that can make us full
and give us joy and living and seldom indeed has anyone realized
that the wonderful person he is the thing he is really looking for
is really the divinity already hidden within himself
and this is god's good man isn't it true that even many of our
success stories are but very weak examples
of how we should imitate others do they really teach us
that there is a deep self which does not have to imitate anyone
you can read shakespeare all your life and never become shakespeare you can be
familiar with all the poems ever written without being able to produce three
verses that are original you can imitate all the great actors and
still give a poor performance this alone should teach us that
imitation is suicide you and i will have to learn how to live
by living we have lived too much by imitation
now let's try a new experiment let's make up our minds
that god the supreme intelligence has hidden within
each of us the essence of his own being and let us alone to discover it and in
discovering it to find ourselves first of all
we must have a conviction there is such a real self
hid behind this mask that we are wearing you and i did not implant this divinity
within us this is the gift of life
how can you account for those inner strivings you have
the feeling that stirs within you unless it is an echo of some
deep self wishing to become revealed you see life has made us
individual what we call our personality is merely the use we are making of a
presence within us that waits on our recognition of it
of course the world is full of skepticism and doubt
and a lot of what we call or i think perhaps
miscall hard-headed practical people who are so apt to treat lightly the
thought that man might be divine but i am not quite sold on the idea that
you can weigh everything in a scale or measure it with a yardstick you might
kill a nightingale but you will not have captured his song
the king that produced beethoven's symphony was beethoven himself
it wasn't some external or internal piece of mechanism
it was his own soul that projected these symphonies
and when he left this world he took their cause along with him
even though he did leave behind a beautiful echo
for all to hear yes you can dissect the human body
and still its life will have eluded you you can analyze the brain and not find
one single thought in there no man is not just an
aggregate of mechanical reactions i have never yet seen a typewriter that
can of its own accord produce a beautiful pawn
nor have i seen a printing press that can produce a sermon
on the mount so at the expense of being thought a little
impractical by those who are so filled with common sense that it oozes out of
them like perspiration on a hot day you and i
will do well to remain true to dream a dream no
analyst has ever analyzed because it isn't a dream at all it is
the one solid and final reality about us we are a spirit
right now and that spirit which you are is rooted
in the eternal spirit which is god the living spirit almighty deep within
us deep within you and me and within all
people something was planted by life and in deep deep within us and trying to
come forth into the footage of endeavor you and i and all people have our roots
in an abiding reality and how shall the rose tree blossom red
unless it draws its being from that life in which it is rooted and
how shall one rose be different from another
a left unless life is imported to reach in some unique some individual
expression of its own feeling its own beauty its own fragrance
so you and i would like to have that great big wonderful personality
we would like to be the person we have dreamed of
we have nearly been looking in the wrong place it is time for us to stop and look
and listen while we are on the crossroads of
terrific human events never awaits news from the kingdom of
heaven and who will bring it you are the only
one who can bring it to yourself i am the only one who can bring it to
myself we are the only ones who can reveal it to
each other when i say you and i and we we
mean that the universe and god come silent and alone to each one of us
in the stillness of our own soul god is life and in him there is no death
god is love and perfect love tests out fear
as we enter into this life and this love and commune with this divine presence
let us know that we are one with a living spirit
we know that love guides us now in all of us
we enter into our divine inheritance today
we know that in the father's house there are many mansions
today is god's day and tomorrow will be god's day
and so will all the tomorrows that ever shall transpire
love prepares the way for us here and love prepares the way for us
there we sing the song of eternity we chant the hymn of the living but he
is not there he is risen and we think of our loved
ones who have entered into that larger life
and we know that they are not there they are just away we know that they
walk in the garden of god and walk back to us a kiss from the
kingdom of heaven believing that our word is the seed of
good and that the divine giver of all life
wills us to have a harvest we plant this seed in the warm rich soil of
divine love and bury it deep in our faith
and we know that from this seed which is our word
and from the power of god which is greater than we are
we shall receive a harvest this is the springtime of our hope
and we desire that love peace and confidence shall envelop us
and everyone we meet as we sit in the garden of god
which is our garden of eden we desire the joy and happiness shall go forth
from us to make glad the life of everyone we
meet we are planting these seeds of happiness
a friendship of love of good will for everyone and for the whole
world not alone in our garden do we wish these
seeds to grow but we pray that we may broadcast them
wherever we walk and uniting with all others in
faith we rest in the supreme assurance that that life which the whole world
seeks after shall find fruitage in the garden of
love that we are planting today