Anthony De Mello

To a visitor who described himself as a seeker after Truth the Master said, "If what you seek is Truth, there is one thing you must have above all else."

"I know. An overwhelming passion for it."

"No. An unremitting readiness to admit you may be wrong."

Silence is not the absence of sound, but the absence of self.

Much advance publicity was made for the address the Master would deliver on The Destruction of the World and a large crowd gathered at the monastery grounds to hear him.

The address was over in less than a minute. All he said was:

"These things will destroy the human race: politics without principle, progress without compassion, wealth without work, learning without silence, religion without fearlessness and worship without awareness."

Every word, every image used for God is a distortion more than a description.

When you come to see you are not as wise today as you thought you were yesterday, you are wiser today.

When you are guilty, it is not your sins you hate but yourself.

"Help us to find God."

"No one can help you there."

"Why not?"

"For the same reason that no one can help the fish to find the ocean."

The Master would frequently assert that holiness was less a matter of what one did than of what one allowed to happen.

"You are only a disciple because your eyes are closed. The day you open them you will see there is nothing you can learn from me or anyone."

"What then is a Master for?"

"To make you see the uselessness of having one."

A writer arrived at the monastery to write a book about the Master.

"People say you are a genius. Are you?" he asked.

"You might say so." said the Master, none too modestly.

"And what makes one a genius?" "The ability to recognize." "Recognize what?"

"The butterfly in a caterpillar: the eagle in an egg; the saint in a selfish human being."

To a disciple who was forever complaining about others the Master said, "If it is peace you want, seek to change yourself, not other people. It is easier to protect your feet with slippers than to carpet the whole of the earth."

"What kind of a person does Enlightenment produce?"

Said the Master:

"To be public-spirited and belong to no party,

to move without being bound to any given course,

to take things as they come,

have no remorse for the past,

no anxiety for the future,

to move when pushed,

to come when dragged,

to be like a mighty gale,

like a feather in the wind,

like weeds floating on a river,

like a mill-stone meekly grinding,

to love all creation equally

as heaven and earth are equal to all

— such is the product of Enlightenment."

On hearing these words one of the younger disciples cried, "This sort of teaching is not for the living but for the dead," and walked away, never to return.