Text of the meditation
The True, the Beautiful, the Great is always childlike, and is perennially fresh and young. The great person is always the good person; they are always simple. They draw from, indeed live in, the inexhaustible fountain of divine Goodness within; they inhabit the Heavenly Places; commune with the vanished great ones; live with the Invisible: they are inspired, and breathe the airs of Heaven.
Whoever would be great, let them learn to be good. They will therefore become great by not seeking greatness. Aiming at greatness, a person arrives at nothingness; aiming at nothingness, they arrive at greatness. The desire to be great is an indication of littleness, of personal vanity and obtrusiveness.
The willingness to disappear from view, the utter absence of self-aggrandisement, is the witness of greatness. Littleness seeks and loves authority. Greatness is never authoritative, and it thereby becomes the authority to which the after ages appeal. Be your simple self, your better self, the impersonal self, and behold: you are great!
James Allen (1864–1912), Book of Meditations for Every Day in the Year (1913) – public-domain text, gently modernised.
The original 1913 text is in the public domain.
