Text of the meditation
Nowhere in the three worlds can the soul find lasting satisfaction apart from the realisation of righteousness. Every soul, consciously or unconsciously, hungers for righteousness, and every soul seeks to gratify that hunger in its own particular way, and in accordance with its own particular state of knowledge.
The hunger is one, and the righteousness is one, but the pathways by which righteousness is sought are many. Those who seek consciously are blessed, and will shortly find that final and permanent satisfaction of soul that righteousness alone can give, for they have come into a knowledge of the true path.
Those who seek unconsciously, although for a time they may bathe in a sea of pleasure, are not blessed, for they are carving out pathways of suffering for themselves, over which they must walk with torn and wounded feet, and the soul will cry out for its lost heritage, the eternal heritage of the righteous.
Blessed are those who earnestly and intelligently seek.
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.
