And, indeed, I will at this point ask an idle question on my own account: which is better — cheap happiness or exalted sufferings? Well, which is better?
I do not perceive even one other thing, O monks, that when undeveloped and uncultivated entails such great suffering as the mind. The mind when undeveloped and uncultivated entails great suffering.
Today in May 1938, the world around us suffers from the anxiety which the unemployment of millions brings with it. In Germany we begin to be anxious because we have not enough workmen.
We are made weak both by idleness and distrust of ourselves. Unfortunate, indeed, is he who suffers from both. If he is a mere individual he becomes nothing; if he is a king he is lost.
A lui la foi, a' elle le doute, a' elle le fardeau le plus lourd: la femme ne souffre-t-elle pas toujours pour deux? For him, faith; for her, doubt and for her theheavier load: does not the woman always suffer for both?
Now what I contend is that my body is my own, at least I have always so regarded it. If I do harm through my experimenting with it, it is I who suffer, not the state.
Of all the ways we have found to hurt ourselves, the worse has been through love. We are always suffering because of someone who doesn't love us, or someone who has left us, or someone who won't leave us. If we are alone, it is because no one wants us.