Wisdom From The World's Religions

Without Hate

May every creature abound in wellbeing and peace.

May every living being, weak or strong, the long and the small, the short and the medium-sized, the mean and the great,

May every living being, seen or unseen, those dwelling far off, those living near by, those already bom, those waiting to be born,

May all attain inward peace.

Let no one deceive another. Let no one despise another in any situation.

Let no one, from antipathy or hatred, wish evil to anyone at all.

Just as a mother, with her own life, protects her only child from hurt, so within yourself foster a limitless concern for every living creature.

Display a heart of boundless love for all the world in all its height and depth and broad extent,

Love unrestrained, without hate or enmity.

Then as you stand or walk, sit or lie, until overcome by drowsiness, devote your mind entirely to this: It is known as living the life divine.

(Buddhist)

The Space Within

Thirty spokes share the wheel's hub;
It is the center hole that makes it useful.

Shape clay into a vessel;
It is the space within that makes it useful.

Cut doors and windows for a room;
It is the holes that make it useful.

Therefore profit comes from what is there;
Usefulness from what is not there.

Lao-Tse

If there is to be peace

There must be peace in the nations.

If there is to be peace in the nations,
There must be peace in the cities.

If there is to be peace in the cities,
There must be peace between neighbours.

If there is to be peace between neighbours,
There must be peace in the home.

If there is to be peace in the home,
There must be peace in the heart.

Lao-Tse

The Free Mind

I call that mind free which masters the senses, and which recognizes its own reality and greatness: Which passes life, not in asking what it shall eat or drink, but in hungering, thirsting, and seeking after righteousness.

I call that mind free which jealously guards its intellectual rights and powers, which does not content itself with a passive or hereditary faith:

Which opens itself to light whencesoever it may come; which receives new truth as an angel from heaven.

I call that mind free which is not passively framed by outward circumstances, and is not the creature of accidental impulse:

Which discovers everywhere the radiant signatures of the infinite spirit, and in them finds help to its own spiritual enlargement.

I call that mind free which protects itself against the usurpations of society, and which does not cower to human opinion:

Which refuses to be the slave or tool of the many or of the few, and guards its empire over itself as nobler than the empire of the world.

I call that mind free which resists the bondage of habit, which does not mechanically copy the past, nor live on its old virtues:

But which listens for new and higher monitions of conscience, and rejoices to pour itself forth in fresh and higher exertions.

I call that mind free which sets no bounds to its love, which, wherever they are seen, delights in virtue and sympathizes with suffering:

Which recognizes in all human beings the image of God and the rights of God's children, and offers itself up a willing sacrifice to the cause of humankind.

I call that mind free which has cast off all fear but that of wrongdoing, and which no menace or peril can enthrall:

Which is calm in the midst of tumults, and possesses itself, though all else be lost.

William Ellery Channing

Texts from Singing the Living Tradition, The Unitarian Hymnal