VI
We have discovered together, you will recall, that the world is offered to all men that it may be possessed by each with the help of all. You see, then, that in your modest rôle of apostle there is a means of making others rich while securing their help for your own undertakings.
Estimate your wealth according to the importance of what you give. Dispossess yourself boldly. Everything will be returned to you at the right time and a hundredfold.
If the great apostles were able to bring the good news, it was because they had faith; but nothing could have exalted their faith more than to bring the good news.
If you have been interested in something you have read, in a walk, if you have been astonished at some spectacle, invite all those whom you know to read what you have read, to take that walk, to contemplate that spectacle. Show some discernment in your invitations. Distrust the sceptics a little, the ironical, cruel, or contradictory spirits. Distrust them, but do not abandon them: they are the strayed sheep whose return ought to rejoice your heart supremely. When you have made them admit: “Yes, there’s something really fine! Yes, there’s something interesting, there’s something worth the pain of living!” you may fall asleep with a smile; your day will not have been lost.
At times, you will make a discovery so rare, so delicate that, by some secret warning, you will know it cannot be communicated, that it is strictly individual, that it ought to remain as a private relation between the world and your soul. In that case, keep your own counsel. Perhaps a day will come when your thought will have gained in precision through being amplified; on that day you will be mysteriously informed that your treasure has lost its private character, that it has become suitable for sustaining your communion with others. When that day comes, speak forth. Until that day, however, be patient; do not fall into the error of those spirits who are called obscure because they offer us impressions that have been insufficiently ripened and experienced, impressions that are not for all humanity.
On the other hand, when someone offers you one of these obscure impressions, do not reject it, do not laugh with disdain. Force yourself to feel what has been pictured for you in this faulty fashion. You will do your partner a service in visualizing his discovery, and you will perhaps be able to increase your own stock. Perhaps there will be something worth seizing and understanding at the bottom of it.
Always seek communion. It is the most precious thing men possess. In this respect, the symbol of the religions is indeed full of majesty. Where there is communion there is something that is more than human, there is surely something divine.
When you deem that you have grasped a truth do not forget, in communicating it to others, that there are two conditions of truth. Any truth one receives is but a small fortune in comparison with the value of that which one experiences. Therefore persuade those you love into the experiencing of truths, into the religious, courageous, persistent experiencing of the well-beloved truth.