I have noted down the following and I think it is very important (which might be good for the Declaration of Faith):
[1)] We are very much accustomed to the reasoning as to how the life of other people, people in general, should be arranged. And such kind of reasoning does not seem strange to us. And yet such kind of reasoning could in no ways exist among religious and therefore free people; such reasoning is the consequence of despotism, ... In this way reason ... They say: “If I had the power I would do so and so with the others.” That is a dangerous error, not only because it tortures, deforms people who have to undergo violence ... but it weakens in all people the consciousness of the necessity of improving themselves, which is the only effective means of influencing other people.
2) To-day I thought about this from another angle. I recalled the words of the Gospel: “And the pupil is not higher than the teacher; if he learns then he will be like the pupil.” We, the rich master-classes, teach the people. What would happen if we succeeded in teaching them so that they become as we are?
3) They talk, they write, they preach about the knowing of God. What a horrible blasphemy, and horrible admission of the non-understanding of what God is and what we are. We, a particle of the infinite whole, wish to understand not only this whole, but its causes, the origin of the whole. What absurdity and what a recognition of godlessness, or a recognition of God of that which is not God. We can only know that He is, Τὸ ὄν, He exists, and we can only conclude by ourselves, what He is not.
4) Love is God. Love is only the recognition that God is not flesh, not passion, not egoism, not malice. (Doubtful.)
5) Violence rules our world, i.e., malice, and therefore there is always found in society a majority of dependent, unstable members: women, children, stupid ones—brought up on malice, and who side with malice. But the world ought to be ruled by reason, by goodness; then all this majority would be brought up on goodness and would side with it. In order that this should take place it is necessary that reason and goodness manifest themselves, and undismayed, assert their existence; that is very important.
6) The complexity of knowledge is a sign of its falseness. That which is true is simple.
7) How bad it is that people seeking perfection are pained at calumny, at a deserved bad name (or better still, at an undeserved). Calumny, a bad name, gives an opportunity, drives toward an activity, the value of which is only in our conscience. This is so rare, so difficult, and so useful. Involuntary simpleness is the best school for goodness.[372]
8) I have noted down: “Justice is insufficient. It is ...[373] necessary to oppose.” I cannot remember what this means.