Comments on Life and Religion

There are two techniques that every man and woman needs to live life. One is the technique of volition, of trying hard, putting your back into it and doing your best. That’s output. . . .The other is the philosophy of intake, of spiritual hospitality, of the receptivity of the soul to the oversoul, of the open door that lets the highest in. That’s intake. One is like the ranches of a tree, spreading out. The other is like roots, digging in. Multitudes of people in our modern world are using only the first technique. They are trying hard, and then someday, inevitably, like everybody else, they run into an experience that they can’t handle simply by trying hard—a great grief, for example. Try hard? You need intake, too. You need sustenance; you need invigoration from beyond yourself. Harry Emerson Fosdick

It is a fine thing to establish one’s own religion in one’s heart, not to be dependent on tradition and second-hand ideals. Life will seem to you, later, not a lesser, but a greater thing. D. H. Lawrence

Don’t be agnostic. Be something. Robert Frost

Whatever you are, be a good one. Abraham Lincoln

To learn the worth of a man’s religion, do business with him. John Lancaster Spalding