For Today and Tomorrow
| | Daily Encouragement by Daisaku Ikeda Sunday, April 29, 2012 What is success in life? Who are the truly successful? There are famous and powerful people who become pitiful figures in their old age. There are people who die alone, feeling empty and desolate inside. Just what is success? The English thinker Walter Pater (1839-94) wrote: "To burn always with this hard, gemlike flame, to maintain this ecstasy, is success in life." The person who lives life fully, glowing with life's energy, is the person who lives a successful life. Wisdom for Modern Life by Daisaku Ikeda Sunday, April 29, 2012 Our efforts for the sake of dialogue, in order to be worthy of the term dialogue, must be carried through to the end. To refuse peaceful exchange and choose force is to compromise and give in to human weakness; it is to admit the defeat of the human spirit. Socrates encourages his youthful disciples to train and strengthen themselves spiritually, to maintain hope and self-control, to advance courageously, choosing virtue over material wealth, truth over fame. From the Writings of Nichiren Daishonin Sunday, April 29, 2012 Little streams come together to form the great ocean, and tiny particles of dust accumulate to form Mount Sumeru. When I, Nichiren, first took faith in the Lotus Sutra, I was like a single drop of water or a single particle of dust in all the country of Japan. But later, when two people, three people, ten people, and eventually a hundred, a thousand, ten thousand, and a million people come to recite the Lotus Sutra and transmit it to others, then they will form a Mount Sumeru of perfect enlightenment, an ocean of great nirvana. |