Precept and Practice – JULY 22 – The Value of Harmless Pleasures

To relinquish pleasures in order that some one else may partake of them is noble;  to cut ourselves off from the higher sources of enjoyment simply because all have not at present access to them, is not only so much loss in the present, but is even likely to retard their attainment by the people in the future.

The life that is reduced to sackcloth and ashes may be on a spiritual level, but, again, it may be very barren and useless.   Perhaps one of our greatest needs at the present day is to open wider all the ways to harmless pleasures, refined enjoyment, progressive interests; and we shall not do this by needlessly turning our backs upon them.   People are intensely imitative.   If your neighbours see that you are really interested in music or books of art, they will first begin to wonder what it is all about, and then begin to think there must be something in it;  while if you take the line of maintaining that the interests of this world are mere vanity, and that life has really nothing in it worth living for, the mischief you do will be only limited by the amount of confidence which your neighbours place in your judgment.   And if by merely cultivating our own power of appreciation, by letting our light shine before men, we can do something to show the way upwards to those who have not yet seen it, still more potent is the influence of those who can actually create new delights and new interests in any branch of art or knowledge.

(Mrs. Bosanquet – The Strength of the People)

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From the Introduction to Precept and Practice

The kindly welcome given to my other little books, ‘Being and Doing’ and ‘Character and Conduct,’ must be my excuse for adding another collection of extracts to the number now in circulation.

The quotations are gathered from the books of many earnest thinkers, and deal with Life in all its length and breadth, with ourselves, our characters, our plain unvarnished faults and weaknesses, our often untoward circumstances, and with all that drags us down;-  with our purposes, our religion, our love and friendships, and with all that uplifts us;-  with our relation to others, our influence and responsibilities, and finally with those stages of our journey which bring us to the Road’s Last Turn and to the Silent Land.

CONSTANCE  M. WHISHAW