What does the prostitute live on? And what does Faust live on? The one sells the body, the other the soul. Which of them is better? There is no better and no worse, for we are all prostitutes, because we sell our bodies, if not for the pleasure of others, then for our own. And we are all Fausts, because we sell our souls as well. He did it for the sake of knowledge, we do it for survival, for power, position or advantage in the short run, but in the long run surely to our own harm.
If someone calls me Fool! – I only smile, for he is right: I am not yet omniscient. If another says: Thief! – I accept it, for I do not always manage to make use of what divine providence has entrusted to me, and often I merely misuse it. Yet another says: False! – well, that hurts, but I have to admit that I do not always manage to be entirely sincere. And if they say: Unfit! – I do not mind, for there is a second chance too, and what I strive for is rather not to be unworthy…
Say what anyone will, truth remains truth, and falsehood falsehood. All that passes away is false, what remains is true, and all that is false passes away, and all that is true remains. There is nothing amiss here. The transient is not worth knowing, for it perishes, and yet it is worth knowing, so that I can tell it apart from the lasting. I must know what knowledge is and what ignorance is, for they lead to different ends. I must know both good and evil too – for no other reason than to avoid the one and do the other. For whoever does not know the knot cannot untie it – as Aristotle said thousands of years ago.
What, then, is to be seen, what is to be noticed? The shadow, or the light? The person or their faults? Everyone knows the right answers, and it is worth starting to act on them too. A sage notices the gold even on a dunghill, and in the little boy he sees the great man to come. From the husk of appearances we ought to make our way to seeing the essence. As our consciousness is, so we see and perceive the world. According to the Greek philosophers, people suffer not from the world as it is, but from the way they see it. The sage and the fool look at the same tree, but they do not see the same tree.
With fault-finding sight, which is sensitive to the basest half-truths, we notice at most the shortcomings of others. True sight perhaps weighs things more faithfully, sees the good as well as the bad, and discovers the virtues alongside the weaknesses. The compassionate way of seeing perceives the promising good beside the many frailties, and supports these traits as well. Whereas seeing the soul perceives, beyond all that passes, the soul that never passes, and for it weakness no longer matters, nor is it sensitive to shortcomings.
Seeing the soul is also seeing the essence. Two phases of it are known: its subjective side is authentic self-knowledge and self-respect, and its objective side, beyond compassionate seeing, is spiritual vision. The sage, starting from himself, sees the likeness in every living being, happy and unhappy. Seeing the soul therefore begins within, in ourselves. At some point we must understand, in very truth, that beyond the transient bodily husks and notions we are eternal souls. Thus at a single stroke everything in life can fall into place, for there are relative and there are absolute points of reference.
The words fool, false touch only the transient layers of our self, and so it can be easy to accept them as true. Our lasting self, however, is not like that: it is no fool, but possesses full knowledge. This is not divine omniscience, but that fullness of knowledge which an individual can ever have, that is, all the knowledge needed for one's personal fulfilment. The soul is true, sincere and authentic, and these traits need only be allowed to prevail. Seeing the soul, however, calls for a particular instrument, since only through the soul can the soul be known. What is not spiritual cannot reveal the soul. Do not stop at the shortcomings of your fellow men, see farther, see deeper, see beyond!