must first
look to see whether he is right. He may be partly right, and not
entirely,--but, whatever truth there is in his criticism, I want to
know it in order that I may see the fault clearly myself and remedy it.
If his criticism is ill-natured it is not necessarily any the less
true, and I must not let the truth be obscured by his ill-nature. All,
that I have to do with the ill-nature is to be sorry, on my friend's
account, and help him out of it if he is willing; and there is nothing
that is so likely to make him willing as my recognizing the justice of
what he says and acting upon it, while, at the same time, I neither
resent nor resist his ill-nature. If the man is both ill-natured and
unjust,--if there is no touch of what is true in his criticism,--then
all I have to do is to cease resenting it. I should be perfectly
willing that he should think anything he pleases, while I, so far as I
can see, go on and do what is right.

_The trouble is that we care more to appear right than to be right._
This undue regard for appearances is very deep-seated, for it comes
from long habit and inheritance; but we must recognize it and
acknowledge it in ourselves, in order to take the true path toward
freedom. So long as we are working for appearances we are not working
for realities. When we love to _be_ right first, then we will regard
appearances only enough to protect what is good and true from needless
misunderstanding and disrespect. Sometimes we cannot even do that
without sacrificing the truth to appearances, and in such cases we must
be true to realities first, and know that appearances must harmonize
with them in the end. If causes are right, effects must be orderly,
even though at times they may not seem so to the superficial observer.
Fear of not being approved of is the cause of great nervous strain and
waste of energy; for fear is resistance, and we can counteract that
terrified resistance only by being perfectly willing that any one
should think anything he likes. When moving in obedience to
law--natural and spiritual--a man's power cannot be overestimated; but
in order to learn genuine obedience to law, we must be willing to
accept our limitations and wait for them to be gradually removed as we
gain in true freedom. Let us not forget that if we are
overpleased--selfishly pleased--at the approval of others, we are just
as much in bondage to them as if we were angry at their disapproval.
Both approval and disappro