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“First keep thyself in peace, and then shalt thou be able to be a peacemaker towards others.”
The devotional instruction makes inward steadiness prior to outward peacemaking: a person who is internally ruled by agitation will struggle to reduce conflict in relationships around them.
Source note: The Imitation of Christ, Chapter III, “Of the good, peaceable man,” William Benham translation, Project Gutenberg #1653. The surrounding passage is explicitly Christian devotional teaching about peace, suspicion, anger and living peaceably with difficult people.
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“Better is the end of a thing than the beginning thereof: and the patient in spirit is better than the proud in spirit.”
Finishing and enduring are given more weight than the excitement of starting or the pride of appearance.
Source note: Ecclesiastes 7:8 in the King James Version; the verse contrasts patient spirit with pride and values the completed end of a matter over the excitement of its beginning.
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“Holiness alone is undying peace.”
Allen contrasts lasting peace with temporary comfort or outward victory, then immediately connects the durable state he describes with self-control and an increasing orientation toward wisdom.
Source note: The Way of Peace, “The Realization of Perfect Peace,” Project Gutenberg #10740. The sentence follows Allen’s contrast between temporary peace from comfort or worldly victory and what he calls the enduring “Peace of Heaven”; the theological framework is retained rather than recast as clinical advice.
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“Wisely and slow; they stumble that run fast.”
Voice: Fictional character · Friar Laurence
Speed without judgment can undermine the very goal a person is pursuing, so patience becomes part of effective action.
Source note: Act 2, Scene 3; Friar Laurence urges Romeo to move with greater care.
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“Very little indeed is necessary for living a happy life.”
The line challenges the assumption that a good life requires constant accumulation or ideal circumstances.
Source note: Meditations, Book VII, in George Long’s translation.
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“Remember that you must behave in life as at a dinner party.”
The dinner-party image recommends waiting for what comes in proper order instead of grabbing anxiously, turning restraint into a model for daily conduct.
Source note: Enchiridion, chapter 15; the following sentences explain waiting until things come round to you.