Of the Imitation of Christ/Book III/Chapter XLIV
CHAPTER XLIV.
OF NOT DRAWING TROUBLE TO OURSELVES FROM OUTWARD THINGS.
Y son, in many things it is thy duty to be ignorant, and to esteem thyself as dead upon earth, and to whom the whole world is crucified.
Many things thou must also pass by with a deaf ear, and think rather of those which belong to thy peace.
It is more profitable to turn away one's eyes from unpleasing things, and to leave every one to his own opinion, than to be a slave to contentious discourses.
If all stand well betwixt thee and God, and if thou hast His judgment in thy mind, thou shalt easily endure to be overcome.
2. O Lord, to what a pass are we come! Behold, we bewail a temporal loss: for a pitiful gain we toil and run; and the spiritual losses are forgotten, and hardly at last return to the memory of it.
That which little or nothing profiteth we heed; and that which is especially necessary, we pass over; because the whole man doth slide off into outward things; and unless he speedily repent, he willingly settleth down in them.