Monday, February 20, 2006

The Line Between Good and Bad

Alexandr Solzhenitsyn, the 1970 Nobel Prize winner in literature once wrote:

I have learned one great lesson from my years in prison camps, I learned how a person becomes evil and how he becomes good.

When I was young, I thought I was infallible and, I was cruel to those under me. I was madly in love with power, and in exercising it. I was a murderer and an oppressor. Yet in my most evil moments I thought I was doing good, and I had plenty of arguments with which to justify my deeds.

It was only when things were reversed, when as a prisoner I lay on rotten straw, that I began to feel within myself the first stirring of good.

Gradually I came to realize that the line which separates good from evil passes not between states, or between classes, or between political parties, but right through every human heart.

Even in the hearts that are overwhelmed by evil, one small bridge head of good is retained. And in the best of all hearts, there remains an unrooted small corner for evil.

I thought it's a good way to start the week. I hope you didn't mind it.
 

3 comments:

Liam said...

That's a nice post, Fay. Too often we only recognize the evil in others and not ourselves. That leads to trouble.

Fayrouz said...

It's rare when we recognize our wrong doing. But we are always ready to point fingers at others.

If we become more critical of ourselves, the world would become a better place.

Fayrouz said...

Don,

As long as there's good spots in your heart, then it can overshadow the black.