I came into this world, not chiefly to make this

To live is to open ourselves to possibility, to rule out nothing. There is no way we can spare ourselves, or those we love, the pains of living, because they are inseparable from the joys.

How grandiose we are when we think we can save the world.

All we can do -- and it's quite a lot -- is to live the best way we can, achieving a balance amid the forces that pull on us: pleasure, responsibility, power, love.

If we can live so that we respond to all of them, rule out none of them and yet enslave ourselves to none, we will have the best the world can give.

One quality all great people seem to share is humor -- the capacity to see our struggles and triumphs with detachment.

Not that our life is unimportant, but that it's only a part of the huge web of life on this planet.

If we can keep our lives in balance, we won't get puffed up by any little triumph, or squashed by a defeat.

We'll keep on with our lives, confident that we're doing our best.

"Decent" means appropriate, proper, becoming. Decency of mind means to think appropriate thoughts, to respond properly to events and people, neither exaggerating nor trivializing their importance. 

What a consolation it must be to have a mind always in balance, always ready to dwell on the good and let the negative aspects go!

It's possible to achieve such decency.

Perhaps it is a gift from a higher power; but we must ready ourselves to receive a gift like that.

Becoming ready for the gift of a balanced outlook entails work: the work of overcoming our tendencies to, on the one hand, ignore, postpone, and forget unpleasantness, and on the other, to dwell on misfortune until we let it blot out the sun.

Decency is another name for the middle way, the true road. 

When we achieve decency of mind, we'll know it by the serenity of our outlook. 

Obstacles won't melt, but they will assume their true proportions.