The officer’s uniform will not make you brave, neither the priest’s cassock will make you compassionate, nor the judicial robe fair, nor the minister’s armchair strong, if your soul is not full of bravery, compassion, justice and mental strength.
You have to have a soul that is capable of three things: to endure, to love life, but also to be ready to sacrifice itself. You will never have such a soul if you are pessimistic. The pessimists cannot sacrifice their lives, because life for them has no value and what has no value can only be “thrown away” and not be sacrificed. When people offer something they love, then they make a sacrifice, whereas when they offer something they hate, they do not sacrifice it, they “throw it away” instead.
The pessimist cannot love life because it seems to have no meaning and joy. Life for such a person is nonsense, pain, recklessness, sadness and thus, he/she does not love it. Pessimists cannot endure life, for the same reasons that they cannot love life. Man can endure the pain that has some meaning and an end. But he can’t stand the pain that has no essence and no end. The lives of pessimistic people are a reckless and endless pain.
If you are pessimistic, you will not be able to sacrifice yourselves, to love or even endure life. Neither will you be useful to life, nor will life matter to you. In the last three cases, life in its dizzying course will contemptuously “look” at you and will pass by you very quickly. Life as a noisy and silver river will pass very quickly by your pessimistic water hole. You will throw mud and slander to life from this water hole in vain. Do you think you will muddy life? No, you will only muddy your vision and your soul.
Saint Nicholas of Ohrid
