When anyone hears that it is possible for am an to evolve he always concludes that he can start to do this from wherever he happens to be. He thinks that it is quite unnecessary for him to give up anything at all. If this were possible, it would mean that as such a man evolved everything in him would become bigger, his weaknesses as well as his strengths, both his faults and his virtues, everything that makes up that man.

No, we must be prepared to destroy before we can begin to build; in other words, to get rid of much that stands in our way. When one goes to a tailor for new clothes one does not put on the new suit over one’s old clothes. Yet some people insist on clinging to all their old ideas. Instead of making any adjustments themselves, they expect me to bring my teaching into line with what they think, with what they believe they already know.

But why treat truth as though it were something exceedingly delicate and fragile? We must be brave enough to put everything we have into the crucible, and when it is withdrawn from the furnace, we shall find that the gold we have put in is still there. Nothing that is true will have been lost.