64. Forgive and Forget

People ask God for forgiveness. But since God is everything and
everyone, who is there for Him to forgive? Forgiveness of the
created was already there in His act of creation. But still people
ask God's forgiveness, and He forgives them. But they, instead of
forgetting that for which they asked forgiveness, forget that God
has forgiven them, and, instead, remember the things they were
forgiven—and so nourish the seed of wrongdoing, and it bears its
fruit again. Again and again they plead for forgiveness, and again
and again the Master says, I forgive.

But it is impossible for men to forget their wrongdoings and the
wrongs done to them by others. And since they cannot forget,
they find it hard to forgive. But forgiveness is the best charity. (It is
easy to give the poor money and goods when one has plenty, but
to forgive is hard; but it is the best thing if one can do it.)

Instead of men trying to forgive one another they fight. Once they
fought with their hands and with clubs. Then with spears and
bows and arrows. Then with guns and cannon. Then they
invented bombs and carriers for them. Now they have developed
missiles that can destroy millions of other men thousands of miles
away, and they are prepared to use them. The weapons used
change, but the aggressive pattern of man remains the same.

Now men are planning to go to the moon. And the first to get there
will plant his nation's flag on it,and that nation will say, It is mine. But another nation will dispute
the claim and they will fight here on this earth for possession of
that moon. And whoever goes there, what will he find? Nothing
but himself. And if people go on to Venus they will still find nothing
but themselves. Whether men soar to outer space or dive to the
bottom of the deepest ocean they will find themselves as they are,
unchanged, because they will not have forgotten themselves nor
remembered to exercise the charity of forgiveness.
Supremacy over others will never cause a man to find a change in
himself; the greater his conquests the stronger is his confirmation
of what his mind tells him—that there is no God other than his own
power. And he remains separated from God, the Absolute Power.
But when the same mind tells him that there is something which
may be called God, and, further, when it prompts him to search
for God that he may see Him face to face, he begins to forget
himself and to forgive others for whatever he has suffered from
them.
And when he has forgiven everyone and has completely forgotten
himself, he finds that God has forgiven him everything, and he
remembers Who, in reality, he is.