This excerpt is from the dictation Teaching by Example by Kuthumi published in the 1970 Pearl of Wisdom Vol. 13 No. 3.

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The power of right thought to guide the lives of men is often overlooked; for the preeminence that men give to ego-centered emotions when making decisions that will affect their entire lives leads them into wrong thought patterns and negative spirals that can produce only more ego-centered emotions.

“He that is slow to anger is better than the mighty; and he that ruleth his spirit than he that taketh a city.”

Emotional control is the need of the decade. This need must be recognized by those who would go forth as representatives of the World Teachers (Jesus and Kuthumi). You who would set the example for the age must also bear in mind that you cannot mold the thoughts of others by argument, nor will a display of the ego generate respect in those you would lead. Therefore, your only alternative is to follow the commandment of the Lord, to “Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven.” Teaching by example is the way of those who have attained self-mastery.

It Is Not Necessary to Classify Individuals

How well we know that the misinterpretation of an individual’s thoughts and motives often creates a false picture of his character. Therefore, blessed hearts, the Brotherhood explains that it is not necessary to classify individuals. But, if after reading our admonishment you still feel compelled to do so, will you not “reclassify” them if your first opinion should be wrong? Why be hasty or feel the need to shove everyone you meet conveniently into a niche of your own creation?

Practice the Presence of God in your own life, we say, invoke the Spirit of his discernment in all matters, and you will more readily spread the balm of peace and beauty among your peers.

How easy it is for men and women to find fault with one another! Yet, how true it is that each such episode of faultfinding, when it is falsely based in any respect, brings forth a karmic recompense which may well create in the lives of the faultfinders those very faults that they so easily condemned in others. What, then, is the value of holding the immaculate concept for those whose lives are so impurely lived? Is it not in order to invoke the magnetization of benign energies throughout the universe?

And, conversely, does not the sordid thought about another sully also the garments of the mind of the one engaged in the practice?

How quickly the vibrations of a building, or of a consciousness, are lowered as men and women continually dwell on the errors and shortcomings of others. Hierarchy does not say that there is anything wrong with the statement, “By their fruits you shall know them”; but in heaven’s name, blessed ones, to know what a man is at a given moment should not forever defraud him of the mighty potential of improving his lot.

While the lives of men are full of shame, ending in blame toward one another, we would make them to be full of hope, that the dawn of self-improvement might appear daily to each human life. Why should we limit men when the balm of forgiveness can bring about a spiritual equity in the entire evolution of a planet? What applies to men individually applies to organizations, to nations, and to the split infinitives of purpose.