A fascinating mix of Christian, Buddhist, and Daoist thought presented by the original self-help guru in 1910.
As Lily L Allen put it, "all his works [are] eminently practical. He never wrote theories, or for the sake of writing; but he wrote when he had a message, and it became a message only when he had lived it out in his own life, and knew that it was good. Thus he wrote facts, which he had proven by practice. "
Born in Leicester, UK, to an illiterate mother in 1864, Allen's father left when he was 15 to find work in America, and was promptly murdered on arrival. After leaving school and finding work as a clerk, Allen's writing career lasted for only a decade, from 1902-1912. In that time he wrote nineteen books about how to recognise and live the divine and virtuous life, deeply informed by both Jesus and Buddha.
As he puts it in this book,
"To have transcendent virtue is to enjoy transcendent felicity. The beatific blessedness which Jesus holds out is promised to those having the beatific virtues—to the merciful, the pure in heart, the peacemakers, and so on. The higher virtue does not merely and only lead to happiness, it is happiness. It is impossible for a man of transcendent virtue to be unhappy. The cause of unhappiness must be sought and found in the self-loving elements, and not in the self-sacrificing qualities. A man may have virtue, and be unhappy, but not so if he have divine virtue. Human virtue is mingled with self, and therefore with sorrow; but from divine virtue every taint of self has been purged away, and with it every vestige of misery. "