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The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from Rasselas, Prince of Abyssinia by Samuel Johnson: consider them as acts of piety by which they are always advancing
towards endless felicity."
"Do you think," said Nekayah, "that the monastic rule is a more
holy and less imperfect state than any other? May not he equally
hope for future happiness who converses openly with mankind, who
succours the distressed by his charity, instructs the ignorant by
his learning, and contributes by his industry to the general system
of life, even though he should omit some of the mortifications
which are practised in the cloister, and allow himself such
harmless delights as his condition may place within his reach?"
"This," said Imlac, "is a question which has long divided the wise
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