We cannot change anything, unless we accept it We cannot change anything, unless we accept it Unless we accept it Unless we accept it We cannot change anything, unless we accept it Condemnation does not liberate It oppresses and I am the oppressor of the person I condemn Not his friend and fellow sufferer Fellow sufferer I do not in the least need to say that we must never pass judgment When we desire to help and improve But if the doctor wishes to help a human being He must be able to accept him as he is And he can do this in reality Only when he has already seen And accepted himself as he is As he is Perhaps this sounds very simple But simple things are always the most difficult In actual life It requires the greatest art to be simple And so acceptance of one's self is the essence of the moral problem And the acid test of one's whole outlook on life We cannot change anything, unless we accept it We cannot change anything, unless we accept it Unless we accept it Unless we accept it We cannot change anything, unless we accept it That I feed the beggar That I forgive an insult That I love my enemy in the name of Christ All these are undoubtedly great virtues What I do unto the least of my brethren That I do unto Christ But what if I should discover that the least amongst them all The poorest of all beggars The most impudent of all offenders Ye, the very fiend himself That these are within me And that I myself stand in need of the arms of my own kindness That I myself am the enemy who must be loved What then? Then, as a rule the whole truth of Christianity is reversed There is then no more talk of love and long suffering We say to the brother within us, "Raca" And condemn and rage against ourselves We hide him from the world We deny ever having met this least among the lowly in ourselves And had it been God himself who drew near to us In this despicable form We should have denied him a thousand times Before a single cock had crowed We cannot change anything unless we accept it We cannot change anything unless we accept it Unless we accept it Unless we accept it We cannot change anything unless we accept it We cannot change anything unless we accept it We cannot change anything unless we accept it Unless we accept it Unless we accept it We cannot change anything unless we accept it