“Sincerity and honesty are in reality something quite different. What a man calls ‘SINCERITY’ in this case is in reality simply being unwilling to restrain himself. And deep down inside him a man is aware of this. But he lies to himself when he says that he does not want to lose SINCERITY. Fragments: Eight

“Exteriorly man’s being has many different sides: activity or passivity; truthfulness or a tendency to lie; SINCERITY or inSINCERITY; courage, cowardice; self-control, profligacy; irritability, egoism, readiness for self-sacrifice, pride, vanity, conceit, industry, laziness, morality, depravity; all these and much more besides make up the being of man. Fragments: Four

“The most dangerous thing in this case is to rely on one’s own judg-ment. If a roan is lucky he may at this time have someone near him who can tell him where he is and where ‘Ouspensky’ is. But he must moreover trust this person, because he will undoubtedly think that he understands everything himself and that he knows where he is and where ‘Ouspensky’ is. And not only in relation to himself but in relation also to other people will he think that he knows and sees their ‘Ouspenskys.’ All this is of course self-deception. At this stage a man can see nothing either in rela-tion to himself or to others. The more convinced he is that he can, the more he is mistaken. But if he can be even to a slight extent sincere with himself and really wants to know the truth, then he can find an exact and infallible basis for judging rightly first about himself and then about other people. But the whole point lies in being sincere with oneself. And this is by no means easy. People do not understand that SINCERITY must be learned. They imagine that to be sincere or not to be sincere depends upon their desire or decision. But how can a man be sincere with himself when in actual fact he sincerely does not see what he ought to see in himself? Someone has to show it to him. And his attitude towards the person who shows him must be a right one, that is, such as will help him to see what is shown him and not, as often happens, hinder him if he begins to think that he already knows better. Fragments: Eight

“This fear of losing SINCERITY is of course self-deception, one of those formulas of lying upon which human weaknesses are based. Man cannot help identifying and considering inwardly and he cannot help expressing his unpleasant emotions, simply because he is weak. Identifying, considering, the expressing of unpleasant emotions, are manifestations of his weakness, his impotence, his inability to control himself. But not wishing to acknowledge this weakness to himself, he calls it ‘SINCERITY’ or ‘honesty’ and he tells himself that he does not want to struggle against SINCERITY, whereas in fact he is unable to struggle against his weaknesses. Fragments: Eight

“As I have said already, one of the first demands is SINCERITY. But there are different kinds of SINCERITY. There is clever SINCERITY and there is stupid SINCERITY, just as there is clever inSINCERITY and stupid inSINCERITY. Both stupid SINCERITY and stupid inSINCERITY are equally mechanical. But if a man wishes to learn to be cleverly sincere, he must be sincere first of all with his teacher and with people who are senior to him in the work. This will be ‘clever SINCERITY.’ But here it is necessary to note that SINCERITY must not become ‘lack of considering.’ Lack of considering in relation to the teacher or in relation to those whom the teacher has appointed, as I have said already, destroys all possibility of any work. If he wishes to learn to be cleverly insincere he must be insincere about the work and he must learn to be silent when he ought to be silent with people outside it, who can neither understand nor appreciate it. But SINCERITY in the group is an absolute demand, because, if a man continues to lie in the group in the same way as he lies to himself and to others in life, he will never learn to distinguish the truth from a lie. Fragments: Eleven