Gary Furnell

The Hardest Path Is the Easiest: Exploring the Wisdom Literature with Pascal, Burke, Kierkegaard and Chesterton Gary Furnell

Most people naturally want to live a good life and enjoy a satisfying sense of love, meaning and purpose. Most people want to express their love and skills in ways that bring lasting benefits to themselves, their family, friends, community and nation. Most people want to attain some degree of wisdom in their decision-making, attitudes and perspectives so they are aligned with good sense rather than conflicting with good sense. But amid so much societal noise, this isn't easy; it requires reflection and careful selection. This sifting process needs guidance by those gifted with acuity.

The ancient Hebrew wisdom literature-among the greatest prose works ever written-provides a wealth of instruction, especially compiled for those who desire wisdom. The Hardest Path is the Easiest is a thematic treatment of The Book of Proverbs, with extracts from Ecclesiastes. Commentary is provided with dozens of excerpts from four great writers: Blaise Pascal, the seventeenth-century French polymath; Edmund Burke, the eighteen-century English Parliamentarian; Soren Kierkegaard, the nineteenth-century Danish man of letters; and Gilbert Chesterton, the twentieth-century English journalist.

The Hardest Path is the Easiest is for those who want to live wisely, who have the humility to gain wisdom and prepared to undertake the life-long work.