Being "base"

Among the things that I resolved to do this year was a lot more working out and a lot more reading. I’ve been stagnating intellectually, physically, and spiritually. In an effort to expand my mind, I’ve put down the Tom Clancy and picked up some classical-type books and already I’m glad that I did. There’s a lot to be said for the “best books”, whether secular or spiritual. Oftentimes the two are closely intertwined.

From a really old but more-relevant-than-ever book on prosperity by James Allen I found the following nugget:

“Man is manacled only by himself; thought and action are the jailors of Fate—they imprison, being base; they are also the angels of Freedom—They liberate, being noble. Not what he wished and prays for does a man get, but what he justly earns. His wishes and prayers are only gratified and answered when they harmonize with his thoughts and actions.

In the light of this truth, what, then, is the meaning of fighting against circumstances? It means that a man is continually revolting against an effect without, while all the time he is nourishing and preserving its cause in his heart. That cause may take the form of a conscious vice or an unconscious weakness; but whatever it is, it stubbornly retards the effort of its possessor, and thus calls aloud for remedy.”

I wonder what Mr. Allen would have thought about the 21st century with the Internet, Facebook, computer games, and all of the other things that tend to keep our thoughts and actions “base”.