But it is a long, often vexing journey before such a state of harmonious self-knowledge can be reached, if it can be ever reached.
Indeed, as historian James Moore has remarked "with but few exceptions the leading Christian thinkers in Great Britain and America came to terms quite readily with Darwinism and evolution". But Darwin, brought up on William Paley's harmonious, self-satisfied vision of creation, could not.
And although in his busy career he has specialized in sharp-witted, oft-conniving characters who know how to work the angles, as a musician he seems humbly focused on harmonious self-expression.
The awful, unwatchable video of James Foley's execution just made it onto a massive public screen in Beijing, which perfectly fits China's desire to project a harmonious self-image to its own citizenry while portraying global chaos.
One could say that financial catastrophes do indeed represent a type of self-correction, just like a population crash in wildlife biology/ecology that wipes out more than 90% of the overpopulated species in question--but if so, they are a type of self-correction too hideous to contemplate, and far outside the framework of Smith's harmonious, self-balancing vision of the world.
Perhaps people will learn what she and the other Taoist devotees view as the elements of a harmonious life: self-discipline, kindness and the pursuit of simplicity.
St. Augustine thus no longer assumed, as did Plato and Aristotle, that a harmonious and self-sufficient good life could be achieved within a properly organized city-state; he projected his political philosophy into a cosmic and lurid drama working out to a predestinate end.
Official control of Lord Howe Island lay initially with the British Crown until it passed to New South Wales in 1855, although until at least 1876 the islanders lived in "a relatively harmonious and self-regulating community".
Lyrical and harmonious, radiant with self-belief, their dancing in Act 2 and Act 4 is the truest element of an uneven production.
"Teaching Peace" is a collection of songs that promote harmonious living, healthy self-esteem, equality and acceptance of others.
