"Thoughts are the seeds of acts, and precede them," President David O. McKay wrote in Gospel Ideals. "Mere compliance with the word of the Lord, without a corresponding inward desire, will avail but little. Indeed, such outward actions and pretending phrases may disclose hypocrisy, a sin that Jesus most vehemently condemned.
" `O generation of vipers,' He exclaimed, `how can ye, being evil, speak good things?' ( Matt. 12:34. )"The Savior's constant desire and effort were to implant in the mind right thoughts, pure motives, noble ideals, knowing full well that right words and actions would eventually follow. He taught what modern physiology and psychology confirm, that hate, jealousy, and other evil passions destroy a man's physical vigor and efficiency. . . .
"Charles Dickens makes impressive use of this fact in his immortal story, Oliver Twist, wherein Monks is introduced first as an innocent, beautiful child; but as `ending his life as a mass of solid bestiality, a mere chunk of fleshed iniquity.' It was thinking upon vice and vulgarity that transformed the angel's face into the countenance of a demon."
President McKay added: "I am trying to emphasize that each one is the architect of his own fate, and he is unfortunate, indeed, who will try to build himself without the inspiration of God, without realizing that he grows from within, not from without. . . .
"What a man continually thinks about determines his actions in times of opportunity and stress. A man's reaction to his appetites and impulses when they are aroused gives the measure of that man's character. In these reactions are revealed the man's power to govern or his forced servility to yield."