(Lecture delivered on Thursday afternoon,March 5, 1903)
There was a question put to Rama after the Lecture delivered in Old Fellows’ Hall, and the reading from the Upanishads will answer the question.
The question was, “Why do you preach Renunciation, and talk of giving up desires and casting aside all worldly attachments?”Vedanta wants us to break all connections with the whole world and suppress our love for the whole world. It crushes out and dries up all love for humanity in our hearts.
Upanishads -”When one obtains True Bliss or realizes his true Self, then his duties are good, and good flows from him spontaneously. That is the law. One who does not obtain Bliss cannot do good to humanity; only he who obtains bliss can do good to humanity. If you are very poor, if you have no food and are starving yourself, how can you appease the hunger of others?”
Pupil—Sir, I want to understand what this Bliss is.
Preceptor—The Infinite is Bliss. There is no Bliss in anything finite. So long as you are finite, there is no bliss, no happiness for you. The Infinite is Bliss. The Infinite only is Bliss.
This Infinite! How must we understand it?
There is no need to make any comments, but Rama. -wants you to mark these words and think over them and settle in your mind and the time will come when you will apply these words,”The Infinite is Bliss; there is no Bliss in the finite”. And this Infinite you must understand.
In the English language there is the word”Whole.”Are you whole?”means”are you strong, are you healthy?”Beautiful word is this. So long as you regard yourself as a part only, a small, finite something like three cubits and one-half long and 150 pounds heavy, so long as you consider yourself to be flesh and blood, so long as you are limited, you are impaired, you are cut, you are divided, you are not whole, you are simply a finite fraction, and are not whole, not healthy, not strong. You are stagnating. If you separate a small particle of water from the sea, it will become putrid; it will become stagnant and filthy. Similarly, the man, the sage or saint, or anybody who feels himself as a finite being, who feels himself a finite being limited by time or space, confined within a short area, is not healthy, is not whole and is not happy; he can lay no claim to happiness. The very moment your vision is not limited, the very moment you dispel your finite consciousness and feel that you are the all, that you are the whole world, that you are an Infinity; when you realize that, then you become whole, an 1 bodily disease, trouble, anxiety is dispersed, dispelled, evaporated.
This is the secret of all healing, all magnetism, all mesmerism. Be thou whole. Whole you are. That is the Truth. Live in Truth. Realize that you are the Whole, that you are Almighty, that you are Divinity.
Pupil – What is this Infinity?
Preceptor – Limitation is of three kinds, limitation due to time, limitation due to space, and limitation due to causation. Being the whole means realizing Self, pervading all time, transcending all time, transcending all space, transcending all personality. Where one sees nothing else, hears nothing else, understands nothing else, there is Infinity, because so long as something else is beside you, you are limited and finite.
Where one sees or hears or understands something else, that is finite. Hearing or seeing spirits, hearing astral bells, or clairvoyance as it is called, is finite. You are on the road to Realization, but you have not yet reached the final goal, when one sees nothing else, hears nothing else but Infinity. The Infinite is Immortality and the Finite is Mortality.
Pupil—Sir, where does Infinity abide, on what plane?
Preceptor – In its own greatness; not even in greatness.
It means that Infinity is beyond time and space. Then how can you bring Infinity within time and space? To ask about Infinity, where it resides, is putting the question like this,”Bring me half an ounce of sea waves.”Sea waves are not measured by ounces or pounds Avoirdupois. Similarly, Infinity cannot be measured by how, when, and why. If it could be, it would not be Infinity.
The question put to Rama was that Vedanta by teaching renunciation of all desires and attachments preaches hatred. Now it is not so. Just mark the words of Vedanta,”Give up love and attachment.” But you say,”O, if we give up love, love is God and we give up God.” O people! Love in this country means cupidity, it means stupidity.
In India there is a better word which means stupidity. People say,”O, he is in love!”Well, this is not love at all, it is something diabolical. Rama has more regard for Truth than for anything else. All personal attachment makes you finite, and makes the object of love also finite; then both fall, you and the object of love. Vedanta wants you to give up cupidity, stupidity, and all attachments, but does not want you to give up True Love; that you have not to give up.
Take the case of the child. Is the child a lover? No, no. The child is not a lover, but is love itself. So Vedanta says,”Be not a lover but become love itself.”Now what is it that makes a child a magnet? It is not being a lover, but being love itself. The child has no attachment, no clinging, no personal selfishness, but the child is love itself, and that is what Vedanta says,”Become love itself; then you become a magnet, become whole”.
People talk a great deal about making themselves healthy, about healing others etc., but please wave aside all selfish methods and motives which keep you finite. All desire is love, all desire is personal love, all desire is attachment. Throw it off and you are Purity itself. If you gain that, then your body is bound to be healthy. Your intellect is bound to be perfection itself, if you realize this purity which Vedanta preaches. This purity is the real Renunciation so frequently preached by Vedanta.
Get that Purity. Is not the child pure? It is indifferent to everything. Mark the little tyrant. He rides on the strongest shoulders and pulls the hair of laurelled heads. How strong a magnet is he? What is the cause? Purity. That is what makes the child a magnet and that is what nukes the child so beautiful. So Vedanta says,”Realize this renunciation and you become love itself; through you will flow naturally and spontaneously good to all mankind.”When we want to do good to the world, we can only when we become all goodness; not till light comes from us naturally, spontaneously, as light comes from the burning lamp.
Mark, the eyes of the snake are charming; they are a magnet, and small birds fly into the mouth of the snake. What is that charm in the eyes of the snake? They have a look of indifference; there is no clinging to anything, and you know the saying is,”Be as wise as the serpent.”
There is the whole secret of magnetism, of power, of health, and everything. It is true that sometimes the snake apparently swallows its young ones to protect them, or rather the snake puts its young in its mouth to protect them, but it often eats up its own children. The snake gives birth to a hundred small snakes, and if all these snakes should live, the world would become uninhabitable, but nature has provided for the protection of the world and the snake eats up its young. The snake is an animal which has no attachment. The snake casts off its skin, it has no attachment for its skin. Similarly, Rama tells you that if you can mentally realize”Vedantic consciousness and really cast off the body as if it never existed, if you can throw it aside and realize”I am Divinity, the All, the God,”if you realize that, you have nothing to do with the senses, the personality, then you become an infinite being. You become a magnet. Vedanta says,”If you realize this, if you become perfectly pure, you become a magnet, and what is this magnet? You become the concentrated essence of Love, and good flows through you of itself.”
Again, do you not see in all your attachment that it is not to be denied, that you are misreading your affections and feelings and when you say you are in love, in reality you are in hatred. So when Vedanta says,”Give up love,”it should put it”Give up hate.”This must be understood. Whenever you attach yourself to an object, you are attached to one object but are detached from the whole world, are you not? When the child has not learned love, the child is all love, it is as it were one with all. When the child is a month old, any person may pick up the child, may fondle the child, it is so good; the child was love; but there came a time after a while when the child fell in love with somebody, and what happened? The parents became a burden, the sister and companions pleased not, and the old friends were detached, the whole world was detached; the grown up child goes to business but it suffers, he goes to the beach but that becomes irksome, for nowhere is his lady love, all things become insufficient compared to the lady love. When you say a man is loving, he is really hating the whole world. When you are loving a particular object, you are detaching yourself from the whole world. So Vedanta says all personal attachment means detachment, separation; it means stagnation. Then do not commit suicide.
Vedanta says here is a case of cupidity, and here is the case of the child; the child was love itself and this first case was cupidity and nothing more.
So when Vedanta says, ‘Rise above your desires,’ it means to make you a blessing to humanity. Vedanta puts your powers at their best and makes you unite with humanity.
Is it not a fact that all the benefactors lived pure lives, lived free of personal attachment? Did Christ ever marry? No. Saints and prophets, did they marry? No. Rama speaks not against marriage, but he means to keep the mind one with Divinity, to keep the soul one with the whole world. Some of the saints married, just mark their relation. Their mind was perfectly unattached, perfectly pure even though they lived in the family, had children; but we do not live where our bodies live, we live where our minds live. We live in reality where our minds live; so all our saints who lived apparently a married life, lived wholly and solely with Truth, lived in the Light.”I am the All.”Thus Vedanta by asking you to gradually give up your attachments simply makes you the benefactors of the whole human race.
Most of the literature which comes from the American Press makes a big talk about magnetism and mesmerism, hypnotism and clairvoyance, and all sorts of things, and most of this literature publishes and teaches different methods and ways of keeping the body strong and healthy, and of curing disease. It is all very noble, and the intention is most laudable. But with some notable exceptions, the vast majority of such writers smack of a principle diametrically opposed to the Truth; a principle which is tinctured and tainted with selfishness, a principle accentuated by a copyrighting, favour-currying, self-aggrandizing spirit. And remember, though these people are doing their best and are doing a grand and noble work, still if you want to steer clear of their weakness, if you want to keep yourselves masters of the real power and to achieve success, you will see that the Truth is paradoxical. The way to achieve a thing lies in becoming opposite to the thing. It is so and Ave cannot help it. Rama lays before you the perfect truth, and you may verify it by your own experience. You may try all other methods, and then take the words of Kama and try and use them when you get time.
The way to gain anything is to lose it. He who would gain his life must lose it, Kama finds that most writers contradict this Truth. If you want to achieve success, you must become a magnet, as to a magnetic particles of iron are drawn from all directions, and desire is like a particle of iron.
When a man is successful, he is a magnet. If you want to be a magnet, you will have to undergo the process of making yourself a magnet. And what is the process?
Here is something. In it there is a positive as well as a negative element, both are stored up; both are there; but how is it in the magnet? When the two elements are not separated there is no attractive force, but the magnet has the positive element free from the negative element. The positive collects on this side and the negative on the opposite side, then the force becomes perfect like the Rod of Moses with which he touched the Red Sea and divided the waters. So, here are the divisions and in order to have a magnet they must be polarized. Similarly, you have to be polarized and then you become a magnet. Now, what is Vedanta? Vedanta, teaching the principle of Renunciation, is simply like the Rod of Motes, the beautiful Rod of Moses, it separates the chaff from the grain; it divides the lower nature from the higher; it makes a discrimination; it makes you separate your Divinity from your animal nature. Just mark. All clinging attachments are due to the finite nature in you. What desire can there be to the Infinite? All desire implies finiteness, limitation. The Infinite cannot desire; the Infinite has nothing beside it, for it is but itself. Then how can the Infinite desire? It is the limited being only that can desire. Thus you see that all your desires and attachments proceed from your finite nature, your mayavic element. The Infinite Self in you is above desires. So you see the desiring element in you, this little false ego, is the animal nature in you, is the low nature, and the Divinity or Infinite in you is beyond all desire. Now, then what does Vedanta do? Vedanta wants you to separate the two. Everything is mixed up and you are calling yourself this little selfish finite ego; and the Heal Atman or Kama, or God you are mixing up with the false, apparent, deluding, finite nature.
Vedanta says render unto Caesar the things which are Caesar’s, and so render unto llama or Divinity the things which belong to Divinity. These desires, this false self should be taken at its own worth and realised to be nothing. Assert your Divinity; feel yourself to be the God of gods, the Lord of lords, the Infinite One, then what desires have I. I am everything. He can desire who is not in all time. He will desire things which come to pass in seven years. To the true Self there is no desiring, for the true Self everything is. Everything is within you. Verily, all objects, all joy, riches, everything man can desire am T. Feel that and chant Om, and try to feel that. You must realize that. You have always thought yourself to be the body, and the body you have become. Think Divinity, live in Divinity, and where is then any room for desire? This Vedanta makes you a magnet, the positive and negative poles are separated and the body is magnetized.
Here is now something very important. People make a mistake in saying that such and such a speaker has great personal magnetism about him. That is not the only magnet you desire. There is one man who.wants to be a magnet to attract thought; another wants to be a magnet to attract richer; another wants to be a, magnet of personal charms, beauty; other people want to be magnets of other kinds; but the secret of all this magnetism is Renunciation; mark these words, pure renunciation and nothing else. You need not waste your time in printing books to teach perfect health. If you can remember these words and act according to them, you are a great magnet. Rama tells you these things from personal experience, and you may try them. In order to become a magnet of thought, so as to attract all sorts of knowledge to us, will it do to pray to God? To say”O Lord Almighty, give me Light. O Thou who art Light, give me Light.”O, will this make you light, it won’t do.”O let me have Light.”Remember, just as we think, so we become. If your thought is of this kind,”Let me have light,”what will the result be? The realization of this thought in you will result in your being in a position from which light is always away? This thought”Give me Light”of imparting light, in asking and begging for Light, places you at a distance from Light, and the result will be that Light will never come, it will always be away.
Rama says, mark the man born of rich parents, his birthright you say is Pen Million; but when does he get his birthright? O, he must wait a long time. He is always wishing for the death of his mother so that he may get his birthright. So when we pray to God and say,”O Lord, I am your disciple, and being your disciple, O Lord, let me have this and that,”then you will have to wait till God dies. God never dies, and you will never get your birthright. This is not the way to get Light or Knowledge from around us. Never did man get anything by praying, by begging, asking or seeking.
This is an astounding statement. Philosophy proves it. What is Might? Might is to give up the desire for even Light. So long as you desire Light, it eludes your grasp. Sh.ill I ask Light to come to me? By the act of asking or begging you shut out light. The very act of asking or begging closes all light upon you.
Kama will relate a very funny story. There was a man in India who was practicing a mantram in order to win his lady love, but the sage who told him the mantram that he was to repeat to himself, asked the man to beware of one thing. Now what was that? The sage told the man never to allow the idea or thought of a monkey to enter his mind when he was practicing this mantram. Well, the man began to practice the mantram and he was trying hard not to think of the monkey, but every time he practiced, the thought of the monkey came to his mind, he could not exclude the thought of the monkey, the monkey kept all the time before him. He could not for a single second repeat the mantram without the thought of the monkey coming before him. He went to the sage and said,”Sir, sir, if you had not cautioned me not to think of the monkey, I would have been able to chant the mantram, and would never have thought of the monkey, but when you want me to keep out the thought, then it haunts me, overshadows me. Similarly, by the very attempt to shut out ignorance, and weakness, you post weakness and ignorance there.
Light, comes as does the light from the sun or from the stars. Vedanta says,”Give up desiring and asking for Light, purify yourselves of this desire for Light, renounce it, give it up,”and O, what happiness! Feel Truth.”Let Light come or not, I have nothing to do with it. O, I am the Sun of the universe, I am the Light of the universe.”Feel that. Here you see you are not the lover but Love itself. You are not asking, or begging for Light, for you are Light itself. I am not the body or the mind. Light is to come to the small personality, the little ego only, but you are not the ego, you are in reality Light itself. Think this, realize this and you rise above desires.
There is a beautiful verse in Hindustani language which means,”You are honey, honey, no desires, but above all desire.”
It is a matter of personal experience that whenever Rama tried to even think out any subject, no matter how hard Rama tried and tried but he failed, until unconsciously the mind became disgusted, and Rama said,”O, let matters go. I shall have nothing to do with the essay, let it be attended to or not, I care not”; when lo! All of a sudden the idea came.”O, why, why desire for Light, discard the desire, throw it aside, and desire not.”Then light came, knowledge came.
When studying in the advanced class at the University, Rama took a vow never to do anything with the aid of the Professors, and this was a very hard task. This was the self-appointed task to solve all the hard problems in Mathematics, and do all this without the aid of any keys or professors. While trying to solve the deep problems Rama laboured and laboured. In some cases he was successful, but in many cases not. Rama worked from 5 o’clock in the evening till 4 or 5 o’clock in the morning and still the problems were not solved. Rama became disgusted and went to walk upon the top of the house to get the fresh air and was thinking of taking a knife to kill himself, for he must solve those problems and as yet he had not. At those times when Rama gave up the body, everything of the solutions came to him. So we see that always in difficult matters when we make ourselves a magnet of Thought, we rise above Thought. Now in these days what does Rama do? The first thing is to throw aside all idea of doing this or that, “I do not desire to write anything, away, away, what do I want with it. I am Light and I enjoy my own Glory, and the enjoyment of my own Glory is success, real success, and all other things are mere delusion; even if worldly success comes to me, I will never enjoy it. My every joy is Divinity.” This is the way. Try to possess the knowledge of Heaven and everything else will follow. Have first your own secret secure, and all things will follow. Here is the thought,”I have nothing to do with this or I have no responsibility or fear, I am not responsible to anybody, I do not have to pay anything to anybody, I am myself, I am Light.”
What pleasure can the world give you? All joy, all pleasure comes from within you. The real Self is all Bliss, all glory, all joy. I will enjoy that ever. If I get these things, I must not enjoy them, and what happens? The result is that my mind is filled with thoughts and ideas. Ideas seek you. This is the law. Thus we see that in order to become a magnet of Thought, one must rise above the desire for Light; and this rising above the desire for Light is the negative side of the question, and the positive side is”Feel, I am Light. I enjoy my own Glory.”
Now another secret. If you want a friend or wealth etc. to come to you, what have you to do? Give up the attachment to the desire, and after doing the negative side or part of the problem, take up the positive side which is the statement and belief that”I am Divinity, I am the Lord of lords, the Light of lights, all beauty, all joy, all pleasure am I, I am the great over-soul of all, I am the Ruler of the universe.”Feel that, think yourself Divinity, give up the idea entirely, and when things come, look at them with other eyes, enjoy Divinity only. Then you are successful in the eyes of others, but in your true eyes you are more than successful.
The other day it was told that when a vacuum is produced in the atmosphere by the rarification of air at a particular spot, the rarified air by the heat of the sun rises, and a vacuum is produced. What happens? The air rushes up to fill the vacant space. Similarly, when you create a vacuum by rising above desire, your body becomes a vacuum, when you are in Divinity, then to you the body, the seeming ego, is dead and gone; it has vacated its place and what happens? Every object hereabout must rush up to you.
According to some, the nature of the magnet is nothing else but a vacuum. Well, here is a vacuum created by giving up desires, the selfish desires which were choking up yourself. Throw these off and then you become a magnet, a vacuum is produced.
Question—In order to heal disease, is it necessary to deny matter?
Answer: To heal disease you must feel yourself to be the whole, you must see nothing but Divinity all through. Feel, feel Divinity, and there is no disease. Health, strength, all things flock to you instantly, when you rise above all these. Desire not to see or hear God, for God you already are; when you desire to see God, you place God outside yourself, you place God away. You desire to do good to humanity. Why should the world be so poor to beg your attention?
In the case of Newton, he gave himself up to meditation. Meditation is nothing else but rising above desire. His little self was merged in the subject before him and the result was that he became a benefactor of mankind. He did not solve the problem with the idea of benefiting mankind or languishing mankind in debt. He had no such notion. He did his work because to him that work brought joy itself and he became a benefactor to mankind.
No matter if people do not praise you, no matter if you bear no name. What is success in the eyes of the world is mere delusion of the senses. You gain success on the spot when you feel”I am One with All, with Divinity, success I am.”
Then, must matter be denied? Certainly! Remember, you are Divinity, and the moment you feel Divinity, matter is gone. Deny matter and assert Divinity. There are not two distinct processes but they are one and the same. Similarly, the Real Self of you, you find to be the over-soul, the Ruler and Governor of all these bodies, these suns, these stars, these trees, etc. When you feel that and rise above that and you feel further, what do you feel? When Rama walks, he thinks,”There is the sun, and the sun creates all these clouds and mists, all these are due to the sun; some people say they are due to the earth, water, etc., but it is not true. Water, clouds mists, all spring from the sun. The sun creates them, and when he looks strongly at them, the clouds and mists disappear.”So it is one state of Realization when you feel yourself to be the over-soul, like the sun, and in the other you drive off the mists of the under-soul.
People say,”I am created in the image of God”. Rama says,”Be images, and you will always be miserable.”You are not a likeness or image of God, but you are God.
Take the image reflected in the water. In respect to this image reflection in water, the sun is called the Over-soul, so in the first state of Realization man feels his over-soul like the sun.
By opening and shutting the eyes, Rama usually perceives this,”I envelope the sun, moon, stars, and all that. I give them power, energy, and life. I am their back and support. I am the over-soul.”
This is one state. If you realize this state, then you will see that all jealousy, hatred, fear go away; to you there is no thought of danger lest somebody copyright your productions, or make capital out of them.
When the child takes away a book, does the mother become disturbed? No, because the child is hers and the book is hers, so why should she be disturbed. So, if a man steals anything from you, the man and you are one, and what he steals is 3’ours and his also, then why fear? To you success or joy is not to be had by begging, is not to be had or looked at from the stand-point of what people call success. Your goal is Reality itself, and if other pleasures and objects of the world come to you, you must say”Get behind me, Satan, I take nothing at thy hands.”Then how happy you become. Heaven itself you become, and you make your life a success.
In order to gain or possess health, to overcome disease, is it necessary to d^ny matter? Rama says no, simply assert yrur true Self and place yourself in the second state of Realization, the state in which the sun looks at the dew or the mist and they disappear. So when you realize yourself in the second state, you reach a state where there is natural duality.
What is pranayama or the practice of breathing? In regard to this, people want to lay stress on this practice, but Rama says when your mind becomes merged or lost in Truth, the breathing practice will take care of itself. The very moment we are lost in that feeling, when at that time we chant OM, the breathing operates of itself in the most desirable and best way possible; it fills the lungs and comes from even below the abdomen and fills you. The principal thing is feeling Reality, and if that is there, everything else will be there.
There are people in this country who want to get beautiful eyes, and beautiful noses, and chins.
Rama says even by acquiring spiritual powers, you are still finite and not happy. People want to apply this psychic power to make riches, even so you are finite, you are miserable and wretched.
Mark this. If you want to gain the objects of desire, beauty, colour, riches, health, you will have to practice Vedantic Renunciation, but not wholly, in part only. Thus as you practice in part, you get this partial benefit, but partial benefit will not mend matters. Then, why not get the Fountain-head, and the particular object you desire will come to you and in addition everything el**e will also seek you. So be not confined to particular objects of desire only, but take the royal road. The short cut to Heaven and Bliss is to realize that you are Heaven itself to-day.
Realization comes in two ways, by faith or through knowledge. You can remove your doubts by studying Vedantic literature, and it is expected that a clear and thorough exposition of this Philosophy will be given by Rama in no distant future. If you cannot get Realization by reading Vedantic literature, then have faith in it.
When Christians get a glimpse of Realization, they do not see just as Christ saw, but they have faith. So if you have time and interest enough, then read Vedantic literature, if not, then have faith in Rama, God, in your own Self, and you are saved. Realize your own Salvation. There is no other way.
Om! Om!! Om!!!