The three paths to union with God; lectures delivered at Benares, at the sixth annual convention of the Indian Section of the Theosophical Society, October 19th, 20th and 21st, 1896

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THE
THREE PATHS

ANNIE BESANT

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LIBRARY

UNIVERSITY Of
CAUFCXtNIA

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THE THREE PATHS

TO UNION WITH GOD

THE THREE PATHS

TO UNION WITH GOD

LECTURES DELIVERED AT BENARES, AT
THE SIXTH ANNUAL CONVENTION OF THE
INDIAN SECTION OF THE THEOSOPHICAL
SOCIETY, OCTOBER IQTH, 20TH AND ZIST, 1896

BY

ANNIE BESANT

LONDON

THE THEOSOPHICAL PUBLISHING SOCIETY

161 NEW BOND STREET, W.

Reprinted 1913

All Rights Reserved

LOAN STACK

QPfftS

FOREWORD

ON the occasion of the Sixth Annual Convention
of the Indian Section of the Theosophical Society
I was asked to deliver three lectures and to take
the Bhagavad Gita as subject. Feeling quite in-
competent to lecture on that divine book, I took
the humbler topic of the Three Paths of Karma,
Jnana and Bhakti, as explained in the Bhagavad
Gttd, and the lectures delivered are now issued in
book form.

I am indebted to Babu Sirish Chandra Bose,
Munsif, of Benares, for the wonderfully accurate
report which he most kindly took of the discourses ;
I have been reported by the best London men, but
have never sent a report to the press with less cor-
rection than that supplied by my amateur friend.

ANNIE BESANT.

BENARES,
February 1, 1897.

007

CONTENTS

rr

KARMA MARGA

MARGA .... 21

BHAKTI MARGA ..... 45

vn

KARMA MARGA

THREE Paths have been traced by the Sages along
any one of which a man may tread, and, by follow-
ing, may attain liberation. Three are the Paths,
and yet in a sense they are but one. Differing in
their methods, their end is one and the same.
Differing in the external conditions, they all lead
to the one Self, they all seek the same goal. These
three Paths — the three Margas as they are called
in the Indian Philosophy — that of Karma or action,
that of Jnana or Wisdom, that of Bhakti or Devotion
— these three Paths finally blend into one, each of
them acquiring in the end the qualities of the others,
each of them passing as it were into the other two,
blending into one the characteristics of the three.
For when you reach Yoga, whether it be the Karma
Yoga, or whether it be the Jnana Yoga, or whether
it be the Bhakti Yoga, the end is one — Union with
the Self ; the attributes needed resemble each other,
and the man reaching perfection through one is

1 1

KARMA wanting in none of the qualities which have been
MARGA deveiopeci aiong any Of tne three Paths.

Sp These three Paths, in the difference of their
methods, and in the identity of their aim, have
been explained for us in that most beautiful and
most widely spread of Indian Scriptures, the Song
of the Lord, the Discourse of Shri Krishna — the
Bhagavad Gitd. There it is that the Paths are
explained and there it is that their end is declared.
There we learn how in the heart of the man of
perfect devotion wisdom springs up ; there we learn
how action may be wrought without attachment,
without binding a man to rebirth ; and there we
learn also that along any one of these Paths the
Lord will meet with man, the Supreme will bless
him. Let men travel along one or the other,
they seek the one Self whether by action, or by
wisdom, or by devotion ; and those who seek shall
surely, shall inevitably, find Him ; for the Self of
all is One, and the goal of all the three Paths is
the same.

If we turn our glance over Nature, if we look
over the whole of the world, everywhere we find
things seeking the Self ; everywhere in every direc-
tion, under whatever form and whatever name,
whether wisely or blindly, whether clear-sightedly
or gropingly, all seek the Self, all are striving to
find the Self. The sun as it darts its rays through
2

space is seeking the Self ; the vast ocean when it KARMA
surges into waves is but seeking the Self ; the winds
as they wander over the surface of the earth are ^
seeking the Self; the forest trees as they stretch
their arms outwards are seeking the Self; every
animal, however dimly, is groping after the Self;
mankind, however blindly, however foolishly, how-
ever mistakenly, is searching for the Self. This
tendency in all creation, this universal fact in every
form of life, in ancient times was called the seek-
ing of the Self. Modern science notices the same
tendency in Nature, and names it Evolution. So
to whichever side we turn, ancient or modern, we
find this upward, this inward, aspiration.

Why should all things seek the Self? Why
should the Self be the goal of all endeavours ? Is
it not because the Self dwells alike in the hearts of
all ? Whether it be in the ocean, whether it be in a
mineral or in a tree, whether in an animal or in a
man, the Self there is hidden within, concealed by
the outer covering of illusion. The one Self is
seated alike in the sun and in the cavity of the
heart, and every living creature searching after
happiness is but seeking the Self; for searching,
however mistakenly, after happiness is but the
blind groping after the Self, which is Bliss. Yea,
the Self is Bliss, eternal, unending, undying ; and
what we call happiness is the Self, which is Bliss,
3

KARMA reflected in broken beams through the medium

MARGA Wj1jcj1 surrounds us. Let none mistake, let none

^ be blinded by the divergences of seeking, by the

errors caused by the outer illusions ; for all are

really seeking in the outer form the inner life.

They seek it everywhere, in all their blind efforts

after joy; and it was the Self Incarnate Shri

Krishna who said: "Who sees seated equally in

all beings, the supreme fshvara, he seeth."1

The Paths that we are to trace in these after-
noon meetings are the three great Paths along
which consciously or unconsciously the Self is
sought. In the earlier stages, the seeking is un-
conscious seeking, the blind desire for happiness, for
satisfaction and joy. In the later stages, the seek-
ing becomes conscious, an intelligent understanding
of what is sought, and of the methods of the search.
Whether in blindness or in vision, the search is
being carried on, and according to the stage of the
evolution of the soul is its knowledge of the methods
and its knowledge of its final goal. These Paths as
they are followed raise the man above the illusion
caused by the qualities of Nature, those qualities
known to us in their widest sense as the three
gunas. It is these that blind the souls, that veil
the Self, that bring in the character of illusion
and prevent the recognition of the reality. On
1 Bhagavad Gitd, xiii. 27.
4

the Paths men learn, by utilising these very gunas, KARMA
to rise beyond them, using different methods, of MARGA
activity, of wisdom and of devotion, in order to ^
learn to separate the Self from the outer activities,
to learn to discriminate the Self from the senses
and the mind which move after their appropriate
objects, to pass above and beyond the gunas ; and
then, above and beyond the gunas, they find the
unveiled Self.

The Path that is our special object of study this
afternoon is Karma Marga, the Path of Action,
which is blindly and quite unconsciously followed
by the mass of mankind, not knowing either the
method or the object. We shall find, as we look
into the history of our race, that this Karma Marga
leads man to plunge into action of every kind, to
rush out after objects of every description, to go
restlessly seeking satisfaction by way of the external
universe, always trying to get more and more and
more, always to accumulate more and more,
largely, and chiefly by increasing activity, by greater
energy of motion, by increased concentration of
effort, by incessant action, to find the Self. He
plunges into action, saying, " I do, I feel, I ex-
perience, I have pleasure and pain." He knows
not that all these doings, feelings, experiences of
pleasure and pain, belong to the energies of Nature,
and that the true Self is not doing, nor feeling, nor
5

KARMA acting, and that these energies of Nature are
MARGA f0uowing one eternal ceaseless round. At first
^ he is moved to action by desire for its fruit. He
desires to enjoy. If he lies down doing nothing,
without activity, he will feel no enjoyment, he will
constantly suffer ; the body itself would perish were
utter inactivity to supervene. Tamas has first to
be overcome; the quality in Nature of darkness,
sluggishness, inertia, sloth, has to be mastered,
controlled, and brought into entire subjection.
Look at the mass of mankind and see how little at
present they are susceptible to higher impulses. It
would be useless to appeal to their desire for know-
ledge, for they have no such longing. They cannot
appreciate the delights of intellectual struggle, still
less can they answer to the stimulus of spiritual
aspiration. They are sunk in the darkness of the
tamasic guna, are wrapped in ignorance and in
darkness, and desire to remain undisturbed. How
shall they be stirred into activity ? Better activity
of any kind than no activity at all; better mis-
directed energy than absolute inertia — the absence
of all motion. They must be moved. At first the
grossest and the coarsest animal desires are the
spurs of Nature ; the sting, as it were, of Nature's
whip, driving the sluggish beings into exertion, and
scourging them forth on the path of action. Man
must be moved by desires, by something to which

6

his nature responds. Later on these desires will KARMA
be recognised as degrading, as unworthy of
humanity, as dragging him back on the Path, as 5p
stifling higher possibilities. But in the earlier
stages they are necessary for the growth of man,
for his progress out of this tamasic quality which
enwraps him, which prevents him from moving at
all. They are better than death ; low as they are,
they have more promise in them than absolute
stagnation. So the activity which is born of desire,
which stirs the man to action, which makes him
seek gratification, which sends him after pleasure
even though the pleasure be low, is the early teach-
ing of Nature which drives him into activity, in
order that he may grow. However much, then,
these evils are to be reprobated, they have their
place, their function for the lowest and most
stagnant natures. And therefore the Lord has
said that He is present even in the vices of the
vicious, in that which is driving them into action in
order that some activity may be obtained.

Treading the Path of Karma, the man later on is
moved by a desire for a somewhat higher fruit, and
that develops in him the quality of Rajas. He
becomes exceedingly active ; he rushes out in every
direction. His energies are abundant, overwhelm-
ing, aggressive, and combative. He flies into the
outer world, driven by the activities of the senses
7

KARMA and the mind, and seeking their gratification. He

A performs action with this desire for fruit.
%> Now the fruit may be of two kinds. He desires
to enjoy the result of his action, whether it may be
in this world, or whether it may happen to be in
another. If we glance back to ages which are
known to be less material, if we look backward to
the times when religion was exercising a pre-
dominant influence over mankind, when man re-
cognised the immortality of the soul, not as a
phrase of the lips but as the ruling idea of the life,
when the man felt and knew that he himself was
immortal, then the action was motived by the desire
for fruit to be enjoyed in the realms of Svarga.
The man's activities might be rajasic, working
entirely for fruit, giving up a thing here that he
might gain much more elsewhere ; sacrificing some
of his wealth in charity in order that he might have
goods on the other side of death ; laying up happi-
ness in the superphysical realm, that in Svarga he
might enjoy the fruit : yet in those ages, though the
action was largely guided by the motive or desire
for fruit, the fruit was to be enjoyed in the realms
on the other side of death, instead of being limited
to the material delights of the earth.

But if we turn to the activities around us at the
present time, to the Path as it is being trodden so
very largely in the West, and to an increasing extent
8

in the East, we shall find that the fruit of action KARMA
that men are desiring, the fruit which is the motive MAR
of their exertion and the object of their labour, that ^
fruit is to be something on this side of death, and
consists very largely in the increase of material
objects, in the acquirement and the possession of
material wealth. Let us look now for a moment at
the western nations. We find them continually
engaged in the effort to increase their comforts. I
may call it, in fact, a diseased activity. No man is
thought to be doing anything unless there is a
result produced on the physical material plane.
The activity is not recognised unless it brings fruit
in the physical, in the outer or lower material
world. You find men very often following science.
While the desire on the part of the scientific
discoverer may be the desire for knowledge pure
and simple, the interest of the public in his dis-
covery, the eagerness with which they watch his
progress, the great anxiety with which they take up
his results, is because the increase of knowledge
leads to increased power for the accumulation of
objects, to increased gratification of material de-
sires, to increased abundance of material wealth.
We find endless multiplication of objects. There is
a race between the objects that gratify desires and
the creation of new desires which will demand
fresh objects for their gratification. There is a
9

KARMA constant struggle between the wearied men of the

TVT A T? f* A

world, of wealth and of pleasure, who are longing
5p for new sensations, for new activities, for new
channels into which all their energies may pour,
and those who supply their desires, who try to
invent new objects in order to stimulate fresh
desires and thus obtain fresh avenues of employ-
ment for themselves. Thus always men want to
have more and more pleasures of the same kind.
Men have learned to travel faster; journeys that
used to take formerly the greater part perhaps of a
year are now accomplished in a month or so, and
journeys of months are accomplished in weeks or
even in days. But is man very much the happier,
and has his desire been satisfied? No. His cry to
the man of science still is : " Find us a new motive
power, something that will transcend the possibilities
of steam, something like electricity if you will, which
will enable us to cross continents and oceans in a
couple of days, and fly over the surface of earth
with greater rapidity. Steam we are tired of; find
electricity, or find some new motor that will carry
us more swiftly."

How much is man really the happier for this
swifter movement? How much would he be the
higher in spiritual progress if he could do in a day
what before he took a year to do ? More and more
speed, bigger and bigger vessels, and thus men go
10

on in an unending succession. Lately they were KARMA
boasting in the papers in Paris that a new man MARGA
will come into existence on a new earth, because ^
they hope to create food by chemical processes
instead of by agricultural methods, because they
are getting more knowledge, accumulating greater
stores of wealth. That pursuit is doomed to failure.
That restless seeking for satisfaction in mere in-
crease of activity has no ending. More and more
may be gained; more and more may be accumu-
lated ; and in the midst of it all, man will remain
weary and discontented ; because in none of these
is the Self to be found unveiled ; and the soul of
man, identical in nature with the Self, is ever weary
until it finds its home in Him. Therefore it is
that along that particular line of Karma no ulti-
mate satisfaction can be gained. A man toils all
his life for wealth, but he is discontented, and in
the midst of all his possessions the cry is for some-
thing more. Truly was it said by Manu that we
might as well try to extinguish a fire by pouring
butter into it, as to extinguish desire by gratifying
it with the objects of desire. Such gratification
ends in weariness; such gratification ends in
satiety; and the Self, which is greater than all
objects of desire, will sting the Soul still onward
to seek a deeper satisfaction.

After a time the man on the Path of Karma
11

KARMA discovers this. He finds he is weary, dissatisfied,
MARGA and Discontented : that the more he acquires, the
^ more causes of discontentment arise around him,
and deep and bitter is his disappointment. Then
reaction comes. He sees that here there is no
satisfaction, no gratification. He says: Let me
fly from the world, let me renounce all objects of
the senses, for here on the Path of Karma there
is neither peace nor contentment to be found;
and out of sheer disgust the man will for a time
rush away from all the objects of the senses, and
seek to find peace in the solitude of recluse life.
But to his disappointment, to his discouragement,
to his grief, he discovers that not by fleeing from
the objects of desire can desire itself be extin-
guished. He finds that the taste for them pursues
him even into the jungle. The images of the sense-
objects come after him to his cave and hermitage,
and the man dwells mentally upon such images of
the senses; although the body is held back, the
man is still a prey to desires, he is still torn by
the contending passions of his lower nature. For
desire is not extinguished by external withdrawal
from the objects of desire. Its roots are deeper
in human nature; and the Path of Karma must
be further trodden if desire is to disappear.

Then there comes to him the voice of the Lord
in the silence of this inactivity that he has forced
12

upon himself. The Voice will come through the KARMA
silence, and it speaks the words of eternal wisdom : MARGA
" Man winneth not freedom from action by ab- ^
staining from activity, nor by mere renunciation
(of activity) doth he rise to perfection."1 Not
with outer inactivity, but with freedom from desire
is this Path of Karma to be trodden. Freedom
from action will not be won by the bodily ab-
stention from activity. The Path of Action must
yet be trodden before the soul may be free. The
freedom is won on that Path itself by learning a
deeper lesson than the removal of the body from
the city to the jungle. He learns that lesson from
the same Divine source, the duty of the man living
in the world who yet would be free from attach-
ment. He learns that he must act, but that the
motive must be changed. He must tread the
Path of Action, but the motive is to be new and
divine in its character. And that same Voice, the
same great Teacher, breathes once more its lesson
into the soul of the weary and exhausted seeker
for freedom : " As the ignorant act from attach-
ment to action, O Bharata, so the wise act without
attachment, desiring the maintenance of man-
kind." 2

Here is a change, indeed. Not to rush away
into outer inactivity, deserting the place which his

1 Bhagavad Gitd, iii. 4. 2 Bhagavad Gitd, iii. 25.

13

KARMA Karma had marked out in the world ; not to desert
MARGA the duty to his famjiy or to his nation . but to

5p bring into the discharge of those duties a new
spirit, carrying on his action inspired by a new
motive. His place may be that of a man whose
duty it is to acquire wealth. Let him acquire it ;
but where the ignorant would acquire wealth in
order to enjoy the fruit, let him work without
attachment; let the wealth flow into his hands,
but let him take it as a steward for the world,
and not as its possessor. He works for the benefit
of mankind, and not from attachment to action.
Such a man will turn his wealth into new lines
of active work for man. He will plan magnificent
schemes ; he will think and work and toil for the
benefit of man: as others work and toil for the
benefit of their own personal selves and their
immediate family, he will work for others, and
thus use his powers for the benefit of mankind.

Here a subtler temptation attacks him. This
work for the maintenance of mankind even may
have a personal object running through it, and
may start from a subtler root of actions, may
have a different kind of looking for result. For
a man who plans out great schemes of benevolence
is anxious that the schemes should succeed. He
wants success, and part of his motive is this longing
for success and for the gratification of seeing the
14

fruits of his labours. Or perhaps it may be that KARMA
he desires the love and gratitude of his fellowmen M
and to gain their approbation. Thus a personal ^
return for his action may be sought. But that
must not be. If any personal motive comes in
he is bound by the fruit of his action ; he is fettered
by the desired result.

And so the same Lord who before had taught
him, the same Divine Teacher who had made him
understand that freedom from outer activity was
not freedom from action, that the wise man must
act for the sake of serving mankind, now gives him
a deeper lesson, now carries him on to a still
further step on the Path — it is the grand lesson of
renouncing every fruit of action, the loving, joyful
surrender of every motive which has its roots in
the personal Self. The lesson comes in those words
of the Lord : " Thy business is with the action
only, never with its fruits," even though the fruits
be the love and gratitude that give delight to the
lower man. " Never with its fruits " ; that must
not mingle with the motive. And then the Teacher
goes on to say : " Let not the fruit of action be
thy motive, nor be thou to inaction attached." l

Perfect renunciation. No longer moved by
personal desire to enjoy the fruit here ; no longer
by the personal desire to enjoy the fruit on the
1 Bhagavad Gitd, ii. 47.

15

KARMA other side of death ; no longer by the higher per-
sonal desire to reap the love and gratitude of his
^ fellowmen ; but the renunciation of all desires, the
doing of action with no regard to the fruit. Let
success come ; what is it to the doer ? Let failure
come ; what matters it to him who has done his
work ? " Balanced even in success and failure :
equilibrium is called Yoga." * Equal in success
and failure, in pleasure and pain, honour and dis-
honour, in love and in hatred. No motive that
touches the lower Self is mingled with the activity.
The action is the work of the Lord, and whatever
the result, it accrues to the Lord. Plan and
scheme for the benefit of man, and your scheme
fails. It is well. Plan and scheme for the benefit
of man, and your scheme succeeds. It is well.
Success was not the object; failure was not the
object. The only object was the performance of
duty. Whatever the fruit of the action, the man
remains untouched and undisturbed. Action is
his duty. This is the true treading of the Path of
Karma — not seeking action when it is not present,
nor refusing to perform it when it is there. Will-
ing to work, if work be duty ; willing to be inactive,
if no work comes within the duty of the moment —
absolute indifference to every result. The man
who is thus treading the Path of Karma may be
1 Bhagavad Gitd, ii. 48.
16

living in a palace, may be fed with the most delicate KARMA
and savoury dishes, all around him may lie objects MAR
of gratification to the senses ; he remains unaffected. ^
Let them come, let them go, "the senses move
among the objects of sense," 1 I remain untouched
and undisturbed. They give him no gratification ;
they give him no repulsion. He neither repulses
objects when they are present, nor desires them
when they are absent. He is hurled from a palace
to a hovel ; instead of rich clothes he is clad in
rags ; instead of savoury dishes, he has to live on
broken food that may be given him by the poor, —
what matters it to him ? He desired not what has
passed away, any more than he rejected it when it
was present. He is as happy in the hovel as in
the palace ; as happy in the palace as in the hovel.
Neither attracts him, neither repels him. They
are outer energies of Nature, passing illusion of
Matter. What are they to him who has attained
renunciation, and cares nothing for fruit, but only
for the doing of duty ? A sublime life, a noble life,
one of the hardest of all lives to live — to live sur-
rounded by every object and absolutely indifferent
to all. To move through riches or poverty, through
pleasure or pain, through honour or ignominy, with
equal contentment, with equal serenity, and with
equal calm. To what a height has such a man
1 Bhagavad Gitd, v. 9.

17 2

KARMA risen as he treads the difficult Path of Karma, now
MARGA become the path Of Karma- Yoga ! He is approach-
^p ing the stage of Yoga where all paths blend into
one, and where the Supreme will unveil Himself
to the man who is free from the illusions of matter.
Out of this life — the life that asks nothing, that
seeks nothing, that claims nothing, that refuses
nothing, out of that life wisdom arises. How can
the eyes remain without discrimination of him
who has learned to discriminate between the outer
activities and the Self by the renunciation of desire
while performing the action ? Such a man becomes
wise by action as another may become wise by
intellectual study and contemplation. But there
is another Path — the Path of Bhakti— and that
must blend with both the others when the journey
is complete.

Then a glimpse of the Supreme is gained. The
eyes, purged of all desires, perceive Him under all
veils of matter. The heart, purified from all
desires, sees deep within itself the one Self of all.
Then from that sight of the Supreme, from that
glimpse of the eternal Beauty, the last touch is put
to Karma-Yoga, the last step is taken on the
karmic path, and that is the lesson of sacrifice.
It still comes from the same Teacher, and is poured
out from the same Divine lips ; once more to the
soul that is purified, that has learned the lesson
18

of activity as duty, the lesson of renunciation of KARMA
fruit, and that is working out the law, comes the MARGA
final, the supreme, lesson : — " The world is bound 2p
by all action unless performed with sacrifice for
object." l Every action nowr is to be done not only
without desire for his fruit, but with the object of
sacrifice to the Supreme. Man has to become a
co-worker with the Lord, a fellow-worker with the
Deity Himself. Once he did action with fruit as
motive. Then he learned to do it for mankind.
Then he learned to do it for duty's sake, renouncing
every fruit, in taking every thing as the same.
Lastly, he learns to do it with sacrifice as object,
and every action becomes an act of worship, every
action is an act of homage to the Supreme. Then
indeed on the Path of Karma he tastes the joy of
the Lord ; then there begins to flow into him the
bliss of the Self. He learns to renounce and to
stand without attachment to the lower, and the
higher flows in and fills his being and he knows
himself as one with the Supreme. The deepest
joy suffuses the whole of his nature ; work is done
as sacrifice, and the joy of the sacrificer is his.
He shares in the life of Ishvara; he is a channel
for the working of the Lord; he sees all action
done as sacrifice to Him — He the only Worker,
the one Sacrifice. He the Giver, and He the

1 Bhagavad Gitd, iii. 9.

19

KARMA Taker of the fruit and the Enjoyer, the whole

^

bound up in Him. And when that perfect sacrifice
is accomplished, when the life gives always and
takes from none save God, when the light flows
out through it, but it asks nothing for itself, when
the sun shines on the uttermost limits of the world
and cares nothing for its own radiance and claims
nothing save to belong to the Lord — then the Path
of Karma passes into the Supreme Peace. Then
man has found his goal ; he reaches union with
the Self.

So may we close with the teaching and the pro-
mise of the same Divine Instructor, whose precepts
we have been striving to understand, and to apply
to our own lives the teaching and the promise
embodied in the mighty words : " The disciplined
Self, moving among sense-objects with senses free
from attraction and repulsion, mastered by the
Self, goeth to Peace. . . . This is the Brahman
state, O son of Pritha. Having attained thereto
none is bewildered. Who, even at the death-hour,
is established therein he goeth to the Nirvana of
Brahman." l

1 Bhagavad Gitd, ii. 64, 72.

20

JftANA MARGA

WE were considering yesterday the way in which
the Self might be sought by way of activity. We
were studying that Path of Action which so many
of mankind must tread. Studying that Path, we
learned how a man might gradually grow from
attachment to non-attachment, how he might
practise renunciation, how finally by sacrifice he
might attain to the Supreme. This afternoon we
are to consider the second of the great Paths
leading to the Self, that which is called the Jfiana
Marga or the Path of Wisdom, — a Path trodden
by the minority only, a Path which is not suited
to the mass of mankind, a Path which is encum-
bered with special dangers, most particularly for
the untrained, for those who have not accomplished
the preliminary steps of purification. For neither
about the Path of Karma, nor about the Path of
Bhakti, is there the same danger of misunderstand-
ing, the same likelihood of confusion, the same
21

JNANA possibility of going utterly wrong, if due preparation
MARGA £or jte higher stages has not been properly made

as there is in connection with Jnana Marga. We
are to trace it from its early stages to its later
growth. We are to see how it leads from the life
of the world to the goal of the Supreme. We
shall take it stage by stage, in order that we may
understand it, in order that we may avoid mis-
conception, and may not fall into those traps
which are on either side of it, and which ensnare
so many unwary pilgrims.

I have said that the entrance to it is only
possible to some. The way which begins in pure
intellect, although it transcends pure intellect in
its later stages, implies the development in the
man who would tread it at all, of a wide, of a large,
of a penetrating and a lofty intellect. The senses
must be subjugated, the mind must be cultivated,
— and cultivated not with a view of obtaining
anything by its exercise save the pure enjoyment
of pure wisdom at a later time; it must not be
tainted by desire for anything that may come as
the result of knowledge, connected with the grati-
fication of the lower nature of man. As we saw
yesterday, intellect is often used to subserve the
gratification of the senses. Science is often em-
ployed in order to increase the accumulation of
material objects, in order to increase the comforts
22

of the physical world. The man who is preparing JNANA
to tread the Path of Wisdom must have outgrown MAR
all those lower desires, must have turned aside ^
from the attraction of the senses, and must find,
at first in knowledge and later in wisdom, the
reward which is all-sufficient in itself, and which
needs no adventitious advantages in order to be
attractive to the inner man. Tamas must be
entirely subjugated, must no longer have power
to influence his nature, no longer have power to
hold the feet of the man in the mire belonging
to the lowest world. Rajas, the quality of activity,
must be turned away from all those lines of action
that have to do with material objects. Rajas must
be turned in the direction of gaining knowledge ;
all its energies must be concentrated on the
accumulation of knowledge, before the Path of
true Wisdom can be approached at all.

In the earlier stages of the Path, what we may
call the entrance stage, knowledge will be sought
for its own sake. You may pick out the souls
that have entered on this Path by watching how
a man will gradually develop within himself, or
be born with, the tendency innate in the Ego to
search for knowledge, asking for nothing save the
delight of discovery, save the joy of a wide intel-
lect, of the conscious increase of powers of the
mind. You will find such men scattered over the
23

JNANA world, though few and far between, — men who
A care nothing for fame, nothing for wealth, who
<£* are not seeking the applause of their fellows, nor
the gratification of their lower nature. They are
devotees of knowledge for the joy that knowledge
gives. They find in its pursuit its own reward.
They are passionate in their search after know-
ledge up to death. They long to know the nature
of the universe, the nature of man, to plunge into
the heights and depths of existence, to fathom
all the secrets of Nature, to assimilate all the
knowledge which the outer world can give. Know-
ledge, as I said, is not wisdom. Knowledge lies
in the observation of facts, the observation of
phenomena, in gathering those observations to-
gether, in arranging them side by side and tracing
out the relation between them, in searching for
some underlying principle which may group and
classify and co-ordinate these separately observed
phenomena, and then in welding them together
into some hypothesis which fits them all, will
explain them all. Then the student takes the
hypothesis based upon observation and upon
reasoning by inference from the results of obser-
vation ; and comparing that hypothesis anew with
the phenomena of the outer world, he devises
experiments to test it, seeking for all possible
methods by which its accuracy or inaccuracy may
24

be discovered ; and thus having completed his ex- JNANA
periments he can say : " I have experimented, and MARGA
found an invariable result, which was foretold by ^
the hypothesis." Then the result is regarded as
a Law in Nature, on which men may build with
certainty. A man of science will work in this
fashion, doing admirable work of its own kind,
watching carefully, observing with endless patience,
showing what has been described as " the sublime
patience of the investigator," and asking Nature
questions time after time, month after month, year
after year, until her answer is ever repeated with
undeviating identity, so that he may build on a
rock of truth on which Science may securely
stand and advance to fresh discoveries. If you
would understand the way in which knowledge is
thus gained, take as an example Charles Darwin,
the great English naturalist, whose marvellous
experiments were the admiration of his own gener-
ation as well as of those that follow. You will
find him, for instance, devoting himself to the
cultivation of certain plants, changing the soil,
regulating the light, observing all the conditions
that surrounded them, giving to one more, to
another less, varying the conditions in every
possible way, and noting down the results of each
variation. Then perhaps repeating the observa-
tions a hundred times over. Doing this, that no
25

JNANA inaccuracy might creep in, that no hasty inference
might be made, that no partial view should be
jj* taken as the whole, that no blunder should be
made in tracing the thread of causation, and that
mere succession of phenomena should not mislead
the inquirer into a mistaken view of a sequence
which was never changed. This is admirable in
its devotion to truth, in its candour, determining
to give endless labour before an assertion is made.
All this is real worship of that God of truth whose
hand is shown in the laws of the physical world.
And this very patience is the proof of the real
and unadulterated desire for knowledge which
animates the man. To such a worker nothing in
Nature is small and nothing is great. Every
phenomenon is observed with the same patient
accuracy, whether it be the course of suns or the
movement of small microscopic creatures in a drop
of water. Who can tell where knowledge may be
hidden ? Who can say where the finger of Nature
is pointing to a new discovery? It may be that
the movements of a particle, observed under the
microscope, may be more significant of the Divine
working in Nature than the course of a comet in
its orbit as it whirls through space and plunges
into the infinite depths. Nothing is either small
or great; everything is the manifestation of Nature,
and may hide the secret of the working. He learns
26

as he studies that Nature works as carefully, as
exquisitely, as delicately, with the same geometri-
cal accuracy and precision of form, when she
fashions the shell of an invisible diatom, as when
she makes a solar system of planets revolving
round their central sun. And this view of Nature
— that all in Nature is equally worthy of observa-
tion^— is interwoven into the very life of the man
who gives himself to knowledge, and follows her
to her obscurest corners. Shall I tell you a curious
fable which presents this truth in a forcible way
by a striking picture, which really expresses, as
well as anything I have ever read, this character-
istic of the searcher after knowledge which is
marked in the earlier stages of this Path ?

A great Russian writer of fiction, that some of
you may have read, Tourguenieff, gives the follow-
ing fable to illustrate the way in which Nature works
over her minutest products as over her greatest
and grandest creations. He says that he travelled
through a mighty rock-hewn temple, a vast temple
whose limits were invisible, lost in obscurity on
either side, so vast that only the darkness seemed
to bound it, and the living rock was above it and
below it, and the living rock made its pillars and
the arches of its gigantic roof. As he went through
that wonderful temple, he saw sitting in it a mighty
Goddess, gigantic in her figure, magnificent in her
27

JNANA form, her face radiant with divine power, love, and
MA intellect. Strength and wisdom were incarnate in
5p this heroic figure, seated lonely amid the immensity
of the rock-hewn fane. She was engaged at work,
— bending over her task in intensest contemplation,
her fingers busily employed in shaping some object,
in producing some creature. Her mighty brows
were bent above it in rapt attention ; all her
thought was given to her labour. Silence was
around her, silence on every side. He approached
in fear and thought, " Surely this Goddess is
fashioning the brain of some mighty hero or of
some great thinker ; some great one of mankind is
occupying her attention, and all her powers are bent
to the gigantic work." He approached in reverence,
and asked her what she wrought. She raised her
face and said — and her deep, soft voice reverberated
through the space around her — " I fashion the hind-
leg of a flea."

Such is the fable. The meaning is clear enough :
In it is depicted the spirit that votaries of knowledge
learn when they meet the mighty Goddess, that for
Her everything is worthy of perfection. The smallest
and the greatest, the tiniest and the mightiest alike,
have got in them something of the Nature- Spirit,
and students search into the secrets of Nature with
eager and reverent minds, and thus knowledge in-
creases, and science after science is builded.
28

The microscope unfolds the infinite world of the JNANA
minute, and the telescope unveils the infinite world
of the vast. Above and below, in all the six direc- ^
tions of space, new fields stretch out for ever new
discoveries. New knowledge beckons the student
from every side. World after world is there to
be studied in our solar system ; world after world
to be conquered. Let us suppose that a man is
equipped, as a man may be, to study all the regions
of solar space, that he is held by no limits of
physical existence. Let the man who seeks Know-
ledge pass from the physical to the astral world,
invisible to fleshly eyes to-day. He has to acquire
there the knowledge of a variety of objects, of a
diversity of phenomena and of new possibilities.
As the intellect evolves new capacities, new depths
of being unfold before the dazzled eyes. He con-
quers the astral, other worlds unfold before him,
the world of intellect, — a new infinity of things to
be observed, a new infinity and diversity of experi-
ences to be gained. Let us say that he has con-
quered the physical, astral, and mental regions.
He has only conquered the three worlds of this
tiny sphere ; and the rest of the infinite universe
stretches around him, unknown, unexplored.
Suppose that he conquers planet after planet until
every one of them is as familiar to him with its
wide field of phenomena as our city is to ourselves.
29

JNANA Imagine that after the conquest of this solar system
MARGA ke starts to conquer other systems through all the
^" infinity of space. Where shall knowledge find its
terminus ? Where shall the intellect acknowledge
itself exhausted ? Knowledge piled on knowledge,
worlds heaped over worlds, systems massed upon
systems, and still the unknown stretches around
him on every side, and still the unexplored beckons
him to its mysterious distances, and the longing for
knowledge spurs on the lagging soul. There is a
story of the pillar of fire in which Mahadeva
stretched upwards and downwards, lost in the
infinities of space ; and Brahma soared upwards a
thousand years and found that it still towered
beyond Him, and Vishnu plunged downwards for a
thousand years, and the fire still stretched below
Him. That might be taken as the picture of the
Infinite Divine Being who manifests Himself in all
the worlds and in all whose worlds only a fraction
of His possibilities are shown. There is no end to
Apara Vidya, to the knowledge of phenomena;
there is no end to seeking. The soul's pinions flag
in the unceasing depths of space, and wearied out
the mind falls back defeated, baffled, unable to com-
plete its knowledge.

But during the search for knowledge, during the
gathering of observations, the Self has been speak-
ing to the heart of man. The Self has been
30

whispering that It is hidden beneath the veil of JNANA
Maya, that these objects are but illusory, and that MARGA
the eternal and endless are but one. That it is ^
not necessary to acquire all knowledge before true
Wisdom may be gained ; that it is not necessary to
pervade the universe before the Self may be dis-
criminated under the veil of illusion, and the step
which leads from knowledge to Wisdom may be
made at any point of the search, for the Self is
hidden everywhere : " Nor is there aught, moving
or unmoving, that may exist bereft of me." l Dimly
the man senses the One beneath the many. Dimly
he senses the Self under the veils that hide It from
the eyes of men. Weary of a search that is endless,
for objects had followed upon objects, weary of a
Path that has no goal, for observation of phenomena
is endless for the intellect, the man dimly at first,
but still truly, knows that he must leave the
objects, must leave observation, must leave the outer
world, must turn inward and not outward, that he
must look at the centre and not at the circumfer-
ence of the circle. Nowhere on the surface, though
he search the universe, shall he find the Self;
everywhere, if he look inwards, shall the Self be
manifest. Then there awakens in that man, slowly
and gradually asserting itself, making itself felt in
all this turmoil of phenomena, what is called Viveka,
1 Bhagavad Gitd, x. 39.
31

discrimination — the discrimination of the Eternal
amid the transient, of the Self within the objects,
^ of the One concealed in the many, of the true end
of all seeking, the Infinite, the Eternal Sat. He
begins to discriminate between the show and the
substance, between the illusory and the real,
between the false and the truth that underlies it.
This quality of discrimination is the first step out
of mere knowledge into true Wisdom. The man
discriminates the Eternal from the transitory, and
his foot is placed on the higher stage of the Path.
The result of the growth of the quality of dis-
crimination within him is the feeling of Vairagya,
the disgust of the outer appearances — a feeling of
shrinking away from them, a desire to fly from
them, a longing to escape from them anywhere out
of the sight of man, into silence, into solitude, away
from the family life into the silence at least of
Nature. But even there phenomena are to be
sensed, and the Self is still hidden under illusion.
He has been tricked by this beautiful show ; like a
foolish child he has been deluded into thinking that
the toy he plays with is a living thing, that the doll
has life and can answer back to his speech, can ex-
perience as he experiences. He is almost angry with
the outer world, that had held him bound in threads
that seemed links of iron, but in reality are mere
webs of gossamer, made of glamour and unreality.

Out of that disgust which follows on the glimpses JNANA
given by true discrimination, he is lifted by the MAR
knowledge that progress is possible for him, and ^
that there are six mental attributes which he must
acquire, to some extent at least, ere he can find the
Self amidst its hidden coverings, ere he can truly
recognise the Self beneath the veils that enshroud
it. The worst enemy of man is himself, in the
lowest nature that answers to the physical and
astral worlds. The man must learn dispassion by
the study of experiences, by disillusionment, until
he has developed certain powers, without which
the later stages of the Path may not be trodden,
although they may be talked about and discussed
by the intellect alone. He must acquire control
of the mind, control of the body, so that neither
body not mind may have the slightest power to
disturb him and so that they will never move
merely in answer to impulses from without. He
must develop that wide breadth of view which
understands and tolerates all, which realises the
one aim under the many methods, which can see
the same object being sought by a great diversity
of ways. He must develop that endurance without
which search for the Self will fail — that endurance
which makes the soul strong. No soul that is
weak can find the Self by the way of Wisdom.
He must develop confidence in his own divinity
33 3

JNANA he must feel himself divine and know that there-
MARGA £ore everyt-hing is possible to him, and he must
%* develop that balance which nothing can disturb.
For how shall the Self become visible if there be
want of balance, preventing clearness and distinct-
ness of vision ?

When he has developed all these qualities, then
it is said that he is ready to enter on the Path that
leads to liberation, ready to stand as a candidate
before the gate which opening shall give to his
tread the Path of pure Wisdom for which he has
trained himself by all the past experiences, by the
purity of his developed intellect, the keenness of
his developed mind, by the reason that he has
sharpened in his struggle, and by the acquiring of
all those other qualities with which he has crowned
his intellectual life; — and then, and not till then,
he is said to be an Adhikari, the man who is ready
for the final teaching, the Wisdom concerning the
Self.

What is that Wisdom ? That Wisdom is the
immediate knowledge of the Self — the knowledge
of the One, the Infinite, the Eternal, the seeing of
That everywhere, through every veil recognising It,
and identifying the one Self wherever It appears,
and It is everywhere. Wisdom is defined by
Shri Krishna Himself who has traced the Path of
Wisdom as well as the Path of Action and the
34

Path of Devotion and has summed up into a single JNANA
sentence the true Wisdom, that which is meant by MAR
the word Jnana. He declared: " I, O Gudakesha, ^
am the Self seated in the heart of all beings ; I am
the beginning, the middle, and also the end of all
beings." x And then later he declared in detail
what was Wisdom : " Humility, unpretentiousness,
harmlessness, forgiveness, rectitude, service of the
teacher, purity, steadfastness, self-control, indiffer-
ence to the objects of the senses, and also absence
of egoism, insight into the pain and evil of birth,
death, old age and sickness, unattachment, absence
of self-identification with son, wife or home, and
constant balance of mind in wished-for and un-
wished-for events, unflinching devotion to Me,
without union with another, resort to sequestered
places, absence of enjoyment in the company of
men, constancy in the Adhyatma wisdom, under-
standing of the object of essential wisdom ; that is
declared to be Wisdom ; all against it is ignorance.
That the Light of all light is said to be beyond
darkness ; Wisdom, the object of Wisdom the end
of Wisdom, seated in the hearts of all."2 That
is Wisdom as declared by the lips of the Lord of
Wisdom ; and when He was speaking of the man,
constant and unceasing in his pursuit of that

1 Bhagavad Gitd, x. 20.

2 Bhagavad Gitd, xiii. 7-11, 17.

35

JNANA Wisdom, He spake of the Adhikari, and defined
Wisdom as the knowledge of the essential Nature
jf of Brahman.1 Nothing less than that is Wisdom.
Everything except that is ignorance. Knowledge
is ignorance, if it knows only the outer effects.
Science is ignorance if it is concerned only with
the Maya of phenomena. Wisdom resides alone
in the knowledge of the Self in His essential Nature,
His all-pervading identity.

Let us follow, however poorly, some of the alpha-
bets of this knowledge of the Self which is Wisdom.
The Self is One. Variety is of the outer universe,
the play of illusions, the veil of Maya, which blinds
us to the Unity which is the only Existence, the
only Life, the only Lord of the whole universe,
beyond whom there is nothing; and He is One.
The Self is actionless. Activity is of Prakriti, the
veil with which the Self surrounds Himself, the
play of gunas. The variety and activity in Nature
are the outer semblances — the visible appearances
of that Unity. The change of one thing into
another — birth, maturity, and death, the wheel of
constant change of living objects, these are the play
of the gunas, and the gunas revolve, whilst the Self
remains unchanged. All this is the Lord sur-
rounded by his Maya, Vishnu with His Lila, the
play of the universe; all is the thought of that
1 Compare Bhagavad Gitd, viii. 3.
36

Supreme. The forms are changing and therefore JNANA
illusory ; the life is Himself, and He is all. It is MARGA
said that " He who seeth that Prakriti verily per- ^
formeth all actions, and that the Self is actionless,
he seeth." l This is the working out of discrimina-
tion, the clear vision between the Self and all
those veils of Nature which enshroud and hide
Him. The Self is actionless ; His apparent move-
ments belong to external Nature. The Self is
everywhere, seated in all, beyond all. Once more
the words of Wisdom come forth : " Seeing indeed
everywhere the same Ishvara equally dwelling." 2

How hard the lesson to learn ! Equally dwelling
everywhere, in the lowest and the vilest as well as
in the loftiest and the greatest, in the atom of the
dust as well as in the central sun of the universe,
in all that is vile and base, the Self of the profligate
the same as the Self of the saint ! What lesson is
this that the Lord is teaching ? What meaning in
words like these ? It means that f shvara is the
same in all, for all the universe is His own mani-
festation ; and doth He not say : " I am the gam-
bling of the cheat, and the splendid things, I ! " 3
Can you catch glimpses of that lesson ? Can you
understand what that means for the universe ? It
implies that there is need of every experience, in

1 Bhagavad Gitd, xiii. 29. 2 Bhagavad Gitd, 28.

8 Bhagavad Gitd, x. 36,

37

JNANA order that Wisdom may be perfected. If you can
MARGA see the one Self in the beautiful, the noble, and the
Sp sublime, can you also see Him in the lowly, the
ignoble, and the repulsive? To a man who can
thus see, there is nothing ugly and nothing beautiful
— all are parts of Himself, necessary for the present
evolution. Everything has its own place, every-
thing its own position, playing its own part and
gathering experience ; for He is infinite, and endless
must be the variety that shall show forth, even a
fragment of Himself. You see the differences, and
therefore you see imperfection ; you see a fragment
and not the whole of which it is a part. It is as if
you took a weaver's carpet, and saw the reverse
side where the threads end, and saw not the
pattern ; nor do you see the upper side, where black
is wanted as well as the exquisite shades of lovely
glow, all falling into their rightful places. That
one Self is in every one, and not one is outside His
life. No fragment is excluded from the whole.
Our purblind eyes see only the imperfection, they
see not the Self working towards perfection ; the
whole is evolving to a perfect Nature, and the most
hideous is on the way to divine beauty, the most
simple is on the way to divine intelligence. There-
fore see Him everywhere, seated equally in all, and
then you will have true discrimination, and the Self
shall shine forth undimmed.
38

Another lesson has still to be learned : all that JNANA
exists and attracts, everything that has in it some-
thing of the element of attraction, has it only ^
because of the Self. Were it possible that the
Self should not be there, all attractiveness would
vanish. Do you remember how Maitreyi prayed
her husband to teach her the lesson of immortality,
and he answered : " Behold, not indeed for the
husband's sake, the husband is dear, but for the
sake of the Self is dear the husband. Behold, not
indeed for the wife's sake the wife is dear, but for
the sake of the Self is dear the wife. Behold, not
for the sons' sake the sons are dear, but for the
sake of the Self are dear the sons. Behold, not
for the property's sake property is dear, but for the
sake of the Self is dear the property." Nay, not
even " for the Gods' sake the Gods are dear, but
for the sake of the Self are dear the Gods." l Thus
the mighty Sage explained to his listening wife the
mystery of the Self, and the mystery of the love
that goes out from each to the other separated
being. This love is the Self seeking Himself in
another. So the Sage gave many another illustra-
tion, teaching how everything is dear for the Self
within it and not for the veil of illusion that
surrounds it. " The Self is verily to be seen, to be
heard, to be meditated upon." That is the secret

1 Brihaddranyakopanishad, iv. v. 6.

39

JNANA of immortality. Such was the teaching of the

MARGA . Of the

teacher speaking to the listening soul of the disciple,
and unveiling the secret of Wisdom. When this
lesson is learned, "Thou art That." When this
lesson is acquired, " I am He " ; there is no differ-
ence. That is the position of the true Jnani of the
liberated soul who cannot any longer be affected by
the play of the gunas, by the revolving wheel of
Nature from which he has escaped. There is One,
there is none other. That lesson, really learned, is
the breaking of every bond, the liberation of the
soul. In such a man all desires are dead, the
activities of the mind are at rest. He doeth
nothing, because the Self doeth all through him.
There is the secret of " action in inaction," there is
the secret of true Wisdom. He may act with the
body, with the mind, but he is doing nothing.

How then does he live ? Ere saying another
word about that, let me remind you of a striking
story that you may distinguish between the true
wisdom and the lip wisdom. It is told in one of
the sacred books, the story of Shri Krishna and
the Gopis, in relation to the Great Rishi Durvasa.
For some time that Rishi ate but once in the year,
and then required for his single meal an enormous
amount of food. The Gopis were wont to carry
him this yearly repast. When the time came to
40

carry the food, they gathered much rich food and JNANA
piled it on many a platter, and a number of them MARGA
started, heavily laden, with these delicate dishes. &
They came near his ashrama, and a river rolled
broad between them and the abode of the saint,
and they could not cross over the tossing waters ;
they feared the anger of Durvasa, and they went
back to their Lord, and said: "What shall
we do ? There is the stream which we cannot
cross, and if the Rishi's wrath burst forth, the
worlds will be burned up." The Lord smiled, and
said : " Go to the river, and speak to it in My
name, and say to that river : 'If Krishna be a
Brahmachari, roll back and let us pass.'" And
they said: "What is this that we are to say?
Krishna surrounded with his Gopis, and still a
celibate ? " But knowing that the Lord was wise,
they going to the river spake those words of power,
and the waters heard their voice, and rolled to
either side, making liquid walls, and the Gopis
trod on dry ground and reached the abode of the
saint and carried the food to him. He emptied
platter after platter, and finished the food. When
the time came for the Gopis to go back, the river
again was running high, and once more they said :
" How shall we cross the river? " And they went
to the Sage for help, and the Sage said : " Go to
the river, and say, ' If Durvasa be but an eater of
41

JNANA air, then roll back and let us pass.' " The Gopis
MARGA said to themseives . « Behold, he has eaten all
^ this food, and nothing is left, and we are to say
that he lives upon air!" But there was nothing
else to do, and going to the river they spake again
the words of power : " If Durvasa be an eater of
air only, then roll back and let us pass." And
again the waters heard the words and rolled back
and made a path for their feet to tread. Then
they related to the Lord the facts, and asked him
to explain. And He taught them the lesson that
the man of perfect Wisdom is unaffected by action,
unchanged by all that surrounds him. The true
Jnani is unaffected by action ; he cannot be touched
by the phenomena of the outer world.

But here a mistake often comes in. Men who
are only wise by lips but not in reality, who repeat
phrases but have not developed the true life of
the Self, who say " I am Brahman " but are
affected by every thing, who are not disciplined
and dispassionate, who seek the gratification of
the senses, and then say, " It is only the body that
seeks it, I am unaffected " ; those men are deluded,
and unconsciously, or even consciously, hypocritical;
for they know not that the true Jnani uses the
gunas, but is not used by them ; he uses them to
carry out the purpose of the universe, but is not
swayed by them, and never can be affected by
42

them. The man who cannot resist the temptations JNANA
of the body, and who then says " It is only the
body that acts, I am Brahman," such a one is ^
but a man of lip-phrases, and possesses not the
real Wisdom, and is affected and degraded by his
vice. The Wise man can take up any activity,
can use it for the purpose of the Lord, and is but
a channel for the maintenance of the world. He
is moved from within and not from without. As
a master he moves to his toils, and not as the
slave is driven to his labour. He is free, and not
a bondsman. To tread the Path — in words, being
mastered by the body, whilst speaking the words
of Wisdom, is to fall a prey to delusion, and to
delay the progress of the soul. To that base end
the labours of the great teachers have been turned,
and the Vedanta has been used as an excuse for
vile living ; the pretence of dispassion has been
set up where the reality is not. It was to avoid
this danger that in the old days none might learn
those lessons save he who had the qualifications.
He whose desires were dead, whose passions were
conquered, who had experienced disgust of the
world, that man only was the fitted pupil, and
to him only the guru taught the mysteries.

Such, then, is the Path of Wisdom, and such are
some of the difficulties of its treading. So may man
escape from the world and pass into a life of freedom.
43

JNANA It may be well for you, however, to remember
MARGA tjiat •£ tkjs escape ke sought for the separated

S" Self and not for the service of the universe, then,
though the liberation may last for countless ages,
the man will have ultimately to return in order
to gain the uttermost perfection. For it is written
in the sacred Upanishad that not by knowledge
alone the Self is found, but by knowledge wedded
to devotion.1 Liberation may be gained by pure
wisdom, and the soul passes into and abides in
Janarloka, freed from birth and deaths ; but that
perfect life, which asks for nothing, which is
content to be in bondage while the Lord is mani-
fest, while fshvara is working, that means the
blending of Wisdom with Devotion, and thereby
only is perfection gained.

1 Mundakopanishad^ {{{. {{. 4.

44

BHAKTI MARGA

" THEY who with Manas fixed on Me, ever har-
monised worship Me, with faith supreme endowed,
these, in My opinion," said Shri Krishna, " are best
in Yoga." And then He went on to say that " The
difficulty of those whose minds are set on the Un-
manifested is greater ; for the Path of the Unmani-
fested is hard for the embodied to reach. Those
verily who, renouncing actions in Me, and intent on
Me, worship meditating on Me, with whole-hearted
Yoga, these I speedily lift up from the ocean of
death and existence, O Partha, their minds being
fixed on Me." l Those are the words in which the
great Lord of Yoga instructed His beloved disciple.
The fixing of mind on Ishvara, the revealed Lord,
the worship intent ever upon Him, the constant
meditation fixed upon the one object, those who
thus act, He said, are speedily raised up by Him
from this ocean into which souls are dipped, life
1 Bhagavad Gitd, xii. 2, 5-7.
45

BHAKTI after life, and from which, wearied as it were, they

MARGA long to escape> Th}s devotion, which he thus

^ described, this fixing of the mind, this constant

meditation, this earnest worship, these are summed

up in the word Bhakti or Love ; and it is the Path

of Love, the Bhakti Marga. It is that which we

are to study at this our concluding meeting.

There is one wide difference between the Path of
Wisdom and the Path of Love, which stands out
before our eyes clear and distinct from beginning
to end ; and this difference is in what we may call
the object of the devotee and the object of the
Jftani ; these are distinct, the one from the other,
in a sense — although of course, fundamentally and
essentially, they are one and the same. The dis-
tinction is alluded to in the shloka that I have
quoted, as to the difficulty of treading and reaching
the Path of the Unmanifested. He who treads
the Path of Wisdom, the Jnana, seeks the Self, the
One existence, the Infinite, the Eternal, and the
Unmanifested, underlying and pervading all, support-
ing all, and hidden beneath all. But as we saw in
our study yesterday, it is by discrimination, by
Wisdom, that he reaches this knowledge of the
Self, and its supreme expression is the " So'ham " —
"I am He" — the perfect identity with the One
without a second. But when we look at the object
to which the Bhakta directs his attention, his love,
46

his worship, his undeviating faith, we find that this BHAKTI
object is the supreme fshvara, the embodied Lord, MARG
the manifested God, the one Lord making Himself ^
manifested in form, and so becoming a concrete
object of love and adoration. In fact, where Bhakti
is to be aroused, it must be directed towards a
Being who shows what, in the widest sense of the
term, may be said to be the limits of individuality.
However much we may extend our conception of
individuality, casting aside all by which it is limited
when we are dealing with an individual who is
human, it ends after all in the very fundamental
idea of limitation ; the Lord of the Universe,
fshvara, the Supreme, has imposed a self-limita-
tion for the purpose of manifestation, in order that
the universe may be ; and this Lord of the Universe
is the object towards which the aspirations, the
love, the worship of all beings in the universe may
be directed.

We find still further that this Supreme Ishvara
who would be called, in the western term, the
" Personal God " — although the word " personal "
brings in an element that we must necessarily exclude
in our thought — this Supreme fshvara still further
manifests Himself from time to time, by way of
Avataras, in order to give man, as it were, a still
more concrete embodiment, to which his love may
turn and his adoration may be addressed, a still
47

BHAKTI more clear individuality which may awaken his
MARGA heart> which may attract his emotion, towards
& whom worship may be directed, and to whom
homage may be paid. We find in the Hindu faith,
and in other faiths as well, that the Supreme
manifests Himself not only as the Lord of the
Universe, but also in the form of man, and that in
that human form He specially arouses devotion,
worship, love; presenting all the attractiveness
which pleases the human heart, all the beauty which
captivates the human imagination. In condescen-
sion to the weakness of His creatures, in compassion
for the feebleness of their thought, He comes, as it
were, within the reach of their limited intelligence,
within the reach of their half-blind love, and presents
Himself as an Avatara, manifesting in human form
some of the perfections of the Supreme.

In studying human faiths, in studying the re-
ligions of the world, we find that this is well-nigh
universal, and that a divine-human Form occupies
the central altar of worship ; and although beyond
Him the Higher is recognised, nay, although even
beyond fshvara Himself, the one without a second
is dimly seen, the human heart clings to the Feet
of the manifested Lord, and the human emotions
find their rest and their home in Him. Whether
it be under the sacred name of Ramachandra, Shri
Krishna, or whether it be under the name of Christ
48

or the name of the Buddha, you will find that BHAKTI
humanity specially craves to worship a Being, and MARGA
seeks in devotional emotion that satisfaction which 2p
no abstract conception of infinity can afford. To
those who tread the Path of Bhakti this object of
worship must be the goal of the Path. For how
can man, in the fullest sense of the word, feel the
ecstasy of love towards the conception of a bound-
less Existence, of limitless space, and how, without
those limitations that make an object " real " to us,
shall the human heart be able to find its rest in
God?

So it is, then, that along this Path of Love we
always find the Bhakta seeking for his Lord.
What is this love that inspires him ? What is
this devotion that animates him ? What is this
which so fully penetrates his being, and thrills
through every fibre of his life, that to him there
seems to be nothing true beyond the one beloved
Presence, and everything else becomes dim in the
light of the all-supreme Lord? He who is the
very embodiment of devotion, that mighty Sage
and Bhakta Narada, has left to us teachings on
Love, and therein he has described its nature, has
given to us the marks, as it were, by which it may
be recognised, has told us what to seek and what
to find, if we would cultivate the quality of devotion.

Narada begins by saying that the nature of
49 4

BHAKTI Bhakti is " extreme devotion to some one " ; l the
element of devotion to an individual is of its very
^ nature. Later on in the same Sutra he gives a
number of definitions of this Love, giving his own
last, full of that devotion which is his main, his
most striking characteristic. Definitions of Love
are given according to the opinion of Vyasa, Garga,
and Sandilya ; and then Narada says : " It is
surrendering all actions to God, and feeling the
greatest misery in forgetting God." 2 There speaks
out the spirit of the true Bhakta — all the life
surrendered to the object of devotion, the worst
misery the forgetting Him. If the heart be blinded
by the veil of some other object, if some cloud
arises between the soul and its Lord, and even for
a moment it forgets its God, then the bitterest
agony is its portion, its greatest misery — the for-
getting its Lord. Thus has Narada taught, and
this is known to the heart of every one who is
blessed with a striving after devotion. Then he
describes the man who has obtained this love :
" Obtaining which man becomes perfect, becomes
immortal, becomes satisfied ; and obtaining which
he desires nothing, grieves not, hates not, does not
delight (in sensuous objects), makes no effort (for
selfish ends) ; knowing which he becomes intoxicated

1 Narada Sutra, translated by E. T. Sturdy, p. 19.

2 Narada Sutra, p. 28.

50

(with joy), transfixed and rejoices in the Self." BHAKTI
Further, "It cannot be made to fulfil desires, for its
nature is renunciation." 1

That then is Bhakti, as drawn by one who is
the very embodiment of it. How should such devo-
tion be attained? Of what steps is the Bhakti
Marga composed ? How shall men whose hearts
are filled with lower loves find the Love that is
supreme? How shall men whose minds run out
after the objects of sense know the One, whom
knowing all is known ? How shall man, wrapped
round with illusion, entangled with baser affec-
tions, his feet clinging to the mire of earth, how
shall he attain to the love of Narada ? How shall
he become the perfected Bhakta, the devotee
without flaw or stain ?

We must trace the early steps of this Path, as
we traced the earlier steps of the others. It is
almost useless to give the perfect picture, and not
to trace the course of its development from the
imperfect, so that one may strive from imperfection
to reach perfection. We may be fascinated by the
beauty of the perfection of devotion, dazzled by
the splendour of a love without a flaw. But we
want to learn how such love may grow in us, with
what fuel to feed the fire of devotion that we may
become its very flame and naught else.
1 Narada Sutra, pp. 22, 24.
51

BHAKTI Human love may serve to give us at first a faint
MARGA reflexjon of jove for the Divine. By looking on
^ that we may learn some signs which would
characterise the real Bhakta. The object would
be changed, but the essential would remain the
same. Think for a moment of the strongest,
purest, noblest, intensest love that you have ever
felt for a human being. Analyse your life deeply,
and see how it was affected by that love. See how
all other things become less attractive under its
light. Perhaps you cared for wealth, perhaps you
were devoted to literature, or perhaps you were
eager in your desire for knowledge. But there
shone on the horizon of your life a face which
attracted you with the intensest love of your
nature, which drew you in spite of yourself towards
it. All the attitude of your mind was suddenly
changed under the glory and the beauty of this
presence. Wealth seemed to be worthless as
compared with the treasure of his love. Literature
seemed to be dull and wearisome as compared
with the delight of conversation with him. All
knowledge seemed as a withered leaf compared
with the ecstasy of his embrace. Your highest
delight was to be near him ; your innermost being
was suffused with the love of him. All other
attractions weakened their power over you; all
other colours grew faint beside the radiance of
52

this bright hue. He was to you not only a friend, BHAKTI
but teacher, guide, lover, summing up in himself
many of the noblest qualities possible in man. jj*
How love for him transformed all your life !
Everything took new colours in the light poured
out by him. Imagine such a human love raised to
the loftiest heaven ; such a human love grown
deeper than the profoundest ocean; imagine it
enhanced by the perfection of the object of love,
intensified by everything being contained in that
object ; imagine that no weariness can come to it,
no satiety be found in it, and you will have some
faint reflection of the feeling with which the true
Bhakta regards the object of his love and worship.
Swami Vivekananda, speaking in America, told
a somewhat graphic story in order to impress
upon his hearers how very little, as a rule, people
really longed after God. He told of a young man
who came to a religious teacher and said that he
wanted to find God. The Sage smiled and said
nothing. The young man returned time after
time, ever repeating the intensity of his desire, his
longing to find God. After many days the Sage
told him to accompany him as he went to the
river to take his morning bath ; and when both were
in the river, the Sage took hold of the young man
and plunged him under the surface of the water
and held him there. The young man struggled
53

BHAKTI and struggled to shake off his hold. Finally he

MARGA

raised him out of the water, and said to him : " My
^ son, what did you long for most when under the
water ? " "A breath of air," gasped the youth.
" Thus must the would-be disciple long after God
if he would find Him. If you have this longing
after God, verily He shall be found of you."

But how many have such a longing? How
many really want to find God? The first thing
that comes across men makes them forget the One,
and the longing vanishes from their heart. Instead
of struggling for breath, the true Bhakta would
have thought only of God, that he would be
nearer to his goal by death under the river-stream.
We want everything that comes in our way; we
want wealth, honour, worldly enjoyments and pos-
sessions. How can this greedy heart of ours find
room for God ? As is said in the Christian story —
there was no room for Christ in the inn, and our
hearts are as inns which are filled with the passing
travellers and have no room for the Divine Guest.

None the less shall we not be without hope ; and
we shall see whether there is not an entrance to
this Path possible. Here a great Sage has helped
us — one of those great ancient Indian writers who
have devoted themselves to the teaching of the
higher spiritual truths — the Sage Ramanuja. He
has dealt with the preliminary stages by which
54

man develops devotion, by which he may gradually BHAKTI
prepare himself to be a receptacle of real love.

That Sage in tracing out these preliminary steps ^
begins at the very beginning, with the man in his
body as he is living here. He first concerns himself
with a man's body, — how should he treat this body ?
how should he behave towards it ? What are the
necessary qualifications for the body of a man
who desires the development of the characteristics
of spiritual love ? The first thing he speaks about
is Viveka : not in the sense we used yesterday, but
in a very much more elementary sense. He applies
it to the discrimination of food. The man who
desires that his body shall be the vehicle in which
the soul penetrated by divine love shall dwell must
have a body that is pure, and must use discrimina-
tion with regard to food. He begins with that
elementary point, and says that the Bhakta must
be careful in the selection of his food. He must
not take that which would require suffering on the
part of other sentient beings before he can enjoy it.
The would-be Bhakta must not be a source of
suffering and misery to others, a source of injury
to creatures who are lower than himself in the
scale of evolution. He must not use as food any-
thing that possesses sentient life, as do all animal
creatures. No Bhakta must touch such food.
He not only pollutes the body by such food, but
55

BHAKTI he degrades his soul by showing hatred instead of
MARGA compassion, selfishness instead of altruism, doing
5p injury to helpless animals instead of protecting
them, doing away with the beautiful life of a
harmless creature for the selfish gratification of
his own palate — this is trampling on the very
idea of love. Therefore, at the outset, he must
learn Viveka or discrimination of food. In the
selection of the food that is necessary for a Bhakta,
the magnetic law of purity must be followed, —
purity which affects the subtler bodies of man,
which are liable to be polluted by outside contacts,
and which should be kept clean from external
pollution as well as from pollution from within.
So also cleanliness should be followed that the
body may in every respect be a worthy temple of
the devotee who has to use it while he treads the
Path of Love. He then passes on to give the
great axiom, " Pure food, pure mind, and constant
memory of God." That is to be the law of life
for the would-be Bhakta — not for him who has
already attained devotion, but for one who desires
to attain it.

These are the preliminary steps for finding God
— for him who would arouse this divine quality of
Love. The Acharya then says that the would-be
Bhakta must practise freedom from desire, — his
only desire must be fixed on God, his only longing
56

must be directed to God, there must be no room BHAKTI
for any other desire in his heart. This desire must MARGA
spread out and encompass every fraction of his &
being, and every other desire must be driven out
to make room for the one supreme attachment.
Then he must practise turning his thoughts to God.
This is to be a constant thing. As he tries this
concentration, he will find that his mind will
wander away, will go after other objects; it will
wander away from the one supreme object, and
seek other things upon which to rest. But has not
the Lord of Yoga said, in answer to the complaint
of Arjuna, that the mind was restless as the wind
and as difficult to subdue, — has not He answered :
" It may be curbed by constant practice." l The
would-be devotee, therefore, should practise con-
stantly to turn his mind to God. He will bring it
back to the object of contemplation when it goes
to other things. He will have stated times during
which he will be engaged in worship, with his mind
directed exclusively to the contemplation of the One.
These are only the first steps. He worships at
stated times in order that presently he may
worship always ; he practises meditation now and
again in order that presently there may be no
intervals ; but meditation may be ever going on,
unbroken, continuous, and complete. He is only
1 Bhagavad Gttd, vi. 35.
57

BHAKTI learning, so he has fixed times for worship and
contemplation. He fixes his heart on the Supreme.
^ That is not enough. That practice may lead into
a life wanting in the characteristics of true Bhakti.
He may find delight in his meditation, joy from
contemplation, and thus may become forgetful of
others and may worship for the pleasure of worship-
ping. But the true Bhakta does not seek to gain ;
he seeks to give, to give constantly, perpetually, in
order that he may overcome the selfishness of
human nature and eradicate the grasping tendency
of the mind. Therefore the next step which is laid
down is that he must do good to others. Not in
contemplation is he to find his only employment ;
his love must flow out towards his fellowman, and
his life must be one of constant service, continual
assistance, to all who are in need. He will never
eradicate the grasping element unless he cultivates
the giving spirit; unless he is always stripping
himself in order that others may enjoy. Give, give,
give, continually, for giving is of the very nature of
love. Love asks for nothing save the right to give ;
love asks for nothing save the right to spend ; love
asks for no return, no gratitude. It asks for no
enjoyment for itself. It asks only to be allowed
to love, to spread itself out in every direction and
make all happy in the embrace of the lover. As
our hearts are hard and selfish, even in religion
58

itself we have the subtlest forms of selfishness, we BHAKTJ
ruin the pure gold with the dross ; therefore it is
that religion, the noblest and purest of all things, ^
sometimes becomes degraded and defiled, because
men bring their selfishness into the sanctuary and
convert that sacred place to a market where buying
and selling goes on — so much worship for so much
joy. Where there is no free giving there is no
place for God.

Therefore active doing of good to others is part
of the training of the devotee. How few really
love, as far as their fellowmen are concerned. We
are always asking for something back, some grati-
fication of the lower self, and we always crave and
crave that something shall come from our beloved
to us. That is not love, but calculation. It is a
subtler form of selfishness. Pure human love pours
itself out freely. It is enough to be permitted to
love. The true lover does not ask more than to
give his love.

Such training will more and more prepare the
man to feel the true Bhakti — the love of God.
Then it is said we must gain purity and truth and
rectitude and charity and the absence of injury to
others and compassion. All these things are laid
down as necessary on the Path, if ever we are to
attain Bhakti, if ever we are to know the love that
is divine. See how many of these steps we are
59

BHAKTI prepared to take. See these qualities wanted as

MARGA preliminary steps, and then let us examine our own

5p hearts and see where they are lacking ; in beginning

to supply the lack we shall be beginning to tread

the Bhakti Marga.

The company of good men is another thing that
is advised. Those who are more advanced than
ourselves, those who spend some of their time
in conversing on subjects of a spiritual nature or
who sit together in silence meditating on the object
of devotion, are the persons whose company should
be sought, rather than the company of the worldly
and the frivolous. Try to be with such. Man is
influenced by the company into which he goes.
The thoughts of other men play upon him. And
he will largely have his mind coloured by the
atmosphere into which he goes. If he consorts
always with the careless and the frivolous and
walks with the foolish, how shall such a man be
able to gather himself in and concentrate on the
Self? How shall he find his Lord? Rather let
him seek a quiet life, never forgetting duty, but
never seeking activity for the mere sake of distrac-
tion. Let him seek the company of the holy, and
catch from them a reflection of their nobler thought
and purer aspiration ; for the companionship of
those who love the Lord is stimulating to those
who are beginning the Path.
60

Good books should also be read, books that BHAKTI
stimulate devotion and set before us the noble MARGA
examples of the saints and the sages of the world. <£*
Do not fritter away your time in worthless litera-
ture ; do not fall into the habit of frivolous reading.
You have no time to waste. When you read, read
what helps you in the object of your search. If
you desire to succeed in law, you will not read
stories, but you will read books of jurisprudence,
the history of the law of different countries; you
will study their customs and eschew everything
that will not help you in your search for success.
Do not do less for the love of God. When will
men work for God as they work for reputation ?
When will they seek His face with the same ardour
as they seek the toys and frivolities of earth ?
Teachers are not wanting ; the steps are not
hidden. It is the heart that is wanting, the
love that is lacking, the desire which is absent.
These are the things that keep us back, and not
our ignorance of the way. So Narada also taught
to avoid mischievous books and vain discussions,
and to ponder over the Scriptures and devotional
works.

Then, step by step, following these stages, tread-
ing this earlier portion, there comes a time when
fshvara, diligently sought, reverently worshipped,
persistently followed, though yet He was not seen,
61

BHAKTI reveals Himself to his worshipper, and the Supreme
is seen. Then there comes a change over the life ;
^ then a new element enters into the heart ; there
sweeps over the man a wave of emotion, and he is
never again the same as he was before. When
the Supreme has been seen, though only a glimpse
of His beauty be caught, though only one gleam
of that glory has come down and touched the
heart of the devotee, the inner man is changed;
the whole heart is revolutionised ; the back is
turned upon the externalities of the earth, and
without effort the face is turned to God. Re-
member that most significant and suggestive
phrase found in the Scripture of Devotion, the
Bhagavad Gitd, where it is said, in talking of these
stages, that the objects of senses turn aside from
the abstemious dweller in the body ; but the flavour
itself, the desire for them, the wish for them, the
slightest inclination for them, turneth away when
once the Supreme is seen.1

Then, indeed, the Path begins to shine with
heavenly radiance; the first touch of the blessed-
ness of the bliss which is the Self thrills the whole
nature. How long has the Bhakta been calling
to his Lord? How long has his heart been calling
out for a sight of his Lord? How he has said
over and over again : "How may I know Thee,
1 Bhagavad Gitd, ii. 59.
62

O Yogi, by ceaseless meditation ? In what, in BHAKTI
what aspect art Thou to be thought of by me, O MARGA
blessed Lord ? " l When the Lord reveals himself ^
to the soul of His servant, in the radiance of that
sunlight all other objects fade away — in the glory
of that sight supreme, the vision of the Lord. The
earth is never again the same when once that light
has shone. Again clouds may arise, mistakes and
feebleness may hinder the disciple's Path ; but he
has seen, he knows, and he remembers, and has
an ever-present memory to support him through
every endeavour. Then it is that it is said by the
Lord that such a man, " having cast aside egoism,
violence, arrogance, desire, wrath, covetousness,
selfless and peaceful, he is fit to become Brah-
man." 2 He is becoming fit for the constant vision
of the Lord. Selfless and serene he becomes
the mirror of the Supreme soul, and becoming
Brahman, merged in Brahman, being the same
to all creatures, he enters into the Lord. Such
is the word of Shri Krishna; such the promise
of the Supreme.

He who has thus trained himself, who has
purified his lower nature, who has become un-
swerving in devotion, who is serene and passionless,
who does wrong to no one, who embraces all

1 Bhagavad Gitd, x. 17.

2 Bhagavad Gitd, xviii. 53.

63

BHAKTI beings in the perfect love of his nature, and who
shuts none out from the limits of his compassion,
^ who feels towards every creature as a mother feels
for her first-born son — such a man has become
fit for the presence of his Lord. He passes to
the Supreme above. He is ready for the ever-
lasting peace. For he who is love is God; he
whose whole being is love is the image of the
Supreme ; in himself he reproduces the divinity,
for Love is God and God is Love. What can keep
him then apart from that which is himself ? What
barrier can arise between the soul and its Lord?
That soul is filled with the love of the Lord ; itself
is love unbounded; and as a river joining with
other rivers rushes into the ocean, so does that
soul that is love fly into the ocean of love, the
Supreme. The waters of the river mingle with
the ocean, and become one in nature, one in quality.
Who shall keep them separate ? Who shall divide
the soul from God ? The soul knows its Lord ; it
bows before Him in worship, and wrapped up in
the Supreme it becomes one for ever with the
Lord who is Itself. And then the Lord says no
longer, he shall come to Me, or he shall find Me,
or he shall tread the Path to My supreme abode,
but He says : He verily is Myself.1 He is Myself.
That is the end of the Path, that the inevitable

1 Bhagavad Gitd, vii. 18.

64

outcome of love. Love is God, and the more it is BHAKTI
perfect the more the divine becomes manifest in
it. Even in human love we see how it breaks ^
down walls ; how, as we love each other, we forget
" I and mine " and become one. Even in our
poor human love, the lover feels one with the
beloved, and no longer separate. Have you not
felt that all that is yours is his, and you know
no difference between yourself and him ? So it is
with the soul and its Lord ; separated for the
purposes of worship and adoration, intended to
draw out the soul and all its powers, the per-
fected soul becomes one with its Lord — one for
service, one for help, one for saving the world as
He saves it, one to help the world as He helps
it. In this communion between the lover and
the beloved there is such utter merging and
identification that all that is done by the one
is done by the other. The Bhakta becomes the
Saviour of the world ; he is very God ; and all
that God can do, he who is one with Him can
also do in the creation and dissolution of the
worlds.

What might not India be if she would give
birth to some real Bhaktas, not those of the lips,
but of the heart, of the life. If only one or two
such men were found, whose hearts were so fired
with divine love that nothing was left out of its
65 5

BHAKTI all-embracing scope, India would be saved, as it
were, in a moment. Love would have its way.
^ Remember you not that example of tried devotion,
the boy Prahlada? How nothing could injure
him, no poison could kill, no fire could burn, no
mountain could crush him, and this because he
was perfectly devoted, he worshipped his Lord
with all the strength of his heart, through every
danger and difficulty. The perfect devotee can
be harmed by none : no weapon can slay him, no
water can drown him. He is one with the Spirit
Immortal, and love is immortal life. Therefore,
said Narada, and I finish with him as I began
with him : " Its nature is supreme devotion to
some one ; Love is immortal."

Oh ! for such a man to help us ! for such a
man to teach us ! We cannot yet become it. We
cannot be the love that makes us God. But might
we not by our love help others who are worthier ?
Might we not press on the progress of those who
have advanced further ? Remember that many a
little stream joined together may form a mighty
torrent. Let us bring our rills of love and
adoration to the feet of the Supreme. Let us
give our love however feeble, let us give our
aspiration however halting, let us give our devotion
however weak; let us place them at His feet who
is love, who is pure good. Might it not be that
66

out of our many loves a great flame of love should BHAKTI

MARGA

arise that should help our land, that should purify
our people? While the aspiration is here, the ^
result is a possibility. Let it be ours to do some-
thing for that great work.

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