Three mountains stand as typical of progress — the Himalayas of Indo-Aryan, Sinai of Hebrew, and Olympus of Greek civilisation. When the Aryans reached India, they found the climate so hot that they would not work incessantly, so they began to think; thus they became introspective and developed religion. They discovered that there was no limit to the power of mind; they therefore sought to master that; and through it they learnt that there was something infinite coiled up in the frame we call man, which was seeking to become kinetic. To evolve this became their chief aim. Another branch of the Aryans went into the smaller and more picturesque country of Greece, where the climate and natural conditions were more favourable; so their activity turned outwards, and they developed the external arts and outward liberty. The Greek sought political liberty. The Hindu has always sought spiritual liberty. Both are one-sided. The Indian cares not enough for national protection or patriotism, he will defend only his religion; while with the Greek and in Europe (where the Greek civilisation finds its continuation) the country comes first. To care only for spiritual liberty and not for social liberty is a defect, but the opposite is a still greater defect. Liberty of both soul and body is to be striven for.
THOUGHTS ON THE VEDAS AND THE UPANISHADS
The Vedic sacrificial altar was the origin of Geometry.
The invocation of the Devas, or bright ones, was the basis of worship. The idea is that one invoked is helped and helps.
Hymns are not only words of praise but words of power, being pronounced with the right attitude of mind.
Heavens are only other states of existence with added senses and heightened powers.
All higher bodies also are subject to disintegration as is the physical. Death comes to all forms of bodies in this and other lives. Devas are also mortal and can only give enjoyment.
Behind all Devas there is the Unit Being — God, as behind this body there is something higher that feels and sees.
The powers of creation, preservation, and destruction of the Universe, and the attributes, such as omnipresence, omniscience, and omnipotence, make God of gods.
“Hear ye children of Immortality! Hear ye Devas who live in higher spheres!” (Shvetâshvatara, II. 5). “I have found out a ray beyond all darkness, beyond all doubt. I have found the Ancient One” (ibid. III. 8). The way to this is contained in the Upanishads.
On earth we die. In heaven we die. In the highest heaven we die. It is only when we reach God that we attain life and become immortal.
The Upanishads treat of this alone. The path of the Upanishads is the pure path. Many manners, customs, and local allusions cannot be understood today. Through them, however, truth becomes clear. Heavens and Earth are all thrown off in order to come to Light.
The Upanishads declare:
“He the Lord has interpenetrated the universe. It is all His.”
“He the Omnipresent, the One without a second, the One without a body, pure, the great poet of the universe, whose metre is the suns and stars, is giving to each what he deserves” (Isha Upanishad, 8, adapted).
“They are groping in utter darkness who try to reach the Light by ceremonials. And they who think this nature is all are in darkness. They who wish to come out of nature through this thought are groping in still deeper darkness” (Isha, 9).
Are then ceremonials bad? No, they will benefit those who are coming on.
In one of the Upanishads (i.e. Katha) this question is asked by Nachiketâ, a youth: “Some say of a dead man, he is gone; others, he is still living. You are Yama, Death. You know the truth; do answer me.” Yama replies, “Even the Devas, many of them, know not — much less men. Boy, do not ask of me this answer.” But Nachiketa persists. Yama again replies, “The enjoyments of the gods, even these I offer you. Do not insist upon your query.” But Nachiketa was firm as a rock. Then the god of death said, “My boy, you have declined, for the third time, wealth, power, long life, fame, family. You are brave enough to ask the highest truth. I will teach you. There are two ways, one of truth; one of enjoyment. You have chosen the former.”
Now note here the conditions of imparting the truth. First, the purity — a boy, a pure, unclouded soul, asking the secret of the universe. Second, that he must take truth for truth’s sake alone.
Until the truth has come through one who has had realisation, from one who has perceived it himself, it cannot become fruitful. Books cannot give it, argument cannot establish it. Truth comes unto him who knows the secret of it.
After you have received it, be quiet. Be not ruffled by vain argument. Come to your own realization. You alone can do it.
Neither happiness nor misery, vice nor virtue, knowledge nor non-knowledge is it. You must realise it. How can I describe it to you?
He who cries out with his whole heart, “O Lord, I want but Thee” — to him the Lord reveals Himself. Be pure, be calm; the mind when ruffled cannot reflect the Lord.
“He whom the Vedas declare, He, to reach whom, we serve with prayer and sacrifice, Om is the sacred name of that indescribable One. This word is the holiest of all words. He who knows the secret of this word receives that which he desires.” Take refuge in this word. Whoso takes refuge in this word, to him the way opens.
ON RAJA-YOGA
The first stage of Yoga is Yama.
To master Yama five things are necessary:
(1) Non-injuring any being by thought, word, and deed.
(2) Speaking the truth in thought, word, and deed
(3) Non-covetousness in thought, word, and deed.
(4) Perfect chastity in thought, word, and deed.
(5) Perfect sinlessness in thought, word, and deed.
Holiness is the greatest power. Everything else quails before it.
Then come Âsana, or posture, of a devotee. The seat must be firm, the head, ribs, and body in a straight line, erect. Say to yourself that you are firmly seated, and that nothing can move you. Then mention the perfection of the body, bit by bit, from head to foot. Think of it as being dear as crystal, and as a perfect vessel to sail over the sea of life.
Pray to God and to all the prophets and saviours of the world and holy spirits in the universe to help you.
Then for half an hour practice Prânâyama or the suspending, restraining, and controlling of the breath, mentally repeating the word Om as you inhale and exhale the breath. Words charged with spirit have wonderful power.
The other stages of Yoga are: (1) Pratyâhâra or the restraint of the organs of sense from all outward things, and directing them entirely to mental impressions; (2) Dhâranâ or steadfast concentration; (3) Dhyâna or meditation; (4) Samâdhi or abstract meditation. It is the highest and last stage of Yoga. Samadhi is perfect absorption of thought into the Supreme Spirit, when one realises. “I and my Father are one.”
Do one thing at a time and while doing it put your whole soul into it to the exclusion of all else.
ON BHAKTI-YOGA
Bhakti-Yoga is the path of systematised devotion for the attainment of union with the Absolute. It is the easiest and surest path to religion or realisation.
Love to God is the one essential to be perfect in this path.
There are five stages of love.
First, man wants help and has a little fear.
Second, when God is seen as Father.
Third, when God is seen as Mother. Then all women are looked upon as reflections of the Mother-God. With the idea of Mother-God real love begins.
Fourth, love for love’s sake. Love for love’s sake transcends all qualities.
Fifth, love in Divine-union. It leads to oneness or superconsciousness.
God is both Personal and Impersonal as we are personal and impersonal.
Prayer and praise are the first means of growth. Repeating the names of God has wonderful power.
Mantra is a special word, or sacred text, or name of God chosen by the Guru for repetition and reflection by the disciple. The disciple must concentrate on a personality for prayer and praise, and that is his Ishta.
These words (Mantras) are not sounds of words but God Himself, and we have them within us. Think of Him, speak of Him. No desire for the world! Buddha’s Sermon on the Mount was, “As thou thinkest, so art thou.”
After attaining superconsciousness the Bhakta descends again to love and worship.
Pure love has no motive. It has nothing to gain.
After prayer and praise comes meditation. Then comes reflection on the name and on the Ishta of the individual.
Pray that that manifestation which is our Father, our Mother, may cut our bonds.
Pray, “Take us by the hand as a father takes his sons and leave us not.”
Pray, “I do not want wealth or beauty, this world or another, but Thee, O God! Lord! I have become weary. Oh, take me by the hand, Lord, I take shelter with Thee Make me Thy servant. Be Thou my refuge.”
Pray, “Thou our Father, our Mother, our dearest Friend! Thou who bearest this universe, help us to bear the little burden of this our life. Leave us not. Let us never be separated from Thee. Let us always dwell in Thee.”
When love to God is revealed and is all, this world appears like a drop.
Pass from non-existence to existence, from darkness to light.
ON JNANA-YOGA
First, meditation should be of a negative nature. Think away everything. Analyse everything that comes in the mind by the sheer action of the will.
Next, assert what we really are — existence, knowledge and bliss — being, knowing, and loving.
Meditation is the means of unification of the subject and object. Meditate:
Above, it is full of me; below, it is full of me; in the middle, it is full of me. I am in all beings, and all beings are in me. Om Tat Sat, I am It. I am existence above mind. I am the one Spirit of the universe. I am neither pleasure nor pain.
The body drinks, eats, and so on. I am not the body. I am not mind. I am He.
I am the witness. I look on. When health comes I am the witness When disease comes I am the witness.
I am Existence, Knowledge, Bliss.
I am the essence and nectar of knowledge. Through eternity I change not. I am calm, resplendent, and unchanging.
THE REALITY AND SHADOW
That which differentiates one thing from another is time, space, and causation.
The differentiation is in the form, not in the substance.
You may destroy the form and it disappears for ever; but the substance remains the same. You can never destroy the substance.
Evolution is in nature, not in the soul — evolution of nature, manifestation of the soul.
Maya is not illusion as it is popularly interpreted. Maya is real, yet it is not real. It is real in that the Real is behind it and gives it its appearance of reality. That which is real in Maya is the Reality in and through Maya. Yet the Reality is never seen; and hence that which is seen is unreal, and its has no real independent existence of itself, but is dependent upon the Real for its existence.
Maya then is a paradox — real, yet not real, an illusion, yet not an illusion.
He who knows the Real sees in Maya not illusion, but reality. He who knows not the Real sees in Maya illusion and thinks it real.
HOW TO BECOME FREE
All things in nature work according to law. Nothing is excepted. The mind as well as everything in external nature is governed and controlled by law.
Internal and external nature, mind and matter, are in time and space, and are bound by the law of causation.
The freedom of the mind is a delusion. How can the mind be free when it is controlled and bound by law?
The law of Karma is the law of causation.
We must become free. We are free; the work is to know it. We must give up all slavery, all bondage of whatever kind. We must not only give up our bondage to earth and everything and everybody on earth, but also to all ideas of heaven and happiness.
We are bound to earth by desire and also to God, heaven, and the angels. A slave is a slave whether to man, to God, or to angels.
The idea of heaven must pass away. The idea of heaven after death where the good live a life of eternal happiness is a vain dream, without a particle of meaning or sense in it. Wherever there is happiness there must follow unhappiness sometime. Wherever there is pleasure there must be pain. This is absolutely certain, every action has its reaction somehow.
The idea of freedom is the only true idea of salvation — freedom from everything, the senses, whether of pleasure or pain, from good as well as evil.
More than this even, we must be free from death and to be free from death, we must be free from life. Life is but a dream of death. Where there is life, there will be death; so get away from life if you would be rid of death.
We are ever free if we would only believe it, only have faith enough. You are the soul, free and eternal, ever free ever blessed. Have faith enough and you will be free in a minute.
Everything in time, space, and causation is bound. The soul is beyond all time, all space, all causation. That which is bound is nature, not the soul.
Therefore proclaim your freedom and be what you are — ever free, ever blessed.
Time, space, and causation we call Maya.
THE GOAL
Dualism recognises God and nature to be eternally separate: the universe and nature eternally dependent upon God.
The extreme monists make no such distinction. In the last analysis, they claim, all is God: the universe becomes lost in God; God is the eternal life of the universe.
With them infinite and finite are mere terms. The universe, nature, etc. exist by virtue of differentiation. Nature is itself differentiation.
Such questions as, “Why did God create the universe?” “Why did the All-perfect create the imperfect?” etc., can never be answered, because such questions are logical absurdities. Reason exists in nature; beyond nature it has no existence. God is omnipotent, hence to ask why He did so and so is to limit Him; for it implies that there is a purpose in His creating the universe. If He has a purpose, it must be a means to an end, and this would mean that He could not have the end without the means. The questions, why and wherefore, can only be asked of something which depends upon something else.
SOUL AND GOD
Anything that is in space has form. Space itself has form. Either you are in space, or space is in you. The soul is beyond all space. Space is in the soul, not the soul in space.
Form is confined to time and space and is bound by the law of causation. All time is in us, we are not in time. As the soul is not in time and space, all time and space are within the soul. The soul is therefore omnipresent.
Our idea of God is the reflection of ourselves.
Old Persian and Sanskrit have affinities.
The primitive idea of God was identifying God with different forms of nature — nature-worship. The next stage was the tribal God. The next stage, the worship of kings.
The idea of God in heaven is predominant in all nations except in India. The idea is very crude.
The idea of the continuity of life is foolish. We can never get rid of death until we get rid of life.
THE DESIGN THEORY
The idea that nature in all her orderly arrangements shows design on the part of the Creator of the universe is good as a kindergarten teaching to show the beauty, power, and glory of God, in order to lead children in religion up to a philosophical conception of God; but apart from that, it is not good, and perfectly illogical. As a philosophical idea, it is entirely without foundation, if God is taken to be omnipotent.
If nature shows the power of God in creating the universe, (then) to have a design in so doing also shows His weakness. If God is omnipotent, He needs no design, no scheme, to do anything. He has but to will it, and it is done. No question, no scheme, no plan, of God in nature.
The material universe is the result of the limited consciousness of man. When man becomes conscious of his divinity, all matter, all nature, as we know it, will cease to exist.
The material world, as such, has no place in the consciousness of the All-Presence as a necessity of any end. If it had, God would be limited by the universe. To say that nature exists by His permission is not to say that it exists as a necessity for Him to make man perfect, or for any other reason.
It is a creation for man’s necessity, not God’s. There, is no scheme of God in the plan of the universe. How could there be any if He is omnipotent? Why should He have need of a plan, or a scheme, or a reason to do anything? To say that He has is to limit Him and to rob Him of His character of omnipotence.
For instance, if you came to a very wide river, so wide that you could not get across it except by building a bridge, the very fact that you would have to build the bridge to get across the river would show your limitation, would show your weakness, even if the ability to build the bridge did show your strength. If you were not limited but could just fly or jump across, you would not be under the necessity of building the bridge; and to build the bridge just to exhibit your power to do so would show your weakness again by showing your vanity, more than it would show anything else.
Monism and dualism are essentially the same. The difference consists in the expression. As the dualists hold the Father and Son to be two, the monists hold them to be really one. Dualism is in nature, in manifestation, and monism is pure spirituality in the essence.
The idea of renunciation and sacrifice is in all religions as a means to reach God.