Choose Highest Ideal

No amount of ignorance or wrong ideas can put a barrier between the soul and God. Even if there be no God, still hold fast to love. It is better to die seeking a God than as a dog seeking only carrion. 

Choose the highest ideal, and give your life up to that. 

"Death being so certain, it is the highest thing to give up life for a great purpose." 

                  - Swami Vivekananda, Inspired Talks  

Great Milch Cow

Dreaming Trash

Once you find the hidden object in a puzzle picture, you see it ever more; so when once you are free and stainless, you see only freedom and purity in the world around. 

That moment all the knots of the heart are cut asunder, all crooked places are made straight, and this world vanishes as a dream. 

And when we awake, we wonder how we ever came to dream such trash! 

                  - Swami Vivekananda, Inspired Talks

Missionary Religions

Let God Work

Be perfectly resigned, perfectly unconcerned; then alone can you do any true work. No eyes can see the real forces, we can only see the results. 

Put out self, lose it, forget it; just let God work, it is His business. We have nothing to do but stand aside and let God work. The more we go away, the more God comes in. 
Get rid of the little "I", and let only the great "I" live. 

              - Swami Vivekananda, Inspired Talks

I Am That

Realize Atman

Know Him, think of Him, by knowing whom everything else is known. And when that Atman is realised, the purport of all scriptures will be perceived as clearly as a fruit on the palm of one's hand. 

The Rishis of old attained realisation, and must we fail? 
We are also men. What has happened once in the life of one individual must, through proper endeavour, be realised in the life of others. 
History repeats itself. 

                - Swami Vivekananda, 
                    Conversations and Dialogues, 
                     recorded by Sharat Chandra Chakravarty

Censer of God

Beyond Life and Death

The Atman is the unity of all personalities and is unchangeable, the "One without a second". It is not life, but it is coined into life. It is beyond life and death and good and bad. 
It is the Absolute Unity. 

Dare to seek Truth even through hell. Freedom can never be true of name and form, of the related. No form can say, "I am free as a form." Not until all idea of form is lost, does freedom come.  

               - Swami Vivekananda, 
                 Discourses on Jnana-Yoga, US

Love Him, Love Him, Love Him

Law

Classification or grouping of phenomena by their similarities is the first step in scientific knowledge--perhaps it is all. 

An organized grouping, revealing to us a similarity running through the whole group, and a conviction that under similar circumstances the group will arrange itself in the same form--stretched over all time, past, present and future--is what we call law. 

             - Swami Vivekananda, 
                 Article written in New York Medical Times,
                   February 1895  

Life and Death - Maya

Clowns Tumbling

MISS BELL: This world is an old schoolhouse where we come to learn our lessons.

SWAMI VIVEKANANDA: Who told you that? [Miss Bell could not remember.] Well, I don't think so. I think this world is a circus ring in which we are the clowns tumbling.

MISS BELL: Why do we tumble, Swami?

SWAMI VIVEKANANDA: Because we like to tumble. When we get tired, we will quit. 

           - From Mrs. Alice Hansbrough's reminiscences of 
               Swami Vivekananda's conversation with 
                Miss Bell at Camp Taylor, California, 1900

Give up Egotism

Associates of Avatara

Know this for a truth that they alone are the associates of the Avatara who have renounced all self for the sake of others, who, giving up all sense-enjoyments with repugnance, spend their lives for the good of the world, for the welfare of the Jivas. 

The disciples of Jesus were all Sannyasins. 
The direct recipients of the grace of Shankara, Ramanuja, Shri Chaitanya and Buddha were the all-renouncing Sannyasins. 

               - Swami Vivekananda, 
                   Conversations and Dialogues, 
                     recorded by Sharat Chandra Chakravarty

True Self

Economic Side

Always remember this, that whenever a religious system gains ground with the people at large, it has a strong economic side to it. It is the economic side of a religion that finds lodgement with the people at large, and never its spiritual, or philosophic, side. 

If you should preach the grandest philosophy in the streets for a year, you would not have a handful of followers. But you could preach the most arrant nonsense, and if it had an economic element, you would have the whole people with you. 

                 - Swami Vivekananda, 
                    Class Notes taken in San Francisco, 
                     May 26, 1900

God Percolating

His Play

All reasoning and arguing is within the limit of the realm of Maya; it lies within the categories of space, time, and causation. 
But He [God] is beyond these categories. 

We speak of His law, still He is beyond all law. He creates, or becomes, all that we speak of as laws of nature, and yet He is outside of them all. He on whom His grace descends, in a moment goes beyond all law. For this reason there is no condition in grace. 
It is as His play or sport. 

And this creation of the universe is like His play --"लोकवत्तू लीलाकैवल्यम् -- it is the pure delight of sport, as in the case of men" (Vedanta - Sutras, II. i. 33). 

                 - Swami Vivekananda, 
                    Conversations and Dialogues, 
                      recorded by Sharat Chandra Chakravarty  

To Be

Hindu and Buddhist Method

The great point of contrast between Buddhism and Hinduism lies in the fact that Buddhism said, 'Realise all this as illusion', 
while Hinduism said, 'Realise that within the illusion is the Real.' Of how this was to be done, Hinduism never presumed to enunciate any rigid law. 

The Buddhist command could only be carried out through monasticism; the Hindu might be fulfilled through any state of life. All alike were roads to the One Real.  

                     - Swami Vivekananda, 
                       Sayings and Utterances

We Are Everywhere

Necessity and Luxury

Mankind generally thinks that everything is to be expected from the teacher. 
Very few people understand that they are not fit to be taught. 

In the disciple first this is necessary: that he must want--he must really want spirituality.
We want everything but spirituality. 

What is meant by want? Just as we want food. Luxuries are not wants, but necessaries are wants. Religion is a necessary thing to very few; and to the vast mass of mankind it is a luxury.  

               - Swami Vivekananda, 
                   Class-Talk in New York, 
                    (January 20, 1896)

Give without Barter

True Civilization

The great civilizations--what have they died of? They went for pleasure. And they went further down and down until, under the mercy of God, savages came to exterminate them, lest we would see human brutes growling about. 
Savages killed off those nations that became brutalized through sense enjoyment, lest Darwin's missing link would be found.

True civilization does not mean congregating in cities and living a foolish life, but going Godward, controlling the senses, and thus becoming the ruler in this house of the Self.  

               - Swami Vivekananda, 
                  Class-Talk in New York, 
                     (December 11, 1895)

Gold and Iron Chains

Law of Karma

When we speak of free will, we mean the will is not caused by anything. But that cannot be true, the will is caused; and since it is caused, it cannot be free -- it is bound by law. 

That I am willing to talk to you and you come to listen to me, that is law. Everything that I do or think or feel, every part of my conduct or behaviour, my every movement -- all is caused and therefore not free. 

This regulation of our life and mind -- that is the law of Karma.  

                - Swami Vivekananda, 
                   Lecture in San Francisco, March 20, 1900

Are You Not Atman?

One with Father

Sects, ceremonies, and books, so far as they are the means of a man's realizing his own nature, are all right; when he has realized that, he gives up everything. 
"I reject the Vedas!" is the last word of the Vedanta philosophy. 

Ritual, hymns, and scriptures, through which he has traveled to freedom, vanish for him. "So'ham, So'ham"-- I am He, I am He -- bursts from his lips, and to say "Thou" to God is blasphemy, for he is "one with the Father".  

                  - Swami Vivekananda, Lecture in US

God's Mercy

Detached Work

The veil cast by bad Karma is ignorance. Good Karma has the power to strengthen the moral powers. And thus it creates non-attachment; it destroys the tendency towards bad Karma and thereby purifies the mind. 

But if the work is done with the intention of enjoyment, it then produces only that very enjoyment and does not purify the mind or Chitta. Therefore all work should be done without any desire to enjoy the fruits thereof.  

             - Swami Vivekananda, 
                  Answer to a Question in US

Beyond Good and Evil

Two Aspects

The fact is, everything existing has two aspects. One is noumenal, unchanging and indestructible; the other is phenomenal, changing and destructible. 

Man in his true nature is substance, soul, spirit. This soul, this spirit, never changes, is never destroyed; but it appears to be clothed with a form and to have a name associated with it. This form and name are not immutable or indestructible; they continually change and are destroyed. 
Yet men foolishly seek immortality in this changeable aspect, in the body and mind -- they want to have an eternal body.  

                    - Swami Vivekananda, 
                      Lecture in San Francisco, March 20, 1900

Mother in All

Need for Karma-Yoga

Although the explanation and rationale of this unselfish work [of Karma-Yoga] is only in Jnana-yoga, yet the natural divinity of man makes him love all sacrifice simply for the good of others, without any ulterior motive, whatever his creed or opinion. 

Again, with many the bondage of wealth is very great; and Karma-yoga is absolutely necessary for them as breaking the crystallization that has gathered round their love of money.  

                  - Swami Vivekananda, 
                    Answer to a Question in US

   

Consummation of Human Life

Semitic and Aryan

To the Semitic, this life is an outpost where we are posted to test our fidelity; to the Aryan this life is on the way to our goal. 
To the Semitic, if we do our duty well, we shall have an ever-joyful home in heaven. To the Aryan, that home is God Himself. 

To the Semitic, serving God is a means to an end, namely, the pay, which is joy and enjoyment. To the Aryan, enjoyment, misery -- everything -- is a means, and the end is God. 
The Semitic worships God to go to heaven. The Aryan rejects heaven to go to God. 

In short, this is the main difference.  

               - Swami Vivekananda, 
                   Answer to a Question in US 

Root of all Weakness

One with Universe

… immortality is not gained by dying and going to heaven, but by giving up this piggish individuality, by not tying ourselves down to one little body. 
Immortality is knowing ourselves as one with all, living in all bodies, perceiving through all minds. 
We are bound to feel in other bodies than this one. We are bound to feel in other bodies. 

What is sympathy? Is there any limit to this sympathy, this feeling in our bodies? It is quite possible that the time will come when I shall feel through the whole universe.  

                - Swami Vivekananda, 
                   ‘Is Vedanta the Future Religion’, 
                    Talk at San Francisco

Upanishadic Knowledge

All Blissfulness

The Lord is all blissfulness. He is the reality behind all that exists, He is the goodness, the truth in everything. 
You are His incarnations. That is what is glorious. 

The nearer you are to Him, the less you will have occasions to cry or weep. The further we are from Him, the more will long faces come. The more we know of Him, the more misery vanishes. 
If one who lives in the Lord becomes miserable, what is the use of living in Him? What is the use of such a God? Throw Him overboard into the Pacific Ocean! We do not want Him!  

               - Swami Vivekananda, 
                  ‘Is Vedanta the Future Religion’, 
                   Talk at San Francisco

Sum of Total Eternal Truths

I Am in All

Therefore Vedanta formulates, not universal brotherhood, but universal oneness. 
I am the same as any other man, as any animal -- good, bad, anything. It is one body, one mind, one soul throughout. 

Spirit never dies. There is no death anywhere, not even for the body. Not even the mind dies. 
How can even the body die? One leaf may fall -- does the tree die? The universe is my body. See how it continues. All minds are mine. With all feet I walk. Through all mouths I speak. In everybody I reside.  

               - Swami Vivekananda, 
                 ‘Is Vedanta the Future Religion’, 
                  Talk at San Francisco

Intense Longing

Self as All

You are a complete whole; this body is the outside manifestation, the crust, of the inside; the external is grosser and the inside finer; and so finer and finer until you come to the Self. 

And at last, when we come to the Self, we come to know that it was only the Self that was manifesting all this; that it was the Self which became the mind and became the body; that nothing else exists but the Self, and all these others are manifestations of that Self in various degrees, becoming grosser and grosser.  

            - Swami Vivekananda, Notes of Class Talks

Remove the Cloud

Knowledge Will Make us Free

The main cause of all bondage is ignorance. Man is not wicked by his own nature--not at all. His nature is pure, perfectly holy. 

Each man is divine. Each man that you see is a God by his very nature. This nature is covered by ignorance, and it is ignorance that binds us down. 
Ignorance is the cause of all misery. Ignorance is the cause of all wickedness; and knowledge will make the world good.
Knowledge will remove all misery. Knowledge will make us free. 

This is the idea of Jnana Yoga: knowledge will make us free!  

            - Swami Vivekananda, 
               Class-Talk in New York, (December 11, 1895)

Everyone is Brahman

No Sins, Only Mistakes

These are what Vedanta has not to give. No book. No man to be singled out from the rest of mankind --"You are worms, and we are the Lord God!"-- none of that. 
If you are the Lord God, I also am the Lord God. 

So Vedanta knows no sin. There are mistakes but no sin; and in the long run everything is going to be all right. 
No Satan -- none of this nonsense. Vedanta believes in only one sin, only one in the world, and it is this: the moment you think you are a sinner or anybody is a sinner, that is sin.  

           - Swami Vivekananda, 
              ‘Is Vedanta the Future Religion’, 
                Talk at San Francisco

Exponent of Universal Religion