UNITY IN DIVERSITY 6

[Guest guest]

Om Namah Sivaya

Discourse by Sri Swami Vivekananda

(Delivered in London, 3rd November 1896)

Here, on this earth, nowhere else. A few words ought to be said here. You will generally hear that this Vedanta, this philosophy and other Eastern systems, look only to something beyond, letting go the enjoyments and struggle of this life. This idea is entirely wrong. It is only ignorant people who do not know anything of Eastern thought, and never had brain enough to understand anything of its real teaching, that tell you so. On the contrary, we read in our scriptures that our philosophers do not want to go to other worlds, but depreciate them as places where people weep and laugh for a little while only and then die. As long as we are weak we shall have to go through these experiences; but whatever is true, is here, and that is the human soul. And this also is insisted upon, that by committing suicide, we cannot escape the inevitable; we cannot evade it. But the right path is hard to find. The Hindu is just as practical as the Western, only we differ in our views

of life. The one says, build a good house, let us have good clothes and food, intellectual culture, and so on, for this is the whole of life; and in that he is immensely practical. But the Hindu says, true knowledge of the world means knowledge of the soul, metaphysics; and he wants to enjoy that life. In America there was a great agnostic, a very noble man, a very good man, and a very fine speaker. He lectured on religion, which he said was of no use; why bother our heads about other worlds? He employed this simile; we have an orange here, and we want to squeeze all the juice out of it. I met him once and said, "I agree with you entirely. I have some fruit, and I too want to squeeze out the juice. Our difference lies in the choice of the fruit. You want an orange, and I prefer a mango. You think it is enough to live here and eat and drink and have a little scientific knowledge; but you have no right to say that that will suit all tastes.

Such a conception is nothing to me. If I had only to learn how an apple falls to

the ground, or how an electric current shakes my nerves, I would commit

suicide. I want to understand the heart of things, the very kernel itself. Your

study is the manifestation of life, mine is the life itself. My philosophy says you

must know that and drive out from your mind all thoughts of heaven and hell

and all other superstitions, even though they exist in the same sense that this

world exists. I must know the heart of this life, its very essence, what it is, not

only how it works and what are its manifestations. I want the why of everything,

I leave the how to children. As one of your countrymen said, 'While I am

smoking a cigarette, if I were to write a book, it would be the science of the

cigarette.' It is good and great to be scientific, God bless them in their search;

but when a man says that is all, he is talking foolishly, not caring to know the

raison d'être of life, never studying existence itself. I may argue that all your

knowledge is nonsense, without a basis. You are studying the manifestations of

life, and when I ask you what life is, you say you do not know. You are

welcome to your study, but leave me to mine."

 

 

 

 

Sivaya Namah

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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