Great Throughts Treasury

"Everyone can play the role of a master, but it is very difficult to be a servant."

"Everybody's mind becomes concentrated at times. We all concentrate upon those things we love, and we love those things upon which we concentrate our minds."

"Every thought that we think, every deed that we do, after a certain time becomes fine, goes into seed form, so to speak, and lives in the fine body in a potential form, and after a time it emerges again and bears its results. These results condition the life of man. Thus he molds his own life. Man is not bound by any other laws excepting those which he makes for himself."

"Every vicious though will rebound, every thought of hatred which you have thought, in a cave even, is stored up, and will one day come back to you with tremendous power in the form of some misery here. If you project hatred and jealousy, they will rebound on you with compound interest. No power can avert them; when once you have put them in motion you will have to bear them. Remembering this will prevent you from doing wicked things."

"Every thought is a little hammer blow on the lump of iron which our bodies are, manufacturing out of it what we want to be."

"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."

"Everyone makes shipwreck on the rock of would-be Guruism, except those souls that were born to be Gurus."

"Everything can be sacrificed for truth, but truth cannot be sacrificed for anything."

"Experience is the only source of knowledge. The same methods of investigation which we apply to the sciences and to exterior knowledge should be applied to religion. If a religion is destroyed by such investigation and found it was nothing but a useless and unworthy superstition; the sooner it disappeared the better. Why religions should claim that they are not bound to abide by the standpoint of reason no one knows. For it is better that mankind should become atheist by following reason than blindly believe in two hundred million Gods on the authority of anybody. Perhaps there are prophets, who have passed the limits of sense and obtained a glimpse of the beyond. We shall believe it only when we can do the same ourselves; not before. It is said that reason is not strong enough, that often it makes mistakes. If reason is weak why should a body of priests be considered any better guides?"

"Everything must be sacrificed, if necessary, for that one sentiment: universality."

"Experience is the only teacher we have. We may talk and reason all our lives, but we shall not understand a word of truth until we experience it ourselves."

"Everything is conscious which rebels against nature; there, consciousness is manifested. Just try to kill a little ant, even it will once resist to save its life. Where there is struggle, where there is rebellion, there is the sign of life, there consciousness is manifested."

"Everything that we perceive around us is struggling towards freedom, from the atom to the man, from insentient, lifeless particle of matter to the highest existence on earth, the human soul. The whole universe is in fact the result of this struggle for freedom."

"Everything that can weaken us as a race we have had for the last thousand years. It seems as if during that period the national life had this one end in view, viz how to make us weaker and weaker, till we have become real earthworms, crawling at the feet of every one who dares to put his foot on us. Therefore my friends, as one of your blood, as one that lives and dies with you, let me tell you that we want strength, strength, and every time strength."

"Expansion is life, contraction is death."

"External nature is only internal nature writ large."

"Faith, faith, faith in ourselves, faith, faith in God---this is the secret of greatness. If you have faith in the three hundred and thirty millions of your mythological gods, and in all the Gods which foreigners have now and again introduced into your midst, and still have no faith in yourselves, there is no salvation for you. Have faith in yourselves, and stand up on that faith and be strong; that is what we need."

"Face the brutes. That is a lesson for all life—face the terrible, face it boldly. Like the monkeys, the hardships of life fall back when we cease to flee before them."

"First, the practice of meditation has to proceed with someone object before the mind. I used to concentrate my mind on some black point. Ultimately during those days, I could not see the point any more, nor notice that the point was before me at all -- the mind used to be no more -- no wave of functioning would arise, as if it were all an ocean without any breath of air. In that state I used to experience glimpses of supersensuous truth."

"For us is only submission, calm and perfect. The soldier has no right to complain, nay murmur, if the General orders him into the cannon's mouth."

"Freedom can never be reached by the weak. Throw away all weakness. Tell your body that it is strong, tell your mind that it is strong, and have unbounded faith and hope in yourself."

"Feel nothing, know nothing, do nothing, have nothing, give up all to God, and say utterly, 'Thy will be done.' We only dream this bondage. Wake up and let it go."

"Feel, my children, feel; feel for the poor, the ignorant, the downtrodden; feel till the heart stops and the brain reels and you think you will go mad; then pour the soul out at the feet of the Lord, and then will come power, help and indomitable energy."

"Fill the brain with high thoughts, highest ideals, place them day and night before you, and out of that will come great work."

"Fear is death, fear is sin, fear is hell, fear is unrighteousness, fear is wrong life. All the negative thoughts and ideas that are in the world have proceeded from this evil spirit of fear."

"First get rid of the delusion I am the body, then only will we want real knowledge."

"Feel for the miserable and look up for help--it shall come. I have travelled twelve years with this load in my heart and this idea in my brain. I have gone from door to door of the so-called rich and great. With a bleeding heart I have crossed half the world to this strange land, seeking for help. The Lord is great. I know He will help me. I may perish of cold or hunger in this land, but I bequeth to you, young men, this sympathy, this struggle for the poor, the ignorant, the oppressed."

"First, believe in the world—that there is meaning behind everything."

"From the high spiritual flights of the Vedanta philosophy, of which the latest discoveries of science seem like echoes, to the low ideas of idolatry with its multifarious mythology, the agnosticism of the Buddhists and the atheism of the Jains, each and all have a place in the Hindu's religion."

"Freedom is the motive of the universe, freedom its goal. The laws of nature are the methods through which we are struggling to reach that freedom under the guidance of Mother. This universal struggle for freedom attains its highest expression in man in the conscious desire to be free."

"Give up all argumentation and other distractions. Is there anything in dry intellectual jargon? It only throws the mind off its balance and disturbs it. Things of subtler plane has to be realized. Will talking do that? So give up all vain talk. Read only those books which has been writted by persons who have had realization."

"Give up jealously and conceit. Learn to work unitedly for others."

"Give me few men and women who are pure and selfless and I shall shake the world."

"Freedom is the one goal of nature, sentient or insentient; and consciously or unconsciously everything is struggling towards that goal.The freedom which the saint seeks is very different from that which the robber seeks; the freedom loved by the saint leads him to the enjoyment of infinite, unspeakable bliss, while that on which the robber has set his heart only forges other bonds for his soul."

"From Whom all beings are projected, in Whom all live, and unto Whom they all return; that is God."

"Give the organ of taste a free rein, and the other organs will also run on unbridled."

"Give love, give help, give service, give any little thing you can, but keep out barter."

"Give up all desire for enjoyment in earth or heaven. Control the organs of the senses and control the mind. Bear every misery without even knowing that you are miserable. Think of nothing but spiritual freedom."

"Give up the burden of all deeds to the Lord; give all, both good and bad. Do not keep the good and give only the bad. God helps those who do not help themselves."

"Give up that awful disease that is creeping into our national blood---that idea of ridiculing everything, that loss of seriousness. Give that up. Be strong and have this Shraddha and everything else is bound to follow."

"Give up the idea that by ruling over others you can do any good to them. But you can do just as much as you can in the case of the plant: you can supply the growing seed with the materials for the making up of its body, bringing to it the earth, the water, the air, that it wants. It will take all that it wants by its own nature, it will assimilate and grow by its own nature."

"Go on saying, I am free. Never mind if the next moment delusion comes and says, I am bound. Dehypnotize the whole thing."

"Go on doing good, thinking holy thoughts continuously; that is the only way to suppress base impressions. Never say any man is hopeless, because he only represents a character, a bundle of habits, which can be checked by new and better ones. Character is repeated habits, and repeated habits alone can reform character. … The chaste brain has tremendous energy and gigantic will-power."

"God gave me nothing I wanted , He gave me everything I needed."

"God is eternal, without any form, omnipresent. To think of Him as possessing any form is blasphemy. But the secret of image worship is that you are trying to develop your vision of Divinity in one thing."

"Go on! Do not look back if you think you have done something that is not right. Now, do you believe you could be what you are today, had you not made those mistakes before? Bless your mistakes then. They have been angels unawares. Blessed be torture! Blessed be happiness! Do not care what be your lot. Hold on to the ideal. March on!"

"God has become man; man will become God again."

"God is merciful to those whom He sees struggling heart and soul for realization. But remain idle, without any struggle, and you will see that His grace will never come."

"God is not to be reached by the weak. Never be weak. You have infinite strength within you. How else will you conquer anything? How else will you come to God?"

"God is present in every Jiva; there is no other God besides that. Who serves Jiva serves God indeed."