about a new slate of things? They all tiled, and their woik is still going on. The (hlferoiice is this. They had not the faiitaionade of the rcfoimeis of to-day; they hail no cuises on iheii lips a.s modern rcformcis liave; their lips jironounced only blessings. They never condemned. They.said to the people that the lace must abvavsgiow. They looked back and they said, “ O Hindus, w'liat you have done is good, but, my brothels, lei us do better.” They did not say, “ You liave been wicked, now let us be good.” They said, “You have been good, but let us now be beltci.” That makes a whole world of difference. Wo must grow accoiding to onr naUiie. Vain is it to attempt the lines of action that foreign societies have engiaftcd upon us; it is impossible. Glory unto God, that it is impossible, llial w'c cannot be twisted and loituied into the.shape of other nations. 1 do not condemn the imstitutions of otiici races; they arc good for them, but not for us. What is meal for them may he poison for us. 'I'his is the fiist lesson to leain, \V''ith other sciences, oihei institutions, ami other traditions behind them, they have got then piesenl system. We, with our liadilioiis, with thousands of ye.ars of Karma behind us, naturally can only follow our own bent, lun in out own giooves, and that we shall have to do.
What is my plan then? My jilan is to follow the ideas of the gieat ancient Masters. I have studied their woik, and it has been given unto me to discover the line of action they took. They were the great originators of Society. They wcie the gieat givers of strength, and of purity, and of life. They did most maivellous work. We have to do most marvellous woik also, t'iicuiiislances have become a little different, I 66 coLOiUJso To AUiokA and ill consequence the lines of action have to be changed a little, and that is all. I see that each nation, like each individual, has one theme in this life, which is its centre, the principal note round which every other note comes to form the harmony. In one nation political power is its vitality, as in Kngland. Artistic life in another, and so on. In Intlia, religious life forms the centre, the keynote of the whole music of national life; and if any nation attempts to throw off its national vitality, the direction which has become its own ihiough the transmission of centuiies, — that nation dies, if it succeeds ifi the attempt. And, therefoie, if you succeed m the attempt to throw off youi religion and take up eithei politics oi society, or any other thing as your centie, as tlijg vitality of youi national life, the result will be, that you will become extinct. To pievent this you must make all and eveiything woik thiough that vitality of your religion. Let all your neivcs vibrate through the backbone of }our leligion. I have seen that T r.xnnol pi each even leligion to Americans without showing them its piactical effect on social life. I could not pieach religion in Kngland without showing the wondeiful political changes the Vedanta would bung. So, in India, .social icfoim has to be picached by showing how much moie spiritu.il a life the new system will bung; and politics has to be jireached by showing how much it will impiove the one thing that the nation w.xnts, — its spuituality. Kbeiy man has to make his own choice; so has evciy nation. We matle oui choice.xges ago and we must abide by it. And, aftei all, it is not such a bad choice. Is it such a bad choice iix this woild to think, not of in.xltcr but of spiiit, notof man but of (lod.^ That intense faith in anoilici woild, that mlenso hatieil for this world, the intense powei of icmincialion, the intense faith in God, the intense faith in the immoilal soul, is in )ou. I challenge anyone to give it up. Yon cannot. You may tiy to impose upon me by becoming maleri.xlisis, liy talking materialism for a few months, but I know what you aie; if T take you by the hand, back you come as good theists as ever were bom. How can you change youi nature?
So e\eiy improvement in India requites fust of all an upheaval in leligion. Before Hooding India with socialistic or political ideas, fust ileluge the land with Apiiilual ideas. The fiisl woik that demands our attention is, that the most wonder- ful truths confined in oui Upanishads, in our Sciiptures, in onr Pmanas— must be brought out fiom the books, brought out fiom the monasteiies, brought out fiom the forests, bi ought out fiom the possession of selected bodies of people, and scalteied broailcasl all over the land, so that these liulhs may lun like fiic all over the country, fiom north to south, and east to west, from the Ilimaki) as to Comoi in, fiom.Sindh to the Brahmapulia, Kveiyonc must know of them, because it is said, — “'This has fust to be hcaid, then thought upon, and then meditated upon." Let the peojile hcai fiist, and whoever helps in making (he pcojile hear about the great liuths in their own sciiptuies, cannot make for himself a better Karma to-day. Says our Viasa, “In this kaVivui^a there is one Kaima left. Saciifices and licmcndous Tapasyas aie of no avail novv. Of Kaima one remains, and that is the Karma of giving. And of these gifts, the gift of spiiiluality and spiritual knowledge is the highest; the next gift, is the gift of secular knowledge; the next is the gift of life; and the fourth IS tlie gift of food. Look at this wonderfully charitable lace; look at the amount of gifts that aie made in this poor, poor countr); look at the hospitality, where a man can travel from the iioilli to the south, having llie best in the land, being ticated alw.ps by evcivonc as if he was a fiieiid, and where no beggar staives ho long as iheic is a piece of biead anywhere!
Mr PLAN OF CAMPAIGN 67 In this land of charity, let us take up the energy of the first charity, the diffusion of spiiitual knowledge. And that diffusion should not be confined within the bounds of India; it must go out all over the woild. 'J'his has been the custom. Those that tell you that Indian thought never wont outside of India, those that tell yon that I am the fiisL Sannyasin who went to foreign lands to picacii, do not know the hisloiy of their own race. Again and again this phenomenon has happened. Whenever the world has requiied it, this peiennial Hood of spiiituahty has ovcillowed and deluged the world. Gifts of political kiiovt ledge can be made with the blast of li limpets, and the march of colioits. Gifts of secular knowledge and social knowl- edge can be made with file anJswoid; but spiiilual knowledge can only he given in silence, like the dew that falls unseen and unlieaid, yet hiinging into bloom masses of roses. This has been the gift of India to the world agam and again. Whenever thete has been a gi eat coiupiei mg I ace, bunging the nations of the woild together, making roads and tiansit possible, immediately India arose and gave her quota of sjiiritual power to the sum-total of the piogiess of the woild. ’I'liis hai)[)ene(l ages befoie Buddha was boin, and remnants of it are still left in China,. Ill Asia iMinoi, and in the heaitof the Malayan Aichipel.xgo. This was the case when- the gieat Gieek compieior united the^foui coiners of the then known woild; then lushed out Indian spiiitiiality, and the boa.sted ci\ihsalion of the West is but tha lemnaut of that deluge. Now llie same opportunity has again come; the power of Kiigland has linked the nations of the woild together as was never done befoie. I-'iiglish roads and channels of communication lusli fiom one end of the woild to the other. Owing to Knghsh genius, the woild to-day has been linked in such a fashion, as has never befoie been done. I'o-day bade cenlies have been foimed such as have never been before in the histoiy of mankind, and immediately, con- sciously or unconsciousl}, India lises up and poms foith her gifts of sphitiialily, and lliey will lush thioiigh these loads till they have leachcd the vciy ends of the w-oild.
'J’hat I w'cnt to Ameiica not my doing, 01 }oui doing, but the God of India, wlio is guiding her destiny sent me, and w’ill send hundieds of such to all the nations ol the wfuld. No powei on eaiLh can icsist it. This also has to be done. You must go out to preach your leligion,, pieach it to every nation under the sun, pieacli it to every j>cople. This is the fiisl thing to do. And after pieacliing spiiitual knowledge, along with it will come that secular knowledge and eveiy other knowledge that you want; Imt if yon attempt to get the secular knowledge without ic-ligion, 1 tell you plainly, vain is your attempt in India, it wmU never have a hold 011 the people. Itven tlie great Buddhistic movement was a failuie, paitially on account of that.
Therefore, my fiieiids, my plan is to stait institutions in India, lo-tiain our young men as pieacheis of the tiulhs of om scriptures, in India and outside India. IMcn, men, these are TvanteB: everything else will be ready, but strong, vigorous, believing young men sincere to the backbone, are w^anled. A hundieil such and the woild, becomes revolutionised. The will is stionger than anything else. Eveijthing must go dowii' before the will, for that comes from God and God Himself; a pure- and a.strong waU is omnipotent. Do you not believe in it? Preach, preach unto the world the great truths of your leligion; the woild wails for them. For centuries people have been taught theories of degradation. They have been told that they are nothing. The masses have been told all over the woild that they are not human beings. They have been so frightened for centuries, till they have nearly become animals. Never were they allow'ed to hear of the Atman. Let them hear of the Atman — that even the LECTURE S-FROM COLOMBO TO ALMORA rtg lowest of the low have the Atman within, which never dies and never is born — Him whom the sword cannot pieice, nor the fiie bum, nor the air dry, immortal, without beginning or end, the all-pure, omnipotentland omnipresent Atman! Let them have faith in themselves, for what makes the difference between the Englishman and you? Let them talk their religion and duty and so forth, I have found the difference. l‘he dilTeieuce is heie, that the Englishman believes in himself, and you do not. He believes in his being an Englishman, and he believes he can do anything. That biings out the (jod within him, and he can do anything he likes. You have been told and taught that you can do nothing, and non-entities "you are becoming every day. What we want is strength, so believe in yourselves. We have become weak, and tliat is vvhy occulti'^ms and mysticisms come to us, these cieepy things; there may be gieal liuths in them, but they have neaily destroyed us. Make your neives sUong. What we want is, muscles of iron and nerves of steel. We have wept long enough. No moie weeping, but stand on youi feet and be men. It is a man-making religion that we want. It is man-making theoiies that we want. It is man-making education all round that wo want. And here is the lest of truth — anything that makes you weak physically, intellectually and spiiilually, reject as poison, there is no life in it, it cannot be tiue, Tiuth is strengthening. Tiulh is purity, truth is all knowl- edge; truth must be sliengthening, must be enlightening, must be invigoialing. These mysticisms, in sjiite of some giains of liiUh m them, aie generally weakening-. Believe me, I have a life-long experience of it, and the one conclusion that I diavv is that it is weakening. I have tiavcllcd all over India, searched almost every cave here, and lived in the Himalayas, I know people who lived there all their lives. I love my nation, I cannot see }Ou degraded, weakened any more than you aie now. Therefore I am bound foi your sake and for truth’s sake to cry, “ Hold! ” and to raise my voice against this degradation of my race. Give up these weakening mysticisms, and be stiong. Go back to your Upanishads, the shining, the strengthening, the blight philosophy, and pait fiom all these mysterious things, all these weaken- ing things. Take up this philosophy; the greate.st tiiuhs are the simplest things in the world, simple as your own existence. Th-* truths of the Upanishads arc before you. Take them up, live up to them, and the salvation of India will be at hand.
One word more and I have finished. They talk of patiiolism. I believe in patriotism, and I also have my own ideal of patriotism. Three things are necessary for great achievements. First, feel from the heait. What is in the intellect or reason? It goes a few steps and there it stops. But thiough tlie heait comes inspi- ration. Love opens the most impossible gates; love is the gate to all the secrets of the universe. Feel, thoiefoie, my would-be refoimeis, my would-be patriots! Do you feel? Do you feel tliat millions and millions of the descendants of gods and of sages, have become ncxt-dooi neighbouis to biutes Do you feci that millions are starving to-day, and millions have been staiving for ages? Do you feel that igno- rance has conic over the land as a daik cloud.i* Docs it make youicslless? Does it make you sleepless? Has it gone into your ISTood, coursuVg thibugh your veins, becoming conson'^*" vvilh your heait beats? Has it made you almost mad? Are you seized with that one idea of the misery of ruin, and have you forgotten all about your name, your fame, yoUr wives, your children, your property, even your own bodies? Have you done that? That is the first stop to become a patriot, the very fust step I did not go to America, as most of you know, for the Pailiament of JReligions, but this demon of a feeling was in me and within my soul. I travelled 69 MV PLAN OF CAMPAIGN twelve years all ovei India, Tindin!^ no way to woik for my counliMnen, and tliat is why I went to Anieiica. Most of )ou know that, who knew me then. Who cared about this railiamcni of Reli,^ioiis? Here was my o\mi llesh and blood sinking every day, and who caied foi them? This was my hist step.
You may feel, then; but instead of spending } our energies in frothv talk, have you found any way out, any practical solution, some hedp instead of condemnation, some sweet words to soothe their miseries, to bung tluMii out of this hung death? Yet that is not all. Have you got the will to sui mount mountain-high obshuctions?
If the whole wmild stands against you swoid m hand, would 30U still daie to do what you think is light? If youi wives and childien aie against \()u, if all ) our money goes, 3 our name dies, your wealth vanishes, would you still slick to it? Would you still puisne it and go on steadily towaids your owm goal? As the great King Tlhartrihari says “ Let the sages blame 01 let them piaise; lot the goddess of foitune come or let hei go wheiever she likes; let death come to-day, 01 let it come in hundreds of years; he indeed is the sleatly man who does not move one inch from the way of tiuth.” Have you got that steadfastness? If you liave these thiee things, each one of 3^011 will woik miiaclcs. You need not wiile in the newspapers, you need not go about lecturing, your very face will shine. If 3'oii li\c in a cave, your thoughts will peimeale even thiough the rock walls, will go vibialmg all over the world for hundreds of }eais, maybe, until they will fasten on to some biam, and woik out there. Such is the power of thought, of sincerity, and of puiily of puipose.
I am afiaicl I am clela)ing you, but one woid moic. I'his national ship, my couiUiymen, my fi lends, my childien— this national ship has been fci lying millions and millions of souls acioss the w'atcis of life. For scores of shining centmies it has been plying acioss this water, and thiough its agency, millions of souls have been taken to the other shore, to blessedness. But to-day, perhaps through your own fault, this boat has become a little damageil, has spuing a leak, and would you therefore curse It? Is it lit that you stand up and pronounce malediction upon it, one that has ilonc more work than any other thing in the w’oild? If thcie are holes in this national ship, this society of ours, wc aie its children. r.et us go and slop the holes. I.et us gladly do it with our hearts’ blood, and if w'e cannot, then let us die. We will make a plug of oui biains and put them into the ship, but condemn it, never. Say not one harsh w'ord against this sociel3'. I love it for its past gieatness. I love you all because you aie the chiltlien of gods, and because you are the children of the glorious foiefalhers. How- then can I cm sc you I Nevei. All blessings be upon 3 011! I have come to you, my chddicn, to tell you all my plans. If you hear them I am ready to woik with you. But if you will not listen to them, and even kick me out of India, I will come back and tell 3011 that w^e are all sinking! I am come now' to sit in your midst, and, if wc are to sink, let us all sink together, but never let curses rise to our lips.
VEDANTA IN ITS APPLICATION TO INDIAN LIFE.
I'here is a word which has become very common as an appellation of our lace and our Religion. The word “ Hindu,” leqiiues a little exjjlanation in connection with what 1 moan by Vcdantism. This word “ Hindu " was the name that the ancient Peisians used to apjily to the liver Sindhu, Whenever in Sanskiit theie is an “ S ” in ancient Persian It changes into H,” so that “ Sindhu ” became “ Hindu ”; and you a,re all awaie how the Greeks found it hard to pionounce “ H ” and diopped it alto- gether, so that we became known as Indians. Now this woid, “ Hindu ” as applied to the inhabitants of the other side of the Indu.s, \\liate\er might ha\e been its meaning in ancient times, lias lost all its foice in modern times; foi all the people that live on this side of the Indus no longci belong to one icligion. There are the Hindus proper, the IMahominedans, the Parsecs, the Chi istians, the Buddhists and Jains. The woid “ Hindu '■ in its liteial sense ought to include all these; but as signifying the Religion, it would not be pioper to call all these Hindus. It is veiy hard, therefore, to find any common name for our Religion, seeing that this Religion is a collection, so to speak, of vaiious leligions, of various ideas, of vaiious ceicmonials, and forms, all gathered together almost without a name, and without a chinch, and without an organisation. The only point where, peihajis, all our sects agiee is, that we all believe in the Sciiptures — the Vedas. This perhaps is ceitain, that no man can have a light to be called a Hindu who does not admit the siipiemc authoiily of the Vedas. All these Vedas, as you are awaie, are divided into two portions~ihe Karma Kanda and the Jnana Kanda. The Kaima Kanda, includes vaiious saciifices and ceremonials, of which the larger part has become disused iii the present age. The Jnana Kanda, as embodying the spiiitual teachings of the Vedas known as the Upanishads and the Vedanta, have always been cited as the higlile.st aiuhoiity by all our teachers, philosophers, and writers, whether Dualist, or Qualified Monist, or Monist. Whatever be his philosophy or sect, eveiy one in India has to find his authority in the Upanishads. If he cannot, his sect would be beterodo.x. 'Pheiefore perhaps the one name in modern times which would designate evciy Hindu throughout the land would be “ Vedanlist ” or Vdidik ” as you may put it; and in that sense I always use the words “ Vedantism ” and “ Vedanta.” I want to make it a little clearer, for of late it has become the custom of most people to identify the w'ord Vedanta with the Advaitic system of the Vedanta Philosophy. We all know that Advaitism is only one branch of tlie various philosophic systems that have been founded on the Upanishads. The followers of the Visishudvaitic system have as much reverence for the Upanishads as the follovveis of the Advaita, and the Visisht- advaitisls claim as much authority for the Vedanta as the Advaitist. So do the Dualists; so does every other sect in India; but the word VeJantist has become somewhat identified in the popular mind with the word Advaitist, and perhaps with some reason, because, although we have the Vedas for our Scriptures, we have Srniilis and Puranas, — subsequent writings— to illustrate the doctiincs of the Vedas; these of course have not the same weight as the Vedas. And the law is, tliat wherever these Puranas and Smritis differ fiom any part of the Si»ti, the Sruti must be followed and the Smriti rejected. Now in the expositions of the great Advaitic philosopher Sankara, VEDAKTA IK ITS APPLICATIOK TO IKDIAK UEE and the school founded by him, we find most of the authorities cited are of the Upitnishads, very rarely is an authoiily cited from the Sinritis, except, perhaps, to elucitlate a point which could hardly be found in the Siutis. On the othei hand, other schools take retu^^e nioie and moie in the Smntis and less and less in the Srulis, and as we go to ihe more and more Dualistic sects we find a piopoitionate quantity of the Smritis quoted, whuh is out of all piopoilion to what wo should expect fioin a Vedantist. It is peihaps because these gave such predominance to the Paiiiamc aulhoiilics, that the Advaitist came to be considered as the Vetlanli.st par excellence, if 1 may say so.
llowevci it might have been, the word Vedanta must cover the whole ground of Indian religioui life, and it being the Vedas, by all acceptance it is the most ancient liteialure that we have; for whatever might he the idea of modem scholais, the Hindus are not ready to admit that parts of the Vedas wcie wiitten at one lime and pal tb were wiitten at another tune. They of com se still hold on to iheii belief that the whole of the Vedas were pioduced at the same time, rather if I may S{<y so, that they were never pioduccd, but that they always existed in the mind of the r.ord. This is what I mean b) the word Vedanta, that it covers the ground of Dualism, of (^)ualificd iNfoiiisiu and Advailism in India. Perhaps we may even take in paits of Ihuklhism, ami of J.iinism too, if they would come in, — for our hearts aie suflicienlly laige. Put it is they that will not come in; we arc ready; for upon severe analysis you will alway.s find that the essence of Buddhism was all boriowed fioni the same Upanishads; even the ethics, the so-called gicat and wondeifiil ethu.s of Buddhisin, weic there woiil for woid, in some or other of the Upanishails, and so all the good docliine.s of the Jains were there, minus iheii vagaiies. In the Upanishads, also, we find the geims of all the subseiiucnt development of Indian lelit^ious thought. Sometimes it has been urged without any ground whatsoever, that thcic is no ideal of Bliakti in the Upanishads. Those that have been students of the Upanishads know that that is not Hue at all. There is enough of Bhakli in eveiy Upanishad, if you will only seek for it; but many other ideas which are found so fully developed in later times in the Puianas and other Smntis are only in the geim in the Upanishads. The.sketch, the skeleton, was iheie, as it were. It was filled ill in some of the Puianas. But iheie is not one full-grown Indian ideal that cannot be tiaced back to the.same souice--the Ujianishads. ('crtaiii ludicrous attempts have been made by persons without much Upanish.idic scholarship to liacc Bhakli to some fuieign source; but as )ou know, those have all been piovcd to be failures, and all that you want of Bhakli is theie, even in the Samhitas, not to speak of the Upanishads —it is there, worship and love and all the rest of it; only the ideals of Jihakli arc becoming higher and higher. In the Samhita jiortions, now and then, you find liaccs of a religion of fear and tribulation; in the Samhitas now and then you find a worshipper quaking before a Varuna, or.some other god. Now and then you will find they aie vciy much tortured by the idea of sin, but the Upanishads have no place for the delineation of these things. There is no religion of fear in the Upanishads; it is one of Love, and one of Knowledge.