vivekananda on man's true spiritual nature

The following lecture was delivered by Swami Vivekananda, the chief disciple of an Indian saint, Sri Ramakrishna, in London around 1899.This remarkably clear presentation of one's true spiritual nature has inspired me to reproduce it from his book "JNANA YOGA" published in 1939, with permission from The Ramakrishna-Vivekananda Center.Other of Vivekananda's works are available from The Ramakrishna-Vivekananda Center of New York.

Great is the tenacity with which man clings to the senses. Yet, however substantial he may think the external world in which he lives and moves, there comes a time in the lives of individuals and of races, when, involuntarily they ask, "Is this real?" To the person who never finds a moment to question the credentials of his senses, whose every moment is occupied with some sort of sense-enjoyment - even to him death comes, and he also is compelled to ask : "Is this real?" Religion begins with this question and ends with its answer. Even in the remote past, where recorded history cannot help us, in the mysterious light of mythology, back in the dim twilight of civilisation, we find the same question was asked, "What becomes of this? What is real?"

One of the most poetical of the Upanishads, the Katha Upanishad, begins with the enquiry: "When a man dies, there is a dispute. One party declares, that he has gone for ever, the other insists, that he is still living. Which is true?" Various answers have been given. The whole sphere of Metaphysics, Philosophy and Religion is really filled with various answers to this question. At the same time, attempts have been made to suppress it, to put a stop to the unrest of mind which asks, "What is beyond? What is real?" But so long as death remains, all these attempts at suppression will always prove to be unsuccessful. We may talk about seeing nothing beyond, and keeping all our hopes and aspirations confined to the present moment, and struggle hard not to think of anything beyond the world of senses - and perhaps, everything outside helps to keep us limited within its narrow bounds. The whole world may combine to prevent us from broadening out beyond the present. Yet, so long as there is death, the question must come again and again, "Is death the end of all these things to which we are clinging, as if they were the most real of all realities, the most substantial of all substances?" The world vanishes in a moment and is gone. Standing on the brink of a precipice beyond which is the infinite yawning chasm, every mind, however hardened, is bound to recoil, and ask, "Is this real?" The hopes of a life-time, built up little by little with all the energies of a great mind, vanish in a second. Are they real?
This question must be answered. Time never lessens its power; on the other hand, it adds strength to it.
Then, there is the desire to be happy. We run after everything to make ourselves happy; we pursue our mad career in the external world of senses. If you ask the young man with whom life is successful, he will declare that it is real; and he really thinks so. Perhaps, when the same man grows old and finds fortune ever eluding him, he will then declare that it is fate. He finds at last that his desires cannot be fulfilled. Wherever he goes, there is an adamantine wall beyond which he cannot pass. Every sense-activity results in a reaction. Everything is evanescent. Enjoyment, misery, luxury, wealth, power and poverty, even life itself, are all evanescent.

Now, human language is the attempt to express the truth that is within. I am fully persuaded, that a baby whose language consists of unintelligible sounds, is attempting to express the highest philosophy, only the baby has not the organs to express it, nor the means. The difference between the language of the highest philosophers and the utterances of babies, is one of degree and not of kind. What you call the most correct, systematic, mathematical language of the present time, and the hazy, mystical, mythological languages of the ancients, differ only in degree. All of them have a grand idea behind, which is, as it were, struggling to express itself, and often behind these ancient mythologies are nuggets of truth, and often, I am sorry to say, behind the fine, polished phrases of the moderns, is arrant trash.
So, we need not throw a thing overboard because it is clothed in mythology, because it does not fit in with the notions of Mr. So-and-So, or Mrs So-and-So, of modern times. If people should laugh at religion because most religions declared that men must believe in mythologies taught by such and such a prophet, they ought to laugh more at these moderns.
In modern times, if a man quotes a Moses, or a Buddha, or a Christ, he is laughed at; but let him give the name of a Huxley, a Tyndall, or a Darwin, and it is swallowed without salt. "Huxley has said it," that is enough for many. We are free from superstitions indeed! That was a religious superstition, and this a scientific superstition; only in and through that superstition came life-giving ideas of spirituality; in and through this modern superstition come lust and greed: That superstition was worship of God, and this superstition is worship of filthy lucre, of fame or power. That is the difference.

People are frightened when they are told this. They will again and again ask you if they are not going to keep their individuality. What is individuality? I should like to see it. A baby has no moustache; when he grows to be a man, perhaps he has a moustache and beard. His individuality would be lost, if it were in the body. If I lose one eye, or if I lose one of my hands, my individuality would be lost if it were in the body. Then, a drunkard should not give up drinking, because he would lose his individuality. A thief should not be a good man, because he would thereby lose his individuality. No man ought to change his habits, for fear of this. There is no individuality except in the Infinite. That is the only condition which does not change. Everything else is in a constant state of flux. Neither can individuality be in memory. Suppose, on account of a blow on the head, I forget all about my past; then, I have lost all individuality; I am gone. I do not remember two or three years of my childhood, and if memory and existence are one, then whatever I forget is gone. That part of my life which I do not remember, I did not live. That is a very narrow idea of individuality. We are not individuals yet.

We are struggling towards individuality and that is the Infinite; that is the real nature of man. He alone lives, whose life is in the whole universe, and the more we concentrate our lives on limited things, the faster we go towards death. Those moments alone we live, when our lives are in the universe, in others; and living this little life is death, simply death, and that is why the fear of death comes. The fear of death can only be conquered when man realises that as long as there is one life in this universe, he is living. When he can say, "I am in everything, in everybody, I am in all lives, I am the universe," then alone comes the state of fearless. To talk of immortality in constantly changing things is absurd. Says' an old Sanskrit philospher : It is only the Spirit that is the individual, because it is infinite; no infinity can be divided; infinity cannot be broken into pieces. It is the same one, undivided unit for ever, and this is the individual man, the Real Man. The apparent man is merely a struggle to express, to manifest, this individuality which is beyond, and evolution is not in the Spirit. These changes which are going on, the wicked becoming good, the animal becoming man, take them in whatever way you like, - are not in the Spirit.
They are evolution of nature and manifestation of Spirit. Suppose there is a screen hiding you from me, in which there is a small hole through which I can see some of the faces before me, just a few faces. Now suppose the hole begins to grow larger and larger, and as it does so, more nod more of the scene before me reveals itself, and when at last the whole screen has disappeared, I stand face to face with you all. You did not change at all in this case, it was the hole that was evolving and you were gradually manifesting yourselves. So it is with the Spirit.

There is a great tendency in modern times to talk too much of work and decry thought. Doing is very good, but that comes from thinking. Little manifestations of energy through the muscles are called work. But where there is no thought, there will be no work. Fill the brain, therefore, with high thoughts, highest ideals, place them day and night before you, and out of that will come great work. Talk not about impurity, but say that we are pure. We have hypnotised ourselves into this thought that we are little, that we are born and that we are going to die, and into a constant state of fear.

There is a story about a lioness, who was big with young, going about in search of prey; and seeing a flock of sheep, she jumped upon them. She died in the effort and a little baby lion was born, motherless. It was taken care of by the sheep and the sheep brought it up and it grew up with them, ate grass, and bleated like the sheep. And although in time, it became a big, full-grown lion, it thought it was a sheep. One day another lion came in search of prey, and was astonished to find that in the midst of this flock of sheep was a lion, fleeing like the sheep at the approach of danger. He tried to get near the sheep-lion, to tell it that it was not a sheep, but a lion but the poor animal fled at his approach. However, he watched his opportunity, and one day found the sheep-lion sleeping. He approached it and said, "You are a lion." "I am a sheep," cried the other lion, and could not believe the contrary, but bleated. The lion dragged him towards a lake and said, "Look here, there is my reflection and yours." Then came the comparison. It looked at the lion and then at its own reflection, and in a moment came the idea that it was a lion. The lion roared, the bleating was gone.
You are lions, you are souls, pure, infinite and perfect. The might of the universe is within you. "Why weepest thou, my friend? There is neither birth nor death for thee. Why weepest thou? There is no disease nor misery for thee, but thou art like the infinite sky; clouds of various colours come over it, play for a moment, then vanish. But the sky is ever the same eternal blue." Why do we see wickedness? There was a stump of a tree, and in the dark a thief came that way and said, "That is a policeman." A young man waiting for his beloved saw it and thought that it was his sweet-heart. A child who had been told ghost stories took it for a ghost and began to shriek. But all the time it was the stump of a tree. We see the world as we are. Suppose there is a baby in a room with a bag of gold on the table and a thief comes and steals the gold. Would the baby know it was stolen?

That which we have inside, we see outside. The baby has no thief inside and sees no thief outside. So with all knowledge. Do not talk of the wickedness of the world and all its sins. Weep that you are bound to ace wickedness yet. Weep that you are bound to see sin everywhere, and if you want to help the world, do not condemn it. Do not weaken it more. For what is sin and what is misery, and what are all these, but the results of weakness? The world is made weaker and weaker every day by such teachings. Men are taught from childhood that they are weak and sinners. Teach them that they are all glorious children of immortality, even those who are the weakest in manifestation. Let positive, strong, helpful thought enter into their brains from very childhood. Lay yourselves open to these thoughts, and not to weakening and paralysing ones. Say to your own minds, "I am He, I am He." Let it ring day and night in your minds like a song, and at the point of death declare: "I am He." That is the Truth; the infinite strength of the world is yours. Drive out the superstition that has covered your minds. Let us be brave. Know the Truth and practise the Truth. The goal may be distant, but awake, arise, and stop not till the goal is reached.