If a piece of burning charcoal be placed on a man’s head, see how he struggles to throw it off. Similar will be the struggle for freedom of those who really understand that they are slaves of nature.
Please everyone without becoming a hypocrite or a coward.
The sky never changes: it is the cloud that is changing.
The difference between architecture and building is that the former expresses an idea, while the latter is merely a structure built on economical principles. The value of matter depends solely on its capacities of expressing ideas.
Everything is fraught with fear: Renunciation alone is fearless.
Man is born to conquer nature and not to follow it.
All the strength and succour you want is within yourselves. Therefore make your own future. “Let the dead past bury its dead.” The infinite future is before you.
This world is not for cowards. Do not try to fly. Look not for success or failure. Join yourself to the perfectly unselfish will and work on.
When an idea exclusively occupies the mind, it is transformed into an actual physical or mental state.
I ask you all so earnestly to open girl’s schools in every village and try to uplift them. If the Conditions of women are raised, then their children will, by their noble actions, glorify the name of the Country.
All work is simply to bring out the power of the mind which is already there, to wake up the soul. The power is inside every man, so is knowing; the different works are like blows to bring them out, to cause these giants to wake up.
Neither idealists nor materialists are right; we must take both idea and expression.
Stand up, be bold, and take the blame on your own shoulders. Do not go about throwing mud at others; for all the faults you suffer from, you are the sole and only cause.
If I, as an Oriental have to worship Jesus of Nazareth, there is only one way, that is, to worship him as God and nothing else.
All great undertakings are achieved through mighty obstacles. Keep up the deepest mental poise. Take not even the slightest notice of what puerile creatures may be saying against you.
Buddha taught kindness towards lower beings; and since then there has not been a sect in India that has not taught charity to all beings, even to animals. This kindness, this mercy, this charity – greater than any doctrine – are what Buddhism left to us.
The ideal person is he who, in the midst of the greatest silence and solitude, finds the intensest activity, and in the midst of the intensest activity finds the silence and solitude of the desert.
Christ said, “I and my father are one”, and you repeat it. Yet it has not helped mankind. For nineteen hundred years men have not understood that saying. They make Christ the saviour of men. He is God and we are worms!
Give up bondage; become a son, be free, and then you can “see the Father”, as did Jesus.
From Him are all name and form; all the animals and men are from Him. He is the one Supreme. He who knows Him becomes free.