"ETERNAL INDIA" BY SWAMI VIVEKANANDA
- Shall India die? Then from the world all spirituality will be extinct, all moral perfection will be extinct, all sweet-souled sympathy for religion will be extinct, all ideality will be extinct; and in its place will reign the duality of lust and luxury as the male and female deities, with money as its priest, fraud, force, and competition its ceremonies, and the human soul its sacrifice. Such a thing can never be.
- If there is any land on this earth that can lay claim to be the blessed Punya Bhumi, to be the land to which all souls on this earth must come to account for Karma, the land to which every soul that is wending its way GODWARD must come to attain its last Horne, the land where humanity has attained its highest towards gentleness, towards generous,towards purity, toward calmness, above all, the land of introspection and of spirituality - IT IS INDIA.
- I was asked by an English friend on the eve of my departure, "Swami, how do you like now your motherland after four years' experience of the luxurious, glorious, powerful West?" I could only answer, "India I loved before I came away. Now the very dust of India has become holy to me, the very air is now to me holy; it is now the holy land, the place of pilgrimage, the Tirtha."
- The longest night seems to be passing away, the sorest trouble seems to be coming to an end at last, the seeming corpse appears to be awaking..she is awakening, this motherland or ours, from her deep long sleep. None can resist her any more; never is she going to sleep any more; no outward powers can hold her back any more; for the infinite giant is rising to her feet.
- O India! Forget not that the ideal of thy womanhood is Sita, Savitri, Damayanti; forget not that the God thou worship-pest is the great Ascetic of ascetics, the all - renouncing Shankara, the Lord of Uma; forget not that thy marriage, thy wealth, thy life are not for sense-pleasure, are not for thy individual personal happiness; forget not that thou art born as a sacrifice to the Mother's altar; forget not that the lower classes, the ignorant, the poor, the illiterate, the cobbler, the sweeper, are thy flesh and blood, thy brothers.
- So long as the millions live in hunger and ignorance, I hold every man a traitor who, having been educated at their expense, pays not the least heed to them!
- The tidal wave of Western civilization is now rushing over the length and breadth of the country. It won't do now simply to sit in meditation on mountain tops without realizing in the least its usefulness. Now is wanted intense Karma yoga, with unbounded courage and indomitable strength in the heart. Then only will the people of the country be roused.
- The national ideals of India are RENUNCIATION & SERVICE. Intensify her in those channesl, and the rest will take care of itself.
- Our life - blood is SPIRITUALITY. If it flows clear, if it flows strong and pure and vigorous, everything is right; political, social, any other material defects, even the poverty of the land, will all be cured if that blood is pure.
- But mark you, if you give up that spirituality, leaving it aside to go after the materializing civilization of the West, the result will be that in three generations you will be an extinct race; because the backbone of the nation will be broken, the foundation upon which the national edifice has been built will be undermined, and the result will be annihilation all round.
- In India, it is religion that forms the very core of the national heart It is the backbone, the bed-rock, the foundation upon which the national edifice has been built. Politics, power, and even intellect form a secondary consideration here.
- One vision I see clear as life before me: that the ancient Mother has awakened once more, sitting on Her throne rejuvenated, more glorious than ever. Proclaim Her to all the world with the voice of peace and benediction.
- India will be raised, not with the power of flesh, but with the power of the spirit; not with the flag of destruction, but with the flag of peace and love.
- Let us work hard, my brethren; this is no time to sleep. On our work depends the coming of the India of the future. She is there ready waiting. She is only sleeping. Arise and awake and see her seated here on her ETERNAL THRONE, REJUVENATED, MORE GLORIOUS than she ever was - this MOTHERLAND OF OURS.
- India has to learn from EUROPE the conquest of external nature, and Europe has to learn from INDIA the conquest of internal nature. Then there will be neither Hindus nor Europeans - there will be the ideal humanity which has conquered both the natures, the external and the internal. We have developed one phase of humanity, and they another. It is the union of the two that is wanted. The word freedom which is the watchword of our religion really means freedom physically, mentally, and spiritually.
