APPENDIX

THE TEACHING OF THE UPANISHADS

BEING THE SUBSTANCE OF TWO LECTURES TO POPULAR AUDIENCES

I. REST

II. THE NATURE OF THE SELF

I. REST

To some, in the present whirlpool of life and affairs it may

seem almost an absurdity to talk about Rest. For long enough

now rest has seemed a thing far off and unattainable. With

the posts knocking at our doors ten or twelve times a day, with

telegrams arriving every hour, and the telephone bell constantly

ringing; with motors rushing wildly about the streets, and

aeroplanes whizzing overhead, with work speeded up in every

direction, and the drive in the workshops becoming more

intolerable every day; with the pace of the walkers and the

pace of the talkers from hour to hour insanely increasing--

what room, it may well be asked, is there for Rest? And now

the issues of war, redoubling the urgency of all questions, are

on us.

The problem is obviously a serious one. So urgent is it that

I think one may safely say the amount of insanity due to the

pressure of daily life is increasing; nursing-homes have sprung

up for the special purpose of treating such cases; and doctors

are starting special courses of tuition in the art--now becoming

very important--of systematically doing nothing! And yet

it is difficult to see the outcome of it all. The clock of what

is called Progress is not easily turned backward. We should

not very readily agree nowadays to the abolition of telegrams

or to a regulation compelling express trains to stop at every

station! We can't ALL go to Nursing Homes, or afford to enjoy

a winter's rest-cure in Egypt. And, if not, is the speeding-up

process to go on indefinitely, incapable of being checked, and

destined ultimately to land civilization in the mad-house?

It is, I say, a serious and an urgent problem. And it is, I

think, forcing a certain answer on us--which I will now endeavor

to explain.

If we cannot turn back and reverse this fatal onrush of modern

life (and it is evident that we cannot do so in any very brief

time--though of course ultimately we might succeed) then I

think there are clearly only two alternatives left--either to go

forward to general dislocation and madness, or--to learn to

rest even in the very midst of the hurry and the scurry.

To explain what I mean, let me use an illustration. The

typhoons and cyclones of the China Seas are some of the most

formidable storms that ships can encounter. Their paths in

the past have been strewn with wrecks and disaster. But

now with increased knowledge much of their danger has been

averted. It is known that they are CIRCULAR in character, and

that though the wind on their outskirts often reaches a speed of

100 miles an hour, in the centre of the storm there is a space of

complete calm--not a calm of the SEA certainly, but a complete

absence of wind. The skilled navigator, if he cannot escape

the storm, steers right into the heart of it, and rests there.

Even in the midst of the clatter he finds a place of quiet where

he can trim his sails and adjust his future course. He knows

too from his position in what direction at every point around

him the wind is moving and where it will strike him when at

last his ship emerges from the charmed circle.

Is it not possible, we may ask, that in the very midst of the

cyclone of daily life we may find a similar resting-place? If

we can, our case is by no means hopeless. If we cannot, then

indeed there is danger.

Looking back in History we seem to see that in old times

people took life much more leisurely than they do now. The

elder generations gave more scope in their customs and their

religions for contentment and peace of mind. We associate

a certain quietism and passivity with the thought of the

Eastern peoples. But as civilization traveled Westward external

activity and the pace of life increased--less and less time was

left for meditation and repose--till with the rise of Western

Europe and America, the dominant note of life seems to have

simply become one of feverish and ceaseless activity--of activity

merely for the sake of activity, without any clear idea of its

own purpose or object.

Such a prospect does not at first seem very hopeful; but

on second thoughts we see that we are not forced to draw any

very pessimistic conclusion from it. The direction of human

evolution need not remain always the same. The movement,

in fact, of civilization from East to West has now clearly

completed itself. The globe has been circled, and we cannot go

any FARTHER to the West without coming round to the East again.

It is a commonplace to say that our psychology, our philosophy

and our religious sense are already taking on an Eastern color;

nor is it difficult to imagine that with the end of the present

dispensation a new era may perfectly naturally arrive in which

the St. Vitus' dance of money-making and ambition will cease

to be the chief end of existence.

In the history of nations as in the history of individuals there

are periods when the formative ideals of life (through some

hidden influence) change; and the mode of life and evolution

in consequence changes also. I remember when I was a boy

wishing--like many other boys--to go to sea. I wanted to

join the Navy. It was not, I am sure, that I was so very anxious

to defend my country. No, there was a much simpler and more

prosaic motive than that. The ships of those days with their

complex rigging suggested a perfect paradise of CLIMBING, and

I know that it was the thought of THAT which influenced me.

To be able to climb indefinitely among those ropes and spars!

How delightful! Of course I knew perfectly well that I should

not always have free access to the rigging; but then--some

day, no doubt, I should be an Admiral, and who then could

prevent me? I remember seeing myself in my mind's eye,

with cocked hat on my head and spy-glass under my arm,

roaming at my own sweet will up aloft, regardless of the

remonstrances which might reach me from below! Such was my

childish ideal. But a time came--needless to say--when I

conceived a different idea of the object of life.

It is said that John Tyndall, whose lectures on Science were

so much sought after in their time, being on one occasion in

New York was accosted after his discourse by a very successful

American business man, who urged him to devote his scientific

knowledge and ability to commercial pursuits, promising that

if he did so, he, Tyndall, would easily make "a big pile."

Tyndall very calmly replied, "Well, I myself thought of that

once, but I soon abandoned the idea, having come to the

conclusion that I had NO TIME TO WASTE IN MAKING MONEY." The

man of dollars nearly sank into the ground. Such a conception

of life had never entered his head before. But to Tyndall no

doubt it was obvious that if he chained himself to the commercial

ideal all the joy and glory of his days would be gone.

We sometimes hear of the awful doom of some of the Russian

convicts in the quarries and mines of Siberia, who are (or were)

chained permanently to their wheelbarrows. It is difficult to

imagine a more dreadful fate: the despair, the disgust, the

deadly loathing of the accursed thing from which there is no

escape day or night--which is the companion not only of the

prisoner's work but of his hours of rest--with which he has to

sleep, to feed, to take his recreation if he has any, and to

fulfil all the offices of nature. Could anything be more

crushing? And yet, and yet . . . is it not true that we, most of

us, in our various ways are chained to our wheelbarrows--is it

not too often true that to these beggarly things we have for the

most part chained OURSELVES?

Let me be understood. Of course we all have (or ought to

have) our work to do. We have our living to get, our families

to support, our trade, our art, our profession to pursue. In

that sense no doubt we are tied; but I take it that these things

are like the wheelbarrow which a man uses while he is at work.

It may irk him at times, but he sticks to it with a good heart,

and with a certain joy because it is the instrument of a noble

purpose. That is all right. But to be chained to it, not to

be able to leave it when the work of the day is done--that is

indeed an ignoble slavery. I would say, then, take care that

even with these things, these necessary arts of life, you

preserve your independence, that even if to some degree they may

confine your body they do not enslave your mind.

For it is the freedom of the mind which counts. We are

all no doubt caught in the toils of the earth-life. One man is

largely dominated by sensual indulgence, another by ambition,

another by the pursuit of money. Well, these things are all

right in themselves. Without the pleasures of the senses we

should be dull mokes indeed; without ambition much of the

zest and enterprise of life would be gone; gold, in the present

order of affairs, is a very useful servant. These things are

right enough--but to be CHAINED to them, to be unable to think

of anything else--what a fate! The subject reminds one of

a not uncommon spectacle. It is a glorious day; the sun is

bright, small white clouds float in the transparent blue--a day

when you linger perforce on the road to enjoy the sence. But

suddenly here comes a man painfully running all hot and dusty

and mopping his head, and with no eye, clearly, for anything

around him. What is the matter? He is absorbed by one idea.

He is running to catch a train! And one cannot help wondering

what EXCEEDINGLY important business it must be for which all this

glory and beauty is sacrificed, and passed by as if it did not

exist.

Further we must remember that in our foolishness we very

commonly chain ourselves, not only to things like sense-

pleasures and ambitions which are on the edge, so to speak,

of being vices; but also to other things which are accounted

virtues, and which as far as I can see are just as bad, if we

once become enslaved to them. I have known people who were so

exceedingly 'spiritual' and 'good' that one really felt quite

depressed in their company; I have known others whose sense

of duty, dear things, was so strong that they seemed quite

unable to REST, or even to allow their friends to rest; and I

have wondered whether, after all, worriting about one's duty

might not be as bad--as deteriorating to oneself, as distressing

to one's friends--as sinning a good solid sin. No, in this

respect virtues MAY be no better than vices; and to be chained to

a wheelbarrow made of alabaster is no way preferable to being

chained to one of wood. To sacrifice the immortal freedom

of the mind in order to become a prey to self-regarding cares

and anxieties, self-estimating virtues and vices, self-chaining

duties and indulgences, is a mistake. And I warn you, it is

quite useless. For the destiny of Freedom is ultimately upon

every one, and if refusing it for a time you heap your life

persistently upon one object--however blameless in itself that

object may be--Beware! For one day--and when you least

expect it--the gods will send a thunderbolt upon you. One

day the thing for which you have toiled and spent laborious

days and sleepless nights will lie broken before you--your

reputation will be ruined, your ambition will be dashed, your

savings of years will be lost--and for the moment you will be

inclined to think that your life has been in vain. But presently

you will wake up and find that something quite different has

happened. You will find that the thunderbolt which you

thought was your ruin has been your salvation--that it has

broken the chain which bound you to your wheelbarrow, and

that you are free!

--------

I think you will now see what I mean by Rest. Rest is

the loosing of the chains which bind us to the whirligig of the

world, it is the passing into the centre of the Cyclone; it is

the Stilling of Thought. For (with regard to this last) it is

Thought, it is the Attachment of the Mind, which binds us

to outer things. The outer things themselves are all right.

It is only through our thoughts that they make slaves of us.

Obtain power over your thoughts and you are free. You can

then use the outer things or dismiss them at your pleasure.

There is nothing new of course in all this. It has been known

for ages; and is part of the ancient philosophy of the world.

In the Katha Upanishad you will find these words (Max

Muller's translation): "As rainwater that has fallen on a

mountain ridge runs down on all sides, thus does he who sees

a difference between qualities run after them on all sides."

This is the figure of the man who does NOT rest. And it is a

powerful likeness. The thunder shower descends on the mountain

top; torrents of water pour down the crags in every

direction. Imagine the state of mind of a man--however

thirsty he may be--who endeavors to pursue and intercept

all these streams!

But then the Upanishad goes on: "As pure water poured

into pure water remains the same, thus, O Gautama, is the Self

of a thinker who knows." What a perfect image of rest!

Imagine a cistern before you with transparent glass sides and

filled with pure water. And then imagine some one comes

with a phial, also of pure water, and pours the contents gently

into the cistern. What will happen? Almost nothing. The

pure water will glide into the pure water--"remaining the

same." There will be no dislocation, no discoloration (as

might happen if MUDDY water were poured in); there will be

only perfect harmony.

I imagine here that the meaning is something like this. The

cistern is the great Reservoir of the Universe which contains

the pure and perfect Spirit of all life. Each one of us, and

every mortal creature, represents a drop from that reservoir--

a drop indeed which is also pure and perfect (though the phial

in which it is contained may not always be so). When we,

each of us, descend into the world and meet the great Ocean

of Life which dwells there behind all mortal forms, it is like

the little phial being poured into the great reservoir. If the

tiny canful which is our selves is pure and unsoiled, then when

it meets the world it will blend with the Spirit which informs

the world perfectly harmoniously, without distress or

dislocation. It will pass through and be at one with it. How can

one describe such a state of affairs? You will have the key

to every person that you meet, because indeed you are conscious

that the real essence of that person is the same as your

own. You will have the solution of every event which happens.

For every event is (and is felt to be) the touch of the great

Spirit on yours. Can any description of Rest be more perfect

than that? Pure water poured into pure water. . . . There

is no need to hurry, for everything will come in its good

time. There is no need to leave your place, for all you desire

is close at hand.

Here is another verse (from the Vagasaneyi-Samhita Upanishad)

embodying the same idea: "And he who beholds all

beings in the Self, and the Self in all beings, he never turns

away from It. When, to a man who understands, the Self

has become all things, what sorrow, what trouble, can there

be to him--having once beheld that Unity?"--What trouble,

what sorrow, indeed, when the universe has become transparent

with the presences of all we love, held firm in the One

enfolding Presence?

But it will be said: "Our minds are NOT pure and transparent.

More often they are muddy and soiled--soiled, if not

in their real essence, yet by reason of the mortal phial in which

they are contained." And that alas! is true. If you pour

a phial of muddy water into that reservoir which we described

--what will you see? You will see a queer and ugly cloud

formed. And to how many of us, in our dealings with the world,

does life take on just such a form--of a queer and ugly cloud?

Now not so very long after those Upanishads were written

there lived in China that great Teacher, Lao-tze; and he too

had considered these things. And he wrote--in the Tao-Teh-

King--"Who is there who can make muddy water clear?"

The question sounds like a conundrum. For a moment one

hesitates to answer it. Lao-tze, however, has an answer ready.

He says: "But if you LEAVE IT ALONE it will become clear of

itself." That muddy water of the mind, muddied by all the foolish

little thoughts which like a sediment infest it--but if you leave

it alone it will become clear of itself. Sometimes walking along

the common road after a shower you have seen pools of water

lying here and there, dirty and unsightly with the mud stirred

up by the hoofs of men and animals. And then returning

some hours afterwards along the same road--in the evening

and after the cessation of traffic--you have looked again, and

lo! each pool has cleared itself to a perfect calm, and has

become a lovely mirror reflecting the trees and the clouds and

the sunset and the stars.

So this mirror of the mind. Leave it alone. Let the ugly

sediment of tiresome thoughts and anxieties, and of fussing

over one's self-importances and duties, settle down--and

presently you will look on it, and see something there which you

never knew or imagined before--something more beautiful

than you ever yet beheld--a reflection of the real and eternal

world such is only given to the mind that rests.

Do not recklessly spill the waters of your mind in this direction

and in that, lest you become like a spring lost and dissipated in

the desert.

But draw them together into a little compass, and hold them

still, so still;

And let them become clear, so clear--so limpid, so mirror-like;

At last the mountains and the sky shall glass themselves in

peaceful beauty,

And the antelope shall descend to drink, and the lion to quench

his thirst,

And Love himself shall come and bend over, and catch his own

likeness in you.[1]

[1] Towards Democracy, p. 373.

Yes, there is this priceless thing within us, but hoofing along

the roads in the mud we fail to find it; there is this region of

calm, but the cyclone of the world raging around guards us

from entering it. Perhaps it is best so--best that the access

to it should not be made too easy. One day, some time ago,

in the course of conversation with Rabindranath Tagore in

London, I asked him what impressed him most in visiting the

great city. He said, "The restless incessant movement of

everybody." I said, "Yes, they seem as if they were all rushing

about looking for something." He replied, "It is because

each person does not know of the great treasure he has within

himself."

--------

How then are we to reach this treasure and make it our own?

How are we to attain to this Stilling of the Mind, which is the

secret of all power and possession? The thing is difficult, no

doubt; yet as I tried to show at the outset of this discourse,

we Moderns MUST reach it; we have got to attain to it--for

the penalty of failure is and must be widespread Madness.

The power to still the mind--to be ABLE, mark you, when

you want, to enter into the region of Rest, and to dismiss or

command your Thoughts--is a condition of Health; it is a

condition of all Power and Energy. For all health, whether

of mind or body, resides in one's relation to the central Life

within. If one cannot get into touch with THAT, then the life-

forces cannot flow down into the organism. Most, perhaps all,

disease arises from the disturbance of this connection. All mere

hurry, all mere running after external things (as of the man

after the water-streams on the mountain-top), inevitably breaks

it. Let a pond be allowed calmly under the influence of frost

to crystallize, and most beautiful flowers and spears of ice will

be formed, but keep stirring the water all the time with a

stick or a pole and nothing will result but an ugly brash of

half-frozen stuff. The condition of the exercise of power and

energy is that it should proceed from a center of Rest within

one. So convinced am I of this, that whenever I find myself

hurrying over my work, I pause and say, "Now you are not

producing anything good!" and I generally find that that is true.

It is curious, but I think very noticeable, that the places where

people hurry most--as for instance the City of London or Wall

Street, New York--are just the places where the work being

done is of LEAST importance (being mostly money-gambling);

whereas if you go and look at a ploughman ploughing--doing

perhaps the most important of human work--you find all his

movements most deliberate and leisurely, as if indeed he had

infinite time at command; the truth being that in dealing

(like a ploughman) with the earth and the horses and the weather

and the things of Nature generally you can no more hurry than

Nature herself hurries.

Following this line of thought it might seem that one would

arrive at a hopeless paradox. If it be true that the less one

hurries the better the work resulting, then it might seem that

by sitting still and merely twirling one's thumbs one would

arrive at the very greatest activity and efficiency! And indeed

(if understood aright) there is a truth even in this, which--like

the other points I have mentioned--has been known and taught

long ages ago. Says that humorous old sage, Lao-tze, whom

I have already quoted: "By non-action there is nothing that

cannot be done." At first this sounds like mere foolery or

worse; but afterwards thinking on it one sees there is a meaning

hidden. There is a secret by which Nature and the powers

of the universal life will do all for you. The Bhagavat Gita

also says, "He who discovers inaction in action and action in

inaction is wise among mortals."

It is worth while dwelling for a moment on these texts. We

are all--as I said earlier on--involved in work belonging to

our place and station; we are tied to some degree in the bonds

of action. But that fact need not imprison our inner minds.

While acting even with keenness and energy along the external

and necessary path before us, it is perfectly possible to hold

the mind free and untied--so that the RESULT of our action (which

of course is not ours to command) shall remain indifferent and

incapable of unduly affecting us. Similarly, when it is our part

to remain externally INACTIVE, we may discover that underneath

this apparent inaction we may be taking part in the currents of a

deeper life which are moving on to a definite end, to an end or

object which in a sense is ours and in a sense is NOT ours.

The lighthouse beam flies over land and sea with incredible

velocity, and you think the light itself must be in swiftest

movement; but when you climb up thither you find the lamp

absolutely stationary. It is only the reflection that is moving.

The rider on horseback may gallop to and fro wherever he will,

but it is hard to say that HE is acting. The horse guided by

the slightest indication of the man's will performs an the action

that is needed. If we can get into right touch with the immense,

the incalculable powers of Nature, is there anything which

we may not be able to do?" If a man worship the Self only

as his true state," says the Brihad-aranyaka Upanishad, "his

work cannot fail, for whatever he desires, that he obtains from

the Self." What a wonderful saying, and how infallibly true!

For obviously if you succeed in identifying your true being with

the great Self of the universe, then whatever you desire the

great Self will also desire, and therefore every power of Nature

will be at your service and will conspire to fulfil your need.

There are marvelous things here "well wrapped up"--

difficult to describe, yet not impossible to experience. And

they all depend upon that power of stilling Thought, that

ability to pass unharmed and undismayed through the grinning

legions of the lower mind into the very heart of Paradise.

The question inevitably arises, How can this power be

obtained? And there is only one answer--the same answer

which has to be given for the attainment of ANY power or

faculty. There is no royal road. The only way is (however

imperfectly) to DO the thing in question, to practice it. If you

would learn to play cricket, the only way is to play cricket;

if you would be able to speak a language, the only way is to

speak it. If you would learn to swim, the only way is to practice

swimming. Or would you wish to be like the man who when

his companions were bathing and bidding him come and join

them, said: "Yes, I am longing to join you, but I am not going to

be such a fool as to go into the water TILL I KNOW HOW TO SWIM!"

There is nothing but practice. If you want to obtain that

priceless power of commanding Thought--of using it or dismissing

it (for the two things go together) at will--there is no

way but practice. And the practice consists in two exercises:

(a) that of concentration--in holding the thought steadily for

a time on one subject, or point of a subject; and (b) that of

effacement--in effacing any given thought from the mind, and

determining NOT to entertain it for such and such a time. Both

these exercises are difficult. Failure in practicing them is

certain --and may even extend over years. But the power equally

certainly grows WITH practice. And ultimately there may come

a time when the learner is not only able to efface from his mind

any given thought (however importunate), but may even

succeed in effacing, during short periods, ALL thought of any

kind. When this stage is reached, the veil of illusion which

surrounds all mortal things is pierced, and the entrance to the

Paradise of Rest (and of universal power and knowledge) is found.

Of indirect or auxiliary methods of reaching this great

conclusion, there are more than one. I think of life in the open

air, if not absolutely necessary, at least most important. The

gods--though sometimes out of compassion they visit the

interiors of houses--are not fond of such places and the evil

effluvium they find there, and avoid them as much as they can.

It is not merely a question of breathing oxygen instead of

carbonic acid. There is a presence and an influence in Nature

and the Open which expands the mind and causes brigand

cares and worries to drop off--whereas in confined places foolish

and futile thoughts of all kinds swarm like microbes and cloud

and conceal the soul. Experto Crede. It is only necessary to

try this experiment in order to prove its truth.

Another thing which corresponds in some degree to living

physically in the open air, is the living mentally and

emotionally in the atmosphere of love. A large charity of mind,

which refuses absolutely to shut itself in little secluded places

of prejudice, bigotry and contempt for others, and which attains

to a great and universal sympathy, helps, most obviously, to

open the way to that region of calm and freedom of which we

have spoken, while conversely all petty enmity, meanness and

spite, conspire to imprison the soul and make its deliverance

more difficult.

It is not necessary to labor these points. As we said, the

way to attain is to sincerely TRY to attain, to consistently

PRACTICE attainment. Whoever does this will find that the way

will open out by degrees, as of one emerging from a vast and

gloomy forest, till out of darkness the path becomes clear. For

whomsoever really TRIES there is no failure; for every effort in

that region is success, and every onward push, however small, and

however little result it may show, is really a move forward,

and one step nearer the light.