In plain words
For that very reason, in Indian culture, honouring and worshipping gurus as sacred persons, as embodiments of the Trimūrti, became the tradition. Gurus too must develop Śānti, patience, compassion and Prema in themselves, set out to develop Satya, Dharma, Śānti and Prema in individuals and in society, and so find their fulfilment. If they do so, injustice, wrongdoing, Asatya and unrest will all go far away from the people, and well-being will be firmly established in the land.
Tender Hearts
Many people are anxious about what will become of the culture of Bhārata and of Bhārata in the future; this is a great mistake; it is the outlook of those without foresight. You must give no room at all to such fear and anxiety. For if you sow noble feelings in the hearts of the Bal Vikas children at this very tender age and nurture them, the leadership that will shape the country tomorrow will come to them. If you set sacred feelings in their Manas while they are still this young, those feelings will stay all through life. Of the thousands of men and women gathered here, 95 out of every hundred cannot now remember what was in the book they read this morning, but the hymns and moral ślokas their grandmothers and grandfathers taught them in their childhood come back to them clearly, do they not? What is learned at a tender age matters; the stories you hear, the lives of great souls, matter most of all. All of them are sacred seeds. As life grows, they too grow into trees with branches and sub-branches and serve in a form that bears fruit.
Today some people spread the idea that giving spiritual principles to children at a young age is a mistake. You must understand that to think so is a great mistake. Later in life, when the Śānti of the Ātma, courage, patience, śraddhā and Bhakti are needed, this wealth of learning you are given will prove its worth. To start digging a well when you are thirsty would look like foolishness, but nothing would come of it. The counsel “Start early; Drive slowly; Reach safely” applies to journeys of every kind. Through the spiritual sayings taken into the heart at a young age, noble changes come about step by step, and life goes on happily and meaningfully. If we say we will begin spiritual reflection some day after we retire, once we have leisure, that is not something that can be done; it will not happen at all. The Bhāgavata teaches, with fine arguments, that at the last moment it is beyond a man to utter the name of Hari. At that time all around him weep, and he weeps too. How then can the remembrance of God come to him? If man weeps all his life for material things, when will he weep for God? All through life you must weep for the one God alone; you must not weep for the body, which is the very form of wretchedness; if you let go of this human birth, which you earned by gathering a vast treasure of merit, this birth as a man that you won with labour beyond measure, getting it again is impossible.