In plain words
Foremost among those devoted to Dharma! The Dharma for which we have been willing to fight, counting neither wealth, honour nor life: the very name of that Dharma is “Sanātana Dharma”. Sanātana means eternal. Arise! Be ready! The time has come for you to reveal your matchless splendour and valour!
You who were born in Bhārata, the land that shone with unbroken splendour; you who sprang from the Hindu heroes who shone unassailable by others, the very homes of their own fortitude, steadiness, valour and devotion to Dharma; you who are born of the most holy lineages of the great ṛṣis Bhārgava, Kauśika, Vaśiṣṭha, Bharadvāja, Kaśyapa and the rest, who made even the three worlds tremble with the power of their own tapas, valour and the like: is it right for you, while harm befalls Dharma, which is higher than life itself, to sit by indifferent and make no effort, like cowards, like men without valour? God will surely stand by you, who are pledged to the welfare of the world!
As time goes on reform is coming into everything; step by step it has begun to come into the system of education too. In former times they received upanayana at the proper time and studied as the scriptures lay down. With the course of time, because the Westerners became the rulers, many became lovers of Western learning in the hope that by studying their language they would gain artha, the second puruṣārtha.
In former times the teachers made sure that, along with learning, Bhakti for God too took root. That is exactly why they had spiritual Vijñāna in abundance. Every single act of theirs, too, brought the good of the world beyond.
Boys and girls learned in the presence of gurus who knew the secrets of country, faith and saṃskāra. Now, though, the teachers themselves do not know what saṃskāra means, what the spiritual means, what faith means, and so the children cannot find coolness for their hearts.
It happens that teachers infatuated with Western civilisation teach history and the like, which spread atheism, make out the Vedas to be without authority and destroy the Hindu faith. Can what follows such a method be called education? Are those who teach such things fit to be called gurus? Education means this: what makes known God's divine power and the principle of the Ātma that dwells within, that alone is education. That itself is its chief meaning.
Precisely because they have no spiritual citta, they take part in riots and tumults, fall prey to the ways of ignorance, sink lower than the blind and become a laughing-stock. They bring disfigurement upon the very institutions of learning.
Teachers! In our college we have to take up, in some measure, lofty ideas and the loftiest works. Since all of you are cheerful, lovers of the spiritual, and dear to Sai, I mean to hand on to you the thoughts within Me.
1 Merely by our giving lessons in the college, a lofty state does not take shape in the children sufficiently. Just because you have planted a seedling, it is not a tree; fitting protection for it, nourishment, and weeding done every now and then are vital.
2. To turn innocent village children into lovers of the English language and make them lose humility and faith in their daily lives is not wholesome. Merely by being made fit for jobs, students cannot grow in morality and honesty. We must make them into people who help their parents at home as they should and earn their regard.
3. Making the 200 village children there are into groups of 20 or 30 each, each teacher must take on the care of one group, bring on in the right way the subject in which they are behind, build some ties of kinship with their parents, find out how the boy is placed, and take fitting steps to nourish the best feelings in him.