In plain words
For this concentration, rest for the mind is vital. Why diseases have grown so far beyond all measure in the world today is, at root, that the mind has no rest! If we are to keep away from disease, to live a peaceful life, to gain health, rest for the mind is vital. The students of today do not know what rest for the mind is. Until they fall asleep they are sunk in thoughts of many kinds. And from the moment they get up, these thoughts begin. From waking until sleep, with these very thoughts they put their lives through torment of many kinds. So the students cannot enjoy their health in the way we would wish. If they escape a sickness of the mind there is a sickness of the body; if they escape a sickness of the body there is a sickness of the mind; and so, one after another, the students of today suffer them all the time. When a study was made at Calcutta University of the students’ health over the last three years, it came out that 85 per cent of the students had some illness or other. When the same was looked into at Madras University, 90 per cent of the students were found sick. In Bombay, 82 per cent of them were found ill. Seen like this, in every university the young, the strong, the brave, the heroic, the dignified, all these students are rotting with such diseases and sinking under them; truly, how far will their future go!
Distraction and blankness, these two are bringing man low today
The root cause of this ill health is food and pastimes! The power to discern what food ought to be eaten and what is unfit has become nil in them. When it is time to satisfy their hunger, these students eat whatever they can lay their hands on. We may even try to curb our hunger, but we must not touch food that brings illness. And their pastimes, if we look at them, are beyond words. Through this, suffering ill health in mind and body, their concentration and memory are lost and they fall into weakness of the nerves.