Passage 4

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In plain words

We must conduct ourselves in the way we think is the right path when others conduct themselves so. That is the natural dharma we can give to the ordinary world. Not everyone can recognise the Vedic dharma and the dharma of Vedānta. If we want to experience a life of Satya in our daily life, we must follow and practise whatever conduct we think good in others.

Dharma is not oneway traffic. It is give and take. Through the principle of Rāma, Vālmīki spread such natural dharma through the world. In each age dharma spreads in its own way. There is a mango tree of a good variety. When they turn into fruit, sweet juice develops in them. But while they are raw they are astringent and sour. Though the variety is good, there is one taste while it is raw and another when it comes to ripeness. In the same way, though the human race is the highest, most of it falls as raw fruit before it ripens. Some others fall when ripe. Only those that have come to fruit and ripened give a fine taste. The principle of the Ātma, which is in all, is one: this is a fine example of it. Countless waves rise up in the ocean. No wave looks like another. Though the waves are different, the waves are not one thing and the ocean another. All the waves remain within the ocean.

Human beings are the waves called jīvas that arise in the Brahmānanda called the principle of the Ātma. Each man's form, feeling and nature may be his own. But we must recognise the truth that all of them are drops in the Brahmānanda.

Born in the water itself, growing in the water itself, the water bubble subsides in the water itself. Man is the bubble, Nārāyaṇa the water.

The bubble called man was born in Nārāyaṇa alone. It moves about in the water called Nārāyaṇa alone. It perishes in the water called Nārāyaṇa alone. The bubble called man cannot exist apart from the water called Nārāyaṇa. That is why "An eternal part of Me alone becomes the jīva in the world of the living": all jīvas are parts of Me, … part, not a part of the senses. The branch is a part of the tree. The branch cannot exist apart from the tree. If it leaves the tree, the branch dries up. The child is a part of the mother. The child cannot live apart from the mother. Just as a fish cannot live apart from water, man cannot live apart from God. The cause of suffering unrest is separation. Money, gold, goods and vehicles: none of these can give Ānanda. Of all the time man spends for the sake of wife and children, for the sake of family and relatives, it is enough if he spends just a moment of it in dhyāna on the feet of God.