In plain words
That is just the mistake. How wrong it is to commit many faults! How sinful! 'I am a human, so making mistakes is my nature.' So he justifies himself. That is very wrong among children. Because you are a human being, you must not make mistakes. If it is an animal, it does not matter if it makes mistakes. It is an animal, so it behaves as it does. Having become a human being, you must not make mistakes. Making such mistakes and thinking, 'This is only natural to man', is justifying it. Born an animal, it behaves as an animal. How contrary it is for us, born as human beings, to behave as animals! So behave as a human being. And some very clever students justify themselves in many ways. Birds roam freely. They go wherever they like. A bird makes friends with any kind of bird. So it has full freedom. Beasts and birds enjoy their own freedom. If beasts and birds enjoy freedom, need man not enjoy freedom? True: enjoy freedom yourself as well. But what freedom do the beasts enjoy? They enjoy the freedom of beasts. What freedom do wild animals enjoy? They enjoy the freedom of wild animals. You are a human being; enjoy the freedom of a human being. If, being a human being, you enjoy the freedom of a wild animal, is that not a fault? So we take this 'freedom, freedom', develop it with wrong meanings and all kinds of meanings, and forget what it truly is. So this is not real freedom. What is freedom? Is wandering about at will freedom? Is letting the senses loose to run wild freedom? No. No. Ātma-jñāna. Ātmānanda. Ātma-nigraha: this is freedom.
In the morning Chabbar put up two maps, and labelled one side knowledge and the other side character. So our balance is this: only when the two, knowledge on one side and character on the other, are in harmony will there be a proper balance.
Today's learning grows cleverness alone; it does not grow good character even a little. If you have ten million kinds of learning and no good character, what is their fruit, what is their worth?
However much cleverness you have, what use is it?