In plain words
Even in questioning with humility and obedience, in a proper situation, there is a rule. We think that asking a question and getting it answered is freedom. It is not freedom. It is a rule that belongs to the system of education. This is your duty.
There is a difference between duty and freedom. It is of three kinds: relation, compulsion and duty. But what is the difference between these three? Now a Sunday has come. You have decided to call all your friends and give a tea party. For four o'clock that day you have made all the arrangements. A high temperature came on. Then at once you telephoned these friends. "I have a high temperature; today I have called off the tea party," he said. We think this is freedom. If you like, you may give it; if you do not like, you may call it off. You are at the office. There too a high temperature came on. That same day your director is visiting your office. You cannot take leave then. You must go to the doctor, take tablets, have an injection and go to the office with the fever. This is compulsion. The third is duty. For some reason or other, a husband and wife quarrelled. In this fit of anger the husband gave her a couple of blows. She went to the bedroom crying and lay down. She did not cook. The man sat in the drawing room; he was very angry. One anger came over the matter, another came with hunger; the two joined, and he is restless. Just at that moment a friend came. As he came in, he said, smiling, "Hello, come on." He told him to sit down, talked with the friend smiling and cheerful, spent the time with him, then went inside and said angrily, "My friend has come; make coffee." The wife must not know that he was happy with the friend. The friend must not know that he was angry with his wife. This is duty. Today relation has gone. Compulsion has gone. Duty has gone even more. This is the ruin of Dharma. This is what was called the decline of Dharma. If a man who has quarrelled with his wife is in the drawing room and says "get out" when a friend comes, the friend will think, "Has he gone mad?" To change our feelings and our actions to suit the moment: that is duty.