In plain words
If someone calls a blind man, “O blind man! Come here,” he is badly hurt. Instead, if you go up to him and call, “O Sūradās! Please come here,” how glad he will be! So every word we speak must be very sweet and pleasing. For it to be so, the heart must first of all become full of Prema.
Humanness is very sacred
The moral, the dhārmic and the spiritual: humanness is the very form in which these three are blended. But man today has forgotten all three. If we inquire how sacred humanness is, the man of today will have to feel ashamed. In this land of Bhārata, which flourished through virtues such as Satya, Prema, patience, compassion and sympathy, wherever you look today, vices such as cruelty, selfishness and hardness of heart are dancing their wild dance. Prema is nowhere to be seen. Today people install the statues of great souls and worship them, but the good things those very souls taught they bury in the ground. Why this pomp? Why these dramas? Worshipping statues and forgetting teachings is not humanness. To recognise the kinship and the bond between one man and another, and to act on it: that is true humanness.
The Trimūrti are in man himself
You worship Brahmā, Viṣṇu and Maheśvara. But there is no one in this world who has seen them. Then what are their upādhis? The guṇas sattva, rajas and tamas present in every human being: these are their upādhis. Who is meant by Īśvara? The Vedas have called the principle of Īśvara the ‘Ātma’, and have declared the heart too to be the ‘Ātma’. So the heart itself is the form of Īśvara. “Īśvarassarvabhūtānāṃ.” The name Īśvara belongs to the heart itself. His saṅkalpa is the mind. This very mind is the form of Viṣṇu. Viṣṇu means the one who pervades all. So the mind too pervades everywhere. “Manomūlam idaṃ jagat.” The whole world is made of the mind alone. From this mind came forth speech. The one who arose from Viṣṇu's navel is Brahmā. So speech itself is the principle of Brahmā. That is precisely why the principle of Brahmā has been described as “Śabdabrahmamayi, carācaramayi, jyotirmayi, vāṅmayi ...”. All in all, humanness is the very principle of these three: the heart, the mind and speech. The heart itself is the principle of Īśvara, the mind itself the principle of Viṣṇu, speech itself the principle of Brahmā. So all three forms, of Brahmā, Viṣṇu and Maheśvara, are present in every human being. Forgetting such humanness, we perform merely worldly karmas. These are not what we ought to practise. Practice joined with inner feeling is very necessary.
Good and bad are not in time
Today the new year has begun. This is the year named Īśvara. So in this year at least we must foster the feelings of Īśvara. Living in unity and in harmony with one another, we must carry out the karmas that are our duty.