In plain words
‘All this is indeed Brahman.’ There is no second thing apart from this. What is, is one alone. Yesterday an American boy came. I asked him, ‘How old are you?’ I said. ‘Seven years,’ he said. ‘How do you know?’ I said. ‘My mother and father told me,’ he said. ‘No, no: it is one alone; this one has turned into 7,’ I said. Only when seven ones came together did it turn into seven. If the one itself were missing, there would have been no seven. So the whole world, all the millions, every one, is held only within one single oneness. This is what Vedānta calls ‘Sat is one; the wise speak of it in many ways.’ All that is, is one alone. There is no second thing apart from this. We appear with different names and forms, but the different names and forms, all of them, are not lasting. What is one in all things, without exception, is divinity alone. But men are unable to believe it. That is why: where can one who cannot trust himself find Ānanda? First of all, one must trust oneself. That itself is great Viveka. There must be a great deal of faith in the Ātma. Without it, people can trust nothing. One cannot trust even oneself. Then how can one trust others? That is why, first of all, faith in the Ātma must arise within oneself. Those who lack this faith in the Ātma keep meeting with many kinds of hardship. The root cause of these hardships is precisely the lack of faith in the Ātma. Whatever the circumstances, you must hold firmly to faith in the Ātma. From ancient times the people of Bhārata have pressed on through time by faith in the Ātma alone. Without this faith in the Ātma, the people of Bhārata could not have lived even for a moment. So we must make our faith grow. We must regard faith, viśvāsa, as our very breath, śvāsa. We must shape all our learning into learning that is true. We must put into practice the studies we have pursued. What is not put into practice is bookish knowledge; that is merely superficial knowledge. From it we gain no fitting result at all. We must enter into practical knowledge.