In plain words
Keep this truth in your heart and follow ‘culture’. But you are doing what you should not do. Even if you follow both ‘caste’ and ‘culture’, it is of no use if you have no ‘discrimination power’. Your intelligence and cleverness are not what matter; ‘discrimination’ is very necessary. When we are in the dark, we must switch on the light. But to switch on the light while it is daylight is not the mark of the wise. So we must take what we need and live in the right way.
Students! What you chiefly have to learn is not ‘bookish knowledge’; what you have to build up is not physical ‘energy’. These two keep coming and going. You must develop ‘discrimination’, which stays for ever. Whatever you see: “Is this good? Is it bad? Is this useful? Or not?” This you must think over first. Before you do any work: “May I do this work? Or should I not?” This you must think over. In this way you must go on growing in humanness.
Above all others, mother and father come first
We must not hurt the parents who bore us, brought us up and raised us. The Veda said, ‘Regard your mother as God, regard your father as God, regard your teacher as God, regard your guest as God.’ Above all others, mother and father come first. But children today want neither mother nor father; it is the wife who came along the way who matters to them; she is the one they follow. They forget the parents who carried them nine months, bore difficulties and losses, gave birth to them and raised them. Love your wife. But show your humility and obedience to your mother and father. Only after mother and father come all the others. As the Veda teaches, first of all love your mother. Take her command upon your head. Only when you make your mother happy will your life go on happily. If your mother sheds tears, you will have to suffer all your life. As you make your mother happy, so happily will your life go on in the future.