Revered sir,
How strong the wish is in my heart to go to holy Kashi, to have darśana of your feet, and to stay on in your good company and so fulfil my soul, no words can describe; but everything is in His hands. Who knows what bond of the heart from some other birth there is between you and me? Otherwise, why is it that here in Calcutta many rich and eminent people show me a great deal of affection, and yet their company wearies me beyond measure, while a single day's talk with you so won my heart that it took you for its very own kin and a friend in dharma? You are a beloved servant of the Lord: that is one reason. The other, I think, is this: 'Without knowing it, the mind surely remembers the friendships of former births, fixed firm in the heart.'
But this time the illness is of another kind. My faith in the gracious hand of God has not gone, nor is it going to go, and my faith in the śāstras has not wavered either. But by the Lord's will my life these last five or seven years has been one unbroken struggle against obstacles and hindrances of every kind. I have found the ideal śāstra, I have seen the ideal man with my own eyes, and yet I cannot manage to carry anything through fully myself. That is what pains me terribly. Above all, so long as I stay near Calcutta I see no way it can happen. My mother and two brothers live in Calcutta. I am the eldest; the second is reading for the First Arts this year, and the youngest is still small.
They were once far better off, but since my father's death they have been in real hardship, so much so that some days pass without food. On top of that, our kinsmen, seeing them weak, drove them out of the ancestral home. They sued in the High Court and did win back their share of the ancestral house, but they have lost everything doing it, as is the way with lawsuits.
Sometimes, when I am near Calcutta and see how badly off they are, rajas gets the upper hand, and a vāsanā to act springs up in me, itself a distortion of ahaṅkāra; and then a fierce battle breaks out in my mind. That is why I wrote that the state of my mind was quite terrible. Now their lawsuit is over. Bless me, that after staying a little while in Calcutta and settling all their affairs I may take leave of these parts for good. 'The ocean, ever being filled and standing unmoved, the waters,' and the rest.
Bless me, that my heart may grow mighty with the great strength of God, and that every kind of Māyā may be driven far away from me. For 'we have taken up the cross, Thou hast laid it upon us, and grant us strength that we bear it unto death. Amen.' — Imitation of Christ.
Your servant,
Narendra.