How Should One Cultivate Human Spirit
Part 1
by Tridandi Goswami A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami
Apart from all these controversial points, we may safely generalise that there are four different classes of human beings all over the world and they are (1) The intelligent class of men or good men or the Brahmins (2) The politicians or the ruling class of men, the men of passion or the Kshatriyas (3) The productive class of men or the men of mixed quality compounded of passion and ignorance called by the name of the Vaishyas and (4) The labour class of men or the men in ignorance called by the name of Sudras. And all of them are meant for co-operation for the common cause of cultivating human spirit. When they co-operate for the common cause there is harmony and progress but when they non-co-operate with one another there is unrest and trouble in the society.
At the present moment there is a tendency of non-co-operation between the different classes of men on account of their missing the common cause of human spirit and therefore there is prime need of a batch of intelligent class of men to combine together and thus educate the other classes in the matter of co-operation for human spiritual culture. The world is now dominated by the third-grade productive and fourth-grade labour class of men and there is scarcity of intelligent class of men and that of political philosophers also. Diplomats are not political philosophers. Without being guided by the intelligent class of men and political philosophers. The productive class of men and the labourer class of men have formed into groups of capitalist and communists ; both of them being practically disabled from the common cause of cultivating human spirit. These two classes of men are more or less concerned with the bodily necessities of life without reference to needs of the human spirit. The intelligent class of men can be interested only in the culture of human spirit and therefore there is need of the intelligent class of men to reform the diplomats, capitalists and the communists all over the world.
Any man identified with the body or the mind is not at all satisfied because he is always troubled in the body and the mind in spite of his all endeavours to avoid them. The troubles are the three fold miseries of life. The first trouble is in relation with his body
namely that he may feel some sort of headache, fever, heat, cold and so forth which he does not want at all. The second trouble is in respect of his mind. Even if one is quite all right se far as his body is concerned, his mind may be in trouble for so many cares and anxieties.
In the modern set up of materialistic civilization nobody is free from cares and anxieties. There are so many great men in the modern world and almost all of them are so much troubled in the mind that they cannot sleep at night peacefully without being intoxicated by some artificial means. Insomnia is a disease for the man always troubled in the mind.
The third trouble is in our relation with other living beings. India thought that the arrangement of the Panchashila will allow her to live in peace and friendship with other nations of the world but in spite of her following a policy of neutrality, her immediate neighbour and friend China has occupied a portion of Indian territory and for this the mind of the Indian leaders is in trouble. We have nothing to do with politics in this connection but we have taken up this particular incident just to get an idea of our trouble in relation with other living beings. The Law court is another place where there is ample evidences of human trouble in respect of our dealings with one another. Even there is trouble in the dealings between husband and wife, father and son, friend and friend, man and animal and so forth and so on. It is concluded, therefore, that there are many troubles between one living creature, with another for want of
And above all these troubles there is another insurmountable trouble imposed by the laws of nature, Famine, pestilence, war, earthquake, volcanic eruptions, flood and so many other things like that are always troubling the human being even though we do not want them. Big brains of world leadership are always busy to get rid of these troubles but so far they have failed to achieve any success over the threefold miseries for want of cultivating human spirit.
A living being's intuition is to get over all the above mentioned troubles of life and live in peace and friendship and the prosperity of eternal life and knowledge.
When I received the letter of invitation from Mr. Toshihiro Nakano, he expressed the following sentiments in his letter under reference. He wrote to say "This seems to be good opportunity for you to present your evidence by attending the glorious meeting to indicate that you have been lending every effort to attain the long-sought goal of securing the ultimate peace and infinite prosperity of humankind, a terrestrial paradise."
Living beings other than the human being, although feeling all the above mentioned troubles, are unable to take any measure against them. The human being is gifted with higher talented status of consciousness and he is always trying to get rid of all these troubles because he is meant for such realisation. Foolish human beings in the third and fourth grade of above mentioned classifications take it for granted that it is impossible to get over the troubles but the intelligent class of men do not give up the attempt and they do try it even life after life. There is no doubt that this congress is being organised only to fit out the ways and means of infinity prosperity which is the natural urge of a developed human being.
The identity of human spirit or the living energy of the living being is never to be
Can the material scientist move this false body made of bones and nerves without the spiritual aid? No, it is not at all possible. Had it been possible to do so by the materialist, then he could move the railway trains without any steam or electric power. Even the steam and electric power is unable to act without the help of a living spiritual being.
They see to the wonderful acts done by the seemingly imperceptible spiritual living being but do not search after the wonderful actor playing the parts of this wonderful act. In the modern days of throwing sputniks in the outer space we are amazed to hear about the revolving of the space vehicle but we neglect to study the spirit behind the bodily structure of the man who works on the sputnik. Certainly the structure of the body as described above, of the sputnik man, is not at all different from that of another non-sputnik man. The difference lies in the qualities of the spiritual spark of the individual being and we have neglected to make a study of it. The body is a lump of matter and it is a burden of the conditioned soul like the fetters of a convicted prisoner of state.
The sum and substance of an analytical study of the physical and anatomical conditions of living beings is explained above. And the ultimate end of such body is to turn into moths, stool or ashes. The dead body is either buried in the grave to be transformed into moth, it is given to be devoured by other animals and birds and the result is that it turns into stool or it is burnt into ashes.
Such a constructive body certainly cannot be imperishable as some of us wrongly think of. We have to seek out the imperishable element beyond the body and that is the process of
But we must always remember that the human form of body is distinct from all other animal bodies. Biological and physiological features of the bodies of man and animal may be on the same level but psychologically there is great difference between the two classes of bodies. This distinctive feature of the human body is a special prerogative of the human body. It is explained in the Puranas that there are 84 lacs species of life in the biological evolutionary process. There are nine lacs of aquatic species of life, twenty lacs species of immovable plants and trees, eleven lace species of worms, ten lac species of birds, thirty lac species of beasts and four lac species of human beings. The highest class of human beings is the intelligent class of men as mentioned herein before. Such intelligent class of men cultivate the qualities of truthfulness, forbearance, restraint, simplicity, faithfulness, toleration, knowledge and conviction in the existence of God. Therefore to be situated in the highest developed consciousness of a human being is the highest cultural efficiency in the evolutionary process of the living being. Such intelligent class of men can churn out the human spirit from the inert material body as it is possible to churn out fat out of the liquid milk. Before churning of the milk it appears that there is no such thing as butter within the milk but after churning, the butter begins to float on the surface and it is collected for proper use. Similarly on the outward dissection of the human bodily structure we cannot see what is the human spirit but by culture of proper and systematic knowledge derived from the right sources we can gradually feel for it, think of it and work for it.
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