Livings Words of the Masters Archives - Page 13 of 15

We Are Like Channels

From observing the way in which workmen, the needy and all the unfortunate act among themselves, I was forced to conclude that the poor are far more charitable, far more prepared to succour their fellow-sufferers than are those more favoured by fortune. There is not enough time to go into the details of all that I have seen, but I assure you that it is instructive. I can, in any case, assure you that if the rich, in proportion to what they have, gave as much as the poor, soon there would no longer be a single starving person in the world.

Thus gold seems to attract gold, and nothing would be more fatal than wanting to accumulate riches before distributing them. But also, nothing would be more fatal than a rash prodigality which, from lack of discernment, would squander a fortune without benefiting anyone.

Let us never confuse disinterestedness, which is one of the conditions of true charity, with a lack of concern that springs from idle thoughtlessness.

Let us learn therefore to make judicious use of what we may have or earn while giving the least possible play to our personality and, above all, let us not forget that charity should not be confined to material aid.

Nor in the field of forces is it possible to accumulate, for receptivity occurs in proportion to expenditure: the more one expends usefully, the more one makes oneself capable of receiving. Thus the intelligence one can acquire is proportionate to the intelligence one uses. We are formed to manifest a certain quantity of intellectual forces, but if we develop ourselves mentally, if we put our brains to work, if we meditate regularly and above all if we make others benefit by the fruit, however modest, of our efforts, we make ourselves capable of receiving a greater quantity of ever deeper and purer intellectual forces. And the same holds true for love and spirituality.

We are like channels: if we do not allow what they have received to pour out freely, not only do they become blocked and no longer receive anything, but what they contain will spoil. If, on the contrary, we allow all this flood of vital, intellectual and spiritual forces to flow abundantly, if by impersonalising ourselves we know how to connect our little individuality to the great universal current, what we give will be returned to us a hundredfold.

Collected Works of the Mother, Volume 2: ‘Words of Long Ago’

2024-08-22

Divine Love in All

August 16, 1913

O Love, divine Love, Thou fillest my whole being and overflowest on every side. I am Thyself even as Thou art I, and I see Thee in each being, each thing, from the soft breath of the passing breeze to the glorious sun which gives us light and is a symbol of Thee.

O Thou whom I cannot understand, in the silence of the purest devotion I adore Thee.

Prayers and Meditations

2024-08-22

Flame of God

This bodily appearance is not all;
The form deceives, the person is a mask;
Hid deep in man celestial powers can dwell.

His fragile ship conveys through the sea of years
An incognito of the Imperishable.

A spirit that is a flame of God abides,
A fiery portion of the Wonderful,
Artist of his own beauty and delight,
Immortal in our mortal poverty.

This sculptor of the forms of the Infinite,
This screened unrecognised Inhabitant,
Initiate of his own veiled mysteries,
Hides in a small dumb seed his cosmic thought.

In the mute strength of the occult Idea
Determining predestined shape and act,
Passenger from life to life, from scale to scale,
Changing his imaged self from form to form,
He regards the icon growing by his gaze
And in the worm foresees the coming god.

At last the traveller in the paths of Time
Arrives on the frontiers of eternity.

In the transient symbol of humanity draped,
He feels his substance of undying self
And loses his kinship to mortality.

Savitri: Book One Canto 3

2024-08-22

Charity

In its most general sense, charity may be defined as the act of giving to each one what he lacks.

That is to say, in the last analysis, to put each thing in its place, which would result in the establishment of the supreme justice upon earth.

Such is the theory, but in practice charity could be considered as the path men ought to follow in their groping advance towards justice.

For, in his present state of evolution, man is incapable not only of realising justice in his earthly abode, but also of conceiving it as it is in its absolute essence. Charity is the living acknowledgment of this inability.

Indeed, in our ignorance of true justice, the justice which is one with perfect harmony, perfect equilibrium and perfect order, our wisest course is to take the path of love, the path of charity which shuns all judgment.

This is what justifies the attitude of those who always set charity against justice. Justice is, in their eyes, rigorous, merciless, and charity must come to temper its excessive severity.

Certainly, they cannot speak thus of divine justice, but more rightly of human or rather of social justice, the egoistic justice which is instituted to defend a more or less extensive grouping of interests and is as much opposed to true justice as shadow is contrary to light.

When we speak of justice as it is rendered in our so-called civilised countries, we should call it not rigorous and merciless but blind and monstrous in its ignorant pretension.

So we can never make too many amends for its fatal effects, and there charity finds an opportunity to apply itself fruitfully.

But this is only one side of the question and before delving deeper into our subject, I would like to remind you that charity, like all other human activities, is exercised according to four different modes which must be simultaneous if its action is to be integral and truly effective. I mean that no charity is complete if it is not at the same time material, intellectual, spiritual or moral and, above all, loving, for the very essence of charity is love.

At present charity is considered almost exclusively from the external standpoint and the word is synonymous with the sharing of part of one’s possessions with life’s rejects. We shall see in a moment how mean this conception is even when confined to the purely material field.

The three other modes of action of charity are admirably summed up in this counsel given by the Buddha to his disciples:

“With your hearts overflowing with compassion, go forth into this world torn by pain, be instructors, and wherever the darkness of ignorance rules, there light a torch.”

To instruct those who know less, to give to those who do evil the strength to come out of their error, to console those who suffer, these are all occupations of charity rightly understood.

Thus charity, regarded from the individual point of view, consists, for each one, of giving to others all they need, in proportion to one’s means.

This brings us to two observations.

The first is that one cannot give what one does not have at one’s command.

Materially this is so evident that it is unnecessary to insist upon it. But intellectually, spiritually, the same rule holds true.

Indeed, how can one teach others what one does not know? How can one guide the weak on the path of wisdom if one does not tread the path oneself? How can one radiate love if one does not possess it within oneself?

And the supreme charity, which is integral self-giving to the great work of terrestrial regeneration, implies first of all that one can command what one wants to offer, that is to say, that one is master of oneself.

Only he who has perfect self-control can consecrate himself in all sincerity to the great work. For he alone knows that no contrary will, no unexpected impulse can ever again come to impede his action, to check his effort by setting him at variance with himself.

In this fact we find the justification of the old proverb which says: “Charity begins at home.”

This maxim seems to encourage every kind of egoism, and yet it is the expression of a great wisdom for one who understands it rightly.

The Mother: CWM 2

2024-08-21

Thy Peace deepens

August 15, 1913

In this even-fall, Thy Peace deepens and grows more sweet and Thy Voice more clear and distinct in the silence that fills my being.

O Divine Master, Thine is all our life, our thought, our love, all our being. Take unto Thyself once more what is Thine; for Thou art ourselves in our Reality.

Prayers and Meditations

2024-08-21

A Godhead stands behind the brute machine

All now seems Nature’s massed machinery;

An endless servitude to material rule

And long determination’s rigid chain,

Her firm and changeless habits aping Law,

Her empire of unconscious deft device

Annul the claim of man’s free human will.

He too is a machine amid machines;

A piston brain pumps out the shapes of thought,

A beating heart cuts out emotion’s modes;

An insentient energy fabricates a soul.

Or the figure of the world reveals the signs

Of a tied Chance repeating her old steps

In circles around Matter’s binding-posts.

A random series of inept events

To which reason lends illusive sense, is here,

Or the empiric Life’s instinctive search,

Or a vast ignorant mind’s colossal work.

But wisdom comes, and vision grows within:

Then Nature’s instrument crowns himself her king;

He feels his witnessing self and conscious power;

His soul steps back and sees the Light supreme.

A Godhead stands behind the brute machine.

Savitri: Book One Canto 2

2024-08-21

The Great Current of Universal Life

I hope we shall always remain united in thought, at all events in the same desire for progress, for perfection.

This desire should always be the centre of our action, animating our will, for, whatever the goal we set ourselves, whatever the duty which devolves to us, whatever the work we have to achieve, in order to attain this goal, to fulfil this duty, to accomplish this work to the best of our ability, we must progress at each moment, we must use yesterday as the stepping-stone to tomorrow.

Life is in perpetual movement, in perpetual transformation. However great or learned or wise one may be, he who does not follow the great current of universal life in an ever ascending march, inevitably moves towards downfall, towards the dissolution of his conscious being….

We have attempted to give you some advice on how to develop, sharpen, widen, liberate and deepen your thought, for on the value of our thought depends the value of our being and our action.

This advice has often been repeated through the ages, at all times, in all countries, by the great Instructors…..

The Self of each individual and the great universal Self are one; we bear God within ourselves.

19 April 1912

The Mother: CWM 2

2024-08-20

Sweet Harmony

August 8, 1913

O sweet harmony that dwellest in all things, sweet harmony that fillest my heart, manifest thyself in the most external forms of life, in every feeling, every thought, every action.

All is to me beautiful, harmonious, silent, despite the outer turmoil. And in this silence it is Thou, O Lord, whom I see; and I see Thee in so unique a way that I can express this perception only as that of an unvarying smile. In truth, the real nature of the feeling experienced in the presence of the sweetest, most calm, most compassionate smile has a poor resemblance to what I feel when I see Thee in this way.

May Thy Peace be with all.

Prayers and Meditations

2024-08-20

A Magic Leverage

In her own self she found her high recourse;
She matched with the iron law her sovereign right:
Her single will opposed the cosmic rule.

To stay the wheels of Doom this greatness rose.

At the Unseen’s knock upon her hidden gates
Her strength made greater by the lightning’s touch
Awoke from slumber in her heart’s recess.

It bore the stroke of That which kills and saves.

Across the awful march no eye can see,
Barring its dreadful route no will can change,
She faced the engines of the universe;
A heart stood in the way of the driving wheels:
Its giant workings paused in front of a mind,
Its stark conventions met the flame of a soul.

A magic leverage suddenly is caught
That moves the veiled Ineffable’s timeless will:
A prayer, a master act, a king idea
Can link man’s strength to a transcendent Force.

Then miracle is made the common rule,
One mighty deed can change the course of things;
A lonely thought becomes omnipotent.

Savitri: Book One, Canto 2

2024-08-20