THE WAY TO SELF-KNOWLEDGE

                Preface


This book is from the Super-Mind
A fast dictated gift sublime,
The Message it contains will find
Full confirmation in due time.

This well-observed phenomenon,
So new to modern intellect,
Has been exhibited, off and on,
In varied tongue and dialect,

Right from the old Egyptian times,
By many a richly gifted mind,
Of which the evidence in some climes,
One can in holy scriptures find.

The current theories, which ascribe
This outflow to the unconscious mind,
Are pure concoctions of a tribe
Of scientists that cannot find

The right solution in their texts,
Or in what their elite have writ,
Who, too, belong to diverse sects,
Each one depending on his wit

Which, in the vast domain of mind,
Is like a pin lost in a stack
Of hay, impossible to find,
When one in search has turned his back

Towards the huge, offending pile,
As Knowledge has turned his to God,
To please himself but for a while,
Intensely searching clay and sod.

The top psychologists whose fame
Still high in learned circles lives,
Are not entirely free of blame
For giving currency to views

About religion, God and soul,
Which are completely off the track,
As far from Truth as the South Pole
Is from the North, and some e'en smack

Of fabrication with a view
To enhance their prestige and their fame,
A subterfuge which is not new,
But in a holy cause, a shame.

The Almighty Power that rules this All
Is neither male nor female nor
Androgynous, and that we call
By names we have a liking for.

Our life can't be a simmering broth,
Where true and false conjointly live,
But there must be a purer Path
From which we Soul's estate can view.

The self-awareness of the soul,
To know her own divinity
Denotes the purpose and the goal
Of human life, as it should be.

That is why holy scriptures grip
So hard the normal human mind,
More than the love of scholarship,
And firmly to religion bind.

Mankind is passing through the age
Of dreams come true of scientists,
And with their gifts has set the stage
Now for the rule of nuclear fists.

What mental plagues will be her share,
If this accursed, infernal race,
With more and more destructive ware,
Continues at a faster pace,

Unless kind nature takes the stand
To make the hotheads see the light,
And comes down with a heavy hand
To bring to dust their vaunted might.

The arsenals built by the urge
To power, by lust, ambition, greed,
Nature will soon use as the purge
To cure these current ills with speed.

This awful Drama shall reveal
How marvelously nature works,
And how in all with which we deal,
Her hand behind the curtain lurks.

This gifted book will leave no doubt
That all we do is preordained,
And knowledge of what comes about,
Before it happens can be gained.

Ambition, passion, lust, desire,
Each impulse, urge or appetite,
Which move, propel or set on fire
Or fill with pain, grief or delight

The mind, must be judiciously
Brought under the control of man,
To help him climb courageously
The height prescribed in nature's Plan.

The bounden duty, in this fight,
Of every parent is to grow
In nobleness and moral height,
Their seeds in every child to sow.

The view of some psychologists
To give a more loose rein to sex
Is poison, and one must resist
Excess, ere it the system wrecks.

The ignorance, just at this stage,
Of this one, all-important Law,
When humankind has come of age
To end the rule of tooth and claw,

Can prove disastrous for the race
And has already done much harm.
That is why she will soon retrace
Her steps back to the field and farm;

And start the steep ascent to reach
The Kingdom nature has ordained,
One which religion came to preach,
When she self-mastery has gained.

Knowledge, entirely in the dark,
About this Crown of human life,
Must soon a new course embark
To clear the erroneous notions rife.

Hence this inspired direction came
To guide humanity aright,
As Dogma has made knowledge lame,
Bias and Hubris weak in sight,

So he cannot discern the Path,
Which nature for Man has aligned.
His cooks too many spoil the broth,
More so, when some are lame, some blind.

That is why Revelations come
To set the wrongs of Knowledge right,
To muffle his loud beating drum,
And bring his faults and fibs to light.

No poet, scholar, scientist
This Wonder-book can duplicate,
Or its innate appeal resist,
As Truth must triumph soon or late.

'Tis come to herald the New Age,
For which some people fondness show.
Like parrots talking in a cage,
What "New Age" means they do not know.

This Book is aimed to make it clear
That the existing two pursuits
Of wealth and power we must forswear,
As both are hence forbidden fruits;

And mankind must begin the ascent,
Free of the faults that block her way,
To reach the glowing firmament
Of Life-Divine without delay.

A new World-Order must emerge
That has no room for rivalry,
Where all attention would converge
On friendship, love and harmony.

Where every human flower must
Receive the thought and care it needs
To bloom divinely, in full trust,
That there are no encroaching weeds.

One can imagine it must be
A comic spectacle for gods
Our proud, intelligent selves to see
Stooping to tricks, deceptions, frauds

To o'ertake or outpace a mate,
A stranger, neighbor, kith or kin
And leave, what we accumulate,
Behind, when bade to quit the bin;

While in us there is, all along,
The Spark which, with a little care,
Can change this life into a song
Of heavenly music all can share.

But we discredit or ignore,
Or for mere trifles sacrifice
This deathless Treasure, evermore,
Which grows in beauty and in price.

There might be many who will try
To pick some hole or find some fault
In this book, but in vain their cry,
As coming storms the attacks will halt.

The more discerning will forbear
From making comments, till the time
When patent signs can make it clear
How far prophetic is this rhyme.

This heaven-sent verse will be excelled
By future Seers, on their Rebirth,
Whose mighty visions might be spelled
In all main languages of the earth.

                            Gopi Krishna
                            New Delhi
                            February 4, 1984

             CHAPTER   I


Devote one short hour every day
To serve your Maker and your Lord,
Do worship, meditate or pray
Or sow some seeds of Good abroad.

Do something, in His name, to show
That you are mindful of the debt
Which children to their parents owe
For all the gifts they freely get.

Do something noble, something fine
That has no color of the self,
No shade of ego, me or mine,
No thought of honor, fame or pelf.

Do something good to benefit
The humble crowds surrounding you,
Whose minds not yet by Wisdom lit
Cannot decide what they should do.

Half of their misery is due
To this: they often fall a prey
To more quick-witted worthies who
Steal from their labor every day.

You cannot meet the Lord alone,
For He is close to one and all,
More so than flesh is to the bone,
Responsive e’en to a silent call.

The Lord of this Creation — God
Of countless planets, suns and moons
Does not stand in need of our laud
To shower on us His priceless boons.

Can you expect an earthly king
To leave his throne and come to you,
If you all day his praises sing
Unless you something special do,

To merit notice of the height
Of your fame for achievements won,
For great discoveries made, or light
Of knowledge shed or service done.

The applause for meritorious deeds
Does not resound on earth alone,
But its accumulated seeds
Are in the soil of future sown.

What on the earth we think or do,
Believing we are free to act,
Comes from the Cosmic mind which, too,
Has its own universe, in fact.

The error lies in holding that
Mind has no province of its own,
The creed of those who, like a bat,
To darkness have accustomed grown.

The glory of the midday sun
Is never open to their view,
His splendor their weak senses shun
And hence they in delusion live.

Impervious to our sensory probe
That Light is e’er before our gaze,
But bound by ego to this globe,
Through life we empty shadows chase,

Retaining at the end of life,
Dim memories of the eventful past,
Reminders of the vanished strife
To which we once were holding fast.

Ask of a soldier, bent with age,
Who has the bloodiest combats seen,
Where’s now the fighting or the stage
On which he had an actor been.

Ask of a lover, old in years,
With palsied limbs and shrunken frame,
Where is the passion that brought tears
To him, when jilted by his flame.

This Magic Show none can explain,
This Mystery no one can solve,
Only when we remold our brain,
This giant phantom can dissolve

To leave one breathless, face to face,
With That from which we draw our thought,
Beyond the pale of Time and Space,
By which this phantom world is wrought.

The Price set on this great Release,
Known as salvation of the soul,
Is not that we should only please
The Lord, but honor His creation whole.

That is why service must be done
With meditation, prayer, laud,
For, at the base, this all is one —
The world, we creatures and our God.

How can a worship solely done
To profit one’s own self alone,
Persuade the Lord to favor one
To such a selfish conduct prone.

That is why crowds of those who seek
By flattery to soar to God,
Although persistent, honest, meek,
Remain till death interred in sod.

There is no Secret Path by which
One can more quickly reach the Lord.
The shortest route avoids the witch
Of self, which to subdue is hard.

That is why Service is a must
In one’s search for the state Divine,
For it rubs off from soul the rust
Of self, the source of “I” and “Mine”.

Those who search for the nearest road
To God must mold their head and heart
To share, with joy, the other’s load
Of pain and sorrow from the start.

Our meditation, Asana, pose
And all the rest would ne’er suffice
To our Beloved to bring us close,
Unless with deeds we pay the price.

Compassion, charity and love
Of neighbor are a vital part
Of worship done to rise above
The self and must come from the heart.







           CHAPTER  XV


There are good people who remain,
Sometimes, at night, for hours awake.
In self-enquiry rack the brain
To cure their intellectual ache.

But never can resolve the doubt:
What is this knowing-self behind
The ego’s bubble rising out
Of the deep ocean, we call mind?

No thinker has explained so far:
Why our self, if from matter born,
Should, like a distant, twinkling star,
Keep us e’er wondering till the morn.

What does this gleaming point of light
Look like? what form does it possess?
What charming scenes would meet our sight?
Or vistas grand our mind impress?

Were we to reach the distant orb
To rove across it and explore;
Its unexplainable riddles probe,
To know about it more and more.

It never can be were the soul
Made of the same material stuff;
Which forms the body of this whole,
That we would always meet rebuff

When probing our own mystery,
For we are no more nearer now
In finding of this lock the key
Than when man first designed the bow.

The reason for this lies in this:
That there are super-earthly planes
Of being, which our senses miss
And cannot pass on to our brains.

Hence now and e’en in coming years
Material science, working with
The present tools, would miss these spheres,
And e’er consider soul a myth.

Can we expect one who is blind
To mark the shades of colored light?
Or with an instrument to find
The wonder of the normal sight?

The same applies to normal brains,
And also to the normal mind.
We miss the super-mundane planes,
As light is ne’er seen by the blind.

The issue is so simple that:
Only a narrow intellect,
Which clings to darkness, like a bat,
This sound conclusion can reject:

We always miss the subtler part
Of this creation, as we lack
The tools to map it out and chart,
And for the search have lost the track.

Instead of setting out to explore
These regions of the universe,
Knowledge is heading more and more
Towards directions, the reverse

Of what he is designed to reach,
To solve the eternal Mystery,
To learn the safest way to breach
The wall of senses and be free.

We can’t expect the normal mind,
Emerging from the average brains,
To exceed the bound for which designed,
And win the super-normal planes.

If, as is certainly the case,
Our soul does not to earth belong,
It means the intellectual race
To know its nature has been wrong.

It also means we try in vain
To know what happens after death,
For, how can Spirit which our brain
Could not detect, while it drew breath,

Become perceptible or tell
What to it after death befalls?
Or in what regions does it dwell
When out of body’s prison-walls?

’Tis rather strange to see how proud
Knowledge is of his intellect:
He rather would the Truth enshroud
In doubt than from this course deflect,

And own that e’en Himalayan stacks
Of books, as high up as the skies,
Can ne’er if e’en his headpiece cracks
Make a voracious reader wise

About the nature of the soul,
And what befalls it on demise,
For there is nothing in this Whole
To help us know it or surmise.

This is beyond the normal brain,
And needs a rare organic change
In it to bring the intangible plane
Of soul within its widened range.

No expert study of the brain
Can yield of soul the slightest clue
To help empiricists to gain
The knowledge of its nature true.

They ne’er can pick up any trace
Of this discarnate spark divine,
If all the experts join the race
In one, a mile wide, endless line.

Nor scientists nor scholars can
Help in this branch of study which
Is portioned for the enlightened man
To make the world sublimely rich.

The gloss and glamour which we see,
All o’er the planet in this age,
Is but a passing show to be
Reset and o’erhauled by the sage.

Vibrations from the realm sublime,
Beyond the reach of intellect,
Empiricists in any clime
Cannot observe, record, detect.

A mandate from that holy Shore
Is couched in its own language and
Has something to say which is more
Than what the learned understand.

And that is why the human mind
Is tinged with religious awe,
With Hope and Faith, at times e’en blind,
To honor this supernal Law.

Religious genius, far ahead,
In matters which relate to soul,
On what the intellect has said
Can always act a leading role.

And that is why, throughout the past,
Religion held a lofty place,
Outreaching the assembly vast,
Of High and Mighty in the race.

It lost that high position, when
Its guardians made a sad mistake,
And turned a palace into a pen,
An ocean into a narrow lake.

In course of time the lake became
A cluster of contending pools,
Of which the wardens know the name,
The observances and the rules,

But not the Essence which had brought
The ocean into existence once:
To broaden human life and thought,
To add to peace, demolish guns.

The world is threatened now because
Knowledge lacks in humility,
In his neck-breaking rush to pause
And try to find the missing key

Which lies unnoticed in the maze
Of earth’s unsearched religious lore,
To show what is beyond our gaze:
The wonders of the Other Shore.

It is not always right to think
That miracles or psychic gifts
Are a part of or have a link
With Super-mind, when nature lifts

The veil, which hides that Sacred Coast,
For, one who has attained the height
Would ne’er of their possession boast
Or use them or e’en think that right:

Those who resort to miracles
Their own accomplishment to show,
Employ a trick, as old as hills,
In fame, esteem or wealth to grow.

Were nature ready to permit,
Magic, like science, to be used,
For self or other’s benefit,
Or let the Secret be abused

Chaos would be let loose in place
Of law and order on this globe,
Pigs would the chairs of learning grace,
And donkeys wear the royal robe.

How can the human world survive,
If lustful wizards in the night,
With their nefarious art contrive
To mate with women left and right?

Erratic, unpredictable, weird,
Magic and sorcery result
From forces man has always feared
And termed as evil or occult.

Psychic displays too often smell
Of something slimy, phony, sick,
So mixed with fraud, ’tis hard to tell,
Which one is genuine, which a trick.

In each case there is nothing sound,
Concrete or lawful at the base,
Nor till now any one has found
Of forces involved the slightest trace.

Can you point to a single case,
In the whole course of history,
Full well confirmed, without a trace
Of doubt, where magic, sorcery

Or witchcraft played a signal role
In helping one to boundless wealth,
Or any cherished lofty goal,
Say deathless life or ageless health,

A ruler’s chair or royal crown,
Or unrestrained delights of love,
Or e’en an honored scholar’s gown,
Or some achievement far above

The common, which for one has found
A place in the annals of the race,
Something accomplished, with one bound,
Through magic or some Siddha’s grace.

To trust in a miraculous rise
To wealth or lordship or to fame
Is like believing that a prize
For speed can be won by the lame,

Or that a sot can win in wit,
A cripple in the strength of arm,
A blind man best a mark can hit,
A hag excel in facial charm.

Those who profess to own these gifts
A challenge ne’er throw to the wise
To come and witness them in shifts,
So that suspicions cease to rise.

But on the contrary the art
Is e’er practised in secrecy.
None e’er came forward to impart
The knowledge, of restrictions free,

To neophytes in open schools,
As service or for any price,
To save from fruitless search the fools
Who think their Maker plays with dice.

One who acquires the Super-mind
Becomes one with the Cosmic Law,
Desire does not his actions bind
Nor can him from his duty draw.

The standards nature must have set
To judge aspirants’ thought and deeds,
Before they can the Medal get,
Is what is taught in holy creeds.

It is because we do not know
That our brain is evolving still,
So that we high in stature grow
To be one with the Cosmic Will,

That scholars ne’er could make it plain:
What office does true Faith perform?
As none suspected that our brain
To grow up sane needs self-reform.

In all the earth’s colossal store
Of books this thought is lacking still.
Hence this Voice from the “Other Shore”,
This gap in knowledge came to fill.

The Super-mind does not concern
Itself with what our wit can know,
For ’tis what She cannot discern
A more evolved brain would show.

Why we of high ideals dream
Or harbor bright Utopias,
Is just because a guiding beam
Tells us to change our social laws.

The office of the awakened sage
Is how to actualize these dreams.
What are the errors, what the rage,
What the excesses and extremes,

Which stubbornly obstruct the way
Leading towards the appointed goal,
For dazzled by a bright display —
A toxic glow from burning coal —

The festive crowds, drunk with delight —
The rulers, scholars, traders, priests —
Enchanted by the wondrous sights,
Engrossed in pleasure, fun and feasts,

Regard with disbelief, at first,
The warnings from that Holy Shore,
But soon, when missiles start to burst,
They see ablaze the glittering store.

Short-lived is doubt, dissent and scorn
Which greet a seer’s inspired discourse,
For nature, when she sounds the horn,
Soon after launches the attack with force.

The Forces we see spread around,
In truth, are nature’s watchful guards,
To turn earth into a battleground,
When Man his future disregards.

How poor in wisdom is this crown
Of earth’s organic kingdom still,
As he thinks nature does not frown
When he performs his duties ill?

We ne’er perceive the Living Light
Which this creation has designed,
And every moment has in sight
The faults and virtues of mankind.

The nuclear weapons, now designed,
To guard our empire, wealth or might,
Bear nature’s grim command, unsigned,
To crush the rebels, when they fight.

The claimants to the seership crown
Must have no other axe to grind,
No thirst for honor or renown
Or wealth or pleasure in their mind.

They must remember that they need
Great care to keep their nature pure,
And their restraint in thought and deed
Must to the very last endure.

For, when they lastly reach the peak,
With their hard efforts, led by Grace,
Nature’s low Voice through them will speak
To guide the still evolving race.

This is, in fact, the principle
On which religious quest is based:
To be one with the Cosmic Will,
Until the ego nigh effaced

Becomes a thin, transparent veil,
When soul, in tune now with the All,
Can mark a coming stormy gale,
And sound the alarm at nature’s call.

How distant from this lofty goal
Is what professional god-men teach!
They ne’er would act a teacher’s role
Were they a Seer’s height to reach.

Their talk of methods and techniques,
Or clannish life or faddish dress,
To achieve success in months or weeks,
Is pure invention, more or less.

It ne’er will be that anyone,
Who wanders from the path decreed,
Whate’er the practice he has done,
Would in this holy quest succeed.

For, nature has here interposed
A barrier so stiff and strong,
That trick and wile are soon exposed,
And sham by Time put in the wrong.

This is the object kept in view,
When Heaven the seer’s diploma grants.
He to the rest must guidance give,
When the Path sharply dips or slants.

The ancient prophet, seer and sage
Nature’s this gracious aim fulfilled,
And one can find on many a page
Of holy scriptures this note trilled.

It is a stupid intellect,
Which did away with this defence,
Against a common grave defect,
Applauded by intelligence,

Unknown to her, which bars the way
To kingdoms, far beyond her dreams,
Nature has kept for man to sway,
If not engorged with earthly creams.

The object of Faith is to bring
This true awareness to the soul,
Free of the illusive sheaths which cling
To it in its embodied role.

A Timeless, Self-effulgent Orb
That can put sun to shame at noon,
Did not the sheaths its light absorb,
Performs, as if sunk in a swoon,

The part it is ordained to act,
Unconscious of its high estate
A deathless sovereignty, in fact —
Until aroused to it by Fate.

By Maya’s trickery held in thrall,
Dreaming this world of name and form,
Of planets, suns and atoms all
Conjured up by Her nameless charm.

There is no way to find this out,
No way to wake up from the dream,
No method to remove the doubt,
Save knowledge of the State Supreme.

Seen from that side of Maya’s screen,
There is Unbounded Consciousness,
From this: the busy Cosmic scene —
A wonder no words can express.