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MAN: ANIMAL AND DIVINE - Part 1
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BY the side of the Ganges, close to the Dashashu-medh Ghat, there sits a man of nearly seventy. He is stark naked. Clad in nature's own garb, the Paramahamsa remains seated in one place, morning, noon and night.
Look at his face. He is of fair complexion. His forehead rises dome-like above his eyes which are clear, serene, and brilliant with soul-fire. His lips have a firm set. In short, his calm and thoughtful eyes, noble forehead, and general features indicate unruffled calmness, great self-control, and immense will-power. For more than eight years he has been there. In the burning mid-day sun of June, when the very ground seems all a-fire, in the biting, bitter cold of December, he sits there. People flock to him in hundreds daily, bring food enough to fill at least thirty stomachs, how to him, and tell him their many griefs. All his reply is a nod of his head and a look from his eyes. He eats a few fruits and drinks a little milk, and the rest of the food he scatters among people ever ready to pick it up. He never talks, never laughs or even smiles. His face is always solemn, calm and rapt. If you go near him as I did, you feel his presence at once. It is at once a magnetic, powerful, and an all-round spiritual personality. Now just turn from this Yogi,-for he is nothing else-and follow me to the fish-market. I have been there only once, but I will tell you something about it. It was eight o'clock in the morning. No less than five hundred men, women and boys were there. My first feeling was one of extreme nausea. (There was a strong, dirty, abominable smell about the place.) The fisher-men had brought in fine, living, leaping fish in their nets. They started by taking these out and beating each living fish dead against the hard, brick floor of the market. Squabbling, haggling, abusing, spitting were in full swing. The evil stink was nothing to them. It was the smell of the rose-flower, as it were. I went out; rather, ran out. I saw many men and women coming out, their hands full of the dirty stuff. Young men, within their teens, were there. Their eyes were pale and hollow, their skins hung loose upon their bones; their faces denoted greed and lust. I saw not one person who had a healthy, steady, self-reliant look; they seemed like a pack of beggars who had stumbled into a little money which they must spend upon fish. Indeed, how can it be otherwise? Now comparing one of these back-boneless men with the Saint, what conclusion do you draw? The one is the ANIMAL-MAN, the other, the DIVINE-MAN. In the one Fear, Greed, Lust, Superstition have made their home. The horrors of the slaughter-house do not shock him at all. His fleshy coating reflects the inner man out and out. His senses are gross and coarse-fibred. In the other, God is manifesting Himself. He is proof against the extreme heat and cold, lust and passion. If a thunder-bolt were to fall upon him, he would not lose his calmness even for the fraction of a moment. Is not that real happiness? To realise that you are not the body; that you can never die; that nothing can touch you; that fire cannot burn you; the sword cannot pierce you, the water cannot drown you; to realise your independence of and mastery over the flesh.
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