12. All waters are brooded over by Nârâyana, but every kind of water is not fit for drink. Similarly, though it is true that the Almighty dwells in every place, yet every place is not fit to be visited by man. As one kind of water may be used for washing our feet, another may serve the purpose of ablution, and others may be drunk, and others again may not be touched at all; so there are different kinds of places. We may approach some, we can enter into the inside of others, others we must avoid, even at a distance.
13. It is true that God is even in the tiger, but we must not go and face the animal. So it is true that God dwells
even in the most wicked, but it is not meet that we should associate with the wicked.
14. The manifestation of the Divinity must be under-stood to be in greater degree in those who are honoured, respected, and obeyed by a large following, than in those who have gained no such influence.
15. The Master said: 'Everything that exists is God.' The pupil understood it literally, but not in the true spirit. While he was passing through a street, he met with an elephant. The driver (mâhut) shouted aloud from his high place, 'Move away, move away!' The pupil argued in his mind, 'Why should I move away? I am God, so is the elephant also God. What fear has God of Himself?' Thinking thus he did not move. At last the elephant took him up by his trunk, and dashed him aside. He was severely hurt, and going back to his Master, he related the whole adventure. The Master said, 'All right, you are God. The elephant is God also, but God in the shape of the elephant-driver was warning you also from above. Why did you not pay heed to his warnings?'
16. God, His scripture (the Bhâgavata), and His devotee are all to be regarded as one, i.e. in one and the same light.
17. Every being is Nârâyana. Man or animal, sage or knave, nay, the whole universe, is Nârâyana, the Supreme Spirit.
18. As many have merely heard of snow but not seen it, so many are the religious preachers who have read only in books about the attributes of God, but have not realised them in their lives. And as many may have seen but not tasted it, so many are the religious teachers who have got only a glimpse of Divine Glory, but have not understood its real essence. He who has tasted the snow can say what it is like. He who has enjoyed the society of God in different aspects, now as a servant, now as a friend, now as a lover, or as being absorbed in Him, &c., he alone can tell what are the attributes of God.
19. As the lamp does not burn without oil, so man cannot live without God.
20. The human body is like a boiling pot, and the mind and the senses are like water, rice or potato, &c. in it. Put the pot with its ingredients on the fire; it will be so hot as to burn your finger when you touch it. But the heat does not belong to the pot, nor anything contained in it, but is in the fire. So it is the fire of Brahman in man that causes the mind and the senses to perform their functions, and when that fire ceases to act, the senses also, or the organs, stop.
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