Swami Vivekananda citations

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“If you think that you are bound, you remain bound; you make your own bondage. If you know that you are free, you are free this moment. This is knowledge, knowledge of freedom. Freedom is the goal of all nature.”

“This earth is higher than all the heavens; this is the greatest school in the universe.”

“Stand as a rock; you are indestructible. You are the Self (atman), the God of the universe.”

“As soon as you know the voice and understand what it is, the whole scene changes. The same world which was the ghastly battlefield of maya is now changed into something good and beautiful.”

“Strength is Life, Weakness is death.”

“Our supreme duty is to advance toward freedom—physical, mental, and spiritual—and help others to do so.”

“Thank God for giving you this world as a moral gymnasium to help your development, but never imagine you can help the world.”

“We must have friendship for all; we must be merciful toward those that are in misery; when people are happy, we ought to be happy; and to the wicked we must be indifferent. These attitudes will make the mind peaceful.”

“Come out into the broad light of day, come out from the little narrow paths, for how can the infinite soul rest content to live and die in small ruts?”

“Delusion will vanish as the light becomes more and more effulgent, load after load of ignorance will vanish, and then will come a time when all else has disappeared and the sun alone shines.”

“He whom the sages have been seeking in all these places is in our own hearts; the voice that you heard was right, says Vedanta, but the direction you gave to the voice was wrong.”

“The essence of Vedanta is that there is but one Being and that every soul is that Being in full, not a part of that Being.”

“Both the forces of good and evil will keep the universe alive for us, until we awake from our dreams and give up this building of mud pies.”

“God is self-evident, impersonal, omniscient, the Knower and the Master of nature, the Lord of all. He is behind all worship and it is being done according to Him, whether we know it or not.”

“First get rid of the delusion “I am the body,” then only will we want real knowledge.”

“The whole universe is one. There is only one Self in the universe, only One Existence.”

“India is immortal if she persists in her search for God. But if she goes in for politics and social conflict, she will die.”

“The world is ready to give up its secrets if we only know how to knock, how to give it the necessary blow. The strength and force of the blow come through concentration.”

“This life is short, the vanities of the world are transient, but they alone live who live for others, the rest are more dead than alive.”

“First, believe in the world—that there is meaning behind everything.”

“As body, mind, or soul, you are a dream; you really are Being, Consciousness, Bliss (satchidananda). You are the God of this universe.”

“Please everyone without becoming a hypocrite or a coward.”

“Tell the truth boldly, whether it hurts or not. Never pander to weakness. If truth is too much for intelligent people and sweeps them away, let them go; the sooner the better.”

“We must be bright and cheerful. Long faces do not make religion. Religion should be the most joyful thing in the world, because it is the best.”

“The Self when it appears behind the universe is called God. The same Self when it appears behind this little universe—the body—is the soul.”

“Everything must be sacrificed, if necessary, for that one sentiment: universality.”

“So long as there is desire or want, it is a sure sign that there is imperfection. A perfect, free being cannot have any desire.”

“It is here that Indians build temples for Mohammedans and Christians; nowhere else. If you go to other countries and ask Mohammedans or people of other religions to build a temple for you, see how they will help. They will instead try to break down your temple and you too, if they can.”

“The goal of mankind is knowledge.... Now this knowledge is inherent in man. No knowledge comes from outside: it is all inside. What we say a man "knows," should, in strict psychological language, be what he "discovers" or "unveils"; what man "learns" is really what he discovers by taking the cover off his own soul, which is a mine of infinite knowledge.”