760621 - Lecture Arrival - New Vrindaban, USA

Lectures by Date, 1976

His Divine Grace
A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada

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760621AR-NEW VRINDAVAN - June 21, 1976 - 22.32 Minutes

Prabhupāda: Any karatālas? (sings Jaya Rādhā-Mādhava) (prema-dvani)

(05:17) So after two years, I think . . .

Devotees: Jaya! (laughter) Thank you very much.

Prabhupāda: . . . I have got the opportunity of seeing you and your Rādhā-Vṛndāvana-Candra, who is so kind upon you. So, real happiness is here. Rādhā-Vṛndāvana-Candra is staying here, and He's pleased with your service. This is the perfection of life. Keep Kṛṣṇa always with you and serve Him sincerely, then all happiness will come, without any endeavor. The foolish people, they do not know. They are trying to improve their economic condition, position, and wasting their time. It has no value. Of course, modern people will take it as very revolting that there is no need of this endeavor for economic development. Actually you, if you study minutely, what is the benefit by economic development? Prahlāda Mahārāja said that . . . what is that verse? Only waste of time. Prayateta? Na tasyeta prayateta, āyur-vyayaḥ param (SB 7.6.4).

This modern civilization . . . it is not modern, but in modern civilization it has become very prominent, that to improve the economic condition. Economic condition means we improve the standard of sense gratification. This is called going on economic condition. But we require a little sense gratification. Dharma artha kāma mokṣa. This is the gradual process of evolution. Real purpose is mokṣa, how to become free from this entanglement of repetition of birth, death, old age and disease. This is the real aim of life. But because we are coming from the lowest grade of living condition, jalajā nava-lakṣāṇi sthāvarā lakṣa-viṁśati (Padma Purāṇa)—like that, 8,400,000 different species of life—our tendency is only for sense gratification. Because in the lower grade of life there is no other pleasure except sense gratification: āhāra-nidrā-bhaya-maithunaṁ ca. A small ant, some information has come to him that on the third floor there is a grain of sugar, and he's running there. Āhāra: something eatable is there.

So sense enjoyment means these four things: eating, sleeping, sex and defense. This is called sense enjoyment. But this is common to everyone.

sukham aindriyakaṁ daityā

deha-yogena dehinām

sarvatra labhyate daivād

yathā duḥkham ayatnataḥ

(SB 7.6.3)

Now, if you study the lower grade of life, they are having all these things without any plan for economic development. Lower grade, just like animals, say, other lower grade . . . lower grade means less than the animal or the aquatics, the plants, the insects, the birds, then come to the beast, then come to the human form of life, civilized . . . uncivilized, then civilized. In this way there is a gradation. So this happiness, sense gratification, that is already there. Prahlāda Mahārāja says, sukham aindriyakaṁ daityā deha-yogena dehinām. The sense gratification is there in different bodies, but the standard may be different. Standard means our calculation; otherwise, the standard is also the same. The sex life between dogs and sex life between human beings, the pleasure is the same. There is no change. There is no change. You don't think that when the dogs on the public street enjoy sex life their standard is lesser than our sex life in a very nice, decorated apartment, and so many things, nice dress, nice bedding. No. The pleasure is the same. Just like if one has got typhoid fever. It is not that the poor man will suffer more than the rich man. No. The fever temperature is the same. The doctor, after taking temperature, he will say the temperature is the same, diseased man . . . it does not mean that because the rich man has got typhoid fever, his suffering is less than the typhoid fever for the poor man. No. That is not possible.

So we think that the standard of sense gratification is pleasure. No. The standard of pleasure of this eating, sleeping . . . we are taking pleasure in eating nice foodstuff. Just now Kīrtanānanda Mahārāja gave me. And another animal, he's also eating something very abominable to our consideration. Just like the pig eating stool. He's also getting the same pleasure. So economic development does not mean that you can improve the quality of pleasure. That is not possible. Therefore I was speaking that the dog is running with four legs and we are running with four wheels, but it does not mean the pleasure of running is different. The dog is also enjoying by running here and there—perhaps you have seen sometimes—with four legs, and we are also. The standard does not improve. The superficial change, I may think that this is advancement. No. That is not advancement, because the real thing is that your sense pleasure.

The sense pleasure of the dog and sense pleasure of the human being may be executed in a different way, but the pleasure derived out of it is the same. Therefore śāstra says, sukham aindriyakaṁ daityā deha-yogena: simply the living entity is put in a certain type of body, he's endeavoring in a different way. Therefore he said, tat-prayāso na kartavyo yata āyur-vyayaḥ param. Simply if to improve the standard of . . . actually there is no improvement, but we think that we have improved. Rather, we have taken so much risk. That requires knowledge. But anyone can understand. Suppose I can eat some quantity of food. Even if I am millionaire, I shall eat the same quantity. Not that because I am millionaire . . . Kīrtanānanda Mahārāja gave me so much nice foodstuff, but I could take only according to my appetite. One purī, two samosās, that's all. (laughter) It is not that because Kīrtanananda Mahārāja has given so nice food, I shall eat the whole plate. No. That is not possible. I'll have to eat so much as I can eat.

So by improving the so-called standard, I shall eat the same proportion as I am able to eat, not more nor less. And that is destined. That is destined. When I came to your country I had no shelter, I had no food, no arrangement. But I was eating. And now I have got so many nice sons and daughters, but I am eating the same. So when there was nobody to help me, I was eating; and now you are so many to give me satisfaction, I am also eating. So eating is not stopped. Eating is not stopped, in any condition. That is arranged by God. Every living entity, eko yo bahūnāṁ vidadhāti kāmān, nityo nityānāṁ cetanaś cetanānām (Kaṭha Upaniṣad 2.2.13). That's God. God is providing food for the ant and for the elephant, simultaneously. So why should we waste our time for this purpose, eating, sleeping . . .? That is already settled up. It is already . . . tasyaiva hetoḥ prayateta kovido (SB 1.5.18). Settled up. "Then we haven't got to work?" Yes, you haven't got to work. You haven't got to work. For Kṛṣṇa's service—not for your eating, sleeping, mating, defending. No, you haven't got. It is already there. It is already fixed up.

Therefore śāstra says, tasyaiva hetoḥ prayeteta kovido na labhyate yad bhramatām upary adhaḥ. In every life you have tried to get very nice food, nice shelter, nice sex life. That is going on. But when you have got this human form of life, if you try for the same purpose and waste your time, thinking yourself advanced in civilization . . . because a dog is running on the street with four legs and you are running with greater speed with four wheels, that does not mean you have improved. You are still dog. You must remember that. You are not even human being. Because the . . . in the form of human being your business is to understand Kṛṣṇa. That is your business. If you don't try to understand Kṛṣṇa and simply improve your method of running better than the dog, that is not civilization. This is our presentation. Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement means presenting a new life of civilization: how to become a servant of Kṛṣṇa. Then everything will come automatically.

Kṛṣṇa is supplying already. Just like government: When a man is put into the jail for his criminality, the government takes care of his food, of his shelter; if he's sick, hospital, everything—but he's still punished, for correction. Similarly, we are all part and parcel of Kṛṣṇa. Kṛṣṇa will give us food, shelter, sex facility and defense everywhere. Sukham aindriyakaṁ daityā deha-yogena dehinām sarvatra labhyate daivād: by the arrangement of the superior. You can see practically. The elephant is eating forty kilos grass at a time, and he has no attempt for economic development. He's getting. And the ant also, a grain of sugar, he's getting. You'll find within your room, in a hole, there are thousands of ants. Are you giving him food? Who is giving them? Not only one, two—thousands. So this is intelligence, that God has provided for everyone for these facilities, so human being, why he should not have this facility from God? It is already there. There is no doubt about it.

Therefore human life should be utilized to understand God, because forgetting God we are in this material world and suffering so many miserable condition of life. That is our problem. And the most important problem is birth, death, old age and disease. So to make a solution of this birth, death, old . . . that is meant in the human form of life. That is Kṛṣṇa consciousness. If you simply become Kṛṣṇa conscious, Kṛṣṇa says,

janma karma me divyaṁ

evaṁ yo vettitattvataḥ

tyaktvā dehaṁ punar janma

naiti mām eti . . .

(BG 4.9)

Simply by understanding Kṛṣṇa you'll become free from this material entanglement—birth, death, old age and disease. Yad gatvā na nivartante (BG 15.6). That should be our aim of life, not the so-called rat-racing or dog-racing. No. This is not civilization. And Kṛṣṇa has given . . . (break) (end)