Pradyumna: "The Lord in the temple, in the worshipable form, is never to be considered to be made of stone or wood, because the Lord in His arcā incarnation as the Deity in the temple shows immense favor to the fallen souls by His auspicious presence. By the hearing process, as mentioned hereinbefore, this realization of the presence of the Lord in the temple is made possible. As such, the first process of hearing in the routine work of devotional service is the essential point. Hearing by all classes of devotees from the authentic sources like Bhagavad-gītā and Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam is essential. The common man who is puffed up with his material position and does not bow down before the Deity of the Lord in the temple, or who defies temple worship without any knowledge of the science, must know that his so-called turban or crown will only succeed in further drowning him in the water of the ocean of material existence. A drowning man with a heavy weight on his head is sure to go down more swiftly than others, who have no heavy weight."
"A foolish, puffed-up man defies the science of God and says God has no meaning for him, but when is in the grip of God's law and is caught up by some disease like cerebral thrombosis, that godless man sinks into the ocean of nescience by the weight of his material acquisition. Advancement of material science without God consciousness is a heavy load on the head of human society. So one must take heed of this great warning."
"The common man, if he has no time to worship the Lord, may at least engage his hands for a few seconds washing or sweeping the Lord's temple. Mahārāja Pratāparudra, the greatly powerful king of Orissa, was always very busy with heavy state responsibilities, yet he made it a point to sweep the temple of Lord Jagannātha at Purī once a year during the festival of the Lord. The idea is that however important a man may be, he must accept the supremacy of the Supreme Lord. This God consciousness will help a man even in his material prosperity."
"Mahārāja Pratāparudra's subordination before Lord Jagannātha made him a powerful king, so much so that even the great Pathan in his time could not enter into Orissa on account of the powerful Mahārāja Pratāparudra. And at last, Mahārāja Pratāparudra was graced by Lord Śrī Caitanya on the very grounds of his acceptance of subordination to the Lord of the universe. So even though a rich man's wife has glittering bangles made of gold on her hands, she must engage herself in rendering service to the Lord."
Prabhupāda: So this is an actual fact, that Mahārāja Pratāparudra . . . he was the King of Orissa, and in the fifteenth century, India was conquered by the Muhammadans, Pathans, but they could not conquer that portion of the country, Orissa, because Mahārāja Pratāparudra was very strong king. But his strength was on the basis of his devotion to Lord Jagannātha. So even if we want to enjoy the material world . . . the devotee does not want to enjoy, but Kṛṣṇa keeps his devotee in all comfortable situation. There is no question about it.
So we should not desire separately for material comfort. We should simply depend on Kṛṣṇa and be satisfied. In whatever condition He keeps, be satisfied. Then He will look after whether you are comfortable or uncomfortable. If you try yourself, independently, to become comfortable, that is māyā. You cannot become so. Otherwise, you see everyone is trying to be comfortable in this material world. Do you think that everyone is comfortable? Who is trying for discomfiture? No, nobody's trying. Everyone is trying to be very happy, but why there are so many discrepancies? Somebody is very poor, somebody is very rich, somebody is in the middle. That means there is superior supervision. If you simply try to become rich, that is not possible.