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Measure (Conversations)

Conversations and Morning Walks

1971 Conversations and Morning Walks

Room Conversation -- July 18, 1971, Detroit:

Prabhupāda: We require help from personalities like you, because it is very important movement, checking a great mistake in the modern world. Modern civilization is very risky. Risky in this sense: that the human form of life is an opportunity for self-realization, but our leaders, they are miseducating that "You are this body." A basic mistake. But I am not this body, but just like you are sitting there, if I take account of your shirt and coat only, not you as a person, then there is a great mistake. Similarly, the modern civilization, education, everything is based on this bodily concept of life. But actually we are not body. Body is my shirt and coat. Mind, intelligence and ego, that is the shirt, finer dress. And this five element body—earth, water, fire, air, ether—this is gross. Just like shirt and coat. Similarly, we are dressed, the spirit soul. The spirit soul is also a measure one ten-thousandth part of the tip of the hair. So this Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement is very important in this sense, that they are trying to bring people to the constitutional position. A living entity is transmigrating from one body to another, as well in our present body also, we are transmigrating. In my childhood I had a small body. That body is no longer existing, but I am existing. So there is no reason to believe that when I give up this body, I'll not exist. No. I shall exist, but in another body. So people are not interested to make the research work how the soul is working. This is ignorance. The Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement is trying to revive the pure consciousness of the human society so that he can know himself and act accordingly. Then his life is successful.

Room Conversation with Dr. Weir of the Mensa Society -- September 5, 1971, London:

Dr. Weir: This is the..., you see, unconsciously you grow up with all these sort of prejudices, which are necessary. You've got to have some sort of time scale, you've got to have some sort of measuring scale and therefore you tend to look up and therefore you think highly of more important (indistinct), you talk about high position, you don't think of chaps sitting on the fence...

Śyāmasundara: Inherently you'll find the rose is better than the daisy.

Dr. Weir: No. Some people might prefer the daisy.

Śyāmasundara: But the qualities are there, inherent in the rose, which are preferable to those of the daisy.

Dr. Weir: Why? Tell me why. I mean, you haven't given me any reason for saying it is better.

Prabhupāda: What is that?

Śyāmasundara: The rose has nice scent. It appears...

Prabhupāda: ...beautiful.

Room Conversation with Dr. Weir of the Mensa Society -- September 5, 1971, London:

Dr. Weir: Well, I would take up that straight away, fundamentally, that it's perfectly correct to say it's the same size in every (indistinct) has no size.

Prabhupāda: No. It has size. We cannot measure it.

Dr. Weir: That's what I mean. Therefore the word size is a misconception.

Prabhupāda: But that is not a scientific statement. Because you have no measuring instrument you cannot say it has no size.

Dr. Weir: Now what you say it has not got three dimension, but when we talk about size...

Prabhupāda: Yes, three dimension. It is said, it is estimated that ten... one ten-thousandth part of the tip of the hair.

Room Conversation with Dr. Weir of the Mensa Society -- September 5, 1971, London:

Prabhupāda: In Geometry they say the point has no length nor breadth. But that is not fact. The point has length and breadth but you cannot measure it.

Dr. Weir: Ah, but the mathematician would say that that isn't the definition of a point is something that has no breadth or depth, but his purpose is working out his philosophy.

Mensa Member: (indistinct) he'd say something entirely different... absolute (indistinct) point.

Prabhupāda: But if you magnify the point you'll find there is...

Dr. Weir: But, coming back to...

Prabhupāda: It is a question of vision. With your present imperfect vision you do not see. When you take a magnifying glass you see, "Oh, there is length and breadth."

Room Conversation with Dr. Weir of the Mensa Society -- September 5, 1971, London:

Prabhupāda: Spiritual means it has no material qualification. Nirbandhaḥ kṛṣṇa-sambandhe yuktaṁ vairāgyam ucyate.

Dr. Weir: You can't measure the beauty of a rose with a ruler.

Śyāmasundara: But you can it's like this, it's like that. You have to be able to describe it somehow.

Prabhupāda: Actually in higher sense there is nothing material because everything is emanating from God, therefore everything is spiritual.

Dr. Weir: Well, that's true but the electron, as far as you can say, may be spiritual.

Prabhupāda: There is no distinction in higher status because we say that everything that we see that is manifestation of God's energy.

1972 Conversations and Morning Walks

Interview -- July 5, 1972, New York:

Prabhupāda: Your real dimension is mentioned there that you are a spiritual atom. The measurement is one ten-thousandth part of the tip of the hair. That is the seed, or basic principle. Now, on that small particle of spirit soul we have developed this body. We have got human bodies, other has got the elephant body, other has got the mountainous body, but this is external. The real seed is that one ten-thousandth part of the hair. Similarly, as you have developed this material body under different consciousness, similarly when we give up the material connection we shall develop our spiritual body, and in that spiritual body we shall be able to enter the kingdom of God, back to home, back to Godhead. This is the position. This body you have to give up, today or tomorrow or one hundred years after. You have to give it up. The Bhagavad-gītā says after giving up this body, tyaktvā dehaṁ punar janma naiti (BG 4.9), after giving up this body he does not accept any more material body. Then what happens to him? Tyaktvā dehaṁ punar janma naiti mām eti (BG 4.9), he comes to Me. So "He comes to Me" means just like in your country one who comes to you becomes citizen.

Morning Walk Conversation -- September 28, 1972, Los Angeles:

Svarūpa Dāmodara: They cannot think so many things because they are concentrated in a small area of even their own...

Prabhupāda: Yes, that is we call kūpa-maṇḍūka-nyāya(?), the frog, Dr. Frog of the well. He cannot conceive what is Atlantic Ocean, but still he will theorize, "Atlantic Ocean may be so big, so big, so big." What experience you can get Atlantic Ocean living in a three-foot well? That is going on. And if I ask you, "What is the measurement of the space?" You cannot say that. You cannot say that. But there is measurement (indistinct). It may be unlimited for you, but as it is a created thing, there must be measurement. Any created thing has measurement. Unless they agree to submit... They must submit. Just like you have submitted, you are (indistinct), so you can understand God. This is the only qualification. Therefore, Kṛṣṇa says, sarva-dharmān parityajya mām ekam (BG 18.66), "First of all submit, rascal, then I shall (indistinct), you will be able to understand the truth." There is no possibility of understanding the whole thing by challenge. That is (indistinct). Their only challenge (indistinct).

1973 Conversations and Morning Walks

Morning Walk -- April 19, 1973, Los Angeles:

Karandhara: Not just say that it was created by chance, random biology. But scientists objected, said: "We cannot say that God created the earth because then everyone will take us as fools." And they defeated the measure. The scientists said "Everyone knows. The earth is just created by biological chemistry. If we say that God created the earth, everyone will think us as fools."

Prabhupāda: The biology, chemistry, why don't you create? The biology and chemistry has advanced so much. Why don't you create? What is their answer?

Karandhara: In the future.

Prabhupāda: That is their foolishness. Why future? If it is already created, biology and chemistry, and you know the process, why don't you create it by chemistry, biology?

Brahmānanda: It's very wet.

Svarūpa Dāmodara: It is a little wet, Prabhupāda.

Prabhupāda: So we can...

Devotee: It's all wet.

Prabhupāda: Therefore I do not wish to come here. There is no facility for walking. Everywhere wet.

Morning Walk -- April 20, 1973, Los Angeles:
Prabhupāda: Then your scientific knowledge is perfect. Either from the chemical department or physical department or electrical department. Any department. It doesn't matter. Through that department you go to the ultimate center. Just like here is center. And there are so many spokes. So many spokes. So whichever spoke you may be, come to the center. That is your perfection. The spokes may be of different direction. Like that. But center is Kṛṣṇa. The energy, central energy is Kṛṣṇa. Ataḥ pumbhir dvija-śreṣṭhā varṇāśrama-vibhāgaśaḥ, svanuṣṭhitasya dharmasya saṁsiddhir hari-toṣaṇam (SB 1.2.13). And these, these living entities, they're flying. They have got intelligence. "The men are coming. We shall be smashed." They're flying, taking shelter. Defence. Āhāra-nidrā-bhaya-mai... Defence, defence measures. They know how to defend themselves in their own way. Similarly they know how to eat and similarly they know how to sleep. But what is the difference between this insect and me? I can talk of God, I can understand God. It cannot. That is the difference. I can study Vedic literature, so many facilities for me. But all these facilities, all this intelligence, I am utilizing for the same purpose, eating, sleeping, sex and defence. Therefore it is useless waste of time, waste of life, valuable life. What is their benefit? Suppose you are studying that this law is working like that, this law is working like that, but you cannot help. You cannot change the law. You are under the laws. So what is the benefit simply by studying?
Morning Walk At Cheviot Hills Golf Course -- May 15, 1973, Los Angeles:

Prabhupāda: No, that's all right.

Svarūpa Dāmodara: No, once they see the spirit soul, they can detect somehow, then they are definitely convinced.

Prabhupāda: So how you can see? It is... The measurement is given, 1/10,000th part of the tip of the hair. So where is your seeing power?

Svarūpa Dāmodara: Still they want to sense it by some...

Prabhupāda: Sense, that is... Any rascal can sense that here is living energy. That is spirit soul. Just like if you inject one grain of poison and immediately he dies, does it require how he dies? That one, not one grain. Even one hundredth part of one grain, venomous poison, how it acts? So even nobody can see it, when the snake bites, nobody can see where is that... How he dies?

Svarūpa Dāmodara: They will explain that by..., it blocks some of the metabolic paths...

Prabhupāda: That's all right, but it is acting. That is my point. You can explain in your nonsense way, this, so many things. But I see that because that very little portion of poison is there, immediately he dies. Why don't you see the action?

Room Conversation with Krishna Tiwari -- May 22, 1973, New York:

Prabhupāda: So I don't think your science has reached to the point to find out the measurement of the living entity.

Krishna Tiwari: Well, that is very true.

Prabhupāda: Huh?

Krishna Tiwari: That is very true. That is very true.

Prabhupāda: But we get information that there is a measurement. Keśāgra-śata-bhāgasya, śatāṁśaḥ sādṛśātmakaḥ (CC Madhya 19.140). The tip of the hair you divide into one hundred parts, and take that part, again divide into one hundred parts, that is the measurement. That is one ten-thousandth part of the tip of the hair. How far do you agree with this?

Krishna Tiwari: I don't know. (laughs) I don't know what you mean by that, but of course it is very true that we do not know much about life, and scientists are the first to agree to that, that we know very little.

Prabhupāda: That is real scientist.

Room Conversation with Krishna Tiwari -- May 22, 1973, New York:

Prabhupāda: Just like I was speaking that the measurement of the living entity is such and such. So how God has become so small? Aṇor aṇīyān mahato mahīyān. This is... This we can simply imagine: one ten-thousandth part of the tip of the hair. I don't think any scientist can have any measuring instrument.

Krishna Tiwari: I think that can be measured.

Prabhupāda: Huh?

Krishna Tiwari: I think they can measure that.

Prabhupāda: How think?

Krishna Tiwari: It can be measured.

Prabhupāda: It can be measured?

Krishna Tiwari: Yes.

Prabhupāda: It can be measured; otherwise how it is said?

Krishna Tiwari: Very easily measured.

Prabhupāda: Ah! It can be measured, but they say there is no soul.

Krishna Tiwari: Scientists say there's no soul?

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Room Conversation with Krishna Tiwari -- May 22, 1973, New York:

Prabhupāda: Therefore, how they'll measure? That way it is impossible for them to measure.

Devotee: They can't find it.

Prabhupāda: They cannot find it.

Krishna Tiwari: But nobody else has.

Prabhupāda: Huh?

Krishna Tiwari: Nobody else has found it.

Prabhupāda: Yes. We, I said, this is the measurement.

Krishna Tiwari: But since nobody else has found it...

Prabhupāda: Nobody else has found it, that is different thing, but the measurement is there in the śāstra.

Krishna Tiwari: How to measure it then?

Prabhupāda: How to measure, that is a different thing, but the measurement is there.

Krishna Tiwari: What is the measurement?

Prabhupāda: The one ten-thousandth part of the tip of the hair.

Room Conversation with Krishna Tiwari -- May 22, 1973, New York:

Krishna Tiwari: Well that's very easy to measure.

Prabhupāda: So why don't you find it.

Krishna Tiwari: But that's probably the reason. Nothing is there, just a number, because...

Prabhupāda: Huh?

Krishna Tiwari: This is just a number, because one-thousandth part of hair is just a big number that...

Prabhupāda: Not one thousandth. One ten-thousandth.

Krishna Tiwari: That doesn't matter. You can make it one millionth.

Prabhupāda: How's that?

Krishna Tiwari: It will be a measure of a distance, which is very easy. That cannot be a source.

Prabhupāda: So... No. That cannot be so easy. It is definitely said, jīvaḥ bhāgasya vijñeyaḥ. Jīva means solo, soul. Soul's measurement is given there in the śāstra.

Krishna Tiwari: Yeah, but what are the... This is the... I don't know. This is the measurement, one thousandth of a...

Prabhupāda: One ten-thousandth.

Room Conversation with Krishna Tiwari -- May 22, 1973, New York:

Krishna Tiwari: Well, that is... I don't understand that, because that will be, at that time I think it was all right, because people thought nobody could measure one thousandth, ten-thousandth of the tip of a hair.

Prabhupāda: I, we don't say people could not measure. People could measure. People measured; therefore it is, the measurement is given there. It is not that people could not measure. People measured it, definitely, and then gave it, "This is the measure."

Krishna Tiwari: Okay, so what you are trying to say? What symbolically it means, very small. Is that what it means? Is that what it means?

Prabhupāda: Very small..., that small part is there in every body. The soul is there. Now, they, without finding it, they say soul is nirākāra; there is no measurement. That is my point. I say there is ākāra, form.

Krishna Tiwari: There is a form of soul, according to you.

Prabhupāda: Yes, yes. But they say there is no form. That is my point.

Room Conversation with Krishna Tiwari -- May 22, 1973, New York:

Prabhupāda: Now, so far we are laymen, we have no instrument to measure. We simply hear from the śāstra and we try to perceive, that's all. But there is something. That measurement very, may be very, very small, but there is the substance. That is our point.

Krishna Tiwari: Right. But, I mean, with due respect to śāstras, after all, in my opinion śāstras are written by very intelligent people, and how so ever intelligent they would have been five thousand years ago, they could not have...

Prabhupāda: Not five thousand years.

Krishna Tiwari: Or ten thousand?

Prabhupāda: No. You cannot calculate.

Room Conversation with Krishna Tiwari -- May 22, 1973, New York:

Prabhupāda: How can you know?

Krishna Tiwari: Oh, we know. We know our own measurements, which are very reliable. Different people will come up with the same number, and we do not have to depend upon any, you know, round-about answer.

Prabhupāda: No, we have to depend...

Krishna Tiwari: No, we don't.

Prabhupāda: You theories changes every year.

Krishna Tiwari: No... Well it changes (laughter), because it is very...

Prabhupāda: Therefore we have to depend.

Krishna Tiwari: No. Change is the law of nature. Change is the law of nature. Change...

Prabhupāda: "Change is the law of nature," that's fine...

Krishna Tiwari: And therefore...

Prabhupāda: ...but one should know the whole duration of change. Just like we know that sunrise, from the morning 'till evening, there are so many changes, but I know what is that changes. That is knowledge.

Room Conversation with Krishna Tiwari -- May 22, 1973, New York:

Prabhupāda: What is your explanation between dead body and living body?

Krishna Tiwari: As I said, you see, it's a very complex thing, and I would not say something that I know from which probably I don't know. What we can measure in a dead body is that we see many things, you know. Things, say organs are not working...

Prabhupāda: Apart from the soul, how, what is your explanation of this dead body?

Krishna Tiwari: We point that the organs get diseased, reactions do not take place as they do, and the nature of, law of nature takes over. We are the great believers of law of nature, better than, than religious people. We believe law of nature more than anybody else does.

Room Conversation with Krishna Tiwari -- May 22, 1973, New York:

Śyāmasundara: Then how can you measure it?

Krishna Tiwari: That you..., there are ways to do it. I mean, that, the what is earth today will not be tomorrow.

Devotee (1): Measurements are blunt.

Krishna Tiwari: Oh of course.

Ātreya Ṛṣi: Can I, can I summarize to you what our position on authority is? What we're talking about is that simply you're saying we both agree that there is a very beautiful set-up here. It's not accidental set-up. (indistinct) intelligent laws of nature. We both agree that there must be something beyond it.

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Room Conversation with Krishna Tiwari -- May 22, 1973, New York:

Śyāmasundara: How do you measure that improvement?

Prabhupāda: Now, this is another point. First of all you must settle up this. (laughter). First of all we must settle up this fact, that we are all under the laws of nature.

Krishna Tiwari: I agree, Swamiji, completely.

Prabhupāda: Now the point is, we, we say the laws of nature is also given by somebody else. That is our point.

Krishna Tiwari: Which probably I have nothing to add to.

Prabhupāda: That is the point.

Krishna Tiwari: Yes, but my one...

Prabhupāda: Now, what is that person, that is another thing, but simply let us agree that we are under the laws of nature, and laws of nature is also controlled by somebody.

Room Conversation with Banker -- September 21, 1973, Bombay:

Prabhupāda: (To Tamāla) Bring the other light. The second one, down. Yes. How is that. It is not in order? First one. (break)

Banker: I haven't found a common yardstick yet. I prefer my own, but that's measured by my yardstick.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: I think you also prefer this country's, Prabhupāda.

Prabhupāda: Yes, sincerely. Therefore I went to your country, to start this movement.

Banker: So many people in this country have argued with me and have told me that... They haven't been out of India, but they have told me that their country is better.

Prabhupāda: Indians?

Banker: Yes.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: They say their country is better, but I don't think...

Banker: And they never left India. I don't know how they make this comparison. They say they have happiness here and we have wealth, and because of our wealth we are unhappy people.

Prabhupāda: The Americans say?

Banker: No, no, that is what they say here.

Room Conversation -- November 4, 1973, Delhi:

Prabhupāda: So, we are thinking now we have got defense measure with atomic bomb, we are now advanced. But what is that advancement? That defense method is there even with cats and dogs. What you have done beyond this? They have no brain. Everyone is spoiling life with these four principles of how to eat, how to sleep. Eating...

Guest: Even they don't eat nicely. They eat rubbish.

Prabhupāda: Actually they eat all rubbish, but they think like.... It is a misguided civilization.

Guest: (indistinct)

Prabhupāda: So we are practically against all this misguidance of the human civilization.

Morning Walk -- December 17, 1973, Los Angeles:

Prabhupāda: No, no. I'll not suffer.

Karandhara: Then don't be rascals.

Prajāpati: Thank you, Śrīla Prabhupāda.

Devotees: All glories to Śrīla Prabhupāda. (break) (in the car:)

Rūpānuga: ...comes in contact with the so-called matter, is that false ego?

Prabhupāda: No, consciousness is spread all over the body. And due to the false ego... (break)

Rūpānuga: How big is the material atom?

Prabhupāda: There is measurement.

Rūpānuga: Oh, in Bhāgavatam.

Prabhupāda: But it is said that unless six atoms are joined together, you cannot see. (end)

1974 Conversations and Morning Walks

Morning Walk -- January 9, 1974, Los Angeles:

Svarūpa Dāmodara: I don't know.

Prabhupāda: Yes. That increases. If you go, see today, and go ten years after, you'll see—take the measurement—it has increased. They'll go...

Svarūpa Dāmodara: But they will say that because of the position of the dust particles the size will increase. Even a small...

Prabhupāda: No, no, no. It is clean. There is no... It is being washed even. Its name is Tila-bandhesvara. (?) So there is no uncleanliness. Still, the body increases. There is still Tila-bandhesvara. (?) There is temple of Tila-bandhesvara. People go to see.

Svarūpa Dāmodara: But the consciousness is covered there.

Prabhupāda: Covered, yes. Dullness means consciousness is covered. You put a child in open air. He'll not feel much cold. You see practically. He'll not feel. Because consciousness is not developed. Animal, they will not feel cold. But we feel.

Morning Walk -- February 17, 1974, Bombay:

Prabhupāda: No, it is not the question of you or she. I am just pointing out.

Dr. Patel: No, no, no. I will try. I have taken your, this thing to my heart. I will try to collect some fund and get some clothing, those ready-made ones.

Prabhupāda: So one day a tailors may be brought and take their measurement.

Dr. Patel: But ready-made is there.

Prabhupāda: Or ready-made. Ready made. So in the evening they should come, they should take bath, be cleansed, and give dress. Next day when they come, change the dress. Let them be habituated. They are coming...

Dr. Patel: In cleanliness, you give them impression of cleanliness.

Prabhupāda: ...voluntarily, to dance, to take prasādam. So why you should not take care of them? This is my point. We don't make distinction whether they are coming from Christian or Hindu or...

Dr. Patel: No, no, no, no, man is a man. I mean those Christians think that we are Hindus and they are Christian. We don't think because in Hinduism or in actually Vedic religion everyone is created one.

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Morning Walk 'Varnasrama College' -- March 14, 1974, Vrndavana:

Prabhupāda: We have got so many duties to do. Don't waste time, a single moment. And don't eat more and don't sleep more. Then you'll be able to work.

Viṣṇujana: And this is the most auspicious work for now, is this remedial measure of...?

Prabhupāda: Eh?

Viṣṇujana: This is the most auspicious work for now, is this remedial measure to stop the chaos in the world?

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Viṣṇujana: That's most auspicious.

Prabhupāda: Most auspicious. Because if the people are in chaos, how they'll be able to accept the great philosophy? It requires cool brain.

Viṣṇujana: For example, in my program...

Prabhupāda: Budhaḥ. Budhaḥ. Eh? Yes?

Viṣṇujana: My program now is I have ten brahmacārīs in buses, and everything and we're distributing books. But if the people are in chaos, how they will be able to accept the knowledge in the books?

Prabhupāda: No, not all of them are in chaos. There are some of them. Some of them. Not that all of them. Hare Kṛṣṇa (break) ...in separate department.

Morning Walk -- March 16, 1974, Vrndavana:

Prabhupāda: One side.

Devotee: Yes.

Prabhupāda: So if somebody can manufacture by seeing the photograph in Jaipur. That's all right. Otherwise we shall test (?). (break) ...marble statues, by seeing the morning. (break) ...actual measurement.

Gurudāsa: Oh. (break)

Prabhupāda: ...our gṛhastha householders, how they are rising early, taking bath in Yamunā, coming to the temple.

Gurudāsa: Yes.

Prabhupāda: This is Vedic culture. (break) ...of eating. Western culture means: early in the morning tea. First of all tea, and, what is called?

Devotee: Coffee.

Prabhupāda: Coffee, tea, and so many other things.

Morning Walk -- May 29, 1974, Rome:

Prabhupāda: So where is equal rights? Even in Russia, there is managerial class and laborer class. Where are equal rights? Why there are managers? Yes. I have seen it. The managerial class and the laborer class. So where is equality? Why the managerial class? You know that? There must be required. The old women, they are sweeping the street. Why not Mr. Lenin come and sweep the street? Why he is sitting in a big palace and the poor woman has been engaged to sweep the street? Where is equality? What advancement they have made? We are following opiate. They are following opiate, Lenin's rascal's philosophy. That's all. That is also opiate. But where is equality? That is also opiate. You are advocating equality, but where there is a man manager and another man is working. So why you are accepting this nonsense philosophy being opiated by rascal Lenin?

Haihaya: They measure everything by the type of work.

Prabhupāda: It doesn't matter. If I become manager, I will pay for that. Suppose there is work as a... Would you like to work sweep the street or become manager? What shall I say? "No, no, I shall become manager." Why this mentality? Why he does not accept, "Yes, I shall sweep"?

Haihaya: Yes, but the point is that equal right is...

Prabhupāda: Where is equal right?

Morning Walk -- May 30, 1974, Rome:

Prabhupāda: ...oba. Mitho 'bhipadyeta gṛha-vratānām. Adānta-gobhir viśatām... (aside:) Not too near. Adānta-gobhir viśatāṁ tamisraṁ punaḥ punaś carvita-carvaṇānām (SB 7.5.30). Punaḥ punaś carvita-carvaṇānām, getting life after life and enjoying sense: the same eating, the same sleeping, the same sexual intercourse, and same defense, either as dog or as man or as bird or beast. This is called punaḥ punaś carvita-carvaṇānām (SB 7.5.30). These four things are available, either you become a dog or a god. Not God, these demigods. In the material world, everyone is given the facilities for eating, sleeping, sexual intercourse and defense. Now, if some dangers come, so we may be victims, but a bird immediately goes. He has better defense. Is it not? If some dangers come immediately... Suppose all of a sudden a motorcar comes and kills us. We cannot do anything, but the bird, small bird, "Hut!" He can do that. Is it not? So his defensive measure is better than us. Similarly, I want to have sex. I have to arrange for that, find out some... But the female bird is always around him, at any time. This sparrow, the pigeon. You have seen it? Immediately ready for sex life. And eating? Oh, there is some fruit. Immediately he can eat. And sleeping? That is also very comfortable.

Room Conversation with Mr. C. Hennis of the International Labor Organization of the U.N. -- May 31, 1974, Geneva:

Prabhupāda: At the present moment in the society, there is very, very little care for the first-class intellectual class of men.

C. Hennis: The International Labor Organization has as one of its major aims to promote social justice, and that means that every class of worker, if you like to accept the four categories that you mentioned—the intellectual, the productive, the protective, and the laboring classes-should each have their proper place in society, should each have a full measure of human dignity, and should each have a proper share in the rewards for labor, both clearly material rewards and honors and dignity and leisure and time for, free time for meditation and so on. In the International Labor Organization, we are not like UNESCO devoted to the more philosophical and cultural and educational aspects for the intelligentsia, but I would draw your attention to the fact that the UNESCO is very much concerned with looking after the head part of society.

Prabhupāda: Yes. So that is my request to you.

Room Conversation with Monsieur Roost, Hatha-yogi -- May 31, 1974, Geneva:

M. Roost: I am according, but how to understand, how to measure...?

Prabhupāda: This is plain understanding. Just like physician says that "If you eat these things, then you will not be cured." A physician should straightly speak to the patient, "You should not do this. Then you will be cured." If he does not agree, then he will not be cured. It is like that. If you remain sinful, then you cannot make any spiritual progress of life. That is going on. All the swamis, yogis, and... Don't mind. I have seen. They keep them in the sinful life and talk very, very, big, big words. That will not help. Sinful life must be stopped. Then yoga practice will be successful. Yuktāhāra-vihārasya yogo bhavati siddhiḥ. That is stated in the Bhagavad-gītā. If you are yogi, if you want siddhi, then you must eat and sleep and accept things—yukta. Yukta means "as it is required, not more than that, not less than that." That is yukta. We don't say that you stop. No, we don't say. We give them eatables. We don't say there is no sex life. Sex life is there. But married, simply for begetting children. Otherwise, no sex life. Not for sense gratification. If these things go on... In New York there is a yogi. I do not wish to name his... But in the paper it was published that he was having sex with his disciple. Is it not?

Nitāi: Yes.

Room Conversation with Biochemist, Dr. Sallaz -- June 4, 1974, Geneva:

Dr. Sallaz: Result. Result, only with physical heat, eight hundred, and pressure, only this. No laser, no atomic energy, nothing at all. Simply by natural measures.

Prabhupāda: We can give you one information, that metals like bell metal. Bell metal is combination of...? What is called? Tin? Tin? What is another name of tin?

Yogeśvara: Copper.

Prabhupāda: Anyway, tin and copper and mercury; if you can mix, it will become gold.

Dr. Sallaz: I'm sure it is possible, from what we have seen and made. But it is not of great interest to make gold.

Prabhupāda: No, we are interested. (laughter) We want gold for spreading Kṛṣṇa consciousness. Nobody is paying us. We are simply selling our books. That's all. Nobody paying us, no government, no..., that "You take so many million dollars for spreading Kṛṣṇa..." Nobody. Therefore we require some gold. So biology, what is the basic principle of biology?

Room Conversation with Mr. Deshimaru -- June 13, 1974, Paris:

Prabhupāda: This authority means just like you follow somebody. You are going to somewhere by aeroplane. You do not know. But others are purchasing ticket and going there, so you have to follow them. That's all. So the authority is if he does not know... Therefore we are giving the chance, the association of the devotee. The devotee, they are practicing something for going back to home, back to Godhead, so you have to mix with the devotees and then gradually understand.

Karandhara: No, what he's saying is: what is the standard of measurement? There are so many people saying they are the authority. How does one individually judge which one is the best or proper?

Prabhupāda: So that he has to judge himself. It is like this: just like if you eat, then you judge yourself whether you are satisfied or not. (French) The process is described. No, no, the process is described. First of all, the thing is that he is inquisitive to know the ultimate goal. That is first qualification, that he is actually searching after the goal of life, the actual. That is first qualification. If he has no such aim, that "I must find out the actual aim of life," then he will remain always in darkness. Then next thing, next process will be that he has to associate with person, those who are also actually the goal of life. And then next process is, as Bhagavān was telling last night, that we have no problem. Then next process will be how we have become free from all problem. Then he will say, "You do like this." Then, acting according to him, one who says that I have no problem, "So let me act like him," when he feels, "Yes, I have no problem," then it is fixed up.

Room Conversation -- June 20, 1974, Germany:

Prabhupāda: Yes, in the spiritual life there is no sex life. In the spiritual world there is no sex intercourse. There is no sex life. Although there is man and woman, there is no sex intercourse. By chanting the glories of God there in the spiritual world, they get so much great pleasure that is far beyond this pleasure of sex life. If you have something best then you forget low grade pleasure. So this sex pleasure is lower grade pleasure. It is not pleasure, it is illusion, but in material world this is the greatest pleasure. Therefore everyone they are coming back to this sex pleasure, everyone. Even so-called religionists and swamis, they are coming down to the sex pleasure. Because in this material world that is the only highest pleasure. So, so long one will be attracted by the sex pleasure it is still in the material world. And when one will be on the platform to spite (spit) on sex pleasure, then his spiritual life begins. That is stated by Yāmunācārya. (Sanskrit). Yāmunācārya, a great saintly person, he was formerly big king, so he said, "Since I have become Kṛṣṇa conscious and enjoying, since that time, as soon as I remember even sex life, I spite (spit) on it and my mouth becomes turned." (laughter) This is the test. Not that you become very advanced spiritualist and at the same time advance in sex life. That is not. (Sanskrit) That is the test that as soon as you are advanced in spiritual life, all these materialistic habits will be rejected automatically. This is the test. Four things are material demands-eating, satisfaction of the tongue or belly and satisfaction of the genital, āhāra, and sleeping and to become a good defender, defense measure. These are material necessity. And the one who is spiritually advanced, these things will be reduced, almost nil. What Christ says, Jesus Christ about sex life? What does he say?

Devotee: Only in the married life.

Reporters Interview -- June 29, 1974, Melbourne:

Satsvarūpa: " ...and according to their own fruitive activities they are transmigrating from one species of life to another and from one planet to another. In this way their engagement in material existence is being continued since time immemorial. The living entities are atomic parts and parcels of the supreme spirit. There is, however, a measurement for the length and breadth of the atomic spiritual spark. It is said in the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, Tenth Canto, Eighty-seventh Chapter, thirty-sixth verse, that if you divide the top of a hair into one hundred parts and again if you divide one part of that into another one hundred parts, such 1/10,000th part of the tip of a hair is the length and breadth of the individual soul. This is also confirmed in the Vedas in the Śvetāśvatara Upaniṣad. This atomic magnitude of the individual living entity is again described in the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, Eleventh Canto, Sixteenth Chapter, eleventh verse, as follows. This is a speech given by one of the four Kumāras known as Sunanda on the occasion of performing a great sacrifice. He said, 'O supreme truth, if the living entities were not infinitesimal sparks of the supreme spirit, then each minute spark would have been all-pervading and there would be no necessity of its being controlled.' "

Prabhupāda: That is very... Otherwise... If the living entity is equal to the Supreme Being, then... Suppose you are a living entity. You could speak everything of what is going on in others' mind or body. You cannot say what I am thinking. I cannot say what you are thinking. Therefore I or you are not all-pervading. We are limited. And that is living entity. This is a very nice example.

1975 Conversations and Morning Walks

Room Conversation with Woman Sanskrit Professor -- February 13, 1975, Mexico:

Guest (1): Must it necessarily be so? That would be so, supposing that we human beings are at the center of existence, and our criteria should be applied, measuring everything which exists. Now, the question, "Why there is anything?" is asked on the more higher level, in the sense, trying to forget about this answer for anthropocentric thinking.

Prabhupāda: No, thinking...

Guest (1): This question relates to everything what may exist, other beings, other intelligences.

Prabhupāda: This is a fact, that intelligent or not intelligent, that doesn't matter. Everyone is seeking pleasure, ānanda. The Sanskrit word is ānanda. So ānanda... Suppose I am constructing a big house to live there, but before the construction is finished I am, by nature, I am taken away. I die. Just like Napoleon. That, in France, that Arc in Paris?

Devotee: Arc de Triumph.

Prabhupāda: He could not finish. You see? There are so many things. We are thinking, "By finishing this, we shall be happy," but that is sometimes hampered. So ānanda is checked. So this is the position. So higher means where ānanda is not checked. That is higher position. The purpose is ānanda, but in this material world we are experiencing ānanda being checked. Just like nobody wants to die. That's a fact.

Morning Walk -- May 12, 1975, Perth:

Prabhupāda: Above the sun. How they'll go? (laughter) They are going to the wrong..., bluffing only. I am repeatedly saying, they have never gone, simply bluff. How it is that they brought some dust? So brilliant, it is blazing, full. There is fire blazing. (walking:)

Paramahaṁsa: They say that they measured the moon and that it's very small compared to the earth, very tiny.

Prabhupāda: All wrong.

Paramahaṁsa: If it's a longer distance than the sun but still it appears so big in the sky, it must be a very large planet.

Prabhupāda: Yes. Similarly Venus and others, they are also above.

Paramahaṁsa: Oh, above the sun.

Prabhupāda: The sun is moving near about that. This is one universe, and there are thousands and millions of universe. Jagad-aṇḍa-koṭi. Yasya prabhā prabhavato jagad-aṇḍa-koṭi (Bs. 5.40). That is God's creation. And they are becoming God, "I am God." Yasyaika-niśvasita-kālam athāvalambya (Bs. 5.48). If we simply think of the creation of God, we can appreciate how great He is.

Room Conversation with Dr. Copeland, Professor of Modern Indian History -- May 20, 1975, Melbourne:

Dr. Copeland: Not by your measure.

Prabhupāda: What is that?

Amogha: He says not by your measure. In your terms that is not.

Prabhupāda: Yes. No, actually, that is the fact. That is stated in the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam. Find out. Kasmād bhajanti kavayo dhana-durmadāndhān (SB 2.2.5).

Madhudviṣa: First volume?

Prabhupāda: Yes, find out the verse from the yellow... Yes. Kasmād bhajanti kavayo dhana-durmadāndhān. The verse begins: cirāṇi kiṁ na santi diśanti.

Madhudviṣa: "C."

Prabhupāda: Cirāṇi kiṁ na pathi santi diśanti bhikṣāṁ naivāṅghripāḥ para-bhṛtaḥ sarito 'py aśuṣyan, ruddhā guhāḥ kim...

Madhudviṣa: Cīra-vāsā?

Prabhupāda: No, cirāṇi. Cirāṇi kiṁ na santi.

Room Conversation with Dr. Copeland, Professor of Modern Indian History -- May 20, 1975, Melbourne:

Dr. Copeland: Well, when I first came in, I asked you why were you so successful, and you said, "I don't know how you measure success," and now you're measuring success by numbers, and that's not fair. That's not logical.

Prabhupāda: No, my standard of success is little different. Of course, this is success. Everyone is saying I am successful. So it is not unsuccessful. But my standard of success is little different. So even if it not fully successful, still, the results are there.

Dr. Copeland: Ah, fair enough.

Prabhupāda: That is called payi-nukuta-nyāya.(?) And when I find full successful, just imagine what is that. This is partial success.

Dr. Copeland: (laughing) That's called "touche."

Prabhupāda: This is the logic, that the partial success is this, and when it will be full successful, you cannot imagine that, what is.

Room Conversation with Dr. Copeland, Professor of Modern Indian History -- May 20, 1975, Melbourne:

Dr. Copeland: If you're measuring your success by the numbers of people, he had a lot of people too.

Prabhupāda: No, we don't take that, by number of people. We take how many people are taking actually. But neither... Ekaś candras tamo hanti: "If one man accepts, then he can become the bright moon." Na ca tārāḥ sahasraśaḥ: "The so-called stars has no value." One moon is sufficient. So our preaching is: Let one man understand Bhagavad-gītā As It Is. We don't want disciples. I never collected disciples. I never compromised that "You can do whatever you like, and you become my disciple. "No. You have to follow this. Now also, this morning, I accepted so many... "First promise whether you are going to do this. Then I initiate." This is my policy. If I would have said, "No, you can do whatever you like, and give me some money. I shall give you mantra," then you would have seen millions. But I accept very selected disciple, not that anyone, everyone comes, and I accept disciple. No. He is first of all trained up six months. Then, when he is able to promise to follow the regulative..., then I accept. This is stricture. It is not that everyone comes, "Give me thirty-five dollars. I give you mantra, and within six months you become God." I do not do that.

Morning Walk -- May 21, 1975, Melbourne:

Madhudviṣa: That is a subjective experience. When you chant Hare Kṛṣṇa you can say, "Oh, I feel good," but to someone who won't chant Hare Kṛṣṇa, if there was some objective way of measuring the difference between the Hare Kṛṣṇa sound and the sound of, let's say, someone's name.

Prabhupāda: No, the sound is the same. I gave you the example. The tongue is the same, but according to your condition of life you taste differently. Tongue is not different. But if you are diseased, then with this tongue you taste something else. And if you are in healthy condition, with the same tongue you can taste differently.

Devotee: So Śrīla Prabhupāda, if the sound is the same, does that mean that when you become fully purified you will also see the sound of an automobile horn as transcendental?

Prabhupāda: Yes, this is transcendental, this microphone, because it is being used for Kṛṣṇa's purpose. The same flower, when you use it for sense gratification, it is material. The same flower when you offer to Kṛṣṇa, it is spiritual. The flower is not different, but by the different use it becomes material and spiritual. I think I have said many times that there is actually no material existence. Therefore it is called māyā. Māyā means it has no actual existence. We create an atmosphere. That is māyā.

Garden Conversation with Dr. Gerson and devotees -- June 22, 1975, Los Angeles:

Dr. Gerson: Many of the defects that the tests might measure are defects that are measured against an insane society that considers itself sane. And so they aren't defects even if they show up.

Prabhupāda: Yes, you will find defects. But if the devotees stick to Kṛṣṇa consciousness principle, these defects will soon become finished.

Revatīnandana: One thing specifically he wants to do in order to counteract this propaganda against the Gurukula which had serious impact, he wants to do some of this testing with the children in a way that is specifically done with children to show that these children are actually happy and they're developing nicely. He wanted to know if that would be permissable for him to do some testing at the Gurukula with the children.

Prabhupāda: That depends on your management, how you are raising the children. If they are Kṛṣṇa conscious, then it is all right. So far bodily defects, you might find. But we are denying from the very beginning, "I am not this body." So by finding some bodily defects how you will decide about the spirit? Because spirit is not this body. You cannot conclude that because there are some bodily defects, therefore he has got spiritual defect. That is not right conclusion. The same example: "because there are some dirty things in the Ganges, the Ganges is no more good." That conclusion is wrong.

Morning Walk -- June 22, 1975, Los Angeles:

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Bhavānanda: Śrīla Prabhupāda, I told Mādhava dāsa in Atlanta that you had said that the sun is actually closer than the moon, and he immediately was able to prove that that is correct. He sat down and he, "Oh..." He was able to prove something by the way they are measuring... They are measuring the distance incorrectly in terms of bending light rays and straight light rays.

Prabhupāda: Oh.

Brahmānanda: Sometimes the moon comes in front of the sun.

Prabhupāda: What is the front?

Brahmānanda: Between the sun and the earth the moon comes.

Television Interview -- July 9, 1975, Chicago:

Harikeśa: The scientists have the theory that the brain, the intelligence is measured by creases in the brain, creases, not by size.

Prabhupāda: Not size, but what is the proof that the brain of woman has increased? Where is the proof?

Harikeśa: They think because the ego has increased, the brain has also increased.

Prabhupāda: Oh, that's nice. (laughter) That's nice. (laughing) So to become angry means defeat. If two persons are in argument the man, the one party, he becomes angry, that means he is defeated. Why one should become angry? It is the argument, logic. They should continue. And to become angry and to go away, that means defeat.

Harikeśa: They become upset because they cannot dominate you.

Prabhupāda: No, it is not the question of domination; it is the question of logic. If you do not agree to logic, then no argument can make progress.

Room Conversation after Press Conference -- July 9, 1975, Chicago:

Prabhupāda: But that is not stopping. That is artificially taking some other measures. That is not stopping.

Harikeśa: The two countries that have women as leaders are in the headlines all the time. Like Israel, Golda Meir, they are always war between there and Egypt.

Brahmānanda: Argentina also.

Harikeśa: Argentina, and India. Now there will be war. Wherever there is woman in charge, there is war, disruption. But they think because they are in charge, that proves they are equal.

Prabhupāda: I think in Indian history she is the first woman to be in charge of the state. Before her, there is no instance of woman becoming in charge.

Brahmānanda: In Śrī Lanka also, they have woman in charge. That is also considered Indian.

Prabhupāda: According to Manu-saṁhitā, which is Vedic laws, it is said that "Woman is not to be given freedom." They have to be protected. According to Vedic civilization, women, children, old man, brāhmaṇa, and cow—they are to be given protection. The state should give protection. (break) ...the defect of modern civilization is that vox populi.

Morning Walk -- July 16, 1975, San Francisco:

Prabhupāda: Scientific... It is the most crude thing. Everyone knows. Even the animal, even the ant, they have got consciousness.

Dharmādhyakṣa: Well, it embarrassed them that they know everyone has consciousness but there was no way they could measure it or, according to gross science, get some factual information about it. So it embarrassed them so much, they tried to avoid the subject, hush it up, not speak about it.

Prabhupāda: That is their disease. When they cannot make any solution, they avoid it. (break) ...touch the real point, that why there is death. Nobody will touch because they cannot make any solution. Why do they not have a department?

Dharmādhyakṣa: Nowadays they're actually realizing their error and they're studying death more, trying to prepare people for death more. But the only thing they can tell them is, "Accept it." The only thing they can do is say, "You are going to die. So just accept it with a cheerful attitude."

Prabhupāda: But I do not wish to die. Why shall I be cheerful? You rascal, you say, "Become cheerful." (laughter) "Cheerfully, you become hanged." (laughter) The lawyer will say, "Never mind. You have lost the case. Now you cheerfully be hanged." (laughter)

Morning Walk -- July 18, 1975, San Francisco:

Paramahaṁsa: Under the threat of nuclear warfare wouldn't Kṛṣṇa consciousness be more easy to spread?

Prabhupāda: No, threat is already there. But they are so fool that they are not afraid of the threat. Threat is already there. Everyone will die. That is the problem. So who is caring for this? They are avoiding this. They cannot take any anti measures.

Yadubara: So it will take a war to bring them to their senses a bit?

Prabhupāda: No, war is going on. But they are so senseless that they will not come to this, so rascal. Therefore they are described as mūḍha, all rascals.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Very hard to preach to these fools, Prabhupāda.

Prabhupāda: Hmm?

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: These people are so stupid, it is very difficult to preach to them.

Prabhupāda: (chuckles) No, chant Hare Kṛṣṇa. That will be...

Morning Walk -- July 18, 1975, San Francisco:

Prabhupāda: ...they require so many scientist to get heat from the nuclear system, then who has created the sun to diffuse so much heat? How great scientist He is. They have no sense that who has created the sun's nuclear system, that heating the whole universe.

Bahulāśva: They can't even measure how much heat is coming from the sun.

Jayatīrtha: They say that the sun is inefficient because in some places it's too hot and in some places it's too cold, so therefore they have to make the adjustment by making the air conditioners and the heaters in order to make up for the sun's inefficiency.

Prabhupāda: But who is getting this advantage?

Paramahaṁsa: Big businessmen.

Morning Walk -- October 16, 1975, Johannesburg:

Prabhupāda: (break)...they have to manage, and the vaiśyas will produce, and brāhmaṇa will give the brain. Then the society will be peace... And at the present moment these śūdras, they are, by artificial votes, they are becoming the brain of the society. How it can be happy? The rascals, they are voted to the legislative assembly, and they are passing every day law which is never perfect. This is going on.

Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: Stopgap measures.

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: They create problem, then they try to solve it.

Prabhupāda: That's it.

Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: One of our life members in Newcastle, a town between Durban and Johannesburg... The city council, they've decided they want to build a road right where his house is. He just built new house. Now they're going to tear it down, so then he has to build another house.

Prabhupāda: Just see. To punish him? (pause) Just see, so much loads of books. He's feeling unhappy, and what he is learning? To become hippie. That's all.

Morning Walk -- November 11, 1975, Bombay:

Brahmānanda: They find these particles in their machines called atom-smashers. They take atoms and they smash them together...

Prabhupāda: But that measure means still they are measuring material. Apareyam. These are all aparā. They cannot come to that. Itas tu viddhi me prakṛtiṁ parām. There is another atom. That, these rascals, they do not know, neither they'll be able to come out. It is stated in the Bhagavad-gītā, apareyam: "These are all material." Itas tu viddhi me prakṛtiṁ parām: "There is another atom." (aside:) Hare Kṛṣṇa. And where is that science? Apareyam itas tu viddhi me prakṛtiṁ parām: And that atom, jīva-bhutaḥ, that is living entity. That, the rascals, they do not know. They're still hovering upon material particles.

Dr. Patel: No, but they get inkling of real higher source of all these things...

Prabhupāda: No, higher...

Dr. Patel: ...slowly and slowly. They have their own way.

Prabhupāda: if you do not know what is that higher.

Morning Walk -- November 11, 1975, Bombay:

Prabhupāda: Yes. Life...

Dr. Patel: How they measured it?

Prabhupāda: Whatever they say, we have to believe. That's all. (laughter) Except Kṛṣṇa, we shall believe everything. When Kṛṣṇa says something: "No, no, these are all fictitious. There is no Kṛṣṇa, and these are all imagination." And as a rascal says, "Oh, this is scientific." This is going on. So we are not so fools that we shall believe these scientific rascals. We believe Kṛṣṇa. That's all. This is Kṛṣṇa consciousness. We are not going to believe the scientific rascals.

Dr. Patel: All, all good, these do good, sir. I believe you should not be very harsh to the scientist. I am sorry...

Prabhupāda: They are not scientists. They are rascals. I don't accept them as scientists. They, if they are putting forward theories every day, what kind of scientist? They are not scientist. Scientist means fixed up idea. It cannot be changed. (aside:) Hare Kṛṣṇa. That is scientist. (aside:) Hare Kṛṣṇa. Na hanyate hanyamāne śarīre (BG 2.20).

Morning Walk -- November 11, 1975, Bombay:

Prabhupāda: First of all find out one ten-thousandth. Then talk. Find out.

Harikeśa: They make measurements with, to the twenty-second power, like a decimal point and twenty-two zeroes and then a one. We were just talking about quarks.

Prabhupāda: Quarks?

Harikeśa: Quark. Yes. The quark is the... There are things called hedons, and the quark is the smallest possible combination of elements that make a hedon, which makes up the protons and electrons. They haven't seen them yet. They just thought they might be there.

Prabhupāda: Again, "Might be. Maybe." (break)

Morning Walk -- November 16, 1975, Bombay:

Indian man (3): What is your idea about the secularism preached by our government of India and the policy of secularism? What do they mean by that? That means they say that there is no place for religion.

Prabhupāda: Yes. Dharmena hina paśubhiḥ samana. As soon as there is no religion, the population-animal, that's all. That is going on. Because there was no religion, therefore the government has to declare emergency. (laughter) Because all animals. So they created first animals, then emergency. This is going on. Hare Kṛṣṇa. Why emergency? If there is human being, then why emergency? All animals. To control the animals you require some special measure. This is the proof that they're animals. Otherwise why? Hare Kṛṣṇa. That is long, long ago said, dharmena hina paśubhiḥ samana: "When you give up religion, you are no better than animals."

Indian man (3): What is the harm if I become an animal also?

Prabhupāda: You are already animal. There is no question of becoming animal. You are already animal. (laughter)

Morning Walk -- November 19, 1975, Bombay:

Yaśomatī-nandana: The upper planetary systems, are they bigger than the lower ones? In other words, sun is bigger than the earth, the moon is bigger...

Prabhupāda: Yes, there is measurement. (break)

Jayapataka: Some people say that "You are coming to India for preaching, but we Indians, we already know all the, about Kṛṣṇa and Rāma. Why don't... You should be preaching in the West, where the people don't know."

Prabhupāda: But you know from the Western people. They are not... They are imitating Western people. You know from the Western people; therefore you have to learn from this Western people this also.

Brahmānanda: They are learning everything else from the Western people, so why not...

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Śrīdhara: Everyone in India knows the līlā of Kṛṣṇa, but the science of Kṛṣṇa, that they have forgotten.

Prabhupāda: They know līlā of Kṛṣṇa but they do not know Kṛṣṇa. Huh? Who was...? You were telling that Mr. Bajaj, he wants to take the instruction of Kṛṣṇa without Kṛṣṇa.

1976 Conversations and Morning Walks

Morning Walk -- January 17, 1976, Mayapur:

Prabhupāda: ...are standing properly? These walls, they are standing in right angle? This wall?

Jayapatāka: I think so, yes.

Prabhupāda: No, you have measured?

Bhavānanda: Standing up properly on the boundary of the land, you mean?

Prabhupāda: No, no.

Madhudviṣa: Vertically.

Jayapatāka: I saw the masons measuring when they bricked it, but I never measured myself.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: What do you think might be wrong, Prabhupāda?

Prabhupāda: Then, in due course of time, it'll fall down.

Morning Walk -- February 4, 1976, Mayapura:

Prabhupāda: Now, if you measure when this sun and when it comes meridian distance, so do you think the earth is moving so quickly? It is... According to their modern science, the earth is moving twenty-five thousand miles only throughout... No, within twenty-four hours.

Harikeśa: That's around the sun.

Prabhupāda: Huh? Then is it possible...

Jagadīśa: Twenty-four-hour day, twenty-five thousand miles circumference.

Prabhupāda: So how earth has gone so quickly round that it is seen, the different position of the sun? This means sun is not fixed. Sun is moving. And in the Bhāgavata it is said that it is moving at the rate of sixteen thousand miles per second. I think I have calculated that. Sixteen thousand miles.

Morning Walk -- March 1, 1976, Mayapur:

Prabhupāda: Eh? No, no, atom, this atom. Scientists, they are studying atom. So what is the measurement of atom?

Hṛdayānanda: So small that...

Prabhupāda: "So small that..." A child can say like that.

Acyutānanda: They are all different sizes.

Hṛdayānanda: That a million, they say that...

Prabhupāda: No, no. There are two sizes. One is anu, and one is paramanu. Six anus make one paramanu. That is statement. Six anus, and combine together it becomes a paramanu. That is atom. Therefore they are dividing atom. That is already there in the Vedic literature.

Morning Walk -- March 17, 1976, Mayapura:

Pañca-draviḍa: Yeah, the crowd here.... There was practically.... I didn't see any incidents of anybody doing anything wrong or trying to cause trouble.

Prabhupāda: Oh, yes.

Satsvarūpa: Jayapatākā Mahārāja just said he was measuring the people as they came in. In one minute, an average of a 150 people came.

Jayapatākā: That was only low time. And peak time was 400.

Hṛdayānanda: Per minute?

Jayapatākā: Per minute.

Prabhupāda: How many visitors, according to your calculations?

Jayapatākā: So that's about between 9,000 to 25,000 an hour.

Hṛdayānanda: They averaged fifteen or twenty thousand an hour.

Jayapatākā: Per hour. Then they, all day they're coming...

Hṛdayānanda: So yes, well over a lakh.

Pañca-draviḍa: Two lakhs. Last night was big. Last night...

Prabhupāda: No, the police officer said that "From all different parts of Bengal, they are coming to see your temple."

Morning Walk -- March 26, 1976, Delhi:

Prabhupāda: Yes. Fractional. It is smaller than the atom.

Dr. Kapoor: Final measure, the smallest fraction of anything, is soul.

Prabhupāda: One ten-thousandth part of the top of the hair.

Dr. Kapoor: Sir, even that has been measured by measuring instrument. I think it is.... You can describe it. But it is smaller part, infinite smallest part of an atom.

Prabhupāda: Yes, it has been measured out. How the measurement is stated? It doesn't.... When the statement is there about the measurement of the soul, it was done. Otherwise how it is described in the śāstra? (break—walk)

Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: The last few days, as guests have been coming to greet you, practically everyone who you've had a conversation with has brought up this question, What is good and what is bad, what is sinful activity?

Prabhupāda: Hm? What?

Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: It seems that people have great difficulty discriminating today between good and bad.

Prabhupāda: So what is your answer?

Room Conversation -- April 23, 1976, Melbourne:

Prabhupāda: Resurrection? What do you mean actually? But it is a fact that one, the soul, is changing from one body to another.

Guest (4): That's what.... We agree.

Prabhupāda: Yes. Just like you are young man. You had a body of a child. That child's body.... You remember that you had a body of a child, but that body is no longer existing. But you remember; therefore you, the owner of the body, is existing. Otherwise how do you remember, "I had a body like, like this," measurement? But that body is no longer existing, so you are remembering. So you are the owner of the body. Just like you have now black coat. Say after two days you may put on another color coat, but you remember that "I was putting on one black coat on that day." So you are existing; the coat is changed. Similarly, the soul is existing; the body is changed. Therefore it is natural that I am old man. When I change this body, I get another body. This is resurrection, if you say.

Guest (3): I believe that, yes. That's what we believe put in a philosophical way.

Prabhupāda: It is not belief, it is fact. You believe or not believe, it will take place.

Garden Conversation -- June 14, 1976, Detroit:

Prabhupāda: That means our men were not experienced, Jagadīśa and Govardhana. Who else? Who was in charge?

Mādhavānanda: Govardhana was the president. If the lawyer knows you do not know, then he will take advantage. (break) He measured the two rooms, and the lecture hall length is forty-seven feet and twenty-seven feet wide. And the temple room length from the back to the altar, not including the Deities room, altar, is fifty feet.

Prabhupāda: Smaller.

Room Conversation -- June 15, 1976, Detroit:

Prabhupāda: Their knowledge is "perhaps." It is nonsense. They have no definite knowledge. "Perhaps." Perhaps is not knowledge.

Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: We had one CIA agent. Previously, he was a CIA agent. I was told this story, I don't know. Anyway, might as well relate it. So they were doing an experiment in the Bahama Islands off Florida. They were all very high intellects. They were developing a certain radio beam to measure the beams which are given off from other planets, thinking that maybe these intelligent beings, they are sending some message out. So they developed this way of sensoring the beams which were coming from the North Star. Anyway, he said—and he was serious, I was told this; he's in India now, one of our devotees there—he said that when they focused on the North Star and they got the beam back, when they translated it, it came out to be the mahā-mantra.

Prabhupāda: Hare Kṛṣṇa.

Room Conversation -- June 18, 1976, Toronto:

Prabhupāda: Working on?

Hari-śauri: Armament. Weapons. Weapon development. Defense. They call it defense measures.

Prabhupāda: Just see. Why defense? Man to man. That means they are dogs. The dogs defend from another dog. Is it not? As soon as they see another dog, (growls) yow, yow, yow. So then where is the defense between man to man?

Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: They're worried now that they won't be able to disarm, the article was saying, because, somehow or another, there's going to be a disaster unless there is immediate disarmament. But they don't think it's possible.

Prabhupāda: No. How they can disarm? They have been trained up like dogs to bark and fight. How there can be disarmament?

Garden Conversation -- June 28, 1976, New Vrindaban:

Prabhupāda: Any scientist here who can answer why Sunday first and Monday second?

Janāhlāda: I'm not a scientist, but I always thought that the ancients thought that the sun was first because without telescopes or without light-measuring instruments it was bigger and it looked closer.

Prabhupāda: That's a fact. Sunday is first, and Monday-moon is beyond sun. If they accept that nobody can approach sun, then how they can approach moon? In calculation, eighteen thousand miles per hour, and if the moon is situated 95,000,000 miles, then how they can go in four days? These are my questions. They have not been answered. It takes at least seven months. And they went in four days, and the man's mother... His photograph was there. She said, "At last my son has gone there." You have seen that photograph? I have seen it. Mother was satisfied. This is going on.

Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa: Next verse?

Prabhupāda: Hm.

Puṣṭa Kṛṣṇa:: Text 19. Tān ahaṁ dviṣataḥ krūrān saṁsāreṣu narādhamān... (BG 16.19).

Prabhupāda: This is their result. These rascals, atheist class, they'll suffer in this way. That is described now.

Morning Walk -- July 4, 1976, Washington, D.C.:
Prabhupāda: This is the position. Now you try to argue, but they will take everything we propose as mythology, and we will take, "Because you are rascal, whatever you say, it is all rascaldom," that's all. This is the position. "You are imperfect, rascals. So whatever you say it is all rascaldom." That is our position. And as soon as we say from śāstra, they will say it is all mythology. Then how you'll meet? This is the difference.

Svarūpa Dāmodara: Now we can argue that mythology is not so serious. I think we can argue on very sound logic, pointing out that their measurement of the ages are also based not on very scientific background, but there are many mistakes, and in fact there are several reports that... (end)

Morning Walk -- July 4, 1976, Washington, D.C.:

Prabhupāda: Salt?

Svarūpa Dāmodara: No, no, the soul, the ātmā, jīva. We get a description that the soul, the size of a soul is one ten-thousandth part of the tip of the hair. We were just discussing whether does this imply that it can be measured.

Prabhupāda: Yes, this is the measurement.

Svarūpa Dāmodara: But we are claiming that it is nonphysical.

Prabhupāda: No, nonphysical, that doesn't mean it has no measurement. It has measurement.

Svarūpa Dāmodara: So measurement... Actually, Sadāputa calculated from how much the size is. Now from electron microscope, actually we can get an idea about the tip of the hair, how much it is. Now you divide it by one ten-thousandth part, so it (will) come out the size of the soul is about two angstroms, by calculation like that.

Prabhupāda: Two atoms?

Svarūpa Dāmodara: No, angstroms. Angstrom is the smallest scale that science can imagine. It is smaller even than the hydrogen atom. So actually it is atomic, it is very small in size.

Prabhupāda: Yes.

Morning Walk -- July 4, 1976, Washington, D.C.:

Prabhupāda: Reasonable? Yes. It is given in Upaniṣads and Padma Purāṇa, authorized.

Rūpānuga: It's just that this one ten-thousandth tip of hair has no material quality. It is nonphysical but still can be measured.

Prabhupāda: Nonphysical... Just like axiomatic truth point has no length, no breadth, but it has length and breadth. You cannot measure it.

Svarūpa Dāmodara: But does this not imply—one ten-thousandth the size—does that not imply measurement, that it can be measured?

Prabhupāda: Yes, measurement, measurement is there. This is closed?

Vipina: Yes, this is the service road, but up here is a very nice way to look at the waterfall.

Room Conversation -- July 6, 1976, Washington, D.C.:

Prabhupāda: What is the value of your speculation? If you are on the wrong platform, then what is the value of your speculation? You have got imperfect senses, you cheat, with the microscope or binocular, but it is manufactured by you. How it is perfect?

Svarūpa Dāmodara: That is one of our reasonings, that the senses...

Prabhupāda: Yes. You are born imperfect, and you are manufacturing some measuring... So that is also imperfect. And you are depending by seeing through the binocular. How it is perfect?

Devotee (1): They've convinced us that these machines are accurate.

Prabhupāda: How it is accurate? It is manufactured by you. You are a fool.

Devotee (1): But some things they say, like the rays...

Prabhupāda: They say, they may say, but first of all, what is the position of the conditioned soul? Four defects. You must commit mistakes, you must be illusioned, his senses are imperfect, and he's a cheater. These are the four defects of conditioned souls. So how the conditioned soul can give perfect knowledge?

Svarūpa Dāmodara: That is our conclusion.

Room Conversation -- July 6, 1976, Washington, D.C.:

Prabhupāda: Actually, from life matter is generated.

Rūpānuga: Jaya.

Prabhupāda: Not from matter life is generated. That is wrong.

Sadāpūta: There are some people who have done measurements and...

Prabhupāda: Measurement is there in the Vedic literature, Upaniṣad.

Rūpānuga: Is it that the living entity, when he creates this matter to expand, like the stone is growing, does he manufacture this material from the etheric platform, or does he...

Prabhupāda: According to his desire he can.

Rūpānuga: Simply by desiring.

Prabhupāda: What is that verse? Icchā dveṣaḥ samutthena sarge yānti.

Rūpānuga: There have been some..., modern scientists have done some experiments showing that in the soil there are organisms, micro-organisms and earthworms that can produce chemicals, increasing just simply by their presence.

Prabhupāda: Yes. I have given that example, already he has mentioned.

Evening Darsana -- July 13, 1976, New York:

Prabhupāda: They will say that is... Whatever they... Foolishly whatever they may say, then let them say. Actually he doesn't like to die. Otherwise let there be fire, why you called fire brigade? Let me die peacefully in the fire. (laughter) Nonsense he's suffering, but still he says there is no suffering. That is nonsense. That is ignorance. He's suffering every moment, but he does not know why he's suffering. That is ignorance. Just like an animal, you are taking into the slaughterhouse. He's suffering, he's screaming, but he does not know why you have taken to slaughterhouse (indistinct). And that is animal life. And when there will be question of why I am suffering? I did not want this fire, why there is fire? That is perfection (indistinct). Is there any solution? Then there is human life. And if he remains like animal, and simply try to make some remedial measures... He's suffering undoubtedly, but because he does not take it seriously, therefore he's animal. Animal does not take seriously why he's suffering. That is the distinction between human life and animal life. Suffering is there, but the animal does not take it seriously. But human life must take it seriously otherwise he's an animal. There are so many sufferings. This is adhibhau... adhidaivika. Adhidaivika: by—you say accident—by nature, by superior power. Some miserable condition is enforced upon us. Suppose if there is an earthquake, that is not in your hand, but it may cause some havoc. This is adhidaivika. Similar, adhibhautika: Suffering caused by other living entities. And adhyātmika, suffering caused by this body and mind. So suffering is always there, but we are suffering, we have been accustomed to suffer. But when the question is that why I am suffering, whether there is any remedy? That is human life. Otherwise, the animal life. That is the distinction between animal and human life. If there is fire, and there are animals only, dogs and cats, they cannot call fire brigade. They'll die, because they do not know how to take measures.

Evening Darsana -- July 13, 1976, New York:
Prabhupāda: But human being immediately calls fire brigade just to try to save himself. But the suffering is there, either he's animal or human being. But the distinction is the human being tries to counteract it, the animal cannot. If you simply become subject to this suffering without any remedial measure, then you are animal. And you are suffering and you try for the remedial measure, that is human life. This is plain thing. You cannot say there is no suffering. Suffering is there both for the animal and for the man. The man tries for the remedial measure, the animal cannot. Hm, what is that?
Evening Darsana -- July 13, 1976, New York:

Devotee: Sometimes they say it's just a dream and they say if you are bothering me, and you are just my dream; I don't have to worry about it, I'll have another dream and you'll go away.

Prabhupāda: No but dream is... It may be, but when there is fire, you call it dream, but why do you call fire brigade? When you are diseased why you go to physician? Dream it. (laughter) The major problem is birth, death, and old age, and disease. You do not want that. You must seek the measures. That is human life. Whether birth, death, old age, disease can be stopped? If there is any such life that there is no more birth, death, that is human life. Athāto brahma jijñāsā. That is the Vedānta philosophy: "Now the human life is meant for enquiring about these things." If you don't enquire, then you remain animal. So this Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement is trying to save the human society from this animal life. To bring him to the real human life. Animal life means there is suffering—go on suffering. Human life means there is suffering—how to get, how to counteract. That is human life. Suffering—so long you have got this body, there must be suffering.

Evening Darsana -- July 13, 1976, New York:
Prabhupāda: If you are forced to become more and more mad by intoxication, by meat eating, by this... Then where is your life? Your life is finished. Because to understand these problems of life requires a little brain. So to create that brain, this little tapasya is required. He's already puzzled, and if you make him more and more puzzled by supplying him intoxication and this gross eating of meat, then he remains in the grossest platform of ignorance. That is not human activity. The brain must be little clear to understand what is the value of life, why I am suffering, if is there any remedial measure, how can I take it. That is brain. And if the brain is used only to find out where is sense gratification, where is sex, where is food, where is shelter, where is money? Then, that is, that business is being done by the hogs and dogs. So this Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement means to save people from this dogs' and hogs' life and to come to the real platform of understanding the value of life. They do not know it. Na te viduḥ svārtha-gatiṁ hi viṣṇuṁ durāśayā ye bahir-artha-māninaḥ (SB 7.5.31). They do not know what is the aim of life.
Room Conversation -- July 26, 1976, London:

Prabhupāda: You can drop many bombs in the Sahara desert. Who cares? Who cares for that? (laughter)

Jayatīrtha: Prabhupāda said they were actually in Arizona. This Mars capsule has landed in Arizona.

Prabhupāda: Yes. Why bomb? "Grapes are sour."

Bhagavān: To measure something.

Prabhupāda: Whatever they measure, they are useless. What they'll gain by dropping a bomb?

Jayatīrtha: Just another foolishness.

Prabhupāda: But nobody is questioning that "Why you are wasting money in this way? You have already failure, the moon planet."

Bhagavān: They are hoping against hope. That is all they have. (break)

Prabhupāda: Let us not be discouraged. Let us go on with our studies, activities, Kṛṣṇa consciousness.

Bhagavān: Seeing their foolishness makes one more convinced; it does not discourage.

Prabhupāda: Yes. This failure was assured ten years ago by me.

Room Conversation -- August 4, 1976, New Mayapur (French farm):

Prabhupāda: (long pause) They have got so many cars.

Hari-śauri: Actually, I think most of our centers have got many, many vans and cars.

Prabhupāda: That means they are rich.

Hari-śauri: Just like in India they used to measure wealth by how many cows, (laughs) in the West they measure wealth by how many cars.

Prabhupāda: And we have both. Cows and cars, both.

Hari-śauri: Yes.

Prabhupāda: So the devotees like this evening class?

Hari-śauri: They like?

Prabhupāda: Evening class.

Hari-śauri: Oh, yes, it's a very enlivening program. In the evening it's very nice out of doors. It's warm from the day. No one falls asleep. Except for the children, and that's very good because then they're quiet.

Prabhupāda: Small children, they also clap and dance on the lap of the mother, they were smiling. Very fortunate children, otherwise from the birth, associating with devotees... (long pause) Nowadays cheating is a good qualification, huh?

Hari-śauri: Yes. It's their only qualification.

Meeting with Endowments Commissioner -- August 24, 1976, Hyderabad:

Prabhaviṣṇu: When I speak to some of these archaeologists that I meet, these professors, I ask them do they believe in the historical validity of this Mahābhārata and Bhāgavatam, and they say, "Personally, I believe, but officially we have to follow the archaeology, the techniques of measuring the time." So they have two faces, one for official life and one for personal life.

Prabhupāda: Duplicity. Duplicity.

Prabhaviṣṇu: Yes. But there are some of them that are trying to prove also that the Mahābhārata was historical.

Prabhupāda: Mahābhārata. That very name suggests history. Bigger India. Mahā means bigger, and Bhārata means India. Where is Mahāṁsa?

Morning Walk -- December 5, 1976, Hyderabad:

Guest (2): Kṛṣṇa is within us.

Prabhupāda: Yes. And Kṛṣṇa is without. That is Kṛṣṇa, antar bahiḥ. Antar bahiḥ. Kuntī says in her prayers that "Kṛṣṇa, You are antar bahiḥ. Still, people cannot understand. You are... Without, You are existing, and within, You are..." Still, they are so rascal, they cannot understand. Antar bahiḥ. Kṛṣṇa is without, Kṛṣṇa is within, but they cannot see. That is their misfortune. Aṇḍāntara-stha-paramāṇu-cayāntara-stham (Bs. 5.35). Kṛṣṇa is within the paramāṇu, atom. Can you find out Kṛṣṇa? He says, īśvaraḥ sarva-bhūtānāṁ hṛd... (BG 18.61). He is within your heart. Can you find out? Then where is your science? It is already indicated that He is here. Find out. How you can find out? The dimension of the soul is given, one ten-thousandth part of the upper portion of the hair. The tip of the hair, you divide into ten thousand parts and that one part is the dimension of the soul. How can you find out? Keśāgra-śata-bhāgasya śatadhā kalpitasya ca jīvo bhāgaḥ sa vijñeyaḥ (CC Madhya 19.140). Everything is written there. Now you find out the measurement. You cannot find out measurement of the tip of the hair. And you have to divide into ten thousand parts. Then the measurement of the soul will come. So how can you do it? But they are described in the śāstra. So go and see ārati. (end)

1977 Conversations and Morning Walks

Morning Discussion about Kumbhamela -- January 8, 1977, Bombay:

Prabhupāda: Then it is fortunate, fortunate.

Gurudāsa: Yes, very good. A blessing in disguise, yes. So they're trying to organize. There's many bhangis who pick up the stool.

Prabhupāda: The place is nice then.

Gurudāsa: Oh, yes. And I cut down the pandal size. Originally the pandal was 100 by 150, 100 feet wide. But I saw that were going to emphasize saṅkīrtana and I measured that 120 by 75 was adequate.

Prabhupāda: Our visitors, they have got facility to come?

Gurudāsa: Yes.

Morning Darsana and Room Conversation Ramkrishna Bajaj and friends -- January 9, 1977, Bombay:

Guest (4): ...God's creation is so huge and vast and unfathomable. If they are able to unravel even a small part of it which was not known to human beings beforehand. So they are so proud. They don't say that they can do what God can do.

Prabhupāda: No, it is known. It is known. Kṛṣṇa says, mamaivāṁśo jīva-bhūtaḥ: (BG 15.7) "This life is my part and parcel." As soon as you study what is this life, you understand Kṛṣṇa, quality, what is Kṛṣṇa. So here is the hint, that Kṛṣṇa said mamaivāṁśo jīva-bhūtaḥ (BG 15.7). So it is very small particle. That is also mentioned in the śāstra:

keśāgra-śata-bhāgasya
satadhā kalpitasya ca
jīvo bhāgasya vijñeyaḥ
sa anantāya kalpate
(CC Madhya 19.140)

The measurement of soul is given there in the śāstra: one ten-thousandth part of the tip of the hair. So everything is there. It is not matter. And that is instructed in the Bhagavad-gītā. Nāyaṁ śāstra... Acchedyo 'yam adāhyo 'yam akledyo 'śoṣya eva ca. "This spiritual spark cannot be cut into pieces." Acchedyo 'yam adāhyo 'yam: "It cannot be burned into the fire." So... (aside:) Come on. But these rascals, they are seeing that "The body is burnt into ashes, so everything is finished." And Kṛṣṇa says, adāhyo 'yam: "It cannot be burned." So it remains.

Room Conversation -- January 21, 1977, Bhuvanesvara:

Prabhupāda: What is this scientific presentation? (laughs) It is simple thing. Kṛṣṇa is giving the example, the dehāntara. A child is changing body to boyhood, boyhood... Very simple thing. But the brain is so dull, they cannot understand.

Rāmeśvara: It is too subtle for them to see or measure with their blunt senses, so therefore they do not accept it. They think of it as just...

Prabhupāda: That is for less intelligent. We accept it, even we do not understand thoroughly. But Kṛṣṇa says, authority, śruti; we believe it.

Rāmeśvara: They have too much bad experience being cheated, so they don't believe anyone. In America...

Prabhupāda: Why you should be cheated when Kṛṣṇa says? Kṛṣṇa is not cheating.

Rāmeśvara: They would say, "How do you know God said that? Just because it is written in a book, how do you know?"

Prabhupāda: No, it is not in the book. It is accepted, all the authorities.

Room Conversation -- January 21, 1977, Bhuvanesvara:

Gargamuni: You can't have more than three...

Prabhupāda: No, why don't you stop? In spite of so many measures for checking population, the population is increasing. How it is? Some years ago I read in a paper that three men are increasing every second or every minute.

Rāmeśvara: They cannot control their sex desire. And some of these methods are imperfect.

Prabhupāda: No. Sex desire cannot be controlled by ordinary man. That's a fact. But they have invented so many things to stop increase of population. Why population is increasing? That is the point. They are killing and more... They're taking contraceptive tablets and so on, so on, a vigorous arrangement for stopping birth or checking increase of population. Why every second or every minute throughout the whole world three men are increasing? That they cannot stop. That is stated in the Bhagavad-gītā. Janma-mṛtyu-jarā-vyādhi-duḥkha-doṣānudarśanam (BG 13.9). It is indeed troublesome, but you cannot stop it. Either birth or death or disease or old age, you cannot stop. You want it. Everyone wants. Who wants to become old man like me to run on with a stick and with so many inconveniences? But I have to become old man. Who can stop it? Similarly, birth, death also, or disease... You may be proud that "We have invented medicine for cancer and...," but you cannot stop disease. That is not possible. What is their answer?

Gargamuni: "We are trying."

Room Conversation with Sannyasis -- January 22, 1977, Bhuvanesvara:

Satsvarūpa: So we have new reviews too from two professors in Finland. We have one who is a man in the Department of Nuclear Physics. He said the Indian astronomers... First... He read the Fifth Canto, with all its scientific descriptions. First he says that he did not think that they possessed instruments to measure distances, but anyway, he said their understanding is truly remarkable. Then he goes on to say... He compares it with Western astronomy. It's a long review.

Rāmeśvara: What did he say about Prabhupāda?

Satsvarūpa: There wasn't much in that way.

Prabhupāda: But they can measure the distance from one planet to another? Their astronomical measurement?

Satsvarūpa: No. Just by theory.

Prabhupāda: So how they can...?

Room Conversation -- February 18, 1977, Mayapura:

Prabhupāda: Should we read?

Hari-śauri: Oh, yes.

Prabhupāda: It is already there.

Satsvarūpa: The whole defense is prepared by Kṛṣṇa.

Prabhupāda: Kṛṣṇa has given all knowledge. Actually nobody has tried to present Bhagavad-gītā like this. That's a fact. And it is acting. (laughs) Now it is acting. Na māṁ duṣkṛtino mūḍhāḥ prapadyante... (BG 7.15). Make your defense measure consulting all these books, everything. Transmigration, in the morning I...?

Satsvarūpa: Yes.

Prabhupāda: Explain.

Satsvarūpa: You explained that whatever a person is thinking, that's his desire. At the time of death the desire is very prominent, so he takes a body according to that desire. And then you described exactly how it happens, that the subtle body carries the soul, just like the air carries the aroma of the flower into the semina of the man to the woman who supplies the ingredients, and the body comes out. In this way he travels from one body to another.

Room Conversation about Harijanas -- April 10, 1977, Bombay:

Prabhupāda: That we can teach.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: He said, "The surest way for our salvation lies in higher education."

Prabhupāda: So who forbids? Is there any restriction that... (break)

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: It says here, "Here are some measures to be implemented. The caste system should be abolished." They are always trying to abolish the caste system.

Prabhupāda: The caste system... Where is the hindrance in the caste system? If you want to become a brāhmaṇa, you can become a brāhmaṇa. Why it should be abolished?

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Incorrect understanding of it should be abolished.

Prabhupāda: "This is the definition of becoming a brāhmaṇa." Give this.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Śamaḥ damaḥ kṣamā śaucam.

Prabhupāda: So you have to learn it. How you can become a brāhmaṇa?

Room Conversation about Harijanas -- April 10, 1977, Bombay:

Prabhupāda: These are the symptoms of becoming a brāhmaṇa. You develop these symptoms. Who checks you? Practically we are doing all over the world. There is no such thing.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: All the measures...

Prabhupāda: Caste system should not be abolished, but it must be properly established. That is wanted. If you have got any defect in the eye, not that the eye should be plucked out. But it should be treated and brought into the normal condition. That is wanted. That we admit. You want to become brāhmaṇa without brahminical qualification. Not only you, everyone wants.

Bhakti-caru: You told Professor Kotovsky that this caste system is existing everywhere, in every society in the world.

Prabhupāda: Yes, yes. In the body there is caste system. The head is the brāhmaṇa, the hand is the kṣatriya, the belly is the vaiśya and the leg is the śūdra. Everything head, that will not help. There must be leg also. But it must be conducted under the guidance of the head. Then it is all right. If the head is not there and leg is utilized for jumping, that is monkey's business. The leg must work according to the dictation of the head. The hand must work according to the dictation of the head. "The caste system should be abolished." What is the caste system? There is no caste system. Everyone is śūdra.

Room Conversation -- June 18, 1977, Vrndavana:

Prabhupāda: But height, they have no...

Bhakti-prema: 80,000 miles high.

Prabhupāda: 80,000.

Bhakti-prema: We cannot measure. Aeroplane cannot...

Prabhupāda: You have measured only 28,000.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Feet.

Prabhupāda: Eh?

Yaśodānandana: Feet.

Prabhupāda: It is feet only.

Room Conversation -- June 18, 1977, Vrndavana:

Prabhupāda: They could not measure the whole thing. That is not possible.

Yaśodānandana: Then it describes here that "On the west and east of Ilāvṛta-varṣa are two great mountains named Mālyavān and Gandhamādana respectively. These two mountains, which are 2,000 yojanas, 16,000 miles..." (break) "...in the north and Niṣadha mountain in the south. They indicate the borders of Ilāvṛta-varṣa and also the varṣas named as Ketumāla-varṣa and Bhadrāśva-varṣa." Then it gets into more details regarding Mount Meru. "Text number eleven. On the four sides of the great mountain known as Sumeru are four mountains," these Mandara Parvata. This is the mountain.

Prabhupāda: So how you'll show actually?

Bhakti-prema: This is according to Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam.

Prabhupāda: No, that's all right. Now, that doll, that you have to make.

Room Conversation with Mr. Myer -- July 2, 1977, Vrndavana:

Prabhupāda: That can be done very easily. It can be done very easily, provided government wants. And we can help. We have to follow simply the Bhagavad-gītā. That's all. They are reading Bhagavad-gītā, but they do not follow. They manufacture their own interpretation. That is the difficulty. Otherwise the Bhagavad-gītā is the preliminary study of happy life and entrance, matriculation, and then Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, graduate, and then Caitanya-caritāmṛta, postgraduate. We are therefore presenting three books. So if we follow, our life is successful. But you don't follow. Daivī hy eṣā guṇamayī mama māyā duratyayā (BG 7.14). Māyā is so strong that untruthful things, we take it as truthful. Just like the modern scientists. These rascals, he could not, they cannot, they will never be able to produce life. Still, they are busy: "Yes, we will do. We shall do." The whole world is full of rascals. What they cannot do, what they could not do, what they'll never be able to do... Still, they will persist. This is the difficulty. They have never gone to moon planet, their aeroplane. They cannot go anywhere. You have got plane. They are conditioned. And they are thinking, "We are free." Just like an animal is bound up in a place, and he's going round, here and here. He's thinking the world is round. The world is round. He does not accept that "I am conditioned." They have got now aeroplane, jet plane and so many. Go anywhere. They cannot go. Still, they are proud: "We have measured." This dog's obstinacy of this modern world has killed the whole civilization.

Room Conversation -- October 4, 1977, Vrndavana:

Prabhupāda: That is real business. These astrologer are karmīs. We have nothing to do with the karmī.

Hari-śauri: Their measurement of happiness and distress is how much nice wife and children they get and how much money they get.

Prabhupāda: Yes. Bhāgavata reading and kīrtana... Hm. Hm.

Hari-śauri: They don't understand that the real happiness is giving everything to Kṛṣṇa.

Prabhupāda: Yes. Don't waste time and money in any other way.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Sometimes I find that you're sleeping, Śrīla Prabhupāda. So I was just wondering—at night, when you do most of your sleeping, whether we should still do kīrtana. I was thinking that we could do it up until nine o'clock at night and then begin in the morning again.

Prabhupāda: No.

Room Conversation With Dr. Ghosh -- October 16, 1977, Vrndavana:

Dr. Ghosh: Our name was in the waiting list. They would not give, do it. Anyway, we have reached.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: Anyway, now it is good that you have come.

Dr. Ghosh: You should measure his urine.

Tamāla Kṛṣṇa: We do. We do that. We have kept a record for two months now of everything that he takes in and passes out.

Prabhupāda: You can show him the record? Huh?

Page Title:Measure (Conversations)
Compiler:Marc, Mayapur
Created:16 of Sep, 2011
Totals by Section:BG=0, SB=0, CC=0, OB=0, Lec=0, Con=90, Let=0
No. of Quotes:90