Religious Leaders

"Work honestly, meditate every day, meet people without fear, and play."

"The world is an abstract art. We see it as we want to see it. It is a garden of roses and it is also a forest of thorny bushes and poison oak."

"Faith and devotion are the foundation on which meditation is built."

"Contentment, compassion, and tolerance are the pillars of peace."

"A person knows what he knows. An animal knows, but doesn't know what he knows. In Yoga, "I" consciousness is called asmita klesha. It is classified as an affliction and a hindrance to attaining higher consciousness."

"Don't think that you are carrying the whole world; make it easy. Make it play, make it a prayer."

"The aim of life is to attain peace. No one can give us peace. We can't buy or borrow it. We have to cultivate it by practicing yama and niyama (yoga restraints and observances)."

"All sadhanas or methods are for simply tricking the mind. The trick is to not let the mind spread out in a form of thoughts."

"Q: What is silence? A: Silence is an austerity. You control your desire to talk. By talking, people try to impress others, which you can't do if you are in silence. In silence you have to develop tolerance. At first it is difficult to do because you separate yourself from others by not expressing yourself. But gradually the mind reduces that ego and an aspirant accepts the situation, which develops tolerance and reduces anger."

"Within the physical body every human being has a subtle body made up of invisible structures and energies (kundalini, nadis, and chakras); and within the subtle is the causal body out of which the subtle and physical bodies are formed."

"Q: How can we stop the mind? A: Not hitting it with a hammer. Stop the mind by the mind."

"There is always a chance for a person to break out of the cycle, but there is no such chance for an animal unless it incarnates as a human and develops "I" consciousness."

"Q: What can I do to overcome my fear of death? A: Attachment to the body causes fear of death. It is the strongest attachment. Even a newborn infant has this attachment. To overcome the fear of death it is necessary to accept that we all have to die."

"God is the only lover and He loves in different forms - parents, husband, wife, friend, children, animals. All are His forms and He, Himself, has no form."

"Without watching ourselves we can't be aware of the tricks the mind plays. So a yogi should be alert all the time."

"What is mind? A heap of thoughts."

"Q: Is life a dream or a meditation? A: Life is a meditation when you know it is a dream."

"..it was well known to people (in Kumoan villages) that Babaji Maharaj's (Hariakhan Baba) age was several thousand years and that he was present at the War of Mahabharata at the time of Krishna."

"In 1929, for the first time, I paid attention to the stories being told by older people about Sombari Maharaj and Hariakhan Maharaj."

"Q: How do you define ego? A: Ego is life. To keep the body's existence is ego. It is the part of the mind which identifies a creature with the world. Ego self tells you, “This is my body,” and also tells you, “This is my Self.” It connects the two."

"When I was building Kenchi Ashram, which is in Nainital District, I was told by the villagers that Hariakhan Maharaj used to live in a cave there. I preserved that cave, which is behind Hanuman Temple at Kenchi."

"Teach to learn. Watch yourself before you teach."

"Pleasure has desire in it. Desire is pain. There is no satisfaction. So pleasure is pain."

"Your body is the temple of your soul. Your soul is God's temple."

"Q: Can intellect aid understanding? A: It helps in the beginning but cannot give full enlightenment. The mind is the main instrument to gain enlightenment, but enlightenment is only reached when the mind stops."

"A wise person is one who sees the effect of an action before he acts."

"How many teachers did you have? A: Myself."

"Haridas was also very active in building the Kainchi temples and purchasing materials for them. His associates, mostly from Nainital, were his friends and companions... Some of them were so attached to him that they parted from Babaji [Neem Karoli] when Haridas left in 1968. The work ran smoothly under Haridas's leadership, with the full cooperation of his associates."

"Religion of your upbringing is like a cloak - you must know how it is made in order to take it off."

"Q: Did you start life like us with lots of demands, and what spurred you to give it up? A: When I was six or seven, I would feel I was inside a box of earth and sky, and I would weep. Once I asked my mother: "Take me out of this box of earth and sky." She said, "I can't." Then I said, "I'm going.""

"Using siddhis (powers) is not good for those who possess them. It can also trap the mind into desires. By being pure in mind siddhis will come by itself, and a yogi should not try to show his powers. First thing is to have siddhis and then not to get trapped in siddhis."

"We cannot describe it. We cannot reveal it. And when we do, we disappear."

"When a person realizes peace inside by doing yoga, he will not smoke and get peace disturbed. The peace obtained by yoga is much higher than the pleasure of smoking."

"The ashram [religious hermitage] protects man from the world. Man must protect himself from the ashram."

"I assure you that I shall never cease to exert myself to the utmost in the cause of reform, and that I will never decline any office which may increase my power to effect it. I am nearly certain of being nominated to the office of Moderator in the year 1818-1819, and as I am an examiner in virtue of my office, for the next year I shall pursue a course even more decided than hitherto, since I shall feel that men have been prepared for the change, and will then be enabled to have acquired a better system by the publication of improved elementary books. I have considerable influence as a lecturer, and I will not neglect it. It is by silent perseverance only, that we can hope to reduce the many-headed monster of prejudice and make the University answer her character as the loving mother of good learning and science."

"This work... was designed in the first instance to be a second edition of a Treatise on Algebra, published in 1830, and which has been long out of print; but I have found it necessary, in carrying out the principles developed in that work, to present the subject in so novel a form, that I could not with propriety consider it in any other light than as an entirely new treatise."

"I have separated arithmetical from symbolical algebra, and I have devoted the present volume entirely to the exposition of the principles of the former science and their application to the theory of numbers and of arithmetical processes: the second volume, which is now in the press, will embrace the principles of symbolical algebra: it will be followed, if other and higher duties should allow me the leisure to complete them, by other works, embracing all the more important departments of analysis, with the view of presenting their principles in such a form, as may make them component parts of one uniform and connected system."

"In arithmetical algebra we consider symbols as representing numbers, and the operations to which they are submitted as included in the same definitions as in common arithmetic; the signs + and - denote the operations of addition and subtraction in their ordinary meaning only, and those operations are considered as impossible in all cases where the symbols subjected to them possess values which would render them so in case they were replaced by digital numbers; thus in expressions such as a + b we must suppose a and b to be quantities of the same kind; in others, like a - b, we must suppose a greater than b and therefore homogeneous with it; in products and quotients, like ab and \frac{a}{b} we must suppose the multiplier and divisor to be abstract numbers; all results whatsoever, including negative quantities, which are not strictly deducible as legitimate conclusions from the definitions of the several operations must be rejected as impossible, or as foreign to the science."

"I Gladly avail myself of the opportunity of inscribing to you, for a second time, a work of mine on Algebra, as a sincere tribute of my respect, affection and gratitude. I trust that I shall not be considered as derogating from the higher duties which, (in common with you), I owe to my station in the Church, if I continue to devote some portion of the leisure at my command, to the completion of an extensive Treatise, embracing the more important departments of Analysis, the execution of which I have long contemplated, and which, in its first volume I now offer to the public, under the auspices of one of my best and dearest friends."

"Symbolical algebra adopts the rules of arithmetical algebra, but removes altogether their restrictions: thus symbolical subtraction differs from the same operation in arithmetical algebra in being possible for all relations of value of the symbols or expressions employed... all the results of arithmetical algebra which are deduced by the application of its rules, and which are general in form, though particular in value, are results likewise of symbolical algebra, where they are general in value as well as in form: thus the product of a^{m} and a^{n}, which is a^{m+n} when m and n are whole numbers, and therefore general in form though particular in value, will be their product likewise when m and n are general in value as well as in form: the series for (a+b)^{n}, determined by the principles of arithmetical algebra, when n is any whole number, if it be exhibited in a general form, without reference to a final term, may be shewn, upon the same principle, to the equivalent series for (a+b)^n, when n is general both in form and value."

"It is now more than twenty years since I somewhat rashly undertook to write the Life of Dr. Young. For many years, however, after making this engagement, I found myself so much occupied by the duties of a very laborious college office, that I had no leisure to commence the work; and when the possession of leisure would have enabled me to have done so, my health became so seriously deranged that I felt myself unequal to any continued and severe literary labour. The undertaking was consequently abandoned, and it was proposed to transfer it to other hands; but it was not found easy to secure the services of a person who possessed sufficient scientific knowledge to enable him to write the life of an author whose works were so various in their character and not unfrequently so difficult to understand and analyse, as those of Dr. Young."

"This principle, which is thus made the foundation of the operations and results of Symbolical Algebra, has been called "The principle of the permanence of equivalent forms", and may be stated as follows: "Whatever algebraical forms are equivalent, when the symbols are general in form but specific in value, will be equivalent likewise when the symbols are general in value as well as in form.""

"I have endeavoured... to present the principles and applications of Symbolical, in immediate sequence to those of Arithmetical, Algebra, and at the same time to preserve that strict logical order and simplicity of form and statement which is essential to an elementary work. This is a task of no ordinary difficulty, more particularly when the great generality of the language of Symbolical Algebra and the wide range of its applications are considered, and this difficulty has not been a little increased, in the present instance, by the wide departure of my own views of its principles from those which have been commonly entertained."

"The Lord works from the inside out."

"The modern Witness believes that Russell was selected and used by God because of his understanding of the various facets of the return of Christ and the end of the age. The evidence proves otherwise. The doctrinal system he developed was nothing more than a rehash of concepts and beliefs derived from other people whose theories had been in existence for a long time. Probably the only unique feature about Russell was the he took all these borrowed concepts and applied smart merchandising methods to spread them far and wide."

"Russell referred quite openly to the assistance in Bible study he had received from others.... C. T. Russell used the Watch Tower and other publications to uphold Bible truths and to refute false religious teachings and human philosophies that contradicted the Bible. He did not, however, claim to discover new truths.....What about other Bible doctrines that were discussed in the Watch Tower and other publications? Did Russell take full credit for uncovering these gems of truth? Explained Russell: “We found that for centuries various sects and parties had split up the Bible doctrines amongst them, blending them with more or less of human speculation and error . . . Then how did Russell perceive the role that he and his associates played in publishing Scriptural truth? He explained: “Our work . . . has been to bring together these long scattered fragments of truth and present them to the Lord’s people—not as new, not as our own, but as the Lord’s. . . . We must disclaim any credit even for the finding and rearrangement of the jewels of truth.” He further stated: “The work in which the Lord has been pleased to use our humble talents has been less a work of origination than of reconstruction, adjustment, harmonization.”"

"Charles Taze Russell left a legacy of prophetic speculation, pseudoreligious theology, and pseudoscientific, pseudomedical quackery that persists in the present-day Watch Tower organization with continued change and adaptation (a hallmark of Watch Tower policy). His life was plagued by lawsuits, controversy, a disintigrated marriage, and the failure of all his prophecies. In his lifetime he played many roles, some of which were ascribed to him by his followers - businessman, orator, writer, teacher, Bible exegete, scholar, historian, medical advisor, and, above all, prophet of God."

"An examination of Russell's eschatalogy reveals that he was an avid reader, and if not a plagiarist, certainly was given to "creative adaptation". The current leadership of the Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society likes to claim a special spiritual authority from God that they trace back to Russell. They would have the world believe that Russell uniquely understood the "times and seasons" that he had found himself in, and that he was led by God to understand the element of chronology that is the backbone of their belief system to this day. Although the vast majority of millenarian groups ultimately abandoned their theories, the Watch Tower system is basically a carryover of stale nineteenth-century Adventism."

"The doctrine of predestination and eternal punishment gave him particular difficulty, and by the time he was seventeen he had become an avowed skeptic, discarding the Bible and the creeds of the churches."

"The two most prominent messengers, are the first and the last - St. Paul and Pastor Russell."