Parables of Rama
by Swami Rama Tirtha | 102,836 words
Stories in English used by Swami Rama to illustrate the highest teaching of Vedanta. The most difficult and intricate problems of philosophy and abstract truths, which may very well tax the brains of the most intellectual, are thus made not only simple and easy to understand but also brought home to us in a concrete form in such an interesting and ...
A crazy man once came up to the boys of the street and told them that the Mayor of the city was preparing a grand, royal feast, and had invited all the children to partake of the feast. You know, children like candies and sweets. The children being assured by the crazy man of the feast arranged by the Mayor, ran to the house of the Mayor; but there was no feast at all, nothing of the kind. The children were baffled; but they were put out of countenance for a while and there was hansi (laughing), and the children said to him "How is it Mr.—that you too came when you knew that this story which you told was wrong?" He said, "Lest there be a real feast, lest the story be true and I miss it." For this reason because he did not wish to miss it, he also followed the boys.
Exactly the same is the case of those who by their imagination, by their own benediction make flowers beautiful, make every object in this world attractive, make everything desirable by their own imagination, like the crazy man, and then they want to run after it, so that they may not miss it.
MORAL: By our own imagination you make things attractive and then run after them.