"The devotee of God wants to eat sugar, and not become sugar. (All laugh.) Do you know how a lover of God feels? His attitude is: "O God, Thou art the Master, and I am Thy servant. Thou art the Mother, and I Thy child." Or again: 'Thou art my Father and Mother. Thou art the Whole, and I am a part.' He does not like to say, "I am Brahman." They yogi seeks to realize the Paramatman, the Supreme Soul. His ideal is the union of the embodied soul and the Supreme Soul. He withdraws his mind from sense objects and tries to concentrate on the Paramatman. Therefore, during the first stage of his spiritual discipline, he retires into solitude and with undivided attention practices meditation in a fixed posture. But the reality is one and the same; the difference is only in name. He who is Brahman is verily Atman, and again, He is the Bhagavan. He is Brahman to the followers of the path of knowledge, Paramatman to the yogis, and Bhagavan to the lovers of God." (Sri Ramakrishna Kathamrita, "The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna", 1882)
"A truly religious man should think that other religions also have many paths leading to the truth. One should always maintain an attitude of respect towards other religions. Dispute not, as you rest firmly on your own faith and opinion, allow others also equal liberty to stand by their own faith and opinion." (Sri Ramakrishna Kathamrita, "Râmakrishna: His Life and Sayings", 1898)
"So long as the bee is outside the petals of the lily, and has not tasted the sweetness of its honey, it hovers around the flower emitting the buzzing sound; but when it is inside the flower, it noiselessly drinks the nectar. So long as a man quarrels and disputes about doctrines and dogmas, he has not tasted the nectar of true faith; when he has tasted it, he becomes quiet and full of peace." (Sri Ramakrishna Kathamrita, "Râmakrishna: His Life and Sayings", 1898)
"The manifestation of the Divinity must be understood to be in greater degree in those who are honoured, respected, and obeyed by a large following, than in those who have gained no such influence." (Sri Ramakrishna Kathamrita, "Râmakrishna: His Life and Sayings", 1898)
"Many good sayings are to be found in holy books, but merely reading them will not make one religious." (Sri Ramakrishna Kathamrita, "Sri Ramakrishna's Teachings", 1916)
"God is directly perceived by the mind, but not by this ordinary mind. It is the pure mind that perceives God, and at that time this ordinary mind does not function. A mind that has the slightest trace of attachment to the world cannot be called pure. When all the impurities of the mind are removed, you may call that mind Pure Mind or Pure Ātman." (Sri Ramakrishna Kathamrita, "The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna", 1942)
"God reveals Himself to a devotee who feels drawn to Him by the combined force of these three attractions: the attraction of worldly possessions for the worldly man, the child's attraction for its mother, and the husband's attraction for the chaste wife. If one feels drawn to Him by the combined force of these three attractions, then through it one can attain Him." (Sri Ramakrishna Kathamrita, "The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna", 1942)
"Live in the world like a waterfowl. The water clings to the bird, but the bird shakes it off. Live in the world like a mudfish. The fish lives in the mud, but its skin is always bright and shiny." (Sri Ramakrishna Kathamrita, "The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna", 1942)
"One can easily realize God if one is free from guile. Spiritual instruction produces quick results in a guileless heart. Such a heart is like well cultivated land from which all the stones have been removed. No sooner is the seed sown than it germinates. The fruit also appears quickly." (Sri Ramakrishna Kathamrita, "The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna", 1942)
"One cannot attain divine knowledge till one gets rid of pride. Water does not stay on the top of a mound; but into low land it flows in torrents from all sides." (Sri Ramakrishna Kathamrita, "The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna", 1942)
"The Pure Mind and the Pure Ātman are one and the same thing. Whatever comes up in the Pure Mind is the voice of God." (Sri Ramakrishna Kathamrita, "The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna", 1942)
"The waves belong to the Ganges, not the Ganges to the waves. A man cannot realize God unless he gets rid of all such egotistic ideas as "I am such an important man" or 'I am so and so'. Level the mound of "I" to the ground by dissolving it with tears of devotion." (Sri Ramakrishna Kathamrita, "The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna", 1942)
"A boat may stay in water, but water should not stay in boat. A spiritual aspirant may live in the world, but the world should not live within him." (Sri Ramakrishna Kathamrita)
"A man is truly free, even here in this embodied state, if he knows that God is the true agent and he by himself is powerless to do anything." (Sri Ramakrishna Kathamrita)
"As a piece of rope, when burnt, retains its form, but cannot serve to bind, so is the ego which is burnt by the fire of supreme Knowledge." (Sri Ramakrishna Kathamrita)
"As the shell, the pith and the kernel of the fruit are all produced form one parent seed of the tree, so from the one Lord is produced the whole of creation, animate and inanimate, spiritual and material." (Sri Ramakrishna Kathamrita)
"As the snake is separate from its slough, even so is the Spirit separate from the body." (Sri Ramakrishna Kathamrita)
"Brahman is beyond mind and speech, beyond concentration and meditation, beyond the knower, the known and knowledge, beyond even the conception of the real and unreal. In short, It is beyond all relativity." (Sri Ramakrishna Kathamrita)
"Disease is the tax which the soul pays for the body, as the tenant pays house-rent for the use of the house." (Sri Ramakrishna Kathamrita)
"Honour both spirit and form, the sentiment within as well as the symbol without." (Sri Ramakrishna Kathamrita)
"It's enough to have faith in one aspect of God. You have faith in God without form. That is very good. But never get into your head that your faith alone is true and every other is false. Know for certain that God without form is real and that God with form is also real. Then hold fast to whichever faith appeals to you." (Sri Ramakrishna Kathamrita)
"It is easy to talk on religion, but difficult to practice it." (Sri Ramakrishna Kathamrita)
"Knowledge leads to unity, and Ignorance to diversity." (Sri Ramakrishna Kathamrita)
"Many are the names of God, and infinite the forms that lead us to know Him. In whatsoever name or form you desire to call Him, in that very form and name you will see Him." (Sri Ramakrishna Kathamrita)
"Meditate upon the Knowledge and Bliss Eternal, and you will also have bliss. The Bliss indeed is eternal, only it is covered and obscured by ignorance. The less your attachment is towards the senses, the more will be your love towards God." (Sri Ramakrishna Kathamrita)
"Right discrimination is of two kinds — analytical and synthetical. The first leads one from the phenomena to the Absolute Brahman, while by the second one knows how the Absolute Brahman appears as the universe." (Sri Ramakrishna Kathamrita)
"Sunlight is one and the same wherever it falls; but only a bright surface like that of water, or of a mirror reflects it fully. So is the light Divine. It falls equally and impartially on all hearts, but the pure and pious hearts of holy men receive and reflect that light well." (Sri Ramakrishna Kathamrita)
"That knowledge which purifies the mind and heart alone is true Knowledge, all else is only a negation of Knowledge." (Sri Ramakrishna Kathamrita)
"The magnetic needle always points to the north, and hence it is that sailing vessel does not lose her direction. So long as the heart of man is directed towards God, he cannot be lost in the ocean of worldliness." (Sri Ramakrishna Kathamrita)
"The nearer you come to God, the less you are disposed to questioning and reasoning. When you actually attain Him, when you behold Him as the reality, then all noise, all disputations, come to an end." (Sri Ramakrishna Kathamrita)
"The young bamboo can be easily bent, but the full grown bamboo breaks when it is bent with force. It is easy to bend the young heart towards God, but the untrained heart of the old escapes the hold whenever it is so drawn." (Sri Ramakrishna Kathamrita)
"To drink pure water from a shallow pond one should gently take the water from the surface without disturbing the pond in the least. If it is disturbed, the sediments rise up and make the whole water muddy. If you desire to be pure, have firm faith, and slowly go on with your devotional practices, without wasting your energy in useless scriptural discussions and arguments. Your little brain will otherwise be muddled." (Sri Ramakrishna Kathamrita)
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