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THE KEY OF KNOWLEDGE.
This was the idea of the temple and the church. ... The idea is that by keeping holy vibrations there the place becomes and remains - illumined."
How many of the places of worship can be said to have preserved their holiness up to the present day, need not be asked. It is no use talking of our holiness when it is well known that the Sunday visit to the church is purely an act of Pharisee-hypocrisy with the object of being considered holy by our fellowmen. When in the church men look round for pretty feminine faces, and the eyes of the fair sex are, more often than otherwise, fixed criticisingly on the new hats and dresses of their fair neighbours, it is then the merest mockery to attend the House of God.
We may now proceed to a consideration of the principle of non-attachment to the fruits of action. Here, again, the object is to rid the soul of its worldly desires. Work we all must perform to avoid stagnation, but it is essential that we should not make our happiness dependent on its result. The significance of work, in religion, is very different from what we ordinarily understand by the word. By work, in its religious sense, is not meant the plodding drudgery of the toiler after riches, nor the performance of labour, whether mental or physical, for the sake of gain. “Work in Vedanta," says Swami Rama Tirtha," always means harmonious vibrations with the Real Self and attunement with the Universe. This unselfish union with the One Reality which is the only real work, is oftentimes labelled and branded as no work, or idleness." Spiritual' work,' certainly, does not mean labour for some worldly gain. The real significance of work in religion is the contemplation
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