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Shri Mahavir Jain Aradhana Kendra
78
www.kobatirth.org
SAINT MIRA
Acharya Shri Kailassagarsuri Gyanmandir
overwhelmed by their outer glamour. Wherever I spoke, I humbly set forth my belief in India's mission to the modern West. I repeatedly said that Europe was declining. I realised more than ever before why Schopenhauer had turned to Hindu thought as the solace of his life, the solace of his death. Wherever I went India was with me. Not the India of the modern politician, the noisy India of the clamorous crowds of cities,-but the India of her Rishis and Saints, the India that communed with the Eternal, and in her forest-schools built up a civilisation which made her a preceptor of the nations in the long ago."
From his earliest years, Dadaji's heart was smitten with love for the Lord: he longed to dedicate his life to the service of God and His suffering children. The ideal that he had always placed before himself was that of the fakir,-the man who took the Word of God to waiting hearts, the man who was shorn of all possessions and was God-possessed. But for several years he had to do "secular" work. He served as Principal of more than one college; he became an idol of youth. There was a brilliant career open to him, but he was not out to carve a career for himself. He was forty years of age when his mother passed away. His only link with earthly existence having broken, he resigned his job. He renounced everything to be, in his own words, "an humble servant of India and the Rishis."
"Why do you give up your lucrative job?" they said to him; "you are still young. You have a bright future before you you can make money, heaps of money."
"Life is not given to make money," he replied.
And they asked him :-"What is the purpose of life?"
He replied "To dedicate it to the Love Divine: to serve and be poured out as a sacrifice!"
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