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THE IDEAL OF THE KARMAYOGIN that Srikrishna manifests Himself; it is as the Zeitgeist consummating in a moment the work carefully prepared for decades that He appears to Arjuna. All have been moving inevitably towards the catastrophe of Kurukshetra. Men did not know it; those who would have done everything possible to avert the calamity, helped its coming by their action or inaction; those who had a glimpse of it strove in vain to stop the wheels of Fate, Srikrishna Himself as the nishkama karmayogin who does His duty without regard to results, went on that hopeless embassy to Hastinapura; but the Zeitgeist overbore all. It was only afterwards that men saw how like rivers speeding towards the sea like moths winging towards the lighted flame all that splendid, powerful and arrogant Indian world with its clans of kings and its weapons and its chariots and its gigantic armies were rushing. towards the open mouths of the Destroyer to be lost
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