Book Title: Karma Yoga
Author(s): Swami Vivekanand
Publisher: Ramkrishna Mission Institute of Culture Culcutta

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Page 313
________________ ITS CENTRAL SECRET. 115 philosophy. This world may be said to be divided between persons of demoniacal nature, who think the taking care of the body to be the be-all and the end-all of existence, and persons of godly nature, who realise that the body is simply a means to an end-an instrument intended for the culture of the soul. The devil can and indeed does quote the scriptures for its own purposes ; and thus the way of knowledge appears to offer justification to what the bad man does, as much as it offers inducements to what the good man does. This is the great danger in JnanaYoga. But Bhakti-Yoga is natural, sweet, and gentle. The bhakta does not take such high flights as the jnana-yogin, and therefore he is not apt to have such big falls. Yetuntil the bondages of the soul pass away, it cannot of course be free, whatever may be, the path that the religious man takes. Here is a passage showing how, in the case of one of the blessed Gopis, the

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