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PROLOGUE
(darshan), and conduct (charitra), in the right (samyak) direction, and to wean the humanity away from the evil and the devil, violence and hatred, cruelty and intolerance. The practice of the principles of Jainism makes the mind and the body tension-free, tranquil and full of equanimity and spiritual vitality.
A few months back when I was with Gurudev Chitrabhanu at his residence in Bombay, we happened to discuss about his prolific correspondence with young and old American and European seekers. When I requested him to share some of the inspiring paragraphs from his students' letters, he read the paragraphs to me and I felt they contained pearl drops of wisdom and knowledge which deserved to be shared widely to promote love and compassion all over the world.
Gurudev instantly welcomed my proposal to digest them in a book form in order to bring out how well, how clearly and correctly, how enthusiastically, spiritually and emotionally had so many foreigners embraced Jainism not merely as a religion but as a way of life in terms of their vegetarian habits, meditation discipline, study of Jain scriptures and vital grasp of the need to attain self-control and self restraint which alone could be instrumental in victory over one's inner self and release of tremendous soul energy for the good of oneself as well as for the good and happiness of others.
That is how I came to write this book from those inspiring gist of the letters dating back to sixtees and continuing since to the present times. I read them once, read them again and again. It was like reading Jain scriptures. Everytime I 'experienced a delightful directness, an awareness full of soul-power, a feeling of gratefulness at having been able to come so close to the deeply
