Paul Brunton - The Maharshi and His Message #2

[Guest guest]

 

The Maharshi and His Message

By Paul Brunton

 

 

 

The author (Paul Brunton) writes more on this Sage in

The Secret Path as follows:

 

Some years ago I wandered for a while through sunbaked

Oriental lands, intent on discovering the last remnants of that

‘mystic East’ about which most of us often hear, but which few

of us ever find. During those journeyings I met an unusual

man who quickly earned my profound respect and received

my humble veneration. For although he belonged by tradition

to the class of Wise Men of the East, a class which has largely

disappeared from the modern world, he avoided all record of

his existence and disdained all efforts to give him publicity.

 

Time rushes onward like a roaring stream, bearing the human

race with it, and drowning our deepest thoughts in its noise.

Yet this Sage sat apart, quietly ensconced upon the grassy

bank, and watched the gigantic spectacle with a calm Buddha-

like smile. The world wants its great men to measure their

lives by its puny foot rule. But no rule has yet been devised

which will take their full height, for such men, if they are

really worth the name, derive their greatness, not from

themselves but from another source. And that source stretches

far away into the Infinite. Hidden here and there in stray

corners of Asia and Africa, a few Seers have preserved the

traditions of an ancient wisdom. They live like angels as they

guard their treasure. They live outwardly apart, this celestial

race, keeping alive the divine secrets, which life and fate have

conspired to confide in their care.

 

The hour of our first meeting is still graven on my memory.

I met him unexpectedly. He made no attempt at formal

introduction. For an instant, those sibylline eyes gazed into

mine, but all the stained earth of my past and the white flowers

that had begun to spring upon it, were alike seen during that

one tinkle of the bell of time. There in that seated being was

a great impersonal force that read the scales of my life with

better sight than I could ever hope to do. I had slept in the

scented bed of Aphrodite, and he knew it; I had also lured

the gnomes of thought to mine for strange enchanted gold

in the depths of my spirit; he knew that too. I felt, too, that if

I could follow him into his mysterious places of thought, all

my miseries would drop away, my resentments turn to

toleration, and I would understand life, not merely grumble

at it! He interested me much despite the fact that his wisdom

was not of a kind which is easily apparent and despite the

strong reserve which encircled him. He broke his habitual

silence only to answer questions upon such recondite topics

as the nature of man’s soul, the mystery of God, the strange

powers which lie unused in the human mind, and so on, but

when he did venture to speak I used to sit enthralled as I

listened to his soft voice under burning tropic sun or pale

crescent moon. For authority was vested in that calm voice

and inspiration gleamed in those luminous eyes. Each phrase

that fell from his lips seemed to contain some precious

fragment of essential truth. The theologians of a stuffier

century taught the doctrine of man’s original goodness.

 

In the presence of this Sage one felt security and inward peace.

The spiritual radiations which emanated from him were all-

penetrating. I learnt to recognise in his person the sublime

truths which he taught, while I was no less hushed into

reverence by his incredibly sainted atmosphere. He possessed

a deific personality which defies description. I might have

taken shorthand notes of the discourses of the Sage. I might

even print the record of his speech. But the most important

part of his utterances, the subtle and silent flavour of

spirituality which emanated from him, can never be reported.

If, therefore, I burn literary incense before his bust, it is but a

mere fraction of the tribute I ought to pay him.

 

One could not forget that wonderful pregnant smile of his,

with its hint of wisdom and peace won from suffering and

experience. He was the most understanding man I have ever

known; you could be sure always of some words from him

that would smooth your way a little, and that word always

verified what your deepest feeling told you already.

The words of this Sage still flame out in my memory like

beacon lights. ‘I pluck golden fruit from rare meetings with

wise men,’ wrote trans-Atlantic Emerson in his diary, and it

is certain that I plucked whole basketfuls during my talks

with this man. Our best philosophers of Europe could not

hold a candle to him. But the inevitable hour of parting came.

............................