Swami Vivekananda tells importance of Chastity for success in Yoga

[Guest guest]

Practical Religion: Breathing And Meditation (Delivered in San Francisco,

April 5, 1900)

 

Another condition [for success in Yoga] is chastity. It is the corner-stone

of all practice. Married or unmarried — perfect chastity. It is a long

subject, of course, but I want to tell you: Public discussions of this

subject are not to the taste of this country. These Western countries are

full of the most degraded beings in the shape of teachers who teach men and

women that if they are chaste they will be hurt. How do they gather all

this? ... People come to me — thousands come every year — with this one

question. Someone has told them that if they are chaste and pure they will

be hurt physically.... How do these teachers know it? Have they been chaste?

Those unchaste, impure fools, lustful creatures, want to drag the whole

world down to their [level]! ...

 

Nothing is gained except by sacrifice.... The holiest function of our human

consciousness, the noblest, do not make it unclean! Do not degrade it to the

level of the brutes.... Make yourselves decent men! ... Be chaste and pure!

.... There is no other way. Did Christ find any other way? ... If you can

conserve and use the energy properly, it leads you to God. Inverted, it is

hell itself ....

 

It is much easier to do anything upon the external plane, but the greatest

conqueror in the world finds himself a mere child when he tries to control

his own mind. This is the world he has to conquer — the greater and more

difficult world to conquer. Do not despair! Awake, arise, and stop not until

the goal is reached!...

 

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