GOSPEL OF RAMAKRISHNA
knowledge. God is the real Actor, others are actors in name only.
The calf says, "Hamma" or "Aham" (I). Now look at the troubles caused by the self which The ego of a calf. says "I, I." In the first place, the calf is sometimes taken into the field where it is yoked to the plough. It is there made to work on from morning till evening, alike in the sun and in the rain. Its troubles are not yet over. It is very often killed by the butcher. Its flesh is eaten as meat. Its skin is tanned into hides which are then made into shoes. The sufferings of the calf in this state know no bounds. But that is not all. Drums are made with the skin which is thus merci-lessly beaten, sometimes with the hand and sometimes with the drumstick. It is only when out of its entrails are made strings for the bows used for carding cotton that the troubles of the poor creature are over. And that is because it no longer says, "Hamma, Hamma" (I, I), but "Tuhum, Tuhum" (It is Thou, O Lord! It is Thou!). Similarly, when Jiva (ego) says, "O Lord! Not I but Thou art the doer and actor, I am merely an instrument in Thy hand," it becomes free from all the world's troubles and attains to absolute freedom from birth and
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