first illumine press edition July, 2010
Copyright (c) 2010 Sri Chinmoy Centre
All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Illumine Press, a division of Illumine Group, LLC, New York.
The Illumine colophon is a registered trademark of Illumine Group, LLC.
Bird drawing by Sri Chinmoy. Back cover photo by Adarini Inkei. Edited by Sanjay Rawal.
ISBN 978-0-9824284-6-7
Smashwords edition 978-0-9824284-7-4
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Designed in the United States of America
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
SRI CHINMOY
America the Beautiful
Sri Chinmoy (1931-2007) was a poet, author, philosopher, playwright, athlete and musician who dedicated his life to the pursuit of peace and goodwill. The recipient of numerous prizes, awards and honorary doctorates, he has been recognized globally for the simplicity and power of his work. He was born in India and made his home in New York City from April, 1964 until his passing in October, 2007. This is the first paperback of Sri Chinmoy’s writing published by Illumine Press and is being released in honor of the 46th anniversary of his arrival in the West.
America the Beautiful
Reflections
on Her Past,
Present and Future
Compiled from the writings of
SRI CHINMOY
foreword by
Dr. James G. Basker
Richard Gilder Professor of Literary History,
Barnard College, Columbia University
President, Gilder Lehrman Institute of
American
History
edited by
Sanjay Rawal
Illumine Press
A Division of Illumine Group, LLC
New York
Praise for the Author
Sri Chinmoy’s many contributions to American life and culture
have been expressed through teaching, athletics, art, music, poetry
and literature. He combines the contemplative traditions of his
native India with the dynamism of his adopted America to serve
humanity . . . He has dedicated his life to inspiring and serving all
those trying to make the world a better place, whether ordinary
citizens or those entrusted with the stewardship of a nation.
–
Congressman Gary L. Ackerman,
Congressional Record, July 27, 2006
As an accomplished poet, author, artist, musician, athlete and
spiritual leader, you have lived your life to the fullest and your
achievements are innumerable. Whether it be your service to the UN,
the Sri Chinmoy Oneness-Home Peace Run [now the World Harmony Run],
the Peace-Blossoms, or your numerous university and literary awards,
you have not only been tremendously successful, but inspirational.
Your tireless efforts to promote peace around the world is not only
exemplary but testimony to the indomitable spirit. May you continue
to change the world with your simple message of peace and love.
–
Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan,
April 29, 1999
I congratulate you on the momentous occasion – the 25th
anniversary of your coming to the United States of America. I applaud
your efforts to achieve world peace. Your activities have touched
people in all walks of life in many continents and I wish you
continued success.
– Senator Edward M. Kennedy,
June 30,
1989
Your varied activities on behalf of world peace are well known. My
prayer is that all citizens of this country and the world will join
in quiet, selfless acts of living a life of peace. It will be from
this base that lasting peace will spring.
– Senator Claiborne
Pell,
November 25, 1992
It was an honor knowing and working with
Sri Chinmoy over his
many years of dedication by this wonderful philosopher and advocate
of world peace. Sri Chinmoy’s contribution to the world has
enriched all of our lives with his living spirituality and with his
dedication to world peace.
– former Congressman Benjamin A.
Gilman,
October 9, 2009
Sri Chinmoy has brought forth gifts of beauty and redemption in
numerous genres and fields of artistic endeavour. Like Gandhi, like
Mother Teresa, like Martin Luther King, Jr., Sri Chinmoy’s presence
and work among us has enriched all of our lives.
– Professor
Charles Johnson, Winner, National Book Award, November 4, 1995
Contents
Publisher’s Note 3
Foreword by Dr. James G. Basker 7
Prologue 15
Awakening 19
Blossoming 37
Reflections 55
Future 71
Notes 95
Biography of Author 101
Publisher’s Note
America the Beautiful: Reflections on Her Past, Present and Future is a compilation of nearly 40 years of material authored by Sri Chinmoy in the form of poems, prose, and lectures.
Sri Chinmoy came to the United States as a young man of 32 in 1964 and spent his first two years working at the Indian Consulate on East 64th Street in New York City. Moving from Greenwich Village to Brooklyn to the Upper East Side, and then finally to Queens, Sri Chinmoy took great inspiration from the generosity of spirit and dynamism of New York City and the spiritual awakening of the country.
Even while in India, Sri Chinmoy was a keen student of American history and those great figures who shaped American policy, aspirations, art and psyche. The culmination of twenty years of spiritual discipline at an Ashram, his arrival in America was prompted by an inner call urging him to travel to the West to be of service to sincere spiritual seekers.
In Sri Chinmoy’s first decade in the United States he traveled the nation, delivering lectures at august institutions and universities. He also developed treasured friendships with local, regional and national luminaries in many fields who exemplified the Founding Fathers’ dedication to freedom and liberty. At the same time, he witnessed firsthand the upheaval of the ’60s and then the political and social events of the next four decades.
Sri Chinmoy approached reality from an inner vantage point, concentrating on the essence, soul or potentiality rather than current outer circumstances. Sri Chinmoy always chose to highlight the ultimate divine destiny of humanity. It was his visionary nature that prompted countless messages of support from Senators, Congressmen and other prominent American leaders over the years. He always encouraged what was good and used that positivity as an illumining force.
This selection is by no means an exhaustive tome of Sri Chinmoy’s writings on America, but a mere glimpse at a literary œuvre both vast in its scope and deep in its insight.
Sri Chinmoy loved America. America was his home for 43 years. Her ideals were his aspiration. Her progress and happiness were his goal.
This is the inaugural publication of Illumine Press, released to commemorate the 46th anniverary of Sri Chinmoy’s arrival in America on April 13, 1964. We welcome you to this volume and look forward to your response.
– Publisher
Foreword
As this extraordinary collection of meditative prose and poetry reveals, Sri Chinmoy loved America. Having come to the United States in 1964, a pivotal time in his own life and that of his adopted country, he expressed his love in a rich and continuous series of reflections that are rooted in American history.
Sri Chinmoy deeply admired the American Founding Fathers – Washington, Jefferson, Adams, Franklin – for their individual virtues and collective achievement.
He salutes in Washington “the indomitable spirit of the general” and praises him for his blend of “high character and majestic will, ... courage and capacity.” In leading America to independence and serving as its first president, Washington became “the Man of Destiny” because “the Divine made him His efficient instrument.”
Jefferson, too, made unique and transcendent contributions. Sri Chinmoy calls him “the most divinely talented man of his time,” and values him above all for writing the Declaration of Independence. “No other American,” he writes, “has done or perhaps will ever do so much for the progress of the American consciousness as Thomas Jefferson.”
The Founding of America, in the vision of
Sri Chinmoy, was an
event not just of national but of global importance. The Founders, he
writes, “wanted to show that their liberty was not only for them
but for the whole world to use. It was an ideal for the world to
embrace.”
Elsewhere, drawing on his personal experience and transnational perspective, he writes that the purpose of America is not only its own “illumination and perfection,” but “the illumination and perfection of the entire world.”
Not that these truths will be universally understood and appreciated. For all his idealism and hope, Sri Chinmoy acknowledges reality. “Those who bring new light into the world will never, never get the appreciation, admiration, adoration and love that they deserve – never!” Nonetheless, he attributes to America a unique importance in world history, both in the past and as its full benefit to humanity unfolds in the future. “The American spirit is America’s eagerness to know what the world needs.”
Naturally, he also saw in Abraham Lincoln a divinely inspired hero
of history. In his admiring and free-flowing poem Abraham
Lincoln,
Sri Chinmoy praises the sixteenth president for upholding
equality as “every man’s birthright and treasure” and quotes
Lincoln’s all-important statement that “this nation cannot exist
half-slave, half-free.”
Lincoln is one of a succession of great Americans who figure in these reflections, including in the 20th century Woodrow Wilson, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, John F. Kennedy, and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Wilson’s great contribution was the League of Nations, which led
eventually to the United Nations, a beloved institution in
Sri
Chinmoy’s world view and central to his hope for the future. FDR is
given a special place, with Washington, Lincoln, and Kennedy, in the
line of greatest American presidents. Martin Luther King of course
figured prominently in the life and sorrows of America in the early
years when Sri Chinmoy first lived in America, and King’s embrace
of Gandhi’s ideas and spirit no doubt earned him a special place in
Sri Chinmoy’s feelings. But it is John F. Kennedy who may have
touched
Sri Chinmoy’s heart most profoundly, as we can see in
perhaps the most moving of his poems in this volume. He closes the
poem with these lines: “Kennedy’s life was the world. / Its
promise was Kennedy. / Together they breathe through Eternity.”
A handful of writers and artists surface again and again in Sri Chinmoy’s meditations. The lyricism and free-verse rhythms of his writings are everywhere evocative of Walt Whitman who, together with Emily Dickinson and her “thousands of psychic poems,” is revered for his ability to awaken “the consciousness of America.”
The great transcendentalists Emerson and Thoreau are also invoked, especially Emerson, who rose so far above parochial or conventional interests that “he studied our Indian Vedas and Upanishads.” In part because of their special connections with Lincoln and the transformative events of the mid-19th century, Emerson and Whitman emerge, in Sri Chinmoy’s view, as the “twin-souls of the Truth.” Among others who appear at different times in his wide-ranging reflections are figures as various as Thomas Paine, Jawaharlal Nehru, Norman Rockwell, Pablo Casals, and Daniel Patrick Moynihan.
Ultimately Sri Chinmoy’s vision, centered on America, is one of hope. The birth of America and its issuance of the Declaration of Independence fundamentally changed the world’s trajectory.
“The American Declaration of Independence had the pioneer vision of faith, dignity and humanity’s basic needs: equal rights, justice, and freedom.” Later came the United Nations Charter, which joined the Declaration “like two close friends walking along the same road . . . [toward] the goal of world peace and satisfaction.”
Sri Chinmoy is not naïve. Americans can sometimes be “complacent” and “America has bad qualities, true,” he observes, “but American principles are absolutely divine.” It is on the level of ideals and spiritual purpose that he is most hopeful about the future. “The next two hundred years will see the manifestation of the soul’s qualities of America.”
America’s material wealth is only a stage in its continuing development. Turning to address America directly, Sri Chinmoy notes that an important “achievement of yours has been to build up the material basis for the coming great age of spirituality.” Thus, says Sri Chinmoy, the key is a certain generosity of spirit in America: “You live not for yourself alone. You live for freedom and for those who share your love for it.”
Every reader, whether American or any other nationality, will be moved by Sri Chinmoy’s reflections in America the Beautiful. Through these writings, he takes his own place in the history and literature of America, while also shining a light into the future of our country and of the emerging global community.
– James G. Basker
Richard Gilder Professor of Literary History,
Barnard
College, Columbia University
President, Gilder Lehrman Institute
of American History
America, America, America
Great you are, good you are,
Brave you are, kind you are.
O my America, America
Your Heaven-freedom
Is earth’s aspiration choice.
With you, in you
Is God-Hour’s Victory-Voice.
– Sri Chinmoy
Prologue
What is the American spirit?
The American spirit is America’s eagerness to know what the world needs.
∞
What does America claim?
A colossal preparation: not only for its own illumination and perfection but for the illumination and perfection of the entire world.
∞
America’s mind believes in the theory of give and take; therefore, America is great. America’s heart believes in the theory of give, just give; therefore, America is good.
∞
The difference between America’s greatness and America’s goodness is this: America’s greatness silences the world and then beckons the world; America’s goodness accelerates the world and then elevates the world.
∞
The soul of America, like a child, is growing, glowing, developing, illumining and fulfilling. It is a soul that is most progressive and most striking.
∞
America’s matchless contribution shall be her supreme universal friendship in which the family of nations will see beckoning hands, oneness-satisfaction and perfection-manifestation.
∞
In the Supreme Pilot’s scheme of things the United States is going to play the role not so much of leadership as of friendship, nay, brotherhood, in mankind’s evolution. And evolution is another name for mankind’s spiritual development.
∞
America’s goal, like the goal of all the nations and human beings, is always in the process of self-transcendence. There is no fixed goal. America’s main goal is a flood of satisfaction, inner and outer. This satisfaction has undoubtedly been achieved to a certain extent. But since everything is progressing and evolving, America’s goal is an ever-loving, ever-illumining and fulfilling goal of continuous self-transcendence.
Awakening
Who is a patriot? A patriot is he who loves his country dearly. A patriot is he who loves his country more than he loves his own life. A patriot is he who intuitively feels and infallibly knows that there is nothing and there can be nothing as significant as his own country. A patriot is he who honours and treasures his soul’s earthbound and Heaven-descending vision. A patriot is he who fulfils devotedly and untiringly the supreme promise to God, the Absolute Supreme, which he made while he was in the realm of the soul, before entering into the earth-arena. A patriot is he who has discovered the true truth that Heaven is in no way superior to earth.
∞
What is true patriotism? True patriotism is not something that declares war in order to prove its supremacy. True patriotism is not unlit, impure self-assertion. True patriotism is one’s genuine love of one’s country. True patriotism is loving what one already has. To be precise, true patriotism is real love for what God has already given us out of His infinite Bounty. True patriotism realises the undeniable fact that an individual patriot and his country are but pure instruments of the Absolute Supreme.
∞
Patriots are those who have helped their country and elevated its consciousness so that the reality of their country has widened. There have been many American patriots in the past and there will be many more. The Supreme had a special vision for the soul of America and He revealed it first through the Founding Fathers. The Founding Fathers were definitely spiritually illumined.
∞
The American patriots were great not because they felt that it was beneath their dignity to remain under the jurisdiction of the British, but because they felt that deep within them they had some truly divine spiritual qualities which could easily be brought to the fore. And when these divine qualities were brought to the fore, they felt that not only would they derive infinite benefit and profit from them, but that the whole world would derive benefit.
∞
To destroy a country we need power. This power is undivine, unillumined and ill-founded. To love a country we need a great power. This great power is our pure and constant concern for our country. To serve a country devotedly and untiringly we need a greater power. This greater power is our intuitive and self-offering psychic light.
To claim all nations as our very own, one and inseparable, we need the greatest power. This power is the all-illumining, all-immortalising, all-fulfilling God-Power, which is always crying and trying, trying and crying, to come to the fore from the inmost recesses of our heart.
∞
We are walking along the road of Eternity with a divine, unending, ceaseless and birthless life to manifest the divinity within us. We have to offer to our country what we have: love, sacrifice and the feeling of oneness. The moment we have offered to our country our unalloyed love and pure sacrifice, and have established our inseparable oneness with the soul of our country, to our wide surprise we see that our country has already immortalised us. For our country has chosen us out of millions, billions and trillions of souls to take birth on her shores. Our country has played her role long before we thought of offering something to our country. What we offer to our country is, at best, an iota of love, whereas our country has already inundated us with boundless love. This is the love our country has already achieved and received from the Absolute Supreme.
∞
Patriotism can achieve for a country the message of oneness, the message of satisfaction, the message of human perfection and God-manifestation.
The country is the mother. In order for the mother to be pleased and fulfilled, she has to be given the full opportunity to feed her children unreservedly. The mother gets this opportunity when the children want from her what she has: her love, her concern, her blessing, her compassion, her sympathy, her feeling of oneness. A patriot can offer his need to the mother country. When he tells his country what he needs, the country gets the opportunity to fulfil it.
Again, when a patriot becomes a real lover of his country, then his love enters into the country. First he cries for love from his country and then he gives the country his own love. When he feels he has no love, he cries for the mother to give him love. Then, when the mother gives love to him, he feels that he has abundant love and he offers it back to his country. When love of country and love from country are simultaneous, the message of oneness, the message of satisfaction, the message of human perfection and God-manifestation can dawn.
∞
Patriotism is self-giving and self-expansion based on your conscious oneness with all consciousness, your inseparable oneness with all. That is the meaning of patriotism in the spiritual sense.
∞
The self-giving of the Founding Fathers was the wish not merely to come out from under the British yoke, but for something higher and deeper. True, first they had to be free from British authority, leadership and guidance. But they had something deeper in the inmost recesses of their hearts that they wanted to express, a higher truth that they wanted to manifest. They wanted to show that their liberty was not only for them to use but for the whole world to use. It was an ideal for the world to embrace, a real ideal in human progress that would stand among humanity’s ultimate achievements.
∞
England said to America, “Yours is not revolution but mental confusion.” America said to England, “Thank you for your self-styled wisdom.”
The world said to America, “America, yours is not revolution but evolution – not only your evolution but the evolution of the world, too.” America said to the world, “I love you for your God-ordained encouragement and inspiration.”
∞
America’s independence, humanity’s self-awareness and Divinity’s self-transcendence were one, inseparably one.
∞
The light always has to be embodied by great and noble individuals.
∞
The soul of America is extremely fond of patriotism and proud of patriotism because it was the patriotic feeling of some brave, divine human beings that brought about liberty in America. America’s soul was in bondage. Its soul, its life of reality, could not come to the fore in the country as a whole. But there came a time when a few heroic divine soldiers felt the necessity of liberating their country. The soul of America came forward to offer its own light and delight to these brave souls. It got the opportunity to inject the feeling of patriotism into these few selected children of America so that they could be true and humble instruments of God and please God according to their capacity, their understanding and their inner and outer awakening.
∞
Victory in the War of Independence is the foundation stone of American nationality.
∞
The American patriots were very noble souls. They never said they desired leadership, but God was moulding them for something. In their case, the word ‘God’ was not uttered, but they spoke about ‘truth’. Patriotism, if it is carried out properly, is truth. India’s greatest patriot, Mahatma Gandhi, said God and truth are the same. So, in the case of America, truth was the sole motivating force. But you have to know that practically every American president has used the term ‘Almighty Father’ in their inaugural addresses. The Almighty Father played His role in silence and in action in and through the leaders of America.
∞
George Washington was the father of the American nation. He was the son of peace and the brother of self-giving.
∞
George Washington, you and you alone were America’s supreme need and divine choice to lead your country to victory!
You offered your country the smile of victory’s freedom-dawn.
Victory’s sun shone on the life and soul of America. And that sun blessed you, embraced you and treasured you.
∞
I salute the indomitable spirit of the General in you. I bow to the peerless wisdom of the President in you. I take endless pride in the Father of the Nation in you.
You have always been a true lover of peace. You have always valued peace infinitely more than anything else. Your country needed you to fight for her. Your country needed you to liberate her from bondage-night. You surrendered your own will to our country’s will. Under your supreme leadership your country won the war.
Then your country needed you desperately to build an undivided nation. Your country needed your guidance inimitable. You were the first and last president to be everybody’s choice. Many succeeded you, but you, with your lofty ideals, will be their pole star.
∞
George Washington
A divinely inspired dream, daring and desperate;
A surprise that made history:
A farmer’s son founds the New World.
“Inferior endowment from nature,”
he thought of himself.
But the Divine made him His efficient instrument.
High character and majestic will
Powerfully blended with courage and capacity:
Thus stood forth the Man of the Hour,
The Man of Destiny, the Man of God.
And from his mighty dream mightily executed
Burst forth a new free world,
Destined to be the hope and defence
Of more free worlds to be.
Victory in the War of Independence:
England lost to her own offspring.
England won for herself a mightier friend.
A new era heralded,
A new shattering blow
Struck at man’s domination over man:
Independence the first step to unity,
And unity, one Truth of God.
George Washington, first to embody
America’s hope,
First in inspiration, first in confidence,
First in war, first in victory,
First in conquering the heart of his nation,
First to envisage a federation of states,
Single, powerful, united, whole.
∞
The essential qualities of Thomas Jefferson were clarity, luminosity and vastness. Clarity, luminosity and vastness – these the Declaration of Independence embodies. Jefferson was the most divinely talented man of his time. He covered quite a few fields in every walk of life, and he went a considerable distance in each. In his case mind, body, vital, heart – everything – went together. This moment he was a musician next moment he was a sculptor; this moment he was a man of brain, next moment he was a physical, earthly labourer. God gave him capacities in many walks of life and he used them well. One book speaks about Jefferson as “the happiest man.” To become the happiest man is the most difficult thing on earth – and that he was.
∞
Unfortunately, Jefferson came long before the world, especially America, was prepared for his beautiful and powerful wisdom-light. Always prophets come at least one minute before the world is able to appreciate them. When they are here, they are not accepted. They have such wisdom, but they are not taken seriously. Only afterwards does the world accept and appreciate them.
∞
Thomas Jefferson never was and perhaps never will be appreciated in the way God wanted him to be appreciated because gratitude was not, is not and never will be born in this world. No other president, no other American, has done or perhaps will ever do so much for the progress of the American consciousness as Thomas Jefferson has done. Countries other than America that have developed inner vision will appreciate Jefferson much more than America.
Those who bring new light into the world never, never get the appreciation, admiration, adoration and love that they deserve – never! This will never happen, because the kind of gratitude that is worthy of their light and their vision has not been born and never will be born on earth.
Jefferson’s vision elevated the consciousness of the world in the twinkling of an eye. The light that he wanted to show his country and the light that he wanted his country to bring forward was so badly misunderstood! He never received the appreciation that he so rightly deserved and he will never get it, because humanity does not have that kind of gratitude.
∞
Thomas Jefferson, for your extraordinary service to your country, you would have been known as a great man. But for your offering of your Independence-Declaration, you are known as a good man, a God-messenger, a Vision-son of God.
∞
Washington lives at one place – in the heart of America. Jefferson lives at three places – in the heart, head and eyes of America. The heart represents the feelings, the head represents the intellect and the eyes represent the vision.
When we think of Washington, we think only of the mission that he had to fulfil. He had to do his duty by his country. This was not his self-imposed duty. It was a duty cast upon him by his mother and others who begged him to become the leader of the nation. But when we think of Jefferson, vision and mission go together. He saw the inner promise of America and he was able to reveal it.
When we look at Washington, we see his power aspect. He played the role of a supreme hero and defeated the British in battle. His was the power not to illumine others but to conquer them. When we look at Jefferson, we see his light aspect. Unlike Washington, he did not have to show his heroism. His role was to stabilise the country by spreading his light. In his case, it was his inner vision or light that conquered the hearts of others.
Washington’s message was for America. It did not extend beyond the boundaries of his country. His aim was to expel the British and he assumed responsibility for accomplishing this feat. Jefferson’s message was for the whole world. When he wrote, he did not specify any country. His words are applicable to the entire humanity. The source of Jefferson’s vision was inner light. This light spread from Jefferson’s heart to his country and then to the world at large.
Washington was like a small circle that grew larger and larger as his power expanded. Jefferson was not like a circle. His light was not confined. It simply permeated the world wherever it could, according to the receptivity of the individuals.
When Washington was playing the role of a dynamic hero, Jefferson was not in the picture. Jefferson came afterwards to help the young nation make progress. He said, “We have thrown the British out of our country, but it is not enough just to defeat our enemies. If we want to make progress and go ahead, then we have to bring forward the inner light.” Jefferson’s vision came as the light that America needed in order to become fully mature. Jefferson’s vision came as the light that the whole world needs in order to become divinely perfect.
∞
Thomas Jefferson’s vision was the Declaration of Independence. But it is not Jefferson’s vision alone. Many people saw the reality. It was the vision of that era, the vision of all who surrounded Jefferson. You can call it the vision of Washington, Adams, Franklin, Paine and others. Again, the sense of sacrifice of all those who fought for this country in those days – no matter how little or how much – deserves our special attention.
∞
Who could have envisaged that the thirteen colonies would one day develop into such a powerful country – fifty states standing indivisible, united by none other than the Hand of the Supreme Being? For the United States, the heart-throbbing and life-illumining song ‘united’ had its birthless and deathless origin in the hearts of the great Americans whose names are synonymous with the lofty principles of liberty, justice and oneness. The founder of the nation, George Washington; the vision-luminary, Thomas Jefferson; the wisdom-sun, Benjamin Franklin; and the tireless fighter, John Adams: these powerful luminaries, along with others, bravely dreamt of unity for the thirteen colonies.
Blossoming
We see another wave of patriotism when President Abraham Lincoln came to office.
∞
Lincoln was a seeker in the pure sense of the term. God gave him a magnanimous heart. Emerson said of him, “His heart was as great as the world, but there was no room in it to hold a wrong.”
When we become a seeker, we try to have a heart as vast as the world itself, or try to have a heart even vaster than the world. In this vast heart, a real seeker does not see the ignorance of the world as belonging to others. The heart of a true seeker sees the imperfections, limitations and bondage of others as its very own. Emerson says Lincoln’s heart did not hold a wrong, but I wish to say that his heart did not hold a wrong of his own. His heart did hold the wrongs of millions and billions of human beings, and he accepted these wrongs of others as his very own – not with a sense of pride, but with a sense of oneness.
∞
Abraham Lincoln
Born under no lucky star,
But dynamic in his dreams,
He fought his way to Luck:
“From log cabin to White House.”
No soul on earth supreme over another –
Equality every man’s birthright and
treasure –
Black and white, brown and red
Make no difference –
This nation cannot exist half-slave, half-free:
From his voice these bold truths rang out.
He had the gift to dream of union,
The courage and capacity to fight,
The confidence to win,
The patience that knew no flagging.
Faith in God’s Justice was his stamina,
Faith in God was his might.
Natural the affinity of vision-luminous souls,
So Emerson could say of Lincoln:
“His heart was as great as the world,
But there was no room in it to hold a wrong.”
“Force is all-conquering,
But its victories are short-lived.”
Love is all-conquering,
And its victories live on forever.
What is really important?
Are we God’s or is God ours?
The idealist in Lincoln reveals:
“We trust, Sir, that God is on our side.
It is more important to know
That we are on God’s side.”
∞
With President Woodrow Wilson, we notice another wave of patriotism. 39 Wilson was the chief architect of the organisation known as the League of Nations, which was potentially a step towards human unity. “Unless America takes part in this treaty,” Wilson was firmly convinced, “the world is going to lose heart. I cannot too often repeat to you how deep the impression made upon me on the other side of [the] water is that this was the nation upon which the whole world depended to hold the scales of justice even. If we fail them, God help the world! Then despair will ensue.”
∞
It was the vision of an American to have the League of Nations, but the ignorance of America did not accept this vision. It was not supported by America. As an American, Wilson was listened to, admired and appreciated by many, many countries because he saw the light. But the members of his own family were not accepting his light. Still, it was not all darkness and we see another wave of patriotism at that time. And the League of Nations grew into the United Nations.
∞
President Franklin D. Roosevelt. He was elected for an unprecedented four terms. There was tremendous, tremendous light in President Roosevelt.
∞
O man of lofty ideals, O hero-warrior, O prophet of the world-illumining dawn, we soulfully salute you!
∞
The supremacy of your soul’s will-power over your body’s revolt, your physical paralysis, was unparalleled. Your very existence was a stranger to fear. Your indomitable courage was far beyond the flight of our wildest imagination. It was your heart’s wisdom-light that so lovingly and convincingly taught the entire world: “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.” Indeed, the vision-light of this loftiest message can illumine the length and breadth of the world.
President Roosevelt, the embodiment of your vision-height and action-power will always be treasured by the freedom-loving and peace-spreading world.
∞
O great, good, illumining, inspiring and fulfilling soul, to you we bow.
∞
President John Fitzgerald Kennedy. There have been so many undivine stories about his personal life, but this is all nonsense. We have to see Kennedy’s vision, his real vision. Kennedy’s soul went very high and very deep. He died quite young; that is why his soul’s light did not manifest fully in the outer life. But the patriotism in his inner life is bound to manifest in the course of time. The light that his soul has will again try to manifest on earth through a different form. He will be known as somebody else, but it will be the same soul. Again, the light that an individual embodies need not remain dormant in him until he comes back to earth again. His light can operate through his dear ones or through those who are not near or dear but who have the same principles. They may not even be American, but they may carry Kennedy’s illustrious vision.
∞
John Fitzgerald Kennedy: President of America, prince of high idealism, freedom incarnate, helper of humanity.
∞
If America wants to be friends with all the world, who can be her enemy? Says her mouthpiece, President Kennedy:
“We are not against any man, or any nation, or any system, except as it is hostile to freedom.”
It seems that in Kennedy’s dictionary there are two complementary words which enrich and fulfil the sense of each other and constitute together the master formula of the language: freedom and peace.
“We will make clear that America’s enduring concern is for both peace and freedom; that we are anxious to live in harmony with the Russian people; that we seek no conquests, no satellites, no riches; that we seek only the day when ‘nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more.’ ”
True, poverty and ignorance are man’s bitter foes. But to replace poverty by affluence and ignorance by knowledge is not enough. Material success is not all. The quest of the spirit is of vital importance. “For the first time,” said Kennedy, “we have the capacity to strike off the remaining bonds of poverty and ignorance, to free our people for the spiritual and intellectual fulfilment which has always been the goal of our civilization.”
President Kennedy was, as it were, the lineal descendant of the American nation’s traditional leadership. As George Washington was the father of the United States, as Abraham Lincoln was its saviour, as Franklin D. Roosevelt was the voice of America, even so, John F. Kennedy was the noble defender of world freedom and world peace.
∞
John Fitzgerald Kennedy
Kennedy is unique.
Why?
God kindled him with His Dream.
On him God showered
His Blessings divine,
Thickly,
Lavishly,
Significantly.
Kennedy is unique.
Why?
God threw on him
The burden of the world at large,
Smilingly,
Consciously,
Inevitably.
Kennedy is unique.
Why?
His soul visioned Tomorrow’s Dawn,
Far beyond the flight of imagination,
Far above the strongest investigation,
Deep within the core of transformation.
Kennedy is unique.
Why?
He pined with his bleeding heart
To free the world
From the spiked wounds of life.
This eyeless earth of ours
Will burst into glorious bloom:
He saw this diamond truth,
While dreaming,
Struggling,
Daring.
∞
Never was he alone.
Tragedy and sovereignty,
Catastrophe and victory,
Freely in him were grown.
Never was he alone.
God’s bright Promise and Bliss,
Earth’s wild ignorance and her kiss,
Lavishly in him were grown.
∞
Alone he stood
Above all storms of life.
He stood alone
To challenge pain and strife.
Alone he stood