Rabindranath Tagore

“You can't cross the sea merely by standing and staring at the water.”

“Clouds come floating into my life from other days no longer to shed rain or usher storm but to give colour to my sunset sky.”

“Tiny grass, your steps are small, but you possess the earth under your tread.”

“The bird thinks it is an act of kindness to give the fish a lift in the air.”

“The pet dog suspects the universe for scheming to take its place.”

“The hills are like shouts of children who raise their arms, trying to catch stars.”

“What you are you do not see, what you see is your shadow.”

“That I exist is a perpetual surprise which is life.”

“Rest belongs to the work as the eyelids to the eyes.”

“Life finds its wealth by the claims of the world, and its worth by the claims of love.”

“You smiled and talked to me of nothing and I felt that for this I had been waiting long.”

“The stars are not afraid to appear like fireflies.”

“Life is given to us, we earn it by giving it.”

“We come nearest to the great when we are great in humility.”

“Thank the flame for its light, but do not forget the lampholder standing in the shade with constancy of patience.”

“We read the world wrong and say that it deceives us.”

“Let life be beautiful like summer flowers and death like autumn leaves.”

“He who wants to do good knocks at the gate; he who loves finds the gate open.”

“Be still, my heart, these great trees are prayers.”

“The dust receives insult and in return offers her flowers.”

“Do not linger to gather flowers to keep them, but walk on, for flowers will keep themselves blooming all your way.”

“Do not insult your friend by lending him merits from your own pocket.”

“Not hammerstrokes, but dance of the water sings the pebbles into perfection.”

“To be outspoken is easy when you do not wait to speak the complete truth.”

“Neither the colourless vagueness of cosmopolitanism, nor the fierce self-idolatry of nation-worship, is the goal of human history.”

“A nation, in the sense of the political and economic union of a people, is that aspect which a whole population assumes when organized for a mechanical purpose.”

“When this organization of politics and commerce, whose other name is the Nation, becomes all-powerful at the cost of the harmony of the higher social life, then it is an evil day for humanity.”

“It is not a question of the British Government, but of government by the Nation--the Nation which is the organized self-interest of a whole people, where it is least human and least spiritual.”

“We have felt its iron grip at the root of our life, and for the sake of humanity we must stand up and give warning to all, that this nationalism is a cruel epidemic of evil that is sweeping over the human world of the present age, and eating into its moral vitality.”

“And we cannot but acknowledge this paradox, that while the spirit of the West marches under its banner of freedom, the Nation of the West forges its iron chains of organization which are the most relentless and unbreakable that have ever been manufactured in the whole history of man.”

“Not merely the subject races, but you who live under the delusion that you are free, are every day sacrificing your freedom and humanity to this fetich of nationalism, living in the dense poisonous atmosphere of world-wide suspicion and greed and panic.”

“And nations who sedulously cultivate moral blindness as the cult of patriotism will end their existence in a sudden and violent death.”

“It is so easy to dull our sense of honour and delicacy of mind with constant abrasion, while falsehoods stalk abroad with proud steps in the name of trade, politics and patriotism, that any protest against their perpetual intrusion into our lives is considered to be sentimentalism, unworthy of true manliness.”

“The whole world is becoming one country through scientific facility.”

“I am not against one nation in particular, but against the general idea of all nations.”

“Our social ideals create the human world, but when our mind is diverted from them to greed of power then in that state of intoxication we live in a world of abnormality where our strength is not health and our liberty is not freedom.”

“Therefore political freedom does not give us freedom when our mind is not free.”

“In the so-called free countries the majority of the people are not free, they are driven by the minority to a goal which is not even known to them.”

“Is the mere name of freedom so valuable that we should be willing to sacrifice for its sake our moral freedom?”

“Let your crown be of humility, your freedom the freedom of the soul.”

“We must again guard our minds from any encroaching distrust of the individuals of a nation.”

“He only has freedom who ideally loves freedom himself and is glad to extend it to others.”

“He who cares to have slaves must chain himself to them; he who builds walls to create exclusion for others builds walls across his own freedom; he who distrusts freedom in others loses his moral right to it.”

“Unless we have true faith in freedom, knowing it to be creative, manfully taking all its risks, not only do we lose the right to claim freedom in politics, but we also lack the power to maintain it with all our strength.”

“The Cult of the Nation is the professionalism of the people.”

“With the growth of nationalism, man has become the greatest menace to man.”

“Nationalism is the training of a whole people for a narrow ideal; and when it gets hold of their minds it is sure to lead them to moral degeneracy and intellectual blindness.”

“But when this idea of the Nation, which has met with universal acceptance in the present day, tries to pass off the cult of collective selfishness as a moral duty, simply because that selfishness is gigantic in stature, it not only commits depredation, but attacks the very vitals of humanity.”

“Now the problem before us is of one single country, which is this earth, where the races as individuals must find both their freedom of self-expression and their bond of federation.”

“Let me not pray to be sheltered from dangers but to be fearless in facing them.”

“Thou hast made me known to friends whom I knew not. Thou hast given me seats in homes not my own. Thou hast brought the distant near and made a brother of the stranger.”

“Your voice, my friend, wanders in my heart, like the muffled sound of the sea among these listening pines.”

“So we must know that the meaning of our self is not to be found in its separateness from God and others, but in the ceaseless realisation of yoga, of union; not on the side of the canvas where it is blank, but on the side where the picture is being painted.”

“Peace, my heart, let the time for the parting be sweet. Let it not be a death but completeness. Let love melt into memory and pain into songs. Let the flight through the sky end in the folding of the wings over the nest. Let the last touch of your hands be gentle like the flower of the night. Stand still, O Beautiful End, for a moment, and say your last words in silence. I bow to you and hold up my lamp to light you on your way.”

“I have got my leave. Bid me farewell, my brothers! I bow to you all and take my departure. Here I give back the keys of my door—and I give up all claims to my house. I only ask for last kind words from you. We were neighbours for long, but I received more than I could give. Now the day has dawned and the lamp that lit my dark corner is out. A summons has come and I am ready for my journey.”

“On the day when death will knock at thy door what wilt thou offer to him? Oh, I will set before my guest the full vessel of my life—I will never let him go with empty hands. All the sweet vintage of all my autumn days and summer nights, all the earnings and gleanings of my busy life will I place before him at the close of my days when death will knock at my door.”

“For, a mere fact is like a blind lane, it leads only to itself—it has no beyond. But a truth opens up a whole horizon, it leads us to the infinite.”

“WHEN I bring you coloured toys, my child, I understand why there is such a play of colours on clouds, on water, and why flowers are painted in tints--when I give coloured toys to you, my child.”

“When I sing to make you dance, I truly know why there is music in leaves, and why waves send their chorus of voices to the heart of the listening earth--when I sing to make you dance.”

“When I kiss your face to make you smile, my darling, I surely understand what pleasure streams from the sky in morning light, and what delight the summer breeze brings to my body--when I kiss you to make you smile.”

“I do not love him because he is good, but because he is my little child.”

“CHILD, how happy you are sitting in the dust, playing with a broken twig all the morning.”

“Child, I have forgotten the art of being absorbed in sticks and mud-pies.”

“The one thing he wants is to learn mother's words from mother's lips. That is why he looks so innocent.”

“He knows that there is room for endless joy in mother's little corner of a heart, and it is sweeter far than liberty to be caught and pressed in her dear arms.”

“Though with the smile of his dear face he draws mother's yearning heart to him, yet his little cries over tiny troubles weave the double bond of pity and love.”

“The world-mother keeps her seat by you in your mother's heart.”

“In all my hopes and my loves, in my life, in the life of my mother you have lived.”

“Heaven's first darling, twin-born with the morning light, you have floated down the stream of the world's life, and at last you have stranded on my heart.”

“As I gaze on your face, mystery overwhelms me; you who belong to all have become mine.”

“I WISH I could take a quiet corner in the heart of my baby's very own world. I know it has stars that talk to him, and a sky that stoops down to his face to amuse him with its silly clouds and rainbows. Those who make believe to be dumb, and look as if they never could move, come creeping to his window with their stories and with trays crowded with bright toys.”

“I wish I could travel by the road that crosses baby's mind, and out beyond all bounds; Where messengers run errands for no cause between the kingdoms of kings of no history; Where Reason makes kites of her laws and flies them, and Truth sets Fact free from its fetters.”

“With whatever you find you create your glad games, I spend both my time and my strength over things I never can obtain.”

“I shall be the cloud and you the moon. I shall cover you with both my hands, and our house-top will be the blue sky.”

“I will be the waves and you will be a strange shore. I shall roll on and on and on, and break upon your lap with laughter. And no one in the world will know where we both are.”

“SUPPOSING I became a champa flower, just for fun, and grew on a branch high up that tree, and shook in the wind with laughter and danced upon the newly budded leaves, would you know me, mother? You would call, "Baby, where are you?" and I should laugh to myself and keep quite quiet. I should slyly open my petals and watch you at your work.”

“When after the midday meal you sat at the window reading Ramayana, and the tree's shadow fell over your hair and your lap, I should fling my wee little shadow on to the page of your book, just where you were reading. But would you guess that it was the tiny shadow of your little child?”

“When in the evening you went to the cow-shed with the lighted lamp in your hand, I should suddenly drop on to the earth again and be your own baby once more, and beg you to tell me a story.”

“When the clouds rumble and it thunders, I love to be afraid in my heart and cling to you. When the heavy rain patters for hours on the bamboo leaves, and our windows shake and rattle at the gusts of wind, I like to sit alone in the room, mother, with you, and hear you talk about the desert of Tepântar in the fairy tale.”

“Mother, I have left all my books on the shelf--do not ask me to do my lessons now. When I grow up and am big like my father, I shall learn all that must be learnt. But just for to-day, tell me, mother, where the desert of Tepântar in the fairy tale is?”

“I AM small because I am a little child. I shall be big when I am as old as my father is.”

“What nice stories, mother, you can tell us! Why can't father write like that, I wonder? Did he never hear from his own mother stories of giants and fairies and princesses? Has he forgotten them all?”

“When my father wastes such heaps of paper, mother, you don't seem to mind at all. But if I take only one sheet to make a boat with, you say, "Child, how troublesome you are!" What do you think of father's spoiling sheets and sheets of paper with black marks all over on both sides?”

“The song that I came to sing remains unsung to this day. I have spent my days in stringing and in unstringing my instrument.”

“The spring has done its flowering and taken leave. And now with the burden of faded futile flowers I wait and linger.”

“And when old words die out on the tongue, new melodies break forth from the heart; and where the old tracks are lost, new country is revealed with its wonders.”

“This is my delight, thus to wait and watch at the wayside where shadow chases light and the rain comes in the wake of the summer.”

“And my pride is from the life-throb of ages dancing in my blood this moment.”

“Keeping steps with that restless, rapid music, seasons come dancing and pass away—colours, tunes, and perfumes pour in endless cascades in the abounding joy that scatters and gives up and dies every moment.”

“On many an idle day have I grieved over lost time. But it is never lost, my lord. Thou hast taken every moment of my life in thine own hands.”

“Time is endless in thy hands, my lord. There is none to count thy minutes. Days and nights pass and ages bloom and fade like flowers. Thou knowest how to wait. Thy centuries follow each other perfecting a small wild flower.”

“Yet stars will watch at night, and morning rise as before, and hours heave like sea waves casting up pleasures and pains.”

“I was not aware of the moment when I first crossed the threshold of this life.”

“God grows weary of great kingdoms, but never of little flowers.”

“The woodcutter's axe begged for its handle from the tree. The tree gave it.”

“The artist is the lover of Nature, therefore he is her slave and her master.”

“The great earth makes herself hospitable with the help of the grass.”

“Roots are the branches down in the earth. Branches are roots in the air.”

“The roots below the earth claim no rewards for making the branches fruitful.”

“I came to your shore as a stranger, I lived in your house as a guest, I leave your door as a friend, my earth.”

“The smell of the wet earth in the rain rises like a great chant of praise from the voiceless multitude of the insignificant.”

“The holy stream of thy music breaks through all stony obstacles and rushes on.”

“When the hour strikes for thy silent worship at the dark temple of midnight, command me, my master, to stand before thee to sing.”

“Let me not force my flagging spirit into a poor preparation for thy worship.”

“This is my prayer to thee, my lord—strike, strike at the root of penury in my heart.”

“When desire blinds the mind with delusion and dust, O thou holy one, thou wakeful, come with thy light and thy thunder.”

“The first thrill of joy to my awakened soul let it come from his glance.”

“Oh, grant me my prayer that I may never lose the bliss of the touch of the one in the play of many.”

“What divine drink wouldst thou have, my God, from this overflowing cup of my life?”

“O thou beautiful, there in the nest is thy love that encloses the soul with colours and sounds and odours.”

“But there, where spreads the infinite sky for the soul to take her flight in, reigns the stainless white radiance.”

“My world will light its hundred different lamps with thy flame and place them before the altar of thy temple.”

“I know thee as my God and stand apart—I do not know thee as my own and come closer.”

“In one salutation to thee, my God, let all my senses spread out and touch this world at thy feet.”

“Whom dost thou worship in this lonely dark corner of a temple with doors all shut?”

“All our egoistic impulses, our selfish desires, obscure our true vision of the soul.”

“When we are conscious of our soul, we perceive the inner being that transcends our ego and has its deeper affinity with the All.”

“Likewise, our soul when detached and imprisoned within the narrow limits of a self loses its significance.”

“In love the sense of difference is obliterated and the human soul fulfils its purpose in perfection, transcending the limits of itself and reaching across the threshold of the infinite.”

“To know our soul apart from the self is the first step towards the realisation of the supreme deliverance.”

“Pride of self interferes with the proper function of the soul which is to realise itself by perfecting its union with the world and the world's God.”

“Man's poverty is abysmal, his wants are endless till he becomes truly conscious of his soul.”

“For a man who has realised his soul there is a determinate centre of the universe around which all else can find its proper place, and from thence only can he draw and enjoy the blessedness of a harmonious life.”

“This is the ultimate end of man, to find the One which is in him; which is his truth, which is his soul; the key with which he opens the gate of the spiritual life, the heavenly kingdom.”

“The vision of the Supreme One in our own soul is a direct and immediate intuition, not based on any ratiocination or demonstration at all.”

“Our pursuit of truth in the domain of nature therefore is through analysis and the gradual methods of science, but our apprehension of truth in our soul is immediate and through direct intuition.”

“Man becomes perfect man, he attains his fullest expression, when his soul realises itself in the Infinite being who is Āvih whose very essence is expression.”

“For this self of ours has to attain its ultimate meaning, which is the soul, not through the compulsion of God's power but through love, and thus become united with God in freedom.”

“He whose spirit has been made one with God stands before man as the supreme flower of humanity.”

“When a man's life rescued from distractions finds its unity in the soul, then the consciousness of the infinite becomes at once direct and natural to it as the light is to the flame.”

“It is only the soul, the One in man which by its very nature can overcome all limits, and finds its affinity with the Supreme One.”

“The idea of God that man has in his being is the wonder of all wonders.”

“This life process is going on—we know it, we have felt it; and we have a faith which no individual instances to the contrary can shake, that the direction of humanity is from evil to good.”

“We know that the life of a soul, which is finite in its expression and infinite in its principle, must go through the portals of death in its journey to realise the infinite.”

“The passage of our self is through its selfhood, which is independent, to its attainment of soul, which is harmonious.”

“As by the limits of law nature is separated from God, so it is the limits of its egoism which separates the self from him.”

“So God's love from which our self has taken form has made it separate from God; and it is God's love which again establishes a reconciliation and unites God with our self through the separation.”

“Yes, our individual soul has been separated from the supreme soul, but this has not been from alienation but from the fullness of love.”

“The human soul is on its journey from the law to love, from discipline to liberation, from the moral plane to the spiritual.”

“Our desires blind us to the truth that there is in man, and this is the greatest wrong done by ourselves to our own soul.”

“When a man feels the rhythmic throb of the soul-life of the whole world in his own soul, then is he free.”

“Joy is the realisation of the truth of oneness, the oneness of our soul with the world and of the world-soul with the supreme lover.”

“The freed soul delights in accepting bonds, and does not seek to evade any of them, for in each does it feel the manifestation of an infinite energy whose joy is in creation.”

“As a matter of fact, where there are no bonds, where there is the madness of license, the soul ceases to be free.”

“But we must remember that as joy expresses itself in law, so the soul finds its freedom in action.”

“The soul of man is ever freeing itself from its own folds by its activity; had it been otherwise it could not have done any voluntary work.”

“But true spirituality, as taught in our sacred lore, is calmly balanced in strength, in the correlation of the within and the without.”

“The entire world is given to us, and all our powers have their final meaning in the faith that by their help we are to take possession of our patrimony.”

“As we become conscious of the harmony in our soul, our apprehension of the blissfulness of the spirit of the world becomes universal, and the expression of beauty in our life moves in goodness and love towards the infinite.”

“In fact, when the soul seeks God she seeks her final escape from this incessant gathering and heaping and never coming to an end.”

“It is evident from this that the real desire of our soul is to get beyond all our possessions.”

“We see everywhere in the history of man that the spirit of renunciation is the deepest reality of the human soul.”

“Thus man truly realises his soul by outgrowing his possessions, and man's progress in the path of eternal life is through a series of renunciations.”

“Thus our soul must soar in the infinite, and she must feel every moment that in the sense of not being able to come to the end of her attainment is her supreme joy, her final freedom.”

“Man's abiding happiness is not in getting anything but in giving himself up to what is greater than himself, to ideas which are larger than his individual life, the idea of his country, of humanity, of God.”

“All that we can ever aspire to is to become more and more one with God.”

“In the region of nature, which is the region of diversity, we grow by acquisition; in the spiritual world, which is the region of unity, we grow by losing ourselves, by uniting.”

“In the same manner, our soul can only become Brahma as the river can become the sea.”

“Once our soul realises her ultimate object of repose in Brahma, all her movements acquire a purpose.”

“If our relation with the divine were all a thing of our own making, how should we rely on it as true, and how should it lend us support?”

“Likewise the man who has his spiritual eyes open knows that the ultimate truth about earth and water lies in our apprehension of the eternal will which works in time and takes shape in the forces we realise under those aspects.”

“Thus the state of realising our relationship with all, of entering into everything through union with God, was considered in India to be the ultimate end and fulfilment of humanity.”

“The attitude of the God-conscious man of the Upanishad towards the universe is one of a deep feeling of adoration.”

“All our poetry, philosophy, science, art and religion are serving to extend the scope of our consciousness towards higher and larger spheres.”

“Our great Revealers are they who make manifest the true meaning of the soul by giving up self for the love of mankind.”

“According to the Upanishads, the key to cosmic consciousness, to God-consciousness, is in the consciousness of the soul.”

“Therefore, in our country he who truly loves God receives such homage from men as would be considered almost sacrilegious in the west.”

“It is not only in Buddhism and the Indian religions, but in Christianity too, that the ideal of selflessness is preached with all fervour.”

“It is the function of religion not to destroy our nature but to fulfil it.”

“The Sanskrit word dharma which is usually translated into English as religion has a deeper meaning in our language.”

“The Vaishnava religion has boldly declared that God has bound himself to man, and in that consists the greatest glory of human existence.”

“He who thinks to reach God by running away from the world, when and where does he expect to meet him?”

“We cannot put our God in the same list with our summer-houses, motor-cars, or our credit at the bank, as so many people seem to want to do.”

“But the highest wisdom in the East holds that it is not the function of our soul to gain God, to utilise him for any special material purpose.”

“"What language is thine, O sea?" "The language of eternal question." "What language is thy answer, O sky? "The language of eternal silence."”

“"Moon, for what do you wait?" "To salute the sun for whom I must make way."”

“The sun goes to cross the Western sea, leaving its last salutation to the East.”

“While the glass lamp rebukes the earthen for calling it cousin, the moon rises, and the glass lamp, with a bland smile, calls her, "My dear, dear sister."”

“What is this unseen flame of darkness whose sparks are the stars?”

“The birth and death of the leaves are the rapid whirls of the eddy whose wider circles move slowly among stars.”

“The sun has his simple robe of light. The clouds are decked with gorgeousness.”

“"In the moon thou sendest thy love letters to me," said the night to the sun. "I leave my answers in tears upon the grass."”

“Let me think that there is one among those stars that guides my life through the dark unknown.”

“I have my stars in the sky, But oh for my little lamp unlit in my house.”

“"Who is there to take up my duties?" asked the setting sun. "I shall do what I can, my Master," said the earthen lamp.”

“"The learned say that your lights will one day be no more." said the firefly to the stars. The stars made no answer.”

“God loves man's lamp lights better than his own great stars.”

“"I have lost my dewdrop," cries the flower to the morning sky that has lost all its stars.”

“When the sun goes down to the West, the East of his morning stands before him in silence.”

“The moon has her light all over the sky, her dark spots to herself.”

“Rockets, your insult to the stars follows yourself back to the earth.”

“"How may I sing to thee and worship, O Sun?" asked the little flower. "By the simple silence of thy purity," answered the sun.”

“The night's silence, like a deep lamp, is burning with the light of its milky way.”

“Wayside grass, love the star, then your dreams will come out in flowers.”

“Let my thoughts come to you, when I am gone, like the afterglow of sunset at the margin of starry silence.”

“Light in my heart the evening star of rest and then let the night whisper to me of love.”

“Let them live who choose in their own hissing world of fireworks. My heart longs for thy stars, my God.”

“To-night there is a stir among the palm leaves, a swell in the sea, Full Moon, like the heart throb of the world. From what unknown sky hast thou carried in thy silence the aching secret of love?”

“I dream of a star, an island of light, where I shall be born and in the depth of its quickening leisure my life will ripen its works like the ricefield in the autumn sun.”