fundamental earnestness and broadmindedness completely
captivated the whole assembly. There were other Hindu
delegates who stood for societies or churches or sects, but
the Swami, who belonged to no sect but rather to India as
a whole, proclaimed the universality of religious truths and
the sameness of the Goal of all religious realizations. In the
course of his illuminating addresses during the sessions of
the Parliament, the Swami placed before the distinguished
audience the cardinal truths of Vedanta, the universal
religion of humanity.
He said: “If there is ever to be a universal religion, it must
be one which will have no location in place or time; which
will be infinite, like the God it will preach, and whose sun will
shine upon the followers of Krishna and Christ, on saint and
sinners alike; which will not be Brahminic or Buddhistic
, Christian or Mohammedan, but the sum total of all these,
and still have infinite space for development; which in its
catholicity will find a place for every human being, from the
lowest grovelling savage not far removed from the brute to
the highest man towering by the virtues of his head and
heart almost above humanity. It will be a religion which will
have no place for persecution or intolerance in its polity
, which will recognize divinity in every man and woman, and
whose whole scope, whose whole force, will be centred in
aiding humanity to realize its own true, divine nature. Offer
such a religion and all the nations will follow you.? The
Christian is not to become a Hindu or a Buddhist
, nor a Hindu or a Buddhist to become a Christian. But each
must assimilate the spirit of the others and yet preserve his
individuality and grow according to his own law of growth.”
The Parliament of Religions, he concluded, had shown to the
world that holiness, purity, and charity were not the
exclusive possession of any church in the world and that
every system had produced men and women of the most
exalted character. In the face of this evidence, if anybody
dreamt of the exclusive survival of his own religion and the
destruction of others, he was to be pitied and told that upon
the banner of every religion will soon be written, in spite of
resistance: “Help and not fight. Assimilation and not
Destruction. Harmony and Peace and not Dissension.”
The effect of these mighty words was tremendous. Over the
heads of the official representatives of the Parliament they
were addressed to a wider public, and Swami Vivekananda
at once became the most celebrated personality of the
Parliament. The American press rang with his fame. The
best known and most conservative of the metropolitan
newspapers proclaimed him a Prophet and a Seer. The New
York Herald referred to him as “undoubtedly the greatest
figure in the Parliament of Religions”, and added, “After
hearing him we feel how foolish it is to send missionaries to
this learned nation.”
The news of Swami Vivekananda’s unparalleled success soon
poured into India as well. Indian journals and magazines -
from Madras to Almora, from Calcutta to Bombay - were
filled with the American reports of his triumph at the
Parliament. The happiness of the monks of the Ramakrishna
Order at Baranagore knew no bounds when they came to
learn that it was their beloved leader who had taken the
New World by storm. The citizens of Calcutta organized a
great representative meeting in the Town Hall to thank the
Swami and the American people. The name Vivekananda
rang with acclaim throughout the length and breadth of
Hindusthan. Everywhere he was recognized as the man who
had come to fulfil a great need. The unknown monk without
titles and ties blossomed into a world-figure and became
the man of the hour. But in the midst of this recognition of
his genius, universal applause, and immense popularity, the
Swami was never found for a moment forgetful of his duties
to the sunken masses of India. On the very day of his
triumph when he was invited by a man of great wealth and
distinction to his home and lodged in a princely room fitted
with luxury beyond anything he could conceive, instead of
feeling happy in this splendid environment he was
miserable. He could not sleep, pondering, in contrast, over
India’s plight. The bed of down became to him a bed of
thorns. He rolled down on the empty floor and in agony of
his heart cried, “O Mother, what do I care for name and
fame when my motherland remains sunk in utmost poverty?
Who will raise the masses in India? Who will give them
bread? Show me, O Mother, how I can help them.” He
wrote inspiring letters to his disciples and admirers in India
to stimulate their hearts into activity and a high pitch of
patriotic fervour. “Gird up your loins, my boys,’ he once
wrote, “I am called by the Lord for this. The hope lies in
you - in the meek, the lowly, but the faithful. Feel for the
miserable and look up for help - it shall come. With a
bleeding heart I have crossed half the world to this strange
land seeking for help. The Lord will help me. I may perish of
cold and hunger in this land, but I bequeath to you, young
men, this sympathy, this struggle for the poor, the ignorant, the
oppressed. Go down on your faces before Him and make a
great sacrifice, the sacrifice of a whole life for them - these
three hundred millions, going down and down every day
. Glory unto the Lord, we will succeed. Hundreds will fall in
the struggle, hundreds will be ready to take it up. Life is
nothing, death is nothing. Glory unto the Lord - march on
, the Lord is our General. Do not look back to see who fall -
.forward, onward!” The Swami never forgot in the midst of
luxury the primary idea of his mission - to save his people, to
mobilize them to help him in his task by widening his appeal
until it became the cause of the people, the cause of the
poor and the oppressed of the whole world.
In order to serve the cause of his motherland he accepted
the offer of a lecture bureau for a tour of the United States
. In the course of this apostolic campaign in America he
began to tell of the glories of India and the greatness of
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