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Excerpts from "Lectures from Colombo to Almora - Swami Vivekananda"

Lectures from Colombo to Almora (1897) is a book of Swami Vivekananda based on his various lectures. After visiting the West, Vivekananda reached Colombo, British Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) on 15 January 1897. Upon Vivekananda's arrival in South India, a forty-feet high monument was built by the king of Ramnad on the spot where he landed to celebrate his achievements at the West. He reached Calcutta via Madras on 20 January 1897. Then Vivekananda travelled extensively and visited many Indian states. On 19 June (1897) he reached Almora. The lectures delivered by him in this period were compiled into the book Lectures from Colombo to Almora. The book contains reports of his 17 lectures. [Wikipedia]



1. Religion does not rest in book.

2. Ekam sat vipra bahudha vadanti(He is one, whom the sages declared by various names. )

3. We are the effects, and we are the causes. We are free therefore.

4. We cannot understand God in our scriptures without knowing soul.

5. Souls are without beginning and without end, immortal by their very nature.

6. All the powers, blessings, purity, omnipresence, omniscience are buried in each soul.

7. Evam tu panditao jnatva sarvabhuta mayam Harim(Thus the sage, knowing that same Lord inhabits all bodies, will worship every body as such)

8. It is in love that religion exists and not in ceremony; in the pure and sincere love in heart.

9. According to Advaita, you are God Himself and have forgotten your own nature in thinking of yourself as a little men.

10. There is but one soul throughout the universe, all is but one existence.

11. Uttishthatha, Jagrata, prapya varan nibhodata ( Arise, awake, and stop not till the goal is reached)

12. The veil of Maya becomes thinner and thinner, the inborn, natural glory of the soul comes out and becomes more manifest.

13. Religion is not in books, nor in theories, nor in dogmas, nor in talking, not even in reasoning. It is being and becoming.

14. The Self is not to be reached by too much talking, not even by the highest intellects, not even by the study of the Scriptures.

15. You can do everything and anything without even the guidance of any one. All power is there. Standup and express the Divinity that is within you.

16. Be you all of one mind, be you all of one thought, for in the days of yore, the gods being of one mind, were enabled to receive oblations.

17. The Atman is not to be reached by too much talking, nor is to be reached by too much intellect.

18. Even in this life they have conquered heaven, whose minds are firm fixed on this sameness of everything, for God is pure, and the same to all, and therefore, such are said to be living in God. Thus seeing the same Lord the same everywhere he the sage, does not hurt the self by the self, and thus goes to the highest goal.

19. The immanent one is at last declared to be the same that is in the human soul.

20. One that is formless and limitless, beyond all compare, beyond all qualities, Oh sage, oh learned man, such a Brahman will shine in your heart in samadhi.

21. Om, this is the great secret; Om, this is the greatest possession; he who knows the secret of this Om, whatever he desires that he gets.


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