Countrymen (Lectures)

Expressions researched:
"country man" |"country men" |"country-men" |"countryman" |"countrymen"

Bhagavad-gita As It Is Lectures

Lecture on BG 1.30 -- London, July 23, 1973:

There is no happiness actually, expanding selfishness. Just like a national leader like Mahatma Gandhi in our country. He planned that "Let the Britishers go away. My countrymen will be happy. My countrymen will be happy." But when the Britishers went away, giving the responsibility of Indian empire to the Indian people, Gandhi was thinking in the morning, "Oh, I am so unhappy. Now only death will please me." And the next, the same evening, he was killed. He was so unhappy. Because everything was topsy-turvied. He wanted Hindu-Muslim unity. Now the country was divided. The Muslims became separated. The whole program was changed. There were so many things. He wanted that the government should be very simplified. But he saw that his disciples, his followers, were after office, simply for office. So nimittāni. He saw that "I shall be happy, my countrymen will be happy," but at the end he saw viparītāni, all opposite. Everyone will experience that. So long he will be materially attached, he will find viparītāni. "I wanted to be..." Sukhera lāgiyā, e ghara bandhinu, aguṇe puriyā gelā (?): "I constructed this nice house for living happily, but there was fire and everything finished." This is the way. You construct everything for happiness, but there will be something which will put you into the most miserable condition. This is called material world. They do not know. Therefore one who is intelligent, he thinks that "If I have to work so hard for so-called happiness, and here is Kṛṣṇa is canvassing, asking me, that 'You work for Me,' so why not work for Kṛṣṇa? Here I see viparītāni, everything is opposite. There is no happiness." So that is intelligence.