Kṛṣṇa says Himself that "Out of many, many millions of people, one may be interested how to make life successful. One may know what is the aim of life." That is called siddhi. Yatatām... Manuṣyāṇāṁ sahasreṣu kaścid yatati siddhaye. Everyone is interested how to earn money or how to gratify senses. That is the modern civilization. Here is a competition of sense gratification. I'm gratifying my senses in one way, and all others, they are trying to imitate me or compete with me though they hate me. This is going on. Everyone is trying to be the lord of all I survey. That is competition. Why I want to become the lord of all I survey? Because I want to gratify my senses to the greatest extent. This is going on. But actually our position is not to lord it over. Our position is to be lorded by the Lord. That is our position, actually. If you don't agree to be predominated by the Supreme Lord, then you shall be predominated by other agent, other energy, the material energy. I met one great professor in Moscow. The subject matter was freedom, Communism. So my last question was that "You people, Communists, you have surrendered to Lenin, and we have surrendered to Kṛṣṇa. Then where is the difference? You have selected a personality like Lenin or Stalin or Marx. We have selected a personality, Kṛṣṇa. Now, so far the principle of surrender is concerned, it is there in Communism and our Vaiṣṇavism. Now it has to be seen whether Kṛṣṇa is good or Lenin or good. That is a different question." So actually we are trying to be free, but we surrender to some rascal, that's all. Instead of surrendering to Kṛṣṇa we prefer to surrender to some rascal or fool. That is māyā. We have to surrender. Caitanya Mahāprabhu has said, jīvera svarūpa haya nitya kṛṣṇa-dāsa (Cc. Madhya 20.108-109). Our real identification is eternal servant of God, or Kṛṣṇa. That is our real identification. But unfortunately, artificially we are trying to lord it over Kṛṣṇa or over the material nature. This is struggle. Daivī hy eṣā guṇa-mayī mama māyā duratyayā (BG 7.14). This struggle you cannot overcome. Kṛṣṇa says duratyayā. It is very difficult to surmount the influence of material nature. Mama māyā duratyayā. Mām eva ye prapadyante māyām etāṁ taranti te: "If anyone surrenders unto Me, then he can get rid of this influence of the material nature." This is the law. You cannot artificially change it. If you do not become Kṛṣṇa conscious, if you do not surrender to Kṛṣṇa, God, then the māyā, or the material energy, will always give you trouble. The triṣu, three kinds of miserable conditions. The trident you have seen. The trident in the hand of Goddess Durgā, and she is punishing the demons with the trident on the chest. Therefore Narottama dāsa Ṭhākura has said, viṣaya-viṣānale dibā-niśi hiyā jvale. Our heart is always burning on account of this material condition, threefold miseries of material life: adhyātmika, adhibhautika, and adhidaivika. Viṣaya-viṣānale dibā-niśi hiyā jvale juṛāite nā koinu upāya. "I did not make any attempt how to get out of it." Golokera prema-dhana hari-nāma-saṅkīrtana rati nā janmila kene tāya. "Unfortunately, I could not develop my attachment for Kṛṣṇa or His name, which is the only process to get out of this anxieties of material existence."
So these are the facts. Everyone is anxious to have peace. The process of peace is not that you can manufacture. The process of peace is already there in the Bhagavad-gītā, in the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam. In the Bhagavad-gītā it is said by the Lord that,
- bhoktāraṁ yajña-tapasaṁ
- sarva-loka-maheśvaram
- suhṛdaṁ sarva-bhūtānāṁ
- jñātvā māṁ śāntim ṛcchati
- (BG 5.29)
This is the way of śānti. So this Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement is for actual peace and prosperity. Now if we are unfortunate, if we do not take this movement very seriously, that is a different thing. But actually this movement is on sound basis of Vedic knowledge, and it is very scientific. Any scientist, any philosopher can scrutinizingly study this movement. We have got book, very big, big books, four hundred, five hundred pages, one dozen books. If you have time, you read this philosophy, this science, and try to understand what is this Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement. But it is not a new movement. It is already known in India. Unfortunately, we Indian people, we are rejecting. That is our misfortune. Our misfortune is, as it is said, (Hindi). We have kicked out our own culture; now we are trying to develop another culture from other spheres of the world. So you can do that—there is no objection—but don't forget your original culture, Kṛṣṇa consciousness, which was taught by Kṛṣṇa Himself five thousand years ago in the Bhagavad-gītā, man-manā bhava mad-bhakta mad-yājī māṁ namaskuru: "Always think of Me, always worship Me, always offer your respect unto Me, then you will come back to home, back to Godhead." Sarva dharmān parityajya mām ekaṁ śaraṇaṁ vraja: (BG 18.66) "Just try to surrender unto Me only," mām ekaṁ śaraṇaṁ vraja ahaṁ tvāṁ sarva-pāpebhyo mokṣayiṣyāmi mā śucaḥ. Our sufferings are due to our sinful activities. We cannot surpass the vigilance of material nature by committing or by executing sinful life. That is not possible. Therefore in our movement we ask everybody, especially our serious students, to refrain from four kinds of sinful activities: illicit sex life, intoxication, gambling and meat-eating. These are the pillars of sinful life. If you think that you are enjoying life by indulging in these four kinds of sense gratification, that means you are implicating yourself. The chance of human body which you have got now to develop Kṛṣṇa consciousness, if you misuse it and indulge in sinful life, then next life is waiting as cats and dogs. That is nature's law. But if we forget the nature's law, if you simply become puffed-up by false education, that is another thing. You can do that. But real fact is this: vāsāṁsi jīrṇāni yathā vihāya (BG 2.22).