Translation: "The humble sage, by virtue of true knowledge, sees with equal vision the learned and gentle brāhmaṇa, a cow, an elephant, a dog and a dog-eater (outcaste)."
Prabhupāda: Mm. Just read again.
Devotee: "The humble sage, by virtue of true knowledge, sees with equal vision...
Prabhupāda: Equal vision.
Jesuit: Equal vision.
Prabhupāda: Equal vision.
Jesuit: What does that mean, equal vision?
Prabhupāda: Equal vision means that I don't make any distinction between you and a dog.
Jesuit: You make no distinction...
Prabhupāda: No, this is spiritual vision because a paṇḍita, paṇḍita means learned man, his equal vision means he does not make any difference between the souls. The dog has got also soul and the learned scholar has got also soul. But the soul is covered by the dog's body, and here the soul is covered by the learned scholar's body. Actually both of them are souls, part and parcel of God.
Jesuit: Would you think that their souls are of different value, the soul of the dog...?
Prabhupāda: No, soul is of the same value.
Jesuit: That I would find hard to accept.
Prabhupāda: Huh?
Jesuit: 'Cause as I would understand it, the soul of the man, of any man, is what we would call a spiritual soul, an immortal soul, and the soul of the animal is a principle of life, what the Greeks would call savvy(?), Aristotle would call psyche. But it is not of an immortal soul, therefore the man has higher value than the animal, the dog, something like that.
Prabhupāda: No. What do you think? Just like a child, as a child's father, the child has got different soul and the father has got different soul?
Jesuit: They've got different souls but they're both immortal, spiritual souls.
Prabhupāda: Who is important, the child or the father?
Jesuit: Both are important, both very important, both more important than...
Prabhupāda: Which one? Which important?
Devotee: He says both are equally important, but they're both more important than the dog.
Prabhupāda: Important, so far important is concerned, both of them same.
Jesuit: Same, they're different people aren't they?
Prabhupāda: No, you say both of them equal. That means from the importance point of view, they're the same. You say both of them...
Jesuit: The father and son, they're both the same importance.
Guest: But they're different people, they're different souls...
Prabhupāda: That's all right, but you say both of them important, on which platform?
Jesuit: But when you say two things are important, you don't say they are they are of equal...
Prabhupāda: Yes, life. Both of them are life.
Jesuit: Both of them are life, a flower has life, a dog has life.
Prabhupāda: That's all right.
Jesuit: A man has life, for me that is a gradation of life, you've got to start...
Prabhupāda: That gradation so far, just like there are gradation of motor cars. This is made by Ford, this is made by (indistinct), but the petrol is the same.
Jesuit: The petrol is the same.
Prabhupāda: Yes.
Jesuit: Hm, even that can vary, but still...
Prabhupāda: There is no still, petrol is the same. The machine
may be different.
Jesuit: They're all machines.
Prabhupāda: Yes, the body is machine.
Jesuit: All inferior (indistinct).
Prabhupāda: Yes, body is matter.
Jesuit: Body is matter.
Prabhupāda: Yes.
Jesuit: But a person is more than just matter. I'm more than matter.
Prabhupāda: No, the person, just like... that is... If a man is sitting on a Rolls Royce car, he's thinking, "Very important." And a man sitting on some ordinary car, he's thinking, "I am poor." But as man, both of them (are) equal. Falsely, because he is sitting in a particular type of car, he is thinking, "I am bigger."
Jesuit: Yes, I can see I agree with all that.
Prabhupāda: So the soul is the same. So there is no difference, mamaivāṁśo jīva-bhūtaḥ (BG 15.7), find out this verse. Soul is the part and parcel of the supreme soul, Supersoul, God.
Jesuit: That is what I find hard to understand, your divine grace, that my soul, your soul is part of the supreme soul.
Prabhupāda: Yes, their soul is part and parcel...
Jesuit: I can't understand that because the supreme soul, God, the deity, is infinite.
Prabhupāda: Yes, infinite, just like your, I'll let you know, just like the ocean and the drop of ocean.
Jesuit: But even the... No, no, I can't say that either, the ocean is not infinite, the ocean is not...
Prabhupāda: It is a comparison, a drop of water... He is infinite, God is infinite, we are finite.
Jesuit: We are finite, God is infinite, therefore we cannot, added together, make up God.
Prabhupāda: No. I don't say that. I don't say that. That finite and infinite, they... Finite is there, only "in" is not there. That is lacking. They, individual soul, (indistinct) we are not infinite.
Jesuit: No, of course.
Prabhupāda: But God is infinite, and I am finite. So the finite portion is common. The "in" is more in God, infinite. So similarly I am giving the example, just like a drop of ocean water, it contains the same chemical, you find salty, and the whole ocean also salty, but the ocean is big salt and this drop is a small particle. The salt is there.
Jesuit: But I can't accept the example because the little drops of water which have salt and so on, all together coalesce to form the huge ocean but the ocean is still finite. It is not infinite. But you and I are finite...
Prabhupāda: That is already explained.
Jesuit: If we coalesce together, then that how many of us that there are...
Prabhupāda: No, I'm not comparing that combined together that we shall be equal to God. I don't say that.
Jesuit: I didn't follow you then.
Prabhupāda: I don't (indistinct) some men here, or the whole universal souls combined together, still they are finite. They're not infinite. Yes, multi-billions of zeroes cannot make one. So I don't say that, but the quality is there very minutely.
Jesuit: Imitation of the divine powers.
Prabhupāda: Not imitation, actually we have got. Just like, another example, gold and a particle of gold, a small fragmentary, that will be called gold, but not the gold equal to the mine.
Jesuit: No.
Prabhupāda: Therefore the philosophy is acintya-bhedābheda, inconceivable one and different simultaneously. One in quality, but different in quantity. God's power... I have got some creative power, and God has got creative power. So the creative power is there. But God has created millions of the planets that floating in the air and we have created a 747 airplane, we want to take more credit than God. That is our foolishness.