This so-called advancement of civilization means the living entity is always compared as an ass, mūḍha. So instead of becoming intelligent, by material education one becomes more and more first-class ass, jaḍa-vidyā saba māyāra vaibhava tomāra bhajane bādhā. Because the more you become advanced in so-called material civilization, you'll forget God, māyāra vaibhava. Māyā's business is to keep you always sleeping, forgetting God. This is māyā's business. Daivī hi eṣā guṇa-mayī mama māyā duratyayā (BG 7.14). This is māyā's business. The more you forget Kṛṣṇa, the more you are under the influence of māyā. Jaḍa-vidyā saba māyāra vaibhava. So if you increase your volume of material civilization, then more and more you'll forget God and you'll be attached to this material world, māyāra vaibhava.
So people are increasing more and more and becoming under the clutches of māyā. That is janma-mṛtyu-jāra-vyādhi (BG 13.9). Clutches of māyā means birth, death, old age and disease. This is māyā's shackles, or ropes. But they do not care for it. They do not take into account that "I am eternal, na hanyate hanyamāne śarīre (BG 2.20). I do not die even after the destruction of this body. So why shall I suffer in this way repeatedly birth and death?" And that is also not only inconvenient, but very much painful. Today you are American or something, or Indian, but tomorrow if you become a tree in the American land, then what is your position? But they do not care for it, do not understand it; therefore it is māyāra vaibhava. This advancement of material civilization is māyāra vaibhava.
Therefore the Vedic civilization is voluntarily accepting poverty. Voluntary. Big, big kings, they voluntarily accepted poverty. Rūpa Gosvāmī. Don't go to the past, big, big. . . Bharata Mahārāja and others. Even Lord Rāmacandra. Take recent history, within five hundred years. Rūpa Gosvāmī, the chief minister of the government of Bengal, most opulent position: tyaktvā tūrṇam aśeṣa-maṇḍala-pati-śreṇīm. They became mendicant, voluntarily accepting, tyaktvā tūrṇam aśeṣa-mandala-pati-śreṇīṁ sadā tucchavat. "What is this nonsense position, minister, opulent life? Kick it out." They are not fools. They are politicians. But why they "Kick it out"? Then what they became? Bhūtvā dīna-gaṇeśakau karuṇayā kaupīna-kanthāśritau. They become mendicant.
So voluntarily accepting poverty, this is Indian civilization, this is Vedic civilization. Not to increase material opulence but to decrease. The more you decrease, you are civilized. And the Western country, if you decrease, if you instruct them that "Decrease these nonsense activities. No more tire civilization," they'll say, "Oh, this is primitive. Primitive. This tendency is primitive." But actually, the primitive civilization . . . Not primitive; that is very sober civilization, anartha. Instead of increasing unwanted necessities, decrease it. That is Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam.
- anarthopaśamaṁ sākṣād
- bhakti-yogam adhokṣaje
- lokasya ajānataḥ vidvāṁś
- cakre sātvata saṁhitām
- (SB 1.7.6)
This sātvata saṁhitām bhāgavata is there, simply to decrease this unwanted so-called material civilization.