Sunday, March 11, 2012

Annie Besant Quotes

Annie Besant (1 October 1847 – 20 September 1933) was a prominent British Theosophist, women's rights activist, writer and orator and supporter of Irish and Indian self rule. Annie Besant actively participated in indian freedom movement and was elected as the president of indian national congress in 1917. Annie Besant was one of most remarkable and intelligent lady of last century who devoted his entire life to religious, educational, women' rights and other noble causes.
Annie Besant was president of Theosophy movment for number of years. Annie Besant was also instrumental in the education and upbringing of enlightened mystic Jiddu Krishnamurti. When Jiddu Krishnamurti broke away with Theosophy movement, Annie Besant did not complained to J Krishnamurti and relation between them always remain friendly. Annie Besant always supported J Krishnamurti and remain in touch with him till her last days.

  1. The man of meditation is the man who wastes no time, scatters no energy, misses no opportunity.
     
  2. Mysticism is the realisation of God, of the Universal Self.
     
  3. Service is that which is done for love's sake for another. It is not true service which is paid with wages.
     
  4. Desire draws together the Desirer and the Desired. — You see the one motive power in the universe as attraction everywhere. So long as it is drawn out from you by outer objects, we call it Desire. When the same power is directed from within, we call it Will. Everything you desire to possess is drawn towards you by desire, because there is One Life in all, and the lives separated by their different forms are ever trying to rejoin.
     
  5. As you give Happiness or Misery to others, so shall you reap Happiness or Misery for Yourself. — According to the effect of our action upon others comes a similar reaction upon ourselves. As by sowing rice you reap rice, so by sowing pleasure you reap pleasure. But if done for a selfish motive, it works out as a selfish character.
     
  6. When a man feels devotion to the Supreme, he has turned his back on evil and has turned his face to the goal; he may stumble, stray, even fall, but his face is turned in the right direction, he is going homewards; he must needs become dutiful by the force of his devotion.
     
  7. We are free always; none can give us freedom, none can withhold it. But only long experience and effort can remove from us the delusion that we are bound. All the purification is but the cleaning of the lamp-glass which hides the Light; the purification does not light the lamp, it only permits the ever-burning light to send forth its rays. So effort does not give liberation; it only removes the delusion of bondage. Anywhere, at any stage, the Self may know and assert his freedom; steps are nothing, stages are nothing, time is nothing; the Self abides in eternity, the ever-free.
     
  8. The first step to the finding of the Self is, as the Upanishad declares, the 'ceasing from evil ways'. Until evil is deliberately put away by a full effort of the will and a resolute unwavering determination, the very beginning of the finding of the Self may not be. The feet which tread the miry ways of sin may not place themselves upon the path of Holiness.
     
  9. I hold that alcohol itself is essentially a destructive, mischievous agency, and therefore its use ought to be entirely opposed, entirely renounced, as of no benefit in the economy of the human body.
     
  10. No one can eat the flesh of a slaughtered animal without having used the hand of a man as slaughterer. Suppose that we had to kill for ourselves the creatures whose bodies we would fain have upon our table, is there one woman in a hundred who would go to the slaughterhouse to slay the bullock, the calf, the sheep or the pig?
     
  11. Liberation is the state of the spirit when he realizes his own nature, his own eternity; when he knows himself as the reality, and not as one of the passing phenomena of the world in which he happens to be manifesting.
     
  12. Better remain silent, better not even think, if you are not prepared to act.
     
  13. Never forget that life can only be nobly inspired and rightly lived if you take it bravely and gallantly, as a splendid adventure in which you are setting into an unknown country, to face many a danger, to meet many a joy, to find many a comrade, to win and lose many a battle.
     
  14. For centuries the leaders of Christian thought spoke of women as a necessary evil, and the greatest saints of the Church are those who despise women the most.

Annie Besant's Mantra:

(This mantra is used in the Theosophical Society Adyar all over the world)

Oh hidden Life
Vibrant in every atom

Oh hidden Light
Shining in every creature

Oh Hidden Love
Embracing all in Oneness

May all who feel themselves
As one with Thee

Know they are therefore
One with Every Other

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