THE SPIRITUAL IDEAL

CHAPTER 1 

THE SPIRITUAL QUEST 

Spiritual Conversion 

The Young prince Siddhartha was sitting alone under a tree in his palace-garden absorbed in his thoughts. It was mid-night and the whole world lay hushed in darkness and silence. He had just then left the banquet hall having got disgusted with the noise and mirth of dancing girls. An intense dissatisfaction, a deep void, was growing within him. All of a sudden, there arose strange voice. As he listened, he heard some celestial beings singing in chorus:

We moan rest, alas! But rest can never find; We know not whence we come, nor where we float away. Time and again we tread this round of smiles and tears; In vain we pine to know whither our pathway leads, and why we play this empty play  

Rise, dreamer, from your dream, and slumber not again! (Quoted in the Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna)