| Whether a man
frees himself from the fruits of his past deeds or adds more links to the chains that bind
him depends upon the way he lives. Past deeds or rather their effects hold one in their
grip from birth, but the soul has freedom to act and in the exercise of that freedom it
has the power to overcome tendencies and to strive for liberation. The process and
effort can be extended over many births. We make for
ourselves our opportunities, and the process goes on ceaselessly for better or worse and
is carried on from birth to birth. The battle is as long as eternity and the tedium
is relieved by the lapse of memory with each death. Eternity, so to say, bears its own
burden. The bur den of infinity is not on us but is borne by itself.
We can not get eternity to shrink in order to suit our
impotent finite ness. The infinite number of births that a soul goes through may seem to
be an unbearable burden by reason of our limited faculties. It is no more unthinkable and
no less natural than the age of our mountains or the lifetime of a star. We are indeed
blessed in the total lapse of memory with each death. The law works without putting a
strain on our feeble minds. |
