Choked with tears

Sri Ramana Maharshi

5-6-1945 Afternoon

Harindranath Chattopadhyaya asked Bhagavan, "How is it, Bhagavan, we sometimes feel choked with tears in Bhagavan's Presence?" Bhagavan smiled and kept quiet. 

I said, "It is a good thing if one's tears gush forth like that and even of Bhagavan it is recorded that when he used to go and stand before the image in the temple at Madurai, before he came here, tears used to flow involuntarily out of his eyes, not as the result of any joy or pain, but purely out of bhakti (devotion)." Bhagavan was thereupon kind enough to add, "Even after coming here such a thing has happened. Even on reading or hearing touching passages from books such a thing has happened. Apparently a stock of emotional tears is latent in so many of us, so that at any opportune moment, or on the slightest provocation, they well out without any control on our part." 

Then Bhagavan narrated, very dramatically as is usual with him, an incident which occurred when he was about 22 and living in the Virupakshi Cave. It seems he was sitting on a rock near the cave and a boy of 8 or 10 years came there, looked at Bhagavan and, not being able to bear the sight of such a young and bright person taking to such a hard life of penance, was so moved to compassion that he started to sob and sobbed violently for some time. Bhagavan said, "Who could say what was the reason for his sobbing and why tears flowed out of him merely at his seeing me?"