Guru Vachaka Kovai

Sri Ramana Maharshi

• O Man, like a parrot waiting expectantly for the silk-cotton fruit to ripen, you persist in your sufferings, believing this world appearance to be real and enjoyable; if the world is real simply because it appears to your senses, then a mirage would be water.
• Forgetting Self, which gives you (the seer) light to see, and being confused, do not run after this appearance (the world which you see). The appearance will disappear, and is hence not real, but the Self, the source of you (the seer), can never disappear, so know that That alone is real.
• Fear not on seeing this empty world, which appears as a dream in the sleep of Self-forgetfulness. This imaginary and bondage-causing world-picture of the dark, dense mind, will not stand in the light of Supreme Knowledge, Sat-Chit-Ananda.
• O aspirants who hide yourselves away fearing this world, nothing such as a world exists! Fearing this false world which appears to exist, is like fearing the false snake which appears in a rope.

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From Guru Vachaka Kovai (Collection of Guru's Sayings) by Sri Muruganar