Chapter 5

Chapter V

For the Piccadilly Sunday lectures the Water Color Painter’s Gallery was hired, and a notice placed in the newspaper. A church paper published that an atheist had come from India to preach his doctrines; he did not believe in God, criticized the Christian religion and various other nice things. In all the newspapers such was the influence of the clergy that this was the general understanding. On Friday or Saturday evening Goodwin would write out, on small pieces of paper, notices ready to be sent to each newspaper. As many copies had to be made, Swami Saradananda and Mohendra did this. These were sent but not a mention came out in the Sunday papers. From this it was clearly understood that there was a strong inside prejudice. Goodwin was just as determined: every week when he wrote the notice he would send it to all the papers. But there was no mention in the church news column.

Canon Haweis

Goodwin heard that in a church near Regent’s Park a highly-placed clergyman was going to give a talk on Hinduism or relating to Swami Vivekananda. The man (a Canon) used to attend regularly the evening class, with his wife and daughter. He had great regard for, and faith in, Swamiji. More people attended the Regent’s Park church than most churches; at that time this man was very popular with the common folk. Next day Goodwin suggested that after breakfast Swami Saradananda, Goodwin, Fox and Mohendra all go together to hear the sermon. Swamiji at first agreed. Fox pronounced the preacher’s name “Hawees”; Swamiji corrected him: “Hawai-s.” A bit later, Goodwin, thinking it over said, “Let Fox and me go, otherwise people seeing two Indians, many would guess that they had come to spy out what would be said about Swami Vivekananda.” In the end Fox could not go and Goodwin went alone. When he returned he reported, “What a lecture! Backty and Backto.” Canon Haweis had said that this idea comes from India. Just now from India had come this Swami Vivekananda who was explaining this so beautifully. Many people were hearing and appreciating it and he himself had learned it from him. If this approach could be brought into Christianity it would be beneficial etc. Goodwin laughed a lot about the (pronunciation) Backty and Backto, but said many times how happy the sermon had made him.

Lecture at the Galleries

    By four o’clock all were ready to go to Piccadilly. Miss Muller went by herself. The men all went by “bus” (horse-drawn). Swamiji and Sturdy sat on the roof on a bench, talked and smoked cigarettes, the other three sitting behind them. Upstairs at the Galleries Swamiji first made light talk with acquaintances. In the hall, four or five hundred could be seated. Goodwin said there would be many people at lecture time. Ahead of time, Swami Saradananda and Mohendra occupied a sofa near the lecture platform, lest they not be able to get out afterward. Swamiji seated two Indians inside and turning around and coming back, began to welcome everyone at the door. Miss Muller, not getting a place in the hall, stood near the door, with a necklace of huge yellow glass beads around her neck. There were some pictures on the walls, and a polished wooden floor. The speaker’s place was a platform at one end with table and glass of water. Mr. Sturdy mounted this and introduced the subject and speaker in a couple of minutes and stepped down.

    Meanwhile Goodwin tipped off Swamiji as to the subject announced, as he would forget what had been published. He did not worry about or prepare the lectures. He wore a red tunic or long shirt, a collar but no tie. There was a sash around his waist but he was bare-headed. With his arms crossed on his chest he began to pace the platform like a swift lion. His facial expression was now altogether changed. Now his facial expression became completely changed. The same person who, five minutes before had been just laughing and making jokes like an ordinary man, smoking a cigarette, now in him a sleeping power had suddenly awakened; the muscles had become firm and hard, the eyes dilated and his glance full of fire and authority. He had become a man free and disembodied. Then he lowered his arms to his side and occasionally swung them a little. All of sudden he stood stiff, his eyes had an inward look; he seemed to have left the gross body and gone to the subtle, and he remained with a fixed gaze like this, as if looking at something in the air.

    Then gradually, with tones of affection the words began to come out quickly. Even when his voice was soft, he would be clearly heard to the end [of the hall?] Gradually as the thought became tense and complex, so the voice would rise accordingly. Slowly his left arm was set in motion and the fingers of his hand sometimes clenched, sometimes spread, expressing the thought in his mind. Sometimes he would raise his right arm, and sometimes when the thought was very profound, he used both arms to aid the expression. Thus the lecture ended after nearly an hour and a half. The audience had sat still and breathless as if there were no one in the room. Then he drank water, came down, seemed his normal self and within five minutes tried to mix with everyone. Even then a “lit” look remained in his face and eyes. Among the audience those who were American said, “We heard this lecture in America.” But those who were hearing it for the first time were astonished. Miss McLeod was present. The house lectures were on Raja Yoga and the Piccadilly ones serially on Jnana Yoga and other stories and subjects arranged in various places in the Complete Works.

Below stairs

   One day Swamiji and his brother-Swami went down to the kitchen, made ghee, cooked potatoes into khichuri, and made a very spicy curry and brought it up to the dining-room. Suddenly Swami Saradananda said to Mohendra, “Oh, take a bit out for Miss Cameron, otherwise she will scold us when she comes in the afternoon.” Mohendra did so, but Miss Cameron did not come that afternoon. She came next day at four o’clock bringing a young Swiss man [Max Gysi?]. Miss Cameron was about forty-five years old, a friend of Mr. Sturdy. She loved Swamiji very much and had a loud mouth but a big heart. She would come to the door and say, spiritedly, to Swami Saradananda, “You kooky Swami, you devil Swami,” etc. Though scolding, she would examine everything minutely, from kitchen to bedroom, seeing whether the kitchen was supplied, what was being cooked, talk over with the housekeeper the menus etc., tidy up each room, see if the sheets were clean, then come and sit in the dining-room. The young man had spoken before with Swami Saradananda and Mohendra. Later it was learned that he came from Switzerland and Miss Cameron was taking care of him like an adopted son. When Swami Saradananda fed them some of the curry, it made her eyes water and she cried out, “Oh, it is poison,” and teased him.
   Goodwin always stayed close to Swamiji, listened carefully to his words and took down everything about Vedanta and Raja Yoga. At that time the mood of Vedanta became much awakened in Goodwin. There was an elderly maidservant (apparently Irish) with whom he used to banter. She once took exception to something that was being done in the house and when told “Swami Vivekananda is responsible for it; why don’t you complain to him?”, she lost her nerve and said, “No, Swami is a great man. I love him much. He is very kind to all. He is a great-hearted man!” She never attended any lecture and stayed downstairs; but seeing and hearing about the people who came to him and what they said, she had much faith in him and devotion to him.
   Sturdy, who did not smoke and did not know tobacco, one day brought Swamiji a pound of special pipe tobacco which he tried, but could not get to burn properly. He said to Goodwin, “You see, Sturdy is rather stingy. He got a bargain, and so the tobacco is no good. No taste, no smell, it won’t draw in the pipe. Throw this away, my boy, and go out and get me some good tobacco. All day I have to spend talking with people, have to lecture, have to think; I can’t even smoke a little if I want to. This sour-faced man into whose hands I have fallen has taken the life out of me.” Goodwin did as he was bidden.

Clarification of “Yoga”

   A young man from Gujerat named Deshai [who wrote in Reminiscences of Swami Vivekananda] used to come to Swamiji frequently. Sometimes he would write Sanskrit poems and read them to him. Hearing these the latter would say, “Do the work you came here to do, with a concentrated mind. You didn’t have to cross the seven seas and all that to compose Sanskrit poems; you could have done that sitting at home.” Sometimes one or two other Gujerati boys also would come. Deshai once asked, “Swamiji, you are always giving lectures on Raja Yoga. Why not Hatha Yoga?”
   “Look, my boy, wearing the sadhu’s outfit and wandering all over India I had a difficult time enough to get my meals; and you speak of hatha yoga! In hatha yoga one has to regulate the food, wrap the body in a flannel blanket, etc. This is a business fraught with difficulties. Those who have provision for proper food, whose mind doesn’t go in other directions, who can sit by the hour and carefully look after the body, can do hatha yoga.
   Deshai: “But doesn’t hatha yoga help to improve the mind?”
   Swamiji: “Mind improvement and all mental matters are called raja yoga. Hatha yoga is only fixing the body. One can keep it a long time.
In Maharaj Ranjit Singh’s durbar there was a sadhu named Baba Haridas. He was a hatha yogi. Once he showed the hatha yoga practices. First he sat stiff. Then, putting him into a safe-like box, people fastened it with a chain, buried the chest in the earth and planted wheat over it.
The wheat ripened and was cut; five or six months had passed. On all sides guards were kept. When it was opened there was Baba Haridas still stiff, only the top of his head was a little warm. Then his disciples began to rub his back with the juice of trees and shrubs to bring him back to outer consciousness. Ranjit Singh wanted to present him with many gifts, but he would accept nothing. At the end of his life he was not very well. In hatha yoga there is no improvement in the mind, merely doing different things with the body. Raja Yoga is the only way for matters mental.”

Swamiji and History

   Fox became so much attracted to Swamiji’s genius that on any argument raised he would go to him for authority. When it came to history, Fox said, “Swamiji says that the French are the Persians of Europe.” Talking with Fox Swamiji said one day, “Pajamas and tailored dress were first made by the Persians and then taken up by others; the other races of Europe now demonstrate the elegance of the Persians.” He and Fox used to talk a lot of history. Once Swamiji said: “At the time of Megasthenes many of the people of India were Persian. He was a contemporary of Chandragupta. But thereafter with the ascendancy of Buddhism, the Indian blood got mixed with all kinds of other peoples and the race became dark-skinned, and their strength diminished.”
   One day the subject came up of the Roman Emperor Aulus Vitellius (15 – 69 CE). In Gibbon’s Roman History it is mentioned that Vitellius did nothing but eat during his reign. Swamiji said that myna birds from Assam, peacocks from various parts of India, used to go to Rome. Vitellius would eat myna birds cooked in ghee and milk. And the liver of white fox from Siberia. The man’s food was very odd. Fox used to say about Swamiji, “He puts to shame many an American professor and pandit.”
Sometimes Swamiji would say to Fox, “Look, I have seen your America. People have become mad to make money; it is their whole world. They are unaware that there is anything else to be thought about. Do you know what? One day when I went to see the Exhibition in Chicago I took ride on the huge merry-go-round. Two people happened to bump their heads together, and instead of being ashamed and apologizing to each other, they exchanged business cards! People speak of nothing but business. But when the country becomes a bit more prosperous, their minds will go to higher things; then in that land you will see the development of philosophy, art and music. Oh, what a time I had in one big American barbershop! One has to take somebody with him as a birth certificate – otherwise the barber of a respectable shop will not cut the hair of a “darkie.” This is a terrible thing. I saw that the hatred of dark color is very strong in America.”
   One day about two or three o’clock Swamiji was leaning back in his easy chair in one corner of the room, his legs crossed, eyes closed, as if pondering something. He stayed this way a long time. Fox, Mohendra and others were sitting still. Swamiji suddenly uncrossed his legs and said with a serious face: “Fox, I have been thinking about Paul and the Christian religion. Do you know what I see? A minor religion was in the hands of a few fishermen. At that time the Greeks and Romans were two powerful races. The Jews were a subject race. Paul became the advocate of the ideas of these fishermen. Paul was a learned fanatic, so he could overturn the Greek philosophy and Roman government. Mere religion and devotion doesn’t do the trick; there have to be fanatics. Do you know what I am? Paul was a learned fanatic and I want to create a band of learned fanatics. You see, just a fanatic is not enough – that is a kind of brain disease and makes much mischief. It must be a learned fanatic.” He got quite excited over this: everyone listened awestruck. So it is, many say, “What Paul was to Jesus, Vivekananda is to Ramakrishna.”
   After morning lecture one day Swamiji was slowly coming downstairs with Miss Muller. We have previously mentioned the unpleasantness between her and Swami Saradananda on a certain occasion. Swamiji was saying to her, in a soothing voice, but by way of chiding, “We are all monomaniacs. I am a monomaniac for my preaching of Vedanta; you are a monomaniac for your whims. The world is full of monomaniacs.”
   Miss Muller did not care for the cooking of the elderly housekeeper and began to make a fuss about it. One afternoon she grumbled and grumbled, got dressed up and went off to her relatives. Sturdy was not there that day. Swamiji became cross and said, “I can’t put up with it. Nothing but quarrels. As soon as the slightest thing goes wrong, she puts up a fuss. Let her stay with her family for a while; she will cool off and come back.”
   Once as they sat down to a meal Swamiji asked Goodwin to look in the diary to see if there was any engagement today. Goodwin saw that there was an invitation from a duke in Park Lane at this very hour. [Perhaps the Duke of Cambridge, one of Queen Victoria’s sons.] A terrible rush ensued, with everyone trying to get Swamiji ready. A carriage was called, etc. Goodwin was at his every beck and call, whirling like a spinning wheel. Then they sat down again to their meal. Goodwin raved about the split-pea dal. “How delicious! I could eat this all my life,” etc. Swami Saradananda and Mohendra smiled to themselves. Swamiji returned very late at night.
   The next day he said to the other Swami, “Well, Sarat, have you noticed? Big and influential people of Calcutta come here, but nobody cares a fig for them. Do the dukes eat with them? By bringing many certificates they may succeed in meeting important people, whereas I am fed by invitation. And do you see? Before me they are struck all of a heap!”
   “I belong to the class of “teachers”, here – that is why I am honored. I move right in step with the rich, the high-born, the intelligentsia, like an Englishman. And don’t you see? I pound Vedanta into their bones. From now on they will see India with new eyes. They will hear about India with respect.” And he laughed softly. About half-past one or two o’clock he said to Fox: “Come on! Eating a monotonous diet every day is no good. Let us two go out and eat at a hotel.”
   One day after breakfast Swamiji was sitting in his own chair and others around him. The subject of America came up. Goodwin said, “Our biggest meeting was in Detroit. Nearly six thousand people. That day your words came out with superhuman strength. I was mad with joy.”
   Swami replied, “In America, who are they who will help spread Vedanta?” Goodwin said,
   “I can count on my fingers the big people who used to attend the lectures in America.”
   Swamiji: “What about Tesla and Edison?”
   Goodwin: “Tesla would work out all right, but Edison would be utterly incompatible.” In this way the names of many noted persons were mentioned and who would be helpful and who would not. When he heard Goodwin’s opinion that the spread of Vedanta in America would be permanent, Swamiji became heartened and joyful.
   In 1895 in London many of the barber shops were operated by Germans, who would work for lower wages than the English. When Swamiji needed a haircut he would take with him some well-known person to the high-class English shops. Such barber shops were not open to the common man. All of them were like palaces. But they would serve Swamiji if he was accompanied by one of the elite. Again he made the comparison with the color-bar in American shops.
   It seems that once he got his toenails cut by one of the Hale Sisters.