Page:Essays On The Gita - Ghose - 1922.djvu/317

Rh We shall therefore run as briefly as possible through the substance of this sixth chapter. First the Teacher emphasises—and this is very significant—his often re- peated asseveration about the real essence of Sannyasa, that it is an inward, not an outward renunciation “Whoever does the work to be dene without resort to its fruits, he is the Sannyasin and the Yogin, not the man who lights not the sacrificial fire and does not the works. What they have called renunciation (Sannyasa), know to be in truth Yoga;for none becomes a Yogin who has not renounced the desire-will inthe mind.” Works are to be done, but with what ptrpose and in what order ? They are first to be done while ascending the hill of Yoga, for then works are the cause, kdranaimn. The cause of what? The cause of self-perfection, of liberation, of nirvana in the Brahman;for by doing works with a steady practice of the inner renunciation this perfection, this liberation, this conquest of the desire-mind and the Yoga-self and the lower nature are easily accomplighed.

But when one has got to the top ? Then works are no longer the cause ; the calm of self-mastery and self- possession gained by works becomes the cause. Again, the cause of what ? Of fixity in the self, in the Brahman- consciousness and of the perfect equality in which the divine works of the liberated man are done. * For when one does not get attached to the objects of sense or to works and has renounced all will of desire in the mind, then is he said to have ascended to the top of Yoga.” That, as we know already, is the spirit in which the liberated man does works; he does them without desire and attachment, without the egoistic °