There are hundreds of thousands of microbes surrounding us, but they cannot harm us unless we become weak, until the body is ready and predisposed to receive them. There may be a million microbes of misery floating about us. Never mind! They dare not approach us, they have no power to get a hold on us, until the mind is weakened. This is the great fact: strength is life. Weakness is death. Strength is felicity, life eternal, immortal. Weakness is constant strain and misery: weakness is death
Swami VivekanandaLook not back. No, not even if you see the dearest and nearest cry. Look not back, but forward. We cannot stop. If we stop we die. We have either to go forward or to go backward. We have either to progress or to degenerate.
Swami VivekanandaThose who are acquainted with the literature of India will remember a beautiful old story about this extreme charity, how a whole family, as related in the Mahรขbhรขrata, starved themselves to death and gave their last meal to a beggar. This is not an exaggeration, for such things still happen.
Swami VivekanandaAll practice or worship is only for taking off this veil. When that will go, you will find that the Sun of Absolute Knowledge is shining in Its own lustre.
Swami Vivekananda