Now coming to the subject of attainment of truth. No doubt as already mentioned, the first step to the attainment of the truth cannot be taught in books, or be imparted by a teacher. It must come spontaneously, namely through the love for truth. The next step is to search for it; The third step is the actual attainment.

How can one attain? In order to attain truth one must make one's own life truthful. This is life in its moral aspect. The more truthful one is in one's every day life the more one practices this moral despite its great difficulty, the more one approaches the only religion which there is. But it is the most difficult to practice this moral in this world of falsehood, where every move one makes is touched by some unreality which impresses one. Every moment of a person's life is touched by falsehood which is likely to impress him.

The love of truth gives one an appreciation of truth, and all the little shadows of truth become reflected in such a person's heart more and more until at length he expresses trueness in his nature. Seeking after truth enables one to learn to appreciate all that comes from truthful hearts. Passing from the state of natural man, through the state of being a lover of truth and a seeker after truth, one begins to express truth.

The intellectual side of this is that when one loves the truthful life, naturally the intelligence, - the torch by which to see both the world seen and the world unseen, - begins to help one, and the clouds of illusion within and without begin to become scattered. Man then begins to see with his own light in his hand. It is a hint towards this process which we find in the words of Jesus Christ, "Raise your light high, let no one keep his light under a bushel." The act of raising the light on high is to hold the torch of intelligence in one's hand in order to see into the external world, - that which is seen, - and also into the world which is within and unseen.

As has already been said, truth is the very self of man. Truth is the divine element in man. Truth is every soul's seeking. Therefore as soon as the clouds of illusion are scattered, that which man now begins to see is nothing but the truth which has been there all the time. He finds that the truth was never absent; it was only covered by clouds of illusion. By changing his own nature, by making himself more truthful, he disperses the clouds of falsehood within and without, and begins to see life as it really is both inwardly and outwardly. From this time onwards, the meaning of religion becomes clear.

One begins to understand what the great teachers have taught. Then one becomes tolerant to the various religions. Nothing seems strange any more. Nothing surprises. For now one begins to know the innermost nature of man; one sees the cause behind every action. Therefore tolerance and forgiveness and understanding of others come naturally. The person who knows the truth is the most tolerant. It is the knower of truth who is forgiving; it is the knower of truth who understands another person's point of view. It is the knower of truth who does not readily voice his opinion, for he has respect for the opinions of others.

When man gains insight into himself, he also gains insight into the hearts of others. All this desire for learning occult or mystical powers or psychic powers now disappears, because he begins to see all this power in one truth, - loving truth, seeking truth, looking for truth, living the truthful life. That it is which opens all doors. He does not need to learn how to read thoughts. He does not need to learn secret or occult powers or psychic powers in order to penetrate into the heart of man. The heart of every person is open to him.

When our heart is closed, it is shut to all other hearts. It is the lack of knowledge of ourselves which makes us ignorant of them and closed to us. To say a person "does not open his heart" means that his heart is not open. Were he to understand himself, that understanding would itself help him to understand another. Once he is open himself, the other person no longer seems closed. It is the action and reaction between two hearts. The opening of the one heart has an influence on the other, and it opens. When one's own heart is closed, the other person's heart, though open, will also close.

Lack of reality and lack of truth causes one to wander away from truth all the time, but at the same time there is a great desire to understand and learn truth. But though prompted by that desire, when the person comes to search for truth, he seeks to find it in complexity of things, things which he cannot understand. The simple words of great teachers as Christ and Buddha are too simple for many, who say,"This is only something we have always heard in churches, something which the old people have always said." He thinks it is not new, and he can only give his mind to something that is new and complex, something that he cannot understand. So he gropes on into darkness, into one subtlety after another. It is like going into a maze. Children enjoy going to a place where they cannot find their way, for they know they are safe with their parents all the time. So, too, the soul which is not mature, continues to seek after complexities, and is not satisfied with the ultimate truth.

If one were to describe the truth in simple words, they would reply, "That is too simple," "We know that," "We know it already." But though the real knowledge of truth is already within every person, everyone is not conscious of knowing it. If he is made conscious of it now, one is after all only making him conscious of something which is already there; that is why he does not think that what he hears is something new. It is true. It was there already all the time.

True spiritual teaching does not consist in imparting something to another, but in awakening a sense within him which requires to be awakened. No spiritual teacher imparts new knowledge to his pupil unless he wants him to play with a puzzle Parents often make a great game for their children by perplexing them with puzzles.

When a person really wants to find the way, it is not very far from him. It depends on the sincerity of the desire to find it whether it is far or not. What is necessary for finding it is not much reading, or discussion or argument, but a practical study of self. One questions one's own self: what am I? Am I a material body, or a mind, or something behind a mind? Am I myself or my coat? Is this object "me," or something different? Is this body my cover, or myself?

Truth can be attained by reflecting thus, "For what am I toiling from morning till evening? What is the purpose of my life, to work for wealth, or for honor, or for position? If that is my life, how shall I be able to hold it? Shall I part from what I have gathered together? If that is so, then it does not belong to me; so it is not really my own property. That which can be snatched from my hand is not really my property, and therefore I must seek something - in myself, perhaps - which can be depended on, and is also valuable." Once a person realizes the falsehood of things, he will cease to consider them important; their color fades, and their real values appear. It is just like a child going into a theater and seeing a palace on the stage.

He thinks, "How beautiful; I would like to live there in that palace." But take him in the day-time, and let him see it was really only a painted curtain, and not a palace at all. Then he will lose the value he attached to that scene. So it is with all things. Everything we value, all we long for and toil for, from morning till evening, all these things so often cause us to lose sight of honesty and truth. We are very often placed in positions in which honesty and truth are lost, where one person plots against another, and where there is reciprocity in falsehood. One's whole life becomes folded up and covered in by falsehood. The soul must be unfolded so that reality can come to view.

This does not mean that we are obliged to give up everything that seems false and everything that seems real. That would be impossible. We cannot live in the world and overlook its need and all that is necessary for life. We must work for such things. But at the same time we must have a realization of the true and the false, we must discriminate between what is our soul's need and what our body's need, what our soul seeks for and what will always stay with us, and what will leave us. It is a matter of discriminating between the true coin and its counterfeit. It is not a matter of retiring away from the world and "going to live in a forest."