But love in its higher sense teaches us that there is a love, an object, a beloved that can last with us and prove satisfactory, compared with which there is nothing in life worthy of all our love; and that one object is God. But among those who say, "O yes, I love God", very few tell the truth; very often that is a false pretence. How can we love the formless and colorless? It is impossible to love one whom we cannot confine within any particular beauty. It is only those who pretend to be spiritual because they are godly and pious towards those of their own sect that say, "We love God." It is as absurd to say this as to say to a beloved, "O beloved, I love you very much, but I do not like looking at your face." For God says, "I have made man in My own image."

When man is prejudiced against man and still says, "I love God", how can God be pleased with that kind of love? How can that be true love for God which refuses to see the beauty that is before it? If God said, "If you wish to see Me, see Me in the face of man; that is My own image" this would show what true love is. Also, if a person claiming to love an artist were to say to him, "I love you very much, but I cannot bear to look at your picture", what kind of love could that be? The artist has given all his soul and life to that art; his very self has, so to speak, become art, and his whole satisfaction lies in our appreciation of his art. How can those claim to love the Creator who do not love what He has created? For God could never have become known had there been no manifestation. So he who does not find sufficient beauty to admire in His manifestation cannot pretend to love God.

So, too, if someone limits his love to a single "object, saying, "I only love this and there is nothing else I need", surely he has not the right kind of love either. True love is limitless. Though it begins by being limited in such a way, yet it progresses and some day breaks out. Such a thing is constantly happening in life, but people do not understand the psychic law which underlies it. Eastern people say, when someone loves another person intensely and does not care for anyone else, "There will be some mishap there some day." There is always some breakdown, some danger waiting, some trouble in the future, when love is not allowed to flow freely and is limited.

The Japanese and Chinese have called God jealous, because He does not allow two persons to be devoted only to each other. God cannot tolerate this narrowing of love. If one tried to put the whole sea into a little jar, the sea would break it. The sea of love breaks its limited channel. To speak of the jealous God means that the unlimited force of love cannot allow its expression to be directed towards one limited object. That is why the love of God alone is the culmination of love, for love is as vast as God. Verily, love itself is God.

There is a beautiful story which has been dramatized and acted in India for hundreds of years; the people never get tired of seeing it, so it is acted even today. It is called "The Court of Indra."

Indra is the God of Heaven. His court is made up of Devas and Peris. The latter dance in the court, the Devas are to attend the pleasure of Indra. No earthly creature is ever allowed to enter, nothing of the earth is ever seen or allowed in the court of Indra.

Once a Peri, the Green Peri, happened to fly to the surface of the earth, and she saw a prince of that country over which she was flying, whose beauty charmed her so much that she thought that if she could in some way or other take him to her high dwellings, she would be happy. She told one of the Devas about it, and he carried away Gulfam, the Prince, while he was asleep.

He wakes up, and finds himself in a strange place, and breathing a different air. After great bewilderment he sees a Peri, a creature much more beautiful than the creatures of the earth. He looks at her and asks her how he comes to be there. She tells him he is in Indra Loka, that she loves him and will be happy to keep him there. "I will do anything for your happiness", she says.

Gulfam forgets all about his kingdom, and lives with the Peri, most happy in her love. Every day she has to leave him to be at her duty, and every day she returns, never saying where she has been. This arouses his curiosity, but still she will not tell where she goes and what she does. Finally she does tell him that she has to dance before Indra every day. Then he wants to go and see. She expostulates, but at length consents to take him.

She keeps him behind her, and hopes to conceal him with her wings as she dances before Indra. But one of the Devas sees him and tells Indra, who for a long time will not believe it possible that a human being could be in his court. Then he discovers him, and pronounces a curse upon him, while the Peri is to be banished until she has undergone the successive stages of purification through earth, water, fire, air, and ether. Not till then can she be allowed to enter the heavens again.

This story shows that in the highest dwellings, in that sphere which is Indra Loka where love conquers man, the King is Indra, the perfection of beauty. The highest love must be for God; it belongs to Him. In its development love should aim at that idea. The Peri is the human soul, Gulfam is the human body. The soul, which is heavenly, becomes interested in this earthly body; but when by the power of love it comes from the earth to the heavenly sphere, it brings to heaven an object which is destined only for the earth. The love of a limited being is not allowed to remain in heaven, and will be condemned to be purified and uplifted until it can nevermore find satisfaction in a limited object, in the love for a human being. Homage must be paid to the Lord of Heaven.

True love must have free flow; and to learn that free flow the teachers have taught us first to love from the limited, and thence to advance in love till we attain to the love of God, the Unlimited.