White Roses

31 January 1961

From the point of view of spiritual realisation, the time has no concrete reality; all depends on the sincerity and intensity of the aspiration, on the steadiness of the effort. Some can do in a few weeks and even days what takes years for others. Moreover, as the mind and the vital, the chief factors of progress, arc not submitted to the same rules of decay as the material body, the age factor loses all its importance when we speak of spiritual and intellectual growth; there is no time limit nor age limit for the mental progress which can go on steadily for hundreds of years.

Secondly, failure is not the sign of incapacity—far from that.

Repeated failures come always to those who have something exceptional to do; it is only those who are satisfied with a commonplace and ordinary realisation who succeed easily in what they attempt to do. The natures of a special value have always to face many ordeals.

And thirdly, when I say to take refuge in the Divine's love, I do not mean that it is all sufficient in itself. Not so; personal effort and favourable circumstances are also necessary for the promptness of the advance. But those who can take refuge in the Divine's love find there a support, a protection and a joy that give them strength to face all the ordeals and surmount all the difficulties.