The Fool

Long is the night for one who sleeps not; long is the

road for one who is weary; long is the cycle of births

for the fool who knows not the true law.

If a man cannot find a companion who is his superior

or even his equal, he should resolutely follow a soli-

tary path; for no good can come from companionship

with a fool.

The fool torments himself by thinking, “This son is

mine, this wealth is mine.” How can he possess sons

and riches, who does not possess himself?

The fool who recognises his foolishness is at least wise

in that. But the fool who thinks he is intelligent, is a

fool indeed.

Even if the fool serves an intelligent man throughout

his life, he will nevertheless remain ignorant of the

truth, just as the spoon knows not the taste of the

soup.

If an intelligent man serves a wise man, if only for a

moment, he will quickly understand the truth, just as

the tongue instantly perceives the savour of the soup.

The fools, those who are ignorant, have no worse

enemies than themselves; bitter is the fruit they gather

from their evil actions.

The evil action which one repents later brings only

regrets and the fruit one reaps will be tears and lamen-

tations.             

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The good action one does not need to repent later

brings no regret and the fruit one reaps will be con-

tentment and satisfaction.

As long as the evil action has not borne its fruits, the

fool imagines that it is as sweet as honey. But when

this action bears its fruits, he reaps only suffering.

Though month after month the fool takes his food

with the tip of a blade of Kusa grass,¹ he is not for

all that worth a sixteenth part of one who has under-

stood the truth.

An evil action does not yield its fruits immediately,

just as milk does not at once turn sour; but like a fire

covered with ashes, even so smoulders the evil action.

Whatever vain knowledge a fool may have been able

to acquire, it leads him only to his ruin, for it breaks

his head and destroys his worthier nature.

The foolish monk thirsts after reputation, and a high

rank among the Bhikkhus, after authority in the mo-

nastery and veneration from ordinary men.

“Let ordinary men and holy ones esteem highly what

I have done; let them obey me!” This is the longing

of the fool, whose pride increases more and more.

One path leads to earthly gain and quite another leads

to Nirvana. Knowing this, the Bhikkhu, the disciple

of the Perfectly Enlightened One, longs no more for

honour, but rather cultivates solitude.  

¹ Kusa grass is considered sacred in India. Taking one's food with the tip of a blade of Kusa grass symbolises an act of asceticism.

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This seems to point directly to hypocrites who take up the external forms and appearances of wisdom but in their hearts keep all the desires, ambitions, the need for show, and live to satisfy this ambition and these desires instead of living for the only thing that is worth living for: attainment of the true consciousness, integral self-giving to the Divine, the peace, the light and the delight that come from the true wisdom and self-forgetfulness.

One could easily replace throughout this text the word fool by the word ego. One who lives in his ego, for his ego, in the hope of satisfying his ego is a fool. Unless you transcend ego, unless you reach a state of consciousness in which ego has no reason for existing, you cannot hope to attain the goal.

The ego seems to have been indispensable at one time for the formation of the individual consciousness, but with the ego were born all the obstacles, sufferings, difficulties, all that now appears to us as adverse and anti-divine forces. But these forces themselves were a necessity for attaining an inner purification and the liberation from ego. The ego is at once the result of their action and the cause of their prolongation. When the ego disappears, the adverse forces will also disappear, having no longer any reason for their existence in the world.

With the inner liberation, with a total sincerity and perfect purity, all suffering will disappear, because it will no longer be necessary for the progress of the consciousness towards its final goal.

Wisdom, then, consists in working energetically at the inner transformation so that you may emerge victorious from a struggle which will have borne its fruits but will no longer have any need to exist.

 14 March 1958

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