Arthur Schopenhauer (1788-1860)

Hayagrīva dāsa: For Schopenhauer, happiness is inactive satisfaction, inactivity, nirvāṇa. Since the will to live is the irrational urge that brings about all suffering, he advocates the extinction of this world. In The World As Idea, he writes: "The Vedas and Purāṇas have no better simile than a dream for the whole knowledge of the actual world, which they call the web of māyā....Indeed, life is a long dream....What is this world of perception besides being my idea? Is that of which I am conscious only as idea, exactly like my own body, of which I am doubly conscious, in one aspect as idea, in another aspect as will?" He goes on to conclude that life is a projection of the will.

Śrīla Prabhupāda: Yes, life is a projection of the will, or material desire. The living entity cannot be desireless. Nirvāṇa means that material desires are finished, but because the living entity is an eternal spiritual being, he has spiritual desires. Now these spiritual desires are covered by material desires, but in any case, desire is the constant companion of the living entity. Because he is materially covered, he considers the temporary world to be reality, but because it is constantly changing, it is not. According to the type of body we get, we have different desires. The soul transmigrates in this material world from one body to another, and he creates desires accordingly. The supreme will affords him different bodies in order to fulfill his will or material desires. The living entity is willing, and the supreme will, God, or Kṛṣṇa, understanding the finite will, gives him facilities to fulfill his particular desire. Therefore will is the cause of this material existence. However, we say that since you are a living being, you must have desires. If your desires are stopped, you become like a stone. Instead of trying to put an end to all desire, you should try to cleanse this diseased form of desire. That is the process of bhakti.

"Bhakti, or devotional service, means engaging all our senses in the service of the Lord, the master of all the senses. When the spirit soul renders service unto the Supreme, there are two side effects. He is freed from all material designations, and, simply by being employed in the service of the Lord, his senses are purified." (Bhakti-rasāmṛta sindhu, 1.1.12) Presently, our desires are desires of the body (upādhi). When the living entity acquires the body of an American, a European, a Chinaman, or whatever, he thinks in a certain way. When he changes his body to that of a dog, he spends his time barking. According to his desires, he has received a particular type of body. These desires are temporary, and the living entity moves from one body to another. Therefore in one sense this is all a dream. It is a fact that we cannot fulfill our material desires, which come and go like dreams. Now all material activities, subtle or gross, are manifestations of different desires, and therefore the Māyāvādī philosophers say brahma satyaṁ jagan mithyā. The dreamer is a fact, but the dream is false. Our Vaiṣṇava philosophy agrees that the dreamer is the factual living entity, and the dream is temporary; therefore the dreamer has to be brought to the real spiritual platform so that his material dreams can be extinguished. When we abandon the dream and awaken to reality, that is Kṛṣṇa consciousness, or bhakti.

Śyāmasundara dāsa: Then will or desire can never be annihilated?

Śrīla Prabhupāda: No, not even for a second. Because we are living, we must will and desire. It is stated in Bhagavad-gītā that we cannot live for a second without will, without desires.

"All men are forced to act helplessly according to the impulses born of the modes of material nature; therefore no one can refrain from doing something, not even for a moment." (Bg. 3.5)

Śyāmasundara dāsa: Don't the Buddhists advocate a state of desirelessness, or nonwillingness?

Śrīla Prabhupāda: They believe that if you dismantle this material combination, this material body, there will no longer be will, desire, or suffering. But this is not a fact. You are the eternal servant of Kṛṣṇa, and you do not die after the destruction of the body. Thinking, feeling, and willing are carried from this body to another body in the process of transmigration. When the body dies, the living entity is carried away by his will. According to our will, we receive another body at the time of death. That body may be the body of a demigod, dog, human, or whatever. In any case, will, or desire, is the carrier.

Hayagrīva dāsa: Schopenhauer was profoundly influenced by some of the Vedic literatures. For example, he writes: "Every keen pleasure is an error and an illusion, for no attained wish can give lasting satisfaction; and moreover, every possession and every happiness is but lent by chance for an uncertain time, and may therefore be demanded back the next hour. All pain rests on the passing away of such illusion; thus both arise from defective knowledge. The wise man therefore holds himself equally aloof from joy and sorrow, and no event disturbs his composure."

Śrīla Prabhupāda: Yes, in this material world, people say, "This is good, and this is bad," but factually there is no question of good and bad. This is all on the temporary platform. The Māyāvādīs use the word "false," but we say "temporary." It is also stated in Bhagavad-gītā that the pains and pleasures experienced in the material world do not touch the spirit soul. Under illusion, a spirit soul, concerned with a material body, thinks that the pains and pleasures are his, but this is not a fact. Therefore Kṛṣṇa instructs that the pleasures and pains simply touch the body, not the soul. Kṛṣṇa says:

"O son of Kuntī, the nonpermanent appearance of happiness and distress, and their disappearance in due course, are like the appearance and disappearance of winter and summer seasons. They arise from sense perceptions, and one must learn to tolerate them without being disturbed." (Bg. 2.14) Since pleasures and pains come and go in due course, they are not the reality. So why bother about them? If I feel pain, let me tolerate it and go about my business.

Śyāmasundara dāsa: Schopenhauer sees happiness in the world as a negative state at best, a momentary suspension of suffering.

Śrīla Prabhupāda: Yes, that is also explained by Caitanya Mahāprabhu. Sometimes when a man is to be punished, he is held under water to the point of suffocation. Then he is let up, and when he comes up for temporary relief, he thinks, "Ah! Happiness at last!" The point is, he should do something that will relieve him of his unhappiness permanently.

Śyāmasundara dāsa: Schopenhauer says, "Human life must be some kind of mistake." The greatest crime of man was that he was ever born.

Śrīla Prabhupāda: When you understand that there is a crime, you must understand that someone is there to punish you. If you suffer because of that crime, you must understand that there is someone who has judged you to be criminal.

Śyāmasundara dāsa: He concludes, however, that because the world is mad or irrational, it could not possibly have an author. If there were a God, He would have set the world in order.

Śrīla Prabhupāda: We have certainly experienced that there are madmen in the world, but there are also hospitals where such men can be treated. The world may be mad, but there is hospitalization. Unfortunately, Schopenhauer has no knowledge of the hospital or of the treatment. He speaks of sinful life, but he does not accept the judge who gives the punishment for sinful life. He sees that the world is mad, but he does not know the treatment for madmen.

Hayagrīva dāsa: In The World As Will, Schopenhauer writes: "My body is the objectivity of my will....Besides will and idea, nothing is known to us or thinkable—The genitals are properly the focus of the will, and consequently the opposite pole of the brain, the representative of knowledge....In this respect...they were worshipped by the Hindus in the liṅgam, which are thus the symbol of the assertion of the will. Knowledge, on the other hand, affords the possibility of the suppression of willing, of salvation through freedom, of conquest and annihilation of the world."

Śrīla Prabhupāda: As I said before, willing is done in accordance with the body, but we should understand that we have nothing to do with this material world, which is the production of the material will. We are spiritual, and when we will spiritually, we are Kṛṣṇa conscious. When we will materially, we get different types of material bodies. It is true that the basis of material life is sex. We always say:

"Sex life is compared to the rubbing of two hands to relieve an itch. Gṛhamedhis, so-called gṛhasthas who have no spiritual knowledge, think that this itching is the greatest platform of happiness, although actually it is a source of distress. The kṛpaṇas, the fools who are just the opposite of brāhmaṇas, are not satisfied by repeated sensuous enjoyment. Those who are dhīra, however, who are sober, and who tolerate this itching, are not subjected to the sufferings of fools and rascals." (Bhāg. 7.9.45). The basic principle of those who are addicted to the material world is maithuna, sexual intercourse. This strong desire for sex continues as long as we are in material existence, because that is the center of all pleasure. However, when we get a taste of Kṛṣṇa's pleasure, we can give this up.

"The embodied soul may be restricted from sense enjoyment, though the taste for sense objects remains. But, ceasing such engagements by experiencing a higher taste, he is fixed in consciousness." (Bg. 2.59)

Śyāmasundara dāsa: Schopenhauer considers sex to be selfishness, whereas real love means sympathy.

Śrīla Prabhupāda: Sex is animalistic. It is not love but lust. Sex means the mutual satisfaction of senses, and that is lust. All this lust is taking place under the name of love, and out of illusion, people mistake this lust for love. Real love says, "People are suffering from a lack of Kṛṣṇa consciousness. Let us do something for them so that they can understand the value of life."

Śyāmasundara dāsa: He also considered immoral acts to result from a sense of egoism.

Śrīla Prabhupāda: Yes, that is so. People think, "Why should I surrender to Kṛṣṇa? Kṛṣṇa is a person, and I am also a person." Such thinking is demoniac. Rascals cannot understand that by surrendering unto the supreme will and satisfying the supreme will, salvation can be attained.

Śyāmasundara dāsa: Yet Schopenhauer felt that it is possible to crush egoism and desire by love and sympathy for others.

Śrīla Prabhupāda: Yes, without love, nothing can be sustained. If I do not love Kṛṣṇa, I cannot surrender unto Him. A small child naturally surrenders unto his parents because there is love for the parents. The more you love, the more your surrender is perfect. When there is a lack of love, the mentality by which you can surrender will not develop. If you have some love for me, you will carry out my orders. There is no question of forcing one to surrender. The living entity is free to love or to reject. Without freedom, there cannot be love. Kṛṣṇa consciousness means learning to love Kṛṣṇa.

Śyāmasundara dāsa: Schopenhauer looked on love as compassionate sympathy for one who is suffering. Through this compassionate love, we can lose desire.

Śrīla Prabhupāda: Why should you love those who are suffering and not those who are enjoying?

Śyāmasundara dāsa: Schopenhauer sees everyone as suffering.

Śrīla Prabhupāda: Yes, we agree to this. Everyone within material nature is suffering. Therefore Kṛṣṇa descends and delivers Bhagavad-gītā. Kṛṣṇa is described as the deliverer of all fallen souls. A Vaiṣṇava takes sannyāsa, the renounced order, out of compassion for others, because his only duty is to preach the message of Kṛṣṇa consciousness. People in the world are suffering due to their ignorance. They think, "Oh, now I have a nice car, apartment, and girlfriend; therefore I am happy." Actually, this is not happiness but suffering. Because the Vaiṣṇava loves Kṛṣṇa and understands that he is part and parcel of Kṛṣṇa, he realizes that the conditioned living entities are suffering for want of Kṛṣṇa consciousness. Therefore, out of compassion, the Vaiṣṇava takes sannyāsa and goes forth to preach.

Hayagrīva dāsa: As for the nature of the world, Schopenhauer is vague, but he sees material life as basically irrational and whimsical.

Śrīla Prabhupāda: Yes, that is a fact, and therefore we are changing bodies. This means that our material mind is not fixed; it is constantly rejecting and accepting. Māyāvādī philosophers and Buddhists say that since these material pleasures and pains arise from this material combination, the best course is to dismantle it. They do not say that the soul is the basis, but that the material body is nothing but a combination of the material elements. They therefore advise us to let the earth return to earth, the water return to water, and so on. In this way, they tell us that we should strive to become zero, to attain nirvāṇa.

Śyāmasundara dāsa: Leibnitz claimed that this is the best of all possible worlds, and you agreed because the world is God's arrangement. But Schopenhauer sees this as the worst of all possible worlds.

Śrīla Prabhupāda: There is no doubt that whatever Kṛṣṇa creates is perfect. However, since the nature of this world is material, there are three modes working: goodness, passion, and ignorance. As you work, you receive the results, the reactions. We do not agree that this is the worst of worlds. Why should God create the worst of anything?

Śyāmasundara dāsa: Schopenhauer believes this because the world is so full of madness and frustration.

Śrīla Prabhupāda: Had he taken his frustration seriously, it might have made him successful. We receive many letters from frustrated students who understand that frustration is another hell, and eventually they come to understand that they should seek the real shelter. So frustration is really not so bad. If you are put in a dangerous position, and you know how to save yourself from it, that very danger will later give you pleasure.

Śyāmasundara dāsa: Schopenhauer claims that the working of the world is ethically evil.

Śrīla Prabhupāda: To some extent that is right because when you are in prison, you will find that there is evil. But that evil is good for you. It is there so that you can learn a lesson. When you are out of the prison, you will be able to love someone.

Hayagrīva dāsa: For Schopenhauer, there is frustration behind all material pleasures and endeavors. Happiness eludes us. As soon as we attain the objects of our desires, they no longer appear the same. "They soon grow stale or forgotten," he writes, "and though not openly disowned, are yet always thrown aside as vanished illusions."

Śrīla Prabhupāda: Yes, all this is going on, and therefore the living entity acquires one body after another.

Hayagrīva dāsa: He sees us moving through a constant transition from desire to satisfaction and then to a new desire, "the rapid course of which is called happiness, and the slow course sorrow...." It is this flux from desire to satisfaction that characterizes the will's activities in the phenomenal world. Outside of this, there is only nirvāṇa, extinction.

Śrīla Prabhupāda: That is not a fact. We have to understand that behind the will and its satisfaction is a person who is willing. Schopenhauer does not take that person into consideration; he considers only the will and its satisfaction. It is the individual soul who is willing. If he succeeds in stopping this flickering willing, what next? Even the stopping of the will is temporary. One kind of willing may be stopped, but there will be another kind of willing and satisfaction. We must understand that behind the whimsical will is the spirit soul. When that spirit soul understands his real identification as the eternal servant of Kṛṣṇa, his will is purified. We should not be satisfied by simply trying to annihilate the whimsical will. We should understand the real will of the real person. That is the beginning of spiritual life.

Hayagrīva dāsa: Schopenhauer believes that voluntary and complete chastity is the first step in asceticism, or in the denial of the will to live. "Chastity denies the assertion of the will which extends beyond the individual life," he writes, "and gives the assurance that with the life of the body, the will, whose manifestation it is, ceases."

Śrīla Prabhupāda: Yes, but he must understand that behind the will there is a person who is willing. It will not help us simply to negate the temporary material will. We have to will in reality, and that is our eternal willing, that is Kṛṣṇa consciousness. In the material world, the will is directed toward sense satisfaction because the living entity has forgotten the spiritual field of willing. When the same will is directed towards satisfying the senses of the Supreme, that is the eternal willing of the living entity. Jīvera 'svarūpa' haya—kṛṣṇera 'nitya-dāsa' (Caitanya-caritāmṛta, Madh. 20.108). When we come to the platform of real knowledge, we understand that we are the eternal servants of God. When our will is concentrated on how to serve God, we attain our real position of eternity, bliss, and knowledge.

Hayagrīva dāsa: Although Schopenhauer officially takes an atheistic stand, he writes: "If a man fears death as his annihilation, it is just as if he were to think that the sun cries out at evening, 'Woe is me! For I go down to eternal night....' Thus suicide appears to us as a vain and therefore foolish action...."

Śrīla Prabhupāda: Yes, because the will is there, death is not the stoppage of life. One simply gets another life.

"As the embodied soul continuously passes, in this body, from boyhood to youth to old age, the soul similarly passes into another body at death. The self-realized soul is not bewildered by such a change." (Bg. 2.13) This is proof that the life of the person who is willing is eternal. His desire and will are eternal, but Schopenhauer does not know what his eternal willing is. His eternal will is to serve Kṛṣṇa always. It is a fact that suicide is no solution. One just implicates himself more and more. If we kill the body given by God, we have to accept another body, or remain a ghost. If I live in this body eighty years, and then commit suicide, I have to remain a ghost for five years before I get a chance to receive another body. Of course, you may argue that since the soul is everlasting, it makes no difference whether the body is killed. It is all right if the body is annihilated, but you cannot deliberately kill the body because that is hindering its progress. The living entity is destined to live in a particular body, and if you destroy that body, he has to wait for another. This means that you are interfering with his spiritual evolution, his spiritual progress. Therefore you are liable for punishment.

Hayagrīva dāsa: Schopenhauer also looked on Indian philosophy as a philosophy of the denial of the will, and he cited many examples of suicide as a religious act.

Śrīla Prabhupāda: But he did not study Vedic philosophy and religion perfectly. He has some idea of some portions of the Māyāvādī and Buddhist philosophies, but evidently he did not know about Vaiṣṇavism. Although he has touched Bhagavad-gītā, he did not study it thoroughly, because in Bhagavad-gītā, Kṛṣṇa tells Arjuna that if he only tried to attain knowledge of God, his life and will would be purified, and he would return back to Godhead upon giving up the body.

"One who knows the transcendental nature of My appearance and activities does not, upon leaving the body, take his birth again in this material world, but attains My eternal abode, O Arjuna." (Bg. 4.9) Either Schopenhauer did not study Bhagavad-gītā thoroughly, or he could not understand for want of a real spiritual master. According to Bhagavad-gītā itself, we should go to a bona fide guru who has seen the truth. Schopenhauer is speculating on the basis of his own experience; therefore, although everything is there in Bhagavad-gītā, he could not see it.

Hayagrīva dāsa: As examples of the denial of the will to live, Schopenhauer cites the religious suicides under the wheels of the Jagannātha carts, and the ritual of satī.

Śrīla Prabhupāda: These are not suicides. These are acts based on the understanding that because we are getting different types of bodies, we are suffering a variety of miseries. When one voluntarily accepts death in these ways, he thinks of his spiritual life while dying, and he attains it.

"Whatever state of being one remembers when he quits the body, that state he will attain without fail." (Bg. 8.6) Therefore King Kulaśekhara prayed that Kṛṣṇa take him while he was in good health and remembering Kṛṣṇa, because he feared forgetting Kṛṣṇa when dying in a diseased condition. Often, when death comes, a person is in a coma, his bodily functions are impeded, he dreams in various ways, and so on. Therefore an intelligent man sometimes thinks that it would be more desirable to meet death in sound health so that he can think of his next life and go back to Godhead. If a person thinks of Lord Jagannātha while dying, he goes back to Lord Jagannātha. That is not suicide but the voluntary acceptance of death so that one can immediately transfer to the spiritual world.

Hayagrīva dāsa: And that is effective?

Śrīla Prabhupāda: Yes.

Hayagrīva dāsa: What of Caitanya Mahāprabhu's throwing Himself in the ocean?

Śrīla Prabhupāda: No, that was different. That was an act of ecstasy.

Śyāmasundara dāsa: Schopenhauer noted that the will forces a person to live even when he has nothing to live for. It impels him to suffer day after day. He compares it to the alms which a beggar receives one day just so he can live in hunger the next day. All this misery and frustration are not partaken by a few men, but by all.

Śrīla Prabhupāda: That is certainly a good point, but why does the individual hanker after something when he is being frustrated? The point is that there is a goal, and the individual is hankering after that goal. In order to understand what that goal actually is, we should approach a spiritual master.

Hayagrīva dāsa: According to Schopenhauer, the man of knowledge is not perturbed in any condition. "Such a man would regard death as a false illusion," he writes, "an impudent specter which frightens the weak but has no power over him who knows that he is himself the will of which the whole world is the objectification or copy, and that therefore he is always certain of life and also of the present—"

Śrīla Prabhupāda: This is contradictory. On the one side there is a desire for the certainty of life, and on the other he says that nirvāṇa is the only answer. Which does he want? He is simply trying to adjust things. He cannot understand the philosophy behind purification of the will.

Hayagrīva dāsa: One of the first major Western philosophers to have read Bhagavad-gītā, Schopenhauer feels that it was Kṛṣṇa's assurance of immortality that brought Arjuna to fight.

Śrīla Prabhupāda: Yes, but what is Schopenhauer's philosophy of the immortal living being? He does not understand that just as the living entity is immortal, his will is also immortal. If the soul is immortal, how can his will be stopped? How is nirvāṇa possible?

Hayagrīva dāsa: He offers no solution other than suppression of the will.

Śrīla Prabhupāda: But that is not possible. He must change the quality of his willing in order to be happy. That is the process of bhakti.

"Bhakti, or devotional service, means engaging all our senses in the service of the Lord, the master of all the senses. When the spirit soul renders service unto the Supreme, there are two side effects. He is freed from all material designations, and, simply by being employed in the service of the Lord, his senses are purified." (Bhakti-rasāmṛta sindhu, 1.1.12) Bhakti is the purification process: śravaṇaṁ kīrtanaṁ viṣṇoḥ. Chanting and hearing the pastimes of the Lord will purify us. Schopenhauer misses the point of Bhagavad-gītā. Although he accepts the fact that life is eternal, he thinks that its purpose is nirvāṇa. Unfortunately, he does not know what real nirvāṇa is. Nirvāṇa means putting an end to the whimsical will and coming to the platform of willing in Kṛṣṇa consciousness.

Hayagrīva dāsa: Schopenhauer was impressed that the religion of India has endured for more than four thousand years. He writes that such a religion "cannot be arbitrarily invented superstition, but must have its foundation in the nature of man."

Śrīla Prabhupāda: Within the Vedic religion there are two basic sects: Māyāvādī and Vaiṣṇava. Both acknowledge the fact that the material world is flickering and transient and that there is another life in the spiritual world. For the Māyāvādīs, spiritual life means merging into the Brahman effulgence, and for the Vaiṣṇava it means associating personally with God in His abode, Goloka Vṛndāvana, Vaikuṇṭha. Both envision a spiritual life attainable after death.

Hayagrīva dāsa: Schopenhauer considered Indian religion to be based on the denial of the will.

Śrīla Prabhupāda: Yes, denial of the will for material happiness, but it is not the will itself that is denied. While denying the will for material happiness, we must assert the will for spiritual happiness. When denying one thing, we must accept something else. No one can remain in a neutral position. Paraṁ dṛṣṭvā nivartate (Bg. 2.59). We give up the inferior for the superior.

Śyāmasundara dāsa: For Schopenhauer, there are three means of salvation: aesthetic, ethical, and religious. Through aesthetic salvation, contemplation of the Platonic ideals through poetry, music, and art, we are transported above passion, desire and willing.

Śrīla Prabhupāda: This is nothing new. It is mentioned in Bhagavad-gītā, and the students of this Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement abandoned their abominable living habits because they received a better life with superior thoughts, philosophy, food, song, poetry, and art. When the mind is filled with Kṛṣṇa, there is no chance in its engaging in the contemplation of nonsense.

Śyāmasundara dāsa: Aesthetic salvation is a temporary experience. When we look at a beautiful painting, for instance, we momentarily transcend the lower levels of consciousness and become desireless.

Śrīla Prabhupāda: Yes, we admit that this may be the case, but we wish to remain in that higher consciousness continually, not momentarily. This is possible through practice. By practice, a child learns to read and write, and thus becomes educated. It is not a momentary thing. If we practice Kṛṣṇa consciousness daily, lower consciousness will automatically vanish. Śrī-vigrahārādhana-nitya-nānā-śṛṅgāra-tan-mandira-mārjanādau (Śrī Gurv-aṣṭakam 3). The spiritual master engages his disciples in the temple worship of the Lord. You cannot derive benefit from worshipping the Deities unless the aesthetic sense is applied with reverence and respect.

Śyāmasundara dāsa: According to ethical salvation, we should attempt to satisfy the will. When it is satisfied, no new desires can arise. This brings permanent happiness.

Śrīla Prabhupāda: Apart from the individual will, there is the supreme will. If we satisfy the supreme will, we are happy. Yasya prasādād bhagavat-prasādo (Śrī Gurv-aṣṭakam 8). Our philosophy is that by satisfying the spiritual master, the representative of God, we satisfy the supreme will. It is not our will that is to be satisfied, but the will of God.

Śyāmasundara dāsa: By religious salvation, the most effective type of salvation, the will is denied through asceticism. In this way, Schopenhauer believed that we could attain the state of nirvāṇa, nothingness.

Śrīla Prabhupāda: Such people claim that when there is no longer any sense of pleasure and pain, there is no world. The fact is, there are three stages: waking, sleeping, and total unconsciousness. In all three stages, the will is there. A person can emerge from a state of total unconsciousness and immediately remember his waking state and his dreams. Therefore the will is there. The will cannot be killed because it is the function of the soul. Since the soul is eternal, willing is also eternal. The will may be suppressed for some time, however. For instance, after death, when a living entity enters a womb, he spends the next nine months developing his next body, and there is a suspension of the will. However, according to your will, you develop a certain type of body. When you emerge from your mother's womb, the willing process resumes. Death means a suspension of the will for a few months, that's all. If you train your willing process improperly, you have to suffer life after life, but if you train it properly, you can go to Vaikuṇṭha immediately after death.

Hayagrīva dāsa: Concerning religious practices, Schopenhauer writes that "the Christian mystic and teacher of Vedānta agree that all outward works and religious exercises are superfluous for him who has attained to perfection." But doesn't Kṛṣṇa recommend just the opposite?

Śrīla Prabhupāda: Yes. In Bhagavad-gītā, He says:

"Acts of sacrifice, charity, and penance are not to be given up but must be performed. Indeed, sacrifice, charity, and penance purify even the great souls." (Bg. 18.5) If we give up the ritualistic ceremonies, there is every chance that we will fall down. Even though we may be liberated, we should continue performing sacrifices, charities, and penance in order to keep our position secure.

Hayagrīva dāsa: In discussing the functions of the brain, Schopenhauer notes that the need for sleep is directly proportionate to the intensity of our mental activities. Dull creatures like reptiles and fish sleep little and lightly; the more intelligent animals sleep deeply and long. 'The more completely awake a man is," he writes, "the clearer and more lively his consciousness, the greater for him is the necessity of sleep, and thus the deeper and longer he sleeps."

Śrīla Prabhupāda: No. Those who are ignorant, materially covered, sleep more, and those who are spiritually enlightened sleep less. Sleep is a necessity of the body, not of the soul; therefore those who are spiritually advanced do not require a lot of sleep. Nidrāhāra-vihārakādi-vijitau. We understand that Rūpa Gosvāmī conquered sleeping, eating, and mating. When we are spiritually engaged, we consider sleep a waste of time. Those who are interested in spiritual life adjust their lives in such a way that their sleep is practically nil. Arjuna was addressed as Guḍākeśa, "one who has conquered sleep."

Hayagrīva dāsa: Schopenhauer recommends about eight hours of sleep a night. How many are recommended in the Vedic tradition?

Śrīla Prabhupāda: Sleep should be avoided, but since that is not possible, it should be adjusted to the minimum. The Gosvāmīs did not sleep more than two hours daily. Even some karmīs are so absorbed in their work that they practically don't sleep at all. It is said that Napolean slept while riding his horse, and Gandhi slept while riding in a car. Generally, six hours is sufficient.

Hayagrīva dāsa: In The Ages of Life, Schopenhauer writes: "A complete and adequate notion of life can never be attained by anyone who does not reach old age, for it is only the old man who sees life whole and knows its natural course....He alone has a full sense of its utter vanity, whereas others never cease to labor under the false notion that everything will come out right in the end."

Śrīla Prabhupāda: This may seem to be the case, but in Western countries we observe old men still following the path of sense gratification. So what is the use of their experience? Unless one receives training, it is not sufficient to become an old man in order to understand the purpose of life. Training is required from early childhood. According to the Vedic plan, an old man should take the renounced order of sannyāsa and completely devote his time and energy to understanding and serving God. We do not become spiritually mature just by growing old. We should be trained from the very beginning as brahmacārī.

Hayagrīva dāsa: Schopenhauer points out that it is customary to call youth the happy part of life and old age the sad part, but factually this is not the case. "This would be true if it were the passions that made a man happy," he writes, "but a man feels happy just insofar as his intellect is the predominating part of him."

Śrīla Prabhupāda: For modern civilization, happiness means sense gratification. Desire for sense gratification continues even when one is an old man; therefore early training is required. It is said that one can become an old man even without advancing in age. This means that it is knowledge that is important, not age. If one is not educated properly, he becomes an old fool.

Hayagrīva dāsa: Schopenhauer notes that in the Upaniṣads, the natural human life span is set at a hundred years. "To come to one's end before the age of ninety means to die of disease," he writes. "In other words, prematurely."

Śrīla Prabhupāda: Yes. In this millennium, the maximum age is one hundred years, but in former millennia, men used to live for a thousand years. In the Tretā-yuga, the life span was ten thousand years, and in the Satya-yuga, it was one hundred thousand years. Presently, in Kali-yuga, life has become so degraded that people expect to live only about seventy years. As one becomes more sensuous, his life span decreases. That is the law of nature.