Finding and Losing

“What a magnificent world they built to leave.” This is the story of every human being. Man must realize that death is inevitable. He should strive to build a paradisiacal personality in himself in this world itself, which will accompany him after death.

In the first half of the 20th century the British government was at its peak in India. In those times the British built New Delhi, some examples of its buildings being the Viceregal Lodge, Parliament House, India Gate and other large government buildings. There was a whole network of broad avenues, parks, etc. This world in New Delhi was so distinguished in those times that it came to be regarded as a political Taj Mahal.

Sometime after this political Taj Mahal had been put in place, a French leader visited India. Highly educated, he knew that the democratic revolution had dawned in the world and, like other empires the British Empire, too, was going to come to an end. He expressed his feelings about this in these words: “What a magnificent world they built to leave.”

This is the story of every man in this world, with the sole difference being that some build small palaces, while others build bigger palaces. Whether great or small, no such palace can be kept by its builder. The fate met by the magnificent political Taj Mahal built by the British was that of the British rulers having to leave it on August 15, 1947. This is the fate destined for every man and every woman in this world. Everyone is going to face that time, inevitably, when he will leave the “palace” he or she has built, and will leave this world all alone. This event takes place every day before our very eyes, but no one pays any heed to it. Everyone is living as if what happened had to happen to someone else; it is not going to happen to him.

One may or may not give verbal expression to this truth but it is a fact that in this matter all men and women regard themselves as exceptions, although the reality is that in this matter no exception will be made for any human being.