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<title>The Golden Chain</title>

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<p align="right" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:center;line-height:150%; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0"><a name=ok><b>
<span
style='mso-bidi-font-style:normal'>The Golden Chain</span></b></a><b><i
style='mso-bidi-font-style:normal'><span style='font-size:18.0pt;color:blue'><o:p></o:p></span></i></b></p>
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<p class=MsoNormal align=right style='text-align:right;mso-line-height-alt:
7.9pt;mso-pagination:none; line-height:150%; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'><b><i style='mso-bidi-font-style:normal'>
<span
style='font-size:18.0pt;'><o:p>&nbsp;</o:p></span></i></b></p>

<p class=MsoNormal style='text-align:justify;line-height:150%;mso-pagination:
none; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'>You have been here for many many years, isn't it? – <span class=GramE>many</span>
many years. From your childhood you are here, isn't it?&nbsp; <span class=GramE>perhaps</span>
all of you. Some of you are going out, <span class=GramE>Some</span> are likely
to stay, some still undecided. If you are asked: 'What have you gained here by
your long stay, for some, a very long stay?'... I can tell you what you have
gained. It is not any outward thing, nor any of the things that you have learnt
at school, the knowledge that you have gained here, it is not that, but
something else. Be sure of that. You don't know perhaps yourselves, but that
thing is there, within you. You have not passed your time in vain here: you
have the Mother's touch.</p>

<p class=MsoNormal style='text-align:justify;text-indent:11.5pt;line-height:
150%;mso-pagination:none; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'>Mother said many many times: &quot;Whoever gets my
touch, whoever has a second of true aspiration, true love for me, he is
finished for this life, for all lives – he is bound to me. I have put a golden
chain round his <span class=GramE>neck,</span> his heart is bound eternally to
me.&quot;</p>

<p class=MsoNormal style='text-align:justify;text-indent:12.0pt;line-height:
150%;mso-pagination:none; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'>It is a thing nobody can see, you yourselves don't
see; but it is a fact, it is there. The golden chain is there within your
heart. Wherever you go, you drag that chain, it is a lengthening chain. How far
you may go, it is an elastic chain, it goes on lengthening, but never snaps. In
hours of difficulty, in hours of doubt and confusion in your life, you have
that within you to support you. If you are conscious</p>

<p class=MsoNormal style='text-align:justify;text-indent:12.0pt;line-height:
150%;mso-pagination:none; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'><o:p>&nbsp;</o:p></p>

<p class=MsoNormal style='text-align:justify;text-indent:8.6pt;mso-line-height-alt:
9.8pt;mso-pagination:none; line-height:150%; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'><span style='font-size:10.0pt;mso-bidi-font-size:
12.0pt'>* Addressed to the Final Year students of the Higher Course of Sri
Aurobindo International Centre of Education, Sri Aurobindo Ashram, on<o:p></o:p></span></p>

<p class=MsoNormal style='text-align:justify;mso-line-height-alt:9.8pt;
mso-pagination:none; line-height:150%; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'><st1:date Year="1976" Day="26" Month="10"><span
 style='font-size:10.0pt;mso-bidi-font-size:12.0pt'>October 26, 1976</span></st1:date><span
style='font-size:10.0pt;mso-bidi-font-size:12.0pt'>.<o:p>&nbsp;</o:p></span></p>

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9.8pt;mso-pagination:none; line-height:150%; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'>
<span style='font-size:10.0pt;mso-bidi-font-size:
12.0pt;'>Page – 28<o:p></o:p></span></p>

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<p class=MsoNormal style='text-align:justify;line-height:150%;mso-pagination:
none; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'><span class=GramE>of</span> it, so much the better; if you are not
conscious, believe that it is there. The Mother's love, Her Presence is there <i>always.<o:p></o:p></i></p>

<p class=MsoNormal style='text-align:justify;line-height:150%;mso-pagination:
none;tab-stops:11.0pt dotted 211.65pt; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'><span style='mso-tab-count:1'>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; </span>That
is the thing I wanted to tell you… In the Upanishads there is a story. Once Narada - I suppose it is Narada - went to a Rishi to get initiation. The Rishi
asked him: 'What have you learnt? What have you learnt in your life of a
student now that you come to me?' Narada began to narrate all the <i>vidyas </i>that
he had learnt during his education as a <i>brahmachari<span class=GramE>,<span
style='font-style:normal'>–</span> all the shastras, even
Dhanurvidya, all kinds of learnings. Then the Rishi said: 'All that is apara
vidya, the inferior knowledge. Do you know Brahman?' 'No, sir, I do
not know.' 'That is the thing to be known. Once that one thing is known,
everything else is known.'</span></i></p><i>

<p class=MsoNormal style='text-align:justify;text-indent:11.75pt;line-height:
150%;mso-pagination:none; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'>So I tell you, that one thing needful you have
acquired, you have not to attempt to get it. You are fortunate, you are lucky,
we are all very lucky; Mother called us here and <span class=GramE>She</span>
has given it of Her own Love, infinite Love, unasked, unconditionally. Whatever
you are in your outward character and activities, that is not affected
at all by the outer nature; it remains as it is, pure, unsullied.</p>

<p class=MsoNormal style='text-align:justify;text-indent:11.75pt;line-height:
150%;mso-pagination:none; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'><o:p>&nbsp;</o:p></p>

<p class=MsoNormal style='text-align:justify;text-indent:9.0pt;line-height:
150%;mso-pagination:none;tab-stops:-13.5pt dotted 244.3pt; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'>Some of you were
present at my talk on Dante<span style='mso-tab-count:1 dotted'>....... </span>I
spoke of Dante's vision, it is a wonderful vision, – the vision of the mission
of the Divine Mother.</p>

<p class=MsoNormal style='text-align:justify;text-indent:10.55pt;line-height:
150%;mso-pagination:none; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'>Dante saw a globe of light in front of him. As he
was standing before the Divine Trinity in the Empyrean, suddenly he saw
revealed to him a luminous globe and, within that luminous globe, as if its
reflection, its reflected image, circling, moving. And as he gazed into that
circling light, he saw himself. He saw himself in that circling light: himself
not as he saw himself, but as that circling divine Light saw him – its own
image. 'I was there in the image as conceived by Him, not as conceived by me.'</p>

<p class=MsoNormal style='text-align:justify;text-indent:.15in;line-height:
150%;mso-pagination:none; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'>In our language we can say that the luminous globe
was the supreme Divine and, then, within it, the whirling circling<o:p>&nbsp;</o:p></p>

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mso-pagination:none; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'>
<span style='font-size:10.0pt;mso-bidi-font-size:12.0pt;
'>Page – 29<o:p></o:p></span></p>

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<div class=Section2>

<p class=MsoNormal style='text-align:justify;line-height:150%;mso-pagination:
none; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'><span class=GramE>light</span> – that was the Creative Power, the Divine
Mother in Her creative mood. And, within that, I was there as <span
class=GramE>Her</span> child, in my true reality, not as I see myself but as
She sees me; in that image I saw myself.</p>

<p class=MsoNormal style='text-align:justify;text-indent:11.75pt;line-height:
150%;mso-pagination:none;tab-stops:dotted 99.8pt; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'>Dante says that it was an
experience as if he was looking into an Eye, a big ball of Eye; and in that
Eye he saw reflected his image as the Divine sees him, not 'as I see myself,' –
but 'my true self'… I say, that is the Image the Mother has left to you, within
you. However much you may try, you cannot lose it; it will be there – till its
fruition. Whenever, as I said, you feel discouraged, – naturally when you look
at the world and its happenings, you feel very much distressed, disgusted, z –but
there is another reality behind, it is the Mother's Presence that redeems all
that. In any mood of depression, dejection, difficulty, always know that it is
there in you to support you, to bring you peace and strength, and it is never
failing. So many times <span class=GramE>She</span> has said:</p>

<p class=MsoNormal style='text-align:justify;text-indent:11.75pt;line-height:
150%;mso-pagination:none; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'>&quot;Everything else fails in this world, I will
never fail <span style='font-family:"Arial Narrow";mso-bidi-font-family:"Arial Narrow"'>you.&quot;<o:p>&nbsp;</o:p></span></p>

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<span style='font-size:10.0pt;mso-bidi-font-size:12.0pt;
'>Page – 30<o:p></o:p></span></p>

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