The subject of death is highly metaphysical and yet one of the most practical and helpful—practical in the sense that its implications come in useful in the daily improvement of our own selves. All of us need help in shaping our lives, in moulding our characters, and the subject of life in death and of death in life gives us that help. We live in the midst of death—that is not difficult to perceive; it is little more complex to understand how there is perpetual, immortal, ever-surviving life in the midst of slow decay or the crash of death.

The majestic power of death is a noble theme for study and contemplation. To engender in us humility, we need to ponder over the power of death. To engender in us a sense of equality with all men and women, we need to ponder over the universality of death. To engender in us hope and confidence, we need to ponder over the release that death brings. And unless we study the subject of perpetual death and contemplate on the processes of decay and disintegration, we shall not understand the greater mystery of life perpetual, of birth following birth in the ever lengthening chain of Immortality. Birth and death, disintegration ever leading to reintegration, should be studied together. There are sentimental people who shirk the task of studying and understanding the processes of decay and old age and their culmination—death. On the other hand, there are morbid people who pay extra attention to their own pain and tragedy. Both are wrong. Sentimental ostriches who bury their heads in sand are no exception and will be compelled to face the experience of death. On the other hand, the morbid who only see the force of destruction will be compelled to learn, sooner or later, that life encompasses both birth and death, and while forms of life change, Life Immortal ever presses forward.

In the Bhagavad-Gita, tabulating the qualities that constitute Wisdom-Jnana, Krishna puts forward "a meditation upon birth, death, decay, sickness and error." He speaks of himself as immortality and death; nay more, as Prabhava and Pralaya—the going forth of life and its obscuration or repose. Therefore we must study this subject of birth and death of all things, great and small, of all beings whatsoever their condition and their Karma. One effective way of doing it is to see how we who call ourselves living are in the midst of death, and how birth ever follows death as day follows night.

If we observe Nature we find that in every nook and corner change is taking place; continuous and eternal change is the order of Nature. The motion of the Universe is like our breath; in fact the Universal Life is called the Great Breath, and there is not a second of time when that motion or that breathing stops. In Hindu, as in Theosophic, philosophy, there is that continuous change which is known as constant dissolution—Nitya Pralaya. There are various types of dissolutions for the Universe, just as there are various types of death-changes in the different kingdoms of Nature. Nitya Pralaya is constant and continuous dissolution or death. To take an example: every hour, every minute of every hour, a change is taking place in the human body. The lives making up the body are replaced continuously by other lives.

Not only our body undergoes a continuous transformation; our feelings and emotions too change and their action on the body produces the bodily changes. We love a person when one kind of mood is upon us; when our mood changes we cool off towards that person, or our so-called love even turns to hate. Similarly, our ideas and thoughts undergo a change, and transformed ideation leaves its marks upon the body. Our brain has grooves made by our thoughts, and it undergoes a transformation as day by day we celebrate or ideate.

Most of us do not take advantage of this mighty phenomenon in Nature. We do not contemplate on this Nitya Pralaya, this perpetual dissolution. We do not say to ourselves, "I am dying inch by inch, hour by hour." It will do us good to remember this fact, for then we can get to the next important idea: we begin to ask ourselves, "But what is death? How does it take place?" By studying, as even modern science does, this perpetual transformation in Nature, we come upon the great truth of perpetual birth. Unless we perceive that though living, we are in the midst of death, we shall not learn that surrounded by change, death and transformation, we are ever growing, ever becoming.

So not with a morbid view should we think about death, but with self-confidence should we observe that death is transformation and that in the process of death new life begins.

It is this mystery that the Christian festival of Easter symbolizes. Crucifixion brings the message of death in the midst of life; Resurrection brings the supplementing message of life more powerful than death, every death bringing to birth the glory of Life Immortal. Crucifixion is the tragedy of incompletion, but Resurrection is the drama of Immortality.

To turn to the practical and ethical aspects of this subject: Each one of us is undergoing constant dissolution—Nitya Pralaya; our bodies, our minds, our hearts undergo constant change. Physical death or separation of the body from the Soul is a major change. Just as a rosebud opens gradually and becomes a full-blown flower, and then dies shedding its petals, so too with each one of us. We are constantly going towards death—we grow up to a point, and then we begin to decay till the moment comes when the great change takes place and we die.

It is within the power of every human being to use this changing, moving force that functions in Nature. The plant or the animal is not able to give direction to the processes of Nitya Pralaya, constant and perpetual dissolution; but human beings can. If we observe minor changes, learn about them and control them, in the course of time we can learn to control the major operation of death. Most people are conquered by death, that is, they do not have any say in the matter of their own dying. Sages conquer death; they leave their bodies knowingly, at will, whenever they determine to do so. With the aid of their wisdom, they have gained their immortality. We too can gain for ourselves our own immortality by obtaining knowledge. Then we conquer death and live on knowingly, perceiving that it is only the body that dies.

We do not die; but that certainly cannot apply to our bodies which do die. As Souls we are immortal, for the Soul never dies. Yet there is change taking place in the Soul, for it grows from life to life. Evolution would be meaningless if the Soul did not progress; the universe would be purposeless if the Soul did not grow with the passage of time. There are two kinds of changes or transformations—destruction is one, unfoldment is the other. Thus our body which belongs to the matter aspect of life is undergoing transformation during life, and it is destroyed at death. On the other hand our Soul, representative of the Spirit aspect of life, ever becomes better, nobler, more beautiful in and through the processes of unfoldment and transformation.

Between Soul and body there is our feeling-mind or Kama-Manas. Our feelings and our thoughts are so closely knit that they have become one unit. Fibre by fibre, feelings and thoughts are bound together. This feeling-mind is impressed by the bodily senses which contact the universe, as also impressed by the Soul from within. Therefore our feeling-mind or Kama-Manas has the dual experience of change. Something of Kama-Manas gets destroyed, the rest becomes transformed. The Soul uses the instrument of the feeling-mind dwelling in the body, its brain and senses, and thus gathers its nourishment of experience. But the feeling-mind is greatly swayed by the senses and the body of flesh and blood, and so evil feelings or vices arise, as also egotistic evil thoughts. These evil feelings and thoughts arise from the side of matter and meet with destruction; but in Kama-Manas, under the influence of the Soul, good and noble feelings, high and altruistic thoughts, also arise and these do not die. Becoming the very clothing of the Soul, they are transformed into greater beauty, greater nobility, greater power. The Soul is ever becoming more and more glorious and powerful through each transformation of the feeling-mind when the latter becomes amenable to the guidance of the Soul. But when that feeling-mind falls under the sway of the senses, it is preparing for destruction.

The lesson for each one of us is to choose the way of the Soul. It implies that we should deliberately begin not to allow our feelings and our thoughts to be coloured by the senses; they should be coloured by the Soul. The method for this dual task of distancing oneself from the senses and getting closer to the Soul may be offered in a single aphorism: Impersonalize your feelings and universalize your thoughts.

What does that mean? Let each one look at his or her own feelings. Lust, anger, jealousy, avarice must die; but good emotions such as affection, patience, fortitude, sacrifice, have to be transformed. In our affection we are personal. We are patient with those we love; we are ready to sacrifice for them. But unless we impersonalize our desires, decay and death will overtake us in the whirligig of time. We must deliberately try to remove the personal factor from our good feelings of affection and attachment.

To unfold love for all, for the mass of mankind, and to free ourselves from the feeling of our own small personality, is the task that sooner or later has to be undertaken. It does not mean that we love our friends and kin less, but that we love them intelligently, and are not swayed by the sense of favouritism. So the first axiom is—Impersonalize your feelings. Similarly, in study, in thinking, we must rise to the plane of universality. We must learn to take a universal view of the problems that belong to our family and community, our nation and race. All of us are bound to die as men or women, as Hindus or Muslims, as Asiatics or Europeans, but Man as Man will not die; he only gets transformed, resurrected, becoming immortal. There are those who are so impersonal in their compassion that they cannot be called persons; they are impersonal forces who flood the earth with their radiant love. They are universal beings whose ideation is cosmic. Such beings are the Buddhas and Christs of the race. They are the Immortal Ones who never die, and they remain with Orphan Humanity to teach it the lesson of Life Everlasting.