Life at its best

1957, 73pp, hardcover with dust jacket, in very good condition, stamps of Theosophical Library on first page, sticker on the spine.

Life at Its Best
If understood, life is simply a jest;if misunderstood, life becomes a pest.
Once overcome, life is ever at rest.For pilgrims of the path, life is a test.
When relinquished through lovelife is at its best.

FOREWORD by Dr. W. Y. Evans-Wentz
This small, but precious, volume of American-born messagesfrom Meher Baba, the illustrious Sadguru of India, should prove to
be, not only to his own disciples, but to all pilgrims who haveentered upon the Path, a source of unending inspiration. Every
such book adds, in its own peculiar way, to the spiritual heritageof our One Humanity, and thereby advances Right Knowledge,
not only in this generation, but in all generations yet to come.These messages constitute an authentic record of Meher Baba's
transcendent thought as he traveled across the United States,meeting his many followers, during three weeks of the summer of
1956, and observed the complex phantasmagoria of life in thatpart of the world. All the while strictly maintaining his silence,
which has now been unbroken for thirty-two years, the Teacherdelivered the messages by means of hand gestures rather than
with the aid of his alphabet board.Much that Meher Baba observed then in America seems to have
served, metaphorically, for the setting forth of his teachings. Thisis suggested by the section entitled "Theory and Practice," on
page 23, where he likens spiritually undirected thinking, talkingand writing to the steam which escapes through the whistle of a
railway engine. The whistling makes a noise, but no amount of itcan set the engine in motion. Only by a different application of its
steam can the engine with its train attain a distant destination.Likewise, without wisely directed discipline there can be no
spiritual progress. Mere theorizing will never advance the disciple;it is practice, not theory, that produces results. This yogic truism is
further emphasized on page 52 in "Knowledge ThroughExperience"; and, also, in a more subtle manner, on page 37 in
"Tuition and Intuition." On page 23, the differences between theslow goods train, the oft-stopping ordinary passenger train, and
the special train are cleverly applied to the three classes ofdevotees.
One of the most original of these metaphorical applications is setforth on page 25, in "Humility Disarms Antagonism": the disciple
when meeting with aggression "should be like the football that iskicked, for the very kicking raises it aloft and propels it onward till
the goal is reached." The late Mahatma Gandhi, too, would say,as Meher Baba in this context does, "True humility is strength, not
weakness. It disarms antagonism and ultimately conquers it."Once the leaders of the nations see that this is so, human warfare
will be ended."Control," on page 26, very succinctly, in sixty-six words,
expounds the whole essence of applied yoga. No wiser definitionof the term God has ever been formulated than that set forth on
page 13:Philosophers, atheists and others may affirm or refute the
existence of God, but as long as they do not deny the existence oftheir own being they continue to testify to their belief in God-for I
tell you, with divine authority, that God is Existence, eternal andinfinite. He is EVERYTHING.
As Einstein mathematically demonstrated, energy and matterequal one another; and now Meher Baba enunciates, in "Control
of Mind Over Energy and Matter," on page 38, that energy andmatter are begotten of mind, a truth
towards which Western Science appears to be rapidly advancing.Of the many golden precepts contained herein, the three which
follow suffice to indicate the profundity of their author's insight:—It is not so much that you are within the cosmos as that the
cosmos is within you.The saints of the present are the sinners of the past.
While wine leads to self-oblivion, Divine Love leads to selfknowledge.In the firm conviction that the fifty-eight messages of Meher Baba,
which comprise this volume, will be found to be, as has been saidof the messages of Tibet's Great Yogi Milarepa, "a feast of delight
to them who uphold the Dynasty of Gurus by living according totheir commandments," I conclude this Foreword with "The Final
Account," on page 58:When the goal of life is attained, one achieves the reparation of all
wrongs, the healing of all wounds, the righting of all failures, thesweetening of all sufferings, the relaxation of all strivings, the
harmonizing of all strife, the unraveling of all enigmas, and thereal and full meaning of all life—past, present and future.