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Šri Caitanya caritāmrta
[[Madhya-lilā Ch 8]
TRANSLATION
At this point, Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu replied, “This is all right, but still you can speak more on the subject.” Rāmānanda Rāya then replied, “Ecstatic love for the Supreme Personality of Godhead is the essence of all perfection.”
PURPORT
In this connection, Śrīla Bhaktivinoda Thākura in his  Amṛta-pravāha-bhāṣya  says that after hearing Rāmānanda Rāya, Lord Caitanya Mahāprabhu said,  eho haya, āge kaha āra . This means that this is the process accepted in devotional service, but there is something more than this. Therefore Lord Caitanya Mahāprabhu requested him to explain what was beyond. Simply executing the duties of all  varṇas  and  āśramas  is not as good as offering all the results of one's activities to the Lord. When one gives up all fruitive activity and fully surrenders to the Lord, he attains  sva-dharma-tyāga , wherein he abandons the social order and takes to the renounced order. That is certainly better. However, better than the renounced order is cultivation of knowledge mixed with devotional service. Yet all these activities are external to the activities of the spiritual world. There is no touch of pure devotional service in them. Pure devotional service cannot be attained by empiric philosophy, nor can perfection be attained simply by good association. Devotional service by self-realization is a different subject matter. It is untouched by fruitive activity, for one surrenders the results of activities to the Lord, abandons prescribed duties and accepts the renounced order of life. Such devotional service is situated on a higher platform than that of empiric philosophical speculation with a mixture of  bhakti . This is verified by Śrīla Rūpa Gosvāmī in his  Bhakti-rasāmṛta-sindhu  (1.1.11):
anyābhilāṣitā-śūnyaṁ
jñāna-karmādy-anāvṛtam
ānukūlyena kṛṣṇānu-
śīlanaṁ bhaktir uttamā
“One should render transcendental loving service to the Supreme Lord Krṣṇa favorably and without desire for material profit or gain through fruitive activities or philosophical speculation. That is called pure devotional service.”
Devotional activities, however, sometimes appear to be impure in the neophyte stage, but in the mature stage they are completely pure from material activity. Therefore Rāmānanda Rāya replied after hearing the last statement of Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu:  prema-bhakti — sarva-sādhya-sāra . Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu actually accepted this verse ( jñāne prayāsam ) as the basic principle of perfection. One has to practice this principle in order to make further progress. When further progress is actually made, one comes to the platform of ecstatic loving service to the Lord. This first stage is technically called  sādhana-bhakti , or