Mantra Ten 51

sonality of Godhead, Sri Krsna, and serve Him with rapt
atlention.

17. One should develop a feeling for residing in a secluded
place with a calm and quiet atmosphere favorable for spiritual
culture, and thus avoid congested places where the non-
devotees congregate.

18. One should become a scientist or philosopher, and make
research into spiritual knowledge—not material knowledge—
recognizing that spiritual knowledge is permanent, whereas
material knowledge ends with the death of the body.

These eighteen items form a gradual process for developing
real knowledge. Except for these eighteen items, all other items
whatever are grouped within the category of nescience. Srila
Mhaktivinode Thakur, a great dcarya, said that all the forms of
material knowledge are merely external features of the illusory
energy, and by culturing them one becomes no better than an
ass. Here in Sri Isopanisad the same principle is repeated.
Material advancement of knowledge means actually converting
au human being to the status of an ass. Some materialistic
politicians, under cover of spiritual garments, do decry the
present system of civilization as satanic, but unfortunately they
do not care for the culture of real knowledge which is described
in the Bhagavad-gita, and therefore they cannot change the
satanic situation.

In the modern setup of things, even a boy thinks himself
self-sufficient, and pays no respect to elderly men. Thus, due
to the wrong type of education imparted by our universities,
boys all over the world have become the cause of headache to
the elderly people. Therefore Sri [sopanisad warns very strongly
that the culture of nescience is different from that of knowledge.
The universities are, so to speak, centers of nescience only, and
therefore the scientists are busy discovering lethal weapons to
wipe out the existence of other countrics.

University students today are nol given instructions on the
regulative principles of brahmacarya, the spiritual process of
