forty-six years, spent in obeying the divine command
to "make known to the world the truth which he
had gained." He was now forty-one years of age,
mature in spirit as in body, filled with an abundant
life, capable as never before of holding a steady
balance between the worlds of spirit and of sense.
The double life of action and contemplation, of
supernal love and of human work, towards which
that God Who is both active and at rest had led
through joy and pain the growing soul, was possible
to him at last. We know from the witness of others
the courage and industry with which that self-giving
life was led : a life, rooted in the Infinite yet
manifesting itself in a universal charity towards all
finite things, which obtained for Devendranath even
in his lifetime the title of "great saint" His aim
was the aim of all the true mystics, to "be to the
Eternal Goodness what his own hand is to a man"
an instrument wherewith the Supreme Artist
could do His creative work. His achievement
might have been expressed in the beautiful words
which Walt Whitman has placed on the lips of the
aged Columbus that perfect type of heroic love in
action, whose every enterprise was filled with God
Thou knowest my years entire, my life, My long and crowded life of active work, not adoration merely ; Thou knowest the prayers and vigils of my youth, Thou knowest my manhood s solemn and visionary meditations, Thou Knowest how before I commenced I devoted all to come to Thee,