And what are the consequences of such misuse of our freedom? Loss of freedom. Because even a hospital means loss of freedom. We may not be behind bars; though psychopaths, schizophrenics, they may also find themselves behind bars, and imagine it is not a jail. But the worst prisons are the prisons of our conscience.

All this was created by a false understanding of freedom. I don't think any rational person could possibly controvert this idea. This is what my Master taught. That is, don't have wrong ideas of freedom. Freedom is given to you to achieve yet greater levels of freedom by the right use of freedom.

Really speaking the only freedom is the freedom to do the right. There is no other freedom. A motor car on the street has freedom but only to go where it is permitted. It may not enter a one-way street from the wrong end; it may not exceed speed limits specified; it may park only in areas specifically set aside for this purpose, and so on. Within the framework of these regulations the driver enjoys complete freedom. Why are these rules, restrictive rules, made? They are for the safety of the driver himself. If there was only one car in a city, the rules need not be so rigid. When there are more, then laws get progressively more in number and more and more restrictive too. While on its rails a train is free. If it leaves the rails there is disaster.

It seems clear that at lower levels of activity, the apparent freedom of the individual is greater, while the activity itself seems to need a lesser degree of ability for its performance. As the plane of activity rises, the ability needed for its right performance is more and more, while individual freedom appears to become less and less, and simultaneously the need for stricter obedience increases stage by stage. At the highest levels, the individual's freedom seems to be virtually nonexistent, to have vanished!

To consider this a little further, suppose a person wishes to tell a lie, say about his age. He has considerable freedom in choosing a figure to mention as his age, but to tell the truth there is no freedom whatsoever since the correct figure can be one and one only.

Thus, an orderly existence means discipline. Driving on the right, giving way to traffic, obeying the red lights, in short, a sacrifice of a certain degree of personal freedom to achieve a general order, as a universal measure, for general and universal welfare. And the more the well-being or the greater the degree of well-being that we desire, the greater the sacrifice of personal freedom.

If you extend this line of thinking sufficiently, it follows that one who has totally given up his personal freedom, contributes the most to general welfare; and that is the state of the saint or the Master. Because in the existence of a person like our Master, you find the example of a life sacrificed for the general human welfare by handing over all his personal freedom to his Master: freedom of choice, freedom of action, freedom of thought, everything. And this we call surrender. So it is like a big spectrum, you see, on one side we have total individual freedom with no welfare, and on the other side we have no individual freedom, but total welfare, and in between, we have a mixture of various degrees of this and that.

In examining this idea of freedom we have been led to the conclusion that what we have thought of as loss of freedom is really nothing but a state of surrender to the Master's will. We have not lost freedom in the sense that we have been deprived of it. We have voluntarily, wholeheartedly and devotedly surrendered it to the Master of our Soul. To those who are fortunate enough to arrive at this stage, the Master is no longer a guide for spirituality alone. He has now become the Master of one's life in all its aspects of existence. He becomes the father, the mother, the son, the teacher, the doctor, in fact there is no role that He does not play in the abhyasi's life! He has taken total charge of the abhyasi. So we see that only our surrendering to him can bring about a state where He can take total charge of us!

Analysing this further we find, surprisingly, that a great and unimaginable freedom is now conferred on the abhyasi. It is the freedom from the freedom itself. It is the freedom of invulnerability. We may even say that it is the freedom of invincibility. We are no longer answerable for our actions. We merely obey. The person who issues the orders, the Master, assumes complete responsibility for everything we do. We are no longer vulnerable to the world. Therefore a great calm, a great freedom comes to us. Out of an apparent loss of a previous freedom - largely illusory as we have seen - we now receive as a Divine gift, the true freedom of a spiritual state, a real freedom which some saints have called the "Great Liberation."