FROM "THE MAN OF LOVE"

 
It must be ten years ago since I was taken to a room in London to visit Meher Baba, and the recent receipt of literature about the life and work, and a copy of Mr. C. B. Purdom's book, The Perfect Master*, has reminded me of one of the three most remarkable men I have ever met. I sat beside him cross-legged on a sofa while we talked — by means of an alphabet board, for he had taken a vow of silence — of love, and the use of love and, if I remember rightly, of the doctrine of transmitted merit, whereby, it is said, the Bodhisattva hands over for the benefit of all mankind the karmic benefit of all his noble deeds.

For the first time in my life, and I have not met another like him, I found myself in the aura of a man who literally radiated love. Like all great mystics, he combined the profundity of mystical experience with the guileless candour of a child, and his smile was as infectious as the words he used were immaterial. For I found, as I found with the Abbot Tai Hsü and Nicholas Roerich, that after a while there is no need of words, and one can speak from mind to mind in silence. And all the while he radiated such a pure affection that one wondered why, when all religions praise the value of pure love, it should be a memorable experience to meet one man who practised it.

The cause of war is hatred, born of desire, born of ignorance, and "hatred ceases not by hatred, hatred ceases but by love." If there were more Meher Babas in the world today war would end for want of causes. This man of love sets all men an example. Let us who invoke the name of the All-Compassionate One at least make further attempts to follow it.