[From LIVING THE LIFE, pages 13-16]

One, if not the greatest, of evils by which modern society is
corrupted, is that of gossip. Injurious speech, or small talk
ensouled by the spirit of competition, not only ruins other
people’s character, but also corrupts our own. This is not
recognized. Small talk has become and is studied as an art, and
the infamy of gossip has emerged as an institution of social
amusement. Its infamous nature is forgotten, its dire effects
fail to impart their lesson, and it has assumed for modern men
and women the place of a necessity of life. Social avocations in
cultured drawing rooms as also in abusive slums pursue the path
of small talk and mean gossip.

The first requirement of the spiritual life is to learn the value
of silence. The conservation of spiritual energy demands that
the frittering away of soul-forces be stopped. There are few
avenues through which man’s divinity goes to waste as through
sound and speech. The dirt and dregs of our kamic nature often
find their outlet in useless or injurious speech.

There is a close connection and more than mere metaphorical
analogy in the statement that refers to what is put in the mouth
as food and what comes out of it as words. Through the process
of eating, the assimilation of food and elimination of waste
product take place. The health of the body improves or suffers
with every morsel we take in. One of the main ways of
determining the condition of the body is to examine the
disposition of the process and product of elimination. Our
psychic nature has its own ways of assimilation and elimination,
of sustaining itself in good or ill health. One of the modes of
elimination relates to the power of speech.

In spiritual growth, learning and listening go together. They
precede teaching and speaking. In ancient India, the moment the
seeker of the peace of wisdom resolved to follow in the footsteps
of the guru, the pupil gained the name of Shravaka, a listener.
The ancient Greeks named him Akoustikos. He was not even
permitted to ask questions; bija-sutras, seed-thoughts, were
given him to ponder over and understand to the best of his
ability. These thoughts were intended as purificatory food that,
if adequately assimilated, would cleanse his kamic nature; not
only remove the accumulated poisons of the past but reveal to the
pupil the correct alchemical process of transforming within his
own constitution passion into compassion, lust into love, and
antipathy into sympathy. Once started on this highway, he was
ready to become an exerciser, a positive doer, Shramana, the
Asketos of the Greeks.

Our modern Theosophical student has not fully recognized the
occult significance of silence. A vow of silence does not mean
to become mute and not to speak at all. It consists in: (1)
self-imposition of periodic silence; (2) not indulging at any
time in injurious and untruthful speech; (3) not giving way to
useless speech; (4) not asking questions on philosophy or
practice till what has already been taught or is before us is
fully scanned and thoroughly looked into from the point of view
of our particular questions; (5) not indulging in ahankaric
speech, i.e., not making statements about the Divine Self or Ego
in terms of our kamic or lower nature; (6) not indulging in
injurious speech regarding our lower nature, our own faults and
weaknesses, lest by speaking of them we lend them the strength
that ensues from the power of speech; (7) not to speak even that
that is true unless at proper times, to proper people, and under
proper circumstances.

While this sevenfold exercise is practiced, secrecy has to he
observed about it. To refer to or speak about the exercise we
have undertaken and are practicing is to vitiate it altogether
and make it worse than useless. Such an indulgence gives birth
to conceit and enhances it where it already exists. We need
secrecy and silence. Contemplation on their kinship should
precede the sevenfold exercise.

There is a general desire “to sit for meditation and to practice
yoga,” but this first rule, this primary regulation, is found
irksome and its desirability questioned. No doubt, it is
difficult, well nigh impossible, for the moderns to attain this
control over speech; but if not fully and wholly at least partly
and partially it can be and should be practiced.

Deliberate speech will be the first result. It will not be
rooted in Kama-passion, but in Buddhi-compassion. There are two
types of criticism: one is faultfinding; the other is perception
of virtue in meritorious expressions as also the perception of
virtue behind vice, demerit, and weakness. The deceit of the
dice is Sri Krishna, and the power to perceive that comes from
the second type of criticism. The first is criticism by words of
Kama; the second is by words of understanding. The first is on
the plane of words; the second on the plane of ideas. The first
is of head learning; the second of soul-wisdom. The first
praises or condemns the lower nature; the second imports into it
the strength of the higher, causing readjustment. The first has
behind it the superior spirit of teaching; the second the sublime
spirit of learning and propagating that which is learnt.

How different would be the world if even in some measure the
power of this practice went into the doings of our civilization!
Reviewers and critics would then not look for points to condemn,
but for beauty, goodness, and worth in the books they review. In
all affairs of thought, feeling, and action our tendency is to
look for OUR thoughts repeated, OUR feelings reproduced, and OUR
actions imitated. We regard ourselves as the model for all
examination. We are the pattern whereby right and wrong is to be
determined. Such an attitude is not blatantly expressed, but
veils itself in a subtle form of humility, which is mock modesty.

There are a hundred who plunge into the waters of the ocean for
pleasure or profit to only one who dives for the pearl of great
price. The latter does his work in the secrecy of silence. His
art in the ocean is of a different kind from that of the ordinary
swimmer. Those who are in search of the pearl of wisdom must
acquire the strength of muscle, the control of breath, and the
finesse of stroke necessary against the stormy billows of this
ocean of Samsara. These lie securely hidden in the Power of
Silence. They must invoke that power, not by a pledge to some
other being, but by a vow silently sung and silently registered
in the sanctuary of the Heart. Thus, the path begins in silence
and secrecy and ends in the hearing and the chanting of the
Soundless Sound.