Morning Walk Conversation Prabhupada: Why you went to Vrndavana, New Vrindaban? Guru dasa: I associated with Kirtananda Maharaja. Prabhupada: And what was the result? Guru dasa: Well, I’m a little bit stronger in Krsna consciousness. Associating with devotees is a wonderful thing. They are really doing a lot of productive service there. They just put in a new road. The palace, they’re putting the arches up today. Everyone’s enthusiastic there. [break] Prabhupada: You informed him that you are taking sannyasa? Guru dasa: Yes. Prabhupada: What did he say? Guru dasa: He smiled, said “Very nice.” [break] …Tamala Krsna Gosvami that, as you requested, I’d like to join his bus party. Prabhupada: Is that all right? Tamala Krsna: Oh, yes, Srila Prabhupada. [break] Jayatirtha: What is the position of a soul that’s in a sacred tree like a fig tree? Prabhupada: There are also sattva-guna, rajo-guna, tamo-guna. Sattva-guna, rajo-guna, tamo-guna is working throughout the universe. [break] …was attempt to manufacture gold by combination of metals. They are not doing that? Jayatirtha: No, I don’t think they’re doing that. Prabhupada: Why? Jayatirtha: They think that that’s foolishness. They think that it’s a legendary thing. Sudama: Alchemy is not looked upon as very intelligent. Tamala Krsna: Scientific. Sudama: They’ve replaced it now with science, higher truth of science. Prabhupada: No, it is not legend. If you can mix copper, tin and mercury—this is stated in the sastra—you can make gold. It is not legend. The particular metals to be combined, that is stated: copper, tin and mercury. You mix, and there will be gold. Tamala Krsna: Why aren’t they doing it? Prabhupada: Because they do not know the process. Tamala Krsna: No, but some Vedic people, some men who know the Vedas. In India they know. Prabhupada: No. They make gold, some of the yogis. Brahmananda: Yogis. You once said they swallow some mercury and then they… Prabhupada: Yes. They swallow mercury overnight, and they pass urine on the copper, and then the copper is put into the fire. It becomes gold. There is same combination, mercury, copper. Paramahamsa: The only difficulty is that mercury is certain death if you eat it. Prabhupada: So therefore you must know how to eat. (laughter) Tamala Krsna: But why don’t they… I’m sure the scientists could figure out an easier way than having to swallow it. Prabhupada: But in Kaviraji, they make some medicine which is gold added by this process, makaradhvaja. Makaradhvaja, the medicine which is combination of tin and mercury, and it looks like gold. Tamala Krsna: So we could become rich if we do this, our movement. Prabhupada: Yes, everyone will do, and there will be no rich men. Paramahamsa: Is it tin and copper? Brahmananda: Tin, copper and mercury. Prabhupada: Yes. So you can try. You are… Paramahamsa: That’s brass. That’s the constituents of brass. Prabhupada: Tin and copper? Paramahamsa: Like bell metal. Prabhupada: Yes. And add mercury. Paramahamsa: Is first the metals mixed together? Prabhupada: I do not know that. (laughter) Paramahamsa: I’ll give you all the profits. Prabhupada: I can give you suggestion. This example is given by Sanatana Gosvami. yatha kancanatam yati kamsyam rasa-vidhanatah tatha diksa-vidhanena dvijatvam jayate nrnam This is the definition, that “As kamsa, the bell metal, by manipulating with mercury, it becomes gold, similarly, a person by the process of diksa, initiation, be becomes a brahmana. This is the example he has given. Yatha kancanatam yati. Kancanatam means gold. Rasa-vidhanatah, by process of mercury manipulation. Why he has not taken other metal? This is in the sastra. And the scientists—I do not know—they say that some, what is called, molecules? Some molecules added with mercury, it can be turned into gold. Tamala Krsna: I don’t know why they don’t do it. Paramahamsa: They are experimenting. Prabhupada: They have not come to success. So why not make experiment in the laboratory? Tamala Krsna: Yes. We should do it. Jayatirtha: Perhaps Svarupa Damodara can do it. Svarupa Damodara is a chemist. Paramahamsa: I have a lot of tin and brass. Prabhupada: Brass you have got? Paramahamsa: Would you like? Prabhupada: No, you add mercury, then give. The kaviraji medicines, they mix mercury and sulphur, and then tin, and some other medicine, that make makaradhvaja, and it looks like gold. Svarna-sindhu, the name is svarna-sindhu, “vermillion of gold.” That is a medicine. It looks like gold. The some medicine, they mix mercury and sulphuric acid first of all, and then with some other thing. Mercury cannot be directly heated. It must be mixed with sulphuric acid. Tamala Krsna: What happens when it is directly heated? Prabhupada: It will immediately blow. Paramahamsa: Sulphuric acid is also poisonous. Tamala Krsna: So it blows up as soon as it’s heated. Paramahamsa: Well, it’s not a medicine then. You don’t… Prabhupada: No, they use as medicine, mercury mixed with sulphur. Brahmananda: There was an advertisement that a ten cent piece, a dime, that was minted ten years ago it was made with silver. So that ten cent piece today is actually worth twenty-five cents. And the twenty-five cents piece that they make today, because it’s made with copper, it’s only worth ten cents. So it’s better to have a ten cent piece that was made ten years ago than a twenty-five cent piece that was made today. Paramahamsa: In the British historical museum in London, I have seen there’s a plate about this large, and half of it is pure gold, and the other half is lead. And they found this. They can’t explain. It’s just a straight line where they separate, and they can’t explain how it was produced. So they’re experimenting now to try to change lead because there’s only, what is it, one proton or electron in the atom? Different. There’s only like one proton difference between lead and gold. [break] Prabhupada: …the sky there are many big, big planets where the millions of miles made of gold. Just like desert, there is gold desert. Tamala Krsna: Yeah. We saw coming here a salt desert. There’s a whole desert of salt. Prabhupada: Where? Tamala Krsna: In Utah. It’s called salt flats. There’s a great salt lake. And the lake is gradually drying up. And for miles and miles and miles, simply salt. Prabhupada: Even in this planet. Tamala Krsna: Yes. Sudama: And the water in that lake is far more salty than the ocean water. Prabhupada: Hm, must be. Brahmananda: You cannot sink in it, I think. Tamala Krsna: Yeah, it’s not possible to drown. If you go into the water there, immediately you come up to the surface. Sudama: So much salt. Prabhupada: Oh. [break] …the ocean of milk, ocean of milk. Ocean of liquor, ocean of oil, ocean of yogurt. [break] Nalini-kantha: …in the ocean of nectar. The devotees are living in the ocean also. Nectar. Prabhupada: Yes. That is stated by Caitanya Mahaprabhu, anandambudhi-vardhanam. The ordinary ocean does not increase, but this ocean increases. Anandambudhi-vardhanam. Vardhanam means increasing. (dog barks) So they keep also dog? I was thinking there was no dog. Paramahamsa: They’re strays. Dhira Krsna: Many dogs live around this campus, an unusual number, a very large number. Paramahamsa: Srila Prabhupada, in what sastra is that recipe given for gold? Prabhupada: In the Hari-bhakti-vilasa. Not recipe. The comparison is there in Hari-bhakti-vilasa. Perhaps purposefully the recipe is not given so that you can take and misuse this. (laughter) And forget chanting. Because as soon as you get gold, then you are no more interested in Krsna consciousness. That is the infection of gold. Paramahamsa: But I have gold. Prabhupada: No, you have gold. (laughs) Tamala Krsna: Not great quantities. Paramahamsa: Originally when I came to the movement I asked you this, remember? And you gave lectures on the subject, and I asked you about it. And you asked me for what purpose I wanted it. Prabhupada: No, no, I don’t wonder you. But the gold has got such infection that if one… That is the whole world, that as soon as one has gold, he is no more interested with God. That is the infection. “Ah!” He will say, “This is meant for the poor class of men who has no gold. I have gold. I am God.” You know that Kali-yuga. He was punished, that “You get out.” Then he said that “Where shall I go? Everywhere is your kingdom.” Then Pariksit Maharaja said that “You go here, in the brothel, in the…, these four things.” Striyah suna-pana dyutah yatra papas catur-vidhah: “Illicit sex, and slaughterhouse, and liquor shop, and gambling.” Then he requested that “Instead of going so many places, you give me some place where one place will be sufficient.” Then he said, “You go where there is gold. Then you get everything.” Striyah suna-pana dyutah yatra papas catur-vidhah. Formerly, especially in Bengal, the gold merchants are taken as—that is artificial, of course—the low class because they are rich, and they indulge in these four kinds of prohibition. Hare Krsna. Devotees: Hare Krsna. Jaya, Srila Prabhupada. (end)
with His Divine Grace A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada
July 19, 1975, San Francisco