lives in every one. How can a type come into existence in
which He cannot live? How can anything live and move, save as it has its
being in Him? Each type has its work; each type has its place; the type
of the Rakshasa as much as the type of the Deva, of the Asura as much as
of the Sura. Let me give you one curious little simple example, which
yet has a certain graphic force. You have a pole you want to move, and
that pole is on a pivot, like the mountain which churned the ocean, a
pole with its two ends, positive and negative we will call them. The
positive end, we will say, is pushed in the direction of the river (the
river flowing beyond one end of the hall at Adyar). The negative pole is
pushed--in what direction? In the opposite. And those who are pushing
it have their faces turned in the opposite direction. One man looks at
the river, the other man has his back to it, looking in the opposite
direction. But the pole turns in the one direction although they push in
opposite directions. They are working round the same circle, and the
pole goes faster because it is pushed from its two ends. There is the
picture of our universe. The positive force you call the Deva or Sura;
his face is turned, it seems, to God. The negative force you call the
Rakshasa or Asura; his face, it seems, is turned away from God. Ah no!
God is everywhere, in every point of the circle round which they tread;
and they tread His circle and do His will and no otherwise; and all at
length find rest and peace in Him.

Therefore Shri Krishna Himself can incarnate in the form of
Rakshasa, and when in that form He will act as Rakshasa and not as Deva,
doing that part of the divine work with the same perfection as He does
the other, which men in their limited vision call the good. A great
truth hard to grasp. I shall have to return to it presently in speaking
of Ravana, one of the mightiest types of, perhaps the greatest of, all
the Rakshasas. And we shall see, if we can follow, how the profound
truth works out. But remember, if in the minds of some of you there is
some hesitation in accepting this, that the words that I read are not
mine, but those of the Lord who spoke of His own embodying; He has left
on record for your teaching, that He has embodied Himself in the form of
Rakshasa and has acted after the manner of that order.

Leaving that for a moment, there is one other point I must take, ere
speaking of the need for Avataras, and it is this: whe