# Plato and Vedic Idealism  ## Metadata - Author: [[Swami Paramananda]] - Full Title: Plato and Vedic Idealism - Category: #books ## Highlights - From his fundamental principle “ex nihil, nihil fit,” “out of nothing, nothing is made” or some-thing cannot come out of nothing, he drew the conclusion that all things that exist are eternal and immutable, therefore without beginning. ([Location 123](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B07SKV97JR&location=123)) - Tags: [[favorite]] - To satisfy the growing ambition for fame, power, wealth, there arose teachers known as Sophists—men of keen intellect, who disdained religion and held the aim of life to be worldly glory and pleasure. ([Location 164](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B07SKV97JR&location=164)) - In the Chandogya-Upanishad a father says to his son: “That which exists is One and all things have sprung from that One. It is not, my child, that in the beginning there was nothing and this universe came out of that nothing. No, something cannot come out of nothing. In the beginning there was the One, the Infinite and Absolute”—that which Plato defines as the ultimate Idea of Good or the Permanent Reality: “One which is something over and above the many.” ([Location 243](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B07SKV97JR&location=243)) - Here Socrates expresses with remarkable definiteness the Vedic idea that the Guru is merely instrumental in drawing out the inherent powers of the soul. A real teacher must be full of humility and deeply conscious that he is only a channel through which the Divine works. ([Location 286](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B07SKV97JR&location=286)) - Only through clear knowledge of our soul nature shall we attain it. Free souls, even when they are thrown into the midst of the world, are never overcome by its confusion, because they know how to separate the essential from that which is non-essential. Therefore, they are called in India Paramahamsas or great (parama) swans (hamsas), because like the mythical swan, which can take the milk out of the water when mixed with it, they intuitively discriminate between the real and the apparent, between spirit and matter. ([Location 355](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B07SKV97JR&location=355)) - When our spiritual sight is opened, we turn away from all the nonessentials; our eye becomes single; and through this singleness of vision we are able to perceive the Divine, which is the final goal of all philosophy and all the religions of the world. ([Location 408](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B07SKV97JR&location=408))