Sivananda's Personality - 13.

The Master saw God in animals, nay, even in inanimate things. He bowed mentally to ants and asses, to stones, trees and rivers, to the sky, the sun and the moon, to chairs and tables, to pillars and posts. He talked to them. He told his students again and again, "Practise this Sadhana and see.
Do this for some months and mark the change in yourself.  You will be a different and changed man, a God-man with God-vision."

"First, I bow to the Ganges through the window, then I salute the Himalayas. I salute the door, the window, the commode," he told a stunned Swami Krishnananda, then general secretary of the Ashram.

The Master then went on to recite stanza after stanza of Sanskrit verses in praise of the numerous Deities beloved of the devout Hindu, saying that all these hymns he recited while in the toilet.

A direct result of this habit of seeing the Divine in everything was that the Master could not suffer to see even an insect injured. While he was bathing in the Ganges, if an insect came floating by struggling for life, he would at once take it into his palm and leave it on the bank. He revealed to his disciples, without the least trace of repugnance on his face, "If a worm or an insect were struggling for life in faecal matter, I would remove and protect it."

In the summer months the Ashram is full of flies. A sanitary inspector suggested an insecticide. "Swamiji, it will kill the flies."

The Master looked at him in studied silence. The inspector repeated his promise with great solicitude. This time the Master returned a mystic smile and said, "Inspector Saheb, it should prevent flies from coming, not kill them."

As the Master was returning to his room one day from the office, he noticed crowds of large, black ants cutting across his path. He tried to proceed without hurting them. It was impossible, so he retraced his steps and went to his room by a circuitous way.

Sri N. Ananthanarayanan
To be continued  ...