The answer is: Within ourselves. It cannot be found in anything outside of ourselves. This continual stream of happiness is flowing at all times from our heart of hearts all through our body, but we cannot perceive it, or feel it, because our mind has been covered by the clouds formed out of our hankerings for material objects. Our desire for material pleasures is the only veil that shrouds this fountain of true happiness from our mental vision.
But if our desires for material enjoyments be carefully and intelligently analyzed, we can arrive at only one conclusion, and that is that in hankering for material pleasures we are in fact practically hunting for that happiness which, once attained, is ever full, ever satisfying; which, once enjoyed, lays all hankerings for material enjoyments forever at rest. The fact of our material possessions and enjoyments ever leaving within us a wish, more or less pronounced, for something still more enjoyable, still more pleasurable, is the most indirectly direct proof that we are in quest of something which material objects cannot supply; and the fact of this quest being present in all human souls, in all their thoughts and actions at all times forces us to the irresistible conclusion that we once knew or had a taste of the thing we all are eternally searching for; and that, having lost it, we are ever endeavoring to regain it, its absence having rendered us as unhappy and restless as a fish out of its element.
This lost object, this once enjoyed state of the human soul, now absent but ever longed for, is—Krishna.
It is Krishna—Perfect State of Love or Bliss—that is ever drawing us to Itself. This Krishna was once our home, when this creation, of which we form but atoms, slept for aeons unnumbered in the bosom of Krishna, forming but a part of His will. When those unnumbered aeons were numbered, after these atoms of creation had slept for enough time to rest themselves in that bosom of Absolute Bliss, they were thrust out of that realm into space, to form a universe.
They first manifested themselves as Universal Consciousness, which, wanting to be conscious of something, developed into Ego, and Ego developed into the Mind, as no Ego is possible without the faculty of thought, which is the Mind's function. And as thoughts are not possible without objects to think upon, the five fine objects, namely: Sound, Touch, Form, Taste and Smell, came into existence, along with their gross counterparts and compounds, I mean the five elements, namely, Ether, Air, Fire, Water and Earth; while the Mind's channels of communication with these fine and gross forms of matter were developed simultaneously, namely, the five Cognizing Senses: Power of Seeing, (eye), Power of Hearing (ear), Power of Smelling (nose), Power of Tasting (tongue), Power of Feeling (skin), with the five Working Senses, namely, Power of Speaking (vocal organs), Power of Holding (hands), Power of Moving (feet). Power of Excreting and Power of Generating.
Thus from Krishna to earth, Krishna's Will took twenty-four steps to assume the form of the universe, and myriad steps more to divide the universe into earth, heaven, stars, planets, sun and moon, man and beast and bird; trees and shrubs and grass; mountains and rivers, which go to make it up.
But every particle of this cosmos is conscious, directly or indirectly, in every point, of the home that it has left, the absolute state of Bliss it once has soaked in, the incomparable nectar which it has once tasted. Yes, that memory endures; the memory of that Love Absolute is the cause of all discontent, of all dissatisfaction, of all strife and effort, of all ambition and achievement. It is the cause as well of every philosophy and transcendental thought, of moral and spiritual uplifting, and of developing the human into the Divine.
From Krishna have we all come and Krishnaward are we all tending. And all our actions, good, bad or indifferent, are but the feeble steps with which we are all endeavoring to cover the journey back to Krishna—our Home, Sweet Home!—our ever-loved Home, from which we have come away as sorry truants and to which the needle of our soul ever trembles, pointing to us the forgotten path, by which we fled from and by which we are again to return to that Home—Sree Krishna!
GOD IS FORMLESS AND HAS A FORM.
Thus Krishna is the object we are all seeking through every wish and every act; every moment of our existence we are seeking Krishna. He is the interest which makes life interesting, the one interest which makes life worth living. He is the element of sweetness in the grossest pleasure. He is the highest beatitude which the purest souls attain to. The lover of good eating cannot keep on eating forever to sustain the pleasure that good eating produces; if he did, he would die. The sensation of eating endures as long as the food is on the palate; but the mind alone is the enjoyer of that sensation. The mind alone, likewise, enjoys the pleasure of intoxication, which the dryest and highest priced champagne can afford. A little while and the pleasure of the daintiest of food and the most delicious of drinks is over, giving place to the pain of its loss and the restlessness in the search again for such pleasure!