This was Śrīla Prabhupāda’s spirit in training young men and women in the International Society for Krishna Consciousness, and he was offering these words of Lord Caitanya to strengthen all the Lord’s devotees. The members of the Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement should be confident that by preaching purely they would meet with success. Prabhupāda was confident. Here were the words of śāstra, words spoken by the Supreme Personality of Godhead. And Prabhupāda’s personal experience confirmed the same. Thus he could write,

Our Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement was started singlehandedly, and no one provided for our livelihood, but at present we are spending hundreds and thousands of dollars all over the world and the movement is increasing more and more. Although jealous persons may be envious, if we stick to our principles and follow the footsteps of the Pañca-tattva, this movement will go on unchecked by imitation swamis, sannyāsīs, religionists, philosophers or scientists, for it is transcendental to all material considerations. Therefore, those who propagate the Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement should not be afraid of such rascals and fools.

The verses of the Seventh Chapter described a worldwide inundation of Kṛṣṇa consciousness. Thus the objections that Europeans and Americans could not become brāhmaṇas or sannyāsīs would be swept away as Lord Caitanya’s mercy flooded the entire world. Nothing could check it.

The words of Kṛṣṇadāsa Kavirāja intensified Prabhupāda’s desire to base his worldwide movement in the land where Lord Caitanya appeared and began His saṅkīrtana movement. The Pañca-tattva had begun in Navadvīpa, and from here the waves of love of Godhead were swelling outward.

In Śrīdhāma Māyāpur, there is sometimes a great flood after the rainy season. This is an indication that from the birthplace of Lord Caitanya the inundation of love of Godhead should spread all over the world, for this will help everyone, including old men, young men, women and children. The Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement of Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu is so powerful that it can inundate the entire world and interest all classes of men in the subject of love of Godhead.

In this Seventh Chapter of the Ādi-līlā, Prabhupāda found many other evidences authorizing ISKCON under the principles of Lord Caitanya’s teachings and activities. Kṛṣṇadāsa Kavirāja says that Lord Caitanya’s taking sannyāsa was a trick for delivering certain classes of society who would otherwise not have shown Him respect. Prabhupāda, in his commentary, explained that he also had devised schemes for offering the benefits of Kṛṣṇa consciousness to as wide a spectrum of society as possible, and he cited his acceptance of women into the Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement. “Therefore it is a principle,” he wrote, “that a preacher must strictly follow the rules and regulations laid down in the śāstra, yet at the same time devise a means by which the preaching work to reclaim the fallen may go on with full force.”

June 27, 1973
From Māyāpur Śrīla Prabhupāda went to Calcutta. He wrote to Tamāla Kṛṣṇa Goswami,

… There is a suggestion by Shyamsundar that I may go to London for meeting very important men there in the new house given us by George. … But I want to make some definite settlement of Bombay affairs before I return to Europe or America. If there is a suitable place for me to stay for a few days in Bombay I can go there immediately and from there I may go to London.

While considering his itinerary, Prabhupāda passed some days in the Calcutta temple on Albert Road. He was very free about allowing people to see him, and his room was often filled with local Bengalis as well as his own disciples, seated on the white sheet before him. In the evenings he would go, even when it meant riding for miles through congested parts of the city, to spend an hour in someone’s home, preaching Kṛṣṇa consciousness.

Śrīla Prabhupāda’s sister, Bhavatāriṇī (known as Pisimā to Prabhupāda’s disciples), would also visit the Calcutta temple to see her beloved brother and, as usual, to cook for him. One day, however, a few hours after eating her kacaurīs, Prabhupāda felt sharp pains in his stomach. He closed his doors and went to bed. His followers became very concerned. When his servant, Śrutakīrti, came into the room, he found him tossing.

“Śrīla Prabhupāda, what’s wrong?”

“My stomach,” Prabhupāda replied. “That coconut kacaurī – it was not cooked.”

The seizure continued all night, and several devotees continually massaged Prabhupāda’s body, especially his stomach. But with every breath he would moan. Pisimā was standing by, but Prabhupāda’s disciples feared her presence, thinking she might want to cook something else for him, even in his illness.

Prabhupāda asked that the picture of Lord Nṛsiṁha be taken from the altar and put beside his bed. Some devotees feared that Prabhupāda might be about to pass away. The next morning, when the illness continued, the devotees called for the local kavirāja (Ayurvedic doctor).

The old kavirāja came and diagnosed Prabhupāda’s illness as severe blood dysentery. He left medicine, but it was ineffectual. Later, when Prabhupāda called Bhavānanda to his room and requested fried purīs with a little paṭala [an Indian vegetable similar to a small squash] and salt, Bhavānanda protested; such fried foods would be the worst thing for him. Prabhupāda said that this was the blood dysentery cure his mother had given during his childhood. He then called for his sister, and speaking to her in Bengali, told her to prepare purīs and paṭala. A few hours after taking the food, Prabhupāda again called Bhavānanda; he was feeling better. “My mother was right,” he remarked.

A lengthy telegram arrived from Śyāmasundara, glorifying the preaching opportunities that awaited Prabhupāda in London, where he would be picked up at the airport in a helicopter and flown to the main event – the greatest Ratha-yātrā ever held. The parade would proceed down Picadilly Lane, climaxing under a large pavilion at Trafalgar Square. The telegram went on to say that millions of Englishmen – including certain very, very important people – were eager to see Śrīla Prabhupāda and that arrangements were underway for Prabhupāda to instruct the Queen’s eldest son, Prince Charles, in Kṛṣṇa consciousness.

Some of the promises were exaggerated, Śrīla Prabhupāda knew, but his desire to preach again in England was strong. George Harrison had given the devotees a large estate forty-five minutes outside of London, and Prabhupāda spoke of going there and installing Deities of Rādhā and Kṛṣṇa on Janmāṣṭamī day. Yet even now, over a month before Janmāṣṭamī, he was feeling deeply affected by Śyāmasundara’s invitation. Although still exhausted from dysentery, he considered flying immediately to London.

Calling in those G.B.C. secretaries and sannyāsīs with him in Calcutta, sitting up in bed while they sat before him on the floor, Prabhupāda asked their advice. They concluded that he should go to a healthier climate – Los Angeles or Hawaii – to rest and recuperate. Prabhupāda mildly agreed as his advisors decided Hawaii would be the best place, a place where the climate was ideal and where he would have few interruptions. Suddenly, however, he sat up straighter. He would return to the West, he said, but to London, not to Hawaii. And not to recuperate, but to preach!

“Let me strike while the iron is hot,” he said. “I think that is an English maxim. If you do that, then you can keep the iron in shape. In the West, people are fed up. So we want to give them spiritual enlightenment.”

Prabhupāda had immediately convinced his disciples with his forceful statements. “There are two misleading theories in the West,” he continued. “One is that life comes from matter, and the other is that there is no life after death – you can just enjoy this life. They say everything is matter. So as this Kṛṣṇa consciousness movement grows, the Communists will be curbed down. People say they are trying for unity, but they have no brains to see how this will achieve unity. They have formed a big complicated League of Nations and now United Nations, but they all fail. But this simple method of Ratha-yātrā – all over the world it is spreading. Jagannātha means ‘Lord of the universe.’ So Lord Jagannātha is now international God, through our ISKCON. Therefore, I want to go to the West and give them these things.”

Although Prabhupāda appeared physically unfit to immediately fly to London to the active preaching that awaited him, his disciples submitted, accepting this as another miracle by Kṛṣṇa.

London
July 7, 1973
Paravidha: It was Ratha-yātrā day. I saw Prabhupāda coming into the temple, and he didn’t look very strong. I was really amazed, but I could understand that his strength was something spiritual.

Dhruvanātha: At the parade site we were waiting to receive Śrīla Prabhupāda at Marble Arch, where the procession starts. The vyāsāsana was nicely decorated, and everybody was expecting Prabhupāda simply to sit on his vyāsāsana on the cart and just ride through the streets, just as he had done in the other Ratha-yātrās. So it was to our great amazement and joy that when Prabhupāda came, he refused to sit on the vyāsāsana. He indicated that he would dance and lead the procession!

Yogeśvara: They brought stairs up so Prabhupāda could mount the ratha cart and sit down on the vyāsāsana. But he waved them off and just started walking with the chariots, leading the dancing.

Dhīraśānta: I twisted my ankle and couldn’t walk, so I rode on the cart. Therefore I could see Prabhupāda very clearly. Revatīnandana Mahārāja was chanting into the microphone from the cart, but after about fifteen minutes of the procession Prabhupāda told the devotees to tell Revatīnandana Mahārāja and the others to come down and lead the kīrtana in the street with him.

Revatīnandana: When Prabhupāda saw his vyāsāsana on the cart, he said, “No, I am just a devotee. I will go in the procession.” We had a big, great kīrtana. Haṁsadūta led, I led, Śyāmasundara led – different devotees traded off, leading this fantastic kīrtana. And Prabhupāda was right in the middle of the kīrtana with his karatālas the whole time. He was dancing back and forth and jumping up and down and dancing.

Rohiṇī-nandana: The cart was going quite slowly. Prabhupāda walked about twenty or thirty yards ahead of the cart, leading the procession. Meanwhile the kīrtana was coming from the ratha cart through microphones. Prabhupāda called them all down, and he got them all around himself, and they were chanting Hare Kṛṣṇa. Ever so often he would turn around and raise both his arms very majestically in the air and say, “Jaya Jagannātha!” Sometimes we would get a little further ahead, so then he would turn around and wait for the cart to come on. Sometimes he was dancing, and sometimes he would stand, raising his hands in the air.

Śāradīyā dāsī: Prabhupāda would dance, and then after a few feet he would turn around and look up at the deities with his arms raised. Then he would dance for a few moments, meditating on the deities, and then he would turn around and go on. In this way he danced the entire way. The devotees held hands in a circle around him to protect him from the crowd. It was a wonderful, transcendental affair. Prabhupāda was looking up at the deities, and all the devotees were behind him.

Sudurjaya: Prabhupāda surprised us. We didn’t know if he was sick or not, feeling weak and dizzy or not. Sometimes he looked very ill, and sometimes he looked like an eighteen-year-old boy. He surprised us. He had his cane in his hand but raised it in the air as he danced. After a while, Śyāmasundara came up to me and said, “Listen, he’s not going to make it. Prabhupāda is very ill. I want you to follow in a car. Be within thirty seconds’ reach so we can put Prabhupāda in the car immediately.” Prabhupāda was going down Park Lane, and from time to time he would turn back and raise his hands. He was going so fast that they couldn’t pull the cart fast enough to keep up with him. He would have to wait for the cart to catch up. He would turn back, raise his hands, and say, “Haribol!” Several times he did this. He was going so fast that he had to wait. The devotees were dancing, the weather was beautiful, and the crowd was wonderful.

Dhruvanātha: The passersby were rooted to the spot, looking at Prabhupāda. A man of that age simply dancing and jumping in the air like a young boy was the most amazing sight! And then every five minutes or so Prabhupāda would turn around and look toward Jagannātha. The devotees would clear the way so no one blocked his sight, and he had a perfect view of Jagannātha, Balarāma, and Subhadrā. But after a while the police came and motioned that we couldn’t keep stopping like this. We had to keep the whole thing going, because the traffic jams were becoming critical. Devotees were crying and chanting and dancing, and there was much commotion.

Śrutakīrti: When Prabhupāda was dancing, the bobbies kept on coming up and looking for someone official. Finally they came to me and said, “You’ll have to tell your leader to sit down. He’s causing too much of a disturbance. Everyone is becoming wild, and we can’t control the crowd, you know.” So I said, “All right.” But I didn’t say anything to Prabhupāda.

So then they came again and said, “You must tell him he’ll have to sit down.” So I said, “All right,” and I tapped Prabhupāda. The whole time he had been in ecstasy, dancing before the cart and encouraging everyone else to dance. He would motion with his hands and encourage the devotees to keep dancing. He kept the momentum of the festival. So I said, “Prabhupāda, the policemen want you to sit down. They say you are creating havoc in the parade.” Prabhupāda looked at me, turned, and kept on. He completely ignored it and kept on dancing. And they couldn’t do anything. Prabhupāda wouldn’t stop, and the police wouldn’t say anything to him.

Paravidha: I was distributing Back to Godhead magazines along the whole parade route. I was exhausted, and I was having a lot of trouble keeping up with the procession. But Prabhupāda was just there, and he was dancing like a young boy. I was amazed at his spiritual energy.

Dhruvanātha: When we came to Picadilly Circus, Prabhupāda suddenly stopped the whole procession. Picadilly Circus, of course, was just packed with people. For about three minutes Prabhupāda stopped the procession and just danced and danced with the devotees all around him.

Rohiṇī-nandana: When we got to Picadilly Circus, Prabhupāda really started to dance. He was leaping off the ground. The cart was stopped. It was very similar, actually, to the description in the Caitanya-caritāmṛta of how Lord Caitanya would lead the Ratha-yātrā procession. So the cart was stopped, and then Prabhupāda would wait for it to catch up.

Yogeśvara: When we finally arrived at Trafalgar Square and Prabhupāda saw the big tent and the other arrangements the devotees had made, he held up his hands again. He had been dancing and walking the entire route of the parade. It must have been at least an hour that he had been walking and dancing – all the way from Hyde Park to Trafalgar Square.

Rohiṇī-nandana: When Prabhupāda got to Trafalgar Square, he immediately sat down on the plinth of Nelson’s Column on a little vyāsāsana and delivered a lecture about the holy name of Kṛṣṇa. This was directly after his marathon of chanting and dancing.

The next day’s papers carried favorable news coverage of the festival, and Prabhupāda wrote of it to a disciple in Los Angeles.

You will be glad to know the Rathayatra in London was very successful. The Daily Guardian had a picture on the front page of our cart and stated that we were competition to the monument in memory of Lord Nelson in Trafalgar Square. My health is good and I am taking daily walk and speaking at the class in the morning.

In another letter Prabhupāda wrote,

Our festival here was very well received and I was so much encouraged by the whole thing that I was able to walk and dance the entire way from Hyde Park to Trafalgar Square.

Śrīla Prabhupāda settled into a regular routine at Bhaktivedanta Manor. “Here at Bhaktivedanta Manor,” he wrote, “the place is the nicest possible. It is calm and quiet, and the village is neat and clean.” Prabhupāda’s room on the second floor was spacious enough to seat fifty guests comfortably, and its large windows overlooked the expansive grounds.

Prabhupāda said that if the devotees would clean out the lake and keep up the grounds, then he would stay always at Bhaktivedanta Manor and translate here in peace. They should get some cows, he said, and use some of the extra acreage for farming.

Although the devotees had not long been living in the Manor and had done little to improve the buildings and grounds, Prabhupāda pointed out a place where they could one day build a thirty-story temple, the grandest building in all of London. He proposed that he stay for at least two months and install Rādhā-Kṛṣṇa Deities on Janmāṣṭamī day; he would also oversee the construction of the temple room and altar.

Every morning at about six Prabhupāda would leave the Manor for an hour’s walk. There was no restriction as to who could join him, and sometimes as many as twenty devotees would trail behind, trying to hear anything he might say. Looking off toward the horizon, he commented that Letchmore Heath reminded him of Vṛndāvana.

Prabhupāda would walk down the lane to a place called Round Bush, stroll past a wheat field, and finally return to Letchmore Heath and the Manor. A local policeman had become friends with the devotees and would regularly exchange greetings with Prabhupāda. Particularly Prabhupāda liked the cleanliness of the little village, and he would often point out even the smallest pieces of trash on the Manor grounds. The village, he said, was much neater than American towns.

Śyāmasundara had promised Śrīla Prabhupāda many interested visitors, and Śrīla Prabhupāda reciprocated, promising that as long as the interested people kept coming, he would remain in England. Each night one or two guests – including scholars, priests, and occasional celebrities – would come and visit with Prabhupāda for a couple of hours. Prabhupāda seemed especially eager to present the philosophy of Kṛṣṇa consciousness to intelligent persons. As the world’s foremost Vaiṣṇava paramparā philosopher of the Gītā and the Bhāgavatam, he had thoroughly realized the conclusions of the Vedic literature. He was experienced in countering all challenges and atheistic philosophies and knew what to expect from Christian, Māyāvādī, atheist – anyone. If a guest mentioned the name of a philosopher or school of thought unfamiliar to Prabhupāda, then Prabhupāda would simply ask, “What is his philosophy?” Inevitably he would recognize the “new” philosophy for what it was: an old, familiar mundane philosophy – with a new twist perhaps – easily defeated or brought to its perfection with Kṛṣṇa consciousness.

Prabhupāda was always eager to glorify Kṛṣṇa and repeat Kṛṣṇa’s message, and with complete, enthusiastic freshness he would present again the same points he had presented many, many times before. He said he was like a cow that gives milk in any field. Put him in India or America or England – he would always give the same nectarean milk of Bhagavad-gītā.

Prabhupāda’s entire day – his early-morning dictation of Caitanya-caritāmṛta, morning walk, Bhagavad-gītā lecture, talks with guests – revolved around philosophy. In Scotland, when a man had challenged that God needn’t be presented through philosophy, Prabhupāda had replied, “What do you expect me to talk, some fairy tales?” Philosophy was necessary, especially for the so-called intelligent persons, whose minds raised so many intellectual doubts. And besides, to always be telling others about Kṛṣṇa, Prabhupāda said, was a symptom of love.

Moved by compassion for others’ suffering, Prabhupāda always spoke the message of Kṛṣṇa and never tired of repeating it. He was genuinely angered by the atheistic speculators who mislead the people, because materialistic and impersonalistic philosophies ruined a person’s chances of finding the solution to life’s suffering. Whenever Prabhupāda heard anyone arguing the Māyāvāda doctrine, he would become like fire. He could not tolerate it. He had to correct it. When, after one of Prabhupāda’s lectures at the Manor, a boy had said he had heard someone call the chanting of Hare Kṛṣṇa “a little bit of a bluff,” Prabhupāda had replied, “Who says bluff?Who is that fool? Who is that rascal?” He had been ready to fight the atheist to glorify Kṛṣṇa.

These were Prabhupāda’s natural drives; therefore he could go on and on, without stopping. He wanted to give people Kṛṣṇa consciousness. He had no other life. Even while relaxing in the privacy of his room he always spoke of Kṛṣṇa consciousness.

The devotees had invited many prominent British citizens to meet Śrīla Prabhupāda, and the responses were good. Economist Ernst Schumacher promised to visit, as did philosopher Sir Alfred J. Ayer. When Śyāmasundara informed Prabhupāda that Mr. Ayer was well known, Prabhupāda replied, “What is his philosophy?”

“Well,” Śyāmasundara replied, “he doesn’t believe in the existence of God.”

“I will give him evidence,” Prabhupāda replied. “I will ask him what he means by ‘the existence of God.’ I will ask him to make a list of the deficiencies of God’s existence.” Prabhupāda liked to meet with philosophical men and “corner them and defeat them.”

Historian Arnold Doyenne was old and invalid; therefore, Prabhupāda agreed to visit him at his residence. Interested in discussing life after death, Dr. Doyenne asked Prabhupāda about karma. Most people, he said, were afraid of death. Prabhupāda agreed and added that according to a certain astrologer, one of India’s recent leaders had taken birth as a dog. “So they are afraid they will go down,” he said. When Doyenne asked if karma could be changed, Prabhupāda replied yes, but only by bhakti, devotion to God.

Arnold Doyenne: “Not many people in the West are thinking of this.”

Prabhupāda: “They are less intelligent. It is not good. If they take to Kṛṣṇa consciousness, they can continue to work and live in the city, but they can change their consciousness. Then automatically everything will come.”

Śrīla Prabhupāda asked Dr. Toynbee about the book he was writing, and the professor replied that it concerned ancient Greece’s influence on the Greece of today. “The Greeks came from India,” Prabhupāda said. “Vedic culture was once all over the world. Gradually, a new type of culture – just like this recent partition of India and Pakistan – took place.”

Prabhupāda explained how in the future the governments would fall to rascals and thieves, whose only business would be to exploit the citizens. Food would be scarce. And the governments would levy so many taxes that the people would be harassed and go to the forests for shelter. Only the God conscious people would be free. The future would be an ocean of faults, with but one saving factor: simply by chanting Kṛṣṇa’s names one could be freed. Even now, Prabhupāda said, the hippies were going to the forest, and the men were separated from their wives and money and were going to the hills and forests in disappointment. “You can predict the future in this way,” Prabhupāda said.

Arnold Toynbee: “In India did the politicians keep the Vedas?”

Prabhupāda: “No, they threw them away. Present Indian politicians are not very satisfied with the Vedas. They threw them in the water. I have started, among the Indians and Americans, and for the next ten thousand years Kṛṣṇa consciousness will increase. Then there will be a gloomy picture of Kali-yuga. Ten thousand years is not a short time. It is our duty on behalf of Kṛṣṇa.”

Arnold Toynbee: “Do you travel much?”

Prabhupāda: “All over the world.”

A bearded young priest active in social service visited Prabhupāda and, upon Prabhupāda’s prodding, debated with him about meat-eating and the Bible. During the discussion, Haṁsadūta and Pradyumna were citing passages from the Bible against meat-eating. Later, after the priest had left, Prabhupāda called Haṁsadūta back into his room and said, “It was not very good for us to speak on the basis of the Bible. Better we stick to the Gītā. Why bother to approach them for compromise or cooperation? They will never be convinced. What is the point of meeting with the Pope?” Those inclined to meat-eating, Prabhupāda said, could always find some quote in the Bible, such as the covenant with Noah after the flood. “We do not even know what ghastly things are occurring in the slaughterhouse,” he said. “No one sees these things.”

The next morning on his walk Prabhupāda continued discussing his talk with the priest. “In the name of religion,” Prabhupāda said, “they are killing. The Bhāgavatam says this cheating religion is kicked out and simply worship of God is instated.”

Devotee: “The priest last night said that Jesus ate meat.”

Prabhupāda: “Then Jesus contradicted himself. He also said, ‘Thou shalt not kill.’ One shouldn’t imitate the īśvaras. A hippie-type mendicant in India takes gāñjā and claims to be a devotee of Śiva. No, we should not imitate the powerful controllers. That priest said also that the Bible does not say, ‘Thou shalt not kill,’ but ‘Thou shalt not murder.’ So I told him that if the word is actually ‘Thou shalt not murder’ in the original Hebrew, then Jesus must have been preaching to the fourth-class, tenth-class men – murderers. And the proof is that they murdered him. So such people, what can they understand about God? When I told him, the priest was silent. He could not answer.”