Bacon, the father of literature ?

Shelley opined that Bacon was a poet ! Look at his poetic prose

" There is an abstruse astrologer that saith, were it not for two things, no human being would live.

First, the fixed stars ever maintain like distance from one another and never move furthur asunder and that the diurnal motion perpetually keepeth time ". How correct was Shelley. This is poetic prose at its best !

The Song of Myself by Walt Whitman

Walt Whitman was a transcendentalist. He eulogised the Self. " The Song of Myself " is one of his epic poems. He wondered at Space, Time and Death, the three modes thorough which the Universal expresses Itself

Swiftly I shrivel at the thought of God
At Nature and her marvels - Space, Time and Death !

Then I turn to Thee , O Actual Me,
Lo! Thou gently masterest the orbs
Thou smilest content with Death
And fillest swellest the vastnesses of Space !


From this verse, it is clear that Walt Whitman had philosophic knowledge as he understood the relationship of individual Self to the Supreme Self ! Thee is Actual Me !

How to earn revenue from writing !

It is easy to become a writer, but difficult to make a living out of it !

This statement is true. Anyone can become a writer, but it is difficult to make a living with it.

Now with the rise of the World Wide Web, writers can earn money blogging and setting up websites. The Net is a written medium and hence a writer's Paradise.

You can sign up for blogger and create blogs. You know the statement " We are good at something", meaning that all are experts in some field or other.

So know your area of expertise and set up blogs. Sign up for Google Adsense and post Adsense ads on your blog. You can set up an umpteen no of blogs. These ads will fetch you revenue. I have 21 blogs and I am getting good revenue from them. I have 5 sites and I get good adrevenue from them also. This is how writing can be used for bringing home the bacon!

Not only Google Adsense ads but other ads you can put on the site. Adbrite ads is another source of revenue for me. Also other ads. There are many ads. PPC or Pay Per Click, PPL or Pay per Lead, or PPS, Pay per Sale. Shareasale.com, register.com, Amazon - all these can give you PPS or PPL ads.

Poetry Therapy

It is Poetry Therapy which saved me. During all these years of tension and strife, Poetry alone gave me solace.

When I fell upon the thorns of Life and bled, Poesis saved me. It gave me comfort.

It gave Bliss as Wordsworth described it

With Bliss infeffable

I felt the sentiment of Being spread around

Over all that moveth and all that lieth still

It opened the gates to Heaven. No wonder one great author called it " The Healing Touch of Poetry "!

Shaw, the master Satirist !

Shaw was influenced by Annie Besant and Henri Bergson. Bergson postulated the theory of L'Evolution Creatrice or Creative Evolution.

Everything is done by Creative Evolution and its errors are called the Problem of Evil.

"Shaw's seriousness and mock humour run into an incredible, inextricable melange ", remarked Aurobindo.

One of his best quotations

" This earth of ours is a place where the Fool flourishes, where the good and the wise are hated and persecuted, where men and women torment each other in the name of love; where children are enslaved in the name of parental duty and education, where the weak in body are poisoned and mutilated in the name of medical healing & where the weak in character are imprisoned in the name of justice. It is clear to me that this earth is hell and as the Indian revealed to me, we are here to expiate for crimes committed by us in a former existence.

Gems from the Poet-King, Bhartrihari

With Night and Day as alternating pieces of dice,
On the Chess board of the world, Time plays human beings as pawns !


Poets Self Actualised are the truly triumphant
As their Fame-bodies knoweth no fear of disease or death


Those devoid of learning, penance, charity
Wisdom, character, qualities, Ethics
They burden mighty Mother Earth
As animals disguised as men!

Bhartrihari, The Master Poet !

He was one of the greatest Sanskrit poets of all time. He was a philosopher-king turned renunciant ( (c. 450-510 CE?)

He dealt with Literature, Philosphy & the Arts.

Initially, it is Wealth that is recognised. Hence about Wealth he wrote

He who has wealth is deemed aristocratic
The scholar, the man who is indeed versatile
The philosopher, the leader and the guide
All qualities are based on Wealth !

A wealthy man without kids is not considered fortunate. Or Fortune is an invisible goddess which no wealth can court !

About Fortune he wrote

He who is fortunate is aristocratic
The scholar and the man versatile
The leader, guide and the tribal chief
For all qualities Fortune is the base !

Even then, it is not perfection. For we find that man's span is one hundred years, of which half is gone as night, half as boyhood and old age. The rest is accompanied by service, loss and pain.
Happiness, it seems, is elusive !

As he wrote

One hundred years: one half is stillness of the night,
and half again is gone in boyhood or old age.
In what is left, accompanied by illness, loss and pain,
pleasure is a water bubble, passing breath.

In other words, in contrast to the lives of miserable men, the immortalised poets are the most famous and victorious !

Victorius are the masters, the rasa-siddha poets
Whose body of fame has no fear of age or death.

The true Yogi, the Seer, the Psychic, the Sage is the most fortunate. We find parallel lines in another philosopher, Sankara.

He who recites the sacred syllable Om
He who visualises himsef as the Self Absolute
He who is happy with the Bliss of the Self
Fortune belongs to him; to none else, to none else

Vivekananda - The Cosmic Poet !

Vivekananda was a genius, in whom intellectuality and divinity found the perfect blend.

In his poem ' The Hymn of Cosmic Consciousness " , he proclaims the transcendental experience he had.

" In the void of Mind involute

The fleeting Universe rises and floats

And sinks back in the current "I" "

He declared that all men are infinite and our journey on earth is to manifest that infinity.

He declared that it is a sin to call man a sinner.

He declared that by Vedas no books are meant. Kant's greatest achivement was that he found that Space, Time and Causality are modes of thought, but Vedanta, the Science of Being, knew this long ago and called it Maya.

The Universe is thought and Vedas are the words expressing that Thought !

Osho, the Mystic

Osho was a genius, who was a philosophic rebel. The philosopher is a rebel, he is against the outworn fetishes of a purblind social system !

Osho said that both East and West are extremes. In the East sex is suppressed and in the West sex is free !

He advocated following none and in following one's own Conscience.

His excellent book " Be Still and Know " is an excellent treatise on Mysticism. He postulated a region called " No Mind ", the equivalent of Cosmic Consciousness of transcendental philosophy.

Robert Burns, Poet Laureate !

This was another Poet Laureate who graced our Planet Earth, Robert Burns !

A Bard's Epitaph1786

Is there a whim-inspired fool,

Owre fast for thought, owre hot for rule,

Owre blate to seek, owre proud to snool,

Let him draw near;

And owre this grassy heap sing dool,

And drap a tear.

Is there a bard of rustic song,

Who, noteless, steals the crowds among,

That weekly this area throng,

O, pass not by!

But, with a frater-feeling strong,

Here, heave a sigh.

Is there a man, whose judgment clear

Can others teach the course to steer,

Yet runs, himself, life's mad career,

Wild as the wave,

Here pause-and, thro' the starting tear,

Survey this grave.

The poor inhabitant below

Was quick to learn the wise to know,

And keenly felt the friendly glow,

And softer flame;

But thoughtless follies laid him low,

And stain'd his name!

Reader, attend! whether thy soul

Soars fancy's flights beyond the pole,

Or darkling grubs this earthly hole,

In low pursuit:

Know, prudent, cautious, self-control

Is wisdom's root.

Rabindranath Tagore

About Tagore, W B Yeats once said " There have been great poets, but none his equal "



Mind Without Fear
Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high;
Where knowledge is free;
Where the world has not been broken up
into fragments by narrow domestic walls;
Where words come out from the depth of truth;
Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection;
Where the clear stream of reason
has not lost its way into the dreary desert sand of dead habit;
Where the mind is led forward by thee into ever-widening thought and action---
Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake.

Aurobindo Ghosh

" God descending into materiality is what we call humanity, with Matter as the lowest principle and Absolute Being as the highest " , wrote Aurobindo. He was also one of the greatest writers of all time. In his epic poem, " Savitri ", he depicts the victory of Mortality by Immortality or Self Actualisation.

Everything is done by the divine Conscious Force

A luminous heart of the Unknown is She
A power of Silence in the depths of God
She is the Force, the inevitable word,
The magnet of our difficult ascent,
The Sun from whom we kindle all our suns,
The Light that leans to us from the Unrealised vasts,
The Joy that beckons us from the impossible " ( Savitri)

It is said that at the time of samadhi, his body became golden !

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

It is said that Germany's greatest poet studied Sanskrit to understand that master Epic Poem ' The Shakuntala ' by India's Shakespeare, Kalidasa. In Shakuntala, he glimpsed the absoluteness of poetry.

He was a true Yogi. He died like a Yogi, exclaiming " Light, light, more light ".

Like Milton and Dante, Goethe is classified with one central achievement, the Faust, a dramatic poem, which depicted the Titanic Man or the Master scholar, like Augustus Caesar, Prometheus, Mohammed, Goetz von Berlingen. Goethe drew his inspiration from the great representatives of the Nature Philosophy of the Renaissance - Campanella, Paracelsus & Giordano Bruno.

Dante's Divina Comedia

One of the greatest writers of all time was Dante, who wrote the Divine Comedy. He recorded his psychologicl mystic experiences as journeys through the Inferno ( Hell ), Purgatorio ( purgatory ), & Final Beatitude ( Paradiso or Heaven ). The Divine Comedy is called Divine because of its superhuman beauty.

He was a scholar and astrologer. To Dante, Astrology was the noblest of all sciences.
. He drew a parallel between the seven revolving heavens and the seven liberal arts in his Convivio. He gave Grammar to Moon and Dialectic to Mercury. In Philosophy, he classified the seven reprehensible actions as the Seven Deadly Sins.

In his De Monarchia, he spoke about the One World Government. He declared that for World Peace to manifest, the best solution is the One Government. O happy race of men, heavenly peace on earth if all the hearts of men are ruled by the Love that rules Heaven !

Learning is the Mother of all Virtue !

"Learning is the mother of all virtue" said Montaigne, the Sceptic.

The Bible says " Righteous heart seeketh knowledge ". Islam also gives priority to Learning " The ink of the scholar is greater than the blood of the martyr. He who reads is handsome in the sight of God " !

To Indians, Wisdom and He are synonyms. The distinction between knowledge and Wisdom is made. Knowledge is of things; Wisdom is about the Absolule alone !

Thou art Wisdom
Thy Form the fourfold Veds
Thou art the End of Wisdom !

Vidya sthwam
Vedaroopasthwam
Vedaneeyasthwmevacha !

The Jewish Kabbalah is another treatise on Wisdom. Albert Pyke remarked about the Kabbalah " One is stunned while entering the sanctuary of the Kabbalah, at finding the doctrine so simple, so logical and at the same time so absolute "

Kabbalah, Yoga, Zen, Gnosticism, Sufism - all these mystic schools are the figurative representatives of the royal Solomon and personify Wisdom !

Content which connects all !

We are writing about Philosophy, the scientia scientiarum, or the Science of all sciences. Locke called Ontology the Philosophia Prima ( the First Science ) & Hobbes called Metaphysics the same. Wisdom is the content that connects the Cosmos, content which illumines as well as entertains. Wisdom is greater than riches, all things desirable are not comparable to Her !

Z Files, an instant success !

The Z Files was well received and became an instant success. The first article which was published was my " Vedic Numerology I ", which was appreciated by the multitude.

I had also published articles by other authors. The subscriber base grew to the presesnt 40 K.

The Z Files is meant to be a New Age Encyclopaedia, sort of Occultopaedia

My Ezine, the Z Files

My ezine, the Z Files, was launched in 1999 and now it has a large subscriber base of 40000 subscribers. I was a bit apprehensive about starting the ezine, but got excellent support from my cyber-friend, Dr Cheryl Golden, who said " This ezine is wonderful and full of ideas. I know it will be received well ". She was proved right as subscriptions galore were received via email.


My ezine is a virtual encyclopaedia dealing with the Occult, the psychic sciences. You can read all about Yoga, World Mysticism, Astrology, Numerology, Gemology, Pranic Therapy etc. Marketing is not excluded, as Marketing is defined as the lifeblood of any enterprise !

It was writing which saved me. There is a saying Vidya Rakshathi Rakshitha, meaning that Wisdom saves those who save Her !

My first article

My first article was called " Vedic Numerology Lesson 1 ". Carl Stillman of www.accessnewage.com was the first person to publish my articles ! I was thrilled with joy when he said thank you for your articles.

I was unaware of this type of gaining exposure till I read some marketing experts who averred that writing is equal to free advertising. If my 3 sites are PR4, I attribute it to writing which brought immense traffic ( www.eastrovedica.com, www.articlewisdom.com & www.astrologiavedica.com )


So, dear friends, take up the pen and write !

Improve your writing skills by reading !

Writing skills can be improved by reading.

Only Scholarship can give rise to both writing and speaking skills.

May I quote the great Longfellow

The scholar and the world, the endless strife
The discord in the harmonies of life
The love of learning, the sequestered nooks
And the sweet serenity of books
The market place, eager love for gain
Whose aim is vanity, whose end is pain !

How to Write a Better Weblog

by Dennis A. Mahoney
Published in: Community, Writing | No discussion

There’s been a recent retread of the weblogging phenomenon following a few articles at PC Mag, Time, and The Morning News. After posting my own short list of things that ought to be banned from weblogs, I realized that a list of things to be encouraged would be more useful. Some people are new to weblogging. Others want to raise the bar. In the end, everybody wants better sites, and some of these suggestions might help.

The bulk of this advice focuses on writing, which is generally at the heart of weblogs. All of them are obvious yet often ignored, to the detriment of both the readers and the writers. They’re aimed at people trying to improve the general appeal of their weblogs, but folks writing privately for friends and family might also find them useful. We’ll begin with an example.

Professional vs. Amateur
The professional writer writes:

New York is magnificent in spring.

The amateur writer writes:

I know this is a cliché nowadays, especially after 9/11, but I live in New York, which is much cleaner and safer now because of Giuliani, who really ought to be president after handling the crisis so well, and I know I’ve had some issues in the past with the mayor’s handling of the NYPD in regard to African Americans and his war against art involving sacred religious icons and feces (hello!? freedom of expression!?), but when all is said and done, New York, as maybe the best example of the ‘melting pot’ etc. etc., is a great city, especially when it starts getting warmer and people go outside more, like around March or April.

The amateur reads the professional and cannot bear the understatement. The professional reads the amateur, gives up after the word “nowadays,” and decides that he/she has been video–gamed to idiocy; the amateurs are hopeless; this new wave will be the last.

Not true. Amateurs are writing as they’ve always written. Self-consciousness, self-doubt, awkwardness, and overcompensation are perennial hallmarks of the beginning writer. The reason today’s amateurs seem more profoundly un–profound could be a simple matter of exposure.

There used to be impenetrable gatekeepers. Now, CNN roundtables, documentaries, independent films, MTV, and the web—which has no gatekeepers in most countries—are broadcasting every poorly crafted phrase and half–cooked idea imaginable. Patience, readers. All is not lost.

Great writing can’t be taught, but atrocious writing is entirely preventable.

The Rules
There are, in fact, rules—even online. Rules are not restrictions. Grammar, spelling, punctuation, rhythm, focus, syntax, and structure aren’t especially romantic terms, until you get to know them. Writers want to make sense. They want to move the reader. It ain’t never gonna happen if you got busted paragraphs, mistaken punctuation and, bad rhythm, not to mention kreative spelling: see? Clarity is key. Learn the rules. Break ’em later.

The best rules can’t be stated, but you can learn them by reading excellent writing. Develop an ear. If you know what works, you’ll start to emulate it. Conversely, it’s good to study truly horrendous language, stuff that makes you embarrassed for those responsible. You’ll find yourself mortally afraid of—and automatically avoiding—the same mistakes in your own writing. Hemingway said, “The most essential gift for a good writer is a built–in shock–proof shit-detector.” (They’re cheap if you haven’t already got one.) This is especially important for web writers, most of whom are publishing without the benefit of editors.

Declarative sentences are good. Web readers demand pith.

Bold statements are dangerous, but they won’t kill you. Timidity will—or at least your traffic. Everyone has a hazy opinion or two. The writer’s goal is clarity. Vague feelings or ideas don’t have to be vaguely written. Imagine two sites with similar descriptions of an indescribable sensation. Which would you remember:

A: “Her physical affections made his world feel somehow different and indescribably alive.”

B: “She kissed him with her tongue until the leaves on the trees, the soles of his shoes, and even his thoughts, felt like happy tongues.”

First–person point of view is not the only point of view. I should be necessary, or else avoided. This is not to condemn first person, but to suggest that it needn’t be the default choice. If first-person perfectly suits your subject matter, use it. But maybe second– or third–person is more effective. Consider your options.

The advice “write only what you know” increases the likelihood that you will know the same things forever.

Offer Something New
And are you attempting to produce quality material, or just killing time? If you’re killing time, O.K., but don’t be startled when your audience is small and no one links to you. Instead of publishing disconnected diversions (by the way, look at this, check it out, here you go, really cool), connect the dots or offer a full opinion.

Better yet, take The Nick Hornby Challenge. In High Fidelity, the narrator is described as a professional critic. He’s good at it. Music criticism is what he does. Then he starts an independent label and produces a record made by a couple of talented, shoplifting skate punks in order to, as his girlfriend says, “put something new into the world.”

The web is a tremendous hodgepodge of media. There are sites about books, sites about music, and sites about sites. Plenty of weblogs center on consuming and critiquing other people’s work, and all this recycling and redistribution has its place—a very important place that we’ll make note of later on. But why not make something new? Instead of linking to a few articles every day, write one. Instead of showcasing and discussing the latest designs, design something. You’ve got this absolutely batty opportunity of instant global publishing. Publish! The world is your oyster!

Amuse Your Readers
If you want to share an anecdote or story from your life, pretend the readers weren’t there. Because they weren’t. “You had to be there” never makes a joke funny.

Readers crave your anecdotes and stories. They really do. So give ‘em the whole megillah. Instead of, “The party was a riot!” or “I’m depressed today,” carefully explain why. Elaborate. Parties and depression are perfectly good writing subjects. The Great Gatsby, for instance, has plenty of both.

Anything makes a good subject, as long as you take your time and crystallize the details, tying them together and actually telling a story, rather than offering a simple list of facts. Do readers really want to know how miserable you are? Yes. But they’re going to want details, the precise odor of your room, why you haven’t showered in a week, or how exactly somebody broke your heart. One–liners won’t suffice.

At the same time, you don’t want to over–explain yourself. Understatement can be thunderous, or humorous, or heartbreaking. Or all three.

Have a sense of humor. Everything is funny. Being gay is funny. Being straight is funny. Being American is funny. It’s OK to laugh at things. Making light of serious situations or emotions doesn’t have to be disrespectful or hurtful. And just because something is funny doesn’t mean it has to be light. Example: “When the kidnapper called the blind woman, he told her that she’d never see her son again.” Some of the best humor is heavy.

Being a writer is funny. Don’t take yourself too seriously.

Have a thick skin. If your site gets singled out for attack by some malicious web devil, relax. You’ve gone public and you have to expect both rational and irrational criticism. Listen, people rag on Shakespeare all the time. If you’re a genuine talent, there’ll be plenty of people complimenting your efforts. If someone has a bona fide gripe with something you’ve produced, pay attention—it’s worth considering. If someone has a petty gripe or simply gets nasty, let it go. Get back to producing your site. If novelists spent their time responding to negative reviews, we’d be fresh out of novels.

Beyond Wired
One popular complaint about weblogs is that they all link to the same sites, over and over and over. Sometimes that’s true and sometimes it isn’t. But if you do find yourself linking to a Wired article that’s already been noted on ten other sites, you might consider finding something else.

Sharing great discoveries is largely why weblogging got so hot and sultry in the first place. Big, heavily funded sites weren’t acknowledging the grace notes and hidden talents of the web, so it was up to webloggers. For some webloggers, it still is. Wired doesn’t need your help as much as undiscovered sites, which may be offering equally good (or better) material.

Successful Weblogging
Producing a successful weblog, however you define that, is tough. Instead of money, fame, and Jacuzzis full of sexy nude readers, you’ll probably feel like you’re shouting in outer space. And you probably will be. In 1994, you could hook a thousand readers if you wrote about the mold underneath your refrigerator. Now, you’re lucky to get a hundred regulars, even if your work is excellent.

No matter what your audience size, you ought to write as if your readership consisted of paid subscribers whose subscriptions were perpetually about to expire. There’s no need to pander. Compel them to re–subscribe.

As the beginning of this article noted, a big audience isn’t everybody’s goal, and most of these suggestions are intended for people working to expand their readership. As for actually achieving that expansion, it’s back to the hard sell.

The days when simply having a website equated to visibility are over. The average person doesn’t even know to look for weblogs. When someone does, there’s an array of choices so endless that finding your site will largely be a stroke of luck.

Links and word of mouth can go a long way, but don’t expect a big following right off the bat. You might never get a following. More than ever, you’d better be doing this to satisfy yourself, because it could be your only reward. But if your goal is to satisfy readers, satisfying yourself is a good start.

Learn More
Related Topics: Community, Writing

About the Author
Dennis A. Mahoney writes daily at www.0format.com

Pen's might

The pen is sharper  than the sword. So true. Particularly in the Blogosphere, where the power of the pen is amplified by the keyboard ! Writers have influenced history, more than the men of the sword. According to Indian philosphy, there is not a philosopher who is not a poet. Writing can survive the cosmological cycles.

Another verse says like this


A fool is respected only in his own house
A landlord only in his village
A king only in his kingdom
Whereas a writer is extolled everywhere !

Swagrihe poojyathe moodah
Swagrame poojyathe prabhu
Swadese  poojyathe raja
Vidwan Sarvathra Poojyathe