In these five volumes, comprising the illuminating lectures, writings, articles, books, and epistles etc, of the author, we find the author's marvellous intellect, her lyrical powers of expression, the intensity with which she held her beliefs and convictions, her capacity to see the soul of things straightaway, and above all, her love for India that overflowed all bounds. Her deep study of Indian literature combined with her keen intellect and deep comprehensive mind, helped her to understand India as a whole. This works stands as, perhaps, the best appraisal of India by a western mind.
May I be born again and again, and suffer thousands of miseries so that I may worship the only God that exists, the only God I believe in, the sum total of all souls--and, above all, my God the wicked, my God the miserable, my God the poor of all races, of all species, is the special object of my worship.
-Swami Vivekananda