Russian artist Nicholas Roerich, born October 9th, 1875 wrote of the fire within the heart’s chalice, the all-consuming flames of love!
He who knows the spiritual heart, knows also “the subtle pain ofthe physical heart,” about which the Holy Fathers speak so inspiringly. He who knows this “subtle pain” has cognized also the fire of love—not the love of sighs but the real love of action and attainment. That love which, since antiquity has been called the Love of God-man, which purifies and uplifts the human sensations. Agni Yoga says: “What sage of knowledge would not be a Lord of Love?” (from Flame in Chalice, Agni Yoga)
“The subtle pain,” the heat of the flame of the heart, is known to the experienced onein the highest tests of life. It is known to those to whom enlightened labor has become the daily prayer; and prayer transformed into the ceaseless rhythm of heart, into the rhythm of light. Some will ask what is rhythm and why is its realization so important? It means that he who inquires does not know what is the “subtle pain” of the heart and is unaware of the music of the spheres, and has not hearkened to the hymn of nature. Without his own striving, he shall not cognize the sparks of attainment, which will bring his heart closer to the Cosmos and Love…
Thus can he alone speak who has experienced what is the “spiritual man of the heart”—”a light which even in the darkness shineth and is inextinguishable by darkness.”