By His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada

The matchless gift is permanent freedom from material suffering. But how to obtain the gift? What is the price to pay?

No money in the word can buy spiritual freedom. Yet it is the rarest, most valuable, and most sought-after commodity. And it is equally available to the poor and the wealthy. Do you want the gift in your life? The choice is yours. Here are the steps to achieve it, laid out one after another. Take one step at a time, and you'll find you've bought the matchless gift.

All religious scriptures describe lower planetary systems or hell and higher systems or heaven. A living entity can prepare itself for heaven or hell by the appropriate preparation; as you sow, so shall you reap is the law that governs. Sinful activities can be by thought, word or deed and one has to suffer punishment. People do not believe in the next life because they want to avoid punishment, but one cannot avoid the next life nor save oneself from the laws of nature. We may deny the existence of God and His laws but God and His laws are still there. According to the law of karma if we act properly we are rewarded and if we act sinfully we suffer. Wherever we reach in this life is the starting point in the next life. According to the Vedic way of life, if a person commits a sin and counteracts it by penance, that is atonement; one has to execute the prescribed atonement according to the gravity of the sinful activity. Sinful activities are like diseases and one should follow the prescribed cures to become healthy.

The message of this book is summed up in the paragraph: "Modern civilization is in dire need of an educational system to give people instructions on what happens after death. In actuality the present educational system is most defective because unless one knows what happens after death, one dies like an animal. An animal does not know that he is subject to death or that he is going to have another body. Human life, however, should be more elevated. One should not simply be interested in the animalistic functions of eating, sleeping, defending and mating. A living entity may have abundant supply of food for eating, or many nice buildings for sleeping, or good arrangements for sex life, or a good defense to protect him, but this does not mean that he is a human being. A civilization that is based on these activities should be known as animalistic. Since animals are also interested in these functions, what is the difference between human life and animal life if a human being does not go beyond them? The distinction can be made when the human being becomes inquisitive and asks 'Why have I been put into this miserable condition? Is there any remedy for it? Is there perpetual eternal life? I do not want to suffer. I want to live happily and peacefully. Is there any chance for this? What is the method or science by which this can be achieved?' When these questions are asked, and steps have been taken to answer them, our human civilization is the result." The answers to these questions are to be found in this book.