Jaya-gopala: What is meant by madness?

Prabhupada: Just as don’t you see all these people of the world, they are mad? What they are doing? They whole day the cars going on this side, that side. What is the aim of life? They’re mad. Simply wasting petroleum, that’s all. What they’re doing? Huh? Suppose a cat and dog goes this side and that side, yow, yow, yow, and he goes some motorcars. What is the difference? There is no difference because the aim of the life is the same. Therefore they are mad. That is explained. Nunam pramattah kurute vikarma yad indriya-pritaya aprnoti. Nunam pramattah, pramattah means mad. Prakrsta rupena mata, sufficiently mad. And why? Kurute vikarma. They’re acting which they should not act. They’re acting in a way in which they should not have done. So what is the aim of their acting? Indriya-pritaya, simply for sense gratification. That’s all. So Rsabhadeva says, na sadhu manye, ‘This is not good.’ Na sadhu manye yato atmano ‘yam asann api klesada asa dehah. These madmen do not know that this is the cause of getting this miserable material body. The sufferings of humanity is due to this material body and the cause of vikarma, acting for sense gratification. So this life is meant for acting for liberation, but they are acting for sense gratification. Therefore they are mad. They do not know the aim of life.

Lecture on Bhagavad-gita 2.27-38, Los Angeles, December 11, 1968