|
175 – Because a good man dies or fails and the evil live and triumph, is God therefore evil? I do not see the logic of the consequence. I must first be convinced that death and failure are evil; I sometimes think that when they come, they are our supreme momentary good. But we are the fools of our hearts and nerves and argue that what they do not like or desire, must of course be an evil!
But what about those who are unlucky and always fail in everything they do?
First, once and for all, you should know that luck, good or bad, does not exist. What to our ignorance looks like luck is simply the result of causes we know nothing about. It is certain that for someone who has desires, when his desires are not satisfied, it is a sign that the Divine Grace is with him and wants, through experience, to make him progress rapidly, by teaching him that a willing and spontaneous surrender to the Divine Will is a much surer way to be happy in peace and light than the satisfaction of any desire. 17 October 1969
176 – When I look back on my past life, I see that if I had not failed and suffered, I would have lost my life’s supreme blessings; yet at the time of the suffering and failure, I was vexed with the sense of calamity. Because we cannot see anything but the one fact under our noses, therefore we indulge in all these snifflings and clamours. Be silent, ye foolish hearts! Slay the ego, learn to see and feel vastly and universally.
177 – The perfect cosmic vision and cosmic sentiment is Page – 263 the cure of all error and suffering; but most men succeed only in enlarging the range of their ego.
What is “the cosmic vision and cosmic sentiment” and how can they be attained?
This simply means the vision of the whole earth at the same time and the sentiment which is the result of this vision of the whole. This whole contains all things at the same time, light and darkness, suffering and pleasure, happiness and unhappiness, and all together makes a vibration of adoration turned towards the Divine, just as all sounds heard together make the supreme invocation to the Divine: OM. 18 October 1969
178 – Men say and think “For my country!”, “For humanity!”, “For the world!”, but they really mean “For myself seen in my country!”, “For myself seen in humanity!”, “For myself imaged to my fancy as the world!”. That may be an enlargement, but it is not liberation. To be at large and to be in a large prison are not one condition of freedom.
To be free, one must come out of the prison. The prison is the ego, the sense of separate personality. To be free, one must unite consciously and totally with the Supreme and through this identification break the limits of the ego and eradicate the very existence of the ego by universalising oneself, even though the individualisation of the consciousness is preserved. 19 October 1969 179 – Live for God in thy neighbour, God in thyself, God in thy country and the country of thy foeman, God Page – 264 in humanity, God in tree and stone and animal, God in the world and outside the world, then art thou on the straight path to liberation.
There is nothing to add. It is true – every obviously true – and to be sure, you must experience it, for only experience is absolutely convincing. 21 October 1969
180 – There are lesser and larger eternities; for eternity is a term of the soul and can exist in Time as well as exceeding it. When the Scriptures say “śāśvatīh samāh”, they mean for a long space and permanence of time or a hardly measurable aeon; only God Absolute has the absolute eternity. Yet when one goes within, one sees that all things are secretly eternal; there is no end, neither was there ever a beginning.
How can one experience eternity?
By uniting with the Eternal, that is to say, with the Divine. 23 October 1969
181 – When thou callest another a fool, as thou must, sometimes, yet do not forget that thou thyself hast been the supreme fool in humanity.
182 – God loves to play the fool in season; man does it in season and out of season. It is the only difference.
For some years, almost all our children, big or small, have been in the habit of always using vulgar words Page – 265 in their everyday speech. For example, they punctuate every sentence with words like “idiot”, “fool”, etc… and other similar Indian terms, without any bad intention. How can we help them to get rid of this bad habit which has become so common?
The only remedy is to learn to think before you speak and to say only the words that are absolutely indispensable to express your thought. The less you speak the better. And if it is indispensable to communicate something to anyone else, it would be wise to speak only the words that are indispensable, no more. 24 October 1969
183 – In the Buddhists’ view to have saved an ant from drowning is a greater work than to have founded an empire. There is a truth in the idea, but a truth that can easily be exaggerated.
184 – To exalt one virtue, – compassion even, – unduly above all others is to cover up with one’s hand the eyes of wisdom. God moves always towards a harmony.
Any exaggeration, any exclusiveness, is a lack of balance and a breach of harmony, and therefore an error in one who seeks perfection. For perfection can only exist in supreme harmony. 28 October 1969
185 – Pity may be reserved, so long as thy soul makes distinctions, for the suffering animals; but humanity deserves from thee something nobler, it asks for love, for understanding, for comradeship, for the help of the equal and brother. Page – 266 186 – The contributions of evil to the good of the world and the harm sometimes done by the virtuous are distressing to the soul enamoured of good. Nevertheless be not distressed nor confounded, but study rather and calmly understand God’s ways with humanity.
Sri Aurobindo means that there is a height in the consciousness where the ordinary notions of good and bad lose all their value.¹ And he advises us, instead of being affected by the way things happen on earth, to rise in consciousness to communion with the Divine; then we shall understand why things are as they are. 29 October 1969 187 – In God’s providence there is no evil, but only good or its preparation.
188 – Virtue and vice were made for thy soul’s struggle and progress; but for results they belong to God, who fulfils himself beyond vice and virtue.
Vice and virtue are inventions of human thought for the needs of evolution and progress – but in the Divine Consciousness, vice and virtue do not exist. The whole universe is in a slow ascending evolution towards That which it must manifest. 30 October 1969
189 – Live within; be not shaken by outward happenings.
190 – Fling not thy alms abroad everywhere in an ostentation of charity; understand and love where thou helpest. Let thy soul grow within thee.
¹ This sentence was in English in the original. Page – 267 191 – Help the poor while the poor are with thee; but study also and strive that there may be no poor for thy assistance.
To live within in a constant aspiration for the Divine enables us to look at life with a smile and to remain peaceful whatever the outer circumstances may be. As for the poor, Sri Aurobindo says that to come to their help is good, provided that it is not a vain ostentation of charity, but that it is far nobler to seek a remedy for poverty so that there may be no poor left on earth. 31 October 1969
192 – The old Indian social ideal demanded of the priest voluntary simplicity of life, purity, learning and the gratuitous instruction of the community, of the prince, war, government, protection of the weak and the giving up of his life in the battle-field, of the merchant, trade, gain and the return of his gains to the community by free giving, of the serf, labour for the rest and material havings. In atonement for his serfhood, it spared him the tax of self-denial, the tax of blood and the tax of his riches.
In the beginning, about six thousand years ago, this was absolutely true, and each individual was classed according to his nature. Afterwards it became a rigid and more and more arbitrary social convenience (according to birth), which completely ignored the true nature of the individual. It became a false conception and had to disappear. But gradually, with human progress, human activities are being classified more and more in a similar, less rigid but much Page – 268 truer way (according to each one’s nature and capacity). 7 November 1969
193 – The existence of poverty is the proof of an unjust and ill-organised society, and our public charities are but the first tardy awakening in the conscience of a robber.
194 – Valmikie, our ancient epic poet, includes among the signs of a just and enlightened state of society not only universal education, morality and spirituality but this also that there shall be none who is compelled to eat coarse food, none uncrowned and unanointed, or who lives a mean and petty slave of luxuries.
195 – The acceptance of poverty is noble and beneficial in a class or an individual, but it becomes fatal and pauperises life of its richness and expansion if it is perversely organised into a general or national ideal.
196 – Poverty is no more a necessity of social life than disease of the natural body; false habits of life and an ignorance of our true organisation are in both cases the peccant causes of an avoidable disorder.
Will a day come when there will be no more poor people and no more suffering in the world?
That is absolutely certain for all those who understand Sri Aurobindo’s teaching and have faith in him. It is with the intention of creating a place where this can come about that we want to establish Auroville. But for this realisation to be possible, each one of us must make an effort to transform himself, for most of the sufferings of Page – 269 men are the result of their own mistakes, both physical and moral. 8 November 1969
How can you believe that in Auroville there will be no more suffering so long as people who come to live there are men of the same world, born with the same weaknesses and faults?
I have never thought that there would no more be suffering in Auroville, because men, as they are, love suffering and call it to them even while they curse it. But we shall try to teach them to truly love peace and to try to practise equality. What I meant was involuntary poverty and begging. Life in Auroville will be organised in such a way that this does not exist – and if beggars come from outside, either they will have to go away or they will be given shelter and taught the joy of work. 9 November 1969
What is the fundamental difference between the ideal of the Ashram and the ideal of Auroville?
There is no fundamental difference in the attitude towards the future and the service of the Divine. But the people in the Ashram are considered to have consecrated their lives to Yoga (except, of course, the students who are here only for their studies and who are not expected to have made their choice in life). Whereas in Auroville simply the goodwill to make a collective experiment for the progress of humanity is sufficient to gain admittance. 10 November 1969 Page – 270 197 – Athens, not Sparta, is the progressive type for mankind. Ancient India with its ideal of vast riches and vast spending was the greatest of nations. Modern India with its trend towards national asceticism has fully become poor in life and sunk into weakness and degradation.
198 – Do not dream that when thou hast got rid of material poverty, men will even so be happy or satisfied or society freed from ills, troubles and problems. This is only the first and lowest necessity. While the soul within remains defectively organised, there will always be outward unrest, disorder and revolution.
This is quite obvious and this is what we are trying to make people understand. A safe and quiet life is not enough to make people happy. Inner development is necessary, and the peace that comes from a conscious contact with the Divine. 13 November 1969
199 – Disease will always return to the body if the soul is flawed; for the sins of the mind are the secret cause of the sins of the body. So too poverty and trouble will always return on man in society, so long as the mind of the race is subjected to egoism.
200 – Religion and philosophy seek to rescue man from his ego; then the kingdom of heaven within will be spontaneously reflected in an external divine city.
Sri Aurobindo used the words philosophy and religion so that everyone could understand. But he knew very well that the effective remedy for human egoism lies beyond philosophy and religion, in a true spiritual life accepted and lived on earth by Page – 271 the physical consciousness itself – this makes it truly capable of getting rid of the ego once and for all. 15 November 1969
201 – Mediaeval Christianity said to the race, “Man, thou art in thy earthly life an evil thing and a worm before God; renounce then egoism, live for a future state and submit thyself to God and His priest.” The results were not over-good for humanity. Modern knowledge says to the race, “Man, thou art an ephemeral animal and no more to Nature than the ant and the earthworm, a transitory speck only in the universe. Live then for the State and submit thyself antlike to the trained administrator and the scientific expert.” Will this gospel succeed any better than the other?
202 – Vedanta says rather, “Man, thou art of one nature and substance with God, one soul with thy fellowmen. Awake and progress then to thy utter divinity, live for God in thyself and in others.” This gospel which was given only to the few, must now be offered to all mankind for its deliverance.
There is nothing to add. Sri Aurobindo has clearly and masterfully stated first the evil and then its remedy. All we have to do is to put into practice what he has taught us. 16 November 1969 203 – The human race always progresses most when most it asserts its importance to Nature, its freedom and its universality.
204 – Animal man is the obscure starting-point, the Page – 272 present natural man the varied and tangled mid-road, but supernatural man the luminous and transcendent goal of our human journey.
Man finds his full power for progress when he no longer feels bound to Nature or limited by her laws. Nature is only a limited expression of the Divine, whereas man was created to become the conscious expression of the Divine, with all the possibilities of power and light which that implies. 18 November 1969
205 – Life and action culminate and are eternally crowned for thee when thou hast attained the power of symbolising and manifesting in every thought and act, in art, literature and life, in wealth-getting, wealth-having or wealth-spending, in home, government and society, the One Immortal in His lower mortal being.
No doubt, this is the description of man when he reaches the summit of his being. But it is only the first step of the superman. 24 November 1969 Page – 273 |