August 14, 1964
Last night, and maybe the night before, oh, you and I talked for a very, very long time about all sorts of subjects, and I became aware that there is a place, somewhere in the physical Mind, but very close to the earth, where people must almost inevitably go at night. There are sorts of big meeting rooms where people come and discuss all kinds of problems: they meet, work out programs and discuss problems. I don’t know why, I’ve been going there for the last two nights (I am afraid it is because of all those seminars and all that business where they play tape-recordings of me[[To mark August 15, several groups connected to the Ashram have been meeting in Pondicherry. ]]), something pulls me there. And I am literally bombarded with questions by all those people (some I know, others I don’t), and I start answering this one, answering that one, addressing a crowd, oh! … When I wake up from it, I say to myself, “Well, how silly can I be! … Physically I am out of it all, but now I am doing it at night!” This morning, I was thoroughly disgusted: I woke up delivering a speech, oh!… There was a crowd, and people were asking me questions – seriously, very seriously!
But you were there, you are always there. So I wonder why you don’t remember….
I told you (and even wrote you when you were in France) that I was seeing you. At one time I used to go to the place where the events in the various countries of the world are prepared – you were there, too. And you seemed to be very interested. There were goings-on between China and Japan, and it was very funny because one could see events, people with quite unexpected costumes and
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all sorts of things, ways of life and so on, and it didn’t correspond to an active knowledge: it was a FACT, I had gone there. And you were there; you were there with me and you were interested.
I remember once (I wrote to you about it), we spent a long time, a long while, looking at what the Chinese wanted to do, and there were the two kinds of Chinese: the Communist Chinese and the Formosan Chinese. And they were doing things: there were not only ideas, but acts, their actions could be seen. Now I’ve forgotten the details, but it was really very interesting. There was a place (it was where I wanted to go, and I did go there), the place where the meeting point of those Chinese could be found – I was always leading people and circumstances to a plane where a harmony is worked out.
That was more interesting than the last two nights!
These last two nights (only at the end of the night, around 3 o’clock), it was all the way down.
But very often, the memory has gone, but an image remains. I very often have an image of Pandit Nehru, an image of Khrushchev, an image of a congress in Africa, recently an image in Burma, an image of the Court of England….
That’s it!
It doesn’t mean anything, it’s just an image – what it does, I haven’t the faintest idea.
But that’s it! It must mean that you go to that particular place.
But what takes place exactly, I have no idea.
True, one doesn’t remember much. Personally, I am used to it and if I remain (even after getting up), if I remain sufficiently quiet and absorbed in the consciousness of my dream (not “dream,” but anyway of my activity), I find it again, it comes back – I relive it. But usually, one remembers just an image, like you – something that struck and came through to the other side.
In fact, one is very, very active. To succeed in having a part of the night still (not only mentally: a supreme Stillness in that great universal Movement) requires a whole lot of work, a lot of work.
As a matter of fact, these last few nights I’ve been conducting a sort of review of all the stages my nights went through before being what they are – it’s fantastic! I started working on my nights at the
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beginning of the century, exactly in 1900, sixty-four years ago now, and the number of nights when I didn’t continue my training is absolutely minimal – minimal…. There had to be something unexpected or I had to be ill; and even then, there was another kind of study going on. I remember (Sri Aurobindo was here), I caught a sort of fever like influenza from contact with the workers, one of those fevers that take hold of you brutally, instantly, and in the night I had a temperature of more than 105. Anyway, it was … And then I spent my night studying what people call “delirium” – (laughing) it was very interesting! I was explaining it to Sri Aurobindo (he was there: I was lying on the bed and he was sitting by the bedside), I told him, “This is what’s going on, that is what’s going on … and that (such and such and such a thing) is what gives people what doctors call delirium.” It isn’t “delirium”…. I remember having been assailed for hours by little entities, vital forms that were hideous, vile, and so vicious! An unequaled cruelty. They rushed at me in a troop, I had to fight to repel them: they retreated, moved forward, retreated, moved forward…. And for hours like that. Naturally, at that time I had Sri Aurobindo’s full power and presence, and yet it lasted three or four hours. So I thought, “How terrible it must be for the poor devils who have neither the knowledge I have, nor the power I have, nor Sri Aurobindo’s protective presence – all the best conditions.” It must be frightful, oh! … I have never in my life seen anything so disgusting.
I had picked it all up in the workers’ atmosphere. Because I hadn’t been careful, it was the “festival of arms” and I had been in “communion” with them: I had given them some food and taken something they’d given me, which means it was a terrible communion. And I brought all that back.
I was ill for a long time, several days.
* * *
(Soon afterwards, Mother resumes the filing of her old notes, in particular the following, in English, which dates from the Chinese attack on India’s northern borders in 1962:)
Silence, silence. This is a time for gathering energies and not for wasting them away in useless and meaningless words. Anyone who proclaims loudly his opinions on the present situation of the country, must understand that opinions are of no value and cannot in the least
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help Mother India to come out of her difficulties. If you want to be useful, first control yourself and keep silent – silence, silence, silence. It is only in silence that anything great can be done.
That was just when the war began; people were criticizing the government as if … To one of them I wrote personally: “If you were up there, would you know what has to be done? No. So if you don’t know, you have no right to say anything – keep silent.”
But you know, I make a point of reading an Indian newspaper every day…. You get a sense of a great decomposition.
The country? Oh, but it’s rotten, mon petit! Oh, it’s in an appalling condition.
But what’s extraordinary is that there’s nobody! There’s no opposition, there’s nothing.
(After a long silence) It’s a subject I don’t talk about, first because it’s understood that we do not concern ourselves with politics; I made the decision not to concern myself with politics until WE do it, that is, until we are in power. But in spite of this, since the day of liberation (already seventeen years ago to the day – seventeen years!), I have ceaselessly repeated, “These people are going to ruin the country. They have neither consciousness nor knowledge nor will, and they are going to ruin the country.” Every time, whenever they made a blunder, I repeated the same thing.
Now the country is ruined.
The famine is much worse than it was when it was supposedly “tragic.” Now it’s terrible. There’s not enough to eat; the country is so large, there’s so much uncultivated land, there are so many people without work … and there’s not enough food for everyone! And they’ve closed the borders: they stop the food from coming from outside, and there’s not enough for everyone to eat.
But then, the number of stupid ideas these people have tried out to mend the situation – it’s unbelievable! And each blunder has made the situation worse. Now it’s extremely serious.
Sri Aurobindo said (he said it to me in an absolute way) that nothing could be done as long as WE weren’t the government – not that we were going to start governing in person (!), but that those who govern should be people who “receive” and obey. He also said
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that he expected that in ’67, not only in India, but in the whole world, governments would begin to receive the supramental Influence. And obviously, he expected things to become EXTREMELY bad before that…. They’re bad enough in the world: people are fighting everywhere, people are being killed everywhere – in Indonesia hosts of people have been murdered, in Cyprus hosts of people have been murdered. Anyway, it’s an undeclared war, but it’s everywhere.
And here, there’s TOTAL corruption – total, to such a point that … I’ll give you an example. The government meddles in everything, you can’t move a finger without its permission: you can’t leave the country, you can’t enter the country, you can’t send money out, you can’t open a shop, you can’t … nothing, nothing, nothing, not even plow your field without its permission. They meddle in everything, which in itself is pretty stupid. And then they make regulations – the more regulations you make, the more disobedience it creates, naturally.
People no longer grow crops because it’s too complicated and with all those taxes (they’ve scores of taxes to pay), it costs them much more than they can earn. And as there isn’t enough food, there are naturally individuals who try and hoard as much as they can to sell it for as high a price as possible.
The situation in which we ourselves are [at the Ashram], this difficulty, doesn’t come from anything else: the government’s interference in everything, its meddling in other people’s affairs and putting spokes in the wheels of everything, but everything. I’ve got a pile of examples, of proof for every minute – all the proof.
So there are two possibilities: violence, or Transformation. Violence means invasion or revolution – it’s hanging in the air, it could break out any moment. The government … Nehru wasn’t worth much, but still for the masses he represented a certain ideal (which he was quite incapable of living up to, but anyway …). After him, it’s finished; the present Prime Minister is a man with great goodwill, who has no character, to such a point that in the presence of difficulties he falls ill – he’s ill! Ill, he can’t work! That’s where we are. [[Indira Gandhi will come to power in early 1966, after the death of the present Prime Minister, Lal Bahadur Shastri. ]]
Here, in Pondicherry, it’s the same muddle.
But you get the feeling that in a country like this one, which in spite of everything is receptive, if one great man (I mean, of
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great spiritual value) arose, everyone would follow.
Exactly! They send me delegates, they send me people to ask me, “What should we do?”
I told them, “I lack a man.”
If I had one man, I would see to everything. But I can’t do everything myself.
But that’s just the question: how is it that in this country one man hasn’t arisen, a man you would support from behind?
I think it’s the result of having been under the domination of another country for such a long time. People lost interest in politics (people of value, those who weren’t after personal gains). I think that’s why.
Because I feel very clearly that if one man with a bit of sincerity arose, it would be enough …
Yes, yes!
… for everyone to follow.
Exactly! I tell you, if I had one man and I told people who asked me, “Here he is, follow him,” the work would be done.
(silence)
There are two places where it’s like this: here and in Africa. In Africa, if there were one man, oh! … And he need not be a Negro: he could in fact be an Indian, for instance (there are many of them there, they’re the ones who have enriched the country). But it’s not impossible – it’s not impossible. There, I am not losing hope.
But not here, either.
But the situation might have to get even worse, until they are quite desperate.
All I would need is one man who had an absolute trust and was receptive, with a power of execution.
Those I have are too old.
But, you know, when it’s necessary, the man turns up.
Among the young.
It’s not impossible.
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We’ll see.
At any rate, they are conscious…. A considerable number of ministers, generals, governors (even ministers of the Central Government) are writing, not positively to ask for advice, but to ask for Help. They’re not asking for advice yet (and on the external level you can’t give detailed advice, you can only give general ideas). But there are some things they SHOULD NOT be doing.
How to get out of it? They have tied themselves up in knots….
Yes, it’s general – everything is rotten.
But everything is rotten because they’ve made regulations everywhere! Everywhere, everywhere, for everything. And appalling complications, incredibly stupid. It’s unthinkable, you can’t believe they’re true. Regulations far more restrictive than parents give their children! Children have a greater freedom of movement than people here. There is a WILL to control which is so stupid! It’s unthinkable.
And it’s done almost openly. For instance, they have millions and millions to spend, given them by the Americans – they’ve forbidden the Americans to give A SINGLE CENT without their permission! And they will give their permission only if they have complete control over the spending. Here, at the Ashram, the Americans have expressed several times not only a will, but a very great desire to give a large amount, several million rupees, for the work – opposition from the government. So we’re trying to find a way, but they give answers of this kind: “So long as the Mother has absolute authority, we cannot allow you to receive money, because we cannot give advice to the Mother”! In an official letter, mon petit! … That’s how it is, that’s where we are – an official letter. It’s unbelievable.
Anyway … it means the Moment is going to come, and then …
One thing is obvious, it’s that if everything had gone very well, with good results, the need for a higher Help would never have occurred to them; they would have become puffed up with statistics and with satisfaction with their capacities.
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