The letters reveal Nirod's unique relationship with his guru. The exchanges are suffused with a special humour.
Sri Aurobindo : corresp.
Nirodbaran's correspondence with Sri Aurobindo began in February 1933 and continued till November 1938, when Sri Aurobindo injured his leg and Nirod became one of his attendants. The entire correspondence, which was carried on in three separate notebooks according to topics - private, medical, and literary - is presented in chronological order, revealing the unique relationship Nirod enjoyed with his guru, replete with free and frank exchanges and liberal doses of humour. Covering a wide range of topics, both serious and light-hearted, these letters reveal the infinite care Sri Aurobindo devoted to the spiritual development of his disciple.
THEME/S
I understand that the prestige of the Asram is in its spirituality, but at the same time when a member of the Asram behaves caddishly, doesn't it naturally reflect on us a little, or does it reflect because we are accustomed to take a mundane view of life and its usual code of morals and behaviour? Is it not natural for us to feel proud when praises are bestowed on Doraiswamy or feel embarrassed when things are said against X?
Natural, but mundane.
If the praise and blame of ignorant people is to be our standard, then we may say good-bye to the spiritual consciousness. If the Mother and I had cared for praise or blame, we would have been crushed long ago. It is only recently that the Asram has got "prestige"—before it was the target for an almost universal criticism, not to speak of the filthiest attacks.
For instance we feel a little "embarrassed" when things are said against X (if they are true) especially mentioning that after staying so many years in a spiritual place, he should behave so.
"Behave so" means behave how? I suppose people complain of him because he mixes on one side in "high society" and on the other with cinema girls and singers. But that is from the point of view of social respectability. It is the spirit that matters. If X did it in the right spirit, it wouldn't matter whom he mixed with. It is true that he puts on a Sanyasin's dress which is absurd if he wants to go into that society—but that is an incongruity only.
I admit that it is a mundane view, and it doesn't stop your bringing down the Supermind, but it affects us favourably or adversely. In what way should we then look at it?
Look at what? What you are looking at is the praise and blame of people, not at any "it". One has to look at "it", not from the point of view of whether it is praised or blamed by the public, but from its inherent relation to the spiritual life.
I know uprightness, honesty, etc. have nothing to do directly with spiritual achievement. But when a lax and loose sadhak develops the contrary qualities, won't that be a change of character and a way to the change of nature by your Force?
Who said so?
Spirituality, in order not to defeat its own object, must develop these.
Develop what? A change of consciousness and nature, yes; but it is not a question of moralising the character, but of psychising it.
A liar can't realise the Divine, can he?
A liar does not usually realise the Divine, because one is seeking for Truth and lying comes across Truth; it is not because lying lowers his prestige with the public. Sometimes a liar realises the Divine and stops lying.
Isn't it because of his change of consciousness resulting in a change of values of life that Doraiswamy could discard all fame, post of honour, etc.?
I don't think so. He never wanted to be a judge etc., he was never an office-hunter. His weakness was of a social character, desir to be generous, liked, scrupulous in the discharge of social duties, attachment to family, friends etc.
Just as you have developed poetry, music, etc., in X, I thought these gifts which Doraiswamy is endowed with, may have been due to your Spiritual Force, not knowing what his born or unborn gifts were.
No, Duraiswami was always a sattwic man, a very fine sattwic type. But for spirituality one must get beyond the sattwic.
Then by X's bigness or big fishness, I didn't mean "big fish" in that sense, nor your biggest success. I meant that he is such a complicated formula—
Not so complicated as others I have had to deal with.
—There are so many warring and contrary elements in him that it will be a job for you to change him, as it has been.
Mainly two—but quite at war with each other. The others in him lean to one side or the other.
With sadhaks like us, it is, perhaps, an easy walk-over for you! But him?
It is easy with nobody, not even with Anilbaran or Khirod or Shankararama or Duraiswami who are yet all sattwic people without any adverse vital element in them.
I read a story by the Mother where she says that the joy lies in taming a turbulent and wild horse.217 Such is X's case, and catching him and taming him will be your biggest success! I hope it's clear?
It isn't.
Anyhow you are working on him to change his nature, his mind, vital, etc., etc. Well, if that succeeds, it means he will come and live here.
Certainly; but that is a different thing from fishing or pulling in. It is a quite disinterested spiritual idea without any idea of a "big success" or "prestige".
You said that if people like S.B. came here, they would be extremely troublesome.
Damnably so!
On the contrary I thought and argued that if such vitally strong people once turned to Yoga, they could put all their vital will on one point and all the other things would become minor problems for them.
X also is vitally strong.
For example, for S.B. country is the one thing that matters and nothing else.
Excuse me—country is not the only thing for S.B.—there is also S.B. and he looms very large. You have illusions about these political heroes—I have seen them close and have none.
But you say their bigness will come in the way. Then is our smallness a great privilege?
Bigness = vanity, ambition, self-assertion, a self-confident inability to surrender etc., etc.
Smallness at least gives you a chance.
Do the unbracketed parts in your replies mean that they are public?
No—only that they are not excessively private.
I have shown the document to Doraiswamy and he advises not to go to this Consul who will charge for every erasure, but to go to the Sub-Registrar's office—5 miles from here, in the British territory. Well? In either case I have no money to pay.
Where is it? and are you to go alone or with witnesses or with whom? Let us know a little more clearly. Find out the charges in either case and we can decide and arrange.
July 2, 1938
Guru, the place I mentioned in the British territory is out of the question. It's only the Sub-Registrar's office, it won't do.
There are two ways:
1) British Consul. Purani enquired. They charge Rs. 6/8, and 6 annas for every erasure. It'll come to about Rs. 8.
2) French Notaire Public whose signature is also valid. His charges are Rs. 6-8... He says we'll get the form in 24 hrs. Purani suggests Cuddalore. Doraiswamy believes that it will be cheaper by a couple of rupees... He has friends who will introduce me to the Magistrate, a witness he can arrange for, etc...
The simplest way is to go to the British Consul and have it done there. It is a difference of a couple of Rs. only—not worth the trouble of going to Cuddalore and all the arrangements. Ask Purani to arrange.
Before Dr. André goes, I think we can have R.B.'s X-ray. André has agreed, shall we take her to the hospital?
[Mother:] Yes.
We have to buy barium meal, if you sanction. I enclose a chit.
[Mother:] Where is the chit?
M has hard stools, and passes blood sometimes. May be the beginning of piles. Shall we give him haritaki?
S asks for some more liver injections. We have 3 or 4 ampoules. If you like, we can give them to him.
[Mother:] Is it not too much?
Tajdar complains of becoming more and more weak and lifeless (?). She says her stomach refuses to work, her blood has become very poor, her heart is weak, her liver is out of order, etc., etc.—She wishes to have her blood examined, her liver X-rayed, her urine analysed. I was thinking (yesterday) of asking André to do all that, but now that he is on the point of going I hesitate to give him all that trouble. But in case you see that it will not bother him you can take Tajdar to him—
[Sri Aurobindo put 3 marginal lines against two lines of the disciple's poetry with some of his corrections—
And the cry of the centuries Pass from your ears.]
This triple line is a compliment to my correction, not to your version.
July 3, 1938
I showed Tajdar to André. He says the heart is all right. All her trouble is due to indigestion and constipation... I don't know if it is worth while doing the blood examination.
[Mother:] She was asking blood examination for anaemia.
Today André gave an injection to Lalita. Another due on Wednesday.
[Mother:] Wednesday is a very busy ,day for her—she is asking it on Thursday.
What is meant by your "too much" in relation to S? We shall give him only one injection at a time as done before. We gave him 7, if you remember.
[Mother:] Has it not a cumulative effect?
July 4, 1938
No, it has no cumulative effect as it is not a medicine, but only liver extract. But I was wondering whether it will do him any good.
[Mother:] If he thinks it will do him good there is a chance.
For Tajdar, is it necessary to examine blood for anaemia? It can be done any day, if necessary.
[Mother:] She believes it very necessary as she is convinced "she is fast declining" (her own words). Of course all I tell you is confidential.
Mrs. Sankar Ram has a lot of sugar in urine even after giving up rice. Shall we analyse her blood to see how much blood-sugar she has?
Perhaps. but is not the illness the result of a rheumatic tendency and if this is treated will not that get better?
Bala found the meat extract very good and wants to buy one more bottle himself
[Mother:] We can buy one more for him. After that he will do as he likes.
July 5, 1938
R.B. was X-rayed today. There seems to be a beginning of ulcer in the duodenum, the radiologist says. If it is that she has to stop all solid food. But you had asked me not to stop it... She is also so ridiculous, what to do?
[Mother:] Before saying anything one must be sure that it is an ulcer.
Shall we buy a bottle of Listerine for J?
She also wants cocogem. Shall we supply it?
July 6, 1938
"The growing heart of day Is lily-white..."
Lily-white cheap?
Not only cheap but gratis.
Guru, this again is a riddle of a poem.
Not very cogent, whether realistically or surrealistically. But see how with a few alterations I have coged it. (Excuse the word; it is surrealistic it). I don't put double lines as I don't want to pay too many compliments to myself. I don't say that the new version has any more meaning than the first. But significance, sir, significance! Fathomless!
As for the inspiration it was a very remarkable source you tapped—super-Blakish, but your transcription is faulty e.g. lily-white rising out of the clay, that horrible "various", and constant mistakes in the last four stanzas. Only the third came out altogether right subject to the change you yourself made of destiny to ecstasy and shot to wrought. But obviously the past tense is needed instead of the present so as to give the sense of something that has been seen.
How to be sure about R.B.'s ulcer? X-ray was the one definite way. It may be sound to take it as ulcer. André has given a medicine, Histidine, which won't do any harm even if it is not ulcer. It has to be given either subcutaneously or intramuscularly.
[Mother:] Give subcutaneously.
Dyuman buys vegetables for the soup, once a week. It would be good if Z could have' a "garde-manger" for storing them.
[Mother:] Yes—ask Sahana for one—
Mrs. Sankar Ram doesn't want to go to the hospital since her nail pain is gone and sugar less, she feels better. I explained that it's better to ascertain [diabetes], but to no avail. So, shall we wait?
July 7, 1938
The "garde-manger" given to Z is rather small. Perhaps it will be better to have a special one prepared.
[Mother:] Yes, but it may take some time. Meanwhile ask Sahana if it is not possible to exchange this one for one in the room of an absentee.
Guru, I have seen how your little touches have "coged" the poem. Does it then show that if my transcription becomes perfect some day, the whole thing will drop perfectly O.K.?
Of course. At present the mind still interferes too much, catching at an expression which will somehow approximate to the thing meant instead of waiting for the one true word. This catching is of course involuntary and the mind does it passively without knowing what it is doing—a sort of instinctive haste to get the thing down. In so doing it gets an inferior layer of inspiration to comb for the words even when the substance is from a higher one.
Even if I revised it, do you think I could have made it better?
Not necessarily.
But how can I when I don't understand at all what I am writing? How to correct? By inner feeling?
No; by getting into touch with the real source. The defects come from a non-contact or an interception by some inferior source as explained above.
If I try to understand the thing, every bit of it seems ridiculous.
Because you are trying to find a mental meaning and your mind is not familiar with the images, symbols, experiences that are peculiar to this realm. Each realm of experience has its own figures, its own language, its own vision and the physical mind not catching the link finds it all absurd. At the same time the main idea in yesterday's poem is quite clear. The heart of day evolving from clay and night is obviously the upward luminous movement of the awakened spiritual consciousness covering the intermediate worlds (vital, mental, psychic) in its passage to the supreme Ananda (unknown ecstasy transparence wrought, the transparence being that well known to mystic experience of the pure spiritual consciousness and existence). In the light of the main idea the last four stanzas should surely be clear—the stars and the sun being well known symbols.
"Super-Blakish" you say? And what "remarkable source" please, inner or over? Looks something damnably mystic, but neither inner nor overhead.
Can't specify—as these things have no name. Inner—over also in imagery, but not what I call the overhead planes. These belong to the inner mind or inner vital or to the intuitive mind or anywhere else that is mystic.
July 8, 1938
Z is asking again and again if she can join her work. Do you advise it?
[Mother:] She may try a small amount of work. Days must seem dull to her if she is doing nothing.
July 9, 1938
Guru, I am puzzled! Your additional stanza of yesterday's poem is magnificent. But how can a "body" be born, either God's or an animal's, even if we admit God has a body?
["From which the cosmic fire Sprang rhythmic into Space That God's body might be born And the Formless wear a face." 9.7.38]
It is I who am awfully puzzled by your puzzlement. A body is not born? When the child comes out of the womb, it is not a body that comes out and the coming out is not birth? It has always been so called in English. You have never heard the expression "the birth and death of the body"? What is it then that dies after having been born? The soul doesn't die, nor is it the soul that comes out of the womb! You think God cannot have a body? Brahmo idea? Then what of the incarnation—is it impossible? And how does the Divine appear in vision to the bhakta except by putting on a form = a body? But if you object to God having or getting a body, you must also object to the Formless wearing a face; so the whole significant stanza becomes nonsense. And therefore, I suppose, pure poetry. All the same one can understand a metaphysical (not a poetic) objection to God having a body if one believes that the Infinite cannot manifest the finite or as finite, but that an animal's body is not born is new to me.
July 10, 1938
"A fire leaps from range to range And touches a height Unshadowed by time's sudden change Or the bulk of night."
Night has a bulk?
It may have, but it is not polite or poetic to talk about it—gives the idea that she is corpulent.
[Chand's telegram:] "Embarkment enquiry 13th July protection." Guru, is he embarking for Mecca? Looks like embankment which, he said, he demolished, of a tenant.
It is the telegraph office here that is embarking him—otherwise there would be no enquiry. He must be in trouble over his arbitrary abolition of his neighbours' embankment.
Here is Dilipda's royal mail! I have copied out the whole letter for you. Hope it is not worse than his original!.
For this relief much thanks!
What about Darshan permission for Kalyan, and his staying in Dilipda's house? Both granted?
Yes.
D is facing a lot of criticism, but he says he has resolved not to mind it.
I hope he will keep to his resolution of not minding what people say. It is a sage resolve and, if kept, will make a huge difference.
Any remarks on his songs?
Nothing particular. They have the usual qualities.
Padmasini seems much reduced. She has no appetite... May we give her small doses of arsenic with stomach tonics?
July 11, 1938
I suppose what you wrote yesterday on D's "sage resolve" is meant for my ears only? Or his also?
It can reach his, but not in that language which he might take as ironic. You can say that I was very pleased to read what he had written on that point; the resolution is a good one and I hope he will keep strength to carry it out. It would make a great difference.
"I dive into the fathomless Riches of God..."
One doesn't dive into riches—a tankful of bank notes!
T is quite all right now and can do some light work for a couple of hours or so.
[Mother:] She is doing some embroidery work. I think it is sufficient for the moment.
July 12, 1938
X calls me now and then in the afternoon to taste something she has prepared. So I spend about 15-20 minutes on my way to the hospital.
I like X's smile. It's innocent, childlike—nothing coquettish or sophisticated or trying to captivate.
Very dangerous! especially if you begin to luxuriate in the idea of her unsophisticated simplicity. Unsophisticated or not, if once the vital attachment is made, she will hold you as tightly as the other and with a greater violence of dabi,218 abhiman and the rest of it and, finally when the connection is cut, she will say and think that it was all your fault and that you are a very wicked person who took advantage of her foolishness and innocence. Well, well, you know about as much of women as a house-kitten knows about the jungle and its denizens and it is you who are in this field amazingly naïve.
What exactly is meant by a "sophisticated" mind and "naïveté." in English?
"Sophisticated" means well up to everything, artificial and without simplicity; naïve means ignorantly artless, amusingly simple, not up to things.
... If you think I had better stop this social relationship and check the unyogic enjoyment—I shall.
I certainly think that you should stop while there is yet time. It is no use getting out of one net to fall into another.
July 14, 1938
Guru, you have castigated me for my inexperience, calling me sheep, lamb, house-kitten and what not. You will exhaust the whole zoology on me, methinks!
Why not? man has all the animals within him as he is an epitome of the universe.
Am I really as naïve as all that?
Certainly, there is the naïveté, otherwise you would not have relied on X's simplicity.
Perhaps if X blames me even now, she may be right, for I can't swear that I didn't try to draw her...
But if she joined in, she would have no right to blame anybody but herself. There is no reason. why she should allow herself to be drawn; it would be a proof that she wants it. Besides she is quite capable of drawing herself even if she does it in an unsophisticated manner.
I have resolved that next time X and Y call me, I shall go and "cleverly" tell them that it is the last time. Will it do, Sir?
I've given them mangoes and things before, as once you said regarding S's offer of curry, that it was quite trifling and absolutely harmless.
In S's case it was harmless, but similar things in another case might not be. All depends on the inflammability of the human materials in relation to each other. If they are mutually inflammable, a mango or a curry can be the match to light the flame.
I was alert regarding Z, because I felt she had definite intentions. So I am not altogether naïve, Sir. But as regards X, I wanted to keep just a friendly relation.
... It is certainly naïve to think that because a girl is simple i.e. instinctive and impulsive and non-mental in her movements she can be relied upon to be an asexual friend. Some women can be, but it is usually those who have a clear mental consciousness and strong will of self-control or else those who are incapable of a passion for more than one person in their life and you are lucky enough not to be that person.
[Chand's telegram:] "Partial sex failure must succeed." Guru, after the "embarkment", "partial failure"!
What the deuce does he mean by "partial sex failure"—beginning of the operation but no conclusion? "Embarkment for Cytherea" (land of Venus), and disembarcation in mid-sea? What a phenomenon of a fellow!
July 15, 1938
[Mother:] What about the workman who had his eye wounded?
July 16, 1938
I don't understand how I compare myself to a star, and then the sun.
Well, the Sun is a star, isn't it? and the stars are suns?
What's the name of that place in the "land of Venus"—Lytheria?
Cytherea, Venus is called Cytherea = the C.ytherean in Latin poetry.
July 17, 1938
"... Until an omnipotence Crowned with a white Immaculate destiny."
Don't white and immaculate have the same meaning?
No, one can be immaculate without being white; but it reminds of Gandhi's "spotless white khaddar". Your emendation is quite the right thing.
July 19, 1938
I am most disappointed with this poem,219 Sir! What do you think of it?
Doubly damned fine! Close all right. It is only the two "withs' that are objectionable, but that is soon mended.
By God, I am absolutely staggered by your dragon image! Such things have been done before?
Not before, but worse things than that are done nowadays.
If at any time I face public criticism, I will say that my Guru is to be blamed.
Certainly.
May I know why you object to dilatation by atropine drops in N's case? Is it due to inconvenience to sight? If so it is only for a few days and that too can be shortened by dropping eserine which contracts the pupil. Otherwise I don't know that there is any other risk.
[Mother:] I know of people who never recovered fully the sight they had before. But in his case there is nothing much to lose, I suppose.
About his deafness, the specialist finds nothing in the ear. But that there is some defect of hearing is certain. It may be either due to a bad throat—he has a bad pharyngitis and some sign of tonsillitis or otosclerosis.
[Sri Aurobindo:] Psychologically it is due to his extreme self-centredness. So shut up in himself that his ear is retiring from outward action. Of course that does not exclude the physical cause which is instrumental.
If it is due to the throat, a tonsil operation... If it is due to otosclerosis which can be a remote effect of rheumatism (he had it) then there is no specific cure for it, though Iodine in some form sometimes gives a good effect...
One can't iodine him on the basis of an "if" for a problematically occasional good effect.
Blood can be tested for hereditary syphilis.
Can always see.
Adenoids and tonsils, you know, to a great extent dull the intellect.
Aided by self-imprisonment, I believe.
So whatever you sanction, please write against each one, otherwise he will bother me about your sanction and permission first.
What to sanction, when the doctors can't say what's what?
July 20, 1938
Why did you say, in N's case, that doctors can't say?
Because you say "It may be either" and "if" and "if". According to any ordinary logic that means "We" doesn't know but either guesses or infers.
As regards his eyes, it is quite definite—he has trachoma for which the said treatment can be instituted.
No objection to that. I wrote in reference to the doubtful ear.
And as regards his deafness, it is either due to bad throat or otosclerosis, i.e. sclerosis of the bones of the middle ear; in either case iodine can be given.
You didn't say that. You said "if throat, operation"—if osteo-scl. iodine.
It may be does not = is.
Iodine is very often given, especially collosal iodine injection which is very good. But I heard from Dr. Banerjee that you don't favour internal iodine medication; is it true?
What's this word? Cousin of colossal?
Mother does not favour in certain cases; as in those cases it has a bad effect. Can't say for N. But his subconscious is contradictory like S's and inclined to say No to any medicine.
And if it is due to his extreme self-annihilation, why not tell him so?
Where did you get this self-annihilation? I wrote self-centredness. N's self is not annihilated; it is there alive and kicking and governing everything.
What's the use of telling him' It won't go by the mere telling.
He comes and bothers and bothers, saying that medicine has no effect, "You are not looking carefully..."
Is his sight really so bad that he can't take up any work the whole day? I don't know that eyes have to be much used in his electric supervision work.
So he believes.
You don't allow for the potency of auto-suggestion.
Kantilal had sudden pain on the left side of the chest... I don't find any localising sign, but I suspect he is going in for pleurisy.
!!!
Guru, what sayest Thou to this poem? Staggered simply what?
Exceedingly fine again. Often the intuitive again and throughout almost that.
July 21, 1938
Can't this intuitive faculty grow in my medical sphere and make me see both the disease and the cure?
But in medicine you don't hook on to the intuitive source.
Self-annihilation is my own diagnosis. For, I think, N will revolt if I call him "self-centred" when he is considering himself preparing for self-annihilation.
Anyhow, is there any use of internal medication against that subconscient "No"?
His subconscient is not contradictory to medicines alone. One has to go on in the firm faith that one day it will change. T and others were also like that, but by perseverance something has been arrived at as far as treatment goes.
That word is collosal—from colloidal. I suggested that N should take up some work in the afternoon to which he replied he wrote to you and your answer was—let his eyes get better and best. Otherwise if Sri Aurobindo says, he will surely take up work. Well?
If I tell him to work in the afternoon, he will after a time say his eyes are very bad, very strained, shall he stop? What's the use then?
... S is really extremely difficult to deal with.
He always has been.
Is it his disease that has made him so or his nature?
His nature made the disease.
His friends and his mother say that at home he was quite another person: doing sadhana so well, not caring for worldly things, etc. An admirable fellow in all respects. But something has happened, God knows what, by which he is now completely changed. What can really be the matter, may I know? What sort of difficulty in sadhana is likely to set up such a perverse psychology?
In appearance perhaps he was like that, though it seems to me that there is something of a legend in that. So long as I have known him he has always been sharp and obstinate in pursuing his own idea or interest and the claims of his ego. Maybe, in his first stage of experience, something mental-psychic was there, that gave him the appearance his friends describe, but the vital was not changed, and as always happens, the vital came up for change—and he did not change it, but allowed the old unregenerate vital ego to take hold of him. Hence constant quarrels, resentments, obstinate feuds and hatred, fancies of persecution, neurasthenia, a disorganised nervous system, devastation of the organs by his anger, etc. (liver especially affecting stomach etc.).
The other day his mother was saying that he pines for his past spiritual experiences and visions. Is that then the reason or what? and I am afraid till he or you put that right, nothing is any good.
How can he have them while he indulges and obeys his vital ego to such an excessive extent? The difficulty is that he is self-righteous and priggish in his self-righteousness. Speaks of himself as an angel of meekness and forbearance and all others as wicked devils tormenting this angel martyr. What's to be done with an attitude like that? How can he come out if he does not recognise the necessity of change? It is not that he has not been told, but—
... He has then to shut himself up in his room to escape all disturbances. Even then he will quarrel with the air, light and trees!
Of course.
But if you ask me to do according to what he wants for his health, I will surely and ungrudgingly do it. But you understand how difficult it is!
Do the best you can, knowing that he is both physically and psychically ill.
Romen needs a pair of wooden sandals as the leather ones irritate the patches of eczema he has. Could you please sanction a pair?
[Mother:] Surely he must have. It is to be asked from Benjamin.
Romen was telling me to-day that he always feels tired, very tired, and very often he has head-ache. Is it due to liver? Can nothing be done to relieve him?
Nirod
I send you X's latest epistle, as my capacities are not equal to reproduction—please return the precious document. But mark that it is confidential, you are not supposed to have received it as it contains psychological as well as medical confidences.
I may admit that we are rather inclined to sympathise with her about the guimauve and purgatives and weekly laxatives. Well, what about André's "miksar"?220 Warranted harmless and directed to the purpose she cherishes?
SRI AUROBINDO
July 22, 1938
R's tiredness can be easily accounted for; he works like a Canadian lumberman and eats like a Tamil labourer, or even less... Today he came at about 2 p.m., saying that his head was reeling, the whole body aching. Looked like a heat-stroke. I advised him rest.
[Mother:] Is it not better to give him aspirin or something of the kind?
He says he has no appetite in the evening, which may be true and due, I think, to over-exhaustion. How to remedy that? Something to eat or drink at 4 p.m., or an extra cup of milk at bed-time, perhaps?
[Mother:] For a number of days I gave him something to eat at 4 P.M., a fruit or chocolate or biscuits. After a time he refused saying that his stomach was aching—To-day I once more gave him as he told me what you had said.
... I am sure this headache will go if he takes enough food. I wish some fruits could be given.
[Mother:] I shall give him fruits. I hope he will take them.
Guru, today from 1.30 p.m. to 3.45, I waited and waited, but not a line dropped. So I gave up in disgust... Wasting so much time sitting idle! Or is that sort of idleness as valuable as activity?
No. But you can do something else that may be helpful or useful.
Anyway, there is some tendency to think the same words, expressions, rhymes and thoughts. Everything is repeated.
Can't be avoided in everyday writing—or at least, if you avoid, you will be a phenomenon.
So, Guru, another star [Naik] dropped from your firmament? And after 6 years' luminuous presence too!
Luminous? Not very, and rather a shooting or at least tendency to shoot star. He was always going, going and twice or thrice gone—but—returned; now he is gone.
In spite of his violent temper, we liked the fellow.
He had a very nice side to him as well as an insupportable side.
Sometimes it puzzles me to think that you couldn't save a fellow who had worked so well, keeping himself busy almost the whole day.
Busy in too many directions, unfortunately.
Was his vital so turbulent that you couldn't manage to change him?
Vital turbulence? If that were all, it would be nothing much. It was the intermittent possession by a dark violent force that was the trouble. It was becoming so frequent that I had when he asked to go this time to advise him to do so. But the real cause was deeper down. As for saving, one can't save if the patient cherishes the illness, justifies it and refuses to part with it. It was only recently that he began to admit that it was regrettable and had bad consequences, but even so he was unable to make an effort when the fit came. The shock of having to go may perhaps have a salutary influence.
There is no doubt that he truly loved the Mother; but in this world nothing saves, except those who are blessed extraordinary souls.
What does save is the true will to be saved accompanied by a reliance on the Divine. Those who have gone, did they have it?
I fear moreover, that fate has decreed that doctors must quit! You see three doctors have gone already, R doesn't seem to be on very sure grounds. Rajangam and my dear self remain! Ah, the bullet is passing very close, Sir!
Medical profession can't be based on Naik's case—He dropped it with a joyful grunt as soon as he came here and had nothing to do with it afterwards.
I heard an interesting thing that you gave him a big shout! Ah, I wish I had heard it! But I thought you had lost your capacity to shout?
The supramental (even its tail) does not take away any capacity, but rather sublimates all and gives those that were not there. So I gave a sublimated supramental shout. I freely admit that (apart from the public platform) I have shouted only four or five times in my life.
My yesterday's outburst [with S in the dispensary] seems to be part of a general movement; for I hear that our Benjamin had the courage to slap M yesterday. The fellow has some guts, I must say. The Supramental seems to be descending this time, the head, I mean! But it is really striking that M kept calm when he could have easily pulverised the fellow!
Well, that is a result of the supramental also! But perhaps M felt that Benjamin was too small and weakly a figure to demolish. He apologised to the Mother for having lost his control as far as to speak violently to Benjamin!!
July 23, 1938
There is some trouble now about Benoy's glass eye that we ordered from the Company in Bombay. It does not suit him; he says we should return this one and he will ask friends in Calcutta to send one. I don't think the Company will return us the money. We can only place an order for something else equivalent to its price—1/8.
If you need things from the Company, there is no objection.
Our stock of Sudarshan is nearly over. Punamchand said it is ready, he would send it from Bombay, but no news from him. Many people are taking it now. So shall we get some from Madras for the present?
Can wait and see.
The other day I gave S a new drug, Incretone, as Haemogen was not giving sufficiently good results. That very night I had a dream that the medicine had a good effect: urinary and other troubles were much less. Today the very thing happened...
... R.B.'s pain has given place to burning... Shall we try Histidine injection subcutaneously, or wait?
Wait.
Guru, the same fate today! No poem! You ask me to do something useful or helpful. You mean some reading—poetry or philosophy?
But it seems to me that I have exhausted my source and nothing new will come till after some time, i.e. by some growth of consciousness. Occasionally I may write when even a sameness won't matter much. But to be a "phenomenon" is impossible.
The sameness does not matter much. The use of your writing is to keep you in touch with the inner source of inspiration and intuition, so as to wear thin the crude external crust in the consciousness and encourage the growth of the inner being. The dream you speak of in your medical report shows that the inner being is beginning to awake somewhat, as a result, even in things not having to do with the literary inspiration. For this purpose the "sameness" does not much matter.
In spite of repetitions and sameness, if I persist, I might strike again a new source.
That is right.
Time seems to press very heavily. But to write poetry because of heaviness of time is an unyogic attitude probably. Well!
Neither Yogic nor unyogic.
Today Mother appeared to show some displeasure (or disapproval?) either to me or to the forces acting through me. Cause there must be: my outburst of temper against S, depression due to Naik's departure and my doubt regarding my own fate, etc., etc. Don't know which.
It is the usual false imagination. Perhaps you got it by thinking too much of Naik—for whenever his vital wanted to go wrong or was dissatisfied with itself or people, that was always its movement, to imagine the Mother displeased and then to revolt against her. In that way it succeeded in getting itself into a fit. The fit passed he realised his mistake—but did it again the next time.
It's not important, but the effect is still worse. The blessed vital gets into a revolting attitude and plays mischief by wrong suggestions—the result being as you can expect: all aspiration is clogged up.
Naturally.
I ought to know by now that Mother has no likes or dislikes and whatever she does is absolutely for my own good. But the vital—does it listen? I consider it a dangerous spot in my sadhana. I must cut it out root and branch.
Cut what out root and branch? The habit of wrong imagination and revolted attitude? For that your mind must separate itself from the vital and be able to tell it when it goes wrong, that it is making a fool of itself and that the mind refuses to go with it even one step in that direction. It is always the mind allowing itself to be clouded by the vital that makes these recurrences possible.
July 24, 1938
Guru; ah, you do relieve me! If you had said that the first day, I would have written a poem! Your first day's answer gave me the impression that it doesn't matter much if I can't write every day.
I said nothing about that, except that the repetition couldn't be avoided in constant writing. My answer was about the idleness—saying it was not good, but if you find writing poetry impossible every day, you must do something else and not keep the time vacant.
I think you enjoy playing with us a little, Sir, or perhaps that's your divine way?
I have no such bad intentions.
... Freed from the long-standing obstacle, I have been feeling extremely happy these two days... The thought that I shall be able to send you poems again and get back a touch from you is apparently the main cause of joy. I wonder if behind this there is the awakening of the inner being as well.
It is certainly the inner being that has the feeling.
Today I wrote a poem and it gave me great joy—but I couldn't write the last two days, so I feel gloomy. How do you explain it?
The joy is good, but the gloom is not.
My days would have been still brighter, perhaps, if I had kept my vital free! ...
The vital needs something to hook itself on to, but for a sadhak women are obviously the wrong things for it to hook itself on to—it must get hold of the right peg.
Twice X brought something to eat for me and Mulshankar. I couldn't ask her to stop it. Is it necessary to tell her? Won't it drop by itself if I keep myself right?
If you keep yourself right, yes—but if the attachment continues, then it is better to break off the occasion.
"Worlds have begun To unroll like a time-wave, Each measured beat Filled with an ecstasy Of its golden heat."
I fear you will shout against this "heat".
Certainly, the heat would make anyone shout.
Kantilal is steadily improving. He joined work today. Has been advised not to strain himself.
[Mother:] He came back immediately. Could not stand it. Did you tell him that it is bad to sleep in the verandah? He is asking for a room on medical grounds.
You didn't say anything about S's extra milk. Shall I ask him to resume soup leaving it to his choice?
[Mother:] He has got his milk all right. But it seems to me that the soup was better for his health.
July 25, 1938
We are supplying bowls to those who take soup here in the Dispensary. Some others also come from time to time, so shall we keep a few in stock or shall we ask them to bring their own bowls?
[Mother:] You can ask a few bowls from Purushottam.
July 26, 1938
"A rapturous throb of stars I feel in my heart,..."
I think the stars might just as well not be there. It is difficult for a heart-throb to be a star.
July 27, 1938
"A silver-throated nightingale Has to my spirit brought Unimaginable ecstasy..."
What's this nightingale doing here?
Damned if I know, but let her sing.
"My rock-white will manifests now Through grey barrenness of time Infinities crowned with the sun-glow Of the withdrawn Sublime."
"Rock-white" would mean "white as a rock", but a white rock is rarer than a white elephant.
July 28, 1938
"My heart yearns now for thy divine Primeval Word, Bringing a sense of crystalline Fire-ecstasy, stirred
In every cell and lifted high Into a gold Vision of thy Infinity, Fold after fold."
I don't think infinity can be rolled about like that, but it can be unrolled, that is revealed progressively and continuously before the sight.
Guru, I am afraid this poem has many defects in detail. It was written after a lot of castor-oil drugging!
The castor-oil seems to have been effective at any rate. Very fine poem—only three lines (in themselves very poetic) lack original force (5th stanza).
July 29, 1938
This "correspondence ban"—how far does it affect me?
It doesn't affect your poetry; the medical report also can come, but it should be quite concise during this period.
"My heart is steeped in that reverie And drinks a passionless wine..."
Being steeped, can one drink?
Well, you can drink when you are wet.
July 30, 1938
Rajangam writes that J's chronic complaint of nose and throat has increased. He has suggested douching the nose slowly with cold water and applying menthol-vaseline at the nostrils. She should practise slow breathing exercises, drawing in breath with one nostril and letting it out with the other. She is ready to follow the treatment, if you approve of it.
[Mother:] She can do.
Bala (Atelier) has finished the other bottle of meat extract. He feels very well. Wants to be without any drug for some time.
[Mother:] All right
July 31, 1938
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