Talks by Nirodbaran

13 August 1969

Well, today I scratch my head; I have entered this - what shall I call it - 'the hall of expectancy' with a somewhat guilty face, for which I as well as you are responsible. We share the great fault, for I understand that, in our last talk, I've confounded some of you about the veracity and genuineness of the conversation I had with Sri Aurobindo. Well, it is none of my fault. However, the very fact that you enjoyed the talk makes me free from all the guilt, and proves the purity of my intention, which is to give you delight. To weave some fanciful myth around Mother and Sri Aurobindo is itself something ennobling, uplifting and satisfying. So, on that account, I need submit no apology to you. But you should also remember that I've given you sufficient hints as to the nature of this talk, so you can't blame me either.

Imagination, friends, is a great power. Milton has said that by the

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power of imagination you may "make a Heaven of Hell and a Hell of Heaven".¹⁴¹ Just think where I would have been if I were not a poet, and what if the poets, artists, musicians, and even the scientists had had no imagination - where would they have been, had there been no power of imagination, though Shakespeare confines imagination to the possession of a pack of poets, lovers and madmen!¹⁴² I think some of you have read Bernard Shaw's St. Joan drama where her inquisitors accuse her, saying that the voices she used to hear were all born of her imagination, to which she replies, "That is how the messages of God come to us."¹⁴³

Similarly, when one day one of us asked Sri Aurobindo, "How does one see the Divine in everything, in every man?" He replied, "By your power of imagination. Imagine that the Divine is there in everybody, in everything." I could not resist the temptation and asked, "But is that not imagination?" And pat came His counter-question, "What is imagination?" I couldn't reply. Mother has also said somewhere that the very fact that you imagine something proves that it must exist somewhere, otherwise you can't imagine it. So even if my talk were imaginary, it could have occurred on some occult plane about which I'll speak presently.

Well then, suppose, from now onwards, we strongly imagine that Sri Aurobindo is all the time with us, even here: in our pursuits, in all our trials and woes and tribulations, in all our hardships, will it be an imagination or a fact ? You can answer that question by yourselves. When I go to sleep at night in Sri Aurobindo's room - all of you know perhaps that I have that good fortune - I try to imagine, turning my side towards Him, towards His bed, that He is there. Well, it gives me some solace, satisfaction, and sometimes, good dreams.

But without going so far, in this hard, matter-of-fact world of ours,

141"The mind is its own place, and in itself/ Can make a Heaven of Hell, a Hell of Heaven." Spoken by Satan in John Milton's Paradise Lost (1667), Book 1, lines 254-5.

142"The lunatic, the lover, and the poet/ Are of imagination all compact." Spoken by Theseus in William Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream, Act V, Scene i, Lines 7-8.

143Saint Joan: A Chronicle Play In Six Scenes And An Epilogue (1924) by George Bernard Shaw, Scene I.

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as Hamlet says, we have to sometimes draw our "breath in pain",¹⁴⁴ where imagination is a door of escape to a happier world. When your life is measured out each day to two spoons of sugar, 100 cc. of milk and a few ounces of spirit, etc., etc., you may call to the goddess of imagination and you will see that all your 'kumdos¹⁴⁵ and brinjals have turned into 'rasagollas' and pantuas'.¹⁴⁶ (Laughter) That's how we try to forget reality and take our flight into a world of imagination. It is a solace, a consolation; it is very useful to people who are particularly imaginative.

So ladies and gentlemen, if I have transported you to that land of imagination, it is all to my credit and to your benefit. You have gone for a moment into a world of eternity from this limited, finite world of ours; and you'll hope and pray that from time to time I may do that duty again.

Now perhaps some of you have heard the name of Oscar Wilde. At least, you have read his beautiful story "The Happy Prince"¹⁴⁷, haven't you ? One day when he was sitting in his drawing room doing hard and heavy work, some friends came to visit him. They asked him, "Well, Oscar, what's the matter? Why are you working such late hours? What have you done in the afternoon?" He said, "Well, I have been to the zoo. And what a lovely company of birds and beasts and monkeys and tigers and lions it was. Far away from the company of you people. I saw a royal Bengal tiger poised on a rocky eminence, majestically. I have seen a bear hugging a bearess ... I have seen monkeys coming down as soon as they saw me and stretching their arms to shake hands with me, knowing I was their descendant (Laughter), open their mouths, stretch their hands for some peanuts to swallow. I have seen a kingfisher dive into a pool..." - so on and so forth. As he was going on in this strain, Mrs. Wilde, who'd been listening quietly, knitting at the same time, pulled him up, "What is this ? What is all this nonsense

144The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, by William Shakespeare, Act V, Scene II.

145Pumpkins.

146Rasagollas and Pantuas are Indian sweets.

147The Happy Prince and Other Tales (1888).

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you are saying?" Everybody was surprised. "You have been sitting with me in the drawing room, all afternoon, and you say you have been to the zoo!" He smiled, "Well, my dear, sometimes one must imagine; otherwise what is imagination for, particularly when I am sitting with you?" (Laughter)

But, poor fellow! To this happy and gay man fate dealt a heavy blow. He was sent to prison. But he made capital out of his prison life: his undaunted spirit produced, by his power of imagination, a masterpiece of literature - De Profundis. Just so, I understand, the great French poet Francois Villon produced many ballads in prison. Prison has been made famous by many people for many things. We know very well Sri Aurobindo went to prison and had the vision of Vasudeva. I followed His footsteps into England, took up His father's profession,I followed Him in a sort of Swadeshi movement¹⁴⁸ and followed then its consequences. Then, in my thirties, I followed Him to Pondicherry to take up His yoga. I followed Him into poetry too, but now I am stuck (Laughter) on the waiting list! (Laughter)

That's what it is ... I am trying to be a bit 'Wilde-ish' as you see, particularly in your sweet and happy company. But by now you have learnt to discriminate when I am serious, and when I am playful, when I am teasing, when I cover truth with truth like Narad before Aswapati's queen¹⁴⁹ - after all, there is not much difference between the two names, Nirod and Narad - question of a vowel or two. (Laughter)

So if I tease you now and then, it is not at all out of malice. Teasing, rightly done, is a fine art. It is a sign of, if I may say so, affection, love, tenderness. Brothers and sisters tease each other - I used to do so at least - friends tease each other, lovers certainly do. So teasing is a fine art, if you know how to do it. Perhaps you remember Keats' famous line addressing the Grecian urn - any of my students here? Ah, there!

148Self-rule. The struggle for self-rule was part of the Indian Independence movement.

149When Princess Savitri chose Satyavan to be her husband, Narada the divine sage descended from heaven, visited Aswapati and his Queen, and broke the dreadful news of Satyavan's impending death (in exactly one yeat's time). The Queen remonstrated and pleaded with Savitri to change her decision, but Savitri stood firm.

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-You [the rest of the audience] may also have read it, please excuse me if I misquote:

Thou, silent form, dost tease us out of thought

As doth eternity ...¹⁵⁰

Mark here the beautiful meaning of the word 'tease'. So, as Sri Aurobindo says in Savitri:

Something that wished but knew not how to be,

Teased the Inconscient to wake Ignorance.¹⁵¹

There you are, again - 'Teased' - very original use of the word 'tease'. He certainly meant that this was done not out of malice, but out of joy, not out of duty, but out of delight, hence 'tease'. I have made up a rhyme:

Wherever there is playful teasing,

It is a sign of love's increasing.

When from love flies away the teasing

Be sure that love is freezing.

(Laughter) So ladies and gentlemen, if I teased you out of your ordinary thought and transported you into a world of timeless eternity, you have my apology. It was done with a very good intention. Now I'll make further amends for the sin committed unintentionally or half-intentionally. (Laughter)

I'll narrate to you a genuine talk I had with Sri Aurobindo; again, here also, without the awareness of my external consciousness. I've published Mother's letter to me regarding this matter in this book, Talks with Sri Aurobindo [Holding up the book for all to see]. It is like this, as I have written here in the note:

I don't know how it happened but it was on a very significant date: the first day of the month of February, 1.2.63. In the month of February falls Mother's birthday, and on the very first day, so a very happy day indeed. So as usual I sat down for meditation -rather, tried to meditate; meditation is still a trial for me! - in Sri Aurobindo's room, somewhere in the morning at about 6:00 or

150John Keats, Ode on a Grecian Urn (1820), lines 44-45.

151Book I, Canto 1,2.

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6:30. Somehow fortune favoured me, I at once became - I hope you know what that means ? But at the same time, I was aware of the external world too, there's the beauty. When I had gone inside, I began to have a talk with somebody, I didn't know who that person was; a long talk. But the funny part of it is that as soon as I came out of the meditation, I forgot all about it completely, a blank. Then when I came down for breakfast with my friend Sisir¹⁵² - we two have breakfast together always - as soon as I saw him, everything flashed back; there is a reason, because there was reference to Sisir in it. So I told him: "When I came out of the meditation, I forgot all that had passed. But as soon as I saw you during our breakfast, everything revived as in a flash. Sisir, you know, I was telling you in my meditation that at this place there will be our school building, there this, and there that, and so on!" I wrote about it to the Mother.

I couldn't give Sisir any precise detail, though I had worked out all that in meditation. Only here it will be this, there it will be that, etc. Then it somehow struck me that I'd rather - [Nirod-da suddenly sees Arindam-da.¹⁵³ in the audience] Hello, my friend: you are there! Good God! (Laughter) You came in like a thief! (Laughter) - So it struck me that I should write about it to the Mother. Usually I don't do it. Then Mother promptly sent me this reply, as you have seen, written in her own hand in French. I don't remember now whether I wrote the letter in French; I probably would not have because I gave up study of French long ago. But somehow ... I will read out the French version first, to be followed by the translation in English.

Le nuit demiere nous (toi et moi et quelques nutres) avons ete ensemble assez longtemps dans la demeure permanente de Sri Aurobindo qui se trouve dans le physique subtile, (ce que Sri Aurobindo appelait 'the true physical')... mes benedictions.

So there you see again ... Oh yes, all of you know French? No? What a pity. Now the English version:

Last night we (you and I and some others) were together for quite a long time in the permanent dwelling of Sri Aurobindo which exists in the subtle physical (what Sri Aurobindo used to

152Sisir Kumar Mitra, historian and headmaster of the Ashram school.

153Arindam Basu, eminent professor of philosophy.

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call 'the true physical').¹⁵⁴ All that happened there (much too long and complicated to be told) was, so to say, organised in order to express concretely the rapid movement with which the present transformation is going on; and Sri Aurobindo told you with a smile something like this: 'Do you believe now ?' It was as if he was evoking these three lines from Savitri:

God shall grow up, while the wise men talk and sleep;

For man shall not know the coming till its hour

And belief shall be not till the work is done.

I think this is a sufficient explanation of the meditation you are speaking of.

My blessings.

So there you are. I was happy to see that it's not all imagination; it had some reality in it.

From that time onwards, I don't know from that time or a little before, Mother has spoken to many people about Sri Aurobindo's beautiful dwelling there, where He is very happy, surrounded by bhaktas (devotees) who had come down from above, and those who have departed from here, having a very happy time; and She also said that some of us do go there to visit Him, sit by His side, have a talk with Him. I had an occasion also, long after that, to be told by the Mother that I had been there, and she has told many others also about it; only at that time I didn't know, in my waking consciousness, that I had been there.

That reminds me again of another experience I had long before this. I didn't know anything about the abode that Sri Aurobindo had there or had built there. The Mother told us about this when She was meeting us downstairs in the salon.¹⁵⁵ In the morning, we used to go to do pranam to Her. There used to be quite a number of people. One day, She told me, "I've been meeting you for consecutive days

154Behind the physical world, there are other worlds, real and concrete, but made of much finer, subtler substance. During sleep or even in a trance, we enter into these subtle worlds.

155'Salon' is the Long Room on the first floor, parallel to the stairs ascending from the Meditation Hall to the First Floor. At the southern end, there is the narrow staircase going up to Mother's Room on the Second Floor.

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and we were having a long talk." I was eager to hear what She had to say. Then She said, "I won't tell you anything now. I'll follow the course as the talk is not yet finished just now. Then, after it is finished, I'll tell you all about it." Three or four days passed, yet She didn't say anything to me. She just looked at me; that was typical of Her. I don't remember after how many days, She spoke to me, but not there in the presence of other people, "You were there with Sri Aurobindo and there were many others around Him. I went to see Sri Aurobindo for some work, some purpose, but these people who were surrounding Sri Aurobindo didn't allow me. They asked: 'Who is she? She has no right to come in'. So they would not allow me in nor would they tell Sri Aurobindo that I had come to see Him." Then the Mother continued her story and told me that I'd been sitting there. I came out and told Sri Aurobindo that the Mother had come, She wanted to see Him. I asked these people, "Why don't you allow Mother to come in and see Sri Aurobindo?" They vehemently protested, saying, "She is not one of us." I don't remember the exact words. But all this was said in a spirit of revolt, in a spirit of bad will. Then I protested and said, "It is nothing of the sort. I know that She has done me a lot of good, I have been immensely benefited by Her; so I deny all the charges that you level against the Mother." Then She said something in confidence, which, I am sorry, even if you were my best friends, I couldn't tell you! So that was another occasion when I had a talk with the Mother, without my knowing about it in the waking state.

Now we pass on to something my friend over here has given me to be read out to you on the coming occasion of the Darshan. This is from the book of our late friend Purani. It is a description about how they celebrated the fifteenth of August in 1924. Somebody has written very beautifully; he has recorded his impression of that day. It is very long, so I shall read out to you some selected passages at random. [Reading from Evening Talks with Sri Aurobindo (1974), 486-89:

Who can describe this day? Nothing can be added by the colours of imagination, poetic similes, and loaded epithets. It is enough to say

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'It was the 15th of August.' No other day can come up to it in the depth and intensity of spiritual action ...

... Him you can trust implicitly. You need only to give up your little self, the rest is his work, you have no worry, no anxiety! No effort - only the way of loving surrender! How easy!

Sri Aurobindo Himself told us to be free of the sense of responsibility - you have read it in his books.

From early morning the Ashram is humming with various activities: decoration, flowers, garlands, food, bath etc..

By the way we used to get up ... or not sleep at all those days. Even I got the taste of these Darshans. The whole night used to pass in decorating the seat, in gathering flowers and garlands.

Today is the rare chance of seeing the Divine. There he sits - in the royal chair in the verandah - royal and majestic.

It was a wonderful sight ... of course I hadn't seen Him in the verandah but in the Darshan room. A friend of ours who attended Sri Aurobindo during the accident, a doctor, said "Sir, at Darshan you look grand." (Laughter) Then somebody said, "He doesn't look grand here?" (Laughter) But really it is unforgettable!

As one actually stands in front, all curiosity, all pride, all thoughts, all questions, all resolutions are swept away in some terrific divine Niagara.

There is a fine poem composed by my friend Nishikanto, I am sorry I can't just now remember it...

At four o'clock all gather at the usual place of sitting - the verandah ...

I suppose you know the Prosperity verandah?

And let the world become Divine! Another powerful aspiration that came to the surface was. 'Expression is not needed - let the whole of eternity - flow away in this silence!'