Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol. 7

PLATO has exiled the poet from his Republic – in his ideal society there is no place for the poet – this is a stern condemnation. It is a matter of surprise to us, even of disbelief. Especially when we notice that there is no dearth of poetry in Plato himself – he was no dry-as-dust reasoner like his disciple Aristotle. In genius and temperament he was a true poet. The literary grace that expresses itself in his style is still regarded as something of an ideal. But why is he then so averse to the poets?

Plato's charge is that poets are no worshippers of truth. They are but servitors of imagination, of pseudo-truth or falsehood. Not only that. Their entire skill is to make falsehood appear as truth and imagination as reality; they give to an airy nothing a local habitation and a name – and, what is worse, they make this falsehood and imagination as far as possible beautiful and attractive. What then is the consequence? Men are easily deluded and fascinated by the false beauty of a visionary world and depart from truth, good and real beauty. Poetry, the sweetheart, is the enchantress, the Circe, whose only work is to delude men and turn them into pigs or at least lambs.¹ Do you not see what a low opinion

¹ Whatever may be the case of the poet, it is not that such a notion does not prevail in India at least about the votaries of other arts. The Buddhist Vishuddhi Magga has classed the painter with the cook, that is, both are taken to serve the same purpose, both cater only to the pleasure of the senses.

Manu enjoins that the householder must abstain from vocal and instrumental music and from the dance. A dancer, a singer and a house-builder have no right to be present in the ceremonies performed for the departed

of the gods is entertained by such a great poet as Homer? In what respect are such gods superior to men? All the weaknesses of men are found in them, perhaps on a bigger scale, in a more hideous form. These gods are recommended for worship by poets!

The poet indulges imagination and is by nature human in the extreme. Poetry has no direct relation or inseparable connection at all with truth. The worshipper of truth will find in poetry no utterance worthy of acceptance. Especially the poet will not be able to furnish any clue to the truth that lies beyond the ken of the human mind, beyond all that can be grasped by the daily experiences and perceptions of men, and that truth which is really the deepest and supreme in men. Plato's reasoning amounts to this in modern terms.

What Plato says does not, on reflection, appear to be utterly worthless. The vital world is the source of the poet and all other artists who are creators. When the vital is stirred things spring up from it and take shape. This vital itself is the magic power of the urge for enjoyment and action. For the satisfaction of these two urges towards delight and enjoyment the vital is constantly engaged in creating things. The spell of the vital does not care to find how far they are truth, and how much is their worth in terms of the right and the ultimate good. It is enough if it can build a castle in the air and derive joy from it. But it is not at all necessary that the castle in the air should be a reality.¹ It is enough if it comes within the domain of experience and gives satisfaction. This vital is again the field of all desires and impulses of men. The attractions of the vital keep men confined to an absolutely human plane. Poetry is the unrivalled drug to enslave men to the mortal world.

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soul. Chanakya has put the singer in the same category with the harlot.

It may also be remembered in this connection that portraiture and image making are prohibited in the Hebrew and the Mohammedan religions.

¹ Bernard Shaw has given the name of hell to one such world, vide his play Man and Superman.

The poet says,

The good that is awake in the midst of all conflicts

Is the good which Thou approvest.

Or,

Shadowless is thy Light...

The beauty of which is enhanced

By my tears.

These expressions are wonderful and sweet to the ear. But, the deep spiritual realisation or the highest truth which these words pretend to convey is but happy imagination and pleasant fancy. The true realisation of the spiritual consciousness is quite a different thing.

Liberation? Where will ye find liberation,

Where does it abide?

The Lord Himself has donned

the bondage of creation,

And is enchained with all.

Here the poet for the moment puzzles us by his curious thought and skilful composition. But it is doubtful if to the calm consciousness of the truth-seer there is anything more than the movements of the natural man's complexes behind such an emotion. This very thing is called 'Siren Song' in English.

If the poet be such a terrible creature then why is he called a Rishi? The Rishi is the seer of truth. The poet is really a poet only when he is a seer, that is to say, one who has the direct vision of truth. But the question may be asked: "What is this truth?" One may say, as there is a spiritual truth so there is a mundane truth; there is no hard and fast

material and vulgar can never be the object of fine art.

Perhaps Plato would not accept this kind of philosophy. He would not be prepared to give an equal importance to the two phenomena – the ardours of the life-process and the pleasures of poetry – balanced side by side as two separate entities of the same value. It is well and good if the poetical work can be made an aid to the discipline of life. Otherwise, just for the sake of creation of beauty, for mere enjoyment, for the skilful and sweet display of the ordinary intelligence and of the unregenerated vital, poetry should not be harboured in our consciousness. Therefore Plato wants us to become hermits of an absolute purity. Not the creation of the poet but that of the philosopher is the thing needed.

The poet wants to snatch beauty from the longings of the natural vital, Plato’s wisdom is all for the ultimate truth seized out of the moral sense. But there is no necessity of this duel between the poet and the philosopher. The true poet will seize beauty through the pure sense of delight in the purified vital and at the same time intuit the absolute truth with the divine vision. The vision of the Truth breaks out of the sense of delight, while the sense of delight finds its foundation in the truth-vision. Thus the poet and the seer become united and the delightful and the good stand identified.

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