... faithfully, present and embody the reality beyond somewhat as it acutally is, in its native rhythm and figure and not diffracted and diffused through a hazy atmosphere. European thought, European philosophy particularly, moves under the aegis of the Mind. It takes its stand within the Mind and from there tries to reach out to truths and realities; and therefore, however far it goes, its highest... limbs and gestures, its constituents and functions. Philosophy here is fundamentally a recording of one's vision and a translation or presentation of it in mental terms. The procedure of European philosophy is different. There the reason or the mental light is the starting-point. That light is cast about: one collects facts, one observes things and happenings and then proceeds to find out a general ...
... faithfully, present and embody the reality beyond somewhat as it actually is, in its native rhythm and figure and not diffracted and diffused through a hazy atmosphere. European thought, European philosophy particularly, moves under the aegis of the Mind. It takes its stand within the Mind and from there tries to reach out to truths and realities; and therefore, however far it goes, its highest... limbs and gestures, its constituents and functions. Philosophy here is fundamentally a recording of one's vision and a translation or presentation of it in mental terms. The procedure of European philosophy is different. There the reason or the mental light is the starting-point. That light is cast about: one collects facts, one observes things and happenings and then proceeds to find out a general ...
... of these accused persons without as much as glancing at what was happening around them, were absorbed in reading novels of Bankim Chandra, Vivekananda’s Raja Yoga or Science of Religions or European Philosophy. * Looking at these lads… one felt as if the liberal, daring, puissant men of an earlier age with a different training had come back to India. That fearless and innocent look in their eyes... Upanishads, the works of Vivekananda, the life and conversations of Ramakrishna, the Puranas, hymns, spiritual songs, etc. Among other volumes were the works of Bankim, patriotic songs, books on European philosophy, history and literature. A few of the men practised spiritual disciplines in the morning, some used to read books, still others to chat quietly. Occasionally there were roars of laughter in the ...
... & hammered into philosophic form. It is the reason of the Vedanta's surprising vitality, of the extent to which it enters and the potency with which it governs Indian life, in a way that no European philosophy except recently the Evolutionary has entered into or governed the life of the West. The European metaphysician has something in him of the pedagogue, something indeed of the mechanic, at least ...
... fascinated by a man who is so much at home in a hundred matters — bringing to each a penetrating word. Among the letters, those treating of poetic values, Frank Harris and Shaw, Anatole France, European philosophy, art and spirituality, the inner meaning of the war with Hitler are perhaps the finest. If not anything else, Among the Great is worth buying for these discourses. Roy is nothing ...
... European writers, even in standard textbooks like Alfred Weber's History of Philosophy, 1 there is no mention of any of the Indian philosophies. To the Western writer philosophy means only European philosophy—they begin with the Greek Thales and Anaximander, as if human thinking began with them. That is the old style European mind. It used to be the same in Art and other matters. Now Chinese ...
... Later, in India, I read a book on Bergson, but that too ran off "like water from a duck's back". I remembered very little of what I had read and absorbed nothing. German metaphysics and most European philosophy since the Greeks seemed to me a mass of abstractions with nothing concrete or real that could be firmly grasped and written in a metaphysical jargon to which I had not the key. I tried once a ...
... not be too logical! it's a fall. The creation is a fall. And that's why they are far more easily convinced by Buddhism. I saw this particularly with Richard, whose education was entirely in European philosophy, with Christian and positivist influences; under these two influences, when he came into contact with Theon's 'cosmic philosophy' and later Sri Aurobindo's revelation, he immediately explained ...
... fascinated by a man who is so much at home in a hundred matters - bringing to each a penetrating word. Among the letters, those treating of poetic values, Frank Harris and Shaw, Anatole France, European philosophy, art and spirituality, the inner meaning of the war with Hitler are perhaps the finest. If not anything else, "Among the Great" is worth buying for these discourses. Roy is nothing but ...
... accused persons without as much as glancing at what was happening around them, were absorbed in reading the novels of Bankim Chandra, Vivekananda's Raja Yoga, or the Gita, the Puranas, or European Philosophy.' At last the trial drew to a close. Had it not been for Sri Aurobindo, the case would have been over long ago, for he was the one person, more than any other, whom the Prosecution was anxious ...
... A told me that Kant changed his mind later in life and admitted the necessity of faith with which he deals in his "Critique of practical reason." Sri Aurobindo : I have not read European philosophy carefully. Page 235 Disciple : Moreover, it does not interest us so much as there is no practical side to their philosophy. Sri Aurobindo : That was X's great ...
... reason cannot be enduring. If Purana & Veda cannot be rehabilitated, it is yet possible that our religion driven out of the soul into the intellect may wither away into the dry intellectuality of European philosophy or the dead formality & lifeless clarity of European Theism. It behoves us therefore to test our faith by a careful examination into the meaning of Purana & Veda and into the foundation of that ...
... birth that which is loosed forth, self-created, is the self-conscious !4.7! self-existent being, ātmānam ; for the Vedantic distinction between ātmā and bhūtāni is that which is made in European philosophy between the Being and its becomings. In both cases Maya is the means of the creation or manifestation, but in the divine birth it is by self-Maya, ātmamāyayā , not the involution in the lower ...
... it has been rather busy with the restatement of its past gains than with any new statement which would visibly and rapidly enlarge the boundaries of its thought and aspiration. The contact of European philosophy has not been fruitful of any creative reaction; first because the Page 26 past philosophies of Europe have very little that could be of any utility in this direction, nothing of the ...
... on the nature of his being, the principles of his psychology, his relations with the world and with God, the fixed lines or the great possibilities of his destiny. It is the weakness of most European philosophy—not the ancient—that it lives too much in the clouds and seeks after pure metaphysical truth too exclusively for its own sake; therefore it has been a little barren because much too indirect ...
... ‘Rishi’ Rajnarain Bose (1826-99), was one of the foremost Bengalis of his time. Exposure to Western rationalism caused him to lose faith in Hinduism, and he sought in Islam, Christianity and European philosophy a new synthetic framework for his beliefs. Like many other members of his generation, he discarded the ethical as well as the intellectual standards of his native culture and participated in ...
... view. PURANI: Kant, it seems, changed his mind in later life and admitted the necessity of Faith, which he deals with in his Critique of Practical Reason . SRI AUROBINDO: I haven't read European philosophy carefully. PURANI: Besides, it doesn't interest us, as it has no practical bearing. SRI AUROBINDO: That was Arjava's great complaint, that here people always want something practical. They ...
... much as glancing at what was happening around them, were absorbed in reading the novels of Bankimchandra, Vivekananda's Raja Yoga or Science of Religions, or the Gita, the Puranas, or European Philosophy. 32 As for the way Sri Aurobindo's unruffled demeanour struck the boys, we have the testimony of one of them, Upendranath Bandopadhyaya, as recorded in his book of reminiscences in Bengali: ...
... commented, "I made in fact no study of metaphysics in my school and College days. What little I knew about philosophy I picked up desultorily in my general reading.... German metaphysics and most European philosophy since the Greeks seemed to me a mass of abstractions with nothing concrete or real that could be firmly grasped, and written in a metaphysical jargon to which I had not the key. ... In sum, my ...
... natural attraction to Indian culture and ways of life and a temperamental feeling and preference for all that was Indian," as Sri Aurobindo put it. Incidentally, he who was left indifferent by European philosophy, was profoundly stirred by the Indian. "The first Indian writings that took hold of me were the Upanishads and these raised in me strong enthusiasm . . ." And he repeated, "I remember when I ...
... statement of an attitude common to the average European turn of thinking which is inherently a positivist attitude. Philosophy has been pursued in Europe with great and noble intellectual results by the highest minds, but very much as a pursuit apart from life, a thing high and splendid, but ineffective. It is remarkable that while in India and China philosophy has seized hold on life, has had an enormous... and philosophy or oscillates between irrational Page 115 belief and a troubled or else a self-confident scepticism. In Europe philosophy has been sometimes the handmaid—not the sister—of religion; but more often it has turned its back on religious belief in hostility or in a disdainful separation. The war between religion and science has been almost the leading phenomenon of European culture... but it is a mere nothing compared with the effective power of Asiatic philosophy. The average European draws his guiding views not from the philosophic, but from the positive and practical reason. He does not absolutely disdain philosophy like Mr. Archer, but he considers it, if not a "man-made illusion", yet a rather nebulous, remote and ineffective kind of occupation. He honours the philosophers, but ...
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