... The Human Cycle A League of Nations Ancient tradition believed in a golden age of mankind which lay in the splendid infancy of a primeval past; it looked back to some type or symbol of original perfection, Saturnian epoch, Satya Yuga, an age of sincere being and free unity when the sons of heaven were leaders of the human life and mind and the law of God... is good news, if true. Still, before we enter the house of thanksgiving, let us pause a little and cast an eye of scrutiny on this new infant phenomenon. A just, generous, cordial and valid League of nations is the thing which has been created, it seems, to replace the old unjust Balances of Power and stumbling, quarrelsome Concerts. And if it is to succeed better than the loose, ineffective and easily... rather buried than given a body. And that will depend on the extent to which the conditions already suggested are realised or evolvable from the league's incipient constitution. An effective League of Nations must draw into itself all the existing nations of mankind; for any considerable omission or exclusion will bring in almost inevitably an element of future danger, of possible disagreements and ...
... consideration but had not yet been given a concrete and practical form; but this had to come and eventually a momentous beginning was made. It took the name and appearance of what was called a League of Nations. It was not happy in its conception, well-inspired in its formation or destined to any considerable longevity or a supremely successful career. But that such an organised endeavour should be launched... destructive possibilities which could easily prepare the collapse of civilisation and perhaps eventually something even that could be described as the suicide of the human race. Accordingly, the League of Nations disappeared but was replaced by the United Nations Organisation which now stands in the forefront of the world and struggles towards some kind of secure permanence and success in the great and... towards the beginning of an attempt at union and the practical formation of a concrete body, an organised instrument with that object: rather they have caused and hastened this new creation. The League of Nations came into being as a direct consequence of the first war, the U.N.O. similarly as a consequence of the second world-wide conflict. If the third war which is regarded by many if not by most as ...
... rivalries among nations dominated the scene; two stupendous world devastating Wars swept over the globe and they were accompanied or followed by revolutions with far reaching consequences. A League of Nations was formed, but broke down after some time; the United Nations Organisation came to be built, but its deficiencies and weaknesses are forcing leaders to think of radical changes in its Constitution... into something more than an idea so that it may become a central motive and fixed part of human nature as also of human organisation. It is remarkable that the First Great War gave birth to a League of Nations. It is true that the conception of this League was not happy or well inspired, and it was destined to collapse. But that such an organised endeavour should be launched and proceed on its way for... ill success of this venture a natural consequence. However, the significance of the League was that even when it failed , it could not be allowed to remain without a sequel. Accordingly, the League of Nations disappeared, but the force of idea remained active behind the succeeding years, including the terrible years of the Second World War. That War stirred the deeper depths of humanity and its ...
... Nevertheless it became more and more obvious that the League of Nations was powerless, as the governments' main concern "was not to solve the actual problems but to safeguard, their own interest". In 1923, Monnet's family asked him to come back to Cognac as the firm was in great difficulty. He resigned from his post at the League of Nations. He modernized the enterprise, and after a few years its... provided Monnet with yet another experience. The young man had been remarked for his role in the creation and functioning of inter-allied organizations. He was then chosen as Deputy to the League of Nations' Secretary General, Sir Eric Drummond. He set out to work on finding solutions to some problems (the question of Silesia, a region disputed by Poland and Germany, a financial package for Austria ...
... The Ideal of Human Unity - II The Human Cycle Chapter XXIX The Idea of a League of Nations The only means that readily suggests itself by which a necessary group-freedom can be preserved and yet the unification of the human race achieved, is to strive not towards a closely organised World-State, but towards a free, elastic and progressive world-union... imperialism, foreign or American, has to be regarded as a mortal peril. As a result and as the result of its inevitable amalgamation with that much more qualified aim of the Allied Powers, a League of Nations was bound to have both an opportunist and an idealistic element. The opportunist element was bound to take in its first form the legalisation of the map and political formation of the world as... emergence of a United States of the world with a democratic Congress of the nations as its governing agency. The legalisation might have the good effect of minimising the chances of war, if a real League of Nations proved practicable and succeeded,—even under the best conditions by no means a foregone conclusion. 4 But it would have the bad effect of tending to stereotype a state of things which must ...
... to pay at least a verbal homage. The idea of international unity to which this intervention of the revived force of nationality is leading, takes the form of a so-called League of Nations. Practically, however, the League of Nations under present conditions or any likely to be immediately realised would still mean the control of the earth by a few great Powers,—a control that would be checked only by... majority in each country, the party might control Europe. It might create counterparts of itself in all the American republics and in Asiatic countries. It might by using the machinery of the League of Nations or, where necessary, by physical force or economic or other pressure persuade or compel all the nations into some more stringent system of international unification. A World-State or else a close ...
... 'self-determination' (and he has been amply justified by future events), neither was he impressed by the mountainous labour that was then in progress in the act of producing the mouse of the League of Nations. He has no difficulty in exposing the paltry insufficiency of its aims and the total inadequacy of its means: its selective and its oligarchic character: its shameful compromise with the bigger... that "salvation for individual or community comes not by the Law but by the Spirit". 63 Pending such a radical' spiritual solution to the world's ills, even so imperfect an instrument like the League of Nations might serve humanity's "turn for practice and for a far-off expectation". 64 Finally, in an article in the Arya after the war, Sri Aurobindo took a quick backward glance as well as a sharp... Mammon seated between the guardian figures of Intelligence and Science"), the half-headed peace of Versailles that was but a prolongation of the war, and the feeble and mutilated hope of the League of Nations; but the end of the affair was indicated by none of these, but would be a denouement yet to be played out and concluded: Meanwhile much is gone that had to go, though relics and dregs ...
... comes to us with the appearance of one of the most pregnant and historic dates of the modern world. It has ended the greatest war in history, begotten a new thing in the history of mankind, a League of Nations which claims to be the foundation-stone for the future united life of the human race, and cleared the stage for fresh and momentous other constructions or destructions, which will bring us into... of idealism. The peace which closes the war is evidently in part a prolongation of the past and a thing of the moment, its only importance for the future is its association with the plan for a league of nations. But this league also is a makeshift, a temporary device awaiting the possibility of a more perfect formation. Its insecurity lies in the degree to which it is a concession to the past and founded ...
... × Afterwards realised as the League of Nations. × Some first beginnings of this kind of activity were trying to appear in the activities of the now almost moribund League of Nations. These activities were still only platonic and advisory as in its futile ...
... the early months of the war, two others when it was closing, the last recently during the formation and first operations of that remarkably ill-jointed, stumbling and hesitating machine, the League of Nations. But still they happen to be bound together by a common idea or at least look at four related subjects from a single general standpoint,—the obvious but practically quite forgotten truth that... things are being worked out in the old way with a new name or at the most with some halting change and partial improvement of the method. The botched constitution and limping action of the League of Nations is the result of this ancient manoeuvre. The League has been got into being by sacrificing the principles which governed the idea behind its inception. The one thing that has been gained is a ...
... are they being exported. SATYENDRA: Luckily not. Neither is the British Army large enough in India to consume more. Somebody said that Russia had been threatened with expulsion from the League of Nations. SRI AUROBINDO: Yes, Uruguay made the threat. Now Paraguay should bring in a resolution to expel England and France. I wonder why the League exists at all. PURANI: Herbert was very enthusiastic... d an International Labour Department. SRI AUROBINDO: Labouring over nothing! PURANI: It has gathered a good deal of information. SRI AUROBINDO: Then it may be called, instead of the League of Nations, the League of Informations. EVENING As usual Purani entered with a strong military step and took a few deep breaths looking at Sri Aurobindo. Champaklal and Nirodbaran were stealing a smile ...
... may ultimately result in a possible form of unification. This sentiment is a cosmopolitan and international sentiment. At one stage, it came to be presented concretely in the conception of the League of Nations. As Sri Aurobindo points out, this Page 130 conception was not well inspired in its form or destined to have a considerable longevity or a supremely successful career. But the very... capital importance and meant the ushering in of a new era in world history. Sri Aurobindo points out that even though it failed, it could not be allowed to remain without a sequel. Accordingly, the League of Nations was replaced by the United Nations Organisation which now stands in the forefront of the world and struggles towards some kind of secure permanence and success in the great far reaching endeavour ...
... applauded the foundation of the United Nations, although he was very much conscious of the shortcomings of the organization just like he had been of those of its predecessor, the League of Nations. ‘The League of Nations disappeared but was replaced by the United Nations Organisation which now stands in the forefront of the world and struggles towards some kind of secure permanence and success in the ...
... federal, or a confederacy or a coalition he must arrive at in the end; no smaller or looser expedient would adequately serve the purpose.” 76 “An authority of this nature [then the League of Nations, now the United Nations] would have to command the psychological assent of mankind, exercise a moral force upon the nations greater than that of their own national authority and compel more readily ...
... Sahid Suhrawardy, a Bengali poet and Dilip's friend. He graduated from the Calcutta University with honours in 1910 and from Oxford in 1914. He became secretary to the artistic section of the League of Nations. Later on he became Nizam professor of Indian Studies at Vishwa Bharati, then Bageswari professor of Comparative Arts at Calcutta University. He gave brilliant lectures from 1923 to 1943. After ...
... Bengali poet and a cultured man, was Dilip's friend. He graduated from the Calcutta University with honors in 1910 and from Oxford in 1914. He became secretary to the Artistic section of the League of Nations. Later on he became Nizam Professor of Indian Studies at Vishvabharati, and then Bageswari Professor of Comparative Arts at Calcutta University. He gave brilliant lectures from 1923 to 1943. After ...
... three sisters were overwhelmed, excited, talkative, etc., in great joy while eating the puffed rice (murij + mustard oil. Jean Herbert (1897-1980)—a Swiss national working in the League of Nations. He was translating Sri Aurobindo's The Life Divine into French with a team of translators. My heart is far from overflowing compassion for people who approach the Divine only when ...
... creation of some international system more and more imperative if modern civilisation is not to collapse in bloodshed and chaos. The result of this necessity has been first the creation of the League of Nations and afterwards the U.N.O.: neither has proved very satisfactory from the political point of view, but henceforward the existence of some such arranged centre of order has become very evidently ...
... these ideas and habits with very little or no modification. × The subsequent history of the League of Nations, which had not been formed at the time of writing, has amply proved the inefficacy of these devices. ...
... (September 1918), "The Unseen Power" (December 1918), "1919" (July 1919) and "After the War" (August 1920). In 1920 the first three of these, along with a Foreword and a newly written essay, "The League of Nations", were brought out as a book by S. R. Murthy & Co., Madras. A second edition was published by Sarojini Ghose (Sri Aurobindo's sister) in 1922. Sri Aurobindo dictated a few scattered revisions ...
... form some sort of a system; it need not be a rigid system. If the small neutrals find that it is workable they may join. It has to be some sort of a federation but not the bungle and mess of the League of Nations. EVENING The radio reported that the Germans have advanced through a gap in the British position. PURANI: So they left a gap for the Germans. SRI AUROBINDO ( laughing ): Yes, what ...
... War (World War No. I) was crucial in many ways in the life of humanity. It opened a new direction of man's growth, opened and then closed also apparently. I am referring to the tragedy of the League of Nations. That was an attempt on the part of man (and Nature) to lift the inner life and consciousness to the level of the outer achievements. The attempt failed. Man could not rise to the height demanded ...
... evolve a higher and larger unit of collective life. It was not yet the nation, but an intermediary stage something like a League of clans, (as we in our day are trying another higher stage in the League of Nations). The Rajasuya celebrates the establishment of this New Order of a larger, a greater human organisation, Dharmarajya, as it was called. Page 80 We have just passed through another ...
... violent attempt at this greater aggregation. The Commonwealth of more recent times was a conscious, deliberate and healthier endeavour towards the same goal. The various trials with regard to a league of nations is also a conscious and deliberate, although somewhat groping experiment in the same line. Man's attempt to surpass himself and establish a superhuman race is a conscious and deliberate ...
... Koran, the, 70 Korea, 209 Kosala,91 Kurukshetra, 80,81 LAERTES, 188 Lamarck, 254 Lao-tse, 242 Laplace, 225, 312, 319, 388 League of Nations, 78, 80, 85 Leibnitz, 327 Lenin, 125 Leo X, 207 Leonardo da Vinci, 120 Lewis, Cecil Day, 195 Louis XIV, 207 Lucifer, 267 MACBETH ...
... that India's contribution to the World War should be rewarded with some political progress. At the same time the Russian Revolution and President Wilson's suggestion for the formation of the League of Nations gave added momentum to the demand for Home Rule. The British Government reacted in typical fashion - stern handling and Page 87 suppression of the movement terming it ...
... be a check on unjust dealings among the nations, there had to come into being a Society of Nations where the representatives of all the nations could meet. This is what came to be known as the League of Nations. The unity of the human race was to be founded on a complex harmony of the diverse groups of men. The ideal now was to create a race of men endowed with the highest gifts of education and training ...
... 31 unit that human collectivity could admit without the risk of a break-up. Now it was at this momentous epoch that the first concept or shape of a larger federation—typified in the League of Nations—stirred into life and began to demand its lebensraum. It could not however come to fruition and stability, because the age of isolated nationhood had not yet passed and the principle of sel ...
... War (World War No. I) was crucial in many ways in the life of humanity. It opened a new direction of man's growth, opened and then closed also apparently. I am referring to the tragedy of the League of Nations. That was an attempt Page 21 on the part of man (and Nature) to lift the inner life and consciousness to the level of the outer achievements. The attempt failed. Man could not ...
... Foreign Affairs in France that all humanity is one family and that the different nationalities are its branches. 84 He was a champion of the unity of mankind, and envisaged something like a League of Nations, long before any such idea had struck anybody. He espoused the cause of the peasants in India and fought valiantly for the freedom of the Press. Max Miiller calls Ram Mohan the father of ...
... Afterwards he himself recanted his avatarhood when the shooting affair took place. He has an idea of establishing world peace by bringing all nations together. He can say that he established the League of Nations and somebody else has disestablished it. Disciple : He used to keep nothing for the morrow in his organization – he depended entirely on Divine Grace. Sri Aurobindo : Yes, ...
... The First Edition contained three essays from the Arya : "The Passing of War" (April 1916), "The Unseen Power"(December 1918), "Self-Determination "(September 1918); and a fourth, "A League of Nations", written especially for the volume, with a foreword. In the Third Edition another Arya essay, "After the War" (August 1920), which had been issued in pamphlet form in 1949 (See 1), was ...
... coming Satyayuga 128 pitfalls of revolutionary Indian movements 151-2 Dr Okhawa's process of cure 176 Page 920 the 'Secret of Secrets' 197 the Way of the Bhakta 197 League of Nations 216 India's salvation and mission 200, 216 the Power guiding her 458 significance of his birthday 232 the world of the Gods 232 founding his Ashram 240, 247-8, 251 (cf200, 204 ...
... only the increasing community of political movements and the now total economic interdependence of the whole of Europe that has at last created not any unity, but a nascent and still ineffective League of Nations struggling vainly to apply the mentality born of an agelong separatism to the common interests of the European peoples. But in India at a very early time the spiritual and cultural unity was made ...
... Europe of yet unaccomplished spiritual, intellectual and material revolutions. 2 Page 436 × The League of Nations started with some dim ideal of this kind; but even its first halting attempts at opposing imperial egoisms ended in secession and avoided a civil war among its members only by drawing back from ...
... begun to follow the same trend under the disguise or the mere profession of its opposite. × The League of Nations was at no time a contrary sign. Whatever incidental or temporary good it might achieve, it could only be an instrument for the domination of the rest of the earth by Europe and of all by two or ...
... is a name of the past, the Empire of the Hohenzollerns has disappeared like a dream of the night, all Europe between the Rhine and the Volga is republican. Finally, most important of all, the League of Nations has now been decided upon, the American idea having triumphed at least in principle, and is in travail of formation. But the main suggestions put forward in the book remain unaffected, or rather ...
... impracticable absurdities might take the place of a living truth. × The inclusion of India in the League of Nations has evidently been an arrangement of this type. ...
... and universal Spirit. Page 62 × No longer perhaps now, except with a dwindling minority—now that the League of Nations, constantly misused or hampered from its true functioning by the egoism and insincerity of its greater members, has collapsed into impotence and failure. ...
... that followed it which alone prevents as yet another vast and sanguinary struggle. The new fair and peaceful world-order that was promised us has gone far away into the land of chimeras. The League of Nations that was to have embodied it hardly even exists or exists only as a mockery and a byword. It is an ornamental, a quite helpless and otiose appendage to the Supreme Council, at present only a lank ...
... sayings during the years 1932-34. He was a rich landowner and a cultured man who had become the National Socialist president of the Senate of Danzig, then a “free city” under the protection of the League of Nations. Rauschning’s written memoirs of a few conversations with Hitler and of thoughts he heard Hitler express have been attacked by such authors as Theodor Schieder in 1972 and Wolfgang Hänel in 1983 ...
... having the greater share. With technological advance the killing spree became exponentially geometrical. It was unbridled licence to kill. Their acts are too well known for us to repeat here. A League of Nations was set up to stop aggression but the horrific devastation of WWI was still too vivid, and Western leaders preferred compromise and appeasement to confronting the agressors. 1936-1937 were ...
... rivalries among nations dominated the scene. Two stupendous world- devastating wars swept over the globe and they were accompanied or followed by revolutions with far-reaching consequences. A League of Nations was formed, but broke down after some time; the UNO came to be built, but its deficiencies and Page 17 weaknesses are forcing leaders to think of radical changes in its Constitution ...
... Germany has to pay large sums ($32 billion) to the European victors. As these victors themselves owe big amounts to the USA, they are dependent on these reparations. 1921 —First session of the League of Nations in Geneva. 1925 — Chiang Kai-Shek succeeds Sun Yat-Sen to the leadership of the Kuomintang and leads the Nationalist government in Nanjing. 1929 — Chiang Kai-Shek terminates the treaties granting ...
... a check on unjust dealings among the nations, there had to come into being a Society of Nations where the representatives of all the nations could meet. This is what came to be known as the League of Nations. The unity of the human race was to be founded on a complex harmony of the diverse groups of men. The ideal now was to create a race of men endowed with the highest gifts of education and ...
... evolve a higher and larger unit of collective life. It was not yet the nation, but an intermediary stage something like a League of clans, (as we in our day are trying another higher stage in the League of Nations). The Rajasuya celebrates the establishment of this New Order of a larger, a greater human organisation, Dharmarajya, as it was called. We have just passed through another, a far greater ...
... largest living unit that human collectivity could admit without the risk of a break-up. Now it was at this momentous epoch that the first concept or shape of a larger federation-typified in the League of Nations-stirred into life and began to demand its lebensraum. It could not however come to fruition and stability, because the age of isolated nationhood had not yet passed and the principle of ...
... things up easily. They have nobody to oppose them or say "No" to their demands. Once a country is involved in war, economic factors don't count very much. For instance, Italy was badly hit by the League of Nations when they applied sanctions in the Abyssinian War. But she persisted and carried the war through. PURANI: And what has happened to the military power of France? We used to hear so much about ...
... machinery but change in consciousness, 487; the world crisis, 488; the sutradhara behind, 488; the Russian revolution, 488; Asiatic resurgence, 488; "half-truth" of self-determination, 489; League of Nations, 489; retrospect and prospect, 489 Waste Land, The, 10, 114,294, 535 Wedgewood, Colonel, 530 Wells, H.G., 511 Whitehead, A. N., 441 Whitman, Walt, 78 ...
... ideal of human unity also to be realised on truly spiritual foundations, instead of being sought to be realised (as they now are) through mechanical or semi-legalistic organisations like the old League of Nations or the present United Nations. "Human society", Sri Aurobindo writes, "progresses really and vitally in proportion as law becomes the child of freedom; it will reach its perfection when, man having ...
... 16 Further, writing under the title "1919" in the July 1919 issue of the Arya , Sri Aurobindo felt unhappy that the peace seemed to be "in part a prolongation" of the War, and that even the League of Nations looked like a mere makeshift. On the other hand, there were some hopeful strands as well: a move away "from plutocracy and middle-class democracy to some completeness of socialism and attempt ...
... for Thy Victory, may see the true and genuine results of that victory realised in the world. 10 The United Nations Organisation was being brought into existence, but this too - like the League of Nations after the First World War - was only a concert of the victorious powers. Already USA and USSR were enacting confrontation and carving out spheres of influence. The world was getting divided again ...
... lacking the psychological basis. They were cruds attempts, the first serious and conscious attempt for establishing unity of mankind was made after the first World-War and it to ok the form of the League of Nations. Its constitution and procedure lacked all the elements necessary to bring about real international unity. It insisted on unanimity as a rule which reduced its power of effective action and as ...
... the Peace Conference, the devilish flourish of the weapons of blockade and reparations, the brandishing of words like "war guilt" and "self-determination", and the culminating mockery of the League of Nations. In India, the first faint hopes of self-government had been blasted by the statutory hypocrisy of "dyarchy" in the Provinces and leonine bureaucracy at the Centre, provoking a new tidal wave ...
... against the despotic authority that rules them, can alone help the progress of peaceful reforms in their administration. This was of course written long before the establishment of the League of Nations and of the United Nations Organisation, after the first and second world wars respectively. Sri Aurobindo must have been in favour of such attempts to put down war by international agreement ...
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