... the present. For to the material man the living progressive thinker is an ideologue, dreamer or madman. The old Semites who stoned the living prophets and adored their memories when dead, were the very incarnation of this instinctive and unintelligent principle in Nature. In the ancient Indian distinction between the once born and the twice born, it is to this material man that the former description... approach nearer to the attainment of its supreme personalities. It follows that the object of the material life must be to fulfil, above all things, the vital aim of Nature. The whole aim of the material man is to live, to pass from birth to death with as much comfort or enjoyment as may be on the way, but anyhow to live. He can subordinate this aim, but only to physical Nature's other instincts, the... his dangerous freedom. So he may even serve as a human lightning-rod receiving the electricity of the Spirit and turning it away from the social edifice. Nevertheless it is possible to make the material man and his life moderately progressive by imprinting on the material mind the custom of progress, the habit of conscious change, the fixed idea of progression as a law of life. The creation by this ...
... body is the fulfilment of the tamasic or material man. The realisation of God in self with the eye on the antahkaran or heart and mind is the fulfilment of the rajasic or psychic man. The realisation of God in self with the eye on the spirit is the fulfilment of the sattwic or spiritual man. And each fulfils himself by rising beyond himself. When the material man fulfils Page 503 the divinity... , the Sa and the Tat, God revealed and unrevealed, the Universal and Supreme Spirit who supports and contains the individual. To put it in language easier but more capable of misconception, the material man realises himself by identifying God with his own ego; the psychical man by identifying God with passionless, intelligent, blissful Will in himself; the spiritual man by identifying God with the ...
... this is perhaps a necessary stage of man's development. This was one principal reason of the failure of past attempts to spiritualise mankind, that they endeavoured to spiritualise at once the material man by a sort of rapid miracle, and though that can be done, the miracle is not likely to be of an enduring character if it overleaps the stages of his ascent and leaves the intervening levels untrodden... instruments, loses the spirit and perishes quickly or decays slowly. That is the fate which overtakes all attempts of the vitalistic, the intellectual and mental, the spiritual endeavour to deal with material man through his physical mind chiefly or alone; the endeavour is overpowered by the machinery it creates and becomes the slave and victim of the machine. That is the revenge which our material Nature ...
... you verify or test your experience by physical or objective experience. For instance you see a man. You want to know what he is, what he thinks and what he does. How does the scientist or the material man do it? He watches the man, he notes what he says, what are his expressions of speech and face, what are his actions, what sort of people he lives with, etc. All this is objective. Then he reasons... to be sure that his conclusions are correct or anything indeed correct in his thought, except the actual observation, perceptions of his eye, ear, nose, touch, and taste. Anything beyond this the material man distrusts. Nothing is true to him except what he observes with his senses or what agrees with his sensory perceptions. Now what does the Yogin do? He simply puts himself into relation with the ...
... worship of the ego and its vehement acquisitive self-will and tireless self-regarding intellect is the gospel of the Asura and it can lead only to some gigantic ruin and perdition. The vital and material man must accept for his government a religious and social and ideal dharma by which, while satisfying desire and interest under right restrictions, he can train and subdue his lower personality and ...
... purposes of the inhabitant, less blindly material in their responses, more conscious of the act and aim of the inner movements and powers which use them and which they are wrongly supposed by the material man in us to generate and to use. The brain would be a channel of communication of the form of the thoughts and a battery of their insistence on the body and the outside world where they could then ...
... environing influence. Develop this power of inner sense and all that it brings you. These first seeings are only an outer fringe—behind lie whole worlds of experience which fill what seems to the material man the gap (your Russell's inner void) between the earth-consciousness and the Eternal and Infinite. P. S. I remember when I first began to see inwardly (and outwardly also with the open eye) ...
... of God's immediate purpose and a step towards ultimate victory, grief and pain as concealed and perverse forms of pleasure. A stage arrives even, when physical pain itself, the hardest thing for material man to bear, changes its nature in experience and becomes physical ananda; but this is only at the end when this human being, imprisoned in matter, subjected to mind, emerges from his subjection, conquers ...
... religion is incapable of supplying. "Through our Yoga," Sri Aurobindo wrote, "we propose nothing less than to break totally the past and present formations which make up the ordinary mental and material man and create a new centre of vision, a new universe of activities in ourselves, which will form a divine humanity or a superhuman nature." This is not an "idea" but an experience to be lived , which ...
... importance. Develop this power of inner sense and all that it brings you. These first seeings are only an outer fringe—behind lie whole worlds of experience which fill what seems to the material Page 90 man the gap (your Russell's inner void) between the earth-consciousness and the Eternal and Infinite. The Importance of Visions All visions have a significance of one kind or another ...
... psychic, ethical and economic order—of the Brahmin, Kshatriya, Vaishya and Shudra,—practically, the spiritual and intellectual man, the dynamic man of will, the vital, hedonistic and economic man, the material man; the whole society organised in these four constituent classes represented the complete image of the creative and active Godhead. A different division of the typal society is quite possible. ...
... lower grades of being as one ascends. One may thus work out a comprehensive process of self-development by a sort of inclusive process of self-enlargement and transformation. The evolution of the material man into the vital man, from the vital man into the mental man, from the mental man into the supramental man and from that stage into the divine man, daivyam janam, to use the Vedic term Page 22 ...
... August 29, 1914 What would be the use of man if he were not created to throw a bridge between That which is eternally but is unmanifested and that which is manifested, between all the transcendences and splendours of the divine life and all the dark and sorrowful ignorance of the material world? Man is the link between What must be and what is; he is the footbridge thrown ...
... ascending from the inconscience of material substance to the infinite self-consciousness of spiritual. But all these principles are interconnected.Matter contains all of them and evolves them out of itself in obedience to the constant pressure of the higher worlds, an evolution which must continue until they are able to express themselves fully in the material principle.—Man is the fit instrument for this... and an increasing subtlety, flexibility, power of assimilation, interchange, transmutation, unification.—There is such an ascending scale from the dense to the subtle even in material substance and beyond the subtlest material essence we have grades of other substance corresponding to the series of Matter, Life, Mind, Supermind and Spirit. Each, that is to say, is the basis of a world or other kind... from the Arya (1914-1921) Other Writings from the Arya Essays in Philosophy and Yoga Chapter XXVI The Ascending Series of Substance Argument The materiality of Matter consists in a concentration of the density of substance and its resistance to the conscious-force of which through sense it becomes the object. An ascending scale of substance from Matter ...
... senses is only the material shell of cosmic existence and what is obvious in our superficial mentality is only the margin of immense continents which lie behind unexplored. To explore them must be the work of another knowledge than that of physical science or of a superficial psychology. Religion is the first attempt of man to get beyond himself and beyond the obvious and material facts of his existence... ces of our being used by the Mind-soul which we now are for the execution of its lower purposes that belong to the material existence. Here too we acquire at first a certain remoteness from the life and the body and our real life seems to be on quite another plane than material man's, in contact with a subtler existence, a greater light of knowledge than the terrestrial, a far rarer and yet more sovereign... says the Upanishad, a fivefold soul in man and the world, the microcosm and the macrocosm. The physical soul, self or being,—Purusha, Atman,—is that of which we are all at first conscious, a self which seems to have hardly any existence apart from the body and no action vital or even mental independent of it. This physical soul is present everywhere in material Nature; it pervades the body, actuates ...
... be perfectly calm and at ease witnessing the catastrophies and cataclysms in nature, for one knows it is the dharma of material nature. Man terms them disasters for he judges them according to his own convenience. Even so, one should not be perturbed at the wild behaviour–man calls it wild – of wild animals. Likewise the gods in their sovereign tranquillity smile at the crudeness and stupidities... of growing states or status of being. There is a higher and lower level in point of the measure of consciousness but that involves no moral judgement: the moral judgement is man's; it is Page 289 man's, one might almost say, idiosyncracy, that is to say, a notion that is a prop to help him mount the ladder. Though it might be necessary at a certain stage, in certain circumstances... 287 is not in its right place. Even things considered reprehensible by the moral sense are not so when they are viewed from another standpoint. The moral consciousness seeks to rescue man from the animal consciousness. Its effort is to be delivered from the inferior vital instincts and rise to something higher, genuinely human. It does that or tries to do that by cultivating a feeling ...
... can be perfectly calm and at ease witnessing the catastrophies and cataclysms in nature, for one knows it is the dharma of material nature. Man terms them disasters for he judges them according to his own convenience. Even so, one should not be perturbed at the wild behaviour—man calls it wild—of wild animals. Likewise the gods in their sovereign tranquillity smile at the crudeness and stupidities of... ess, of growing states or status of being. There is a higher and lower level in point of the measure of consciousness but that involves no moral judgement: the moral judgement is man's; it is Page 154 man's, one might almost say, idiosyncracy, that is to say, a notion that is a prop to help him mount the ladder. Though it might be necessary at a certain stage, in certain circumstances... is not in its right place. Even things considered reprehensible by the moral sense are not so when they are viewed from another standpoint. The moral consciousness seeks to rescue man from the animal consciousness. Its effort is to be delivered from the inferior vital instincts and rise to something higher, genuinely human. It does that or tries to do that by cultivating a feeling ...
... can be perfectly calm and at ease witnessing the catastrophies and cataclysms in nature, for one knows it is the dharma of material nature. Man terms them disasters for he judges them according to his own convenience. Even so, one should not be perturbed at the wild behaviour—man calls it wild—of wild animals. Likewise the gods in their sovereign tranquillity smile Page 168 at the crudeness... developing consciousness, of growing states or status of being. There is a higher and lower level in point of the measure of consciousness but that involves no moral judgement: the moral judgement is man's; it is man's, one might almost say, idiosyncracy, that is to say, a notion that is a prop to help him mount the ladder. Though it might be necessary at a certain stage, in certain circumstances, it is not... because it is not in its right place. Even things considered reprehensible by the moral sense are not so when they are viewed from another standpoint. The moral consciousness seeks to rescue man from the animal consciousness. Its effort is to be delivered from the inferior vital instincts and rise to something higher, genuinely human. It does that or tries to do that by cultivating a feeling ...
... philosophy with the philosophy of Sankhya. Modern science denies that man has a soul. Science considers only the laws of nature. It regards nature as material, and man as merely a product of nature. It says man is a creation of natural forces. All his actions are results of fixed laws, and he has no freedom. According to the Sankhya, man has a soul and is essentially the Purusha Page 48 and... effected in the material world. Whatever happens, it happens for the best. I now give you my knowledge, the key to yoga . I remove the veil of ignorance from you. I give you the meaning of yoga ." In the Gita Srikrishna gives certain rules by which a man may hold communion with God. The Gita says that man is not a bundle of outward cares and griefs, of things that do not last. Man is a garment which... and changing, and under her influence all actions take place. Prakriti acts. Man can only free himself by recognising that he is the Purusha. Srikrishna adopts this theory of Sankhya in the Gita, and he also adopts the philosophy of Vedanta. He says that man has an immortal soul, but there is also a universal soul. Man is merely part of God. He is merely a part of something that is eternal, infinite ...
... orce in material body. Man is a transitional being, and the spiritual man is the sign of the new evolution. The intention of Nature in the evolution of the spiritual man is not merely to awaken him to the supreme Reality and release him from herself. There is a further intention—not only a revelation of the Spirit but a radical and integral transformation of Nature. The spiritual man has evolved... found that evolution tends towards unification. According to him, all energy is essentially psychic. In his book The Phenomenon of Man, he conceives for man a superhuman future and presents a transcendental vision of omega-workings. Evolution is pushing man towards a higher goal, an omega point, which can be described as collective divinity. A cosmic divine manifestation is in the making.... According to Sri Aurobindo (1872-1950) evolution presupposes an involutionary process. If Life evolves in Matter, and Mind in Life, it must be because Life is involved in Matter and Mind in Life. The material Inconscience is the involved Super-conscience. Evolution is fundamentally a spiritual phenomenon. It is a phenomenon of an evolutionary self-building of Spirit on a base of Matter, which is itself ...
... behind or above Nature's doings Page 351 and moves on to the ultimate consequences and the complete evolution of its purpose. The will of man is the agent of the Eternal for the unveiling of his secret meaning in the material creation. Man's mind takes up all the knots of the problem and works them out by the power of the spirit within him and brings them nearer to the full force and degree... meaning of existence. Take away this spiritual significance and this world of energy becomes a mechanical fortuity or a blind and rigid Maya. The life of man is a portion of this vast significance, and since it is in him that on this material plane it comes out in its full capacity of meaning, a very important and central portion. The Will in the universe works up to him in the creative steps of... from the glory of their labour. This view of the world is the standpoint from which we must regard the question of man's conscious will and its dealings with life, because then all things fall into their natural place and we escape from exaggerated and depreciated estimates. Man is a conscious soul of the Eternal, one with the Infinite in his inmost being, and the spirit within him is master of ...
... not himself; both may be dissolved, man will persist. But if the mental being also is dissolved, man as man ceases to be; for this is his centre and the nodus of his organism. On the contrary, according to the theory of a material evolution upheld by modern Science, man is only matter that has developed mind by an increasing sensibility to the shocks of its environment; and matter being the basis... in mind which exceed the material limitation and study only its ordinary equation with Matter, we must necessarily accept the theory of Matter as the origin and as the indispensable basis and continent. Otherwise, we shall be irresistibly led towards the early Vedantic conclusions. However this may be, even from the standpoint of the sole material world Man in the substance of his manhood... which is formed outside the material world; but it prepares in that world bodies which become progressively more and more able to house and express Mind. We may image it forming, entering into and possessing the body, breaking into it, as it were,—as the Purusha in the Aitareya Upanishad is said to form the body and then to enter in by breaking open a door in Matter. Man would in this view be a mental ...
... brought down upon earth: What would be the use of man if he were not created to throw a bridge between That which is eternally but is unmanifested and that which is manifested, between Page 49 all the transcendences and splendours of the divine life and all the dark and sorrowful ignorance of the material world? Man is the link between What must be and what is; he is the... see by proxy in others what they al-ways carry but refuse to acknowledge in themselves. It is foolish to measure a man merely by his outer capacities and achievements. It is even more and doubly foolish to measure a man by his outer failures and deficiencies. The true measure of a man is his inmost aspiration and faith. It is this that the Divine sees, this that carries the stamp and seal of the Divine... greatness of an individual, the greatness of the divine in him. For a man can be great and many-sided, he may possess a rare force of intellect, a strong and robust vital in a truly beautiful and healthy body. Yet if the secret soul is not born then there is nothing of true and lasting significance about him. The real worth of a man's life is not in what he does or does not do but in what he is and inwardly ...
... keynote of all living, whether individual or collective. But till this day, man's attempts at harmonisation have all miscarried and failed. He has tried his hand at a number of remedies, but the disease seems to have defied all palliatives up till now. In spite of his great and elaborate material civilisation man Page 219 has not travelled a whit towards true unity with his... divine event lies man's true fulfilment as an individual and as a race. N ā nyo panth ā vidyate ayan ā ya. But a nagging question may haunt us at this point: Will man's physical existence too share in the glory of the divine life upon earth? Will the body of man be ever able to liberate itself from all the present frailties and limitations? In which way will the New Man's body, in its form... From Man Human to Man Divine X Man, the Individual and Social Being (The Malady and its Cure) "A Bliss, a Light, a Power, a flame-white Love Caught all into a sole immense embrace; Existence found its truth on Oneness' breast And each became the self and space of all. The great world-rhythms were heart-beats ...
... attached to a particular one. On some days, a quiet game with people sitting in a circle, on others, running and jumping; there was football for a few days, though the ball was made of a unique material; blind man’s buff was played on some days, on others a number of groups were formed for lessons in ju-jitsu, high and long jumping or for playing draughts. Except a few reserved and elderly people everybody... was not overwhelmed, like the other young people, by a strong desire to serve the national cause. In intellect, character and life he was wholly a yogi and devotee, he had none of the qualities of a man of the world. His grandfather was a realised Tantric yogi ( siddha ), his father too was known to have acquired powers through the pursuit of yoga. The rare birth in a family of yogis of which the Gita... languages and familiarity with western learning. The mother-tongue was their only stay, but among the English-educated group I have found few men of comparable calibre. Instead of complaining to either man or God, both of them had accepted the punishment with a smile. Both brothers were s ādhaks but their natures were different. Nagendra was steady, grave, intelligent. He was very fond of godly conversation ...
... soul's descent into human birth. Of what use would be man if he was not made to throw a bridge between that which eternally is, but is not manifested, and that which is manifested, between all the transcendences, all the splendors Page 65 of the divine life and all the obscure and sorrowful ignorance of the material world? Man is the intermediary between That which has to be and that... deepest aspiration. Man has to be a bridge between That which eternally is, but is not manifested, and that which is manifested. High above, beyond the frontiers of Time and Space, are the ineffable and unthinkable transcendences and infinitudes of the Unmanifest, and below, at the polar end, are the obscure, travailing expanses of the material existence, ignorant and sorrowful. Man must raise himself... higher and higher, and straighter and straighter, like the ceaseless prayer of the integral being, desiring to unite with Thee so as to manifest Thee.”² So long as one is in the material world, living the material life in a physical body, one cannot lead the life of an absorbed contemplative—the ineluctable necessities of this life will constantly pluck at his elbow and remind him again and again ...
... external life has been raised up by man's ever-active mind and life-will, a structure of an unmanageable hugeness and complexity, for the service of his mental, vital, physical claims and urges, a complex political, social, administrative, economic, cultural machinery, an organized collective means for his intellectual, sensational, aesthetic and material satisfaction. Man has created a system of civilization... evolutionary Nature in man is confronting herself with a critical choice which must one day be solved in the true sense if the race is to arrive or even to survive. A rational and scientific formula of the vitalistic and materialistic human being and his life, a search for a perfected economic society and the democratic cultas of the average man are all that the... evolution of which man is the trustee and bearer. It is not in this direction that evolutionary Nature has pointed mankind; this is a reversion towards something that she had left behind her. Page 17 But it has not been found in experience, whatever might have once been hoped, that education and intellectual training by itself can change man; it only provides the ...
... been raised up by man's ever Page 13 active mind and life-will, a structure of an unmanageable hugeness and complexity, for the service of his mental, vital, physical claims and urges, a complex political, social, administrative, economic, cultural machinery, and organized collective means for his intellectual, sensational, aesthetic and material satisfaction. Man has created a system... urgent and imperative. The first danger in this situation is a resurgence of the old vital and material primitive barbarian in a civilized form. This danger is likely to overcome humanity if there is no high and strenuous mental and moral ideal controlling and uplifting the vital and physical man in us and no spiritual ideal liberating him from himself into his inner being. Even if this relapse... which has been negating the meaning and purposefulness of the material world. After centuries of experiments, materialism is gradually giving way to the pressures of new discoveries which require exploration of the psychical and spiritual domains. Similarly, centuries of experiments in the spiritual fields have shown that the neglect of material life and neglect of collective welfare result in poverty or ...
... yogic strain is already involved in the 1 Of what use would be man if he was not made to throw a bridge between That which eternally is, but is not manifested, and that which is manifested; between all the transcendences, all the splendours of the divine life and all the obscure and sorrowful ignorance of the material world ? Man is the intermediary between that which has to be and that which is;... put into material shape each day a little of the conversation I have so often with Thee; I shall make my confession to Thee as well as it may be .. Page 279 herself, spontaneously she seems to be speaking on behalf of all men. The words that she utters come as it were, from the lips of all mankind. She is the representative human being. She gives expression to all that man feels or... rentraient dans leurs corps plus heureux et plus forts qu'avant d'en etre sortis. 1 But her being and consciousness are not limited to mankind alone. She has identified herself with even material objects, with all the small insignificant physical things which our earthly existence deals with. This is how she takes leave of the house where she had lived, and the things it had sheltered, on ...
... force, because we are nearing the origin. The supreme junction of the end is at the beginning of everything: What would be the use of man if he were not meant to be a bridge between That which eternally is and all the dark and painful ignorance of the material world? Man is the link between what must be and what is, the bridge thrown across the abyss. 13 And Mirra wondered in her Prayers and Med... rather say all the old tombs. There were no doors left anywhere, except one—in the .silence of the heart: The true progressive evolution, the one that can lead man to the happiness he is entitled to, does not reside in any external means, material improvements or social transformation. In deep inner improvement of the individual lies the true progress and the key to a complete transformation of the present... clung to Mirra; tormented men suddenly relieved; sorrows here and there that seemed to dissolve: Once, in a bus, there was a man who was tense and weeping; you could see he was utterly wretched. Then without stirring, unnoticed, I saw that “Force" going out towards that man, and little by little, his face relaxed, everything calmed down, he grew quiet. This happened several times.... Something which ...
... yogic strain is already involved in the ¹ Of what use would be man if he was not made to throw a bridge between That which eternally is, but is not manifested, and that which is manifested; between all the transcendences, all the splendours of the divine life and all the obscure and sorrowful ignorance of the material world? Man is the intermediary between that which has to be and that which is;... put into material shape each day a little of the conversation I have so often with Thee; I shall make my confession to Thee as well as it may be--.. Page 229 herself, spontaneously she seems to be speaking on behalf of all men. The words that she utters come as it were, from the lips of all mankind. She is the representative human being. She gives expression to all that man feels or... rentraient dans leurs corps plus heureux et plus forts qu' avant d' en être sortis.¹ But her being and consciousness are not limited to mankind alone. She has identified herself with even material objects, with all the small insignificant physical things which our earthly existence deals with. This is how she takes leave of the house where she had lived, and the things it had sheltered, on ...
... the highest unimaginable Existence and our material way of being the spiritual and psychic knowledge of India did not fix a gulf as between two unrelated opposites. It was aware of other psychological planes of consciousness and experience and the truths of these supraphysical planes were no less real to it than the outward truths of the material universe. Man approaches God at first according to his... held to be the sole thing needful. One school or sect might consider the real self of man to be indivisibly one with the universal Self or the supreme Spirit. Another might regard man as one with the Divine in essence but different from him in Nature. A third might hold God, Nature and the individual soul in man to be three eternally different powers of being. But for all the truth of Self held with... with equal force; for even to the Indian dualist God is the supreme self and reality in whom and by whom Nature and man live, move and have their being and, if you eliminate God from his view of things, Nature and man would lose for him all their meaning Page 183 and importance. The Spirit, universal Nature (whether called Maya, Prakriti or Shakti) and the soul in living beings, Jiva, are ...
... external life has been raised up by man's ever active mind and life will, a structure of an unmanageable hugeness and complexity, for the service of his mental, vital, physical claims and urges, a complex political, social, administrative, economic, cultural machinery, an organised collective means for his intellectual, sensational, aesthetic and material satisfaction. Man has created a system of civilisation... to money making. What is our centre of gravity? It is the economic social ultimate — an ideal material organisation of civilisation and comfort, and the use of reason and science and education for the channelisation of a utilitarian rationality which will create mechanisms and systems for vital and material satisfactions surrounded by luxuries of intellectual and aesthetic pastimes. The contemporary... should be so refined that it can provide to students of non formal education a choice of lateral entry into it at appropriate levels of studies. Harmony of Man with Nature has been the chief theme of our culture, and the quest of man of himself and the universe has been the chief theme of education. These themes are closely interrelated, and it is increasingly realised that this interrelation ...
... life has been raised up by man's ever-active mind and life-will, a Page 129 structure of an unmanageable hugeness and complexity, for the service of his mental, vital, physical claims and urges, a complex political, social, administrative, economic, cultural machinery, an organised collective means for his intellectual, aesthetic and material satisfaction. Man has created a system ... Cycle and The Ideal of Human Unity. In one of the important passages, Sri Aurobindo states: Page 115 The animal is a living laboratory in which Nature has, it is said, worked out man. Man himself may well be a thinking and living laboratory in whom and with whose conscious cooperation she wills to work out the superman, the god. Or shall we not say, rather, to manifest God? For... it from the attraction Page 126 from above. It is true that the more the outer law is replaced by the inner law, the nearer will man be to his natural perfection, and the perfect State must be one in which governmental compulsion is abolished and man is able to live with his fellowmen by a free agreement and cooperation. But this can truly be secured by a power greater than that of reason ...
... l'innombrable manifestation..." 1 1 Of what use would be man if he was not made to throw a bridge between That which eternally is, but is not manifested, and that which is manifested; between all the transcendences, all the splendours of the divine life and all the obscure and sorrowful ignorance of the material world? Man is the intermediary between that which has to be and that which... detail. It has taken, me several weeks to learn that the reason for this written meditation, its justification lies in the very fact of addressing it daily to Thee. In this way I shall put into material shape each day a little of the conversation I have so often with Thee; I shall make my confession to Thee as well as it may be... (2.11.1912) Page 83 know how to express and articulate... dans leurs corps plus heureux et plus forts qu'avant d'en être sortis." (22.2.1914) But her being and consciousness are not lmited to mankind alone. She has identified herself with even material objects, with all the small insignificant physical things which our earthly existence deals with. This is how she takes leave of the house where she had lived, and the things it had sheltered, ...
... towards a greater thought-element as material for poetry. Among the precursors of the new age, various tendencies have been trying to find expression, but behind them all, one sees the general element consisting of the acceptance of the greatness of man as an individual and as a community, of his life, of Nature, of the unity of mankind rising upto the divinity of man in rare moments of inspired sight... burning has left this material world and sands as remnants and given rise to Life that like a flame burns in our very limbs. The line "one flame bums many phenomena" reminds one of the Upanishadic revelation. "It is the one Fire that entered the world and has become every form that we see". The poet continues the figure of the Flame and finds that the Flame burning in the body of man rises in intensity... intensity of a mental perception, and then he asks: "yet how persuade a mind that the thing seen Is habitant of the cerebral cave And has elsewhere no materiality?" All knowledge of man is within his mind and belongs to the mind. The world is a flux and the flux takes place in the mind. He almost makes out that all knowledge is only a mode of the subject, Continuing the same line of ...
... external life has been raised up by man’s ever active mind and life-will, a structure of an unmanageable hugeness and complexity, for the service of his mental, vital, physical claims and urges, a complex political, social, administrative, economic, cultural machinery, an organised collective means for his intellectual, sensational, aesthetic and material satisfaction. Man has created a system of civilisation... and desires, a chaotic mass of unassimilated and intermixed mental, vital and physical material of a larger existence which, because it is not taken up by a creative harmonising light of the Spirit, must welter in a universalised confusion and discord out of which it is impossible to build a greater harmonic life. Man has harmonised life in the past by organised ideation and limitation; he has created... concentration. The mental chaos was to be expected if the view of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother, and the forces activated by their Work, contain any truth. Man is “the mental being” par excellence, as one finds repeated time and again in their books. If man has to be surpassed by the overman and afterwards by the supramental being, then reason, the mental being’s main means of consciousness, must be surpassed ...
... There only material appearance seems to rule. Man is subject to doubts, and difficulties of his own nature which are the products of a process of slow evolution from original Nescience to some spiritual perfection. His movement towards that perfection can begin by his refusing to accept as final the present limitations of his nature. The first effort at realising the spirit releases man from the... proper place and justification and value in the total field of the divine governance. There is an occult order which is behind the material and mental order known to man. And it is that unseen and unknown occult world which governs from behind this outer material, vital and mental life. Faculties of the inmost, i.e. subliminal mind disclose the knowledge of the world's mystery. An ascending and... what he appears to be,—a mere material phenomenon, — mentalised animal having a physical body. He has from the dawn of history a feeling of something imperishable within him. And there are hidden powers in man which can be awakened to make the realisation of that Self possible by following a certain path of inner discipline called Sādhanā in India. The powers of his natural instruments—those of ...
... all was moving in Nature. At present what we know best is man and mind and what mind and its several senses see or infer about the universe. But mind is not the highest possible instrument and mental man is not the last creation possible to the capacities of creative evolution in the material universe. There is indeed the real man as well as this that is apparent. The apparent is this imperfect... secret at first in Force and Form, the growth of a Spirit. This evolution, it is sometimes pretended, ends in man, man is the term and end; but this is because we miss the real values of the process. At first indeed we see this Spirit spending numberless millions of years to evolve a material system of worlds empty in the beginning of life, a lesser but vast enough series of millions to develop an earth... being, man, out of the vital being, the animal, so its next stride will be to evolve out of mental man a greater spiritual and supramental creature. Page 223 50 All mind and life on earth are the progressive manifestation of a Spirit or Being that has involved itself in Matter and is slowly evolving in Matter, against the inconscient resistance of a first rigid material self-formation ...
... fullness of its complexity. Its first evolutionary basis is the material life: Nature began with that and man also has to begin with it; he has first to affirm his material and vital existence. But if he stops there, there can be for him no evolution; his next and greater preoccupation must be to find himself as a mental being in a material life—both individual and social—as perfected as possible. This... stress on the material and economic life was in fact a civilised reversion to the first state of man, his early barbaric state and its preoccupation with life and matter, a spiritual retrogression with the resources of the mind of a developed humanity and a fully evolved Science at its disposal. As an element in the total complexity of human life this stress on a perfected economic and material existence... external life has been raised up by man's ever-active mind and life-will, a structure of an unmanageable hugeness and complexity, for the service of his mental, vital, physical claims and urges, a complex political, social, administrative, economic, cultural machinery, an organised collective means for his intellectual, sensational, aesthetic and material satisfaction. Man has created a system of civilisation ...
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