... them petty though not unimportant,—for nothing in the world is unimportant,—others vast and grandiose. The greatest of them all are those which cluster round the hope of a perfected society, a perfected race, a terrestrial millennium. Each new idea religious or social which takes possession of the epoch and seizes on large masses of men, is in turn to be the instrument of these high realisations; each ...
... the lowest regions, which would manifest to begin with—it can very well happen that there are still a number of intermediary states of being, this is possible—intermediary stages. Certainly the perfect race will not come spontaneously. Very probably not. But already, even the first attempts... in comparison with the present human being, it will make a great difference, great enough for one to feel... which is no longer a human animal but begins to be a divine human, a divine man, will seem something absolutely marvellous, even if he is Page 417 still very incomplete as the perfect type of this new race. One must get accustomed to living in a perpetual movement. There is something which likes very much—perhaps it is necessary for facilitating the action—to fix a goal and say, "This indeed... . Mother, you said that between the supermind and the mind there are many stages, didn't you? And it is written that the next logical stage in the evolution of Nature is the superman. Why not a race which is... Intermediary? We shall see that later. Does this mean that from the mind we can go to the supermind without passing through the intermediary stages? I did not say that they were ...
... The members of the group should first perfect themselves; second, by the force of their words and the greater power of their own lives, they should attract others to this way of life; and so finally "found a typic society or reorganise those that already exist". We thus return to the early Aurobindonian exhortation: Perfect thy human might, Perfect the race. So many seminal ideas are prodigally... exhorts the King: Seek Him upon the earth. For thee He set In the huge press Of many worlds to build a mighty state For man's success, Who seeks his goal. Perfect thy human might, Perfect the race. For thou art He, O King. Only the night Is on thy soul By thy own will. Remove it and recover The serene whole Thou art indeed, then raise up man the... measure of his progressive union with the Divine, this should not mean an escape from life into the Transcendent, a divorce from the social aggregate and the general environment. Perfect thy human might, Perfect the race. If, then, the goal be a "progressing universal harmony", the means for achieving it on earth is the realisation of human unity through awakening and manifesting "the inner ...
... and guidance perfect the human being in all the force of the Nature for a divine living.. .The liberated individual being, united with the Divine in self and spirit, becomes in his natural being a self-perfecting instrument for the perfect outflowering of the Divine in humanity. 47 The individual should perfect himself first, then seek to perfect the race. The spiritual... Buddha, a Christ, or a Sri Aurobindo—is honoured as a Messiah by us who are of the earth because we know that only such a superman can hold the key to the future; but, "whether this means that the human race in general will at some future epoch evolve, reach upward, to his level, who can say?" 39 In the past there had been great yogis in India. The Bhagavad Gita itself, which... has a physical, mental and emotional life—he can work, he can think, he can love. He can exercise his will, he can channel his passions. Any one of his faculties or functions could be isolated and perfected, and we would then have the Yoga of Works (Karma Yoga), the Yoga of Knowledge (Jnana Yoga) and the Yoga of Love or Devotion (Bhakti Yoga). There are other yogas too like Raja, Hatha, and Tantra ...
... far beyond the sun Her golden gaze. But Him I seek, the still and perfect One,- The Sun, not rays. Page 236 RISHI Seek Him upon the earth. For thee He set In the huge press Of many worlds to build a mighty state For man's success, Who seeks his goal. Perfect thy human might, Perfect the race. For thou art He, O King. Only the night Is on thy soul By thy... still the mind into a perfect sleep And leave this lair Of gross material flesh which we would keep Always, before The guardians of felicity will ope The golden door. That is our home and that the secret hope Our hearts explore. To bring those heavens down upon the earth We all descend, And fragments of it in the human birth We can command. Perfect millenniums are sometimes... the morn And flaming dawns for ever on heaven's verge Wheel and turn, Thundering remote the clamorous Arctic surge Saw thee born. There 'twas thy lot these later Fates to build, This race of man New-fashion. O watcher with the mountains wild, The icy plain, Thee I too, asleep, have watched, both when the Pole Was brightening wan And when like a wild beast the darkness stole ...
... But exactly how? A divine life means, firstly, the fulfilment of man's urge to individual perfection; and secondly, the harmonisation of perfected individuals with one another, and the evolution of a perfect collective life. "Perfect the individual, perfect the race"! Page 611 Between the twin poles of individual perfection and hierarchic perfection will revolve the many-splendoured Divine... belying the age of the author. Returning on 10 October to the speculation regarding the probable first appearance of the new race, the Mother makes a significant distinction between an intermediate race evolving out of the present human race and the outright new race that may take a few centuries to arrive upon the terrestrial scene. But the time for the former is even now: ...the time has... way. On 2 May, 16 one of the questions asked was, well, since the supramental manifestation was "a living fact, a reality", Page 618 where was the new race? The Mother felt provoked and returned this answer: The new race? Wait for something like... a few thousand years and you will see it! When the mind descended upon earth, between the time the mind manifested in the earth-atmosphere ...
... whatever be the perfection of the union we have realised, as long as we belong by our body to the world of relativity, this Union with Thee can always grow more perfect. 40 To be able to perfect the race, Mirra would first perfect herself, make visible the divine manifestation. Hence the poignantly repeated, oft repeated, word of aspiration: If we had a truly living faith, if we had... mind to Thy illumination, the clearer and the more adequate is its expression. I listened to Thee as Thou spokest in me .... No more fear, no more uneasiness, no more anguish; nothing but a perfect Serenity, an absolute Confidence, a supreme unwavering Peace. 13 The key to success and happiness is confident unquestioning surrender to the Divine. There is no need even to record the words... for His benevolence and puissance are without limits. Again, two days later: In Peace and Silence the Eternal manifests; allow nothing to disturb you and the Eternal will manifest; have perfect equality in face of all.... No haste, no inquietude, no tension, Thou, nothing but Thou, without any analysis or any objectivising, and Thou art there without a possible doubt, for all becomes a ...
... virtue.... 37 Manu asks again where - whether in heaven or on the earth - he should seek God, and firm comes the Rishi's answer: Seek Him upon the earth.... Perfect thy human might. Perfect the race. For thou art He, O King. Only the night Is on thy soul By thy own will. Remove it and recover The serene whole Page 168 Thou art indeed... life? Where have we come from? Whither are we bound? Man is a veritable siege of contradictory pulls, for two genii "wrestle and strive" in his "dubious heart", and this has been going on "since the race began": One from his body like a bridge of fire Mounds upward azure-winged with eager eyes; One in his brain deep-mansioned labouring lies And clamps to earth the spirit's... great sea. I will seize thy mane, O lion, I will tame thee and disdain;... I come, O Sea, To measure my enormous self with thee. 51 But The Sea at Night, an almost perfect lyric in which sound and sense cohere into a purposive unity, is subdued with its circles of widening peace: The grey sea creeps half-visible, half-hushed, And grasps with its innumerable ...
... 103-4. 35. ibid. , p. 882. 36. In an early poem, The Rishi, King Manu seeks Knowledge from the Rishi of the Pole, who exhorts the King finally: Perfect thy human might, Perfect the race. (Collected Poems and Plays,Vol. I, p.162). 37. Savitri, p. 823. 38. ibid., p. 826. 39. ibid. ., p. 827. 40. ibid... Philosophy. 123. Letters of Sri Aurobindo, Third Series, pp. 305-6. It is also interesting to recall Sri Aurobindo's youthful tribute to Goethe: A perfect face amid barbarian faces, A perfect voice of sweet and serious rhyme, Traveller with calm, inimitable paces, Critic with judgment absolute to all time, A complete strength when men were maimed and... Odyssey: A Modern Sequel, pp. 513-4. Cf. W.B. Stanford: "The Lonely One: here is the nemesis of absolute freedom...Kazantzakis sends his hero, when he has freed himself in turn from the Ego, the Race, and the World, to a much more desolate place—to the wastes of polar ice...The Odysseus of Kazantzakis has pursued personal liberty to the zero-point of the earth." (The Ulysses Theme, p. 236). ...
... entire race can be perfected, we may have to start with experimental groups that strive in their individual and collective life towards perfection. The members of such a group will (i) strain towards self-perfection; (ii) exemplify such striving to others; and (iii) found a "typic society". Along with the discipline of inner development and growth in spiritual or Divine consciousness, there should... sequences, Sri Aurobindo wove together the twin strands of individual and collective transformation, though the proportion or emphasis varied from argument to argument. The formula "Perfect the man, perfect the race" doesn't, however, mean a rigid categorical sequence, for there are degrees of perfection, and even as the pioneer can give a push to the society, a reasonably well-ordered society can... flowering of a new race, the race of the Sons of God". The Son of Man must strive to outgrow his limitations and become the Son of God, and human beings should learn to enact the collective life of a Divine Society. A double attempt at self-perfection is thus called for: individual transformation and social transformation, or the perfection of the individual and the perfection of the race. Before the entire ...
Share your feedback. Help us improve. Or ask a question.