{"id":1045,"date":"2013-07-13T01:32:13","date_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:32:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/?p=1045"},"modified":"2013-07-13T01:32:13","modified_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:32:13","slug":"10-a-task-unaccomplished-vol-02-karmayogin-volume-02","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/01-works-of-sri-aurobindo\/01-sabcl\/02-karmayogin-volume-02\/10-a-task-unaccomplished-vol-02-karmayogin-volume-02","title":{"rendered":"-10_A Task Unaccomplished.htm"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n
\n
\n


\n\tA Task Unaccomplished<\/font><\/span><\/b><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n


\n\tT<\/font>HERE <\/font><\/b>is
\n\tno question so vital to the future of this nation as the spirit in which we
\n\tare to set about the regeneration of our national life. Either India is
\n\trising again to fulfil the function for which her past national life and
\n\tdevelopment seem to have prepared her, a leader of thought and faith, a
\n\tdefender of spiritual truth and experience destined to correct the
\n\tconclusions of materialistic Science by the higher Science of which she has
\n\tthe secret and in that power to influence the world’s civilisation, or she
\n\tis rising as a faithful pupil of Europe, a follower of methods and ideas
\n\tborrowed from the West, a copyist of English politics and society. In the
\n\tone case her aspiration must be great, her faith unshakeable, her efforts
\n\tand sacrifices such as to command the admiration of the world; in the other
\n\tno such greatness of soul is needed or possible; \u2014 a cautious, slow and
\n\tgradual progress involving no extraordinary effort and no unusual sacrifices
\n\tis sufficient for an end so small. In the one case her destiny is to be a
\n\tgreat nation remoulding and leading the civilisation of the world, in the
\n\tother it is to be a subordinate part of the British Empire sharing in the
\n\tsocial life, the political privileges, the intellectual ideals and
\n\tattainments of the Anglo-Celtic race. These are the two ideals before us,
\n\tand an ideal is not mere breath, it is a thing compelling which determines
\n\tthe spirit of our action and often fixes the method. No policy can be
\n\tsuccessful which does not take into view the end to be attained and the
\n\tamount and nature of the effort needed to effect it. The leader of industry
\n\twho enters on a commercial enterprise, first looks at the magnitude of his
\n\tfield and intended output and equips himself with capital and plant
\n\taccordingly, and even if he cannot commence at once on the scale of his
\n\tideal he holds it in view himself, puts it before the public in issuing his
\n\tprospectus and estimating the capital necessary, and all the practical steps
\n\the takes are conceived in the light of his original aspiration and ordered
\n\ttowards its achievement. So it is with the political ven-<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

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\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 49<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

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\n\ttures of
\n\ta nation. To place before himself a great object and then to shrink in the
\n\tname of expediency from the expenditure and sacrifice called for in its
\n\tpursuit is not prudence but ineptitude. If you will be prudent, be prudent
\n\tfrom the beginning. Fix your object low and creep towards it. But if you fix
\n\tyour object in the skies, it will not do to crawl on the ground and because
\n\tyour eyes are sometimes lifted towards the ideal imagine you are progressing
\n\twhile you murmur to those behind, "Yes, yes, our ideal is in the skies
\n\tbecause that is the place for ideals, but we are on the ground and the
\n\tground is our proper place of motion. Let us creep, let us creep." Such
\n\tinconsistency will only dishearten the nation, unnerve its strength and
\n\tconfuse its intelligence. You must either bring down your ideal to the
\n\tground or find wings or aeroplane to lift you to the skies. There is no
\n\tmiddle course.<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n\tWe believe that this nation is one which
\n\thas developed itself in the past on spiritual lines under the inspiration of
\n\ta destiny which is now coming to fulfilment. The peculiar seclusion in which
\n\tit was able to develop its individual temperament, knowledge and ideas; \u2014
\n\tthe manner in which the streams of the world poured in upon and were
\n\tabsorbed by the calm ocean of Indian spiritual life, recalling the great
\n\timage in the Gita, \u2014 even as the waters flow into the great tranquil and
\n\timmeasurable ocean, and the ocean is not perturbed; \u2014 the persistence with
\n\twhich peculiar and original forms of society, religion and philosophical
\n\tthought were protected from disintegration up till the destined moment; \u2014
\n\tthe deferring of that disintegration until the whole world outside had
\n\tarrived at the point when the great Indian ideal which these forms enshrined
\n\tcould embrace all that is yet needed for its perfect self-expression, and be
\n\titself embraced by an age starved by materialism and yearning for a higher
\n\tknowledge; \u2014 the sudden return of India upon itself at a time when all that
\n\twas peculiarly Indian seemed to wear upon it the irrevocable death-sentence
\n\tpassed on all things that in the human evolution are no longer needed; \u2014 the
\n\tmiraculous uprising and transformation of weakness into strength brought
\n\tabout by that return; \u2014 all this seems to us to be not fortuitous and
\n\taccidental but inevitable and preordained in the decrees of an over-ruling
\n\tProvidence. The rationalist looks on such beliefs<\/font><\/span><\/div>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 50<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\n


\n\tand aspirations as mysticism and jargon. When confronted with the truths of
\n\tHinduism, the experience of deep thinkers and the choice spirits of the race
\n\tthrough thousands of years, he shouts "Mysticism, mysticism!" and thinks he
\n\thas conquered. To him there is order, development, progress, evolution,
\n\tenlightenment in the history of Europe, but the past of India is an
\n\tunsightly mass of superstition and ignorance best torn out of the book of.
\n\thuman life. These thousands of years of our thought and aspiration are a
\n\tperiod of the least importance to us and the true history of our progress
\n\tonly begins with the advent of European education ! The rest is a confused
\n\tnightmare or a mere barren lapse of time preparing nothing and leading to
\n\tnothing. This tone is still vocal in the organs of the now declining school
\n\tof the nineteenth century some of which preserve their influence in the
\n\tprovinces where the balance in the struggle between the past and the future
\n\thas not inclined decidedly in favour of the latter. In Bengal it is still
\n\trepresented by an undercurrent of the old weakness and the old want of faith
\n\twhich struggles occasionally to establish itself by a false appearance of
\n\tphilosophical weight and wisdom. It cannot really believe that this is a
\n\tmovement with a divine force within and a mighty future before it. The only
\n\tforce it sees is the resentment against the Partition which in its view is
\n\tenough to explain everything that has happened, the only future it envisages
\n\tis reform and the reversal of the Partition. Recently, however, the gospel
\n\tof Nationalism has made so much way that the organs of this school in Bengal
\n\thave accepted many of its conclusions and their writings are coloured by its
\n\tleading ideas. But the fundamental idea of the movement as a divine
\n\tmanifestation purposing to raise up the nation not only for its own
\n\tfulfilment in India but for the work and service of the world and therefore
\n\tsure of its fulfilment, therefore independent of individuals and superior to
\n\tvicissitudes and difficulties, is one which they cannot yet grasp. It is a
\n\tsentiment which has been growing upon us as the movement progressed, but it
\n\thas not yet been sufficiently put forward by the organs of Nationalism
\n\titself, partly because the old idea of separating religion from politics
\n\tlingered, partly because the human aspects of the Nationalist faith had to
\n\tbe established before we could rise to the divine. But that divine aspect
\n\thas to<\/font><\/span><\/div>\n

<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n
\nPage \u2013 51<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\n

<\/i><\/p>\n

be
\nestablished if we are to have the faith and greatness of soul which can alone
\nhelp us in the tremendous developments the signs of the time portend. There is
\nplenty of weakness still lingering in the land and we cannot allow it to take
\nshelter under the cry of expediency and rationality and seek to kill the faith
\nand force that has been born in the hearts of the young. The Karmayogin <\/i>
\nhas taken its stand on the rock of religion and its first object will be to
\ncombat these reactionary tendencies and lead the nation forward into the fuller
\nlight for which the <\/font>Bande
\nMataram<\/font><\/i> and other organs of the
\nnew faith only prepared. The gospel of Nationalism has not yet been fully
\npreached; its most inspiring tenets have yet to be established not only by the
\neloquence of the orator and inspiration of the prophet but by the arguments of
\nthe logician, the appeal to experience of the statesman and the harmonising
\ngeneralisations of the scientist.<\/font><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n
\nPage \u2013 52<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n


\n HOME<\/font><\/span><\/a><\/b><\/p>\n

 <\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A Task Unaccomplished   THERE is no question so vital to the future of this nation as the spirit in which we are to set…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1045","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-02-karmayogin-volume-02","wpcat-23-id"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1045","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1045"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1045\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1045"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1045"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1045"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}