{"id":1145,"date":"2013-07-13T01:32:54","date_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:32:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/?p=1145"},"modified":"2013-07-13T01:32:54","modified_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:32:54","slug":"64-the-passing-of-war-vol-15-social-and-political-thought-volume-15","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/01-works-of-sri-aurobindo\/01-sabcl\/15-social-and-political-thought-volume-15\/64-the-passing-of-war-vol-15-social-and-political-thought-volume-15","title":{"rendered":"-64_The Passing of War.htm"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n
\n


\nThe Passing of War?<\/span><\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0
\n<\/font> <\/span>
\nT<\/font><\/b>HE
\nprogress of humanity proceeds by a series of imaginations which the Will in the
\nrace turns into accomplished facts and a train of illusions which contain each
\nof them an inevitable truth. The truth is there in the secret Will and
\nKnowledge that are conducting our affairs for us and it reflects itself in the
\nsoul of mankind; the illusion is in the shape we give to that reflection, the
\nveil of arbitrary fixations of time, place and circumstance which that
\ndeceptive organ of knowledge, the human intellect, weaves over the face of the
\nTruth. Human imaginations are often fulfilled to the letter; our illusions on
\nthe contrary find the truth behind them realised most unexpectedly, at a time,
\nin ways, under circumstances far other than those we had fixed for them.<\/font> <\/font><\/p>\n


\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/font> <\/span>Man’s
\nillusions are of all sorts and kinds, some of them petty though not
\nunimportant;- for nothing in the world is unimportant, – others vast and
\ngrandiose. The greatest of them all are those which cluster round the hope of a
\nperfected society, a perfected race, a terrestrial millennium. Each new idea,
\nreligious or social, which takes possession of the epoch and seizes on large
\nmasses of men, is in turn to be the instrument of these high realisations; each
\nin turn betrays the hope which gave it its force to conquer. And the reason is
\nplain enough to whosoever chooses to see; it is that no change of ideas or of
\nthe intellectual outlook upon life, no belief in God or Avatar or Prophet, no
\nvictorious science or liberating philosophy, no social scheme or system, no
\nsort of machinery internal or external can really bring about the great desire
\nimplanted in the race, true though that desire is in itself and the index of
\nthe goal to which we are being led. Because man is himself not a machine nor a
\ndevice, but a being and a most complex one at that, therefore he cannot be
\nsaved by machinery; only by an entire change which shall affect all the members
\nof his being, can he be liberated from his discords and imperfections.<\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage-582<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/div>\n


\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/font> <\/span>One of the
\nillusions incidental to this great hope is the expectation of the passing of
\nwar. This grand event in human progress<\/span>
\nis always being confidently expected, and since we are now all scientific minds
\nand rational beings, we no longer expect<\/span>
\nit by a divine intervention, but assign sound physical and economical reasons
\nfor the faith that is in us. The first form taken by this new gospel was the
\nexpectation and the prophecy that the extension of commerce would be the
\nextinction of war. Commercialism was the natural enemy of militarism and would
\ndrive it from the face of the earth. The growing and universal lust of gold and
\nthe habit of comfort and the necessities of increased production and intricate
\ninterchange would crush out the lust of power and dominion and glory and
\nbattle. Gold-hunger or commodity-hunger would drive out earth-hunger, the dharma
\nof the Vaishya would set its foot on the dharma of the Kshatriya and give it
\nits painless quietus. The ironic reply of the gods has not been long in coming.
\nActually this very reign of commercialism, this increase of production and
\ninterchange, this desire for commodities and markets and ,<\/span> this piling up of a huge burden of
\nunnecessary necessities has been the cause of half the wars that have since
\nafflicted the human race. And now we see militarism and commercialism united in
\na loving clasp, coalescing into a sacred biune duality of national life and
\npatriotic aspiration and causing and driving by their force the most
\nirrational, the most monstrous and nearly cataclysmic, the hugest war of modern
\nand indeed of all historic times.<\/font> <\/font><\/p>\n


\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/font> <\/span>Another
\nillusion was that the growth of democracy would mean the growth of pacifism and
\nthe end of war. It was fondly thought that wars are in their nature dynastic
\nand aristocratic; greedy<\/span> kings
\nand martial nobles driven by earth-hunger and battle-hunger, diplomatists
\nplaying at chess with the lives of men and the fortunes of nations, these were
\nthe guilty causes of war who drove the unfortunate peoples to the battlefield
\nlike sheep to the shambles. These proletariates, mere food for powder, who had
\nno interest, no desire, no battle-hunger driving them to armed conflict, had
\nonly to become instructed and dominant to embrace each other and all the world
\nin a free<\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage-583<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/div>\n

and fraternal amity. Man refuses to learn from that
\nhistory of whose lessons the wise prate to us; otherwise the story of old
\ndemocracies ought to have been enough to prevent this particular illusion. In any
\ncase the answer of the gods has been, here too, sufficiently ironic. If kings
\nand diplomatists are still often the movers of war, none more ready than the
\nmodern democracy to make itself their enthusiastic and noisy accomplice, and we
\nsee even the modern spectacle of governments and diplomats hanging back in
\naffright or doubt from the yawning clamorous abyss while angry shouting peoples
\nimpel them to the verge. Bewildered pacifists who still cling to their
\nprinciples and illusions, find themselves howled down by the people and, what
\nis piquant enough, by their own recent comrades and leaders. The socialist, the
\nsyndicalist, the inter- nationalist of yesterday stands forward as a
\nbanner-bearer in the great mutual massacre and his voice is the loudest to cheer
\non the dogs of war.<\/font> <\/font><\/p>\n


\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/font> <\/span>Another
\nrecent illusion was the power of Courts of Arbitration and Concerts of Europe
\nto prevent war. There again the course that events immediately took was
\nsufficiently ironic; for the institution of the great Court of International
\nArbitration was followed up by a series of little and great wars which led by
\nan inexorable logical chain to the long-dreaded European conflict, and the
\nmonarch who had first conceived the idea, was also the first to unsheath his
\nsword in a conflict dictated on both sides by the most unrighteous greed and
\naggression. In fact this series of wars, whether fought in Northern or Southern
\nAfrica, in Manchuria or the Balkans, was marked most prominently by the spirit
\nwhich disregards cynically that very idea of inherent and existing rights, that
\nbalance of law and equity upon which alone arbitration can be founded. As for
\nthe Concert of Europe, it seems far enough from us now, almost antediluvian in
\nits antiquity, as it belongs indeed to the age before the deluge; but we can
\nremember well enough what an unmusical and discordant concert it was, what a
\nseries of fumblings and blunderings and how its diplomacy led us fatally to the
\ninevitable event against which it struggled. Now it is suggested by many to substitute
\na United States of Europe
\nPage-584<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/div>\n

for the defunct Concert and for the poor helpless Hague
\ntribunal an effective Court of International Law with force behind it to impose
\nits decisions. But so long as men go on believing in the sovereign power of
\nmachinery, it is not likely that the gods either will cease from their studied
\nirony.<\/font> <\/font><\/p>\n


\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/font> <\/span>There have
\nbeen other speculations and reasonings; ingenious minds have searched for a
\nfirmer and more rational ground of faith. The first of these was propounded in
\na book by a Russian writer which had an enormous success in its day but has now
\npassed into the silence. Science was to bring war to an end by making it
\nphysically impossible. It was mathematically proved that. with modern weapons
\ntwo equal armies would fight each other to a standstill, attack would become
\nimpossible except by numbers thrice those of the defence and war therefore
\nwould bring no military decision but only an infructuous upheaval and
\ndisturbance of the organised life of the nations. When the Russo-Japanese war
\nalmost immediately proved that attack and victory were still possible and the
\nbattle- fury of man superior to the fury of his death-dealing engines, another
\nbook was published called by a title which has turned into a jest upon the writer,
\nthe "Great Illusion", to prove that the idea of a commercial
\nadvantage to be gained by war and conquest was an illusion and that as soon as
\nthis was under- stood<\/span> and the
\nsole benefit of peaceful interchange realised, the peoples would abandon a method
\nof settlement now chiefly undertaken from motives of commercial expansion, yet
\nwhose disastrous result was only to disorganise fatally the commercial
\nprosperity it sought to serve. The present war came as the immediate answer of
\nthe gods to this sober and rational pro- position. It has been fought for
\nconquest and commercial expansion and it is proposed, even when it has been
\nfought out on the field, to follow it up by a commercial struggle between the
\nbelligerent nations.<\/font> <\/font><\/p>\n


\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/font> <\/span>The men who
\nwrote these books were capable thinkers, but they ignored the one thing that
\nmatters, human nature. The present war has justified to a certain extent the
\nRussian writer, though by developments he did not foresee; scientific warfare
\nhas brought military movement to a standstill and<\/font><\/p>\n

\n\t\t
\n\t\tPage-585<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/div>\n

baffled the strategist and the tactician, it has
\nrendered decisive victory impossible except by overwhelming numbers or an
\noverwhelming weight of artillery. But this has not made war impossible, it has
\nonly changed its character; it has at the most replaced the war of military
\ndecisions by that of military and financial exhaustion aided by the grim weapon
\nof famine. The English writer on the other hand erred by isolating the economic
\nmotive as the one factor that weighed; he ignored the human lust of dominion
\nwhich, carried into the terms of commercialism means the undisputed control of
\nmarkets and the exploitation of helpless populations. Again, when we rely upon
\nthe disturbance of organised national and international life as a preventive of
\nwar, we forget the boundless power of self-adaptation which man possesses; that
\npower has been shown strikingly enough in the skill and ease with which the
\norganisation and finance of peace were replaced in the present crisis by the
\norganisation and finance of war. And when we rely upon Science to make war
\nimpossible, we forget that the progress of Science means a series of surprises
\nand that it means also a constant effort of human ingenuity to overcome
\nimpossibilities and find fresh means of satisfying our ideas, desires and
\ninstincts. Science may well make war of the present type with shot and shell
\nand mines and battleships an impossibility and yet develop and put in their
\nplace simpler or more summary means which may bring back an easier organisation
\nof warfare.<\/font> <\/font><\/p>\n


\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/font> <\/span>So long as
\nwar does not become psychologically impossible, it will remain or, if banished
\nfor a while, return. War itself, it is hoped, will end war; the expense, the
\nhorror, the butchery, the disturbance of tranquil life, the whole confused
\nsanguinary madness of the thing has reached or will reach such colossal
\nproportions that the human race will fling the monstrosity behind it in
\nweariness and disgust. But weariness and disgust, horror and pity, even the opening
\nof the eyes to reason by the practical facts of the waste of human life and
\nenergy and the harm and extravagance are not permanent factors; they last only
\nwhile the lesson is fresh. Afterwards, there is forgetfulness; human nature
\nrecuperates itself and recovers the instincts that were temporarily dominated.
\nA long peace, even a certain
\n <\/font><\/p>\n

\n\t\tPage-586<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/div>\n

organisation of peace, may conceivably result, but so
\nlong as the heart of man remains what it is, the peace will come to an end; the
\norganisation will break down under the stress of human passions. War is no
\nlonger, perhaps, a biological necessity, but it is still a psychological
\nnecessity; what is within us, must manifest itself outside.<\/font> <\/font><\/p>\n


\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/font> <\/span>Meanwhile
\nit is well that every false hope and confident pre- diction should be answered
\nas soon as may well be by the irony of the gods; for only so can we be driven
\nto the perception of the real remedy. Only when man has developed not merely a
\nfellow- feeling with all men, but a dominant sense of unity and commonalty,
\nonly when he is aware of them not merely as brothers, – that is a fragile bond,
\n– but as parts of himself, only when he has learned to live, not in his
\nseparate personal and communal ego-sense, but in a large universal
\nconsciousness, can the phenomenon of war, with whatever weapons, pass out of
\nhis life without the possibility of return. Meanwhile that he should struggle
\neven by illusions towards that end, is an excellent sign; for it shows that the
\ntruth behind the illusion is pressing towards the hour when it may become
\nmanifest as reality.
\n <\/font><\/p>\n

\n\t\tPage-587<\/font><\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Passing of War?   \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 THE progress of humanity proceeds by a series of imaginations which the Will in the race turns into accomplished…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[25],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1145","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-15-social-and-political-thought-volume-15","wpcat-25-id"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1145","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=1145"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1145\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1145"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1145"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1145"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}