{"id":1176,"date":"2013-07-13T01:33:05","date_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:33:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/?p=1176"},"modified":"2013-07-13T01:33:05","modified_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:33:05","slug":"43-natures-law-in-our-progress-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\/43-natures-law-in-our-progress-vol-15-social-and-political-thought-volume-15","title":{"rendered":"-43_Nature’s Law in Our Progress.htm"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n
\n
\n

\n
\n\t\tCHAPTER <\/font><\/span>
\nXVII<\/span>
\n<\/font>
\nNature’s
\nLaw in Our Progress – Unity in Diversity, Law and Liberty<\/span><\/font><\/p>\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 <\/span><\/font>F<\/font><\/span>OR<\/font> man alone of terrestrial creatures
\nto live rightly involves the necessity of knowing rightly, whether, as
\nrationalism pretends, by the sole or dominant instrumentation of his reason or,
\nmore largely and complexly, by the sum of his faculties; and what he has to
\nknow is the true nature of being and its constant self-effectuation in the
\nvalues of life, in less abstract language the law of Nature and especially of
\nhis own nature, the forces within him and around him and their right utilisation for his own greater perfection and happiness or for that and the
\ngreater perfection and happiness of his fellow creatures. In the old phrase his
\nbusiness is to learn to live according to Nature. But Nature can no longer be
\nimaged, as once it was, as an eternal right rule from which man has wandered,
\nsince it is rather a thing itself changing, progressing, evolving, ascending
\nfrom height to more elevated height, widening from limit to broader limit of
\nits own possibilities. Yet in all this changing there are certain eternal
\nprinciples or truths of being which re- main the same and upon them as
\nbed-rock, with them as a primary material and within them as a framework, our
\nprogress and perfection are compelled to take place. Otherwise there would be
\nan infinite chaos and not a world ordered even in the clash of its forces. <\/font><\/p>\n


\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/font> <\/span>The
\nsubhuman life of animal and plant is not subjected to this necessity of
\nknowledge nor of that which is the necessary accompaniment of knowledge, a
\nconscious will impelled always to execute what knowledge perceives. By this
\nexemption it is saved from an immense amount of error, deformation and disease,
\nfor it lives spontaneously according to Nature, its knowledge and will are hers
\nand incapable, whether conscient or subconscient, of variation from her laws
\nand dictates. Man<\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage-395<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

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

seems, on the contrary, to possess a power of turning
\nhis mind and will upon Nature and a possibility of governing her movement, even
\nof varying from the course she dictates to him. But here there is really a
\ndeformative trick of language. For man’s mentality is also a part of Nature;
\nhis mentality is even the most important, if not the largest part of his
\nnature. It is, we may say, Nature become partly conscious of her own laws and
\nforces, conscious of her struggle of progression and inspired with the
\nconscious will to impose a higher and higher law on her own processes of life
\nand being. In subhuman life there is a vital and physical struggle, but no
\nmental conflict. Man is subjected to this mental conflict and is therefore at
\nwar not only with others but with himself; and because he is capable of this
\nwar with himself, he is also capable of that which is denied to the animal, of
\nan inner evolution, a progression from higher to higher type, a constant
\nself-transcending.
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>This evolution takes place at
\npresent by a conflict and progress of ideas applied to life. In their primary
\naspect human ideas of life are simply a mental translation of the forces and tendencies
\nof life itself as they emerge in the form of needs, desires and interests. The
\nhuman mind has a practical intelligence more or less clear and exact which
\ntakes these things into account and gives to one and another a greater or less
\nvalue according to its own experience, preference and judgment. Some the man
\naccepts and helps in their growth by his will and intelligence, others he
\nrejects, discourages and even succeeds in eliminating. But from this elementary
\nprocess there emerges a second and more advanced character of man’s ideas about
\nlife; he passes beyond the mere mental translation and ready dynamic handling
\nto a regulated valuation of the forces and tendencies that have emerged or are
\nemerging in him and his environment. He studies them as fixed processes and
\nrules of Nature and endeavours to understand their law and norm. He tries to
\ndetermine the laws of his mind and life and body, the law and rule of the facts
\nand forces about him that constitute his environment and determine the field and
\nthe mould of his action. Since we are imperfect and evolutionary beings, this
\nstudy of the laws of life is bound to envisage two aspects: it perceives the
\nrule of what is and the rule<\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage-396<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

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

of what mayor ought to be, the law of our actualities
\nand the law of our potentialities. The latter takes for the human intellect
\nwhich tends always to an arbitrary and emphatic statement of things, the form
\nof a fixed ideal standard or set of principles from which our actual life is a
\nfall and deviation or towards which it is a progress and aspiration.<\/font> <\/font><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/font> <\/span>The evolutionary<\/font><\/span> idea of Nature
\nand life brings us to a pro- founder view. Both what is and what may be are
\nexpressions of the same constant facts<\/span>
\nof existence and forces or powers of our Nature from which we cannot and are
\nnot meant to escape, since all life is Nature fulfilling itself and not Nature
\ndestroying or denying itself; but we may raise and we are intended to raise,
\nchange and widen the forms, arrangements and values of these constant facts and
\nforces of our nature and existence, and in the course of our progress the
\nchange and perfectioning may amount to what seems a radical transformation,
\nalthough nothing essential is altered. Our actualities are the form and value
\nor power of expression<\/span> to which
\nour nature and life have attained; their norm or law is the fixed arrangement
\nand process proper to that stage of evolution. Our potentialities point us to a
\nnew form, value, power of expression with their new and appropriate arrangement
\nand process which is their proper law and norm. Standing thus between the
\nactual and the possible, our intellect tends to mistake present law and form
\nfor the eternal law of our nature and existence and regard any change as a
\ndeviation and fall or else, on the contrary, to mistake some future and
\npotential law and form for our ideal rule of life and all actual deviation from<\/span> that as an error or sin of our
\nnature. In reality, only that is eternal which is constant through all changes
\nand our ideal can be no more than a progressive expression of it. Only the
\nutmost limit of height, wideness and fullness of self- expression possible to
\nman, if any such limit there be, could be regarded, did we know of it, – and as
\nyet we do not know our utmost possibilities, – as the eternal ideal.<\/font> <\/font><\/p>\n


\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/font> <\/span>Whatever
\nthe ideas or ideals which the human mind extracts from life or tries to apply
\nto life, they can be nothing but the expression of that life itself as it
\nattempts to find more and more and fix higher and higher its own law and
\nrealise its potentialities.<\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage-397<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

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

Our mentality represents the conscious part of the
\nmovement of Nature in this progressive self-realisation and self-fulfilment of
\nthe values and potentialities of her human way of living. If that mentality
\nwere perfect, it would be one in its knowledge and will with the totality of
\nthe secret Knowledge and Will which she is trying to bring to the surface and
\nthere would be no mental conflict. For we should then be able to identify
\nourself with her movement, know her aim and follow intelligently her course, –<\/span> realising the truth on which the
\nGita lays stress that it is Nature alone that acts and the movements of our
\nmind and life are only the action of her modes. The subhuman life vitally,
\ninstinctively and mechanically does this very thing, lives according to Nature
\nwithin the limits of its type and is free from internal conflict though not
\nfrom conflict with other life. A superhuman life would reach consciously this
\nperfection, make the secret Knowledge and Will in things its own and fulfil
\nitself through Nature by her free, spontaneous and harmonious movement un-
\nhasting, unresting, towards that full development which is her inherent and
\ntherefore her predestined aim. Actually, because our mentality is imperfect, we
\ncatch only a glimpse of her tendencies and objects and each glimpse we get we
\nerect into an absolute principle or ideal theory of our life and conduct; we
\nsee only one side of her process and put that forward as the whole and perfect
\nsystem which must govern our ordering of our life. Working through the
\nimperfect individual and still more imperfect collective mind, she raises up
\nthe facts and powers of our existence as opposing principles and forces to
\nwhich we attach ourselves through our intellect and emotions, and favouring and
\ndepressing now this and now another she leads them in the mind of man through
\nstruggle and conflict towards a mutual knowledge and the sense of their mutual
\nnecessity and towards a progressively right relation and synthesis of their
\npotentialities which is represented in an increasing harmony and combination of
\nrealised powers in the elastic potentiality of human life.<\/font> <\/font><\/p>\n


\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/font> <\/span>The social
\nevolution of the human race is necessarily a development of the relations
\nbetween three constant factors, individuals, communities of various sorts and
\nmankind. Each seeks<\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage-398<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

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

its own fulfilment and satisfaction, but each is
\ncompelled to develop them not independently but in relation to the others. The
\nfirst natural aim of the individual must be his own inner growth and fullness
\nand its expression in his outer life; but this he can only accomplish through
\nhis relations with other individuals, to the various kinds of community
\nreligious, social, cultural and political to which he belongs and to the idea
\nand need of humanity at large. The community must seek its own fulfilment, but
\nwhatever its strength of mass consciousness and collective organisation, can
\naccomplish its growth only through its individuals under the stress of the
\ncircumstances set for it by its environment and subject to the conditions
\nimposed by its relations to other communities and individuals and to humanity
\nat large. Mankind as a whole has at present no consciously. organised common
\nlife; it has only an inchoate organisation determined much more by
\ncircumstances than by human intelligence and will. And yet the idea and the
\nfact of our common human existence, nature, destiny has always exercised its
\nstrong influence on human thought and action. One of the chief preoccupations
\nof ethics and religion has been the obligations of man to mankind. The pressure
\nof the large movements and fluctuations of the race has always affected the
\ndestinies of its separate communities and there has been a constant
\nreturn-pressure of separate\u00a0 <\/span>communities
\nsocial, cultural, political, religious to expand and include, if it might be,
\nthe totality of the race. And if or when the whole of humanity arrives at an
\norganised common life and seeks a common fulfilment and satisfaction, it can
\nonly do it by means of the relation of this whole to its parts and by the aid
\nof the expanding life of individual human beings and of the communities whose
\nprogress constitutes the larger terms of the life of the race.<\/font>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/font> <\/span><\/p>\n


\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0<\/font><\/span>Nature works always through these three terms
\nand none of them can be abolished. She starts from the visible manifestation of
\nthe one and the many, from the totality and its constituent units and creates
\nintermediary unities between the two without which there can be no full
\ndevelopment either of the totality or of the units. In the life-type itself she
\ncreates always the three terms of genus, species and individual. But while in
\nthe animal life she<\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage-399<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

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

is satisfied to separate rigidly and group suinmarily,
\nin the human she strives, on the contrary, to override the divisions she has
\nmade and lead the whole kind to the sense of unity and the realisation of
\noneness. Men’s communities are formed not so much by the instinctive herding
\ntogether of a number of individuals of the same genus or species as by local
\nassociation, community of interests and community of ideas; and these limits
\ntend always to be overcome in the widening of human thoughts and sympathies
\nbrought about by the closer intermingling of races, nations, interests, ideas,
\ncultures. Still, if overcome in their separatism, they are not abolished in
\ntheir fact, because they repose on an essential principle of Nature, –<\/span> diversity in unity. Therefore it
\nwould seem that the ideal or ultimate aim of Nature must be to develop the
\nindividual and all individuals to their full capacity, to develop the community
\nand all communities to the full expression of that many-sided existence and
\npotentiality which their differences were created to express, and to evolve the
\nunited life of mankind to its full common capacity and satisfaction, not by
\nsuppression of the fullness of life of the individual or the smaller
\ncommonalty, but by full advantage taken of the diversity which they develop.
\nThis would seem the soundest way to increase the total riches of mankind and
\nthrow them into a fund of common possession and enjoyment.
\n       
\nThe united progress of mankind would thus be realised by a general principle of
\ninterchange and assimilation between individual and individual and again
\nbetween individual and community, between community and community and again
\nbetween the smaller commonalty and the totality of mankind, between the common
\nlife and consciousness of mankind and its freely developing communal and
\nindividual constituents. As a matter of fact, although this interchange is what
\nNature even now contrives to bring about to a certain extent, life is far from
\nbeing governed by such a principle of free and harmonious mutuality. There is a
\nstruggle, an opposition of ideas, impulses and interests, an at- tempt of each
\nto profit by various kinds of war on the others, by a kind of intellectual,
\nvital, physical robbery and theft or even by the suppression, devouring,
\ndigestion of its fellows rather than by a free and rich interchange. This is
\nthe aspect of life which hu-<\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage-400<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

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


\nmanity<\/font><\/span>
\nin its highest thought and aspiration knows that it has to transcend, but has
\neither not yet discovered the right means or else has not had the force to
\napply it. It now endeavours instead to get rid of strife and the disorders of
\ngrowth by a strong subordination or servitude of the life of the individual to
\nthe life of the community and, logically, it will be led to the attempt to get
\nrid of strife between communities by a strong subordination or servitude of the
\nlife of the community to the united and organised life of the human race. To
\nremove freedom in order to get rid of disorder, strife and waste, to remove
\ndiversity in order to get rid of separatism and jarring complexities is the
\nimpulse of order and regimentation by which the arbitrary rigidity of the
\nintellectual reason seeks to substitute its straight line for the difficult
\ncurves of the process of Nature.<\/font> <\/font><\/p>\n


\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/font> <\/span>But freedom
\nis as necessary to life as law and regime; diversity is as necessary as unity
\nto our true completeness. Existence is only one in its essence and totality, in
\nits play it is necessarily multiform. Absolute uniformity would mean the
\ncessation of life, while on the other hand, the vigour of the pulse of life may
\nbe measured by the richness of the diversities which it creates. At the same
\ntime, while diversity is essential for power and fruitfulness of life, unity is
\nnecessary for its order, arrangement and stability. Unity we must create, but
\nnot necessarily uniformity. If man could realise a perfect spiritual unity, no
\nsort of uniformity would be necessary; for the utmost play of diversity would
\nbe securely possible on that foundation. If again he could realise a secure,
\nclear, firmly-held unity in the principle, a rich, even an unlimited diversity
\nin its application might be possible without any fear of disorder, confusion or
\nstrife. Because he cannot do either of these things he is tempted always to
\nsubstitute uniformity for real unity. While the life-power in man demands diversity,
\nhis reason favours uniformity. It prefers it because uniformity gives him a
\nstrong and ready illusion of unity in place of the real oneness at which it is
\nso much more difficult to arrive. It prefers it, secondly, because uniformity
\nmakes easy for him the otherwise difficult business of law, order and
\nregimentation. It prefers it too because the impulse of the mind in man is to
\nmake every considerable diversity an excuse for strife and separation<\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage-401<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

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

and therefore uniformity seems to him the one secure
\nand easy way to unification. Morever, uniformity in anyone direction or
\ndepartment of life helps him to economise his energies for development in other
\ndirections. If he can standardise his economic existence and escape from its
\nproblems, he is likely to have more leisure and room to attend to his
\nintellectual and cultural growth. Or again, if he standardises his whole social
\nexistence and rejects its farther possible problems, he is likely to have peace
\nand a free mind to attend more energetically to his spiritual development. Even
\nhere, however, the complex unity of existence asserts its truth: in the end
\nman’s total intellectual and cultural growth suffers by social immobility, –<\/span> by any restriction or poverty of his
\neconomic life; the spiritual existence of the race, if it attains to remote
\nheights, weakens at last in its richness and continued sources of vivacity when
\nit depends on a too standardised and regimented society; the inertia from below
\nrises and touches even the summits.<\/font> <\/font><\/p>\n


\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/font> <\/span>Owing to
\nthe defects of our mentality uniformity has to a certain extent to be admitted
\nand sought after; still the real aim of Nature is a true unity supporting a
\nrich diversity. Her secret is clear enough from the fact that though she moulds
\non one general plan, she insists always on an infinite variation. The plan of
\nthe human form is one, yet no two human beings are precisely alike in their
\nphysical characteristics. Human nature is one in its constituents and its grand
\nlines, but no two human beings are precisely alike in their temperament,
\ncharacteristics and psychological substance. All life is one in its essential
\nplan and principle; even the plant is a recognisable brother of the animal, but
\nthe unity of life admits and encourages an infinite variety of types. The
\nnatural variation of human communities from each other proceeds on the same
\nplan as the variation of individuals; each develops its own character, variant
\nprinciple, natural law. This variation and fundamental following of its own
\nseparate law is necessary to its life, but it is equally necessary to the
\nhealthy total life of mankind. For the principle of variation does not prevent
\nfree interchange, does not oppose the enrichment of all from a common stock and
\nof the common stock by all which we have seen to be the ideal principle of
\nexistence; on the contrary, without<\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage-402<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

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

a secure variation such interchange and mutual
\nassimilation would be out of the question. Therefore we see that in this harmony
\nbetween our unity and our diversity lies the secret of life; Nature insists
\nequally in all her works upon unity and upon variation. We shall find that a
\nreal spiritual and psychological unity can allow a free diversity and dispense
\nwith all but the minimum of uniformity which is sufficient to embody the
\ncommunity of nature and of essential principle. Until we can arrive at that
\nperfection, the method of uniformity has to be applied, but we must not over
\napply it on peril of discouraging life in the very sources of its power,
\nrichness and sane natural self-unfolding.<\/font> <\/font><\/p>\n


\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/font> <\/span>The quarrel
\nbetween law and liberty stands on the same ground and moves to the same
\nsolution. The diversity, the variation must be a free variation. Nature does
\nnot manufacture, does not impose a pattern or a rule from outside; she impels
\nlife to grow from within and to assert its own natural law and development
\nmodified only by its commerce with its environment. All liberty, individual,
\nnational, religious, social, ethical, takes its ground upon this fundamental
\nprinciple of our existence. By liberty we mean the freedom to obey the law of
\nour being, to grow to our natural self-fulfilment, to find out naturally and
\nfreely our harmony with our environment. The dangers and disadvantages of
\nliberty, the disorder, strife, waste and confusion to which its wrong use leads
\nare indeed obvious. But they arise from the absence or defect of the sense of
\nunity between individual and individual, between community and community, which
\npushes them to assert themselves at the expense of each other instead of
\ngrowing by mutual help and interchange and to assert freedom for themselves in
\nthe very act of encroaching on the free development of their fellows. If a
\nreal, a spiritual and psycho- logical unity were effectuated, liberty would
\nhave no perils and disadvantages; for free individuals enamoured of unity would
\nbe compelled by themselves, by their own need, to accommodate perfectly their
\nown growth with the growth of their fellows and would not feel themselves
\ncomplete except in the free growth of others. Because of our present
\nimperfection and the ignorance of our mind and will, law and regimentation have
\nto be called in to restrain and to compel from outside. The facile advantages
\nof a<\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage-403<\/font><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

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

strong law and compulsion are obvious, but equally
\ngreat are the disadvantages. Such perfection as it succeeds in creating tends
\nto be mechanical and even the order it imposes turns out to be artificial and
\nliable to break down if the yoke is loosened or the restraining grasp
\nwithdrawn. Carried too far, an imposed order discourages the principle of
\nnatural growth which is the true method of life and may even slay the capacity
\nfor real growth. We repress and overstandardise life at our peril; by
\nover-regimentation we crush Nature’s initiative and habit of intuitive
\nself-adaptation. Dwarfed or robbed of elasticity, the devitalised
\nindividuality, even while it seems outwardly fair and symmetrical, perishes
\nfrom within. Better anarchy than the long continuance of a law which is not our
\nown or which our real nature cannot assimilate. And all repressive or
\npreventive law is only a make- shift, a substitute for the true law which must
\ndevelop from within and be not a check on liberty, but its outward image and
\nvisible expression. Human society progresses really and vitally in proportion
\nas law becomes the child of freedom; it will reach its perfection when, man
\nhaving learned to know and become spiritually one with his fellow-man, the
\nspontaneous law of his society exists only as the outward mould of his
\nself-governed inner liberty.<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/font>Page-404<\/font><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

CHAPTER XVII Nature’s Law in Our Progress – Unity in Diversity, Law and Liberty   \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 FOR man alone of terrestrial creatures to live rightly…<\/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-1176","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\/1176","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=1176"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1176\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1176"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1176"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1176"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}