{"id":1248,"date":"2013-07-13T01:33:33","date_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:33:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/?p=1248"},"modified":"2013-07-13T01:33:33","modified_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:33:33","slug":"03-reality-and-the-integral-knowledge-vol-19-the-life-divine-volume-19","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/01-works-of-sri-aurobindo\/01-sabcl\/19-the-life-divine-volume-19\/03-reality-and-the-integral-knowledge-vol-19-the-life-divine-volume-19","title":{"rendered":"-03_Reality and the Integral Knowledge .htm"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n\n\n\n
\n

\nBOOK II<\/font><\/b><\/p>\n

\nPart<\/font><\/span>
\nII<\/font><\/b><\/p>\n

\nTHE KNOWLEDGE AND THE IGNORANCE <\/b><\/p>\n

\nTHE SPIRITUAL EVOLUTION<\/b><\/p>\n

\n


\nC<\/font>HAPTER <\/font>
\n XV<\/font><\/b><\/p>\n


\nReality and the Integral Knowledge<\/p>\n

<\/font>
\n<\/b>\n<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThis Self is to be won by the Truth and by an integral knowledge.<\/font><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tMundaka Upanishad.\u00b9<\/font><\/i><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tHear how thou shalt
\n\t\t\tknow Me in My totality… for even of the <\/font><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tseekers who have achieved,
\n\t\t\thardly one knows Me in all the truth <\/font><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tof My being.<\/font><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tGita.\u00b2<\/font><\/i><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

    T<\/font><\/b>HIS<\/font>
\nthen is the origin, this the nature, these the boundaries of the
\nIgnorance. Its origin is a limitation of knowledge, its
\ndistinctive character a separation of the being from its own
\nintegrality and entire reality; its boundaries are determined by
\nthis separative development of the consciousness, for it shuts us to
\nour true self and to the true self and whole nature of
\nthings and obliges us to live in an apparent surface existence. A
\nreturn or a progress to integrality, a disappearance of the
\nlimitation, a breaking down of separativeness, an overpassing of
\nboundaries, a recovery of our essential and whole reality
\nmust be the sign and opposite character of the inner turn towards
\nKnowledge. There must be a replacement of a limited and
\nseparative by an essential and integral consciousness identified with
\nthe original truth and the whole truth of self and
\nexistence. The integral Knowledge is something that is already there in
\nthe integral Reality: it is not a new or still
\nnon-existent thing that has to be created, acquired, learned, invented
\nor built up by the mind; it must rather be discovered or
\nuncovered, it is a Truth that is self-revealed to a spiritual
\nendeavour: for it is there veiled in our deeper and greater self; it is
\nthe very stuff of our own spiritual consciousness, and it is by awaking
\nto it even in our surface self that we have to possess
\nit. There is an integral self-knowledge that we have to recover and,
\nbecause the world-self also is our self, an integral
\nworld-knowledge. A knowledge that can be learned or constructed by the
\nmind exists and has\n<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n      \u00b9<\/font><\/font>
\nIII. 1. 5.<\/p>\n

         
\n\u00b2 <\/font>VII. 1, 3.
\n<\/font>\n<\/p>\n

\nPage-633<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

its value, but that is not what is meant when we speak of the Knowledge and the Ignorance.<\/p>\n

     
\nAn integral spiritual consciousness carries in it a knowledge of all
\nthe terms of being; it links the highest to the lowest
\nthrough all the mediating terms and achieves an indivisible whole. At
\nthe highest summit of things it opens to the reality,
\nineffable because superconscient to all but its own self-awareness, of
\nthe Absolute. At the lowest end of our being it
\nperceives the Inconscience from which our evolution begins; but at the
\nsame time it is aware of the One and the All
\nself-involved in those depths, it unveils the secret Consciousness in
\nthe Inconscience. Interpretative, revelatory, moving
\nbetween these two extremes, its vision discovers the manifestation of
\nthe One in the Many, the identity of the Infinite in the
\ndisparity of things finite, the presence of the timeless Eternal in
\neternal Time; it is this seeing that illumines for it the meaning
\nof the universe. This consciousness does not abolish the universe; it
\ntakes it up and transforms it by giving to it its hidden
\nsignificance. It does not abolish the individual existence; it
\ntransforms the individual being and nature by revealing to them
\ntheir true significance and enabling them to overcome their
\nseparateness from the Divine Reality and the Divine Nature.\n<\/p>\n

     An integral knowledge
\npresupposes an integral Reality; for it is the power of a
\nTruth-Consciousness which is itself the
\nconsciousness of the Reality. But our idea and sense of Reality vary
\nwith our status and movement of consciousness, its
\nsight, its stress, its intake of things; that sight or stress can be
\nintensive and exclusive or extensive, inclusive and
\ncomprehensive. It is quite possible,—and it is in its own field a valid
\nmovement for our thought and for a very high line of
\nspiritual achievement,— to affirm the existence of the ineffable
\nAbsolute, to emphasise its sole Reality and to negate and
\nabolish for our self, to expunge from our idea and sense of reality,
\nthe individual being and the cosmic creation. The reality
\nof the individual is Brahman the Absolute; the reality of the cosmos is
\nBrahman the Absolute: the individual is a
\nphenomenon, a temporal appearance in the cosmos; the cosmos itself is a
\nphenomenon, a larger and more complex temporal
\nappearance. The two terms, Knowledge and Igno-<\/p>\n

\nPage-634<\/p>\n

<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

rance, belong only to this appearance; in order to reach an absolute superconsciousness both have to be transcended:
\nego-consciousness and cosmic consciousness are extinguished in that supreme transcendence and there remains only the
\nAbsolute. For the absolute Brahman exists only in its own identity and is beyond all other-knowledge; there the very idea of
\nthe knower and the known and therefore of the knowledge in which they meet and become one, disappears, is transcended
\nand loses its validity, so that to mind and speech the absolute Brahman must remain always unattainable. In opposition to the
\nview we have put forward or in completion of it,—the view of the Ignorance itself as only either a limited or an involved
\naction of the divine Knowledge, limited in the partly conscient, involved in the inconscient,—we might say from this other
\nend of the scale of things that Knowledge itself is only a higher Ignorance, since it stops short of the absolute Reality which
\nis self-evident to Itself but to mind unknowable. This absolutism corresponds to a truth of thought and to a truth of supreme
\nexperience in the spiritual consciousness; but by itself it is not the whole of spiritual thought complete and comprehensive
\nand it does not exhaust the possibilities of the supreme spiritual experience.<\/p>\n

     
\nThe absolutist view of reality, consciousness and knowledge is founded on one side of the earliest Vedantic thought, but
\nit is not the whole of that thinking. In the Upanishads, in the inspired scripture of the most ancient Vedanta, we find the
\naffirmation of the Absolute, the experience-concept of the utter and ineffable Transcendence; but we find also, not in
\ncontradiction to it but as its corollary, an affirmation of the cosmic Divinity, an experience-concept of the cosmic Self and
\nthe becoming of Brahman in the universe. Equally, we find the affirmation of the Divine Reality in the individual: this too is
\nan experience-concept; it is seized upon not as an appearance, but as an actual becoming. In place of a sole supreme
\nexclusive affirmation negating all else than the transcendent Absolute we find a comprehensive affirmation carried to its
\nfarthest conclusion: this concept of Reality and of Knowledge enveloping in one view the cosmic and the Absolute coincides
\nfundamentally with our own; for it implies that the Ignorance too is a half-veiled part of the Knowledge and world-\n<\/p>\n

\nPage-635<\/p>\n

<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

knowledge a part of self-knowledge. The Isha
\nUpanishad insists on the unity and reality of all the manifestations of
\nthe
\nAbsolute; it refuses to confine truth to any one aspect. Brahman is the
\nstable and the mobile, the internal and the external,
\nall that is near and all that is far whether spiritually or in the
\nextension of Time and Space; it is the Being and all becomings,
\nthe Pure and Silent who is without feature or action and the Seer and
\nThinker who organises the world and its objects; it is
\nthe One who becomes all that we are sensible of in the universe, the
\nImmanent and that in which he takes up his dwelling.
\nThe Upanishad affirms the perfect and the liberating knowledge to be
\nthat which excludes neither the Self nor its creations:
\nthe liberated spirit sees all these as becomings of the Self-existent
\nin an internal vision and by a consciousness which
\nperceives the universe within itself instead of looking out on it, like
\nthe limited and egoistic mind, as a thing other than itself.
\nTo live in the cosmic Ignorance is a blindness, but to confine oneself
\nin an exclusive absolutism of Knowledge is also a
\nblindness: to know Brahman as at once and together the Knowledge and
\nthe Ignorance, to attain to the supreme status at
\nonce by the Becoming and the Non-Becoming, to relate together
\nrealisation of the transcendent and the cosmic self, to
\nachieve foundation in the supramundane and a self-aware manifestation
\nin the mundane, is the integral knowledge; that is
\nthe possession of Immortality. It is this whole consciousness with its
\ncomplete knowledge that builds the foundation of the
\nLife Divine and makes its attainment possible. It follows that the
\nabsolute reality of the Absolute must be, not a rigid
\nindeterminable oneness, not an infinity vacant of all that is not a
\npure self-existence attainable only by the exclusion of the
\nmany and the finite, but something which is beyond these definitions,
\nbeyond indeed any description either positive or
\nnegative. All affirmations and negations are expressive of its aspects,
\nand it is through both a supreme affirmation and a
\nsupreme negation that we can arrive at the Absolute.\n<\/p>\n

     On the one side, then,
\npresented to us as the Reality, we have an absolute Self-Existence, an
\neternal sole self-being, and
\nthrough the experience of the silent and inactive Self or the detached
\nimmobile Purusha we can move towards this
\nfeatureless and<\/p>\n

 Page-636<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

relationless Absolute, negate the actions of the
\ncreative Power, whether that be an illusory Maya or a formative
\nPrakriti,
\npass from all circling in cosmic error into the eternal Peace and
\nSilence, get rid of our personal existence and find or lose
\nourselves in that sole true Existence. On the other side, we have a
\nBecoming which is a true movement of Being, and both
\nthe Being and the Becoming are truths of one absolute Reality. The
\nfirst view is founded on the metaphysical conception
\nwhich formulates an extreme perception in our thought, an exclusive
\nexperience in our consciousness of the Absolute as a
\nreality void of all relations and determinations: that imposes as its
\nconsequence a logical and practical necessity to deny the
\nworld of relativities as a falsity of unreal being, a Non-Existent
\n(Asat), or at least a lower and evanescent, temporal and
\npragmatic self-experience, and to cut it away from the consciousness in
\norder to arrive at liberation of the spirit from its
\nfalse perceptions or its inferior creations. The second view is based
\non the conception of the Absolute as neither positively
\nnor negatively limitable. It is beyond all relations in the sense that
\nit is not bound by any relativities or limitable by them in its
\npower of being: it cannot be tied down and circumscribed by our
\nrelative conceptions, highest or lowest, positive or negative;
\nit is bound neither by our knowledge nor by our ignorance, neither by
\nour concept of existence nor by our concept of
\nnon-existence. But neither can it be limited by any incapacity to
\ncontain, sustain, create or manifest relations: on the
\ncontrary, the power to manifest itself in infinity of unity and
\ninfinity of multiplicity can be regarded as an inherent force, sign,
\nresult of its very absoluteness, and this possibility is in itself a
\nsufficient explanation of cosmic existence. The Absolute
\ncannot indeed be bound in its nature to manifest a cosmos of relations,
\nbut neither can it be bound not to manifest any
\ncosmos. It is not itself a sheer emptiness; for a vacant Absolute is no
\nAbsolute,—our conception of a Void or Zero is only a
\nconceptual sign of our mental inability to know or grasp it: it bears
\nin itself some ineffable essentiality of all that is and all
\nthat can be; and since it holds in itself this essentiality and this
\npossibility, it must also hold in itself in some way of its
\nabsoluteness either the permanent truth or the inherent, even if
\nlatent, realisable actuality\n<\/p>\n

\nPage-637<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

of all that is fundamental to our or the world’s existence. It is this realisable actuality actualised or this permanent truth
\ndeploying its possibilities that we call manifestation and see as the universe.<\/p>\n

     There is, then, in the
\nconception or the realisation of the truth of the Absolute no inherent
\ninevitable consequence of a
\nrejection or a dissolution of the truth of the universe. The idea of an
\nessentially unreal universe manifested somehow by an
\ninexplicable Power of illusion, the Absolute Brahman regarding it not
\nor aloof and not affecting it even as it is unaffected by
\nit, is at bottom a carrying over, an imposing or imputation, adhyā<\/font>ropa<\/i>, of an incapacity of our mental consciousness to That
\nso as to limit it. Our mental consciousness, when it passes beyond its limits, loses its own way and means of knowledge and
\ntends towards inactivity or cessation; it loses at the same time or tends to have no further hold on its former contents, no
\ncontinuing conception of the reality of that which once was to it all that was real: we impute to absolute Parabrahman,
\nconceived as non-manifest for ever, a corresponding inability or separation or aloofness from what has become or seems
\nnow to us unreal; it must, like our mind in its cessation or self-extinction, be by its very nature of pure absoluteness void of
\nall connection with this world of apparent manifestation, incapable of any supporting cognition or dynamic maintenance of it
\nthat gives it a reality,— or, if there is such a cognition, it must be of the nature of an Is that is not, a magical Maya. But
\nthere is no binding reason to suppose that this chasm must exist; what our relative human consciousness is or is not capable
\nof, is no test or standard of an absolute capacity; its conceptions cannot be applied to an absolute self-awareness: what is
\nnecessary for our mental ignorance in order to escape from itself cannot be the necessity of the Absolute which has no
\nneed of self-escape and no reason for refusing to cognise whatever is to it cognisable.
\nThere is that unmanifest Unknowable; there is this manifest knowable, partly manifest to our ignorance, manifest
\nentirely to the divine Knowledge which holds it in its own infinity. If it is true that neither our ignorance nor our utmost and
\nwidest mental knowledge can give us a hold of the Unknowable, still it is also true that, whether through our knowledge or
\nthrough our
\nigno-<\/p>\n

\nPage-638<\/p>\n

<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

rance, That variously manifests itself; for it cannot be manifesting something other than itself, since nothing else can
\nexist: in this variety of manifestation there is that Oneness and through the diversity we can touch the Oneness. But even so,
\neven accepting this co-existence, it is still possible to pass a final verdict and sentence of condemnation on the Becoming
\nand decide on the necessity of a renunciation of it and a return into the absolute Being. This verdict can be based on the
\ndistinction between the real reality of the Absolute and the partial and misleading reality of the relative universe.<\/p>\n

     For we have in this
\nunfolding of knowledge the two terms of the One and the Many, as we
\nhave the two terms of the
\nfinite and the infinite, of that which becomes and of that which does
\nnot become but for ever is, of that which takes form
\nand of that which does not take form, of Spirit and Matter, of the
\nsupreme Superconscient and the nethermost Inconscience;
\nin this dualism, and to get away from it, it is open to us to define
\nKnowledge as the possession of one term and the
\npossession of the other as Ignorance. The ultimate of our life would
\nthen be a drawing away from the lower reality of the
\nBecoming to the greater reality of the Being, a leap from the Ignorance
\nto the Knowledge and a rejection of the Ignorance,
\na departure from the many into the One, from the finite into the
\ninfinite, from form into the formless, from the life of the
\nmaterial universe into the Spirit, from the hold of the inconscient
\nupon us into the superconscient Existence. In this solution
\nthere is supposed to be a fixed opposition, an ultimate
\nirreconcilability in each case between the two terms of our being. Or
\nelse, if both are a means of the manifestation of the Brahman, the
\nlower is a false or imperfect clue, a means that must fail,
\na system of values that cannot ultimately satisfy us. Dissatisfied with
\nthe confusions of the multiplicity, disdainful of even the
\nhighest light and power and joy that it can reveal, we must drive
\nbeyond to the absolute one-pointedness and
\none-standingness in which all self-variation ceases. Unable by the
\nclaim of the Infinite upon us to dwell for ever in the bonds
\nof the finite or to find there satisfaction and largeness and peace, we
\nhave to break all the bonds of individual and universal
\nNature, destroy all values, symbols, images, self-definitions,
\nlimitations\n<\/p>\n

\nPage-639 <\/font><\/p>\n

\n

of the illimitable and lose all littleness and
\ndivision in the Self that is for ever satisfied with its own infinity.
\nDisgusted with
\nforms, disillusioned of their false and transient attractions, wearied
\nand discouraged by their fleeting impermanence and vain
\nround of recurrence, we must escape from the cycles of Nature into the
\nformlessness and featurelessness of permanent
\nBeing. Ashamed of Matter and its grossness, impatient of the
\npurposeless stir and trouble of Life, tired out by the goalless
\nrunning of Mind or convinced of the vanity of all its aims and objects,
\nwe have to release ourselves into the eternal repose
\nand purity of the Spirit. The Inconscient is a sleep or a prison, the
\nconscient a round of strivings without ultimate issue or the
\nwanderings of a dream: we must wake into the superconscious where all
\ndarkness of night and half-lights cease in the
\nself-luminous bliss of the Eternal. The Eternal is our refuge; all the
\nrest are false values, the Ignorance and its mazes, a
\nself-bewilderment of the soul in phenomenal Nature.\n<\/p>\n

     Our conception of the
\nKnowledge and the Ignorance rejects this negation and the oppositions
\non which it is founded: it
\npoints to a larger if more difficult issue of reconciliation. For we
\nsee that these apparently opposite terms of One and Many,
\nForm and the Formless, Finite and Infinite, are not so much opposites
\nas complements of each other; not alternating values
\nof the Brahman which in its creation perpetually loses oneness to find
\nitself in multiplicity and, unable to discover itself in
\nmultiplicity, loses it again to recover oneness, but double and
\nconcurrent values which explain each other; not hopelessly
\nincompatible alternatives, but two faces of the one Reality which can
\nlead us to it by our realisation of both together and not
\nonly by testing each separately,—even though such separate testing may
\nbe a legitimate or even an inevitable step or part of
\nthe process of knowledge. Knowledge is no doubt the knowledge of the
\nOne, the realisation of the Being; Ignorance is a
\nself-oblivion of Being, the experience of separateness in the
\nmultiplicity and a dwelling or circling in the ill-understood maze
\nof becomings: but this is cured by the soul in the Becoming growing
\ninto knowledge, into awareness of the Being which
\nbecomes in the multiplicity all these existences and can so become<\/p>\n

\n Page-640<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

because their truth is already there in its timeless existence. The integral knowledge of Brahman is a consciousness in
\npossession of both together, and the exclusive pursuit of either closes the vision to one side of the truth of the omnipresent
\nReality. The possession of the Being who is beyond all becomings, brings to us freedom from the bonds of attachment and
\nignorance in the cosmic existence and brings by that freedom a free possession of the Becoming and of the cosmic
\nexistence. The knowledge of the Becoming is a part of knowledge; it acts as an Ignorance only because we dwell
\nimprisoned in it, avidyā<\/font>yā<\/font>m antare,<\/i> without possessing the Oneness of the Being, which is its base, its stuff, its spirit, its
\ncause of manifestation and without which it could not be possible.<\/p>\n

     In fact, the Brahman is one
\nnot only in a featureless oneness beyond all relation, but in the very
\nmultiplicity of the
\ncosmic existence. Aware of the works of the dividing mind but not
\nitself limited by it, It finds its oneness as easily in the
\nmany, in relations, in becoming as in any withdrawal from the many,
\nfrom relations, from becoming. Ourselves also, to
\npossess even its oneness fully, must possess it,—since it is there,
\nsince all is that,—in the infinite self-variation of the
\ncosmos. The infinity of the multiplicity finds itself explained and
\njustified only when it is contained and possessed in the
\ninfinity of the One; but also the infinity of the One pours itself out
\nand possesses itself in the infinity of the Many. To be
\ncapable of that outpouring of its energies as well as not to lose
\nitself in it, not to recoil defeated from its boundlessness and
\nendlessness of vicissitudes and differences as well as not to be
\nself-divided by its variations, is the divine strength of the free
\nPurusha, the conscious Soul in its possession of its own immortal
\nself-knowledge. The finite self-variations of the Self in
\nwhich the mind losing self-knowledge is caught and dispersed among the
\nvariations, are yet not the denials but the endless
\nexpression of the Infinite and have no other meaning or reason for
\nexistence: the Infinite too, while it possesses its delight of
\nlimitless being, finds also the joy of that very limitlessness in its
\ninfinite self-definition in the universe. The Divine Being is not
\nincapable of taking innumerable forms because He is beyond all form in
\nHis essence, nor by assuming\n<\/p>\n

\nPage-641<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

them does He lose His divinity, but pours out rather
\nin them the delight of His being and the glories of His godhead; this
\ngold
\ndoes not cease to be gold because it shapes itself into all kinds of
\nornaments and coins itself into many currencies and
\nvalues, nor does the Earth-Power, principle of all this figured
\nmaterial existence, lose her immutable divinity because she
\nforms herself into habitable worlds, throws herself out in the hills
\nand hollows and allows herself to be shaped into utensils of
\nthe hearth and household or as hard metal into the weapon and the
\nengine. Matter,—substance itself, subtle or dense,
\nmental or material,—is form and body of Spirit and would never have
\nbeen created if it could not be made a basis for the
\nself-expression of the Spirit. The apparent Inconscience of the
\nmaterial universe holds in itself darkly all that is eternally
\nself-revealed in the luminous Superconscient; to reveal it in Time is
\nthe slow and deliberate delight of Nature and the aim of
\nher cycles.\n<\/p>\n

     But there are other
\nconceptions of reality, other conceptions of the nature of knowledge
\nwhich demand consideration.
\nThere is the view that all that exists is a subjective creation of
\nMind, a structure of Consciousness, and that the idea of an
\nobjective reality self-existent, independent of Consciousness, is an
\nillusion, since we have and can have no evidence of any
\nsuch independent self-existence of things. This way of seeing may lead
\nto the affirmation of the creative Consciousness as
\nthe sole Reality or to the denial of all existence and the affirmation
\nof Non-Existence or a nescient Zero as the sole Reality.
\nFor, in one view, the objects constructed by consciousness have no
\nintrinsic reality, they are merely structures; even the
\nconsciousness that constructs them is itself only a flux of perceptions
\nthat assume an appearance of connection and
\ncontinuity and create a sense of continuous time, but in reality these
\nthings have no stable basis as they are only an
\nappearance of reality. This would mean that the reality is an eternal
\nabsence at once of all self-conscious existence and of
\nall that constitutes movement of existence: Knowledge would mean a
\nreturn to that from the appearance of the constructed
\nuniverse. There would be a double and complete self-extinction, the
\ndisappearance of Purusha, the cessation or extinction of
\nPrakriti; for the conscious Soul and Nature are\n<\/p>\n

\nPage-642<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

the two terms of our being and comprehend all that we mean by existence, and the negation of both is the absolute Nirvana.
\nWhat is real, then, must be either an Inconscience, in which this flux and these structures appear, or a Superconscience
\nbeyond all idea of self or existence. But this view of the universe is only true of the appearance of things when we regard
\nour surface mind as the whole of consciousness; as a description of the working of that Mind it is valid; there, undoubtedly,
\nall looks like a flux and a construction by an impermanent Consciousness. But this cannot prevail as a whole account of
\nexistence if there is a greater and deeper self-knowledge and world-knowledge, a knowledge by identity, a consciousness to
\nwhich that knowledge is normal and a Being of which that consciousness is the eternal self-awareness; for then the
\nsubjective and the objective can be real and intimate to that consciousness and being, both can be something of itself, sides
\nof its identity, authentic to its existence.<\/p>\n

     
\nOn the other hand, if the constructing Mind or Consciousness is real and the sole reality, then the universe of material
\nbeings and objects may have an existence, but it is purely subjective-structural, made by Consciousness out of itself,
\nmaintained by it, dissolving into it in their disappearance. For if there is nothing else, no essential Existence or Being
\nsupporting the creative Power, and there is not, either, a sustaining Void or Nihil, then this Consciousness which creates
\neverything must itself have or be an existence or a substance; if it can make structures, they must be constructions out of its
\nown substance or forms of its own existence. A consciousness which is not that of an Existence or is not itself an existence,
\nmust be an unreality, a perceptive Force of a Void or in a Void raising there unreal structures made of nothing,—a
\nproposition which is not easily acceptable unless all others prove to be invalid. It then becomes apparent that what we see
\nas consciousness must be a Being or an Existence out of whose substance of consciousness all is created.<\/p>\n

     But if we thus get back to
\nthe biune or the dual reality of Being and Consciousness, we can either
\nsuppose with
\nVedanta one original Being or with Sankhya a plurality of beings to
\nwhom Consciousness or some Energy to which we
\nattribute consciousness presents its structures. If a plurality of
\nseparate\n<\/p>\n

\nPage-643 <\/font><\/p>\n

\n

original beings alone is real, then, since each
\nwould be or create its own world in its own consciousness, the
\ndifficulty is to
\naccount for their relations in a single identical universe; there must
\nbe a one Consciousness or one Energy,—corresponding
\nto the Sankhya idea of a single Prakriti which is the field of
\nexperience of many like Purushas,—in which they meet in an
\nidentical mind-constructed universe. This theory of things has the
\nadvantage of accounting for the multitude of souls and
\nmultitude of things and the oneness in diversity of their experience,
\nwhile at the same time it gives a reality to the separate
\nspiritual growth and destiny of the individual being. But if we can
\nsuppose a One Consciousness, or a One Energy, creating
\na multitude of figures of itself and accommodating in its world a
\nplurality of beings, there is no difficulty in supposing a one
\noriginal Being who supports or expresses himself in a plurality of
\nbeings,— souls or spiritual powers of his one-existence; it
\nwould follow also that all objects, all the figures of consciousness
\nwould be figures of the Being. It must then be asked
\nwhether this plurality and these figures are realities of the one Real
\nExistence, or representative personalities and images
\nonly, or symbols or values created by Mind to represent It. This would
\ndepend largely on whether it is only Mind as we
\nknow it that is in action or a deeper and greater Consciousness, of
\nwhich Mind is a surface instrument, executrix of its
\ninitiations, medium of its manifestations. If it is the former, the
\nuniverse constructed and seen by Mind can only have a
\nsubjective or symbolic or representative reality: if the latter, then
\nthe universe and its natural beings and objects can be true
\nrealities of the One Existence, forms or powers of its being manifested
\nby its force of being. Mind would be only an
\ninterpreter between the universal Reality and the manifestations of its
\ncreative Consciousness-Force, Shakti, Prakriti, Maya.<\/p>\n

     
\nIt is clear that a Mind of the nature of our surface intelligence can be only a secondary power of existence. For it bears
\nthe stamp of incapacity and ignorance as a sign that it is derivative and not the original creatrix; we see that it does not
\nknow or understand the objects it perceives, it has no automatic control of them; it has to acquire a laboriously built
\nknowledge and controlling power. This initial incapacity could not be there if<\/p>\n

\nPage-644<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

these objects were the Mind’s own structures, creations of
\nits self-Power. It may be that this is so because individual mind has only a
\nfrontal and derivative power and knowledge and there is a universal Mind that is
\nwhole, endowed with omniscience, capable of omnipotence. But the nature of Mind
\nas we know it is an Ignorance seeking for knowledge; it is a knower of fractions
\nand worker of divisions striving to arrive at a sum, to piece together a
\nwhole,—it is not possessed of the essence of things or their totality: a
\nuniversal Mind of the same character might know the sum of its divisions by
\nforce of its universality, but it would still lack the essential knowledge, and
\nwithout the essential knowledge there could be no true integral knowledge. A
\nconsciousness possessing the essential and integral knowledge, proceeding from
\nthe essence to the whole and from the whole to the parts, would be no longer
\nMind, but a perfect Truth-Consciousness automatically possessed of inherent
\nself-knowledge and world-knowledge. It is from this basis that we have to look
\nat the subjective view of reality. It is true that there is no such thing as an
\nobjective reality independent of consciousness; but at the same time there is a
\ntruth in objectivity and it is this, that the reality of things resides in
\nsomething that is within them and is independent of the interpretation our mind
\ngives to them and of the structures it builds upon its observation. These
\nstructures constitute the mind’s subjective image or figure of the universe, but
\nthe universe and its objects are not a mere image or figure. They are in essence
\ncreations of consciousness, but of a consciousness that is one with being, whose
\nsubstance is the substance of Being and whose creations too are of that
\nsubstance, therefore real. In this view the world cannot be a purely subjective
\ncreation of Consciousness; the subjective and the objective truth of things are
\nboth real, they are two sides of the same Reality.<\/p>\n

      In a certain sense, to use the
\nrelative and suggestive phrasing of our human language, all things are the
\nsymbols through which we have to approach and draw nearer to That by which we
\nand they exist. The infinity of unity is one symbol, the infinity of the
\nmultiplicity is another symbol: again, since each thing in the multiplicity
\npoints back to the unity, since each thing that <\/p>\n

\nPage-645<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

we call finite is a representative figure, a
\nform-front, a silhouette shadowing out something of the infinite, all
\nthat defines
\nitself in the universe,—all its objects, happenings, idea-formations,
\nlife-formations,—are in their turn each a clue and a
\nsymbol. To our subjective mind the infinity of existence is one symbol,
\nthe infinity of non-existence is another symbol. The
\ninfinity of the Inconscient and the infinity of the Superconscient are
\ntwo poles of the manifestation of the absolute
\nParabrahman, and our existence between these two poles and our passage
\nfrom one to the other are a progressive seizing, a
\nconstant interpretation, a subjective building up in ourselves of this
\nmanifestation of the Unmanifest. Through such an
\nunfolding of our self-existence we have to arrive at the consciousness
\nof its ineffable Presence and of ourselves and the
\nworld and all that is and all that is not as the unveiling of that
\nwhich never entirely unveils itself to anything other than its
\nown self-light eternal and absolute.\n<\/p>\n

     But this way of seeing
\nthings belongs to the action of the mind interpreting the relation
\nbetween the Being and the
\nexternal Becoming; it is valid as a dynamic mental representation
\ncorresponding to a certain truth of the manifestation, but
\nsubject to the proviso that these symbolic values of things do not make
\nthe things themselves mere significant counters,
\nabstract symbols like mathematical formulae or other signs used by the
\nmind for knowledge: for forms and happenings in the
\nuniverse are realities significant of Reality; they are
\nself-expressions of That, movements and powers of the Being. Each
\nform is there because it is an expression of some power of That which
\ninhabits it; each happening is a movement in the
\nworking out of some Truth of the Being in its dynamic process of
\nmanifestation. It is this significance that gives validity to
\nthe mind’s interpretative knowledge, its subjective construction of the
\nuniverse; our mind is primarily a percipient and
\ninterpreter, secondarily and derivatively a creator. This indeed is the
\nvalue of all mental subjectivity that it reflects in it some
\ntruth of the Being which exists independently of the
\nreflection,—whether that independence presents itself as a physical
\nobjectivity or a supraphysical reality perceived by the mind but not
\nperceptible by the physical senses. Mind, then, is not the
\noriginal constructor of the universe: it<\/p>\n

\n Page-646<\/p>\n

<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

is an intermediate power valid for certain
\nactualities of being; an agent, an intermediary, it actualises
\npossibilities and has its
\nshare in the creation, but the real creatrix is a Consciousness, an
\nEnergy inherent in the transcendent and cosmic Spirit.\n<\/p>\n

     There is a precisely
\nopposite view of reality and knowledge which affirms an objective
\nReality as the only entire truth
\nand an objective knowledge as the sole entirely reliable knowledge.
\nThis view starts from the idea of physical existence as
\nthe one fundamental existence and the relegation of consciousness,
\nmind, soul or spirit to the position of a temporary
\noutcome of the physical Energy in its cosmic action,—if indeed soul or
\nspirit has any existence. All that is not physical and
\nobjective has a lesser reality dependent on the physical and objective;
\nit has to justify itself to the physical mind by objective
\nevidence or a recognisable and verifiable relation to the truth of
\nphysical and external things before it can be given a
\npassport of reality. But it is evident that this solution cannot be
\naccepted in its rigour, as it has no integrality in it but looks at
\nonly one side of existence, even only one province or district of
\nexistence, and leaves all the rest unexplained, without
\ninherent reality, without significance. If pushed to its extreme, it
\nwould give to a stone or a plum-pudding a greater reality
\nand to thought, love, courage, genius, greatness, the human soul and
\nmind facing an obscure and dangerous world and
\ngetting mastery over it an inferior dependent reality or even an
\nunsubstantial and evanescent reality. For in this view these
\nthings so great to our subjective vision are valid only as the
\nreactions of an objective material being to an objective material
\nexistence; they are valid only in so far as they deal with objective
\nrealities and make themselves effective upon them: the
\nsoul, if it exists, is only a circumstance of an objectively real
\nworld-Nature. But it could be held, on the contrary, that the
\nobjective assumes value only as it has a relation to the soul; it is a
\nfield, an occasion, a means for the soul’s progression in
\nTime: the objective is created as a ground of manifestation for the
\nsubjective. The objective world is only an outward form
\nof becoming of the Spirit; it is here a first form, a basis, but it is
\nnot the essential thing, the main truth of being. The
\nsubjective and objective are two necessary sides of the\n<\/p>\n

\n Page-647<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

manifested Reality and of equal value, and in the range of the objective itself the supraphysical object of consciousness has
\nas much right to acceptance as the physical objectivity; it cannot be a priori
\n<\/i>set aside as a subjective delusion or
\nhallucination.<\/p>\n

     
\nIn fact, subjectivity and objectivity are not independent realities,
\nthey depend upon each other; they are the Being,
\nthrough consciousness, looking at itself as subject on the object and
\nthe same Being offering itself to its own consciousness
\nas object to the subject. The more partial view concedes no substantive
\nreality to anything which exists only in the
\nconsciousness, or, to put it more accurately, to anything to which the
\ninner consciousness or sense bears testimony but
\nwhich the outer physical senses do not provide with a ground or do not
\nsubstantiate. But the outer senses can bear a reliable
\nevidence only when they refer their version of the object to the
\nconsciousness and that consciousness gives a significance to
\ntheir report, adds to its externality its own internal intuitive
\ninterpretation and justifies it by a reasoned adherence; for the
\nevidence of the senses is always by itself imperfect, not altogether
\nreliable and certainly not final, because it is incomplete
\nand constantly subject to error. Indeed, we have no means of knowing
\nthe objective universe except by our subjective
\nconsciousness of which the physical senses themselves are instruments;
\nas the world appears not only to that but in that, so
\nit is to us. If we deny reality to the evidence of this universal
\nwitness for subjective or for supraphysical objectivities, there is
\nno sufficient reason to concede reality to its evidence for physical
\nobjectivities; if the inner or the supraphysical objects of
\nconsciousness are unreal, the objective physical universe has also
\nevery chance of being unreal. In each case understanding,
\ndiscrimination, verification are necessary; but the subjective and the
\nsupraphysical must have another method of verification
\nthan that which we apply successfully to the physical and external
\nobjective. Subjective experience cannot be referred to
\nthe evidence of the external senses; it has its own standards of seeing
\nand its inner method of verification: so also
\nsupraphysical realities by their very nature cannot be referred to the
\njudgment of the physical or sense mind except when
\nthey project themselves into the physical, and even then<\/p>\n

\n Page-648<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

that judgment is often incompetent or subject to caution; they can only be verified by other senses and by a method of
\nscrutiny and affirmation which is applicable to their own reality, their own nature.<\/p>\n

     There are different orders
\nof reality; the objective and physical is only one order. It is
\nconvincing to the physical or externalising mind because it is directly
\nobvious to the senses, while of the subjective and the supraphysical
\nthat mind has no
\nmeans of knowledge except from fragmentary signs and data and
\ninferences which are at every step liable to error. Our
\nsubjective movements and inner experiences are a domain of happenings
\nas real as any outward physical happenings; but if
\nthe individual mind can know something of its own phenomena by direct
\nexperience, it is ignorant of what happens in the
\nconsciousness of others except by analogy with its own or such signs,
\ndata, inferences as its outward observation can give
\nit. I am therefore inwardly real to myself, but the invisible life of
\nothers has only an indirect reality to me except in so far as
\nit impinges on my own mind, life and senses. This is the limitation of
\nthe physical mind of man, and it creates in him a habit
\nof believing entirely only in the physical and of doubting or
\nchallenging all that does not come into accord with his own
\nexperience or his own scope of understanding or square with his own
\nstandard or sum of established knowledge.<\/p>\n

     
\nThis ego-centric attitude has in recent times been elevated into a
\nvalid standard of knowledge; it has been implicitly or
\nexplicitly held as an axiom that all truth must be referred to the
\njudgment of the personal mind, reason and experience of
\nevery man or else it must be verified or at any rate verifiable by a
\ncommon or universal experience in order to be valid. But
\nobviously this is a false standard of reality and of knowledge, since
\nthis means the sovereignty of the normal or average
\nmind and its limited capacity and experience, the exclusion of what is
\nsupernormal or beyond the average intelligence. In its
\nextreme, this claim of the individual to be the judge of everything is
\nan egoistic illusion, a superstition of the physical mind, in
\nthe mass a gross and vulgar error. The truth behind it is that each man
\nhas to think for himself, know for himself according<\/p>\n

\n Page-649<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

to his capacity, but his judgment can be valid only on condition that he is ready to learn and open always to a larger
\nknowledge. It is reasoned that to depart from the physical standard and the principle of personal or universal verification will
\nlead to gross delusions and the admission of unverified truth and subjective phantasy into the realm of knowledge. But error
\nand delusion and the introduction of personality and one’s own subjectivity into the pursuit of knowledge are always present,
\nand the physical or objective standards and methods do not exclude them. The probability of error is no reason for refusing
\nto attempt discovery, and subjective discovery must be pursued by a subjective method of enquiry, observation and
\nverification; research into the supraphysical must evolve, accept and test an appropriate means and methods other than
\nthose by which one examines the constituents of physical objects and the processes of Energy in material Nature.<\/p>\n

     
\nTo refuse to enquire upon any general ground preconceived and a priori<\/i> is an obscurantism as prejudicial to the
\nextension of knowledge as the religious obscurantism which opposed in Europe the extension of scientific discovery. The
\ngreatest inner discoveries, the experience of self-being, the cosmic consciousness, the inner calm of the liberated spirit, the
\ndirect effect of mind upon mind, the knowledge of things by consciousness in direct contact with other consciousness or
\nwith its objects, most spiritual experiences of any value, cannot be brought before the tribunal of the common mentality
\nwhich has no experience of these things and takes its own absence or incapacity of experience as a proof of their invalidity
\nor their non-existence. Physical truth of formulas, generalisations, discoveries founded upon physical observation can be so
\nreferred, but even there a training of capacity is needed before one can truly understand and judge; it is not every untrained
\nmind that can follow the mathematics of relativity or other difficult scientific truths or judge of the validity either of their
\nresult or their process. All reality, all experience must indeed, to be held as true, be capable of verification by a same or
\nsimilar experience; so, in fact, all men can have a spiritual experience and can follow it out and verify it in themselves, but
\nonly when they have acquired the capacity or can<\/p>\n

\nPage-650<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

follow the inner methods by which that experience and verification are made possible. It is necessary to dwell for a moment
\non these obvious and elementary truths because the opposite ideas have been sovereign in a recent period of human
\nmentality,— they are now only receding,—and have stood in the way of the development of a vast domain of possible
\nknowledge. It is of supreme importance for the human spirit to be free to sound the depths of inner or subliminal reality, of
\nspiritual and of what is still superconscient reality, and not to immure itself in the physical mind and its narrow domain of
\nobjective external solidities; for in that way alone can there come liberation from the Ignorance in which our mentality
\ndwells and a release into a complete consciousness, a true and integral self-realisation and self-knowledge.<\/p>\n

     
\nAn integral knowledge demands an exploration, an unveiling of all the possible domains of consciousness and
\nexperience. For there are subjective domains of our being which lie behind the obvious surface; these have to be fathomed
\nand whatever is ascertained must be admitted within the scope of the total reality. An inner range of spiritual experience is
\none very great domain of human consciousness; it has to be entered into up to its deepest depths and its vastest reaches.
\nThe supraphysical is as real as the physical; to know it is part of a complete knowledge. The knowledge of the
\nsupraphysical has been associated with mysticism and occultism, and occultism has been banned as a superstition and a
\nfantastic error. But the occult is a part of existence; a true occultism means no more than a research into supraphysical
\nrealities and an unveiling of the hidden laws of being and Nature, of all that is not obvious on the surface. It attempts the
\ndiscovery of the secret laws of mind and mental energy, the secret laws of life and life-energy, the secret laws of the
\nsubtle-physical and its energies,—all that Nature has not put into visible operation on the surface; it pursues also the
\napplication of these hidden truths and powers of Nature so as to extend the mastery of the human spirit beyond the ordinary
\noperations of mind, the ordinary operations of life, the ordinary operations of our physical existence. In the spiritual domain
\nwhich is occult to the surface mind in so far as it passes beyond normal and<\/p>\n

\nPage-651<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

enters into supernormal experience, there is
\npossible not only the discovery of the self and spirit, but the
\ndiscovery of the
\nuplifting, informing and guiding light of spiritual consciousness and
\nthe power of the spirit, the spiritual way of knowledge, the
\nspiritual way of action. To know these things and to bring their truths
\nand forces into the life of humanity is a necessary part
\nof its evolution. Science itself is in its own way an occultism; for it
\nbrings to light the formulas which Nature has hidden and
\nit uses its knowledge to set free operations of her energies which she
\nhas not included in her ordinary operations and to organise and place
\nat the service of man her occult powers and processes, a vast system of
\nphysical magic,—for there is
\nand can be no other magic than the utilisation of secret truths of
\nbeing, secret powers and processes of Nature. It may even
\nbe found that a supraphysical knowledge is necessary for the completion
\nof physical knowledge, because the processes of
\nphysical Nature have behind them a supraphysical factor, a power and
\naction mental, vital or spiritual which is not tangible
\nto any outer means of knowledge.\n<\/p>\n

     All insistence on the sole
\nor the fundamental validity of the objective real takes its stand on
\nthe sense of the basic reality
\nof Matter. But it is now evident that Matter is by no means
\nfundamentally real; it is a structure of Energy: it is becoming
\neven a little doubtful whether the acts and creations of this Energy
\nitself are explicable except as the motions of power of a
\nsecret Mind or Consciousness of which its processes and steps of
\nstructure are the formulas. It is therefore no longer
\npossible to take Matter as the sole reality. The material
\ninterpretation of existence was the result of an exclusive
\nconcentration, a preoccupation with one movement of Existence, and such
\nan exclusive concentration has its utility and is
\ntherefore permissible; in recent times it has justified itself by the
\nmany immense and the innumerable minute discoveries of
\nphysical Science. But a solution of the whole problem of existence
\ncannot be based on an exclusive one-sided knowledge;
\nwe must know not only what Matter is and what are its processes, but
\nwhat mind and life are and what are their processes,
\nand one must know also spirit and soul and all that is behind the
\nmaterial surface: only then can we have a
\nknow-<\/p>\n

\nPage-652 <\/font><\/p>\n

\n

ledge sufficiently integral for a solution of the problem. For the same reason those views of existence which arise from
\nan exclusive or predominant preoccupation with Mind or with Life and regard Mind or Life as the sole fundamental reality,
\nhave not a sufficiently wide basis for acceptance. Such a preoccupation of exclusive concentration may lead to a fruitful
\nscrutiny which sheds much light on Mind and Life, but cannot result in a total solution of the problem. It may very well be
\nthat an exclusive or predominant concentration on the subliminal being, regarding the surface existence as a mere system of
\nsymbols for an expression of its sole reality, might throw a strong light on the subliminal and its processes and extend vastly
\nthe powers of the human being, but it would not be by itself an integral solution or lead us successfully to the integral
\nknowledge of Reality. In our view the Spirit, the Self is the fundamental reality of existence; but an exclusive concentration
\non this fundamental reality to the exclusion of all reality of Mind, Life or Matter except as an imposition on the Self or
\nunsubstantial shadows cast by the Spirit might help to an independent and radical spiritual realisation but not to an integral
\nand valid solution of the truth of cosmic and individual existence.<\/p>\n

     An integral knowledge then
\nmust be a knowledge of the truth of all sides of existence both
\nseparately and in the relation
\nof each to all and the relation of all to the truth of the Spirit. Our
\npresent state is an Ignorance and a many-sided seeking; it
\nseeks for the truth of all things but,—as is evident from the
\ninsistence and the variety of the human mind’s speculations as to
\nthe fundamental Truth which explains all others, the Reality at the
\nbasis of all things,—the fundamental truth of things, their
\nbasic reality must be found in some at once fundamental and universal
\nReal; it is that which, once discovered, must embrace
\nand explain all,—for “That being known all will be known”: the
\nfundamental Real must necessarily be and contain the truth
\nof all existence, the truth of the individual, the truth of the
\nuniverse, the truth of all that is beyond the universe. The Mind, in
\nseeking for such a Reality and testing each thing from Matter upwards
\nto see if that might not be It, has not proceeded on a
\nwrong intuition. All that is necessary is to carry the<\/p>\n

\n Page-653<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

inquiry to its end and test the highest and ultimate levels of experience.<\/p>\n

     But since it is from the
\nIgnorance that we proceed to the Knowledge, we have had first to
\ndiscover the secret nature
\nand full extent of the Ignorance. If we look at this Ignorance in which
\nordinarily we live by the very circumstance of our separative existence
\nin a material, in a spatial and temporal universe, we see that on its
\nobscurer side it reduces itself, from
\nwhatever direction we look at or approach it, into the fact of a
\nmany-sided self-ignorance. We are ignorant of the Absolute
\nwhich is the source of all being and becoming; we take partial facts of
\nbeing, temporal relations of the becoming for the
\nwhole truth of existence,—that is the first, the original ignorance. We
\nare ignorant of the spaceless, timeless, immobile and
\nimmutable Self; we take the constant mobility and mutation of the
\ncosmic becoming in Time and Space for the whole truth
\nof existence,—that is the second, the cosmic ignorance. We are ignorant
\nof our universal self, the cosmic existence, the
\ncosmic consciousness, our infinite unity with all being and becoming;
\nwe take our limited egoistic mentality, vitality,
\ncorporeality for our true self and regard everything other than that as
\nnot-self,—that is the third, the egoistic ignorance. We
\nare ignorant of our eternal becoming in Time; we take this little life
\nin a small span of Time, in a petty field of Space, for our
\nbeginning, our middle and our end,—that is the fourth, the temporal
\nignorance. Even within this brief temporal becoming we
\nare ignorant of our large and complex being, of that in us which is
\nsuperconscient, subconscient, intraconscient,
\ncircumconscient to our surface becoming; we take that surface becoming
\nwith its small selection of overtly mentalised
\nexperiences for our whole existence,—that is the fifth, the
\npsychological ignorance. We are ignorant of the true constitution
\nof our becoming; we take the mind or life or body or any two of these
\nor all three for our true principle or the whole account
\nof what we are, losing sight of that which constitutes them and
\ndetermines by its occult presence and is meant to determine
\nsovereignly by its emergence their operations,—that is the sixth, the
\nconstitutional ignorance. As a result of all these
\nignorances, we miss the true knowledge, government and enjoyment of our
\nlife in the<\/p>\n

\n Page-654<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

world; we are ignorant in our thought, will, sensations, actions, return wrong or imperfect responses at every point to the
\nquestionings of the world, wander in a maze of errors and desires, strivings and failures, pain and pleasure, sin and
\nstumbling, follow a crooked road, grope blindly for a changing goal,—that is the seventh, the practical ignorance.<\/p>\n

     Our conception of the
\nIgnorance will necessarily determine our conception of the Knowledge
\nand determine, therefore,
\nsince our life is the Ignorance at once denying and seeking after the
\nKnowledge, the goal of human effort and the aim of the
\ncosmic endeavour. Integral knowledge will then mean the cancelling of
\nthe sevenfold Ignorance by the discovery of what it
\nmisses and ignores, a sevenfold self-revelation within our
\nconsciousness: it will mean the knowledge of the Absolute as the
\norigin of all things; the knowledge of the Self, the Spirit, the Being
\nand of the cosmos as the Self’s becoming, the becoming
\nof the Being, a manifestation of the Spirit; the knowledge of the world
\nas one with us in the consciousness of our true self,
\nthus cancelling our division from it by the separative idea and life of
\nego; the knowledge of our psychic entity and its
\nimmortal persistence in Time beyond death and earth-existence; the
\nknowledge of our greater and inner existence behind
\nthe surface; the knowledge of our mind, life and body in its true
\nrelation to the self within and the superconscient spiritual
\nand supramental being above them; the knowledge, finally, of the true
\nharmony and true use of our thought, will and action
\nand a change of all our nature into a conscious expression of the truth
\nof the Spirit, the Self, the Divinity, the integral spiritual
\nReality.\n<\/p>\n

     But this is not an
\nintellectual knowledge which can be learned and completed in our
\npresent mould of consciousness; it
\nmust be an experience, a becoming, a change of consciousness, a change
\nof being. This brings in the evolutionary character
\nof the Becoming and the fact that our mental ignorance is only a stage
\nin our evolution. The integral knowledge, then, can
\nonly come by an evolution of our being and our nature, and that would
\nseem to signify a slow process in Time such as has
\naccompanied the other evolutionary transformations. But as against that
\ninference there is the fact that the evolution has
\nnow become conscious\n<\/p>\n

\nPage-655 <\/font><\/p>\n

\n

and its method and steps need not be altogether of
\nthe same character as when it was subconscious in its process. The
\nintegral knowledge, since it must result from a change of
\nconsciousness, can be gained by a process in which our will and
\nendeavour have a part, in which they can discover and apply their own
\nsteps and method: its growth in us can proceed by a
\nconscious self-transformation. It is necessary then to see what is
\nlikely to be the principle of this new process of evolution
\nand what are the movements of the integral knowledge that must
\nnecessarily emerge in it,—or, in other words, what is the
\nnature of the consciousness that must be the base of the life divine
\nand how that life may be expected to be formed or to
\nform itself, to materialise or, as one might say, to “realise”. <\/p>\n

\nPage-656<\/font><\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

BOOK II Part II THE KNOWLEDGE AND THE IGNORANCE THE SPIRITUAL EVOLUTION CHAPTER  XV Reality and the Integral Knowledge   This Self is to be…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1248","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-19-the-life-divine-volume-19","wpcat-27-id"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1248","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=1248"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1248\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1248"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1248"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1248"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}