{"id":2174,"date":"2013-07-13T01:39:55","date_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:39:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/?p=2174"},"modified":"2013-07-13T01:39:55","modified_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:39:55","slug":"12-chapter-vii-standards-of-conduct-and-spiritual-freedom-vol-23-24-the-synthesis-of-yoga","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/01-works-of-sri-aurobindo\/03-cwsa\/23-24-the-synthesis-of-yoga\/12-chapter-vii-standards-of-conduct-and-spiritual-freedom-vol-23-24-the-synthesis-of-yoga","title":{"rendered":"-12_Chapter VII Standards of Conduct and Spiritual Freedom.htm"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p>\n

\n\n\n
\n\t\t\t<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tChapter VII <\/font><\/b><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tStandards of Conduct and
\n\t\t\t<\/font><\/b><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tSpiritual Freedom<\/font><\/b><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/font><\/b><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tT<\/font>HE KNOWLEDGE<\/b> on which the doer of
\n\t\t\tworks in Yoga has to found all his action and development has for
\n\t\t\tthe keystone of its structure a more and more concrete perception of
\n\t\t\tunity, the living sense of an all-pervading oneness; he moves in the
\n\t\t\tincreasing consciousness of all existence as an indivisible whole:
\n\t\t\tall work too is part of this divine indivisible whole. His personal
\n\t\t\taction and its results can no longer be or seem a separate movement
\n\t\t\tmainly or entirely determined by the egoistic "free" will of an
\n\t\t\tindividual, himself separate in the mass. Our works are part of an
\n\t\t\tindivisible cosmic action; they are put or, more accurately, put
\n\t\t\tthemselves into their place in the whole out of which they arise and
\n\t\t\ttheir outcome is determined by forces that overpass us. That world
\n\t\t\taction in its vast totality and in every petty detail is the
\n\t\t\tindivisible movement of the One who manifests himself progressively
\n\t\t\tin the cosmos. Man too becomes progressively conscious of the truth
\n\t\t\tof himself and the truth of things in proportion as he awakens to
\n\t\t\tthis One within him and outside him and to the occult, miraculous
\n\t\t\tand significant process of its forces in the motion of Nature. This
\n\t\t\taction, this movement, is not confined even in ourselves and those
\n\t\t\taround us to the little fragmentary portion of the cosmic activities
\n\t\t\tof which we in our superficial consciousness are aware; it is
\n\t\t\tsupported by an immense underlying environing existence subliminal
\n\t\t\tto our minds or subconscious, and it is attracted by an immense
\n\t\t\ttranscending existence which is superconscious to our nature. Our
\n\t\t\taction arises, as we ourselves have emerged, out of a universality
\n\t\t\tof which we are not aware; we give it a shape by our personal
\n\t\t\ttemperament, personal mind and will of thought or force of impulse
\n\t\t\tor desire; but the true   <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 <\/font>188<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\n\t\t\t truth of things, the true law of action exceeds these personal and
\n\t\t\thuman formations. Every standpoint, every man-made rule of action
\n\t\t\twhich ignores the indivisible totality of the cosmic movement,
\n\t\t\twhatever its utility in external practice, is to the eye of
\n\t\t\tspiritual Truth an imperfect view and a law of the Ignorance. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tEven when we have arrived at some glimpse of this
\n\t\t\tidea or succeeded in fixing it in our consciousness as a knowledge
\n\t\t\tof the mind and a consequent attitude of the soul, it is difficult
\n\t\t\tfor us in our outward parts and active nature to square accounts
\n\t\t\tbetween this universal standpoint and the claims of our personal
\n\t\t\topinion, our personal will, our personal emotion and desire. We are
\n\t\t\tforced still to go on dealing with this indivisible movement as if
\n\t\t\tit were a mass of impersonal material out of which we, the ego, the
\n\t\t\tperson, have to carve something according to our own will and mental
\n\t\t\tfantasy by a personal struggle and effort. This is man’s normal
\n\t\t\tattitude towards his environment, actually false because our ego and
\n\t\t\tits will are creations and puppets of the cosmic forces and it is
\n\t\t\tonly when we withdraw from ego into the consciousness of the divine
\n\t\t\tKnowledge-Will of the Eternal who acts in them that we can be by a
\n\t\t\tsort of deputation from above their master. And yet is this personal
\n\t\t\tposition the right attitude for man so long as he cherishes his
\n\t\t\tindividuality and has not yet fully developed it; for without this
\n\t\t\tview-point and motiveforce he cannot grow in his ego, cannot
\n\t\t\tsufficiently develop and differentiate himself out of the
\n\t\t\tsubconscious or half-conscious universal mass-existence. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tBut the hold of this ego-consciousness upon our
\n\t\t\twhole habit of existence is difficult to shake off when we have no
\n\t\t\tlonger need of the separative, the individualistic and aggressive
\n\t\t\tstage of development, when we would proceed forward from this
\n\t\t\tnecessity of littleness in the child-soul to unity and universality,
\n\t\t\tto the cosmic consciousness and beyond, to our transcendent
\n\t\t\tspiritstature. It is indispensable to recognise clearly, not only in
\n\t\t\tour mode of thought but in our way of feeling, sensing, doing, that
\n\t\t\tthis movement, this universal action is not a helpless impersonal
\n\t\t\twave of being which lends itself to the will of any ego according  <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 <\/font>189<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\n\t\t\tto that ego’s strength and insistence. It is the movement of a
\n\t\t\tcosmic Being who is the Knower of his field, the steps of a Divinity
\n\t\t\twho is the Master of his own progressive force of action. As the
\n\t\t\tmovement is one and indivisible, so he who is present in the
\n\t\t\tmovement is one, sole and indivisible. Not only all result is
\n\t\t\tdetermined by him, but all initiation, action and process are
\n\t\t\tdependent on the motion of his cosmic force and only belong
\n\t\t\tsecondarily and in their form to the creature. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tBut what then must be the spiritual position of the personal worker?
\n\t\t\tWhat is his true relation in dynamic Nature to this one cosmic Being
\n\t\t\tand this one total movement? He is a centre only \u2014 a centre of
\n\t\t\tdifferentiation of the one personal consciousness, a centre of
\n\t\t\tdetermination of the one total movement; his personality reflects in
\n\t\t\ta wave of persistent individuality the one universal Person, the
\n\t\t\tTranscendent, the Eternal. In the Ignorance it is always a broken
\n\t\t\tand distorted reflection because the crest of the wave which is our
\n\t\t\tconscious waking self throws back only an imperfect and falsified
\n\t\t\tsimilitude of the divine Spirit. All our opinions, standards,
\n\t\t\tformations, principles are only attempts to represent in this
\n\t\t\tbroken, reflecting and distorting mirror something of the universal
\n\t\t\tand progressive total action and its many-sided movement towards
\n\t\t\tsome ultimate self-revelation of the Divine. Our mind represents it
\n\t\t\tas best it can with a narrow approximation that becomes less and
\n\t\t\tless inadequate in proportion as its thought grows in wideness and
\n\t\t\tlight and power; but it is always an approximation and not even a
\n\t\t\ttrue partial figure. The Divine Will acts through the aeons to
\n\t\t\treveal progressively not only in the unity of the cosmos, not only
\n\t\t\tin the collectivity of living and thinking creatures, but in the
\n\t\t\tsoul of each individual something of its divine Mystery and the
\n\t\t\thidden truth of the Infinite. Therefore there is in the cosmos, in
\n\t\t\tthe collectivity, in the individual, a rooted instinct or belief in
\n\t\t\tits own perfectibility, a constant drive towards an ever increasing
\n\t\t\tand more adequate and more harmonious self-development nearer to the
\n\t\t\tsecret truth of things. This effort is represented to the
\n\t\t\tconstructing mind of man by standards of knowledge, feeling,
\n\t\t\tcharacter, aesthesis and action, \u2014 rules, ideals, norms <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 <\/font>190<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\n\t\t\tand laws that he essays to turn into universal dharmas. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t* *<\/font><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tIf we are to be free in the spirit, if we are to be subject only to
\n\t\t\tthe supreme Truth, we must discard the idea that our mental or moral
\n\t\t\tlaws are binding on the Infinite or that there can be anything
\n\t\t\tsacrosanct, absolute or eternal even in the highest of our existing
\n\t\t\tstandards of conduct. To form higher and higher temporary standards
\n\t\t\tas long as they are needed is to serve the Divine in his world
\n\t\t\tmarch; to erect rigidly an absolute standard is to attempt the
\n\t\t\terection of a barrier against the eternal waters in their onflow.
\n\t\t\tOnce the nature-bound soul realises this truth, it is delivered from
\n\t\t\tthe duality of good and evil. For good is all that helps the
\n\t\t\tindividual and the world towards their divine fullness, and evil is
\n\t\t\tall that retards or breaks up that increasing perfection. But since
\n\t\t\tthe perfection is progressive, evolutive in Time, good and evil are
\n\t\t\talso shifting quantities and change from time to time their meaning
\n\t\t\tand value. This thing which is evil now and in its present shape
\n\t\t\tmust be abandoned was once helpful and necessary to the general and
\n\t\t\tindividual progress. That other thing which we now regard as evil
\n\t\t\tmay well become in another form and arrangement an element in some
\n\t\t\tfuture perfection. And on the spiritual level we transcend even this
\n\t\t\tdistinction; for we discover the purpose and divine utility of all
\n\t\t\tthese things that we call good and evil. Then have we to reject the
\n\t\t\tfalsehood in them and all that is distorted, ignorant and obscure in
\n\t\t\tthat which is called good no less than in that which is called evil.
\n\t\t\tFor we have then to accept only the true and the divine, but to make
\n\t\t\tno other distinction in the eternal processes. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tTo those who can act only on a rigid standard, to those who can feel
\n\t\t\tonly the human and not the divine values, this truth may seem to be
\n\t\t\ta dangerous concession which is likely to destroy the very
\n\t\t\tfoundation of morality, confuse all conduct and establish only
\n\t\t\tchaos. Certainly, if the choice must be between an eternal and
\n\t\t\tunchanging ethics and no ethics at all, it would have that result
\n\t\t\tfor man in his ignorance. But even on the human level, <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 <\/font>191<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\n\t\t\tif we have light enough and flexibility enough to recognise
\n\t\t\tthat a standard of conduct may be temporary and yet necessary for
\n\t\t\tits time and to observe it faithfully until it can be replaced by a
\n\t\t\tbetter, then we suffer no such loss, but lose only the fanaticism of
\n\t\t\tan imperfect and intolerant virtue. In its place we gain openness
\n\t\t\tand a power of continual moral progression, charity, the capacity to
\n\t\t\tenter into an understanding sympathy with all this world of
\n\t\t\tstruggling and stumbling creatures and by that charity a better
\n\t\t\tright and a greater strength to help it upon its way. In the end
\n\t\t\twhere the human closes and the divine commences, where the mental
\n\t\t\tdisappears into the supramental consciousness and the finite
\n\t\t\tprecipitates itself into the infinite, all evil disappears into a
\n\t\t\ttranscendent divine Good which becomes universal on every plane of
\n\t\t\tconsciousness that it touches. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThis, then, stands fixed for us that all standards by which we may
\n\t\t\tseek to govern our conduct are only our temporary, imperfect and
\n\t\t\tevolutive attempts to represent to ourselves our stumbling mental
\n\t\t\tprogress in the universal self-realisation towards which Nature
\n\t\t\tmoves. But the divine manifestation cannot be bound by our little
\n\t\t\trules and fragile sanctities; for the consciousness behind it is too
\n\t\t\tvast for these things. Once we have grasped this fact, disconcerting
\n\t\t\tenough to the absolutism of our reason, we shall better be able to
\n\t\t\tput in their right place in regard to each other the successive
\n\t\t\tstandards that govern the different stages in the growth of the
\n\t\t\tindividual and the collective march of mankind. At the most general
\n\t\t\tof them we may cast a passing glance. For we have to see how they
\n\t\t\tstand in relation to that other standardless spiritual and
\n\t\t\tsupramental mode of working for which Yoga seeks and to which it
\n\t\t\tmoves by the surrender of the individual to the divine Will and,
\n\t\t\tmore effectively, through his ascent by this surrender to the
\n\t\t\tgreater consciousness in which a certain identity with the dynamic
\n\t\t\tEternal becomes possible. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t* *<\/font><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThere are four main standards of human conduct that make an
\n\t\t\tascending scale. The first is personal need, preference and desire; <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

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\n

\n\t\t\tthe second is the law and good of the collectivity; the third
\n\t\t\tis an ideal ethic; the last is the highest divine law of the nature. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tMan starts on the long career of his evolution with only the first
\n\t\t\ttwo of these four to enlighten and lead him; for they constitute the
\n\t\t\tlaw of his animal and vital existence and it is as the vital and
\n\t\t\tphysical animal man that he begins his progress. The true business
\n\t\t\tof man upon earth is to express in the type of humanity a growing
\n\t\t\timage of the Divine; whether knowingly or unknowingly, it is to this
\n\t\t\tend that Nature is working in him under the thick veil of her inner
\n\t\t\tand outer processes. But the material or animal man is ignorant of
\n\t\t\tthe inner aim of life; he knows only its needs and its desires and
\n\t\t\the has necessarily no other guide to what is required of him than
\n\t\t\this own perception of need and his own stirrings and pointings of
\n\t\t\tdesire. To satisfy his physical and vital demands and necessities
\n\t\t\tbefore all things else and, in the next rank, whatever emotional or
\n\t\t\tmental cravings or imaginations or dynamic notions rise in him must
\n\t\t\tbe the first natural rule of his conduct. The sole balancing or
\n\t\t\toverpowering law that can modify or contradict this pressing natural
\n\t\t\tclaim is the demand put on him by the ideas, needs and desires of
\n\t\t\this family, community or tribe, the herd, the pack of which he is a
\n\t\t\tmember. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tIf man could live to himself, \u2014 and this he could
\n\t\t\tonly do if the development of the individual were the sole object of
\n\t\t\tthe Divine in the world, \u2014 this second law would not at all need to
\n\t\t\tcome into operation. But all existence proceeds by the mutual action
\n\t\t\tand reaction of the whole and the parts, the need for each other of
\n\t\t\tthe constituents and the thing constituted, the interdependence of
\n\t\t\tthe group and the individuals of the group. In the language of
\n\t\t\tIndian philosophy the Divine manifests himself always in the double
\n\t\t\tform of the separative and the collective being, vyas<\/font>t<\/font>i<\/i>,
\nsamas<\/font>t<\/font>i<\/i>.
\n\t\t\tMan, pressing after the growth of his
\n..<\/i> ..<\/i>
\n\t\t\tseparate individuality and its fullness and freedom, is unable to
\n\t\t\tsatisfy even his own personal needs and desires except in
\n\t\t\tconjunction with other men; he is a whole in himself and yet
\n\t\t\tincomplete without others. This obligation englobes his personal law
\n\t\t\tof conduct in a group-law which arises from the formation of a
\n\t\t\tlasting group-entity with a collective mind and life of its<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 <\/font>193<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\n\t\t\town to which his own embodied mind and life are subordinated
\n\t\t\tas a transitory unit. And yet is there something in him immortal and
\n\t\t\tfree, not bound to this group-body which outlasts his own embodied
\n\t\t\texistence but cannot outlast or claim to chain by its law his
\n\t\t\teternal spirit. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tIn itself this seemingly larger and overriding law is no more than
\n\t\t\tan extension of the vital and animal principle that governs the
\n\t\t\tindividual elementary man; it is the law of the pack or herd. The
\n\t\t\tindividual identifies partially his life with the life of a certain
\n\t\t\tnumber of other individuals with whom he is associated by birth,
\n\t\t\tchoice or circumstance. And since the existence of the group is
\n\t\t\tnecessary for his own existence and satisfaction, in time, if not
\n\t\t\tfrom the first, its preservation, the fulfilment of its needs and
\n\t\t\tthe satisfaction of its collective notions, desires, habits of
\n\t\t\tliving, without which it would not hold together, must come to take
\n\t\t\ta primary place. The satisfaction of personal idea and feeling, need
\n\t\t\tand desire, propensity and habit has to be constantly subordinated,
\n\t\t\tby the necessity of the situation and not from any moral or
\n\t\t\taltruistic motive, to the satisfaction of the ideas and feelings,
\n\t\t\tneeds and desires, propensities and habits, not of this or that
\n\t\t\tother individual or number of individuals, but of the society as a
\n\t\t\twhole. This social need is the obscure matrix of morality and of
\n\t\t\tman’s ethical impulse. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tIt is not actually known that in any primitive
\n\t\t\ttimes man lived to himself or with only his mate as do some of the
\n\t\t\tanimals. All record of him shows him to us as a social animal, not
\n\t\t\tan isolated body and spirit. The law of the pack has always
\n\t\t\toverridden his individual law of self-development; he seems always
\n\t\t\tto have been born, to have lived, to have been formed as a unit in a
\n\t\t\tmass. But logically and naturally from the psychological viewpoint
\n\t\t\tthe law of personal need and desire is primary, the social law comes
\n\t\t\tin as a secondary and usurping power. Man has in him two distinct
\n\t\t\tmaster impulses, the individualistic and the communal, a personal
\n\t\t\tlife and a social life, a personal motive of conduct and a social
\n\t\t\tmotive of conduct. The possibility of their opposition and the
\n\t\t\tattempt to find their equation lie at the very roots of human
\n\t\t\tcivilisation and persist in other figures when he <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

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\n

\n\t\t\thas passed beyond the vital animal into a highly
\n\t\t\tindividualised mental and spiritual progress. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe existence of a social law external to the individual is at
\n\t\t\tdifferent times a considerable advantage and a heavy disadvantage to
\n\t\t\tthe development of the divine in man. It is an advantage at first
\n\t\t\twhen man is crude and incapable of self-control and self-finding,
\n\t\t\tbecause it erects a power other than that of his personal egoism
\n\t\t\tthrough which that egoism may be induced or compelled to moderate
\n\t\t\tits savage demands, to discipline its irrational and often violent
\n\t\t\tmovements and even to lose itself sometimes in a larger and less
\n\t\t\tpersonal egoism. It is a disadvantage to the adult spirit ready to
\n\t\t\ttranscend the human formula because it is an external standard which
\n\t\t\tseeks to impose itself on him from outside, and the condition of his
\n\t\t\tperfection is that he shall grow from within and in an increasing
\n\t\t\tfreedom, not by the suppression but by the transcendence of his
\n\t\t\tperfected individuality, not any longer by a law imposed on him that
\n\t\t\ttrains and disciplines his members but by the soul from within
\n\t\t\tbreaking through all previous forms to possess with its light and
\n\t\t\ttransmute his members. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t* *<\/font><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tIn the conflict of the claims of society with the claims of the
\n\t\t\tindividual two ideal and absolute solutions confront one another.
\n\t\t\tThere is the demand of the group that the individual should
\n\t\t\tsubordinate himself more or less completely or even lose his
\n\t\t\tindependent existence in the community, \u2014 the smaller must be
\n\t\t\timmolated or self-offered to the larger unit. He must accept the
\n\t\t\tneed of the society as his own need, the desire of the society as
\n\t\t\this own desire; he must live not for himself but for the tribe,
\n\t\t\tclan, commune or nation of which he is a member. The ideal and
\n\t\t\tabsolute solution from the individual’s standpoint would be a
\n\t\t\tsociety that existed not for itself, for its all-overriding
\n\t\t\tcollective purpose, but for the good of the individual and his
\n\t\t\tfulfilment, for the greater and more perfect life of all its
\n\t\t\tmembers. Representing as far as possible his best self and helping
\n\t\t\thim to realise it, it would  <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

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\n

\n\t\t\trespect the freedom of each of its members and maintain itself not
\n\t\t\tby law and force but by the free and spontaneous consent of its
\n\t\t\tconstituent persons. An ideal society of either kind does not exist
\n\t\t\tanywhere and would be most difficult to create, more difficult still
\n\t\t\tto keep in precarious existence so long as individual man clings to
\n\t\t\this egoism as the primary motive of existence. A general but not
\n\t\t\tcomplete domination of the society over the individual is the easier
\n\t\t\tway and it is the system that Nature from the first instinctively
\n\t\t\tadopts and keeps in equilibrium by rigorous law, compelling custom
\n\t\t\tand a careful indoctrination of the still subservient and
\n\t\t\till-developed intelligence of the human creature. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tIn primitive societies the individual life is submitted to rigid and
\n\t\t\timmobile communal custom and rule; this is the ancient and would-be
\n\t\t\teternal law of the human pack that tries always to masquerade as the
\n\t\t\teverlasting decree of the Imperishable,
\nes<\/font>a<\/i> 
\ndharmah<\/font> sanā<\/font>tanah<\/font><\/i>.
\n\t\t\tAnd the ideal is not dead in the human .<\/i>
\n.<\/i> mind; the most recent trend of human progress is to establish an
\n\t\t\tenlarged and sumptuous edition of this ancient turn of collective
\n\t\t\tliving towards the enslavement of the human spirit. There is here a
\n\t\t\tserious danger to the integral development of a greater truth upon
\n\t\t\tearth and a greater life. For the desires and free seekings of the
\n\t\t\tindividual, however egoistic, however false or perverted they may be
\n\t\t\tin their immediate form, contain in their obscure shell the seed of
\n\t\t\ta development necessary to the whole; his searchings and stumblings
\n\t\t\thave behind them a force that has to be kept and transmuted into the
\n\t\t\timage of the divine ideal. That force needs to be enlightened and
\n\t\t\ttrained but must not be suppressed or harnessed exclusively to
\n\t\t\tsociety’s heavy cartwheels. Individualism is as necessary to the
\n\t\t\tfinal perfection as the power behind the group-spirit; the stifling
\n\t\t\tof the individual may well be the stifling of the god in man. And in
\n\t\t\tthe present balance of humanity there is seldom any real danger of
\n\t\t\texaggerated individualism breaking up the social integer. There is
\n\t\t\tcontinually a danger that the exaggerated pressure of the social
\n\t\t\tmass by its heavy unenlightened mechanical weight may suppress or
\n\t\t\tunduly discourage the free development of the individual spirit. For
\n\t\t\tman in the individual can be more easily enlightened, conscious, <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

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\n\t\t\topen to clear influences; man in the mass is still obscure,
\n\t\t\thalf-conscious, ruled by universal forces that escape its mastery
\n\t\t\tand its knowledge. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAgainst this danger of suppression and immobilisation Nature in the
\n\t\t\tindividual reacts. It may react by an isolated resistance ranging
\n\t\t\tfrom the instinctive and brutal revolt of the criminal to the
\n\t\t\tcomplete negation of the solitary and ascetic. It may react by the
\n\t\t\tassertion of an individualistic trend in the social idea, may impose
\n\t\t\tit on the mass consciousness and establish a compromise between the
\n\t\t\tindividual and the social demand. But a compromise is not a
\n\t\t\tsolution; it only salves over the difficulty and in the end
\n\t\t\tincreases the complexity of the problem and multiplies its issues. A
\n\t\t\tnew principle has to be called in other and higher than the two
\n\t\t\tconflicting instincts and powerful at once to override and to
\n\t\t\treconcile them. Above the natural individual law which sets up as
\n\t\t\tour one standard of conduct the satisfaction of our individual
\n\t\t\tneeds, preferences and desires and the natural communal law which
\n\t\t\tsets up as a superior standard the satisfaction of the needs,
\n\t\t\tpreferences and desires of the community as a whole, there had to
\n\t\t\tarise the notion of an ideal moral law which is not the satisfaction
\n\t\t\tof need and desire, but controls and even coerces or annuls them in
\n\t\t\tthe interests of an ideal order that is not animal, not vital and
\n\t\t\tphysical, but mental, a creation of the mind’s seeking for light and
\n\t\t\tknowledge and right rule and right movement and true order. The
\n\t\t\tmoment this notion becomes powerful in man, he begins to escape from
\n\t\t\tthe engrossing vital and material into the mental life; he climbs
\n\t\t\tfrom the first to the second degree of the threefold ascent of
\n\t\t\tNature. His needs and desires themselves are touched with a more
\n\t\t\televated light of purpose and the mental need, the aesthetic,
\n\t\t\tintellectual and emotional desire begin to predominate over the
\n\t\t\tdemand of the physical and vital nature. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t* *<\/font><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe natural law of conduct proceeds from a conflict to an
\n\t\t\tequilibrium of forces, impulsions and desires; the higher ethical
\n\t\t\tlaw <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

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\n

\n\t\t\tproceeds by the development of the mental and moral nature towards a
\n\t\t\tfixed internal standard or else a self-formed ideal of absolute
\n\t\t\tqualities, \u2014 justice, righteousness, love, right reason, right
\n\t\t\tpower, beauty, light. It is therefore essentially an individual
\n\t\t\tstandard; it is not a creation of the mass mind. The thinker is the
\n\t\t\tindividual; it is he who calls out and throws into forms that which
\n\t\t\twould otherwise remain subconscious in the amorphous human whole.
\n\t\t\tThe moral striver is also the individual; self-discipline, not under
\n\t\t\tthe yoke of an outer law, but in obedience to an internal light, is
\n\t\t\tessentially an individual effort. But by positing his personal
\n\t\t\tstandard as the translation of an absolute moral ideal the thinker
\n\t\t\timposes it, not on himself alone, but on all the individuals whom
\n\t\t\this thought can reach and penetrate. And as the mass of individuals
\n\t\t\tcome more and more to accept it in idea if only in an imperfect
\n\t\t\tpractice or no practice, society also is compelled to obey the new
\n\t\t\torientation. It absorbs the ideative influence and tries, not with
\n\t\t\tany striking success, to mould its institutions into new forms
\n\t\t\ttouched by these higher ideals. But always its instinct is to
\n\t\t\ttranslate them into binding law, into pattern forms, into mechanic
\n\t\t\tcustom, into an external social compulsion upon its living units. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tFor, long after the individual has become partially free, a moral
\n\t\t\torganism capable of conscious growth, aware of an inward life, eager
\n\t\t\tfor spiritual progress, society continues to be external in its
\n\t\t\tmethods, a material and economic organism, mechanical, more intent
\n\t\t\tupon status and self-preservation than on growth and
\n\t\t\tself-perfection. The greatest present triumph of the thinking and
\n\t\t\tprogressive individual over the instinctive and static society has
\n\t\t\tbeen the power he has acquired by his thought-will to compel it to
\n\t\t\tthink also, to open itself to the idea of social justice and
\n\t\t\trighteousness, communal sympathy and mutual compassion, to feel
\n\t\t\tafter the rule of reason rather than blind custom as the test of its
\n\t\t\tinstitutions and to look on the mental and moral assent of its
\n\t\t\tindividuals as at least one essential element in the validity of its
\n\t\t\tlaws. Ideally at least, to consider light rather than force as its
\n\t\t\tsanction, moral development and not vengeance or restraint as the
\n\t\t\tobject even of its penal action, is becoming just  <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

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\n\t\t\tpossible to the communal mind. The greatest future triumph of
\n\t\t\tthe thinker will come when he can persuade the individual integer
\n\t\t\tand the collective whole to rest their life-relation and its union
\n\t\t\tand stability upon a free and harmonious consent and
\n\t\t\tself-adaptation, and shape and govern the external by the internal
\n\t\t\ttruth rather than to constrain the inner spirit by the tyranny of
\n\t\t\tthe external form and structure. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tBut even this success that he has gained is rather a thing in
\n\t\t\tpotentiality than in actual accomplishment. There is always a
\n\t\t\tdisharmony and a discord between the moral law in the individual and
\n\t\t\tthe law of his needs and desires, between the moral law proposed to
\n\t\t\tsociety and the physical and vital needs, desires, customs,
\n\t\t\tprejudices, interests and passions of the caste, the clan, the
\n\t\t\treligious community, the society, the nation. The moralist erects in
\n\t\t\tvain his absolute ethical standard and calls upon all to be faithful
\n\t\t\tto it without regard to consequences. To him the needs and desires
\n\t\t\tof the individual are invalid if they are in conflict with the moral
\n\t\t\tlaw, and the social law has no claims upon him if it is opposed to
\n\t\t\this sense of right and denied by his conscience. This is his
\n\t\t\tabsolute solution for the individual that he shall cherish no
\n\t\t\tdesires and claims that are not consistent with love, truth and
\n\t\t\tjustice. He demands from the community or nation that it shall hold
\n\t\t\tall things cheap, even its safety and its most pressing interests,
\n\t\t\tin comparison with truth, justice, humanity and the highest good of
\n\t\t\tthe peoples. No individual rises to these heights except in intense
\n\t\t\tmoments, no society yet created satisfies this ideal. And in the
\n\t\t\tpresent state of morality and of human development none perhaps can
\n\t\t\tor ought to satisfy it. Nature will not allow it, Nature knows that
\n\t\t\tit should not be. The first reason is that our moral ideals are
\n\t\t\tthemselves for the most part ill-evolved, ignorant and arbitrary,
\n\t\t\tmental constructions rather than transcriptions of the eternal
\n\t\t\ttruths of the spirit. Authoritative and dogmatic, they assert
\n\t\t\tcertain absolute standards in theory, but in practice every existing
\n\t\t\tsystem of ethics proves either in application unworkable or is in
\n\t\t\tfact a constant coming short of the absolute standard to which the
\n\t\t\tideal pretends. If our ethical system is a compromise <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

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\n

\n\t\t\tor a makeshift, it gives at once a principle of justification
\n\t\t\tto the further sterilising compromises which society and the
\n\t\t\tindividual hasten to make with it. And if it insists on absolute
\n\t\t\tlove, justice, right with an uncompromising insistence, it soars
\n\t\t\tabove the head of human possibility and is professed with lip homage
\n\t\t\tbut ignored in practice. Even it is found that it ignores other
\n\t\t\telements in humanity which equally insist on survival but refuse to
\n\t\t\tcome within the moral formula. For just as the individual law of
\n\t\t\tdesire contains within it invaluable elements of the infinite whole
\n\t\t\twhich have to be protected against the tyranny of the absorbing
\n\t\t\tsocial idea, the innate impulses too both of individual and of
\n\t\t\tcollective man contain in them invaluable elements which escape the
\n\t\t\tlimits of any ethical formula yet discovered and are yet necessary
\n\t\t\tto the fullness and harmony of an eventual divine perfection.
\n\t\t\tMoreover, absolute love, absolute justice, absolute right reason in
\n\t\t\ttheir present application by a bewildered and imperfect humanity
\n\t\t\tcome easily to be conflicting principles. Justice often demands what
\n\t\t\tlove abhors. Right reason dispassionately considering the facts of
\n\t\t\tnature and human relations in search of a satisfying norm or rule is
\n\t\t\tunable to admit without modification either any reign of absolute
\n\t\t\tjustice or any reign of absolute love. And in fact man’s absolute
\n\t\t\tjustice easily turns out to be in practice a sovereign injustice;
\n\t\t\tfor his mind, one-sided and rigid in its constructions, puts forward
\n\t\t\ta one-sided partial and rigorous scheme or figure and claims for it
\n\t\t\ttotality and absoluteness and an application that ignores the
\n\t\t\tsubtler truth of things and the plasticity of life. All our
\n\t\t\tstandards turned into action either waver on a flux of compromises
\n\t\t\tor err by this partiality and unelastic structure. Humanity sways
\n\t\t\tfrom one orientation to another; the race moves upon a zigzag path
\n\t\t\tled by conflicting claims and, on the whole, works out instinctively
\n\t\t\twhat Nature intends, but with much waste and suffering, rather than
\n\t\t\teither what it desires or what it holds to be right or what the
\n\t\t\thighest light from above demands from the embodied spirit. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t* *<\/font><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

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\n\t\t\tThe fact is that when we have reached the cult of absolute
\n\t\t\tethical qualities and erected the categorical imperative of an ideal
\n\t\t\tlaw, we have not come to the end of our search or touched the truth
\n\t\t\tthat delivers. There is, no doubt, something here that helps us to
\n\t\t\trise beyond limitation by the physical and vital man in us, an
\n\t\t\tinsistence that overpasses the individual and collective needs and
\n\t\t\tdesires of a humanity still bound to the living mud of Matter in
\n\t\t\twhich it took its roots, an aspiration that helps to develop the
\n\t\t\tmental and moral being in us: this new sublimating element has been
\n\t\t\ttherefore an acquisition of great importance; its workings have
\n\t\t\tmarked a considerable step forward in the difficult evolution of
\n\t\t\tterrestrial Nature. And behind the inadequacy of these ethical
\n\t\t\tconceptions something too is concealed that does attach to a supreme
\n\t\t\tTruth; there is here the glimmer of a light and power that are part
\n\t\t\tof a yet unreached divine Nature. But the mental idea of these
\n\t\t\tthings is not that light and the moral formulation of them is not
\n\t\t\tthat power. These are only representative constructions of the mind
\n\t\t\tthat cannot embody the divine spirit which they vainly endeavour to
\n\t\t\timprison in their categorical formulas. Beyond the mental and moral
\n\t\t\tbeing in us is a greater divine being that is spiritual and
\n\t\t\tsupramental; for it is only through a large spiritual plane where
\n\t\t\tthe mind’s formulas dissolve in a white flame of direct inner
\n\t\t\texperience that we can reach beyond mind and pass from its
\n\t\t\tconstructions to the vastness and freedom of the supramental
\n\t\t\trealities. There alone can we touch the harmony of the divine powers
\n\t\t\tthat are poorly mispresented to our mind or framed into a false
\n\t\t\tfigure by the conflicting or wavering elements of the moral law.
\n\t\t\tThere alone the unification of the transformed vital and physical
\n\t\t\tand the illumined mental man becomes possible in that supramental
\n\t\t\tSpirit which is at once the secret source and goal of our mind and
\n\t\t\tlife and body. There alone is there any possibility of an absolute
\n\t\t\tjustice, love and right \u2014 far other than that which we imagine \u2014 at
\n\t\t\tone with each other in the light of a supreme divine knowledge.
\n\t\t\tThere alone can there be a reconciliation of the conflict between
\n\t\t\tour members. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tIn other words there is, above society’s external law and  <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

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\n

\n\t\t\tman’s moral law and beyond them, though feebly and ignorantly
\n\t\t\taimed at by something within them, a larger truth of a vast unbound
\n\t\t\tconsciousness, a law divine towards which both these blind and gross
\n\t\t\tformulations are progressive faltering steps that try to escape from
\n\t\t\tthe natural law of the animal to a more exalted light or universal
\n\t\t\trule. That divine standard, since the godhead in us is our spirit
\n\t\t\tmoving towards its own concealed perfection, must be a supreme
\n\t\t\tspiritual law and truth of our nature. Again, as we are embodied
\n\t\t\tbeings in the world with a common existence and nature and yet
\n\t\t\tindividual souls capable of direct touch with the Transcendent, this
\n\t\t\tsupreme truth of ourselves must have a double character. It must be
\n\t\t\ta law and truth that discovers the perfect movement, harmony, rhythm
\n\t\t\tof a great spiritualised collective life and determines perfectly
\n\t\t\tour relations with each being and all beings in Nature’s varied
\n\t\t\toneness. It must be at the same time a law and truth that discovers
\n\t\t\tto us at each moment the rhythm and exact steps of the direct
\n\t\t\texpression of the Divine in the soul, mind, life, body of the
\n\t\t\tindividual creature.\u00b9<\/font> And we
\n\t\t\tfind in experience that this supreme light and force of action in
\n\t\t\tits highest expression is at once an imperative law and an absolute
\n\t\t\tfreedom. It is an imperative law because it governs by immutable
\n\t\t\tTruth our every inner and outer movement. And yet at each moment and
\n\t\t\tin each movement the absolute freedom of the Supreme handles the
\n\t\t\tperfect plasticity of our conscious and liberated nature. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe ethical idealist tries to discover this supreme law in his own
\n\t\t\tmoral data, in the inferior powers and factors that belong to the
\n\t\t\tmental and ethical formula. And to sustain and organise them he
\n\t\t\tselects a fundamental principle of conduct essentially unsound and
\n\t\t\tconstructed by the intellect \u2014 utility, hedonism, reason, intuitive
\n\t\t\tconscience or any other generalised standard. All such efforts are
\n\t\t\tforedoomed to failure. Our inner nature is the progressive
\n\t\t\texpression of the eternal Spirit and too complex a power to be tied
\n\t\t\tdown by a single dominant mental or <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t\u00b9<\/font>Therefore the Gita defines
\n\t\t\t"dharma", an expression which means more than either religion or
\n\t\t\tmorality, as action controlled by our essential manner of
\n\t\t\tself-being.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

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\n\t\t\tmoral principle. Only the supramental consciousness can reveal
\n\t\t\tto its differing and conflicting forces their spiritual truth and
\n\t\t\tharmonise their divergences. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe later religions endeavour to fix the type of a supreme truth of
\n\t\t\tconduct, erect a system and declare God’s law through the mouth of
\n\t\t\tAvatar or prophet. These systems, more powerful and dynamic than the
\n\t\t\tdry ethical idea, are yet for the most part no more than idealistic
\n\t\t\tglorifications of the moral principle sanctified by religious
\n\t\t\temotion and the label of a superhuman origin. Some, like the extreme
\n\t\t\tChristian ethic, are rejected by Nature because they insist
\n\t\t\tunworkably on an impracticable absolute rule. Others prove in the
\n\t\t\tend to be evolutionary compromises and become obsolete in the march
\n\t\t\tof Time. The true divine law, unlike these mental counterfeits,
\n\t\t\tcannot be a system of rigid ethical determinations that press into
\n\t\t\ttheir cast-iron moulds all our life-movements. The Law divine is
\n\t\t\ttruth of life and truth of the spirit and must take up with a free
\n\t\t\tliving plasticity and inspire with the direct touch of its eternal
\n\t\t\tlight each step of our action and all the complexity of our life
\n\t\t\tissues. It must act not as a rule and formula but as an enveloping
\n\t\t\tand penetrating conscious presence that determines all our thoughts,
\n\t\t\tactivities, feelings, impulsions of will by its infallible power and
\n\t\t\tknowledge. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe older religions erected their rule of the
\n\t\t\twise, their dicta of Manu or Confucius, a complex Shastra in which
\n\t\t\tthey attempted to combine the social rule and moral law with the
\n\t\t\tdeclaration of certain eternal principles of our highest nature in
\n\t\t\tsome kind of uniting amalgam. All three were treated on the same
\n\t\t\tground as equally the expression of everlasting verities, sanā<\/font>tana
\n\t\t\tdharma<\/i>. But two of these elements are evolutionary and valid for
\n\t\t\ta time, mental constructions, human readings of the will of the
\n\t\t\tEternal; the third, attached and subdued to certain social and moral
\n\t\t\tformulas, had to share the fortunes of its forms. Either the Shastra
\n\t\t\tgrows obsolete and has to be progressively changed or finally cast
\n\t\t\taway or else it stands as a rigid barrier to the self-development of
\n\t\t\tthe individual and the race. The Shastra erects a collective and
\n\t\t\texternal standard; it ignores the inner nature of the individual,
\n\t\t\tthe indeterminable<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

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\n\t\t\telements of a secret spiritual force within him. But the
\n\t\t\tnature of the individual will not be ignored; its demand is
\n\t\t\tinexorable. The unrestrained indulgence of his outer impulses leads
\n\t\t\tto anarchy and dissolution, but the suppression and coercion of his
\n\t\t\tsoul’s freedom by a fixed and mechanical rule spells stagnation or
\n\t\t\tan inner death. Not this coercion or determination from outside, but
\n\t\t\tthe free discovery of his highest spirit and the truth of an eternal
\n\t\t\tmovement is the supreme thing that he has to discover. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe higher ethical law is discovered by the individual in his mind
\n\t\t\tand will and psychic sense and then extended to the race. The
\n\t\t\tsupreme law also must be discovered by the individual in his spirit.
\n\t\t\tThen only, through a spiritual influence and not by the mental idea,
\n\t\t\tcan it be extended to others. A moral law can be imposed as a rule
\n\t\t\tor an ideal on numbers of men who have not attained that level of
\n\t\t\tconsciousness or that fineness of mind and will and psychic sense in
\n\t\t\twhich it can become a reality to them and a living force. As an
\n\t\t\tideal it can be revered without any need of practice. As a rule it
\n\t\t\tcan be observed in its outsides even if the inner sense is missed
\n\t\t\taltogether. The supramental and spiritual life cannot be mechanised
\n\t\t\tin this way, it cannot be turned into a mental ideal or an external
\n\t\t\trule. It has its own great lines, but these must be made real, must
\n\t\t\tbe the workings of an active Power felt in the individual’s
\n\t\t\tconsciousness and the transcriptions of an eternal Truth powerful to
\n\t\t\ttransform mind, life and body. And because it is thus real,
\n\t\t\teffective, imperative, the generalisation of the supramental
\n\t\t\tconsciousness and the spiritual life is the sole force that can lead
\n\t\t\tto individual and collective perfection in earth’s highest
\n\t\t\tcreatures. Only by our coming into constant touch with the divine
\n\t\t\tConsciousness and its absolute Truth can some form of the conscious
\n\t\t\tDivine, the dynamic Absolute, take up our earth-existence and
\n\t\t\ttransform its strife, stumbling, sufferings and falsities into an
\n\t\t\timage of the supreme Light, Power and Ananda. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe culmination of the soul’s constant touch with
\n\t\t\tthe Supreme is that self-giving which we call surrender to the
\n\t\t\tdivine Will and immergence of the separated ego in the One who is
\n\t\t\tall. A vast universality of soul and an intense unity with all is<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

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\n

\n\t\t\tthe base and fixed condition of the supramental consciousness
\n\t\t\tand spiritual life. In that universality and unity alone can we find
\n\t\t\tthe supreme law of the divine manifestation in the life of the
\n\t\t\tembodied spirit; in that alone can we discover the supreme motion
\n\t\t\tand right play of our individual nature. In that alone can all these
\n\t\t\tlower discords resolve themselves into a victorious harmony of the
\n\t\t\ttrue relations between manifested beings who are portions of the one
\n\t\t\tGodhead and children of one universal Mother. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t* *<\/font><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAll conduct and action are part of the movement of a Power, a Force
\n\t\t\tinfinite and divine in its origin and secret sense and will even
\n\t\t\tthough the forms of it we see seem inconscient or ignorant,
\n\t\t\tmaterial, vital, mental, finite, which is working to bring out
\n\t\t\tprogressively something of the Divine and Infinite in the obscurity
\n\t\t\tof the individual and collective nature. This power is leading
\n\t\t\ttowards the Light, but still through the Ignorance. It leads man
\n\t\t\tfirst through his needs and desires; it guides him next through
\n\t\t\tenlarged needs and desires modified and enlightened by a mental and
\n\t\t\tmoral ideal. It is preparing to lead him to a spiritual realisation
\n\t\t\tthat overrides these things and yet fulfils and reconciles them in
\n\t\t\tall that is divinely true in their spirit and purpose. It transforms
\n\t\t\tthe needs and desires into a divine Will and Ananda. It transforms
\n\t\t\tthe mental and moral aspiration into the powers of Truth and
\n\t\t\tPerfection that are beyond them. It substitutes for the divided
\n\t\t\tstraining of the individual nature, for the passion and strife of
\n\t\t\tthe separate ego, the calm, profound, harmonious and happy law of
\n\t\t\tthe universalised person within us, the central being, the spirit
\n\t\t\tthat is a portion of the supreme Spirit. This true Person in us,
\n\t\t\tbecause it is universal, does not seek its separate gratification
\n\t\t\tbut only asks in its outward expression in Nature its growth to its
\n\t\t\treal stature, the expression of its inner divine self, that
\n\t\t\ttranscendent spiritual power and presence within it which is one
\n\t\t\twith all and in sympathy with each thing and creature and with all
\n\t\t\tthe collective personalities and powers of the divine.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

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\n\t\t\texistence, and yet it transcends them and is not bound by the
\n\t\t\tegoism of any creature or collectivity or limited by the ignorant
\n\t\t\tcontrols of their lower nature. This is the high realisation in
\n\t\t\tfront of all our seeking and striving, and it gives the sure promise
\n\t\t\tof a perfect reconciliation and transmutation of all the elements of
\n\t\t\tour nature. A pure, total and flawless action is possible only when
\n\t\t\tthat is effected and we have reached the height of this secret
\n\t\t\tGodhead within us. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe perfect supramental action will not follow any single principle
\n\t\t\tor limited rule. It is not likely to satisfy the standard either of
\n\t\t\tthe individual egoist or of any organised group-mind. It will
\n\t\t\tconform to the demand neither of the positive practical man of the
\n\t\t\tworld nor of the formal moralist nor of the patriot nor of the
\n\t\t\tsentimental philanthropist nor of the idealising philosopher. It
\n\t\t\twill proceed by a spontaneous out-flowing from the summits in the
\n\t\t\ttotality of an illumined and uplifted being, will and knowledge and
\n\t\t\tnot by the selected, calculated and standardised action which is all
\n\t\t\tthat the intellectual reason or ethical will can achieve. Its sole
\n\t\t\taim will be the expression of the divine in us and the keeping
\n\t\t\ttogether of the world and its progress towards the Manifestation
\n\t\t\tthat is to be. This even will not be so much an aim and purpose as a
\n\t\t\tspontaneous law of the being and an intuitive determination of the
\n\t\t\taction by the Light of the divine Truth and its automatic influence.
\n\t\t\tIt will proceed like the action of Nature from a total will and
\n\t\t\tknowledge behind her, but a will and knowledge enlightened in a
\n\t\t\tconscious supreme Nature and no longer obscure in this ignorant
\n\t\t\tPrakriti. It will be an action not bound by the dualities but full
\n\t\t\tand large in the spirit’s impartial joy of existence. The happy and
\n\t\t\tinspired movement of a divine Power and Wisdom guiding and impelling
\n\t\t\tus will replace the perplexities and stumblings of the suffering and
\n\t\t\tignorant ego. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tIf by some miracle of divine intervention all
\n\t\t\tmankind at once could be raised to this level, we should have
\n\t\t\tsomething on earth like the Golden Age of the traditions, Satya
\n\t\t\tYuga, the Age of Truth or true existence. For the sign of the Satya
\n\t\t\tYuga is that the Law is spontaneous and conscious in each creature
\n\t\t\tand does <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 <\/font>206<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\n\t\t\tits own works in a perfect harmony and freedom. Unity and
\n\t\t\tuniversality, not separative division, would be the foundation of
\n\t\t\tthe consciousness of the race; love would be absolute; equality
\n\t\t\twould be consistent with hierarchy and perfect in difference;
\n\t\t\tabsolute justice would be secured by the spontaneous action of the
\n\t\t\tbeing in harmony with the truth of things and the truth of himself
\n\t\t\tand others and therefore sure of true and right result; right
\n\t\t\treason, no longer mental but supramental, would be satisfied not by
\n\t\t\tthe observation of artificial standards but by the free automatic
\n\t\t\tperception of right relations and their inevitable execution in the
\n\t\t\tact. The quarrel between the individual and society or disastrous
\n\t\t\tstruggle between one community and another could not exist: the
\n\t\t\tcosmic consciousness imbedded in embodied beings would assure a
\n\t\t\tharmonious diversity in oneness. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tIn the actual state of humanity, it is the individual who must climb
\n\t\t\tto this height as a pioneer and precursor. His isolation will
\n\t\t\tnecessarily give a determination and a form to his outward
\n\t\t\tactivities that must be quite other than those of a consciously
\n\t\t\tdivine collective action. The inner state, the root of his acts,
\n\t\t\twill be the same; but the acts themselves may well be very different
\n\t\t\tfrom what they would be on an earth liberated from ignorance.
\n\t\t\tNevertheless his consciousness and the divine mechanism of his
\n\t\t\tconduct, if such a word can be used of so free a thing, would be
\n\t\t\tsuch as has been described, free from that subjection to vital
\n\t\t\timpurity and desire and wrong impulse which we call sin, unbound by
\n\t\t\tthat rule of prescribed moral formulas which we call virtue,
\n\t\t\tspontaneously sure and pure and perfect in a greater consciousness
\n\t\t\tthan the mind’s, governed in all its steps by the light and truth of
\n\t\t\tthe Spirit. But if a collectivity or group could be formed of those
\n\t\t\twho had reached the supramental perfection, there indeed some divine
\n\t\t\tcreation could take shape; a new earth could descend that would be a
\n\t\t\tnew heaven, a world of supramental light could be created here
\n\t\t\tamidst the receding darkness of this terrestrial ignorance.   <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 <\/font>207<\/font><\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Chapter VII   Standards of Conduct and   Spiritual Freedom   THE KNOWLEDGE on which the doer of works in Yoga has to found all…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[46],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2174","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-23-24-the-synthesis-of-yoga","wpcat-46-id"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2174","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=2174"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2174\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2174"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2174"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2174"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}