{"id":2381,"date":"2013-07-13T01:41:15","date_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:41:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/?p=2381"},"modified":"2013-07-13T01:41:15","modified_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:41:15","slug":"44-on-art-the-national-value-of-art-vol-01-early-cultural-writings","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/01-works-of-sri-aurobindo\/03-cwsa\/01-early-cultural-writings\/44-on-art-the-national-value-of-art-vol-01-early-cultural-writings","title":{"rendered":"-44_On Art – The National Value of Art.htm"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

\n\n\n
\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tPart Four <\/font>
\n\t\t\t<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tOn Art <\/font>
\n\t\t\t<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tSri Aurobindo wrote these essays in 1909\u00ad10. He published all of them except the last in the
\nKarmayogin<\/i>, a weekly newspaper of which he was the editor and principal writer.<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

 <\/p>\n

\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tThe National Value of Art<\/font><\/b><\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tI<\/font><\/b><\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tT<\/font>HERE<\/font><\/b> is a tendency in modern times to depreciate the value of the beautiful and overstress the value of the useful, a tendency curbed in Europe by the imperious insistence of an
\n\t\t\tage-long tradition of culture and generous training of the aesthetic perceptions; but in India, where we have been cut off by a mercenary and soulless education from all our ancient roots of culture and tradition, it is corrected only by the stress of imagination, emotion and spiritual delicacy, submerged but not yet destroyed, in the temperament of the people. The value attached by the ancients to music, art and poetry has become almost unintelligible to an age bent on depriving life of its meaning by turning earth into a sort of glorified
\n\t\t\tant-heap or beehive and confusing the lowest, though most primary in necessity, of the means of human progress with the aim of this great evolutionary process. The first and lowest necessity of the race is that of self-preservation in the body by a sufficient supply and equable distribution of food, shelter and raiment. This is a problem which the oldest communistic human societies solved to perfection, and without communism it cannot be solved except by a convenient but inequitable arrangement which makes of the majority slaves provided with these primary wants and necessities and ministering under compulsion to a few who rise higher and satisfy larger wants. These are the wants of the vital instincts, called in our philosophy the pr<\/i><\/font><\/span>ā<\/i><\/span><\/font>ṇa koṣa<\/i>, which go beyond and dominate the mere animal wants, simple, coarse and undiscriminating, shared by us with the lower creation. It is these vital wants, the hunger for wealth, luxury, beautiful women, rich foods and drinks, which disturbed the first low but perfect economy of society and made the institution of private property, with its huge train of evils, inequality, injustice, violence, fraud, civil commotion and hatred, class selfishness, family selfishness and  
\n\t\t\t<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 433<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tpersonal selfishness, an inevitable necessity of human progress. The Mother of All works through evil as well as good, and through temporary evil she brings about a better and lasting good. These disturbances were complicated by the heightening of the primitive animal emotions into more intense and complex forms. Love, hatred, vindictiveness, anger, attachment, jealousy and the host of similar passions, -the citta <\/i>
\n\t\t\tor mind-stuff suffused by the vital wants of the prana<\/i>, that which the Europeans call the heart -ceased to be communal in their application and, as personal wants, clamoured for separate satisfaction. It is for the satisfaction of the vital and emotional needs of humanity that modern nations and societies exist, that commerce grows and Science ministers to human luxury and convenience. But for these new wants, the establishment of private property, first in the clan or family, then in the individual, the institution of slavery and other necessary devices the modern world would never have come into existence; for the satisfaction of the primary economic wants and bodily necessities would never have carried us beyond the small commune or tribe. But these primary wants and necessities have to be satisfied and satisfied universally, or society becomes diseased and states convulsed with sedition and revolution. <\/font>
\n\t\t\t<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tThe old arrangement of a mass of slaves well fed and provided and a select class or classes enjoying in greater or less quantity the higher wants of humanity broke down in the mediaeval ages, because the heart began to develop too powerfully in humanity and under the influence of philosophy, ethics and religion began to spread its claim beyond the person, the class, the family, the clan to the nation and to humanity or to all creation. A temporary makeshift was invented to replace slavery, called free labour, by which men were paid and bribed to accept voluntarily the position of slaves, contenting themselves with the coarse satisfaction of the animal necessities and in return providing by their labour the higher wants of their masters now called superiors or higher classes. This also has become a solution which will no longer serve. The whole of humanity now demands not merely the satisfaction of the body, the
\nanna<\/i>,<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 434<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tbut the satisfaction also of the prana
\n<\/i>and the citta<\/i>, the vital and emotional desires. Wealth, luxury, enjoyment for oneself and
\n \t\t\tthose dear to us, participation in the satisfaction of national
\nwealth, pride, lordship, rivalry, war, alliance, peace, once the
\n \t\t\tprivilege of the few, the higher classes, of prince, burgess and
\nnoble are now claimed by all humanity. Political, social and
\n \t\t\teconomic liberty and equality, two things difficult to harmonise,
\nmust now be conceded to all men and harmonised as well as
\n \t\t\tthe present development of humanity will allow. It is this claim
\nthat arose, red with fury and blinded with blood, in the French
\n \t\t\tRevolution. This is Democracy, this Socialism, this Anarchism;
\nand, however fiercely the privileged and propertied classes may
\n \t\t\trage, curse and denounce these forerunners of Demogorgon,
\nthey can only temporarily resist. Their interests may be hoary
\n \t\t\tand venerable with the sanction of the ages, but the future is
\nmightier than the past and evolution proceeds relentlessly in its
\n \t\t\tcourse trampling to pieces all that it no longer needs. Those who fight against her fight against the will of God, against a decree
\n \t\t\twritten from of old, and are already defeated and slain in the
\n \t\t\tkāraṇa jagat<\/i>, the world of types and causes where Nature fixes
\n \t\t\teverything before she works it out in the visible world.
\nNihatāḥ<\/i>
\n \t\t\t pūrvameva<\/i>.
\n\t\t\t<\/span><\/font><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tThe mass of humanity has not risen beyond the bodily
\n \t\t\tneeds, the vital desires, the emotions and the current of
\n\t\t\tthought-sensations
\n\t\t\tcreated by these lower strata. This current of thought-sensations is called in Hindu philosophy the
\nmanas <\/i>or mind, it is the highest to which all but a few of the animals can rise, and it
\n \t\t\tis the highest function that the mass of mankind has thoroughly
\nperfected. Beyond the manas <\/i>is the
\nbuddhi<\/i>, or thought proper,
\n \t\t\twhich, when perfected, is independent of the desires, the claims of the body and the interference of the emotions. But only a
\n \t\t\tminority of men have developed this organ, much less perfected
\nit. Only great thinkers in their hours of thought are able to use
\n \t\t\tthis organ independently of the lower strata, and even they are
\nbesieged by the latter in their ordinary life and their best thought
\n \t\t\tsuffers continually from these lower intrusions. Only developed
\n\u00b4<\/i>
\n \t\t\tYogins have a viśuddha-buddhi<\/i>, a thought-organ cleared of the  
\n \t\t\t<\/font>
\n\t\t\t<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 435<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tinterference of the lower strata by
\ncittaśuddhi <\/i>or purification
\n \t\t\tof the citta<\/i>, the mind-stuff, from the prana <\/i>full of animal, vital
\n \t\t\tand emotional disturbances. With most men the
\nbuddhi <\/i>is full of manas <\/i>and the manas <\/i>of the lower strata. The majority of
\n \t\t\tmankind do not think, they have only thought-sensations; a
\nlarge minority think confusedly, mixing up desires, predilections,
\n \t\t\tpassions, prejudgments, old associations and prejudices with
\npure and disinterested thought. Only a few, the rare aristocrats
\n \t\t\tof the earth, can really and truly think. That is now the true
\naristocracy, not the aristocracy of the body and birth, not the
\n \t\t\taristocracy of vital superiority, wealth, pride and luxury, not the
\naristocracy of higher emotions, courage, energy, successful political instinct and the habit of mastery and rule, -though these
\nlatter cannot be neglected, -but the aristocracy of knowledge,
\n \t\t\tundisturbed insight and intellectual ability. It emerges, though it has not yet emerged, and in any future arrangement of human
\n \t\t\tsociety this natural inequality will play an important part.
\n\t\t\t<\/font>
\n\t\t\t<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tAbove the buddhi <\/i>are other faculties which are now broadly
\n \t\t\tincluded in the term spirituality. This body of faculties is still
\nrarer and more imperfectly developed even in the highest than
\n \t\t\tthe thought-organ. Most men mistake intellectuality, imaginative inspiration or emotional fervour for spirituality, but this is a
\n \t\t\tmuch higher function, the highest of all, of which all the others
\nare coverings and veils. Here we get to the fountain, the source
\n \t\t\tto which we return, the goal of human evolution. But although
\nspirituality has often entered into humanity in great waves, it
\n \t\t\thas done so merely to create a temporary impetus and retire
\ninto the souls of a few, leaving only its coverings and shadows
\n \t\t\tbehind to compose and inform the thing which is usually called
\nreligion. Meanwhile the thought is the highest man has really
\n \t\t\tattained and it is by the thought that the old society has been
\nbroken down. And the thought is composed of two separate
\n \t\t\tsides, judgment or reason and imagination, both of which are
\nnecessary to perfect ideation. It is by science, philosophy and
\n \t\t\tcriticism on the one side, by art, poetry and idealism on the
\nother that the old state of humanity has been undermined and
\n \t\t\tis now collapsing, and the foundations have been laid for the  
\n \t\t\t<\/font>
\n\t\t\t<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 436<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tnew. Of these science, philosophy and criticism have established
\ntheir use to the mass of humanity by ministering to the luxury,
\n \t\t\tcomfort and convenience which all men desire and arming them
\nwith justification in the confused struggle of passions, interests,
\n \t\t\tcravings and aspirations which are now working with solvent
\nand corrosive effect throughout the world. The value of the other
\n \t\t\tside, more subtle and profound, has been clouded to the mass of men by the less visible and sensational character of its workings.<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 437<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tII <\/font>
\n\t\t\t<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tT<\/font><\/b>HE ACTIVITY
\n\t\t\t<\/b>of human thought divides itself broadly
\ninto two groups of functions, those of the right hand,
\n \t\t\tcontemplation, creation, imagination, the centres that see the truth, and those of the left hand, criticism, reasoning,
\n \t\t\tdiscrimination, inquiry, the centres that judge the truth when it is seen. In education the latter are fostered by scientific and
\n \t\t\tmanual
\n\t\t\ttraining, but the only quality of the right hand that this education
\n\t\t\tfosters is observation. For this reason a purely scientific education tends to make thought keen and clear-sighted
\nwithin certain limits, but narrow, hard and cold. Even in his
\n \t\t\town sphere the man without any training of the right hand can
\nonly progress in a settled groove; he cannot broaden the base
\n \t\t\tof human culture or enlarge the bounds of science. Tennyson
\ndescribes him as an eye well practised in Nature, a spirit bounded
\n \t\t\tand poor, and the description is just. But a cultivated eye without a cultivated spirit makes by no means the highest type of man.
\n \t\t\tIt is precisely the cultivation of the spirit that is the object of
\nwhat is well called a liberal education, and the pursuits best
\n \t\t\tcalculated to cultivate the growth of the spirit are language,
\nliterature, the Arts, music, painting, sculpture or the study of
\n \t\t\tthese, philosophy, religion, history, the study and understanding of man through his works and of Nature and man through the
\n \t\t\tinterpretative as well as through the analytic faculties. These
\nare the pursuits which belong to the intellectual activities of
\n \t\t\tthe right hand, and while the importance of most of these will be acknowledged, there is a tendency to ignore Art and poetry
\n \t\t\tas mere refinements, luxuries of the rich and leisurely rather
\nthan things that are necessary to the mass of men or useful to
\n \t\t\tlife. This is largely due to the misuse of these great instruments by the luxurious few who held the world and its good things
\n \t\t\tin their hands in the intermediate period of human progress.  
\n \t\t\t<\/font>
\n\t\t\t<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 438<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tBut the aesthetic faculties entering into the enjoyment of the
\nworld and the satisfaction of the vital instincts, the love of the
\n \t\t\tbeautiful in men and women, in food, in things, in articles of use and articles of pleasure, have done more than anything else
\n \t\t\tto raise man from the beast, to refine and purge his passions, to
\nennoble his emotions and to lead him up through the heart and
\n \t\t\tthe imagination to the state of the intellectual man. That which has helped man upward, must be preserved in order that he may
\n \t\t\tnot sink below the level he has attained. For man intellectually
\ndeveloped, mighty in scientific knowledge and the mastery of
\n \t\t\tgross and subtle nature, using the elements as his servants and
\nthe world as his footstool, but undeveloped in heart and spirit,
\n \t\t\tbecomes only an inferior kind of Asura using the powers of a
\ndemigod to satisfy the nature of an animal. According to dim
\n \t\t\ttraditions and memories of the old world, of such a nature was
\nthe civilisation of old Atlantis, submerged beneath the Ocean
\n \t\t\twhen its greatness and its wickedness became too heavy a load for the earth to bear, and our own legends of the Asuras represent
\n \t\t\ta similar consciousness of a great but abortive development in
\nhumanity.
\n \t\t\t<\/font>
\n\t\t\t<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tThe first and lowest use of Art is the purely aesthetic, the
\nsecond is the intellectual or educative, the third and highest the
\n \t\t\tspiritual. By speaking of the aesthetic use as the lowest, we do
\nnot wish to imply that it is not of immense value to humanity,
\n \t\t\tbut simply to assign to it its comparative value in relation to
\nthe higher uses. The aesthetic is of immense importance and
\n \t\t\tuntil it has done its work, mankind is not really fitted to make full use of Art on the higher planes of human development.
\n \t\t\tAristotle assigns a high value to tragedy because of its purifying
\nforce. He describes its effect as
\nkatharsis<\/i>, a sacramental word
\n \t\t\tof the Greek mysteries, which, in the secret discipline of the ancient Greek Tantrics, answered precisely to our
\ncittaśuddhi<\/i>, the purification of the
\ncitta <\/i>or mass of established ideas, feelings
\n \t\t\t˙<\/i> and actional habits in a man either by
\nsaṁyama<\/i>, rejection, or
\n \t\t\tby bhoga<\/i>, satisfaction, or by both. Aristotle was speaking of
\nthe purification of feelings, passions and emotions in the heart
\n \t\t\tthrough imaginative treatment in poetry but the truth the idea  
\n \t\t\t<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 439<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tcontains is of much wider application and constitutes the justification of the aesthetic side of art. It purifies by beauty. The
\n \t\t\tbeautiful and the good are held by many thinkers to be the same
\nand, though the idea may be wrongly stated, it is, when put from
\n \t\t\tthe right standpoint, not only a truth but the fundamental truth of existence. According to our own philosophy the whole world
\n \t\t\t  came out of
\nānanda <\/i>and returns into
\nānanda<\/i>, and the triple term
\n \t\t\t in which
\nānanda <\/i>may be stated is Joy, Love, Beauty. To see divine
\nbeauty in the whole world, man, life, nature, to love that which
\n \t\t\twe have seen and to have pure unalloyed bliss in that love and
\nthat beauty is the appointed road by which mankind as a race
\n \t\t\t  must climb to God. That is the reaching to
\nvidyā <\/i>through avidyā<\/i>, to the One Pure and Divine through the manifold manifestation
\n \t\t\tof Him, of
\n\t\t\twhich the Upanishad repeatedly speaks. But the bliss must be pure
\n\t\t\tand unalloyed, unalloyed by self-regarding emotions, unalloyed by pain and evil. The sense of good and bad,
\nbeautiful and unbeautiful, which afflicts our understanding and
\n \t\t\tour senses, must be replaced by akhanḍa rasa<\/i>, undifferentiated
\n..<\/i>
\n \t\t\tand unabridged delight in the delightfulness of things, before the
\nhighest can be reached. On the way to this goal full use must be
\n \t\t\tmade of the lower and abridged sense of beauty which seeks to
\nreplace the less beautiful by the more, the lower by the higher,
\n \t\t\tthe mean by the noble.
\n\t\t\t<\/span><\/font><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tAt a certain stage of human development the aesthetic sense
\n \t\t\tis of infinite value in this direction. It raises and purifies conduct by instilling a distaste for the coarse desires and passions of
\n \t\t\tthe savage, for the rough, uncouth and excessive in action and
\nmanner, and restraining both feeling and action by a striving
\n \t\t\tafter the
\n\t\t\tdecent, the beautiful, the fit and seemly which received its highest
\n\t\t\texpression in the manners of cultivated European society, the elaborate ceremonious life of the Confucian, the careful
\n<\/font><\/span>
\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t
\nā<\/i><\/span><\/font>c<\/i><\/font><\/span>ā<\/i><\/span><\/font>ra <\/i>and etiquette of Hinduism. At the present stage of progress
\nthis element is losing much of its once all-important value and,
\n \t\t\twhen overstressed, tends to hamper a higher development by
\nthe obstruction of soulless ceremony and formalism. Its great
\n \t\t\tuse was to discipline the savage animal instincts of the body, the
\nvital instincts and the lower feelings in the heart. Its disadvantage
\n\t\t\t<\/font>
\n\t\t\t<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 440<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tto progress is that it tends to trammel the play both of the higher
\nfeelings of the heart and the workings of originality in thought.
\n \t\t\tBorn originally of a seeking after beauty, it degenerates into an attachment to form, to exterior uniformity, to precedent, to
\n \t\t\tdead authority. In the future development of humanity it must be given a much lower place than in the past. Its limits must
\n \t\t\tbe recognised and the demands of a higher truth, sincerity and
\nfreedom of thought and feeling must be given priority. Mankind
\n \t\t\tis apt to bind itself by attachment to the means of its past
\nprogress forgetful of the aim. The bondage to formulas has to
\n \t\t\tbe outgrown, and in this again it is the sense of a higher beauty
\nand fitness which will be most powerful to correct the lower.
\n \t\t\tThe art of life must be understood in more magnificent terms
\nand must subordinate its more formal elements to the service of
\n \t\t\tthe master civilisers, Love and Thought.  
\n\t\t\t<\/font>
\n\t\t\t<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 441<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tIII<\/font>
\n\t\t\t<\/font><\/b>
\n\t\t\t<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tT<\/font><\/b><\/span>HE WORK
\n\t\t\t<\/b>of
\n\t\t\tpurifying conduct through outward form and habitual and seemly
\n\t\t\tregulation of expression, manner and action is the lowest of the many services which
\nthe artistic sense has done to humanity, and yet how wide is
\n \t\t\tthe field it covers and how important and indispensable have
\nits workings been to the progress of civilisation! A still more
\n \t\t\timportant and indispensable activity of the sense of beauty is
\nthe powerful help it has given to the formation of morality. We
\n \t\t\tdo not ordinarily recognise how largely our sense of virtue is a sense of the beautiful in conduct and our sense of sin a sense of
\n \t\t\tugliness and deformity in conduct. It may easily be recognised in the lower and more physical workings, as for instance in the
\n \t\t\tshuddering recoil from cruelty, blood, torture as things intolerably hideous to sight and imagination or in the aesthetic disgust at
\n \t\t\tsensual excesses and the strong sense, awakened by this disgust, of the charm of purity and the beauty of virginity. This latter
\n \t\t\tfeeling was extremely active in the imagination of the Greeks
\nand other nations not noted for a high standard in conduct,
\n \t\t\tand it was purely aesthetic in its roots. Pity again is largely a
\n \t\t\t vital instinct in the ordinary man associated with
\njugupsā<\/i>, the
\n \t\t\t loathing for the hideousness of its opposite,
\nghṛṇā<\/i>, disgust at ..<\/i>
\n \t\t\tthe sordidness and brutality of cruelty, hardness and selfishness as well as at the ugliness of their actions, so that a common
\n \t\t\tword for cruel in the Sanskrit language is
\nnirghṛṇa<\/i>, the man ..<\/i>
\n \t\t\t..<\/i> without disgust or loathing, and the word
\nghṛṇa <\/i>approximates
\n \t\t\t. <\/i> in use to kṛpā<\/i>, the lower or vital kind of pity. But even on a
\n \t\t\thigher plane the sense of virtue is very largely aesthetic and,
\neven when it emerges from the aesthetic stage, must always call
\n \t\t\tthe sense of the beautiful to its support if it is to be safe from
\nthe revolt against it of one of the most deep-seated of human
\n \t\t\tinstincts. We can see the largeness of this element if we study the  
\n \t\t\t<\/span>
\n\t\t\t<\/font><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 442<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tideas of the Greeks, who never got beyond the aesthetic stage of
\nmorality. There were four gradations in Greek ethical thought,
\n \t\t\t -the euprepēs<\/i>, that which is seemly or outwardly decorous;
\n \t\t\t the dikaion<\/i>, that which is in accordance with
\ndikē <\/i>or nomos<\/i>,
\n \t\t\tthe law, custom and standard of humanity based on the sense of fitness and on the codified or uncodified mass of precedents in which that sense has been expressed in general conduct, -in
\nother words the just or lawful; thirdly, the
\nagathon<\/i>, the good,
\n \t\t\tbased partly on the seemly and partly on the just and lawful, and
\nreaching towards the purely beautiful; then, final and supreme,
\n \t\t\tthe kalon<\/i>, that which is purely beautiful, the supreme standard.
\nThe most remarkable part of Aristotle’s moral system is that in
\n \t\t\twhich he classifies the parts of conduct not according to our
\n \t\t\t idea of virtue and sin, pāpa <\/i>and
\npuṇya<\/i>, but by a purely aesthetic
\n \t\t\tstandard, the excess, defect and golden, in other words correct
\nand beautiful, mean of qualities. The Greeks’ view of life was
\n \t\t\timperfect even from the standpoint of beauty, not only because
\nthe idea of beauty was not sufficiently catholic and too much
\n \t\t\tattached to a fastidious purity of form and outline and restraint,
\nbut because they were deficient in love. God as beauty, Srikrishna
\n \t\t\tin Brindavan, Shyamasundara, is not only Beauty, He is also
\nLove, and without perfect love there cannot be perfect beauty, and without perfect beauty there cannot be perfect delight. The
\naesthetic motive in conduct limits and must be exceeded in order
\n \t\t\tthat humanity may rise. Therefore it was that the Greek mould
\nhad to be broken and humanity even revolted for a time against
\n \t\t\tbeauty. The agathon<\/i>, the good, had to be released for a time from
\nthe bondage of the kalon<\/i>, the aesthetic sense of beauty, just as it is
\n \t\t\t now struggling to deliver itself from the bondage of the
\neuprepēs<\/i>
\n \t\t\tand the dikaion<\/i>, mere decorousness, mere custom, mere social
\nlaw and rule. The excess of this anti-aesthetic tendency is visible
\n \t\t\tin Puritanism and the baser forms of asceticism. The progress of
\nethics in Europe has been largely a struggle between the Greek
\n \t\t\tsense of aesthetic beauty and the Christian sense of a higher
\ngood marred on the one side by formalism, on the other by an
\n \t\t\tunlovely asceticism. The association of the latter with virtue has
\nlargely driven the sense of beauty to the side of vice. The good<\/span><\/font><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 443<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tmust not be subordinated to the aesthetic sense, but it must be
\nbeautiful and delightful, or to that extent it ceases to be good.
\n \t\t\tThe object of existence is not the practice of virtue for its own
\n \t\t\t sake but ānanda <\/i>, delight, and progress consists not in rejecting
\nbeauty and delight, but in rising from the lower to the higher,
\n \t\t\tthe less complete to the more complete beauty and delight.
\n\t\t\t<\/span><\/font><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tThe third activity of the aesthetic faculty, higher than the
\n \t\t\ttwo already described, the highest activity of the artistic sense
\nbefore it rises to the plane of the intellect, is the direct purifying
\n \t\t\tof the emotions. This is the katharsis <\/i>of which Aristotle spoke.
\nThe sense of pleasure and delight in the emotional aspects of
\n \t\t\tlife and action, this is the poetry of life, just as the regulating
\nand beautiful arrangement of character and action is the art
\n \t\t\tof life. We have seen how the latter purifies, but the purifying
\nforce of the former is still more potent for good. Our life is
\n \t\t\tlargely made up of the eight rasas<\/i>. The movements of the heart in its enjoyment of action, its own and that of others, may
\n \t\t\teither be directed downwards, as is the case with the animals
\nand animal men, to the mere satisfaction of the ten sense-organs
\n \t\t\tand the vital desires which make instruments of the senses in
\nthe average sensual man, or they may work for the satisfaction
\n \t\t\tof the heart itself in a predominatingly emotional enjoyment of
\nlife, or they may be directed upwards through the medium of
\n \t\t\tthe intellect, rational and intuitional, to attainment of delight
\nthrough the seizing on the source of all delight, the Spirit, the
\n \t\t\t satyam, sundaram, ānanda m <\/i>who is beyond and around, the
\n \t\t\tsource and the basis of all this world-wide activity, evolution
\nand progress. When the heart works for itself, then it enjoys
\n \t\t\tthe poetry of life, the delight of emotions, the wonder, pathos,
\nbeauty, enjoyableness, lovableness, calm, serenity, clarity and
\n \t\t\talso the grandeur, heroism, passion, fury, terror and horror of
\nlife, of man, of Nature, of the phenomenal manifestation of God.
\n \t\t\tThis is not the highest, but it is higher than the animal, vital and
\nexternally aesthetic developments. The large part it plays in life
\n \t\t\tis obvious, but in life it is hampered by the demands of the body
\nand the vital passions. Here comes in the first mighty utility, the
\n \t\t\ttriumphant activity of the most energetic forms of art and poetry.  
\n \t\t\t<\/span><\/font><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 444<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tThey provide a field in which these pressing claims of the animal can be excluded and the emotions, working disinterestedly for
\n \t\t\tthe satisfaction of the heart and the imagination alone, can do
\nthe work of katharsis<\/i>, emotional purification, of which Aristotle
\n \t\t\tspoke. Cittaśuddhi<\/i>, the purification of the heart, is the appointed
\n \t\t\troad by which man arrives at his higher fulfilment, and, if it can be shown that poetry and art are powerful agents towards that
\n \t\t\tend, their supreme importance is established. They are that, and
\nmore than that. It is only one of the great uses of these things
\n \t\t\twhich men nowadays are inclined to regard as mere ornaments of life and therefore of secondary importance.<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 445<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tIV<\/font><\/b>
\n\t\t\t<\/font>
\n\t\t\t<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tW<\/font><\/b>E NOW
\n\t\t\t<\/b>come to the kernel of the subject, the place of art in the evolution of the race and its value in
\n \t\t\tthe education and actual life of a nation. The first
\nquestion is whether the sense of the beautiful has any effect on
\n \t\t\tthe life of a nation. It is obvious, from what we have already
\nwritten, that the manners, the social culture and the restraint
\n \t\t\tin action and expression which are so large a part of national
\nprestige and dignity and make a nation admired like the French,
\n \t\t\tloved like the Irish or respected like the higher-class English, are
\nbased essentially on the sense of form and beauty, of what is
\n \t\t\tcorrect, symmetrical, well-adjusted, fair to the eye and pleasing to the imagination. The absence of these qualities is a source of
\n \t\t\tnational weakness. The rudeness, coarseness and vulgar violence of the less cultured Englishman, the overbearing brusqueness
\n \t\t\tand selfishness of the Prussian have greatly hampered those
\npowerful nations in their dealings with foreigners, dependencies
\n \t\t\tand even their own friends, allies, colonies. We all know what a
\nlarge share the manner and ordinary conduct of the average and
\n \t\t\tof the vulgar Anglo-Indian has had in bringing about the revolt of the Indian, accustomed through ages to courtesy, dignity and
\n \t\t\tthe amenities of an equal intercourse, against the mastery of an obviously coarse and selfish community. Now the sense of
\n \t\t\tform and beauty, the correct, symmetrical, well-adjusted, fair
\nand pleasing is an artistic sense and can best be fostered in a
\n \t\t\tnation by
\n\t\t\tartistic culture of the perceptions and sensibilities. It is
\n\t\t\tnoteworthy that the two great nations who are most hampered by the defect of these qualities in action are also the least
\nimaginative, poetic and artistic in Europe. It is the South German
\n \t\t\twho contributes the art, poetry and music of Germany, the Celt
\nand Norman who produce great poets and a few great artists
\n \t\t\tin England without altering the characteristics of the dominant  
\n \t\t\t<\/font>
\n\t\t\t<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 446<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tSaxon. Music is even more powerful in this direction than Art
\nand by the perfect expression of harmony insensibly steeps the
\n \t\t\tman in it. And it is noticeable that England has hardly produced a single musician worth the name. Plato in his Republic has
\n \t\t\tdwelt with extraordinary emphasis on the importance of music in education; as is the music to which a people is accustomed, so,
\n \t\t\the says in effect, is the character of that people. The importance of painting and sculpture is hardly less. The mind is profoundly
\n \t\t\tinfluenced by what it sees and, if the eye is trained from the days of childhood to the contemplation and understanding of
\n \t\t\tbeauty, harmony and just arrangement in line and colour, the
\ntastes, habits and character will be insensibly trained to follow a
\n \t\t\tsimilar law of beauty, harmony and just arrangement in the life of the adult man. This was the great importance of the universal
\n \t\t\tproficiency in the arts and crafts or the appreciation of them
\nwhich was prevalent in ancient Greece, in certain European ages,
\n \t\t\tin Japan and in the better days of our own history. Art galleries
\ncannot be brought into every home, but, if all the appointments
\n \t\t\tof our life and furniture of our homes are things of taste and
\nbeauty, it is inevitable that the habits, thoughts and feelings of
\n \t\t\tthe people should be raised, ennobled, harmonised, made more
\nsweet and dignified. <\/font>
\n\t\t\t<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tA similar result is produced on the emotions by the study of
\nbeautiful or noble art. We have spoken of the purification of the
\n \t\t\t\u00b4<\/i> heart, the cittasuddhi<\/i>, which Aristotle assigned as the essential
\n \t\t\toffice of poetry, and have pointed out that it is done in poetry by
\nthe detached and disinterested enjoyment of the eight
\nrasas <\/i>or
\n \t\t\tforms of emotional aestheticism which make up life, unalloyed by the disturbance of the lower self-regarding passions. Painting
\n \t\t\tand sculpture work in the same direction by different means.
\nArt sometimes uses the same means as poetry but cannot do it
\n \t\t\tto the same extent because it has not the movement of poetry; it is fixed, still, it expresses only a given moment, a given point
\n \t\t\tin space and cannot move freely through time and region. But it is precisely this stillness, this calm, this fixity which gives its
\n \t\t\tseparate value to Art. Poetry raises the emotions and gives each
\nits separate delight. Art stills the emotions and teaches them the<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 447<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tdelight of a restrained and limited satisfaction, -this indeed was the characteristic that the Greeks, a nation of artists far
\n \t\t\tmore artistic than poetic, tried to bring into their poetry. Music
\ndeepens the emotions and harmonises them with each other.
\n \t\t\tBetween them music, art and poetry are a perfect education for the
\n\t\t\tsoul; they make and keep its movements purified, self-controlled, deep and harmonious. These, therefore, are agents
\nwhich cannot profitably be neglected by humanity on its onward march or degraded to the mere satisfaction of sensuous pleasure
\nwhich will disintegrate rather than build the character. They
\n \t\t\tare, when properly used, great educating, edifying and civilising
\nforces.<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 448<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tV <\/font>
\n\t\t\t<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tT<\/font>HE VALUE<\/font><\/b> of art in the training of intellectual faculty is also an important part of its utility. We have already
\n \t\t\tindicated the double character of intellectual activity,
\ndivided between the imaginative, creative and sympathetic or
\n \t\t\tcomprehensive intellectual centres on the one side and the critical, analytic and penetrative on the other. The latter are best
\n \t\t\ttrained by science, criticism and observation, the former by
\nart, poetry, music, literature and the sympathetic study of man
\n \t\t\tand his creations. These make the mind quick to grasp at a glance,
\n\t\t\tsubtle to distinguish shades, deep to reject shallow
\n\t\t\tself-sufficiency, mobile, delicate, swift, intuitive. Art assists in this
\ntraining by raising images in the mind which it has to understand not by analysis, but by self-identification with other minds; it is a powerful stimulator of sympathetic insight. Art is subtle and
\n \t\t\tdelicate, and it makes the mind also in its movements subtle
\nand delicate. It is suggestive, and the intellect habituated to the
\n \t\t\tappreciation of art is quick to catch suggestions, mastering not
\nonly, as the scientific mind does, that which is positive and on
\n \t\t\tthe surface, but that which leads to ever fresh widening and
\nsubtilising of knowledge and opens a door into the deeper secrets
\n \t\t\tof inner nature where the positive instruments of science cannot
\ntake the depth or measure. This supreme intellectual value of Art
\n \t\t\thas never been sufficiently recognised. Men have made language,
\npoetry, history, philosophy agents for the training of this side of
\n \t\t\tintellectuality, necessary parts of a liberal education, but the
\nimmense educative force of music, painting and sculpture has
\n \t\t\tnot been duly recognised. They have been thought to be bypaths of the human mind, beautiful and interesting, but not
\n \t\t\tnecessary, therefore intended for the few. Yet the universal impulse to enjoy the beauty and attractiveness of sound, to look at
\n \t\t\tand live among pictures, colours, forms ought to have warned  
\n\t\t\t<\/font>
\n\t\t\t<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 449<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tmankind of the superficiality and ignorance of such a view of
\nthese eternal and important occupations of human mind. The
\n \t\t\timpulse, denied proper training and self-purification, has spent
\nitself on the trivial, gaudy, sensuous, cheap or vulgar instead of
\n \t\t\thelping man upward by its powerful aid in the evocation of what is best and highest in intellect as well as in character, emotion
\n \t\t\tand the aesthetic enjoyment and regulation of life and manners. It is difficult to appreciate the waste and detriment involved in
\n \t\t\tthe low and debased level of enjoyment to which the artistic
\nimpulses are condemned in the majority of mankind.
\n \t\t\t<\/font>
\n\t\t\t<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tBut beyond and above this intellectual utility of Art, there is a higher use, the noblest of all, its service to the growth of
\n \t\t\tspirituality in the race. European critics have dwelt on the close
\nconnection of the highest developments of art with religion,
\n \t\t\tand it is undoubtedly true that in Greece, in Italy, in India,
\nthe greatest efflorescence of a national Art has been associated
\n \t\t\twith the employment of the artistic genius to illustrate or adorn
\nthe thoughts and fancies or the temples and instruments of the
\n \t\t\tnational religion. This was not because Art is necessarily associated with the outward forms of religion, but because it was in
\n \t\t\tthe religion that men’s spiritual aspirations centred themselves.
\nSpirituality is a wider thing than formal religion and it is in the
\n \t\t\tservice of spirituality that Art reaches its highest self-expression.
\nSpirituality is a single word expressive of three lines of human
\n \t\t\taspiration towards divine knowledge, divine love and joy, divine
\nstrength, and that will be the highest and most perfect Art which,
\n \t\t\twhile satisfying the physical requirements of the aesthetic sense,
\nthe laws of formal beauty, the emotional demand of humanity,
\n \t\t\tthe portrayal
\n\t\t\tof life and outward reality, as the best European Art satisfies
\n\t\t\tthese requirements, reaches beyond them and expresses
\n\t\t\tinner spiritual truth, the deeper not obvious reality of things, the
\n\t\t\tjoy of God in the world and its beauty and desirableness and the manifestation of divine force and energy in
\nphenomenal creation. This is what Indian Art alone attempted
\n \t\t\tthoroughly and in the effort it often dispensed, either deliberately or from impatience, with the lower, yet not negligible perfections
\n \t\t\twhich the more material European demanded. Therefore Art has  <\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 450<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tflowed in two separate streams in Europe and Asia, so diverse
\nthat it is only now that the European aesthetic sense has so far
\n \t\t\ttrained itself as to begin to appreciate the artistic conventions,
\naims and traditions of Asia. Asia’s future development will unite
\n \t\t\tthese two streams in one deep and grandiose flood of artistic
\nself-expression perfecting the aesthetic evolution of humanity.
\n \t\t\t<\/font>
\n\t\t\t<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tBut if Art is to reach towards the highest, the Indian tendency must dominate. The spirit is that in which all the rest of
\n \t\t\tthe human being reposes, towards which it returns and the final
\nself-revelation of which is the goal of humanity. Man becomes
\n \t\t\tGod, and all human activity reaches its highest and noblest
\nwhen it succeeds in bringing body, heart and mind into touch
\n \t\t\twith spirit. Art can express eternal truth, it is not limited to
\nthe expression of form and appearance. So wonderfully has
\n \t\t\tGod made the
\n\t\t\tworld that a man using a simple combination of lines, an
\n\t\t\tunpretentious harmony of colours, can raise this apparently insignificant medium to suggest absolute and profound
\ntruths with a perfection which language labours with difficulty
\n \t\t\tto reach. What Nature is, what God is, what man is can be
\ntriumphantly revealed in stone or on canvas.
\n \t\t\t<\/font>
\n\t\t\t<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tBehind a few figures, a few trees and rocks the supreme
\nIntelligence, the supreme Imagination, the supreme Energy lurks,
\n \t\t\tacts, feels,
\n\t\t\tis, and, if the artist has the spiritual vision, he can see it and
\n\t\t\tsuggest perfectly the great mysterious Life in its manifestations brooding in action, active in thought, energetic in
\nstillness, creative in repose, full of a mastering intention in that
\n \t\t\twhich appears blind and unconscious. The great truths of religion, science, metaphysics, life, development, become concrete,
\n \t\t\temotional, universally intelligible and convincing in the hands of
\nthe master of plastic Art, and the soul of man, in the stage when
\n \t\t\tit is rising from emotion to intellect, looks, receives the suggestion and is uplifted towards a higher development, a diviner
\n \t\t\tknowledge. <\/font>
\n\t\t\t<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tSo
\n\t\t\tit is with the divine love and joy which pulsates throughout existence and is far superior to alloyed earthly pleasure.
\nCatholic, perfect, unmixed with repulsion, radiating through all
\n \t\t\tthings, the common no less than the high, the mean and shabby  
\n \t\t\t<\/font>
\n\t\t\t<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 451<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tno less than the lofty and splendid, the terrible and the repulsive no less than the charming and attractive, it uplifts all, purifies
\n \t\t\tall, turns all to love and delight and beauty. A little of this
\nimmortal nectar poured into a man’s heart transfigures life and
\n \t\t\taction. The whole flood of it pouring in would lift mankind to
\nGod. This too Art can seize on and suggest to the human soul,
\n \t\t\taiding it in its stormy and toilsome pilgrimage. In that pilgrimage it is the divine strength that supports. Shakti, Force, pouring
\n \t\t\tthrough the universe supports its boundless activities, the frail
\nand tremulous life of the rose no less than the flaming motions
\n \t\t\tof sun and star. To suggest the strength and virile unconquerable
\nforce of the divine Nature in man and in the outside world, its
\n \t\t\tenergy, its calm, its powerful inspiration, its august enthusiasm,
\nits wildness, greatness, attractiveness, to breathe that into man’s
\n \t\t\tsoul and gradually mould the finite into the image of the Infinite is another spiritual utility of Art. This is its loftiest function, its
\n \t\t\tfullest consummation, its most perfect privilege.  
\n \t\t\t<\/font>
\n\t\t\t<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 452<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tVI<\/font><\/b>
\n\t\t\t<\/font>
\n\t\t\t<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tT<\/font><\/b>HE ENORMOUS
\n\t\t\t<\/b>value of Art to human evolution has been made sufficiently apparent
\n\t\t\tfrom the analysis, incomplete in itself, which we have attempted. We have
\nalso incidentally pointed out its value as a factor in education.
\n \t\t\tIt is obvious that no nation can afford to neglect an element of such high importance to the culture of its people or the training
\n \t\t\tof some of the higher intellectual, moral and aesthetic faculties in the young. The system of education which, instead of keeping
\n \t\t\tartistic training apart as a privilege for a few specialists, frankly
\nintroduces it as a part of culture no less necessary than literature
\n \t\t\tor science, will have taken a great step forward in the perfection of national education and the general diffusion of a broad-based
\n \t\t\thuman culture. It is not necessary that every man should be an
\nartist. It is necessary that every man should have his artistic
\n \t\t\tfaculty developed, his taste trained, his sense of beauty and
\ninsight into form and colour and that which is expressed in
\n \t\t\tform and colour, made habitually active, correct and sensitive. It is necessary that those who create, whether in great things or
\n \t\t\tsmall, whether in the unusual masterpieces of art and genius or in the small common things of use that surround a man’s daily
\n \t\t\tlife, should be habituated to produce and the nation habituated to expect the beautiful in preference to the ugly, the noble in
\n \t\t\tpreference to the vulgar, the fine in preference to the crude, the
\nharmonious in preference to the gaudy. A nation surrounded
\n \t\t\tdaily by the beautiful, noble, fine and harmonious becomes that
\nwhich it is habituated to contemplate and realises the fullness of
\n \t\t\tthe expanding Spirit in itself.
\n\t\t\t<\/font>
\n\t\t\t<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tIn the system of National education that was inaugurated
\n \t\t\tin Bengal, a beginning was made by the importance attached to
\ndrawing and clay-modelling as elements of manual training. But
\n \t\t\tthe absence of an artistic ideal, the misconception of the true  
\n \t\t\t<\/font>
\n\t\t\t<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 453<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\taim of manual training, the imperative financial needs of these
\nstruggling institutions making for a predominant commercial
\n \t\t\taim in the education given, the mastery of English ideas, English methods and English predilections in the so-called national
\n \t\t\teducation rendered nugatory the initial advantage. The students
\nhad faculty, but the teaching given them would waste and misuse
\n \t\t\tthe faculty. The nation and the individual can gain nothing by
\nturning out figures in clay which faithfully copy the vulgarity
\n \t\t\tand ugliness of English commercial production or by multiplying
\nmere copies of men or things. A free and active imaging of form
\n \t\t\tand hue within oneself, a free and self-trained hand reproducing
\nwith instinctive success not the form and measurement of things
\n \t\t\tseen outside, for that is a smaller capacity easily mastered, but
\nthe inward vision of the relation and truth of things, an eye
\n \t\t\tquick to note and distinguish, sensitive to design and to harmony in colour, these are the faculties that have to be evoked,
\n \t\t\tand the formal and mechanical English method is useless for this
\npurpose.
\n \t\t\t<\/font>
\n\t\t\t<\/span><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t
\n\t\t\tIn India the revival of a truly national Art is already an
\naccomplished fact and the masterpieces of the school can already
\n \t\t\tchallenge comparison with the best work of other countries. Under such circumstances it is unpardonable that the crude formal
\n \t\t\tteaching of English schools and the vulgar commercial aims and
\nmethods of the West should subsist in our midst. The country
\n \t\t\thas yet to
\n\t\t\tevolve a system of education which shall be really national. The
\n\t\t\ttaint of Occidental ideals and alien and unsuitable methods has to be purged out of our minds, and nowhere
\nmore than in the teaching which should be the foundation of
\n \t\t\tintellectual and aesthetic renovation. The spirit of old Indian
\nArt must be revived, the inspiration and directness of vision
\n \t\t\twhich even now subsists among the possessors of the ancient
\ntraditions, the inborn skill and taste of the race, the dexterity of
\n \t\t\tthe Indian hand and the intuitive gaze of the Indian eye must be
\nrecovered and the whole nation lifted again to the high level of
\n \t\t\tthe ancient culture -and higher.  
\n \t\t\t<\/font>
\n\t\t\t<\/span><\/p>\n

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\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 454<\/font><\/span><\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Part Four   On Art   Sri Aurobindo wrote these essays in 1909\u00ad10. He published all of them except the last in the Karmayogin, a…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[49],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2381","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-01-early-cultural-writings","wpcat-49-id"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2381","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=2381"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2381\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2381"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2381"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2381"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}