{"id":3070,"date":"2013-07-13T01:45:45","date_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:45:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/?p=3070"},"modified":"2013-07-13T01:45:45","modified_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:45:45","slug":"62-summary-and-conclusion-vol-25-the-human-cycle","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/01-works-of-sri-aurobindo\/03-cwsa\/25-the-human-cycle\/62-summary-and-conclusion-vol-25-the-human-cycle","title":{"rendered":"-62_Summary and Conclusion.htm"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n\n\n
\n

\t <\/p>\n

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

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tSummary and Conclusion <\/font><\/b><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tI<\/font>N OTHER<\/b> words, \u2014 and this is the conclusion at which we arrive,
\n\t\t\t\u2014 while it is possible to construct a precarious and
\n quite mechanical unity by political and administrative means,
\nthe unity of the human race, even if achieved, can only be secured and can only be made real if the religion of humanity, which is
\nat present the highest active ideal of mankind, spiritualises itself and becomes the general inner law of human life. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe outward unity may well achieve itself, \u2014 possibly, though by no means certainly, in a measurable time,
\n\t\t\t\u2014 because
\nthat is the inevitable final trend of the working of Nature in human society which makes for larger and yet larger aggregations
\nand cannot fail to arrive at a total aggregation of mankind in a closer international system. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThis working of Nature depends for its means of fulfilment upon two
\n\t\t\tforces which combine to make the larger aggregation inevitable.
\n\t\t\tFirst, there is the increasing closeness of common interests or at
\n\t\t\tleast the interlacing and interrelation of interests in a larger and
\n\t\t\tyet larger circle which makes old divisions an obstacle and a cause
\n\t\t\tof weakness, obstruction and friction, and the clash and collision
\n\t\t\tthat comes out of this friction a ruinous calamity to all, even to
\n\t\t\tthe victor who has to pay a too heavy price for his gains; and even
\n\t\t\tthese expected gains, as war becomes more complex and disastrous,
\n\t\t\tare becoming more and more difficult to achieve and the success
\n\t\t\tproblematical. An increasing perception of this community or
\n\t\t\tinterrelation of interests and a growing unwillingness to face the
\n\t\t\tconsequences of collision and ruinous struggle must push men to
\n\t\t\twelcome any means for mitigating the divisions which lead to such
\n\t\t\tdisasters. If the trend to the mitigation of divisions is once given
\n\t\t\ta definite form, that commences an impetus which drives towards
\n\t\t\tcloser and closer union. If she cannot arrive by these means, if the
\n\t\t\tincoherence is too great for
\nthe trend of unification to triumph, <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 571<\/p>\n

\n

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

\n\t\t\tNature will use other means, such as war and conquest or the temporary domination of the
\npowerful State or empire or the menace of such a domination which will compel those threatened to adopt a closer system
\nof union. It is these means and this force of outward necessity which she used to create nation-units and national empires, and,
\nhowever modified in the circumstances and workings, it is at bottom the same force and the same means which she is using
\nto drive mankind towards international unification. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tBut, secondly, there is the force of a common uniting sentiment. This may work in two ways; it may come before as an originating or contributory cause or it may come afterwards as a
\ncementing result. In the first case, the sentiment of a larger unity springs up among units which were previously divided and leads
\nthem to seek after a form of union which may then be brought about principally by the force of the sentiment and its idea or by
\nthat secondarily as an aid to other and more outward events and causes. We may note that in earlier times this sentiment was insufficiently effective, as among the petty clan or regional nations; unity had ordinarily to be effected by outward circumstances
\nand generally by the grossest of them, by war and conquest, by the domination of the most powerful among many warring or
\ncontiguous peoples. But in later times the force of the sentiment of unity, supported as it has been by a clearer political idea,
\nhas become more effective. The larger national aggregates have grown up by a simple act of federation or union, though this has
\nsometimes had to be preceded by a common struggle for liberty or a union in war against a common enemy; so have grown into
\none the United States, Italy, Germany, and more peacefully the Australian and South African federations. But in other cases,
\nespecially in the earlier national aggregations, the sentiment of unity has grown up largely or entirely as the result of the formal, outward or mechanical union. But whether to form or to preserve the growth of the sentiment, the psychological factor
\nis indispensable; without it there can be no secure and lasting union. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 572<\/p>\n

\n

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

\n\t\t\tIts absence, the failure to create such a sentiment or to make it
\n\t\t\tsufficiently living, natural, forcible has been the cause of
\nthe precariousness of such aggregates as Austro-Hungary and of the ephemeral character of the empires of the past, even as it is
\nlikely to bring about, unless circumstances change, the collapse or disintegration of the great present-day empires. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe trend of forces towards some kind of international world-organisation eventuating in a possible far-off unification,
\nwhich is now just beginning to declare itself as an idea or aspiration though the causes which made it inevitable have been
\nfor some time at work, is enforced by the pressure of need and environment, by outward circumstances. At the same time,
\nthere is a sentiment helped and stimulated by these outward circumstances, a cosmopolitan, international sentiment, still rather
\nnebulous and vaguely ideal, which may accelerate the growth of the formal union. In itself this sentiment would be an insufficient cement for the preservation of any mechanical union which might be created; for it could not easily be so close and
\nforcible a sentiment as national feeling. It would have to subsist on the conveniences of union as its only substantial provender.
\nBut the experience of the past shows that this mere necessity of convenience is in the end not strong enough to resist the pressure
\nof unfavourable circumstances and the reassertion of old or the effective growth of new centrifugal forces. There is, however, at
\nwork a more powerful force, a sort of intellectual religion of humanity, clear in the minds of the few, vaguely felt in its effects
\nand its disguises by the many, which has largely helped to bring about much of the trend of the modern mind and the drift of its
\ndeveloping institutions. This is a psychological force which tends to break beyond the formula of the nation and aspires to replace
\nthe religion of country and even, in its more extreme forms, to destroy altogether the national sentiment and to abolish its
\ndivisions so as to create the single nation of mankind. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tWe may say, then, that this trend must eventually realise
\nitself, however great may be the difficulties; and they are really enormous, much greater than those which attended the national
\nformation. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 573<\/p>\n

\n

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

\n\t\t\tIf the present unsatisfactory condition of international relations
\n\t\t\tshould lead to a series of cataclysms, either large and
\n\t\t\tworld-embracing like the present war or, though each more
\nlimited in scope, yet in their sum world-pervading and necessarily, by the growing interrelation of interests, affecting even
\nthose who do not fall directly under their touch, then mankind will finally be forced in self-defence to a new, closer and more
\nstringently unified order of things. Its choice will be between that and a lingering suicide. If the human reason cannot find
\nout the way, Nature herself is sure to shape these upheavals in such a way as to bring about her end. Therefore,
\n\t\t\t\u2014 whether
\nsoon or in the long run, whether brought about by its own growing sentiment of unity, stimulated by common interest and
\nconvenience, or by the evolutionary pressure of circumstances, \u2014 we may take it that an eventual unification or at least some
\nformal organisation of human life on earth is, the incalculable being always allowed for, practically inevitable. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tI have tried to show from the analogy of the past evolution of the nation that this international unification must culminate or
\nat least is likely to culminate in one of two forms. There is likely to be either a centralised World-State or a looser world-union
\nwhich may be either a close federation or a simple confederacy of the peoples for the common ends of mankind. The last form
\nis the most desirable, because it gives sufficient scope for the principle of variation which is necessary for the free play of
\nlife and the healthy progress of the race. The process by which the World-State may come starts with the creation of a central
\nbody which will at first have very limited functions, but, once created, must absorb by degrees all the different utilities of a
\ncentralised international control, as the State, first in the form of a monarchy and then of a parliament, has been absorbing by
\ndegrees the whole control of the life of the nation, so that we are now within measurable distance of a centralised socialistic State
\nwhich will leave no part of the life of its individuals unregulated. A similar process in the World-State will end in the taking up
\nand the regulation of the whole life of the peoples into its hands; it may even end by abolishing national individuality and turning
\nthe divisions that it has created into mere departmental groupings, provinces and districts of the one common State. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 574<\/p>\n

\n

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

\n\t\t\tSuch an eventuality may seem now a fantastic dream or an
\n\t\t\tunrealisable
\nidea; but it is one which, under certain conditions that are by no means beyond the scope of ultimate possibility, may well become
\nfeasible and even, after a certain point is reached, inevitable. A federal system and still more a confederacy would mean, on the
\nother hand, the preservation of the national basis and a greater or less freedom of national life, but the subordination of the
\nseparate national to the larger common interests and of full separate freedom to the greater international necessities. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tIt may be questioned whether past analogies are a safe guide in a problem so new and whether something else might not be
\nevolved more intimately and independently arising from it and suitable to its complexities. But mankind even in dealing with its
\nnew problems works upon past experience and therefore upon past motives and analogies. Even when it seizes on new ideas, it
\ngoes to the past for the form it gives to them. Behind the apparent changes of the most radical revolutions we see this unavoidable
\nprinciple of continuity surviving in the heart of the new order. Moreover, these alternatives seem the only way in which the
\ntwo forces in presence can work out their conflict, either by the disappearance of the one, the separative national instinct, or by
\nan accommodation between them. On the other hand, it is quite possible that human thought and action may take so new a turn
\nas to bring in a number of unforeseen possibilities and lead to a quite different ending. And one might upon these lines set
\none’s imagination to work and produce perhaps a utopia of a better kind. Such constructive efforts of the human imagination
\nhave their value and often a very great value; but any such speculations would evidently have been out of place in the study
\nI have attempted. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tAssuredly, neither of the two alternatives and none of the
\nthree forms considered are free from serious objections. A centralised World-State would signify the triumph of the idea of
\nmechanical unity or rather of uniformity. It would inevitably mean the undue depression of an indispensable element in the
\nvigour of human life and progress, the free life of the individual, the free variation of the peoples. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 575<\/p>\n

\n

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

\n\t\t\tIt must end, if it becomes permanent and fulfils all its tendencies,
\n\t\t\teither in a death in
\nlife, a stagnation, or by the insurgence of some new saving but revolutionary force or principle which would shatter the whole
\nfabric into pieces. The mechanical tendency is one to which the logical reason of man, itself a precise machine, is easily addicted
\nand its operations are obviously the easiest to manage and the most ready to hand; its full evolution may seem to the reason
\ndesirable, necessary, inevitable, but its end is predestined. A centralised socialistic State may be a necessity of the future, once it
\nis founded, but a reaction from it will be equally an eventual necessity of the future. The greater its pressure, the more certainly
\nwill it be met by the spread of the spiritual, the intellectual, the vital and practical principle of Anarchism in revolt against that
\nmechanical pressure. So, too, a centralised mechanical WorldState must rouse in the end a similar force against it and might
\nwell terminate in a crumbling up and disintegration, even in the necessity for a repetition of the cycle of humanity ending
\nin a better attempt to solve the problem. It could be kept in being only if humanity agreed to allow all the rest of its life to
\nbe regularised for it for the sake of peace and stability and took refuge for its individual freedom in the spiritual life, as happened
\nonce under the Roman Empire. But even that would be only a temporary solution. A federal system also would tend inevitably
\nto establish one general type for human life, institutions and activities; it would allow only a play of minor variations. But
\nthe need of variation in living Nature could not always rest satisfied with that scanty sustenance. On the other hand, a looser
\nconfederacy might well be open to the objection that it would give too ready a handle for centrifugal forces, were such to arise
\nin new strength. A loose confederation could not be permanent; it must turn in one direction or the other, end either in a close
\nand rigid centralisation or at last by a break-up of the loose unity into its original elements. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe saving power needed is a new psychological factor which will at
\n\t\t\tonce make a united life necessary to humanity and force it to
\n\t\t\trespect the principle of freedom. The religion of humanity seems to
\n\t\t\tbe the one growing force which tends in that direction; for it makes
\n\t\t\tfor the sense of human oneness, it
\nhas the idea of the race, and yet at the same time it respects the human individual and the natural human grouping. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 576<\/p>\n

\n

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

\n\t\t\tBut
\nits present intellectual form seems hardly sufficient. The idea, powerful in itself and in its effects, is yet not powerful enough
\nto mould the whole life of the race in its image. For it has to concede too much to the egoistic side of human nature, once all
\nand still nine-tenths of our being, with which its larger idea is in conflict. On the other side, because it leans principally on the
\nreason, it turns too readily to the mechanical solution. For the rational idea ends always as a captive of its machinery, becomes
\na slave of its own too binding process. A new idea with another turn of the logical machine revolts against it and breaks up its
\nmachinery, but only to substitute in the end another mechanical system, another credo, formula and practice. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tA spiritual religion of humanity is the hope of the future. By this is not meant what is ordinarily called a universal religion, a
\nsystem, a thing of creed and intellectual belief and dogma and outward rite. Mankind has tried unity by that means; it has failed
\nand deserved to fail, because there can be no universal religious system, one in mental creed and vital form. The inner spirit is
\nindeed one, but more than any other the spiritual life insists on freedom and variation in its self-expression and means of development. A religion of humanity means the growing realisation that there is a secret Spirit, a divine Reality, in which we are all
\none, that humanity is its highest present vehicle on earth, that the human race and the human being are the means by which it
\nwill progressively reveal itself here. It implies a growing attempt to live out this knowledge and bring about a kingdom of this
\ndivine Spirit upon earth. By its growth within us oneness with our fellow-men will become the leading principle of all our life,
\nnot merely a principle of cooperation but a deeper brotherhood, a real and an inner sense of unity and equality and a common
\nlife. There must be the realisation by the individual that only in the life of his fellow-men is his own life complete. There must be
\nthe realisation by the race that only on the free and full life of the individual can its own perfection and permanent happiness be
\nfounded. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 577<\/p>\n

\n

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

\n\t\t\tThere must be too a discipline and a way of salvation
\nin accordance with this religion, that is to say, a means by which it can be developed by each man within himself, so that it may
\nbe developed in the life of the race. To go into all that this implies would be too large a subject to be entered upon here; it
\nis enough to point out that in this direction lies the eventual road. No doubt, if this is only an idea like the rest, it will go the way of
\nall ideas. But if it is at all a truth of our being, then it must be the truth to which all is moving and in it must be found the means of
\na fundamental, an inner, a complete, a real human unity which would be the one secure base of a unification of human life. A
\nspiritual oneness which would create a psychological oneness not dependent upon any intellectual or outward uniformity and
\ncompel a oneness of life not bound up with its mechanical means of unification, but ready always to enrich its secure unity by a
\nfree inner variation and a freely varied outer self-expression, this would be the basis for a higher type of human existence. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tCould such a realisation develop rapidly in mankind, we might then
\n\t\t\tsolve the problem of unification in a deeper and truer way from the
\n\t\t\tinner truth to the outer forms. Until then, the attempt to bring it
\n\t\t\tabout by mechanical means must proceed. But the higher hope of
\n\t\t\thumanity lies in the growing number of men who will realise this
\n\t\t\ttruth and seek to develop it in themselves, so that when the mind of
\n\t\t\tman is ready to escape from its mechanical bent, \u2014 perhaps when it
\n\t\t\tfinds that its mechanical solutions are all temporary and
\n\t\t\tdisappointing, \u2014 the truth of the Spirit may step in and lead
\n\t\t\thumanity to the path of its highest possible happiness and
\n\t\t\tperfection.   <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 578<\/font><\/font><\/span><\/font><\/font><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Chapter XXXV   Summary and Conclusion   IN OTHER words, \u2014 and this is the conclusion at which we arrive, \u2014 while it is possible…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[58],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3070","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-25-the-human-cycle","wpcat-58-id"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3070","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=3070"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3070\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3070"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3070"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3070"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}