{"id":3081,"date":"2013-07-13T01:45:49","date_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:45:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/?p=3081"},"modified":"2013-07-13T01:45:49","modified_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:45:49","slug":"60-internationalism-and-human-unity-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\/60-internationalism-and-human-unity-vol-25-the-human-cycle","title":{"rendered":"-60_Internationalism and Human Unity.htm"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n\n\n
\n\t <\/p>\n

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

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tInternationalism and Human Unity <\/font><\/b><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tT<\/font>HE GREAT<\/b> necessity, then, and the great difficulty is to help this idea of humanity which is already at work upon
\n our minds and has even begun in a very slight degree to
\ninfluence from above our actions, and turn it into something more than an idea, however strong, to make it a central motive
\nand a fixed part of our nature. Its satisfaction must become a necessity of our psychological being, just as the family idea or the
\nnational idea has become each a psychological motive with its own need of satisfaction. But how is this to be done? The family
\nidea had the advantage of growing out of a primary vital need in our being and therefore it had not the least difficulty in becoming
\na psychological motive and need; for our readiest and strongest mental motives and psychological needs are those which grow
\nout of our vital necessities and instincts. The clan and the tribe ideas had a similar origin, less primary and compelling, and
\ntherefore looser and more dissoluble; but still they arose from the vital necessity in human nature for aggregation and the ready
\nbasis given to it by the inevitable physical growth of the family into clan or tribe. These were natural aggregations, evolutionary
\nforms already prepared on the animal level. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe nation idea, on the contrary, did not arise from a primary vital
\n\t\t\tneed, but from a secondary or even tertiary necessity which resulted
\n\t\t\tnot from anything inherent in our vital nature, but from
\n\t\t\tcircumstances, from environmental evolution; it arose not from a
\n\t\t\tvital, but from a geographical and historical necessity. And we
\n\t\t\tnotice that as one result it had to be created most commonly by
\n\t\t\tforce, force of circumstances partly, no doubt, but also by physical
\n\t\t\tforce, by the power of the king and the conquering tribe converted
\n\t\t\tinto a military and dominant State.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 554<\/p>\n

\n

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

\nOr else it came by a reaction against force, a revolt against conquest and
\ndomination that brought a slow or sudden compactness
\nto peoples who, though geographically or even historically and culturally one, had lacked power of cohesion and remained too
\nconscious of an original heterogeneity or of local and regional and other divisions. But still the necessity was there and the
\nnation form after many failures and false successes got into being, and the psychological motive of patriotism, a sign of the
\ngrowth of a conscious national ego, arose in the form as the expression of its soul and the guarantee of its durability. For
\nwithout such a soul, such a psychological force and presence within the frame, there can be no guarantee of durability. Without it, what circumstances have created, circumstances easily will destroy. It was for this reason that the ancient world failed
\nto create nations, except on a small scale, little clans and small regional nations of brief duration and usually of loose structure;
\nit created only artificial empires which went to pieces and left chaos behind them. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tWhat then of this international unity now in the first obscure throes of the pre-formatory
\n\t\t\tstate resembling a ferment of cells drawing together for
\n\t\t\tamalgamation? What is the compelling necessity behind it? If we look
\n\t\t\tat outward things only, the necessity is much less direct and much
\n\t\t\tless compelling than any that preceded it. There is here no vital
\n\t\t\tnecessity; mankind as a whole can get on well enough without
\n\t\t\tinternational unity, so far as mere living goes; it will not be at
\n\t\t\tall a perfect, rational or ideal collective living of the race, \u2014
\n\t\t\tbut after all where is there yet any element in human life or
\n\t\t\tsociety which is perfect, rational or ideal? As yet at least none;
\n\t\t\tstill we get on somehow with life, because the vital man in us, who
\n\t\t\tis the dominant element in our instincts and in our actions, cares
\n\t\t\tfor none of these things and is quite satisfied with any just
\n\t\t\ttolerable or any precariously or partly agreeable form of living,
\n\t\t\tbecause that is all to which he is accustomed and all therefore that
\n\t\t\the feels to be necessary. The men who are not satisfied, the
\n\t\t\tthinkers, the idealists, are always a minority and in the end an
\n\t\t\tineffectual minority, because though always in the end they do get
\n\t\t\ttheir way partly, their victory yet turns into a defeat; for the
\n\t\t\tvital man remains still the majority and degrades the apparent
\n\t\t\tsuccess into a pitiful parody of their
\nrational hope, their clear-sighted ideal or their strong counsel of perfection. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 555<\/p>\n

\n

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

\n\t\t\tThe geographical necessity for a unification of this kind does not exist, unless we consider that it has been created through
\nthe drawing closer together of the earth and its inhabitants by Science and her magical lessening of physical distances and attenuation of barriers. But whatever may happen in the future, this is as yet not sufficient; earth is still large enough and her
\ndivisions still real enough for her to do without any formal unity. If there is any strong need, it may be described
\n\t\t\t\u2014 if such
\nan epithet can be applied to a thing in the present and the future \u2014 as a historical necessity, that is, a need which has arisen as the
\nresult of certain actual circumstances that have grown up in the evolution of international relations. And that need is economic,
\npolitical, mechanical, likely under certain circumstances to create some tentative or preliminary framework, but not at first
\na psychological reality which will vivify the frame. Moreover, it is not yet sufficiently vital to be precisely a necessity; for it
\namounts mainly to a need for the removal of certain perils and inconveniences, such as the constant danger of war, and at most
\nto the strong desirability of a better international coordination. But by itself this creates only a possibility, not even a moral
\ncertainty, of a first vague sketch and loose framework of unity which may or may not lead to something more close and real. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tBut there is another power than that of external circumstance which we have a right to take into consideration. For
\nbehind all the external circumstances and necessities of which we are more easily aware in Nature, there is always an internal
\nnecessity in the being, a will and a design in Nature itself which precedes the outward signals of its development and in spite
\nof all obstacles and failures must in the long end inevitably get itself realised. Nowadays we can see this truth everywhere in
\nNature down to her lowest forms; a will in the very seed of the being, not quite conscious or only partially conscious in the
\nform itself, but still present there in Nature. It is subconscious or even inconscient if you like, but it is still a blind will, a mute
\nidea which contains beforehand the form it is going to create, is  
\naware of a necessity other than the environmental, a necessity contained in the very being itself, and creates persistently and
\ninevitably a form that best answers to the necessity, however we may labour to interfere with or thwart its operations. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 556<\/p>\n

\n

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

\n\t\t\tThis is true biologically, but it is also, though in a more subtle and variable way, psychologically true. Now the very
\nnature of man is that of an individual who on one side is always emphasising and developing his individual being to the extent of
\nhis power but who is also driven by the Idea or Truth within him to unify himself with others of his species, to join himself to them
\nor agglutinate them to him, to create human groups, aggregates and collectivities. And if there is an aggregate or collectivity
\nwhich it is possible for him to realise but is not yet realised, we may be sure that that too in the end he will create. This
\nwill in him is not always or often quite conscient or foreseeing; it is often largely subconscient, but even then it is eventually
\nirresistible. And if it gets into his conscious mind, as the international idea has now done, we may count on a more rapid
\nevolution. Such a will in Nature creates for itself favourable external circumstances and happenings or finds them created
\nfor it in the stress of events. And even if they are insufficient, she will still often use them beyond their apparent power of
\neffectivity, not minding the possibility of failure, for she knows that in the end she will succeed and every experience of failure
\nwill help to better the eventual success. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tWell then, it may be said, let us trust to this
\n\t\t\tinevitable will in Nature and let us follow out her method of
\n\t\t\toperation. Let us create anyhow this framework, any framework of the
\n\t\t\taggregate; for she knows already the complete form she intends and
\n\t\t\tshe will work it out eventually in her own time; by the power of the
\n\t\t\tidea and our will to realise it, by help of strong force of
\n\t\t\tcircumstances, by pressure of all kinds, by physical force even, if
\n\t\t\tneed be, since that too seems still to be a part of her necessary
\n\t\t\tmachinery, let us create it. Let us have the body; the soul will
\n\t\t\tgrow in the body. And we need not mind if the bodily formation is
\n\t\t\tartificial with at first a small or no conscious psychological
\n\t\t\treality to vivify it. That will begin to form itself as soon as the
\n\t\t\tbody has been
\nformed.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 557<\/p>\n

\n

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

\n\t\t\tFor the nation too was at first more or less artificially formed out of incoherent elements actually brought together by
\nthe necessity of a subconscient idea, though apparently it was done only by physical force and the force of circumstances. As a
\nnational ego formed which identified itself with the geographical body of the nation and developed in it the psychological instinct
\nof national unity and the need of its satisfaction, so a collective human ego will develop in the international body and will evolve
\nin it the psychological instinct of human unity and the need of its satisfaction. That will be the guarantee of duration. And that
\npossibly is how the thing will happen, man being what he is; indeed if we cannot do better, it will so happen, since happen
\nsomehow it must, whether in the worse way or the better. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tIt may be as well to review here briefly in the light of these
\nconsiderations the main possibilities and powers which are shaping us towards such an end in the present world conditions. The
\nold means of unification, conquest by a single great Power, which would reduce part of the world by force and bring the remaining
\nnations into the condition of dependencies, protectorates and dependent allies, the whole forming the basic structure of a great
\nfinal unification, \u2014 this was the character of the ancient Roman precedent, \u2014 does not seem immediately possible. It would require a great predominance of force simultaneously by sea and land,1<\/sup> an irresistibly superior science and organisation and with
\nall this a constantly successful diplomacy and an invincible good fortune. If war and diplomacy are still to be the decisive factors
\nin international politics in the future as in the past, it would be rash to predict that such a combination may not arise, and
\nif other means fail, it must arise; for there is nothing that can be set down as impossible in the chances of the future, and the
\nurge in Nature always creates its own means. But, at present, the possibilities of the future do not seem to point in this direction.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t1<\/sup> Now also by air <\/font><\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 558<\/p>\n

\n

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

\n\t\t\tThere is, on the other hand, a very strong possibility of the whole
\n\t\t\tearth, or at least the three continents of the eastern hemisphere,
\n\t\t\tbeing dominated by three or four great empires largely increased
\nin extent of dominion, spheres of influence, protectorates, and thereby exercising a pre-eminence which they could either maintain by agreements, avoiding all causes of conflict, or in a rivalry which would be the cause of fresh wars and changes. This would
\nnormally have been the result of the great European conflict. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tBut there has struck across this possibility a revived strength
\nof the idea of nationality expressed in the novel formula of the principle of self-determination to which the great worldempires have had to pay at least a verbal homage. The idea of international unity to which this intervention of the revived
\nforce of nationality is leading, takes the form of a so-called League of Nations. Practically, however, the League of Nations
\nunder present conditions or any likely to be immediately realised would still mean the control of the earth by a few great Powers,
\n\t\t\t\u2014 a control that would be checked only by the necessity of conciliating the sympathy and support of the more numerous
\nsmaller or less powerful nations. On the force and influence of these few would rest practically, if not admittedly, the decision of
\nall important debatable questions. And without it there could be no chance of enforcing the decisions of the majority against any
\nrecalcitrant great Power or combination of Powers. The growth of democratic institutions would perhaps help to minimise the
\nchances of conflict and of the abuse of power, \u2014 though that is not at all certain; but it would not alter this real character of the
\ncombination. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tIn all this there is no immediate prospect of any such form of
\nunification as would give room for a real psychological sense of unity, much less necessitate its growth. Such a form might evolve;
\nbut we should have to trust for it to the chapter of accidents or at best to the already declared urge in Nature expressed in the
\ninternationalist idea. On that side, there was at one time a possibility which seemed to be very suddenly and rapidly growing
\ninto something more, the emergence of a powerful party in all the advanced countries of the world pledged to internationalism,
\nconscious of its necessity as a first condition for their other aims and more and more determined to give it precedence and to
\nunite internationally to bring it about.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 559<\/p>\n

\n

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

\n\t\t\tThat combination of the
\nintellectuals with Labour which created the Socialist parties in Germany, Russia and Austria, formed anew recently the Labour
\nparty in England and has had its counterparts in most other European countries, seems to be travelling in that direction.
\nThis world-wide movement which made internationalism and Labour rule its two main principles, had already created the
\nRussian revolution and seemed ready to bring about another great socialistic revolution in central Europe. It was conceivable
\nthat this party might everywhere draw together. By a chain of revolutions such as took place in the nineteenth century and
\nof less violent but still rapid evolutions brought about by the pressure of their example, or even by simply growing into the
\nmajority in each country, the party might control Europe. It might create counterparts of itself in all the American republics
\nand in Asiatic countries. It might by using the machinery of the League of Nations or, where necessary, by physical force or
\neconomic or other pressure persuade or compel all the nations into some more stringent system of international unification. A
\nWorld-State or else a close confederation of democratic peoples might be created with a common governing body for the decision
\nof principles and for all generally important affairs or at least for all properly international affairs and problems; a common
\nlaw of the nations might grow up and international courts to administer it and some kind of system of international police
\ncontrol to maintain and enforce it. In this way, by the general victory of an idea, Socialist or other, seeking to organise humanity according to its own model or by any other yet unforeseen way, a sufficient formal unity might come into existence. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe question then arises, how out of this purely
\n\t\t\tformal unity a real psychological unity can be created and whether
\n\t\t\tit can be made a living oneness. For a mere formal, mechanical,
\n\t\t\tadministrative, political and economic union does not necessarily
\n\t\t\tcreate a psychological unity. None of the great empires have yet
\n\t\t\tsucceeded in doing that, and even in the Roman where some sense of
\n\t\t\tunity did come into being, it was nothing very close and living; it
\n\t\t\tcould not withstand all shocks from within and without, it could not
\n\t\t\tprevent what was much more dangerous, the peril of decay
\nand devitalisation which the diminution of the natural elements of free variation and helpful struggle brought with it.<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 560<\/p>\n

\n

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

\n\t\t\tA complete
\nworld-union would have indeed this advantage that it would have no need to fear forces from without, for no such forces
\nwould any longer exist. But this very absence of outer pressure might well give greater room and power to internal elements
\nof disintegration and still more to the opportunities of decay. It might indeed for a long time foster an internal intellectual
\nand political activity and social progress which would keep it living; but this principle of progress would not be always secure
\nagainst a natural tendency to exhaustion and stagnation which every diminution of variety and even the very satisfaction of
\nsocial and economic well-being might well hasten. Disruption of unity would then be necessary to restore humanity to life.
\nAgain, while the Roman Empire appealed only to the idea of Roman unity, an artificial and accidental principle, this WorldState would appeal to the idea of human unity, a real and vital principle. But if the idea of unity can appeal to the human mind,
\nso too can the idea of separative life, for both address themselves to vital instincts of his nature. What guarantee will there be
\nthat the latter will not prevail when man has once tried unity and finds perhaps that its advantages do not satisfy his whole
\nnature? Only the growth of some very powerful psychological factor will make unity necessary to him, whatever other changes
\nand manipulations might be desirable to satisfy his other needs and instincts. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe formal unification of mankind would come in upon us in the shape of a system which would be born, grow, come to its
\nculmination. But every system by the very nature of things tends after its culmination to decay and die. To prevent the organism
\nfrom decaying and dying there must be such a psychological reality within as will persist and survive all changes of its body.
\nNations have that in a sort of collective national ego which persists through all vital changes. But this ego is not by any
\nmeans self-existent and immortal; it supports itself on certain things with which it is identified. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 561<\/p>\n

\n

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

\n\t\t\tFirst, there is the geographical body, the country; secondly, the
\n\t\t\tcommon interests of all
\nwho inhabit the same country, defence, economic well-being and progress, political liberty, etc.; thirdly, a common name,
\nsentiment, culture. But we have to mark that this national ego owes its life to the coalescence of the separative instinct and the
\ninstinct of unity; for the nation feels itself one as distinguished from other nations; it owes its vitality to interchange with them
\nand struggle with them in all the activities of its nature. Nor are all these altogether sufficient; there is a deeper factor. There must
\nbe a sort of religion of country, a constant even if not always explicit recognition not only of the sacredness of the physical
\nmother, the land, but also, in however obscure a way, of the nation as a collective soul which it is the first duty and need of
\nevery man to keep alive, to defend from suppression or mortal attaint or, if suppressed, then to watch, wait and struggle for its
\nrelease and rehabilitation, if sicklied over with the touch of any fatal spiritual ailment, then to labour always to heal and revivify
\nand save alive. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tThe World-State will give its inhabitants the great advantages of
\n\t\t\tpeace, economic well-being, general security, combination for
\n\t\t\tintellectual, cultural, social activity and progress. None of these
\n\t\t\tare in themselves sufficient to create the thing needed. Peace and
\n\t\t\tsecurity we all desire at present, because we have them not in
\n\t\t\tsufficiency; but we must remember that man has also within him the
\n\t\t\tneed of combat, adventure, struggle, almost requires these for his
\n\t\t\tgrowth and healthy living; that instinct would be largely suppressed
\n\t\t\tby a universal peace and a flat security and it might rise up
\n\t\t\tsuccessfully against suppression. Economic well-being by itself
\n\t\t\tcannot permanently satisfy and the price paid for it might be so
\n\t\t\theavy as to diminish its appeal and value. The human instinct for
\n\t\t\tliberty, individual and national, might well be a constant menace to
\n\t\t\tthe World-State, unless it so skilfully arranged its system as to
\n\t\t\tgive them sufficient free play. A common intellectual and cultural
\n\t\t\tactivity and progress may do much, but need not by themselves be
\n\t\t\tsufficient to bring into being the fully powerful psychological
\n\t\t\tfactor that would be required. <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 562<\/p>\n

\n

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

\nAnd the collective ego created would have to rely on the instinct of unity
\nalone; for it would be in conflict with the 
\nseparative instinct which gives the national ego half its vitality. It is not impossible that the indispensable inner factor for
\nthis outer frame might be increasingly created in its very process of growth, but certain psychological elements would have to
\nbe present in great strength. There would be needed, to make the change persist, a religion of humanity or an equivalent sentiment much more powerful, explicit, self-conscious, universal in its appeal than the nationalist’s religion of country; the clear
\nrecognition by man in all his thought and life of a single soul in humanity of which each man and each people is an incarnation
\nand soul-form; an ascension of man beyond the principle of ego which lives by separativeness,
\n\t\t\t\u2014 and yet there must be no destruction of individuality, for without that man would stagnate; a principle and arrangement of the common life which would
\ngive free play to individual variation, interchange in diversity and the need of adventure and conquest by which the soul of man
\nlives and grows great, and sufficient means of expressing all the resultant complex life and growth in a flexible and progressive
\nform of human society.   <\/p>\n

\n\t\t\tPage \u2013 563<\/font><\/font><\/span><\/font><\/font><\/font><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Chapter XXXIII   Internationalism and Human Unity   THE GREAT necessity, then, and the great difficulty is to help this idea of humanity which is…<\/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-3081","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\/3081","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=3081"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3081\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3081"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3081"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3081"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}