{"id":3745,"date":"2013-07-13T01:50:57","date_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:50:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/?p=3745"},"modified":"2013-12-01T23:20:02","modified_gmt":"2013-12-02T07:20:02","slug":"11-reply-to-leonard-woolfs-criticism-of-mysticism-vol-01-first-series-1947","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/01-works-of-sri-aurobindo\/02-other-editions\/letters-of-sri-aurobindo\/01-first-series-1947\/11-reply-to-leonard-woolfs-criticism-of-mysticism-vol-01-first-series-1947","title":{"rendered":"-11_Reply to Leonard Woolf’s Criticism of Mysticism.htm"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n\n\n
\n

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

\n <\/p>\n

\nScience, Reasoning and Yogic
\nExperience,<\/font><\/b><\/p>\n

\nAvatar and Symbols, Yoga Force,
\n<\/font><\/b><\/p>\n

\nBeauty and Art, etc.<\/font><\/b><\/p>\n

\n\t <\/div>\n

\nReply to Leonard Woolf’s Criticism of
\nMysticism <\/b>
\n<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nI HAVE read Leonard Woolf’s article, but I do
\nnot propose to deal with it in my comments
\non Professor Sorley’s letter\u2014for apart from the
\nignorant denunciation and cheap satire in which it
\ndeals, there is nothing much in its statement of the
\ncase against spiritual thought or experience;  its reasoning 
\nis superficial and springs from an entire misunderstanding 
\nof the case for the mystic. There are
\nfour main arguments he sets against it and none
\nof them has any value. <\/font><\/p>\n

\nArgument number one. Mysticism and mystics
\nhave always risen in times of decadence, of the ebb
\nof life and their loud quacking is a symptom of the
\ndecadence. This argument is absolutely untrue. In
\nthe East the great spiritual movements have arisen
\nin the full flood of a people’s life and culture or on
\na rising tide and they have themselves given a powerful
\nimpulse of expression and richness to its thought
\nand Art and life, in Greece the mystics and the mysteries 
\nwere there at the prehistoric beginning and <\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 339<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nin the middle (Pythagoras was one of the greatest
\nof mystics) and not only in the ebb and decline,
\nthe mystic cults nourished in Rome when its culture
\nwas at high tide, many great spiritual personalities
\nof Italy, France, Spain sprang up in a life that was
\nrich, vivid and not in the least touched with decadence. 
\nThis hasty and stupid generalisation has no
\ntruth in it and therefore no value. <\/font><\/p>\n

\nArgument number two. A spiritual experience can-
\nnot be taken as a truth (it is a chimera) unless it is
\nproved just as the presence of a chair in the
\nnext room can be proved by showing it to the eye.
\nOf course, a spiritual experience cannot be proved
\nin that way, for it does not belong to the order of
\nphysical facts and is not physically visible or touchable,
\nThe writer’s proposition would amount to this that
\nonly what is or can easily be evident to everybody
\nwithout any need of training, development, equipment 
\nor personal discovery is to be taken as true.
\nThis is a position which, if accepted, would confine
\nknowledge or truth within very narrow limits and
\nget rid of a great deal of human culture. A spiritual’
\npeace\u2014the peace that passeth all understanding\u2014is
\na common experience of the mystics all over the
\nworld\u2014it is a fact but a spiritual fact, a fact of the
\ninvisible and when one enters it or it enters into one,
\none knows that it is a truth of existence and is there
\nall the time behind life and visible things. But how
\nam I to prove these invisible facts to Mr. Leonard
\nWoolf? He will turn away saying that this is the <\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 340<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nusual decadent quack quack and pass contemptuously
\non\u2014perhaps to write another cleverly shallow article
\non some subject of which he has no personal knowledge 
\nor experience. <\/font><\/p>\n

\nArgument number three. The generalisations based
\non spiritual experience are irrational as well as unproven. 
\nIrrational in what way? Are they merely
\nfoolish and inconceivable or do they belong to a
\nsupra-rational order of experience to which the
\nordinary intellectual canons do not apply because
\nthese are founded on phenomena as they appear to
\nthe external mind and sense and not to an inner
\nrealisation which surpasses these phenomena? That
\nis the contention of the mystics and it cannot be
\ndismissed by merely saying that as these generalisations 
\ndo not agree with the ordinary experience,
\ntherefore they are nonsense and false. I do not undertake 
\nto defend all that load or Radhakrishnan may
\nhave written\u2014such as the statement that the "universe
\nis good"\u2014but I cannot admit about many of these
\nstatements condemned by the writer that they are
\nIrrational at all. "Integrating the personality" may
\npave no meaning to him, it has a very clear meaning
\nto me, for it is a truth of experience\u2014and, if modern
\npsychology is to be believed, it is not irrational,
\nsince there is in our being not only a conscious but
\nan unconscious or subconscious or concealed subliminal 
\npart and it is not impossible to become aware
\nof both and make some kind of integration. To
\ntranscend both also may have a rational meaning if <\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 341<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nwe admit that as there is a subconscious so there may
\nbe a superconscious part of our being; to reconcile
\ndisparate parts of our nature or our experience is
\nalso not such a ridiculous or meaningless phrase.
\nIt is not absurd to say that the doctrine of Karma
\nreconciles determinism and free-willism, since it supposes 
\nthat our own past action and therefore our
\npast will determine to a great extent the present
\nresults but not so as to exclude a present will modifying 
\nthem and creating a fresh determinism of our
\nexistence yet to be. The phrase about the value of
\nthe world is quite intelligible when we see that it
\nrefers to a progressive value, not determined by the
\ngood or bad experience of the moment, a value of
\nexistence developing through time land taken as a
\nwhole. As for the statement about God, it<\/i> has no
\nmeaning if it is taken in connection with the superficial 
\nidea of the Divine current in popular religion,
\nbut it is a perfectly logical result of the premises
\nthat there is an Infinite and Eternal which is manifesting 
\nin itself Time and things that are phenomenally
\nfinite. One may accept or reject this complex idea
\nof the Divine which is founded on co-ordination of
\nthe data of long spiritual experience passed through
\nby thousands of seekers in all times, but I fail to see
\nwhy it should be considered unreasonable. If it is
\nbecause that means "to have it not only in both ways
\nbut in every way", I do not see why that should be
\nso reprehensible and inadmissible. There can be after
\nall a synthetic and global view and consciousness of <\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 342<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nthings which is not bound by the oppositions and
\ndivisions of a mere analytical and selective or dissecting 
\nintelligence. <\/font><\/p>\n

\nArgument number four. The plea of intuition is
\nonly a cover for the inability to explain or establish
\nby the use of reason\u2014Joad and Radhakrishnan reason,
\nbut take refuge in intuition where their reasoning
\nfails. Can the issue be settled in so easy and trenchant
\na way? The fact is that the mystic depends on an
\ninner knowledge, an inner experience; but if he
\nphilosophises, he must try to explain to the reason,
\nthough not necessarily always by the reason alone,
\nwhat he has seen to be the Truth. He cannot but
\nsay "I am explaining a truth which is beyond outer
\nphenomena and the intelligence which depends on
\nphenomena; it really depends on a certain kind of
\ndirect experience and the intuitive knowledge which
\narises from that experience, it cannot be adequately
\ncommunicated by symbols appropriate to the world
\nof outer phenomena, yet I am obliged to do as well
\nas I can with these to help me towards some statement 
\nwhich will be intellectually acceptable to you.
\nThere is no wickedness or deceitful cunning therefore
\nin using metaphors and symbols with a cautionary
\n"as it were", as in the simile of the focus, which is.
\nsurely not intended as an argument but as a suggestive
\nimage. I may observe in passing that the writer himself 
\ntakes refuge in metaphor frequently, beginning
\nwith the quack quack and Joad might well reply
\nthat he does so in order to damn the opposite side <\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 343<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nwhile avoiding the necessity of a sound philosophical
\nreply to the philosophy he dislikes and repudiates.
\nAn intensity of belief is not the measure of truth, but
\nneither is an intensity of unbelief the right measure. <\/font><\/p>\n

\nAs to the real nature of intuition and its relation
\nto the intellectual mind, that is quite another and
\nvery large and complex question which I cannot deal
\nwith here. I have confined myself to pointing out
\nthat this article is quite inadequate and superficial
\ncriticism. A case can be made against spiritual experience 
\nand spiritual philosophy and its positions,
\nbut to deserve a serious reply it must be put forward
\nby a better advocate. <\/font><\/p>\n

\n31-12-1933 <\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 344<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\n
\nReasoning and Yogic Experience<\/a> <\/b>
\n<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nY0U ask me whether you have to give up your
\npredilection for testing before accepting and to accept everything in Yoga a priori\u2014<\/i>and by testing
\nyou mean testing by the ordinary reason. The only answer I can give to that is that the experiences of
\nYoga belong to an inner domain and go according
\nto a law of their own, have their own method of
\nperception, criteria and all the rest of it which are
\nneither those of the domain of the physical senses
\nnor of the domain of rational or scientific enquiry.
\nJust as scientific enquiry passes beyond that of the
\nphysical senses and enters the domain of the infinite
\nand infinitesimal about which the senses can say
\nnothing and test nothing\u2014for one cannot see and
\ntouch an electron or know by the evidence of the
\nsense-mind whether it exists or not or decide by
\nthat evidence whether the earth really turns round
\nthe sun and not rather the sun round the earth as
\nour senses and all our physical experience daily tell
\nus\u2014so the spiritual search passes beyond the domain
\nof scientific or rational enquiry and it is impossible <\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 345<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nby the aid of the ordinary positive reason to test
\nthe data of spiritual experience and decide whether
\nthose things exist or not or what is their law and
\nnature. As in science, so here you have to accumulate
\nexperience on experience, following faithfully the
\nmethods laid down by the Guru or by the systems
\nof the past, you have to develop an intuitive discrimination 
\nwhich compares the experiences, see what
\nthey mean, how far and in what field each is valid,
\nwhat is the place of each in the whole, how it can
\nbe reconciled or related with others that at first might
\nseem to contradict it, etc. etc. until you can move
\nwith a secure knowledge in the vast field of spiritual
\nphenomena. That is the only way to test spiritual
\nexperience. I have myself tried the other method
\nand I have found it absolutely incapable, and in-
\napplicable. On the other hand if you are not prepared
\nto go through all that yourself\u2014as few can do except
\nthose of extraordinary spiritual stature\u2014you have to
\naccept the leading of a Master, as in Science you
\naccept a teacher instead of going through the whole
\nfield of Science and its experimentation all by yourself
\n\u2014at least until you have accumulated sufficient experience 
\nand knowledge. If that is accepting things
\na priori,<\/i> well, you have to accept a priori.<\/i> For I am
\nunable to see by what valid tests you propose to make
\nthe ordinary reason the judge of what is beyond it, <\/font><\/p>\n

\nYou quote the sayings of V or X. I would like to
\nknow before assigning a value to these utterances
\nwhat they actually did for the testing of their spiritual <\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 346<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nperceptions and experiences. How did V test the
\nvalue of his spiritual experiences\u2014some of them not
\neasily credible to the ordinary positive mind any more
\nthan the miracles attributed to some famous Yogis?
\nI know nothing about X, but what were his tests and
\nhow did he apply them? What are his methods? his
\ncriteria? It seems to me that no ordinary mind will
\naccept the apparition of Buddha out of a wall or the
\nhalf hour’s talk with Hayagriva as valid facts by any
\nkind of testing. It would either have to accept them
\na priori<\/i> or on the sole evidence of V which comes to
\nthe same thing or to reject them a priori<\/i> as hallucinations 
\nor mere mental images accompanied in one case
\nby an auditive hallucination. I fail to see how it could
\n"test" them. Or how was I to test by the ordinary mind
\nmy experience of Nirvana? To what conclusion could
\nI come about it by the aid of the ordinary positive
\nreason? How could I test its validity? I am at a loss
\nto imagine. I did the only thing I could\u2014to accept
\nit as a strong and valid truth of experience, let it have
\nits full play and produce its full experimental consequences 
\nuntil I had sufficient Yogic knowledge to put
\nit in its place. Finally, how without inner knowledge
\nor experience can you or any one else test the inner
\nknowledge and experience of others? <\/font><\/p>\n

\nI have often said that discrimination is not only
\nperfectly admissible but indispensable in spiritual
\nexperience. But it must be a discrimination founded
\non knowledge, not a reasoning founded on ignorance.
\nOtherwise you tie up your mind and hamper <\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 347<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nexperience by preconceived ideas which are as much a
\npriori<\/i> as any acceptance of a spiritual truth or experience 
\ncan be. Your idea that surrender can only come
\nby love is a point in instance. It is perfectly true in
\nYogic experience that surrender by true love which
\nmeans psychic and spiritual love is the most powerful,
\nsimple and effective of all, but one cannot, putting that
\nforward as a dictum arrived at by the ordinary reason,
\nshut up the whole of possible experience of surrender
\ninto that formula or announce on its strength that one must wait till one loves perfectly before one can surrender. Yogic experience shows that surrender can also be made by the mind and will, a clear and
\nsincere mind seeing the necessity of surrender and a clear and sincere will enforcing it on the recalcitrant 
\nmembers. Also experience shows that not only can surrender come by love, but love also can
\ncome by surrender or grow with it from an imperfect
\nto a perfect love. One starts by an intense idea and
\nwill to know or reach the Divine and surrenders more
\nand more one’s ordinary personal ideas, desires,
\nattachments, urges to action or habits of action so
\nthat the Divine may take up everything. Surrender
\nmeans that, to give up our little mind and its mental
\nideas and preferences into a divine Light and a greater
\nknowledge, our petty personal troubled blind stumbling 
\nwill into a great calm, tranquil, luminous Will
\nand Force, our little, restless, tormented feelings into
\na wide intense divine Love and Ananda, our small
\nsuffering personality into the one Person of which it <\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 348<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nis an obscure outcome. If one insists on one’s own
\nideas and reasonings, the greater Light and Knowledge
\ncannot come or else is marred and obstructed in the
\ncoming at every step by a lower interference; if one
\ninsists on one’s desires and fancies, that great luminous
\nWill and Force cannot act in its own true power\u2014for
\nyou ask it to be the servant of your desires; if one
\nrefuses to give up one’s petty ways of feeling, eternal
\nLove and supreme Ananda cannot descend or are mixed
\nand spilt from the effervescing crude emotional vessel.
\nNo amount of ordinary reasoning can get rid of the
\nnecessity of surmounting the lower in order that the
\nhigher may be there. <\/font><\/p>\n

\nAnd if some find that retirement is the best way of
\ngiving oneself to the Higher, to the Divine by avoiding
\ns much as possible occasions for the bubbling up of
\ntie lower, why not? The aim they have come for is
\nhat and why blame or look with distrust and suspicion 
\non the means they find best or daub it with disparaging 
\nadjectives to discredit it\u2014grim, inhuman and
\nhe rest? It is your vital that shrinks from it and your
\nvital mind that supplies these epithets which express
\nonly your shrinking and not what the retirement really
\nis. For it is the vital or its social part that shrink from
\nsolitude; the thinking mind does not but rather
\ncourts it. The poet seeks solitude with himself or with
\nNature to listen to his inspiration; the thinker plunges
\ninto solitude to meditate on things and commune
\nwith a deeper knowledge; the scientist shuts himself
\nup in his laboratory to probe by experiment into<\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 349<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nthe secrets of Nature; these retirements are not grim
\nand inhuman. Neither is the retirement of the sadhaka
\ninto the exclusive concentration of which he feels the
\nneed; it is a means to the end\u2014to the end on which
\nhis whole heart is set. As for the Yogin or Bhakta who has already begun to have the fundamental
\nexperience, he is not in a grim and inhuman solitude.
\nThe Divine and all the world are there in the being of the one, the supreme Beloved or his Ananda is
\nthere in the heart of the other. <\/font><\/p>\n

\nI say this as against your depreciation of retirement
\nfounded on ignorance of what it really is; but I do
\nnot, as I have often said, recommend a total seclusion,
\nfor I hold that to be a dangerous expedient which
\nmay lead to morbidity and much error. Nor do I
\nimpose retirement on any one as a method or approve of it unless the person himself seeks it, feels its necessity, 
\nhas the joy of it and the proof that it helps to
\nthe spiritual experience. It is not to be imposed on
\nany one as a principle, for that is the mental way of
\ndoing things, the way of the ordinary mind\u2014it is
\nas a need that it has to be accepted, when it is felt as
\na need, not as a general law or rule. <\/font><\/p>\n

\nWhat you describe in your letter as the response
\nof the Divine would not be called that in the language
\nof Yogic experience\u2014this feeling of great peace,
\nlight, ease, trust, difficulties lessening, certitude would
\nrather be called a response of your own nature to
\nthe Divine. There is a Peace or Light which is the
\nresponse of the Divine, but that is a wide Peace, a <\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 350<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\ngreat Light which is felt as a presence other than
\none’s personal self, not part of one’s personal nature,
\nbut something that comes from above, though in the
\nend it possesses the nature\u2014or there is the Presence
\nitself which carries with it indeed the absolute liberation, 
\nhappiness, certitude. But the first responses
\nof the Divine are not often like that\u2014they come
\nrather as a touch, a pressure one must be in a condition 
\nto recognise and to accept, or it is a voice of
\nassurance, sometimes a very "still small voice", a
\nmomentary Image or Presence, a whisper of Guidance 
\nsometimes, there are many forms it may take.
\nThen it withdraws and the preparation of the nature
\ngoes on till it is possible for the touch to come again
\nand again, to last longer, to change into something
\nmore pressing and near and intimate. The Divine in
\nhe beginning does not impose himself\u2014he asks for recognition, for acceptance. That is one reason why the
\nmind must fall silent, not put tests, not make claims\u2014
\nhere must be room for the true intuition which
\nrecognises at once the true touch and accepts it. <\/font><\/p>\n

\nThen for the tumultuous activity of the mind which
\nprevents your concentration. But that or else a more
\ntiresome, obstinate, grinding, mechanical activity is
\nalways the difficulty when one tries to concentrate
\nand it takes a long time to get the better of it. That or
\nthe habit of sleep which prevents either the waking
\nconcentration or the conscious samadhi or the absorbed
\nand all-excluding trance which are the three forms that
\nYogic concentration takes. But it is surely ignorance <\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 351<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nof Yoga, its process and its difficulties that makes.
\nyou feel desperate and pronounce yourself unfit for
\never because of this quite ordinary obstacle. The
\ninsistence of the ordinary mind and its wrong reasonings, 
\nsentiments and judgments, the random activity
\nof the thinking mind in concentration or its mechanical 
\nactivity, the slowness of response to the veiled
\nor the initial touch are the ordinary obstacles the mind
\nimposes, just as pride, ambition, vanity, sex, greed,
\ngrasping of things for one’s own ego are the difficulties
\nand obstacles offered by the vital. As the vital difficulties 
\ncan be fought down and conquered, so can the
\nmental. Only one has to see that these are inevitable
\nobstacles and neither cling to them nor be terrified
\nor overwhelmed because they are there. One has to
\npersevere till one can stand back from the mind as
\nfrom the vital and feel the deeper and larger mental
\nand vital Purushas within one which are capable of
\nsilence, capable of a straight receptivity of the true
\nWord and Force as of the true silence. If the nature
\ntakes the way of fighting down the difficulties first,
\nthen the first half of the way is long and tedious and
\nthe complaint of the want of the response of the Divine
\narises. But really the Divine is there all the time,
\nworking behind the veil as well as waiting for the
\nrecognition of his response and for the response to
\nthe response to be possible. <\/font><\/p>\n

\n18-11-1934 <\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 352<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nKrishna Consciousness<\/a>
\n<\/b>
\n<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nTHE answer to the question depends on what value
\nwe attach to spiritual experience and to the data
\nof other planes of consciousness other than the physical,
\nas also on the nature of the relations between the
\ncosmic consciousness and the individual and collective 
\nconsciousness of man. From the point of view
\nof spiritual and occult Truth, what takes shape in the consciousness of man is a reflection and particular
\nkind of formation, in a difficult medium, of things
\nmuch greater in their light, power and beauty or in
\ntheir force and range which came to it from the cosmic
\nconsciousness of which man is a limited, and, in his
\npresent state of evolution, a still ignorant part. All
\nthis explanation about the genius of the race, of a
\nconsciousness of a nation creating the Gods and their
\nforms is a very partial, somewhat superficial and in
\nitself a misleading truth. Man’s mind is not an original 
\ncreator, it is an intermediary; to start creating
\nit must receive an initiating "inspiration", a transmission 
\nor a suggestion from the cosmic consciousness
\nand with that it does what it can. God is, but man’s<\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 353<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nconceptions of God are reflections in his
\nown mentality, 
\nsometimes of the Divine, sometimes of other
\nBeings and Powers and they are what his mentality
\ncan make of the suggestions that come to him, generally 
\nvery partial and imperfect so long as they are
\nstill mental, so long as he has not arrived at a higher
\nand truer, a spiritual or mystic knowledge. The
\nGods already exist, they are not created by man
\neven though he does seem to conceive them in his
\nown image;\u2014fundamentally, he formulates as best he
\ncan what truth about them he receives from the
\ncosmic Reality. An artist or a bhakta may have a
\nvision of the God and it may get stabilised and generalised 
\nin the consciousness of the race and in that
\nsense it may be true that man gives their forms to
\nthe Gods; but he does not invent these forms, he
\nrecords what he sees; the forms that he gives are
\ngiven to him. In the "conventional" form of Krishna
\nmen have embodied what they could see of his eternal
\nbeauty and what they have seen may be true as well
\nas beautiful, it conveys something of the form, but
\nit is fairly certain that if there is an eternal form of
\nthat eternal beauty, it is a thousand times more
\nbeautiful than what man had as yet been able to see
\nof it. Mother India is not a piece of earth; she is a
\nPower, a Godhead, for all nations have such a Devi
\n<\/i>supporting their separate existence and keeping it in
\nbeing. Such beings are as real and more permanently
\nreal than the men they influence but they belong
\nto a higher plane, are part of the cosmic consciousness <\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 354<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nand being and act here on earth by shaping
\nthe human consciousness on which they exercise their
\ninfluence. It is natural for man who sees only his
\nown consciousness individual, national or racial at
\nwork and does not see what works upon it and shapes
\nit, to think that all is created by him and there is
\nnothing cosmic and greater behind it. The Krishna
\nconsciousness is a reality, but if there were no
\nKrishna, there could be no Krishna consciousness; except in arbitrary metaphysical abstractions there
\ncan be no consciousness without a Being who is
\nconscious. It is the person who gives value and
\nreality to the personality, he expresses himself in it
\nand is not constituted by it. Krishna is a being, a
\nperson and it is as the Divine Person that we meet
\nhim, hear his voice, speak with him and feel his
\npresence. To speak of the consciousness of Krishna
\nas something separate from Krishna is an error of
\nthe mind, which is always separating the inseparable
\nand which also tends to regard the impersonal,
\nbecause it is abstract, as greater, more real and more
\nenduring than the person. Such divisions may be
\nuseful to the mind for its own purposes, but it is not
\nthe real truth; in the real truth the being or person
\nand its impersonality or state of being are one reality. <\/font><\/p>\n

\nThe historicity of Krishna is of less spiritual
\nimportance and is not essential but it has still a considerable 
\nvalue. It does not seem to me that there
\ncan be any reasonable doubt that Krishna the man
\nwas not a legend or a poetic invention but actually <\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 355<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nexisted upon earth and played a part in the Indian
\npast. Two facts emerge clearly that he was regarded
\nas an important spiritual figure, one whose spiritual
\nillumination was recorded in one of the Upanishads
\nand that he was traditionally regarded as a divine
\nman, one worshipped after his death as a deity; this is apart from the story in the Mahabharata and
\nthe Puranas. There is no reason to suppose that
\nthe connection of his name with the development
\nof the Bhagavata religion, an important current in
\nthe stream of Indian spirituality was founded on a
\nmere legend or poetic invention. The Mahabharata
\nis a poem and not history, but it is clearly a poem
\nfounded on a great historical event, traditionally
\npreserved in memory; some of the figures connected
\nwith it, Dhritarashtra, Parikshit for instance, certainly
\nexisted and the story of the part played by Krishna
\nas leader, warrior and statesman can be accepted
\nas probable in itself and to all appearance founded
\non a tradition which can be given a historical value
\nand has not the air of a myth or a sheer poetical-
\ninvention. That is as much as can be positively
\nsaid from the point of view of the theoretical reason
\nas to the historic figure of the man Krishna; but
\nin my view there is much more than that in it and
\nI have always regarded the incarnation as a fact and
\naccepted the historicity of Krishna as I accept the
\nhistoricity of Christ. <\/font><\/p>\n

\nThe story of Brindavan is another matter; it does
\nnot enter into the main story of the Mahabharata <\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 356<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nand has a Puranic origin and it could be maintained
\nthat it was intended all along to have a symbolic
\ncharacter. At one time I accepted that explanation
\nbut I had to abandon it afterwards; there is nothing
\nin the Puranas that betrays any such intention. It
\nseems to me that it is related as something that
\nactually occurred or occurs somewhere. The Gopis are
\nto them realities and not symbols. It was for them
\nat the least an occult truth and occult and symbolic
\nare not the same thing; the symbol may be only a
\nsignificant mental construction or only a fanciful
\ninvention, but the occult is a reality which is actual
\nsomewhere, behind the material scene as it were
\nand can have its truth for the terrestrial life and its
\ninfluence upon it may even embody itself there.
\nThe lila<\/i> of the Gopis seems to be conceived as something  which is always going on in a divine Gokul
\nand which projected itself in an earthly Brindavan
\nand can always be realised and its meaning made
\nactual in the soul. It is to be presumed that the
\nwriters of the Puranas took it as having been actually
\nprojected on earth in the life of the incarnate Krishna
\nand it has been so accepted by the religious mind of India. <\/font><\/p>\n

\nThese questions and the speculations to which
\nthey have given rise have no indispensable connection  with the spiritual life. There what matters is
\nthe contact with Krishna and the growth towards
\nthe Krishna consciousness, the presence, the spiritual  relation, the union in the soul and till that is <\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 357<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nreached, the aspiration, the growth in bhakti and
\nwhatever illumination one can get on the way. To one who has had these things, lived in the presence,
\nheard the voice, known Krishna as Friend or Lover,
\nGuide, Teacher, Master or, still more, has had his
\nwhole consciousness changed by the contact, or felt
\nthe presence within him, all such questions have
\nonly an outer and superficial interest. So also one
\nwho has had contact with the inner Brindavan and
\nthe lila<\/i> of the Gopis, made the surrender and undergone  the spell of the joy and the beauty or even only
\nturned to the sound of the flute, the rest hardly
\nmatters. But from another point of view, if one can
\naccept the historical reality of the incarnation, there
\nis this great spiritual gain that one has a point d’appui
\n<\/i>for a more concrete realisation in the conviction
\nthat once at least the Divine has visibly touched the
\nearth, made the complete manifestation possible, made
\nit possible for the divine supemature to descend
\ninto this evolving but still very imperfect terrestrial
\nnature. <\/font><\/p>\n

\n2-12-1946 <\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 158<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\n
\nCanalisation of Spiritual
\nExperience \u2014Avatar and Symbols<\/a> <\/b>
\n<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nOF course, X’s view about the canalisation of Niagara  is my standpoint also. But for the human
\nmind it is difficult to get across the border between
\nmind and spirit without making a forceful rush or push
\nalong one line only and that must be some line of pure
\nexperience in which, especially if it is the bhakti
\nway, one gets easily swallowed up in the rapids (did
\nnot Chaitanya at last disappear in the waters?) and
\ngoes no farther. The first thing is to break into the
\nspiritual consciousness, any part of it, anyhow and
\nanywhere, afterwards one can explore the country, to
\nwhich exploration there can hardly be a limit; one is
\nalways going higher and higher, getting wider and wider
\nbut there is a certain intense ecstasy about the first
\ncomplete plunge which is extraordinarily seizing. It is
\nnot only the Bhakta’s rapture, but the Jnani’s plunge
\ninto the Brahma-Nirvana or Brahmananda or release
\ninto the still eternity of the Self that is of that seizing
\nand absorbing character\u2014it does not look at first as
\nif one could or would care or need to get beyond into <\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 359<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nanything else. One cannot find fault with the Sannyasi  lost in his laya<\/i> or the Bhakta lost in his ecstasy; they remain there probably because they are constituted  for that and it is the limit of their leap. But all
\nthe same it has always appeared to me that it is a stage
\nand not the end, I subscribe fully to the canalisation
\nof the Niagara. <\/font><\/p>\n

\nAdhikara is of course a matter of the psychology
\nand the soul and the nature, it has nothing to do with
\nany outer or artificial standards. <\/font><\/p>\n

\nThen as to the Avatar and the symbols. There is,
\nit seems tome, a cardinal error in the modem insistence
\non the biographical and historical, that is to say, the
\nexternal factuality of the Avatar, the incidents of his
\noutward life. What matters is the spiritual Reality,
\nthe Power, the Influence that come with him or that he
\nbrought down by his action and his existence. First of
\nall what matters in a spiritual man’s life is not what
\nhe did or what he was outside to the view of the men
\nof his time (that is what historicity or biography comes
\nto, does it not?) but what he was and did within; it
\nis only that that gives any value to his outer life at
\nall. It is the inner life that gives to the outer any power
\nit may have and the inner life of a spiritualman is something  vast and full and, at least, in the great figures, so
\ncrowded and teeming with significant things that no
\nbiographer or historian could ever hope to seize it all
\nor tell it. Whatever is significant in the outward life
\nis so because it is symbolical of what has been realised
\nwithin himself and one may go on and say that the <\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 360<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\ninner life also is only significant as an expression, a
\nliving representation of the movement of the Divinity behind it. That is why we need not enquire whether
\nthe stories about Krishna were transcripts, however loose, of his acts on earth or are symbol-representations  of what Krishna was and is for men, of the
\nDivinity expressing itself in the figure of Krishna.
\nBuddha’s renunciation, his temptation by Mara, his enlightenment under the
\nBo-tree are such symbols,  so too the virgin birth, the temptation in the desert, the crucifixion of Christ are such symbols,
\ntrue by what they signify, even if they are not scrupulously  recorded historical events. The outward facts
\nas related of Christ or Buddha are not much more than what has happened in many other lives\u2014what
\nis it that gives Buddha or Christ their enormous
\nplace in the spiritual world? It was because something
\nmanifested through them that was more than any
\noutward event or any teaching. The verifiable historicity  gives us very little of that, yet it is that only that
\nmatters. So it seems to me that X is fundamentally
\nright in what he says of the symbols. To the physical
\nmind only the words and facts and acts of a man matter; to the inner mind it is
\nthe spiritual happenings  in him that matter. Even the teachings of Buddha
\nand Christ are spiritually true not as mere mental
\nteachings but as the expression of spiritual states
\nor happenings in them which by their life on earth
\nthey made possible (or even dynamically potential)
\nin others. Also evidently sectarian walls are a <\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 361<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nmistake, an accretion, a mental limiting of the Truth
\nwhich may serve a mental, but not a spiritual purpose.
\nThe Avatar, the Guru have no meaning if they do not
\nstand for the Eternal; it is that that makes them what
\nthey are for the worshipper or the disciple. <\/font><\/p>\n

\nIt is also a fact that nobody can give you any spiritual  realisation which does not come from something
\nin one’s true Self, it is always the Divine who reveals
\nhimself and the Divine is within you; so He who
\nreveals must. be felt in your own heart. Your query
\nhere simply suggests that this is a truth which can
\nbe misinterpreted or misused, but so can every spiritual  truth if it is taken hold of in the wrong way\u2014
\nand the human mind has a great penchant for taking
\nTruth by the wrong end and arriving at falsehood.
\nAll statements about these things are, after ;all, mental statements and at the
\nmercy of any mind that interprets  them. There is a snag in every such statement
\ncreated not by the Truth that it expresses but by
\nthe mind’s interpretation. The snag (what you call
\nthe slip) lies not in the statement itself which is quite
\ncorrect, but in the deflected sense in which it may be
\ntaken by ignorant or self-sufficient minds enamoured
\nof their ego. Many have put forward the "own self"
\ngospel without taking the trouble to see whether it
\nis the true Self, have pitted the ignorance of their
\n"own self"\u2014in fact, their ego\u2014against the knowledge of the Guru or made their ego or something that
\nflattered and fostered it the Ishta Devata. The snag
\nin the worship of Guru or Avatar is a sectarian bias <\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 362<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nwhich insists on the Representative or the Manifestation  but loses sight of the Manifested; the snag in
\nthe emphasis on the other side is the ignoring of the
\nneed or belittling of the value of the Representative
\nor Manifestation and the substitution not of the true
\nSelf one in all but of one’s "own self" as the guide
\nand light. How many have done that and lost the
\nway through the pull of the magnified ego which is one of the great perils on the way! However that does not lessen the truth of the things said by X,\u2014only
\nin looking at the many sides of Truth one must put each thing in its place in the harmony of the All
\nwhich is for us the expression of the Supreme. <\/font><\/p>\n

\n8-2-1936 <\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 363<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\n
\n
\nComments on Prof. Sorley’s Remarks on "The Riddle of This World"<\/a>
\n<\/b> <\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nIN reference to what Prof. Sorley has written on "The Riddle of This World", the book of
\ncourse was not meant as a full or direct statement of
\nmy thought and, as it was written to sadhakas mostly,
\nmany things were taken for granted there. Most
\n<\/b>of
\n<\/b>the major ideas, e.g. Overmind\u2014were left without
\nelucidation. To make the ideas implied clear to the
\nintellect, they must be put with precision in an intellectual form\u2014so far as that is possible with supra-
\nintellectual things. What is written in the book can
\nbe clear to those who hive gone far enough in experience, but for most it can only be suggestive.
\n<\/font><\/p>\n

\nI do not think, however, that the statement of
\nsupra-intellectual  things necessarily involves a making of
\ndistinctions in the terms of the intellect. For,
\nfundamentally, it is not an expression of ideas
\narrived at by speculative thinking. One has to arrive
\nat spiritual knowledge through experience and a
\nconsciousness of things which arises directly out of
\nthat experience or else underlies or is involved in it. <\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 364<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nThis kind of knowledge, then, is fundamentally a
\nconsciousness  and not a thought or formulated idea. For instance, my first
\nmajor experience\u2014radical and overwhelming,  though not, as it turned out, final and exhaustive \u2014came after and by the exclusion and silencing
\nof all thought\u2014there was, first, what might be called a
\nspiritually substantial or concrete consciousness of
\nstillness and silence, then the awareness of some sole
\nand supreme Reality in whose presence things existed
\nonly as forms but forms not at all substantial or real
\nor concrete; but this was all apparent to a spiritual
\nperception and essential and impersonal sense and there
\nwas not the least concept or idea of reality or unreality or any other notion,
\nfor all concept or idea was hushed  or rather entirely absent in the absolute stillness.
\nThese things were known directly through the pure
\nconsciousness and not through the mind, so there was no
\nneed of concepts or words or names. At the same time
\nthis fundamental character of spiritual experience is
\nnot absolutely limitative; it can do without thought,
\nbut it can do with thought also. Of course, the first
\nidea of the mind would be that the resort to thought
\nbrings one back at once to the domain of the intellect
\n\u2014and at first and for a long time it may be so; but it is not my experience that
\nthis is unavoidable. It happens  so when one tries to make an intellectual
\nstatement  of what one has experienced; but there is another
\nkind of thought that springs out as if it were a body
\nor form of the experience or of the consciousness
\ninvolved in it\u2014or of a part of that consciousness\u2014 <\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 365<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nand this does not seem to me to be intellectual in its
\ncharacter. It has another light, another power in it,
\na sense within the sense. It is very clearly so with
\nthose thoughts that come without the need of words
\nto embody them, thoughts that are of the nature of
\na direct seeing in the consciousness, even a kind of
\nintimate sense or contact formulating itself into a
\nprecise expression of its awareness (I hope this is
\nnot too mystic or unintelligible); but it might be
\nsaid that directly the thoughts turn into words they
\nbelong to the kingdom of intellect\u2014for words are a
\ncoinage of the intellect. But is it so really or inevitably?  It has always seemed to me that words came
\noriginally from somewhere else than the thinking
\nmind, although the thinking mind secured hold of
\nthem, turned them to its use and coined them freely .for its purposes. But even
\notherwise, is it not possible  to use words for the expression of something
\nthat is not intellectual? Housman contends that poetry
\nis perfectly poetical only when it is non-intellectual,
\nwhen it is nonsense. That is too paradoxical,
\nbut I suppose what he means is that if it is put to
\nthe strict test of the intellect it appears extravagant
\nbecause it conveys something that expresses, and is
\nreal to, some other kind of seeing than that which
\nintellectual thought brings to us. Is it not possible
\nthat words may spring from, that language may be
\nused to express\u2014at least up to a certain point and
\nin a certain way\u2014the supra-intellectual consciousness
\nwhich is the essential power of spiritual experience? <\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 366<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nThis however is by the way\u2014when one tries to
\nexplain  spiritual experience to the intellect itself, then
\nit is a different matter. <\/font><\/p>\n

\nThe interpenetration of the planes is indeed for me
\na capital and fundamental part of spiritual experience  without which Yoga as I practise it and
\nits aim could not exist. For that aim is to manifest, reach or embody a higher consciousness upon earth
\nand not to get away from earth into a higher world or some supreme Absolute. The old Yogas (not
\nquite all of them) tended the other way\u2014but that was, I think, because they found the earth as it is
\na
\nrather impossible place for any spiritual being and the resistance to change too obstinate to be borne; earth-nature looked to them in Vivekananda’s simile
\nlike the dog’s tail which every time you straighten
\nit goes back to its original curl. But the fundamental
\nproposition in this matter was proclaimed very
\ndefinitely in the Upanishads which went so far as
\nto say that the Earth is the foundation and all the
\nworlds are on the earth and to imagine a clean-cut or
\nirreconcilable difference between them is ignorance here and not elsewhere, not by going to some other
\nworld the divine realisation must come. This statement
\nwas used to justify a purely individual realisation,
\nbut it can equally be the basis of a wider endeavour. <\/font><\/p>\n

\nAbout polytheism, I certainly accept the truth of
\nthe many forms and personalities of the One which
\nsince the Vedic times has been the spiritual essence of
\nIndian polytheism\u2014a secondary aspect in the seeking <\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 367<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nfor the One and only Divine. But the passage referred
\nto by Professor Sorley (p.56) is concerned with
\nsomething else\u2014the little godlings and Titans spoken
\nof there are supraphysical beings of other planes.
\nIt is not meant to be suggested that they are real
\nGodheads and entitled to worship\u2014on the contrary
\nit is indicated that to accept their influence is to move
\ntowards error and confusion or a deviation from the
\ntrue spiritual way. No doubt they have some power
\nto create, they are makers of forms in their own
\nway and in their limited domain, but so are men
\ntoo creators of outward and of inward things in their
\nown domain and limits\u2014and, even, man’s creative
\npowers can have repercussions on the supraphysical
\nlevels. <\/font><\/p>\n

\nI agree that asceticism can be overdone. It has its
\nplace as one means\u2014not the only one\u2014of self-mastery,  but asceticism that cuts away life is an
\nexaggeration though one that had many remarkable results which perhaps could
\nhardly have come otherwise. The play of forces in this world is enigmatic,
\nescaping from any rigid rule of the reason, and even
\nan exaggeration like that is often employed to bring
\nabout something needed for the full development
\nof human achievement and knowledge and experience.
\nBut it was an exaggeration all the same and not,
\nas it claimed to be, the indispensable path to the
\ntrue goal. <\/font><\/p>\n

\n14-1-1934 <\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 368<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nPsychology of St. Augustine<\/a>
\n<\/b>
\n<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nST. Augustine was a man of God and a great saint, but great saints are not always\u2014or; often\u2014great psychologists or great thinkers. The
\npsychology here is that of the most superficial schools,
\nif not that of the man in the street; there are as many
\nerrors in it as there are psychological statements\u2014
\nand more, for several are not expressed but involved
\nin what he writes. I am aware that these errors are
\npractically universal, for psychological enquiry in
\nEurope (and without enquiry there can be no sound
\nknowledge) is only beginning and has not gone very
\nfar, and what has reigned in men’s minds up to now
\nis a superficial statement of the superficial appearances
\nof our consciousness as they look to us at first view
\nand nothing more. But knowledge only begins when
\nwe get away from the surface phenomena and look
\nbehind them for their true operations and causes.
\nTo the superficial view of the outer mind and senses
\nthe sun is a little fiery ball circling in mid air round
\nthe earth and the stars twinkling little things stuck
\nin the sky for our benefit at night. Scientific enquiry <\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 369<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\ncomes and knocks this infantile first-view to pieces.
\nThe sun is a huge affair (millions of miles away
\nfrom our air) around which the small earth circles
\nand the stars are huge members of huge systems
\nindescribably distant which have nothing apparently
\nto do with the tiny earth and her creatures. All
\nscience is like that, a contradiction of the sense-view
\nor superficial appearances of things and an assertion
\nof truths which are unguessed by the common and
\nthe uninstructed reason. The same process has to
\nbe followed in psychology if we are really to know
\nwhat our consciousness is, how it is built and made
\nand what is the secret of its functionings or the way
\nout of its disorder. <\/font><\/p>\n

\nThere are several capital and common errors
\nhere:\u2014 <\/font><\/p>\n

\n1. That mind and spirit are the same thing. <\/font><\/p>\n

\n2. That all consciousness can be spoken of as "mind". <\/font><\/p>\n

\n3. That all consciousness therefore is of a spiritual substance. <\/font><\/p>\n

\n4. That the body is merely matter, not conscious,
\ntherefore something quite different from the spiritual
\npart of the nature. <\/font><\/p>\n

\nFirst, the spirit and the mind are two different
\nthings and should not be confused together. The
\nmind is an instrumental entity or instrumental
\nconsciousness whose function is to think and perceive
\n\u2014the spirit is an essential entity or consciousness
\nwhich does not need to think or perceive either in <\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 370<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nthe mental or the sensory way, because whatever
\nknowledge it has is direct or essential knowledge, svayamprakash.<\/i> <\/font><\/p>\n

\nNext, it follows that all consciousness is not necessarily  of a spiritual make and it need not be true and is
\n<\/i>not true that the thing commanding and the thing
\ncommanded are the same, are not at all different, are
\nof the same substance and therefore are bound or at least ought to agree together. <\/font><\/p>\n

\nThird, it is not even true that it is the mind which
\nis commanding the mind and finds itself disobeyed by
\nitself. First there are many parts of the mind, each
\na force in itself with its formations, functionings,
\ninterests, and they may not agree. One part of the
\nmind may be spiritually influenced and like to think of
\nthe Divine and obey the spiritual impulse, another
\npart may be rational or scientific or literary and prefer to follow the
\nformations, beliefs or doubts, mental preferences  and interests which are in conformity with
\nits education and its nature. But quite apart from that,
\nwhat was commanding in St. Augustine may very well
\nhave been the thinking mind or reason while what was commanded was the vital,
\nand mind and vital, whatever  anybody may say, are not the same. The thinking
\nmind or buddhi<\/i> lives, however imperfectly in man, by
\nintelligence and reason. Vital, on the other hand, is
\na thing of desires, impulses, force-pushes, emotions,
\nsensations, seekings after life-fulfilment, possession
\nand enjoyment; these are its functions and its nature,
\n\u2014it is that part of us which seeks after life and its <\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 371<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nmovements for their own sake and it does not want to
\nleave hold of them if they bring it suffering as well
\nas or more than pleasure; it is even capable of luxuriating  in tears and suffering as part of the drama of
\nlife. What then is there in common between the thinking  intelligence and the vital and why should the latter
\nobey the mind and not follow its own nature? The
\ndisobedience is perfectly normal instead of being,
\nas Augustine suggests, unintelligible. Of course man
\ncan establish a mental control over his vital and in
\nso far as he does it he is a man,\u2014because the thinking mind is a nobler and more
\nenlightened entity and consciousness  than the vital and ought, therefore, to rule
\nand, if the mental will is strong, can<\/i> rule. But this rule is precarious,
\nincomplete and held only by much self-discipline.  For if the mind is more enlightened,
\nthe vital is nearer to earth, more intense, vehement,
\nmore directly able to touch the body. There is too a
\nvital mind which lives by imagination, thoughts or
\ndesire, will to act and enjoy from its own impulse and
\nthis is able to seize on the reason itself and make it its
\nauxiliary and its justifying counsel and supplier of
\npleas and excuses. There is also the sheer force of
\nDesire in man which is the vital’s principal support and
\nstrong enough to sweep off the reason as the Gita says
\n"like a boat on stormy waters", navamivambhasi.<\/i> <\/font><\/p>\n

\nFinally, the body obeys the mind automatically in
\nthose things in which it is formed or trained to obey
\nit, but the relation of the body to the mind is not in
\nall things that of an automatic perfect instrument. The <\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 372<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nbody also has a consciousness of its own and,
\nthough 
\nit is a submental instrument or servant consciousness,
\nit can disobey or fail to obey as well. In many things,
\nin matters of health and illness for instance, in all automatic functionings, the body acts on its own and is
\nnot a servant of the mind. If it is fatigued, it can offer
\na passive resistance to the mind’s will. It can cloud
\nthe mind with tamas,<\/i> inertia, dullness, fumes of the
\nsubconscient so that the mind cannot act. The arm
\nlifts no doubt when it gets the suggestion, but at first
\nthe legs do not obey when they are asked to walk; they
\nhave to learn how to leave the crawling attitude and
\nmovement and take up the erect and ambulatory habit.
\nWhen you first ask the hand to draw a straight line or
\nto play music, it can’t do it and won’t do it. It has
\nto be schooled, trained, taught, and afterwards it does
\nautomatically what is required of it. All this proves
\nthat there is a body-consciousness which can do things
\nat the mind’s order but has to be awakened, trained,
\nmade a good and conscious instrument. It can even be
\nso trained that a mental will or suggestion can cure
\nthe illness of the body. But all these things, these
\nrelations of mind and body, stand on the same footing
\nin essence as the relation of mind to vital and it is not so
\neasy or primary a matter as Augustine would have it. <\/font><\/p>\n

\nThis puts the problem on another footing with the
\ncauses more clear and, if we are prepared to go far
\nenough, it suggests the way out, the way of Yoga. <\/font><\/p>\n

\n12-6-1934 <\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 373<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nPS. All this is quite apart from the contributing
\nand very important factor of plural personality of which
\npsychological enquiry is just beginning rather obscurely
\nto take account. That is a more complex affair. <\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 374<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nFree-Will and Determinism<\/a>
\n<\/b>
\n<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nAFTER reading X’s cogent exposition, I saw what might be said from the intellectual point of
\nview on this question so as to link the reality of the supreme Freedom with the
\nphenomenon of the Determinism  of Nature\u2014in a different way from his but
\nto the same purpose. In reality, the freedom and the
\ndetermination are only two sides of the same thing\u2014
\nfor the fundamental truth is self-determination of the
\ncosmos and in it a secret self-determination of the
\nindividual. The difficulty arises from the fact that we
\nlive in the surface mind of ignorance, do not know what
\nis going on behind and see only the phenomenal process of Nature. There the
\napparent fact is an overwhelming  determinism of Nature and as our surface-consciousness  is part of that process we are unable to
\nsee the other term of the biune reality. For practical
\npurposes on the surface there is an entire determinism
\nin Matter\u2014though this is now disputed by the latest
\nschool of Science. As life emerges a certain plasticity
\nsets in, so that it is difficult to predict anything exactly
\nas one predicts material things that obey a rigid law, <\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 375<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nThe plasticity increases with the growth of Mind so
\nthat man can have at least a sense of free-will, of a
\nchoice of his action, of a self-movement which at least
\nhelps to determine circumstances. But this freedom
\nis dubious because it can be declared to be an illusion, a device of Nature,
\npart of its machinery of determination,  only a seeming freedom or at most a
\nrestricted, relative and subject independence. It is only
\nwhen one goes behind away from Prakriti to Purusha
\nand upward away from Mind to spiritual Self that the
\nside of freedom comes to be first evident and then, by
\nunison with the Will which is above Nature, complete. <\/font><\/p>\n

\n23-9-1934 <\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 376<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nDivine Grace<\/a> <\/b>
\n<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nEACH mind can have its own way of approaching the supreme Truth and there is an entrance
\nfor each as well as a thousand ways for the journey
\nto it. It is not necessary to believe in the Grace or
\nto recognise a Godhead different from one’s highest
\nSelf\u2014there are ways of Yoga that do not accept
\nthese things. Also for many no form of Yoga is
\nnecessary. One can arrive at some realisation by a
\nsort of pressure of the mind or the heart or the will
\nbreaking the screen between it and what is at once
\nbeyond it and its own source. What happens after
\nthe breaking of the screen depends on the play of
\nthe Truth on the consciousness and the turn of the
\nNature. There is no reason therefore why X’s realisation  of his being should not come in its own way
\nby growth from within, not by the Divine Grace if
\nhis mind objects to that description but, let us say,
\nby the spontaneous movement of the Self within him. <\/font><\/p>\n

\nFor as to this "Grace" we describe it in that way
\nbecause we feel in the infinite Spirit or Self or existence  a Presence or a Being, a Consciousness that <\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 377<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\ndetermines\u2014that is what we speak of as the Divine,
\n\u2014not a separate person, but the one Being of whom
\nour individual self is a portion or a vessel. But it
\nis not necessary for everybody to regard it in that
\nway. Supposing it is the impersonal Self of all only,
\nyet the Upanishad says of this Self and its realisation:  "This understanding is not to be gained by
\nreasoning nor by tapasya nor by much learning, but
\nwhom this Self chooses, to him it reveals its own
\nbody". Well, that is the same thing as what we call
\nthe Divine Grace; it is an action from above or from
\nwithin independent of mental causes which decides
\nits own movement. We can call it the Divine Grace; we can call it the Self within choosing its own hour
\nand way to manifest to the mental instrument on the
\nsurface; we can call it the flowering of the inner being or inner nature into
\nself-realisation and self-knowledge.  As something in us approaches it or as it
\npresents itself to us, so the mind sees it. But in
\nreality it is the same thing and the same process of
\nthe being in Nature. <\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 378<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nMeaning and Value of Sacrifice<\/a>
\n<\/b>
\n<\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nSACRIFICE has a moral and psychological value always. This value is the same no matter what
\nmay be the cause for which the sacrifice is made,
\nprovided the one who makes it believes in the truth
\nor justice or other worthiness of his cause. If one
\nmakes the sacrifice for a cause one knows to be
\nwrong or unworthy, all depends on the motive and
\nspirit of the sacrifice. Bhishma accepting death
\nin a cause he knew to be unjust, obeyed the call of
\nloyalty to what he felt to be his personal duty. Many
\nhave done that in the past, and the moral and
\npsychic value of their act lies, irrespective of the
\nnature of the cause, in the nobility of the motive. <\/font><\/p>\n

\nAs to the other question, in this sense of the word
\nsacrifice there is none for the man who gives up
\nsomething which he does not value, except in so
\nfar as he undergoes loss, defies social ban or obloquy
\nor otherwise pays a price for his liberation. I may
\nsay, however, that without being cold and unloving
\na man may be so seized by a spiritual call or the call
\nof a great human cause that the family or other ties <\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 379<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\ncount for nothing beside it, and he leaves all joyfully,
\nwithout a pang, to follow the summoning Voice. <\/font><\/p>\n

\nIn the spiritual sense, however, sacrifice has a
\ndifferent meaning\u2014it does not so much indicate
\ngiving up what is held dear as an offering of oneself,
\none’s being, one’s mind, heart, will, body, life, actions
\nto the Divine. It has the original sense of "making
\nsacred" and is used as an equivalent of the word
\nYajna.<\/i> When the Gita speaks of the "sacrifice of
\nknowledge", it does not mean a giving up of anything,
\nbut a turning of the mind towards the Divine in the
\nsearch for knowledge and an offering of oneself
\nthrough it. It is in this sense, too, that one speaks
\nof the offering or sacrifice of works. The Another
\nhas written somewhere that the spiritual sacrifice is
\njoyful and not painful in its nature. On the spiritual
\npath, very commonly, if a seeker still feels the old
\nties and responsibilities strongly he is not asked to
\nsever or leave them, but to let the call in him grow
\ntill all within is ready. Many, indeed, come away
\nearlier because they feel that to cut loose is their
\nonly chance, and these have to go sometimes through
\na struggle. But the pain, the struggle, is not the
\n.essential character of this spiritual self-offering. <\/font><\/p>\n

\n16-10-1935 <\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 380<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

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

\n <\/p>\n

\nIT is quite true that the word "superstition" has been habitually used as a convenient club to
\nbeat down any belief that does not agree with the
\nideas of the materialistic reason, that is to say, the
\nphysical mind dealing with the apparent .law of physical  process and seeing no further. It has also been
\nused to dismiss ideas and beliefs not in agreement
\nwith one’s own idea of what is the rational norm of
\nsupraphysical truths as well. For many ages man
\ncherished beliefs that implied a force behind which
\nacted on principles unknown to the physical mind
\nand beyond the witness of the outward reason and the senses. Science came in
\nwith a method of knowledge  which extended the evidence of this outer field
\nof consciousness and thought that by this method
\nall existence would become explicable. It swept away
\nat once without examination all the ancient beliefs a&
\nso many "superstitions"\u2014true, half-true or false, alt went into the
\ndust-bin in one impartial sweep, because  they did not rely on the method of physical
\nScience and lay outside its data or were or seemed <\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 381<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nincompatible with its standpoint. Even in the field
\nof supraphysical experience only so much was
\nadmitted as could give a mentally rational explanation
\nof itself according to a certain range of ideas\u2014all
\nthe rest, everything that seemed to demand an occult,
\nmystic or below-the-surface origin to explain it was
\nput aside as so much superstition. Popular beliefs
\nthat were the fruit sometimes of imagination but
\nsometimes also of a traditional empirical knowledge
\n.or of a right instinct shared naturally the same fate.
\nThat all this was a hasty and illegitimate operation,
\nitself based on the "superstition" of the all-sufficiency
\nof the new method which really applies only to a
\nlimited field, is now becoming more and more evident.
\nI agree with you that the word superstition is one
\nwhich should be used either not at all or with great
\ncaution. It is evidently an anachronism to apply it
\nto beliefs not accepted by the form of religion one
\nhappens oneself to follow or favour. <\/font><\/p>\n

\nThe growing reversal of opinion with regard to
\nmany things that were then condemned but are now
\ncoming into favour once more is very striking. In
\naddition to the instances you quote a hundred others
\nmight be added. One does not quite know why a
\nbelief in graphology should be condemned as irrational  or superstitious; it seems to me quite rational
\nto believe that a man’s handwriting is the result of
\nor consistent with his temperament and nature and,
\nif so, it may very well prove on examination to be
\nan index of character. It is now a known fact that <\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 382<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\neach man is an individual by himself with his own
\npeculiar formation different from others and made
\nby minute variations in the general human plan,\u2014
\nthis is true of small physical characteristics, it is
\nevidently equally true of psychological characteristics; it is not unreasonable to suppose a correlation between
\nthe two. On that basis cheiromancy may very well
\nhave a truth in it, for it is a known fact that the lines
\nin an individual hand are different from the lines in
\nothers and that this, as well as differences of physiognomy,  may carry in it psychological indications is
\nnot impossible. The difficulty for minds trained
\nunder rationalistic influences becomes greater when
\nthese lines or the data of astrology are interpreted
\nas signs of destiny, because modern rationalism resolutely refused to admit that
\nthe future was determined  or could be determinable. But this looks more
\nand more like one of the "superstitions" of the modern
\nmind, a belief curiously contradictory of the fundamental  notions of Science. For Science has believed,
\nat least until yesterday, that everything is determined in Nature and it attempts to find the laws of that
\ndetermination and to predict future physical happenings  on that basis. If so, it is reasonable to suppose
\nthat there are unseen connections determining human events in the world and that future happening may
\ntherefore be predictable. Whether it can be done
\n<\/b>on <\/b>the lines of astrology or cheiromancy is a matter of enquiry and one does not get any further by dismissing
\nthe possibility with a summary denial. The case <\/b> for <\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 383<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nastrology is fairly strong; a case seems <\/b> to exist
\n<\/b>for <\/b>cheiromancy also. <\/font><\/p>\n

\nOn the other hand, it is not safe to go too hastily
\nin the other direction. There is the opposite tendency
\nto believe everything in these fields and not keep
\none’s eyes open to the element of limitation or error
\nin these difficult branches of knowledge\u2014it was the
\nexcess of belief that helped to discredit them, because
\ntheir errors were patent. It does not seem to me
\nestablished that the stars determine the future\u2014
\nthough that is possible, but it does look as if they
\nindicate it\u2014or rather, some certitudes and potentialities  of the future. Even the astrologers admit that
\nthere is another element of determination in man
\nhimself which limits the field of astrological prediction  and may even alter many of its ascertained
\nresults. There is a very tangled and difficult complex
\nof forces making up any determination of things in
\nthe world and when we have disentangled one thread
\nof the skein and follow it we may get many striking
\nresults, but we cannot rely on it as the one wholly
\nreliable clue. The mind’s methods are too rigid and
\nconveniently simple to unravel the true or whole
\ntruth whether of the Reality or of its separate phenomena, <\/font><\/p>\n

\nI would accept your statement about the possibility
\nof knowing much about a man from observations of
\na small part of his being, physical or psychological, but I think it is to go
\ntoo far to say that one can reconstruct  a whole man from one minute particle of <\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage -384<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\na hair. I should say from my knowledge of the complexity  and multiplicity of elements in the human
\nbeing that such a procedure would be hazardous and would leave a large part of
\nthe Unknown overshadowing  the excessive certitude of this inferential structure. <\/font><\/p>\n

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

\nI suppose we cannot go so-far as to deny that
\nthere is such a thing as superstition\u2014a fixed belief
\nwithout any ground in something that is quite unsound
\nand does not hang together. The human mind readily
\nclaps on such beliefs to things which can be or are
\nin themselves true, and this is a mixture which very badly confuses the search
\nfor knowledge. But precisely  because of this mixture, because somewhere
\nbehind the superstition or not far off from it there
\nis very usually some real truth, one ought to be
\ncautious in using the word or sweeping away with
\nit as a convenient broom the true, the partly true
\nand the unfounded together and claiming that the
\nbare ground left is the only truth of the matter. <\/font><\/p>\n

\nI7-I-I937 <\/font><\/p>\n

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

\nWhen I wrote that sentence about "a fixed blind
\nbelief", I was not thinking really of religious
\nbeliefs, but of common popular ideas and beliefs. <\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 385<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nYour feeling about the matter, in any case, is quite
\nsound. One can and ought to believe and follow one’s
\nown path without condemning or looking down on
\nothers for having beliefs different from those one
\nthinks or sees to be the best or the largest in truth. The spiritual field is
\nmany-sided and full of complexities  and there is room for an immense variety
\nof experiences. Besides, all mental egoism\u2014and spiritual  egoism\u2014has to be surmounted and this sense
\nof superiority should therefore not be cherished. <\/font><\/p>\n

\n21-1-1937 <\/font><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\nPS. A sincere, whole-hearted and one-pointed following  of this Yoga should lead to a level where these
\nrigid mental divisions do not exist for they are mental
\nwalls put round one part of Truth and Knowledge,
\nso as to cut it off from the rest, but this view from
\nabove the mind is comprehensive and everything falls
\ninto its place in the whole. <\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage – 386<\/font><\/font><\/b><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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