{"id":622,"date":"2013-07-13T01:29:17","date_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:29:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/?p=622"},"modified":"2013-07-13T01:29:17","modified_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:29:17","slug":"30-indeterminates-cosmic-determinations-and-the-indeterminable-vol-18-the-life-divine-volume-18","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/01-works-of-sri-aurobindo\/01-sabcl\/18-the-life-divine-volume-18\/30-indeterminates-cosmic-determinations-and-the-indeterminable-vol-18-the-life-divine-volume-18","title":{"rendered":"-30_Indeterminates, Cosmic Determinations and the Indeterminable .htm"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n
\n


\n                                    B<\/font>OOK
\nII<\/font><\/b><\/p>\n


\n                                    P<\/font>ART 
\n<\/font>O<\/font>NE<\/font><\/b><\/p>\n

                                    C<\/font>HAPTER<\/font>
\nI <\/font> <\/b>\n\t\t<\/p>\n


\nIndeterminates,
\nCosmic Determinations
\nand the Indeterminable<\/p>\n

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

\n                       
\nThe Unseen with whom there can be no pragmatic relations,
\n
                       
\nunseizable, featureless, unthinkable, undesignable by name,
\n
                       
\nwhose substance is the certitude of One Self, in whom world-
\n                       
\nexistence is stilled, who is all peace and bliss — that is the
\nSelf,
\n                       
\nthat is what must be known.
\n
\n<\/i>                                                                                       
\n     Mandukya Upanishad.<\/i>1<\/sup><\/font><\/p>\n

                       
\nOne sees it as a mystery or one speaks of it or hears of it as a
\n                       
\nmystery, but none knows it.
\n<\/font>
                                                                                                                           
\nGita.<\/font><\/i>2<\/sup><\/font><\/p>\n

                       
\nWhen men seek after the Immutable, the Indeterminable, the
\n
                       
\nUnmanifest, the All-Pervading, the Unthinkable, the
\nSummit
\n                       
\nSelf, the Immobile, the Permanent,—equal in mind to all,
\n                       
\nintent on the good of all beings, it is to Me that they
\ncome.
\n
\n                                                                                                                           
\nGita.<\/i>
\n3<\/sup><\/font><\/p>\n

                       
\nHigh beyond the Intelligence is the Great Self, beyond the Great
\n                       
\nSelf is the Unmanifest, beyond the Unmanifest is the
\nConscious
\n                       
\nBeing. There is nothing beyond the Being,—that is the extreme
\n                       
\nultimate, that the supreme goal.
\n
                                                                                                    
\nKatha Upanishad.<\/i>4<\/sup><\/font><\/p>\n

                       
\nRare is the great of soul to whom all is the Divine Being.
\n
                                                                                                                           
\nGita.<\/i> 5<\/sup> <\/font><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

     A<\/font><\/b> <\/font>
\nconsciousness-force<\/font>,<\/span> everywhere inherent in Existence, acting even when concealed, is the creator of the worlds, the
\noccult secret of Nature. But in our material world and in our own being consciousness has a double aspect; there is a force
\nof Knowledge, there is a force of Ignorance. In the infinite consciousness of a self-aware infinite Existence knowledge must
\nbe everywhere implicit or operative in the very grain of its action; but we see here at the beginning of things, apparent as the
\nbase or the nature of the creative world-energy, an Inconscience, a total Nescience. This is the stock with which the
\nmaterial universe commences: consciousness and knowledge emerge at\n<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

       1<\/sup> verse 7.    2<\/sup>
\nII.29.    3<\/sup> XII. 3,4.    4<\/sup>
\nIII. 10, 11.    5<\/sup> vasudevah sarvamiti<\/i>… VII.
\n19.<\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage 295<\/p>\n

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

\n

first in obscure infinitesimal movements, at points,
\nin little quanta which associate themselves together; there is a tardy
\nand
\ndifficult evolution, a slowly increasing organisation and ameliorated
\nmechanism of the workings of consciousness, more and
\nmore gains are written on the blank slate of the Nescience. But still
\nthese have the appearance of gathered acquisitions and
\nconstructions of a seeking Ignorance which tries to know, to
\nunderstand, to discover, to change slowly and strugglingly into
\nknowledge. As Life here establishes and maintains its operations with
\ndifficulty on a foundation and in an environment of
\ngeneral Death, first in infinitesimal points of life, in quanta of
\nlife-form and life-energy, in increasing aggregates that create
\nmore and more complex organisms, an intricate life-machinery,
\nConsciousness also establishes and maintains a growing but
\nprecarious light in the darkness of an original Nescience and a
\nuniversal Ignorance. <\/p>\n

\n        Moreover the knowledge
\ngained is of phenomena, not of the reality of things or of the
\nfoundations of existence.
\nWherever our consciousness meets what seems to be a foundation, that
\nfoundation wears the appearance of a
\nblank,—when it is not a void,—an original state which is featureless
\nand a multitude of consequences which are not inherent
\nin the origin and which nothing in it seems to justify or visibly to
\nnecessitate; there is a mass of superstructure which has no
\nclear native relation to the fundamental existence. The first aspect of
\ncosmic existence is an Infinite which is to our
\nperception an indeterminate, if not indeterminable. In this Infinite
\nthe universe itself, whether in its aspect of Energy or its
\naspect of structure, appears as an indeterminate determination, a
\n“boundless finite”,—paradoxical but necessary expressions
\nwhich would seem to indicate that we are face to face with a
\nsuprarational mystery as the base of things; in that universe
\narise—from where?—a vast number and variety of general and particular
\ndeterminates which do not appear to be
\nwarranted by anything perceptible in the nature of the Infinite, but
\nseem to be imposed,—or, it may be, self-imposed,—upon
\nit. We give to the Energy which produces them the name of Nature, but
\nthe word conveys no meaning unless it is that the
\nnature of things is what it is by virtue of a Force which arranges\n<\/p>\n

\nPage 296<\/p>\n

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

\n

them according to an inherent Truth in them; but the
\nnature of that Truth itself, the reason why these determinates are what
\nthey are is nowhere visible. It has been possible indeed for human
\nScience to detect the process or many processes of
\nmaterial things, but this knowledge does not throw any light on the
\nmajor question; we do not know even the rationale of the
\noriginal cosmic processes, for the results do not present themselves as
\ntheir necessary but only their pragmatic and actual
\nconsequence. In the end we do not know how these determinates came into
\nor out of the original Indeterminate or
\nIndeterminable on which they stand forth as on a blank and flat
\nbackground in the riddle of their ordered occurrence. At the
\norigin of things we are faced with an Infinite containing a mass of
\nunexplained finites, an Indivisible full of endless divisions,
\nan Immutable teeming with mutations and differentiae. A cosmic paradox
\nis the beginning of all things, a paradox without
\nany key to its significance.<\/p>\n

            <\/p>\n

   
\nIt is possible indeed to question the need of positing an Infinite
\nwhich contains our formed universe, although this
\nconception is imperatively demanded by our mind as a necessary basis to
\nits conceptions,—for it is unable to fix or assign a
\nlimit whether in Space or Time or essential existence beyond which
\nthere is nothing or before or after which there is
\nnothing,—although too the alternative is a Void or Nihil which can be
\nonly an abyss of the Infinite into which we refuse to
\nlook; an infinite mystic zero of Non-Existence would replace an
\ninfinite x as a necessary postulate, a basis for our seeing of
\nall that is to us existence. But even if we refuse to recognise
\nanything as real except the limitless expanding finite of the
\nmaterial universe and its teeming determinations, the enigma remains
\nthe same. Infinite existence, infinite non-being or
\nboundless finite, all are to us original indeterminates or
\nindeterminables; we can assign to them no distinct characters or
\nfeatures, nothing which would predetermine their determinations. To
\ndescribe the fundamental character of the universe as
\nSpace or Time or Space-Time does not help us; for even if these are not
\nabstractions of our intelligence which we impose
\nby our mental view on the cosmos, the mind’s necessary perspective of
\nits picture, these too are indeterminates\n<\/p>\n

\nPage 297<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

and carry in themselves no clue to the origin of the
\ndeterminations that take place in them; there is still no explanation
\nof the
\nstrange process by which things are determined or of their powers,
\nqualities and properties, no revelation of their true
\nnature, origin and significance. <\/p>\n

\n        Actually to our Science this
\ninfinite or indeterminate Existence reveals itself as an Energy, known
\nnot by itself but by its
\nworks, which throws up in its motion waves of energism and in them a
\nmultitude of infinitesimals; these, grouping
\nthemselves to form larger infinitesimals, become a basis for all the
\ncreations of the Energy, even those farthest away from
\nthe material basis, for the emergence of a world of organised Matter,
\nfor the emergence of Life, for the emergence of
\nConsciousness, for all the still unexplained activities of evolutionary
\nNature. On the original process are erected a multitude
\nof processes which we can observe, follow, can take advantage of many
\nof them, utilise; but they are none of them,
\nfundamentally, explicable. We know now that different groupings and a
\nvarying number of electric infinitesimals can
\nproduce or serve as the constituent occasion—miscalled the cause, for
\nhere there seems to be only a necessary antecedent
\ncondition,—for the appearance of larger atomic infinitesimals of
\ndifferent natures, qualities, powers; but we fail to discover
\nhow these different dispositions can come to constitute these different
\natoms,—how the differentiae in the constituent
\noccasion or cause necessitate the differentiae in the constituted
\noutcome or result. We know also that certain combinations
\nof certain invisible atomic infinitesimals produce or occasion new and
\nvisible determinations quite different in nature, quality
\nand power from the constituent infinitesimals; but we fail to discover,
\nfor instance, how a fixed formula for the combination
\nof oxygen and hydrogen comes to determine the appearance of water which
\nis evidently something more than a combination
\nof gases, a new creation, a new form of substance, a material
\nmanifestation of a quite new character. We see that a seed
\ndevelops into a tree, we follow the line of the process of production
\nand we utilise it; but we do not discover how a tree can
\ngrow out of a seed, how the life and form of the tree come to be
\nimplied in the substance or energy of the seed or, if that be
\nrather the fact,\n<\/p>\n

\nPage 298<\/p>\n

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

\n

how the seed can develop into a tree. We know that
\ngenes and chromosomes are the cause of hereditary transmissions, not
\nonly of physical but of psychological variations; but we do not
\ndiscover how psychological characteristics can be contained
\nand transmitted in this inconscient material vehicle. We do not see or
\nknow, but it is expounded to us as a cogent account of
\nNature-process, that a play of electrons, of atoms and their resultant
\nmolecules, of cells, glands, chemical secretions and
\nphysiological processes manages by their activity on the nerves and
\nbrain of a Shakespeare or a Plato to produce or could
\nbe perhaps the dynamic occasion for the production of a Hamlet or a
\nSymposium or a Republic; but we fail to discover or
\nappreciate how such material movements could have composed or
\nnecessitated the composition of these highest points of
\nthought and literature: the divergence here of the determinants and the
\ndetermination becomes so wide that we are no
\nlonger able to follow the process, much less understand or utilise.
\nThese formulae of Science may be pragmatically correct
\nand infallible, they may govern the practical how of Nature’s
\nprocesses, but they do not disclose the intrinsic how or why;
\nrather they have the air of the formulae of a cosmic Magician, precise,
\nirresistible, automatically successful each in its field,
\nbut their rationale is fundamentally unintelligible. <\/p>\n

\n        There is more to perplex us;
\nfor we see the original indeterminate Energy throwing out general
\ndeterminates of
\nitself,—we might equally in their relation to the variety of their
\nproducts call them generic indeterminates,—with their
\nappropriate states of substance and determined forms of that substance:
\nthe latter are numerous, sometimes innumerable
\nvariations on the substance-energy which is their base: but none of
\nthese variations seems to be predetermined by anything
\nin the nature of the general indeterminate. An electric Energy produces
\npositive, negative, neutral forms of itself, forms that
\nare at once waves and particles; a gaseous state of energy-substance
\nproduces a considerable number of different gases; a
\nsolid state of energy-substance from which results the earth principle
\ndevelops into different forms of earth and rock of
\nmany kinds and numerous minerals and metals; a life principle produces
\nits vegetable\n<\/p>\n

\nPage 299<\/p>\n

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

\n

kingdom teeming with a countless foison of quite different plants, trees, flowers; a principle of animal life produces an
\nenormous variety of genus, species, individual variations: so it proceeds into human life and mind and its mind-types towards
\nthe still unwritten end or perhaps the yet occult sequel of that unfinished evolutionary chapter. Throughout there is the
\nconstant rule of a general sameness in the original determinate and, subject to this substantial sameness of basic substance
\nand nature, a profuse variation in the generic and individual determinates; an identical law obtains of sameness or similarity
\nin the genus or species with numerous variations often meticulously minute in the individual. But we do not find anything in
\nany general or generic determinate necessitating the variant determinations that result from it. A necessity of immutable
\nsameness at the base, of free and unaccountable variations on the surface seems to be the law; but who or what
\nnecessitates or determines? What is the rationale of the determination, what is its original truth or its significance? What
\ncompels or impels this exuberant play of varying possibilities which seem to have no aim or meaning unless it be the beauty
\nor delight of creation? A Mind, a seeking and curious inventive Thought, a hidden determining Will might be there, but there
\nis no trace of it in the first and fundamental appearance of material Nature. <\/p>\n

       
\nA first possible explanation points to a self-organising dynamic Chance
\nthat is at work,—a paradox necessitated by the
\nappearance of inevitable order on one side, of unaccountable freak and
\nfantasy on the other side of the cosmic phenomenon
\nwe call Nature. An inconscient and inconsequent Force, we may say, that
\nacts at random and creates this or that by a
\ngeneral chance without any determining principle,—determinations coming
\nin only as the result of a persistent repetition of
\nthe same rhythm of action and succeeding because only this repetitive
\nrhythm could succeed in keeping things in
\nbeing,—this is the energy of Nature. But this implies that somewhere in
\nthe origin of things there is a boundless Possibility or
\na womb of innumerable possibilities that are manifested out of it by
\nthe original Energy,—an incalculable Inconscient which
\nwe find some embarrassment in calling either an Existence or a
\nNon-Existence;\n<\/p>\n

\nPage 300 <\/font><\/p>\n

\n

for without some such origin and basis the
\nappearance and the action of the Energy is unintelligible. Yet an
\nopposite aspect
\nof the nature of the cosmic phenomenon as we see it appears to forbid
\nthe theory of a random action generating a persistent
\norder. There is too much of an iron insistence on order, on a law
\nbasing the possibilities. One would be justified rather in
\nsupposing that there is an inherent imperative Truth of things unseen
\nby us, but a Truth capable of manifold manifestation,
\nthrowing out a multitude of possibilities and variants of itself which
\nthe creative Energy by its action turns into so many realised
\nactualities. This brings us to a second explanation,—a mechanical
\nnecessity in things, its workings recognisable by
\nus as so many mechanical laws of Nature;—the necessity, we might say,
\nof some such secret inherent Truth of things as
\nwe have supposed, governing automatically the processes we observe in
\naction in the universe. But a theory of mechanical
\nNecessity by itself does not elucidate the free play of the endless
\nunaccountable variations which are visible in the evolution:
\nthere must be behind the Necessity or in it a law of unity associated
\nwith a co-existent but dependent law of multiplicity,
\nboth insisting on manifestation; but the unity of what, the
\nmultiplicity of what? Mechanical Necessity can give no answer.
\nAgain the emergence of consciousness out of the Inconscient is a
\nstumbling-block in the way of this theory; for it is a
\nphenomenon which can have no place in an all-pervading truth of
\ninconscient mechanical Necessity. If there is a necessity
\nwhich compels the emergence, it can be only this, that there is already
\na consciousness concealed in the Inconscient, waiting
\nfor evolution and when all is ready breaking out from its prison of
\napparent Nescience. We may indeed get rid of the
\ndifficulty of the imperative order of things by supposing that it does
\nnot exist, that determinism in Nature is imposed on it by
\nour thought which needs such an imperative order to enable it to deal
\nwith its surroundings, but in reality there is no such
\nthing; there is only a Force experimenting in a random action of
\ninfinitesimals which build up in their general results different
\ndeterminations by a repetitive persistence operative in the sum of
\ntheir action; thus we go back from Necessity to Chance
\nas the basis of our existence. But what then\n<\/p>\n

\nPage 301<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

is this Mind, this Consciousness which differs so radically from the Energy that produced it that for its action it has to
\nimpose its idea and need of order on the world she has made and in which it is obliged to live? There would then be the
\ndouble contradiction of consciousness emerging from a fundamental Inconscience and of a Mind of order and reason
\nmanifesting as the brilliant final consequence of a world created by inconscient Chance. These things may be possible, but
\nthey need a better explanation than any yet given before we can accord to them our acceptance. <\/p>\n

       
\nThis opens the way for other explanations which make Consciousness the
\ncreator of this world out of an apparent
\noriginal Inconscience. A Mind, a Will seems to have imagined and
\norganised the universe, but it has veiled itself behind its
\ncreation; its first erection has been this screen of an inconscient
\nEnergy and a material form of substance, at once a disguise
\nof its presence and a plastic creative basis on which it could work as
\nan artisan uses for his production of forms and
\npatterns a dumb and obedient material. All these things we see around
\nus are then the thoughts of an extra-cosmic Divinity,
\na Being with an omnipotent and omniscient Mind and Will, who is
\nresponsible for the mathematical law of the physical
\nuniverse, for its artistry of beauty, for its strange play of
\nsamenesses and variations, of concordances and discords, of
\ncombining and intermingling opposites, for the drama of consciousness
\nstruggling to exist and seeking to affirm itself in an
\ninconscient universal order. The fact that this Divinity is invisible
\nto us, undiscoverable by our mind and senses, offers no
\ndifficulty, since self-evidence or direct sign of an extra-cosmic
\nCreator could not be expected in a cosmos which is void of
\nhis presence: the patent signals everywhere of the works of an
\nIntelligence, of law, design, formula, adaptation of means to
\nend, constant and inexhaustible invention, fantasy even but restrained
\nby an ordering Reason might be considered sufficient
\nproof of this origin of things. Or if this Creator is not entirely
\nsupracosmic, but is also immanent in his works, even then there
\nneed be no other sign of him,—except indeed to some consciousness
\nevolving in this inconscient world, but only when its
\nevolution reached a point at which it could become aware of the
\nindwelling Presence. The intervention of this\n<\/p>\n

\nPage 302<\/p>\n

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

\n

evolving consciousness would not be a difficulty, since there would be no contradiction of the basic nature of things in its
\nappearance; an omnipotent Mind could easily infuse something of itself into its creatures. One difficulty remains; it is the
\narbitrary nature of the creation, the incomprehensibility of its purpose, the crude meaninglessness of its law of unnecessary
\nignorance, strife and suffering, its ending without denouement or issue. A play? But why this stamp of so many undivine
\nelements and characters in the play of One whose nature must be supposed to be divine? To the suggestion that what we
\nsee worked out in the world is the thoughts of God, the retort can be made that God could well have had better thoughts and
\nthe best thought of all would have been to refrain from the creation of an unhappy and unintelligible universe. All theistic
\nexplanations of existence starting from an extra-cosmic Deity stumble over this difficulty and can only evade it; it would
\ndisappear only if the Creator were, even though exceeding the creation, yet immanent in it, himself in some sort both the
\nplayer and the play, an Infinite casting infinite possibilities into the set form of an evolutionary cosmic order. <\/p>\n

       
\nOn that hypothesis, there must be behind the action of the material
\nEnergy a secret involved Consciousness, cosmic,
\ninfinite, building up through the action of that frontal Energy its
\nmeans of an evolutionary manifestation, a creation out of
\nitself in the boundless finite of the material universe. The apparent
\ninconscience of the material Energy would be an
\nindispensable condition for the structure of the material
\nworld-substance in which this Consciousness intends to involve itself
\nso that it may grow by evolution out of its apparent opposite; for
\nwithout some such device a complete involution would be
\nimpossible. If there is such a creation by the Infinite out of itself,
\nit must be the manifestation, in a material disguise, of truths
\nor powers of its own being: the forms or vehicles of these truths or
\npowers would be the basic general or fundamental
\ndeterminates we see in Nature; the particular determinates, which
\notherwise are unaccountable variations that have
\nemerged from the vague general stuff in which they originate, would be
\nthe appropriate forms or vehicles of the possibilities
\nthat the truths or powers\n<\/p>\n

\nPage 303<\/p>\n

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

\n

residing in these fundamentals bore within them. The principle of free variation of possibilities natural to an infinite
\nConsciousness would be the explanation of the aspect of inconscient Chance of which we are aware in the workings of
\nNature,—inconscient only in appearance and so appearing because of the complete involution in Matter, because of the veil
\nwith which the secret Consciousness has disguised its presence. The principle of truths, real powers of the Infinite
\nimperatively fulfilling themselves would be the explanation of the opposite aspect of a mechanical Necessity which we see
\nin Nature,—mechanical in appearance only and so appearing because of the same veil of Inconscience. It would then be
\nperfectly intelligible why the Inconscient does its works with a constant principle of mathematical architecture, of design, of
\neffective arrangement of numbers, of adaptation of means to ends, of inexhaustible device and invention, one might almost
\nsay, a constant experimental skill and an automatism of purpose. The appearance of consciousness out of an apparent
\nInconscience would also be no longer inexplicable. <\/p>\n

       
\nAll the unexplained processes of Nature would find their meaning and
\ntheir place if this hypothesis proved to be tenable.
\nEnergy seems to create substance, but, in reality, as existence is
\ninherent in Consciousness-Force, so also substance would
\nbe inherent in Energy,—the Energy a manifestation of the Force,
\nsubstance a manifestation of the secret Existence. But as
\nit is a spiritual substance, it would not be apprehended by the
\nmaterial sense until it is given by Energy the forms of Matter seizable
\nby that sense. One begins to understand also how arrangement of design,
\nquantity and number can be a base for
\nthe manifestation of quality and property; for design, quantity and
\nnumber are powers of existence-substance, quality and
\nproperty are powers of the consciousness and its force that reside in
\nthe existence; they can then be made manifest and
\noperative by a rhythm and process of substance. The growth of the tree
\nout of the seed would be accounted for, like all
\nother similar phenomena, by the indwelling presence of what we have
\ncalled the Real-Idea; the Infinite’s self-perception of
\nthe significant form, the living body of its power of existence that
\nhas\n<\/p>\n

\nPage 304<\/p>\n

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

\n

to emerge from its own self-compression in energy-substance, would be carried internally in the form of the seed, carried in
\nthe occult consciousness involved in that form, and would naturally evolve out of it. There would be no difficulty either in
\nunderstanding on this principle how infinitesimals of a material character like the gene and the chromosome can carry in
\nthem psychological elements to be transmitted to the physical form that has to emerge from the human seed; it would be at
\nbottom on the same principle in the objectivity of Matter as that which we find in our subjective experience,—for we see
\nthat the subconscient physical carries in it a mental psychological content, impressions of past events, habits, fixed mental
\nand vital formations, fixed forms of character, and sends them up by an occult process to the waking consciousness, thus
\noriginating or influencing many activities of our nature. <\/p>\n

       
\nOn the same basis there would be no difficulty in understanding why the
\nphysiological functionings of the body help to
\ndetermine the mind’s psychological actions: for the body is not mere
\nunconscious Matter: it is a structure of a secretly
\nconscious Energy that has taken form in it. Itself occultly conscious,
\nit is, at the same time, the vehicle of expression of an
\novert Consciousness that has emerged and is self-aware in our physical
\nenergy-substance. The body’s functionings are a
\nnecessary machinery or instrumentation for the movements of this mental
\nInhabitant; it is only by setting the corporeal
\ninstrument in motion that the Conscious Being emerging, evolving in it
\ncan transmit its mind formations, will formations and
\nturn them into a physical manifestation of itself in Matter. The
\ncapacity, the processes of the instrument must to a certain
\nextent reshape the mind formations in their transition from mental
\nshape into physical expression; its workings are necessary
\nand must exercise their influence before that expression can become
\nactual. The bodily instrument may even in some
\ndirections dominate its user; it may too by a force of habit suggest or
\ncreate involuntary reactions of the consciousness
\ninhabiting it before the working Mind and Will can control or
\ninterfere. All this is possible because the body has a
\n“subconscient” consciousness of its own which counts in our total\n<\/p>\n

\nPage 305<\/p>\n

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

\n

self-expression; even, if we look at this outer
\ninstrumentation only, we can conclude that body determines mind, but
\nthis is
\nonly a minor truth and the major Truth is that mind determines body. In
\nthis view a still deeper Truth becomes conceivable;
\na spiritual entity ensouling the substance that veils it is the
\noriginal determinant of both mind and body. On the other side, in
\nthe opposite order of process,—that by which the mind can transmit its
\nideas and commands to the body, can train it to be
\nan instrument for new action, can even so impress it with its habitual
\ndemands or orders that the physical instinct carries
\nthem out automatically even when the mind is no longer consciously
\nwilling them, those also more unusual but well attested
\nby which to an extraordinary and hardly limitable extent the mind can
\nlearn to determine the reactions of the body even to
\nthe overriding of its normal law or conditions of action,—these and
\nother otherwise unaccountable aspects of the relation
\nbetween these two elements of our being become easily understandable:
\nfor it is the secret consciousness in the living
\nmatter that receives from its greater companion; it is this in the body
\nthat in its own involved and occult fashion perceives or
\nfeels the demand on it and obeys the emerged or evolved consciousness
\nwhich presides over the body. Finally, the
\nconception of a divine Mind and Will creating the cosmos becomes
\njustifiable, while at the same time the perplexing
\nelements in it which our reasoning mentality refuses to ascribe to an
\narbitrary fiat of the Creator, find their explanation as
\ninevitable phenomena of a Consciousness emerging with difficulty out of
\nits opposite—but with the mission to override these
\ncontrary phenomena and manifest by a slow and difficult evolution its
\ngreater reality and true nature. <\/p>\n

\n        But an approach from the
\nmaterial end of Existence cannot give us any certitude of validity for
\nthis hypothesis or for
\nthat matter for any other explanation of Nature and her procedure: the
\nveil cast by the original Inconscience is too thick for
\nthe Mind to pierce and it is behind this veil that is hidden the secret
\norigination of what is manifested; there are seated the
\ntruths and powers underlying the phenomena and processes that appear to
\nus in the material front of Nature. To know with\n<\/p>\n

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greater certitude we must follow the curve of
\nevolving consciousness until it arrives at a height and largeness of
\nself-enlightenment in which the primal secret is self-discovered; for
\npresumably it must evolve, must eventually bring out
\nwhat was held from the beginning by the occult original Consciousness
\nin things of which it is a gradual manifestation. In
\nLife it would be clearly hopeless to seek for the truth; for Life
\nbegins with a formulation in which consciousness is still submental and
\ntherefore to us as mental beings appears as inconscient or at most
\nsubconscious, and our own investigation
\ninto this stage of life studying it from outside cannot be more
\nfruitful of the secret truth than our examination of Matter.
\nEven when mind develops in life, its first functional aspect is a
\nmentality involved in action, in vital and physical needs and
\npreoccupations, in impulses, desires, sensations, emotions, unable to
\nstand back from these things and observe and know
\nthem. In the human mind there is the first hope of understanding,
\ndiscovery, a free comprehension; here we might seem to
\nbe coming to the possibility of self-knowledge and world-knowledge. But
\nin fact our mind can at first only observe facts and
\nprocesses and for the rest it has to make deductions and inferences, to
\nconstruct hypotheses, to reason, to speculate. In
\norder to discover the secret of Consciousness it would have to know
\nitself and determine the reality of its own being and
\nprocess; but as in animal life the emerging Consciousness is involved
\nin vital action and movement, so in the human being
\nmind-consciousness is involved in its own whirl of thoughts, an
\nactivity in which it is carried on without rest and in which its
\nvery reasonings and speculations are determined in their tendency,
\ntrend, conditions by its own temperament, mental turn,
\npast formation and line of energy, inclination, preference, an inborn
\nnatural selection,—we do not freely determine our
\nthinking according to the truth of things, it is determined for us by
\nour nature. We can indeed stand back with a certain
\ndetachment and observe the workings of the mental Energy in us; but it
\nis still only its process that we see and not any
\noriginal source of our mental determinations: we can build theories and
\nhypotheses of the process of Mind, but a veil is still
\nthere over the inner secret\n<\/p>\n

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of ourselves, our consciousness, our total nature. <\/p>\n

       
\nIt is only when we follow the yogic process of quieting the mind itself
\nthat a profounder result of our self-observation
\nbecomes possible. For first we discover that mind is a subtle
\nsubstance, a general determinate — or generic
\nindeterminate — which mental energy when it operates throws into forms
\nor particular determinations of itself, thoughts,
\nconcepts, percepts, mental sentiments, activities of will and reactions
\nof feeling, but which, when the energy is quiescent,
\ncan live either in an inert torpor or in an immobile silence and peace
\nof self-existence. Next we see that the determinations
\nof our mind do not all proceed from itself; for waves and currents of
\nmental energy enter into it from outside: these take
\nform in it or appear already formed from some universal Mind or from
\nother minds and are accepted by us as our own
\nthinking. We can perceive also an occult or subliminal mind in
\nourselves from which thoughts and perceptions and
\nwill-impulses and mental feelings arise; we can perceive too higher
\nplanes of consciousness from which a superior mind
\nenergy works through us or upon us. Finally we discover that that which
\nobserves all this is a mental being supporting the
\nmind substance and mind energy; without this presence, their upholder
\nand source of sanctions, they could not exist or
\noperate. This mental being or Purusha first appears as a silent witness
\nand, if that were all, we would have to accept the
\ndeterminations of mind as a phenomenal activity imposed upon the being
\nby Nature, by Prakriti, or else as a creation
\npresented to it by Prakriti, a world of thought which Nature constructs
\nand offers to the observing Purusha. But afterwards
\nwe find that the Purusha, the mental being, can depart from its posture
\nof a silent or accepting Witness; it can become the
\nsource of reactions, accept, reject, even rule and regulate, become the
\ngiver of the command, the knower. A knowledge
\nalso arises that this mind-substance manifests the mental being, is its
\nown expressive substance and the mental energy is its
\nown consciousness-force, so that it is reasonable to conclude that all
\nmind determinations arise from the being of the
\nPurusha. But this conclusion is complicated by the fact that from
\nanother viewpoint our personal mind seems to be little
\nmore than a\n<\/p>\n

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formation of universal Mind, an engine for the
\nreception, modification, propagation of cosmic thought-waves,
\nidea-currents,
\nwill-suggestions, waves of feeling, sense-suggestions,
\nform-suggestions. It has no doubt its own already realised expression,
\npredispositions, propensities, personal temperament and nature; what
\ncomes from the universal can only find a place there if
\nit is accepted and assimilated into the self-expression of the
\nindividual mental being, the personal Prakriti of the Purusha. But
\nstill, in view of these complexities, the question remains entire
\nwhether all this evolution and action is a phenomenal creation
\nby some universal Energy presented to the mental being or an activity
\nimposed by Mind-Energy on the Purusha’s
\nindeterminate, perhaps indeterminable existence, or whether the whole
\nis something predetermined by some dynamic truth
\nof Self within and only manifested on the mind surface. To know that we
\nwould have to touch or to enter into a cosmic state
\nof being and consciousness to which the totality of things and their
\nintegral principle would be better manifest than to our
\nlimited mind experience.<\/p>\n

\n
\n        Overmind consciousness is
\nsuch a state or principle beyond individual mind, beyond even universal
\nmind in the
\nIgnorance; it carries in itself a first direct and masterful cognition
\nof cosmic truth: here then we might hope to understand
\nsomething of the original working of things, get some insight into the
\nfundamental movements of cosmic Nature. One thing
\nindeed becomes clear; it is self-evident here that both the individual
\nand the cosmos come from a transcendent Reality
\nwhich takes form in them: the mind and life of the individual being,
\nits self in nature must therefore be a partial
\nself-expression of the cosmic Being and, both through that and
\ndirectly, a self-expression of the transcendent Reality,—a
\nconditional and half-veiled expression it may be, but still that is its
\nsignificance. But also we see that what the expression
\nshall be is also determined by the individual himself: only what he can
\nin his nature receive, assimilate, formulate, his portion
\nof the cosmic being or of the Reality, can find shape in his mind and
\nlife and physical parts; something that derives from
\nReality, something that is in the cosmos he expresses, but in the terms
\nof his own self-expression, in the terms of\n<\/p>\n

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his own nature. But the original question set out
\nfor us by the phenomenon of the universe is not solved by the overmind
\nknowledge,—the question, in this case, whether the building of thought,
\nexperience, world of perceptions of the mental
\nPerson, the mind Purusha, is truly a self-expression, a
\nself-determination proceeding from some truth of his own spiritual
\nbeing, a manifestation of that truth’s dynamic possibilities, or
\nwhether it is not rather a creation or construction presented to
\nhim by Nature, by Prakriti, and only in the sense of being
\nindividualised in his personal formation of that Nature can it be
\nsaid to be his own or dependent on him; or, again, it might be a play
\nof a cosmic Imagination, a fantasia of the Infinite
\nimposed on the blank indeterminable of his own eternal pure existence.
\nThese are the three views of creation that seem to
\nhave an equal chance of being right, and mind is incapable of
\ndefinitely deciding between them; for each view is armed with
\nits own mental logic and its appeal to intuition and experience.
\nOvermind seems to add to the perplexity, for the overmental
\nview of things allows each possibility to formulate itself in its own
\nindependent right and realise its own existence in
\ncognition, in dynamic self-presentation, in substantiating
\nexperience. <\/p>\n

\n        In Overmind, in all the
\nhigher ranges of the mind, we find recurring the dichotomy of a pure
\nsilent self without feature
\nor qualities or relations, self-existent, self-poised, self-sufficient,
\nand the mighty dynamis of a determinative
\nknowledge-power, of a creative consciousness and force which
\nprecipitates itself into the forms of the universe. This
\nopposition which is yet a collocation, as if these two were
\ncorrelatives or complementaries, although apparent contradictions
\nof each other, sublimates itself into the co-existence of an impersonal
\nBrahman without qualities, a fundamental divine
\nReality free from all relations or determinates, and a Brahman with
\ninfinite qualities, a fundamental divine Reality who is the
\nsource and container and master of all relations and
\ndeterminations—Nirguna, Saguna. If we pursue the Nirguna into a
\nfarthest possible self-experience, we arrive at a supreme Absolute void
\nof all relations and determinations, the ineffable first
\nand last word of existence. If we enter through the Saguna into some
\nultimate possible of experience, we arrive at a\n<\/p>\n

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divine Absolute, a personal supreme and omnipresent Godhead, transcendent as well as universal, an infinite Master of all
\nrelations and determinations who can uphold in his being a million universes and pervade each with a single ray of his
\nself-light and a single degree of his ineffable existence. The overmind consciousness maintains equally these two truths of
\nthe Eternal which face the mind as mutually exclusive alternatives; it admits both as supreme aspects of one Reality:
\nsomewhere, then, behind them there must be a still greater Transcendence which originates them or upholds them both in its
\nsupreme Eternity. But what can that be of which such opposites are equal truths, unless it be an original indeterminable
\nMystery of which any knowledge, any understanding by the mind is impossible? We can know it indeed to some degree, in
\nsome kind of experience or realisation, by its aspects, powers, constant series of fundamental negatives and positives
\nthrough which we have to pursue it, independently in either or integrally in both together; but in the last resort it seems to
\nescape even from the highest mentality and remain unknowable. <\/p>\n

       
\nBut if the supreme Absolute is indeed a pure Indeterminable, then no
\ncreation, no manifestation, no universe is possible.
\nAnd yet the universe exists. What then is it that creates this
\ncontradiction, is able to effect the impossible, bring this insoluble
\nriddle of self-division into existence? A Power of some kind it must
\nbe, and since the Absolute is the sole reality, the one
\norigin of all things, this Power must proceed from it, must have some
\nrelation with it, a connection, a dependence. For if it is
\nquite other than the supreme Reality, a cosmic Imagination imposing its
\ndeterminations on the eternal blank of the
\nIndeterminable, then the sole existence of an absolute Parabrahman is
\nno longer admissible; there is then a dualism at the
\nsource of things,—not substantially different from the Sankhya dualism
\nof Soul and Nature. If it is a Power, the sole Power
\nindeed, of the Absolute, we have this logical impossibility that the
\nexistence of the Supreme Being and the Power of his
\nexistence are entirely opposite to each other, two supreme
\ncontradictories; for Brahman is free from all possibility of
\nrelations and determinations, but Maya is a creative Imagination
\nimposing these very things upon it, an originator of\n<\/p>\n

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relations and determinations of which Brahman must necessarily be the supporter and witness, — to the logical reason an
\ninadmissible formula. If it is accepted, it can only be as a suprarational mystery, something neither real nor unreal,
\ninexplicable in its nature, anirvacaniya<\/i>.
\nBut the difficulties are so great that it can be accepted only if it
\nimposes itself
\nirresistibly as the inevitable ultimate, the end and summit of
\nmetaphysical inquiry and spiritual experience. For even if all
\nthings are illusory creations, they must have at least a subjective
\nexistence and they can exist nowhere except in the
\nconsciousness of the Sole Existence; they are then subjective
\ndeterminations of the Indeterminable. If, on the contrary, the
\ndeterminations of this Power are real creations, out of what are they
\ndetermined, what is their substance? It is not possible
\nthat they are made out of a Nothing, a Non-Existence other than the
\nAbsolute; for that will erect a new dualism, a great
\npositive Zero over against the greater indeterminable x we have
\nsupposed to be the one Reality. It is evident therefore that
\nthe Reality cannot be a rigid Indeterminable. Whatever is created must
\nbe of it and in it, and what is of the substance of the
\nutterly Real must itself be real: a vast baseless negation of reality
\npurporting to be real cannot be the sole outcome of the
\neternal Truth, the Infinite Existence. It is perfectly understandable
\nthat the Absolute is and must be indeterminable in the
\nsense that it cannot be limited by any determination or any sum of
\npossible determinations, but not in the sense that it is
\nincapable of self-determination. The Supreme Existence cannot be
\nincapable of creating true self-determinations of its
\nbeing, incapable of upholding a real self-creation or manifestation in
\nits self-existent infinite.      <\/p>\n

  
\n
\n        Overmind, then, gives us no
\nfinal and positive solution; it is in a supramental cognition beyond it
\nthat we are left to seek
\nfor an answer. A supramental Truth-Consciousness is at once the
\nself-awareness of the Infinite and Eternal and a power of
\nself-determination inherent in that self-awareness; the first is its
\nfoundation and status, the second is its power of being, the
\ndynamis of its self-existence. All that a timeless eternity of
\nself-awareness sees in itself as truth of being, the conscious
\npower of its being manifests in Time-eternity. To Supermind therefore\n<\/p>\n

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\n

the Supreme is not a rigid Indeterminable, an
\nall-negating Absolute; an infinite of being complete to itself in its
\nown
\nimmutable purity of existence, its sole power a pure consciousness able
\nonly to dwell on the being’s changeless eternity, on
\nthe immobile delight of its sheer self-existence, is not the whole
\nReality. The Infinite of Being must also be an Infinite of
\nPower; containing in itself an eternal repose and quiescence, it must
\nalso be capable of an eternal action and creation: but
\nthis too must be an action in itself, a creation out of its own self
\neternal and infinite, since there could be nothing else out of
\nwhich it could create; any basis of creation seeming to be other than
\nitself must be still really in itself and of itself and could
\nnot be something foreign to its existence. An infinite Power cannot be
\nsolely a Force resting in a pure inactive sameness, an
\nimmutable quiescence; it must have in it endless powers of its being
\nand energy: an infinite Consciousness must hold within
\nit endless truths of its own self-awareness. These in action would
\nappear to our cognition as aspects of its being, to our
\nspiritual sense as powers and movements of its dynamis, to our
\naesthesis as instruments and formulations of its delight of
\nexistence. Creation would then be a self-manifestation: it would be an
\nordered deploying of the infinite possibilities of the
\nInfinite. But every possibility implies a truth of being behind it, a
\nreality in the Existent; for without that supporting truth there
\ncould not be any possibles. In manifestation a fundamental reality of
\nthe Existent would appear to our cognition as a
\nfundamental spiritual aspect of the Divine Absolute; out of it would
\nemerge all its possible manifestations, its innate
\ndynamisms: these again must create or rather bring out of a
\nnon-manifest latency their own significant forms, expressive
\npowers, native processes; their own being would develop their own
\nbecoming, svar\\=upa, svabh\\=ava. This then would be the
\ncomplete process of creation: but in our mind we do not see the
\ncomplete process, we see only possibilities that determine
\nthemselves into actualities and, though we infer or conjecture, we are
\nnot sure of a necessity, a predetermining truth, an
\nimperative behind them which capacitates the possibilities, decides the
\nactualities. Our mind is an observer of actuals, an
\ninventor or discoverer of possibilities, but not a seer of the occult
\nimperatives that necessitate\n<\/p>\n

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the movements and forms of a creation: for in the front of universal existence there are only forces determining results by
\nsome balance of the meeting of their powers; the original Determinant or determinants, if it or they exist, are veiled from us
\nby our ignorance. But to the supramental Truth-Consciousness these imperatives would be apparent, would be the very stuff
\nof its seeing and experience: in the supramental creative process the imperatives, the nexus of possibilities, the resultant
\nactualities would be a single whole, an indivisible movement; the possibilities and actualities would carry in themselves the
\ninevitability of their originating imperative,—all their results, all their creation would be the body of the Truth which they
\nmanifest in predetermined significant forms and powers of the All-Existence. <\/p>\n

       
\nOur fundamental cognition of the Absolute, our substantial spiritual
\nexperience of it is the intuition or the direct
\nexperience of an infinite and eternal Existence, an infinite and
\neternal Consciousness, an infinite and eternal Delight of
\nExistence. In overmental and mental cognition it is possible to make
\ndiscrete and even to separate this original unity into
\nthree self-existent aspects: for we can experience a pure causeless
\neternal Bliss so intense that we are that alone;
\nexistence, consciousness seem to be swallowed up in it, no longer
\nostensibly in presence; a similar experience of pure and
\nabsolute consciousness and a similar exclusive identity with it is
\npossible, and there can be too a like identifying experience
\nof pure and absolute existence. But to a supermind cognition these
\nthree are always an inseparable Trinity, even though one
\ncan stand in front of the others and manifest its own spiritual
\ndeterminates; for each has its primal aspects or its inherent
\nself-formations, but all of these together are original to the triune
\nAbsolute. Love, Joy and Beauty are the fundamental
\ndeterminates of the Divine Delight of Existence, and we can see at once
\nthat these are of the very stuff and nature of that
\nDelight: they are not alien impositions on the being of the Absolute or
\ncreations supported by it but outside it; they are truths
\nof its being, native to its consciousness, powers of its force of
\nexistence. So too is it with the fundamental determinates of
\nthe absolute consciousness,—knowledge and will; they\n<\/p>\n

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are truths and powers of the original Consciousness-Force and are inherent in its very nature. This authenticity becomes still
\nmore evident when we regard the fundamental spiritual determinates of the absolute Existence; they are its triune powers,
\nnecessary first postulates for all its self-creation or manifestation,—Self, the Divine, the Conscious Being; Atman, Ishwara,
\nPurusha. <\/p>\n

       
\nIf we pursue the process of self-manifestation farther, we shall see
\nthat each of these aspects or powers reposes in its
\nfirst action on a triad or trinity; for Knowledge inevitably takes its
\nstand in a trinity of the Knower, the Known and
\nKnowledge; Love finds itself in a trinity of the Lover, the Beloved and
\nLove; Will is self-fulfilled in a trinity of the Lord of
\nthe Will, the object of the Will and the executive Force; Joy has its
\noriginal and utter gladness in a trinity of the Enjoyer, the
\nEnjoyed and the Delight that unites them; Self as inevitably appears
\nand founds its manifestation in a trinity of Self as
\nsubject, Self as object and self-awareness holding together Self as
\nsubject-object. These and other primal powers and
\naspects assume their status among the fundamental spiritual
\nself-determinations of the Infinite; all others are determinates of
\nthe fundamental spiritual determinates, significant relations,
\nsignificant powers, significant forms of being, consciousness,
\nforce, delight,—energies, conditions, ways, lines of the truth-process
\nof the Consciousness-Force of the Eternal, imperatives,
\npossibilities, actualities of its manifestation. All this deploying of
\npowers and possibilities and their inherent consequences is
\nheld together by supermind cognition in an intimate oneness; it keeps
\nthem founded consciously on the original Truth and
\nmaintained in the harmony of the truths they manifest and are in their
\nnature. There is here no imposition of imaginations, no
\narbitrary creation, neither is there any division, fragmentation,
\nirreconcilable contrariety or disparateness. But in Mind of
\nIgnorance these phenomena appear; for there a limited consciousness
\nsees and deals with everything as if all were separate
\nobjects of cognition or separate existences and it seeks so to know,
\npossess and enjoy them and gets mastery over them or
\nsuffers their mastery: but, behind its ignorance, what the soul in it
\nis seeking for is the Reality, the Truth, the Consciousness, <\/p>\n

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the Power, the Delight by which they exist; the mind has to learn to awaken to this true seeking and true
\nknowledge veiled within itself, to the Reality from which all things hold their truth, to the Consciousness of which all
\nconsciousnesses are entities, to the Power from which all get what force of being they have within them, to the Delight of
\nwhich all delights are partial figures. This limitation of consciousness and this awakening to the integrality of consciousness
\nare also a process of self-manifestation, are a self-determination of the Spirit; even when contrary to the Truth in their
\nappearances, the things of the limited consciousness have in their deeper sense and reality a divine significance; they too
\nbring out a truth or a possibility of the Infinite. Of some such nature, as far as it can be expressed in mental formulas, would
\nbe the supramental cognition of things which sees the one Truth everywhere and would so arrange its account to us of our
\nexistence, its report of the secret of creation and the significance of the universe. <\/p>\n

\n        At the same time
\nindeterminability is also a necessary element in our conception of the
\nAbsolute and in our spiritual
\nexperience: this is the other side of the supramental regard on being
\nand on things. The Absolute is not limitable or definable
\nby any one determination or by any sum of determinations; on the other
\nside, it is not bound down to an indeterminable
\nvacancy of pure existence. On the contrary, it is the source of all
\ndeterminations: its indeterminability is the natural, the
\nnecessary condition both of its infinity of being and its infinity of
\npower of being; it can be infinitely all things because it is no
\nthing in particular and exceeds any definable totality. It is this
\nessential indeterminability of the Absolute that translates itself
\ninto our consciousness through the fundamental negating positives of
\nour spiritual experience, the immobile immutable Self,
\nthe Nirguna Brahman, the Eternal without qualities, the pure
\nfeatureless One Existence, the Impersonal, the Silence void of
\nactivities, the Non-being, the Ineffable and the Unknowable. On the
\nother side it is the essence and source of all
\ndeterminations, and this dynamic essentiality manifests to us through
\nthe fundamental affirming positives in which the
\nAbsolute equally meets us; for it is the Self that becomes all things,
\nthe Saguna Brahman, the\n<\/p>\n

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Eternal with infinite qualities, the One who is the Many, the infinite Person who is the source and foundation of all persons
\nand personalities, the Lord of creation, the Word, the Master of all works and action; it is that which being known all is
\nknown: these affirmatives correspond to those negatives. For it is not possible in a supramental cognition to split asunder the
\ntwo sides of the One Existence,—even to speak of them as sides is excessive, for they are in each other, their co-existence
\nor one-existence is eternal and their powers sustaining each other found the self-manifestation of the Infinite. <\/p>\n

       
\nBut neither is the separate cognition of them entirely an illusion or a
\ncomplete error of the Ignorance; this too has its
\nvalidity for spiritual experience. For these primary aspects of the
\nAbsolute are fundamental spiritual determinates or indeterminates
\nanswering at this spiritual end or beginning to the general
\ndeterminates or generic indeterminates of the
\nmaterial end or inconscient beginning of the descending and ascending
\nManifestation. Those that seem to us negative carry
\nin them the freedom of the Infinite from limitation by its own
\ndeterminations; their realisation disengages the spirit within,
\nliberates us and enables us to participate in this supremacy: thus,
\nwhen once we pass into or through the experience of
\nimmutable self, we are no longer bound and limited in the inner status
\nof our being by the determinations and creations of
\nNature. On the other, the dynamic side, this original freedom enables
\nthe Consciousness to create a world of determinations
\nwithout being bound by it: it enables it also to withdraw from what it
\nhas created and re-create in a higher truth-formula. It is
\non this freedom that is based the spirit’s power of infinite variation
\nof the truth-possibilities of existence and also its capacity
\nto create, without tying itself to its workings, any and every form of
\nNecessity or system of order: the individual being too by
\nexperience of these negating absolutes can participate in that dynamic
\nliberty, can pass from one order of self-formulation to
\na higher order. At the stage when from the mental it has to move
\ntowards its supramental status, one most liberatingly
\nhelpful, if not indispensable experience that may intervene is the
\nentry into a total Nirvana of mentality and mental ego, a
\npassage into the silence\n<\/p>\n

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of the Spirit. In any case, a realisation of the
\npure Self must always precede the transition to that mediating eminence
\nof the
\nconsciousness from which a clear vision of the ascending and descending
\nstairs of manifested existence is commanded and
\nthe possession of the free power of ascent and descent becomes a
\nspiritual prerogative. An independent completeness of
\nidentity with each of the primal aspects and powers—not narrowing as in
\nthe mind into a sole engrossing experience
\nseeming to be final and integral, for that would be incompatible with
\nthe realisation of the unity of all aspects and powers of
\nexistence—is a capacity inherent in consciousness in the Infinite; that
\nindeed is the base and justification of the overmind
\ncognition and its will to carry each aspect, each power, each
\npossibility to its independent fullness. But the Supermind keeps
\nalways and in every status or condition the spiritual realisation of
\nthe Unity of all; the intimate presence of that unity is there
\neven within the completest grasp of each thing, each state given its
\nwhole delight of itself, power and value: there is thus no
\nlosing sight of the affirmative aspects even when there is the full
\nacceptance of the truth of the negative. The Overmind
\nkeeps still the sense of this underlying Unity; that is for it the
\nsecure base of the independent experience. In Mind the
\nknowledge of the unity of all aspects is lost on the surface, the
\nconsciousness is plunged into engrossing, exclusive separate
\naffirmations; but there too, even in the Mind’s ignorance, the total
\nreality still remains behind the exclusive absorption and
\ncan be recovered in the form of a profound mental intuition or else in
\nthe idea or sentiment of an underlying truth of integral
\noneness; in the spiritual mind this can develop into an ever-present
\nexperience. <\/p>\n

\n     All aspects of the omnipresent Reality have
\ntheir fundamental truth in the Supreme Existence. Thus even the aspect
\nor
\npower of Inconscience, which seems to be an opposite, a negation of the
\neternal Reality, yet corresponds to a Truth held in
\nitself by the self-aware and all-conscious Infinite. It is, when we
\nlook closely at it, the Infinite’s power of plunging the
\nconsciousness into a trance of self-involution, a self-oblivion of the
\nSpirit veiled in its own abysses where nothing is manifest
\nbut all inconceivably is and can emerge from that ineffable latency. In
\nthe\n<\/p>\n

\nPage 318<\/p>\n

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

\n

heights of Spirit this state of cosmic or infinite
\ntrance-sleep appears to our cognition as a luminous uttermost
\nSuperconscience: at the other end of being it offers itself to
\ncognition as the Spirit’s potency of presenting to itself the
\nopposites of its own truths of being,—an abyss of non-existence, a
\nprofound Night of inconscience, a fathomless swoon of
\ninsensibility from which yet all forms of being, consciousness and
\ndelight of existence can manifest themselves,—but they
\nappear in limited terms, in slowly emerging and increasing
\nself-formulations, even in contrary terms of themselves; it is the
\nplay of a secret all-being, all-delight, all-knowledge, but it observes
\nthe rules of its own self-oblivion, self-opposition,
\nself-limitation until it is ready to surpass it. This is the
\nInconscience and Ignorance that we see at work in the material
\nuniverse. It is not a denial, it is one term, one formula of the
\ninfinite and eternal Existence. <\/p>\n

\n    It is important to observe here the sense that is
\nacquired in such a total cognition of cosmic being by the phenomenon of
\nthe Ignorance, its assigned place in the spiritual economy of the
\nuniverse. If all that we experience were an imposition, an
\nunreal creation in the Absolute, both cosmic and individual existence
\nwould be in their very nature an Ignorance; the sole
\nreal knowledge would be the indeterminable self-awareness of the
\nAbsolute. If all were the erection of a temporal and
\nphenomenal creation over against the reality of the witnessing timeless
\nEternal and if the creation were not a manifestation
\nof the Reality but an arbitrary self-effective cosmic construction,
\nthat too would be a sort of imposition. Our knowledge of
\nthe creation would be the knowledge of a temporary structure of
\nevanescent consciousness and being, a dubious Becoming
\nthat passes across the vision of the Eternal, not a knowledge of
\nReality; that too would be an Ignorance. But if all is a
\nmanifestation of the Reality and itself real by the constituting
\nimmanence, the substantiating essence and presence of the
\nReality, then the awareness of individual being and world-being would
\nbe in its spiritual origin and nature a play of the
\ninfinite self-knowledge and all-knowledge: ignorance could be only a
\nsubordinate movement, a suppressed or restricted
\ncognition or a partial and imperfect evolving knowledge with the true
\nand total self-awareness and all-awareness<\/p>\n

\nPage 319<\/p>\n

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

\n

concealed both in it and behind it. It would be a temporary phenomenon, not the cause and essence of cosmic existence; its
\ninevitable consummation would be a return of the spirit, not out of the cosmos to a sole supracosmic self-awareness, but
\neven in the cosmos itself to an integral self-knowledge and all-knowledge. <\/p>\n

\n    It might be objected that the supramental cognition
\nis, after all, not the final truth of things. Beyond the supramental
\nplane of consciousness which is an intermediate step from overmind and
\nmind to the complete experience of
\nSachchidananda, are the greatest heights of the manifested Spirit: here
\nsurely existence would not at all be based on the
\ndetermination of the One in multiplicity, it would manifest solely and
\nsimply a pure identity in oneness. But the supramental
\nTruth-Consciousness would not be absent from these planes, for it is an
\ninherent power of Sachchidananda: the difference
\nwould be that the determinations would not be demarcations, they would
\nbe plastic, interfused, each a boundless finite. For
\nthere all is in each and each is in all radically and integrally,—there
\nwould be to the utmost a fundamental awareness of
\nidentity, a mutual inclusion and interpenetration of consciousness:
\nknowledge as we envisage it would not exist, because it
\nwould not be needed, since all would be direct action of consciousness
\nin being itself, identical, intimate, intrinsically
\nself-aware and all-aware. But still relations of consciousness,
\nrelations of mutual delight of existence, relations of self-power
\nof being with self-power of being would not be excluded; these highest
\nspiritual planes would not be a field of blank
\nindeterminability, a vacancy of pure existence. <\/p>\n

\n     It might be said again that, even so, in Sachchidananda
\nitself at least, above all worlds of manifestation, there could be nothing but
\nthe self-awareness of pure existence and consciousness and a pure delight of
\nexistence. Or, indeed, this triune being itself might well be only a trinity of
\noriginal spiritual self-determinations of the Infinite; these too, like all
\ndeterminations, would cease to exist in the ineffable Absolute. But our position
\nis that these must be inherent truths of the supreme being; their utmost reality
\nmust be pre-existent in the Absolute even if they are ineffably other there than
\nwhat they are in the spiritual mind’s <\/p>\n

\nPage 320 <\/font><\/p>\n

\n

highest possible experience. The Absolute is not a mystery of
\ninfinite blankness nor a supreme sum of negations; nothing can manifest that is
\nnot justified by some self-power of the original and omnipresent Reality. <\/p>\n

\nPage 321<\/font><\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

                                    BOOK II                                     PART  ONE                                     CHAPTER I Indeterminates, Cosmic Determinations and the Indeterminable                         The Unseen with whom there can be no pragmatic…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-622","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-18-the-life-divine-volume-18","wpcat-13-id"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/622","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=622"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/622\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=622"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=622"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=622"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}