{"id":642,"date":"2013-07-13T01:29:25","date_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:29:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/?p=642"},"modified":"2013-07-13T01:29:25","modified_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:29:25","slug":"11-conscious-force-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\/11-conscious-force-vol-18-the-life-divine-volume-18","title":{"rendered":"-11_Conscious Force .htm"},"content":{"rendered":"<table border=\"0\" cellpadding=\"6\" style=\"border-collapse: collapse\" width=\"100%\">\n<tr>\n<td>\n<p style=\"margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0;line-height:150%\" align=\"center\">\n<b><font size=\"4\">C<\/font><font size=\"2\">HAPTER<\/font><font size=\"4\">&nbsp;<br \/>\nX <\/font><br \/>\n<\/b>\n<\/p>\n<p style=\"margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0;line-height:150%\" align=\"center\"><b><br \/>\n\t\t<font size=\"4\">Conscious Force<\/p>\n<p><\/font><\/b><\/p>\n<p style=\"margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0;line-height:150%\" align=\"justify\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<br \/>\n&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<br \/>\n&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<br \/>\n&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<br \/>\n&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p style=\"margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0;line-height:150%\" align=\"right\">\n<font size=\"2\">They beheld the self-force of the Divine Being deep hidden by its own conscious modes of working.<\/font><\/p>\n<p style=\"margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0;line-height:150%\" align=\"right\">\n<font size=\"2\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Swetaswatara<br \/>\nUpanishad.<font face=\"Times New Roman\">\u00b9<\/font><\/font><\/p>\n<p style=\"margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0;line-height:150%\" align=\"right\">\n<font size=\"2\">This is he<br \/>\nthat is awake in those who sleep. <\/font><\/p>\n<p style=\"margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0;line-height:150%\" align=\"right\">\n<font size=\"2\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Katha<br \/>\nUpanishad.<font face=\"Times New Roman\"><br \/>\n\u00b2<\/font> <\/font><\/p>\n<p style=\"margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0;line-height:150%\" align=\"right\">\n&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p align=\"justify\" style=\"line-height: 150%;margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0\"><b><font size=\"4\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; A<\/font><\/b><font size=\"2\">LL<\/font><br \/>\nphenomenal existence resolves itself into Force, into a movement of<br \/>\nenergy that assumes more or less material, more or<br \/>\nless gross or subtle forms for self-presentation to its own experience.<br \/>\nIn the ancient images by which human thought<br \/>\nattempted to make this origin and law of being intelligible and real to<br \/>\nitself, this infinite existence of Force was figured as a<br \/>\nsea, initially at rest and therefore free from forms, but the first<br \/>\ndisturbance, the first initiation of movement necessitates the<br \/>\ncreation of forms and is the seed of a universe.<\/p>\n<p align=\"justify\" style=\"line-height: 150%;margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<br \/>\nMatter is the presentation of force which is most easily intelligible<br \/>\nto our intelligence, moulded as it is by contacts in<br \/>\nMatter to which a mind involved in material brain gives the response.<br \/>\nThe elementary state of material Force is, in the view<br \/>\nof the old Indian physicists, a condition of pure material extension in<br \/>\nSpace of which the peculiar property is vibration<br \/>\ntypified to us by the phenomenon of sound. But vibration in this state<br \/>\nof ether is not sufficient to create forms. There must<br \/>\nfirst be some obstruction in the flow of the Force ocean, some<br \/>\ncontraction and expansion, some interplay of vibrations, some<br \/>\nimpinging of force upon force so as to create a beginning of fixed<br \/>\nrelations and mutual effects. Material Force modifying its<br \/>\nfirst ethereal status assumes a second, called in the old language the<br \/>\naerial, of which the special property is contact between<br \/>\nforce and force, contact that is the basis of all material relations.<br \/>\nStill we have not as yet real forms but only varying forces.<br \/>\nA sustaining principle is needed. This is provided by a third<br \/>\nself-modification of the primitive Force of which the principle of<br \/>\nlight, electricity, fire and heat is for us the characteristic<br \/>\nmanifestation. Even then, we can have forms of<\/p>\n<p align=\"justify\" style=\"line-height: 150%;margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0\">&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p align=\"justify\" style=\"line-height: 150%;margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0\"><font size=\"2\"><font face=\"Times New Roman\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<br \/>\n\u00b9&nbsp; <\/font>I. 3.&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<br \/>\n<font face=\"Times New Roman\">\u00b2&nbsp; <\/font>II. 2. 8.<\/font><\/p>\n<div style=\"border-bottom-style: solid;border-bottom-width: 1px;padding-bottom: 1px\">\n<p style=\"margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0;line-height:150%\" align=\"center\">\n<font size=\"2\">&nbsp;Page-80<\/font><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p style=\"margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0;line-height:150%\" align=\"justify\">&nbsp;force preserving their own character and peculiar action, but not stable forms of Matter. A fourth state characterised by<br \/>\ndiffusion and a first medium of permanent attractions and repulsions, termed picturesquely water or the liquid state, and a<br \/>\nfifth of cohesion, termed earth or the solid state, complete the necessary elements.<\/p>\n<p align=\"justify\" style=\"line-height: 150%;margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; All forms of Matter of<br \/>\nwhich we are aware, all physical things even to the most subtle, are<br \/>\nbuilt up by the combination<br \/>\nof these five elements. Upon them also depends all our sensible<br \/>\nexperience; for by reception of vibration comes the sense of<br \/>\nsound; by contact of things in a world of vibrations of Force the sense<br \/>\nof touch; by the action of light in the forms hatched,<br \/>\noutlined, sustained by the force of light and fire and heat the sense<br \/>\nof sight; by the fourth element the sense of taste; by the<br \/>\nfifth the sense of smell. All is essentially response to vibratory<br \/>\ncontacts between force and force. In this way the ancient<br \/>\nthinkers bridged the gulf between pure Force and its final<br \/>\nmodifications and satisfied the difficulty which prevents the<br \/>\nordinary human mind from understanding how all these forms which are to<br \/>\nhis senses so real, solid and durable can be in<br \/>\ntruth only temporary phenomena and a thing like pure energy, to the<br \/>\nsenses non-existent, intangible and almost incredible,<br \/>\ncan be the one permanent cosmic reality.\n<\/p>\n<p align=\"justify\" style=\"line-height: 150%;margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; The problem of<br \/>\nconsciousness is not solved by this theory; for it does not explain how<br \/>\nthe contact of vibrations of Force<br \/>\nshould give rise to conscious sensations. The Sankhyas or analytic<br \/>\nthinkers posited therefore behind these five elements two<br \/>\nprinciples which they called Mahat and Ahankara, principles which are<br \/>\nreally non-material; for the first is nothing but the<br \/>\nvast cosmic principle of Force and the other the divisional principle<br \/>\nof Ego-formation. Nevertheless, these two principles, as<br \/>\nalso the principle of intelligence, become active in consciousness not<br \/>\nby virtue of Force itself, but by virtue of an inactive<br \/>\nConscious-Soul or souls in which its activities are reflected and by<br \/>\nthat reflection assume the hue of consciousness.\n<\/p>\n<p align=\"justify\" style=\"line-height: 150%;margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Such is the explanation of<br \/>\nthings offered by the school of Indian philosophy which comes nearest<br \/>\nto the modern<br \/>\nmaterialistic ideas and which carried the idea of a mechanical or<\/p>\n<div style=\"border-bottom-style: solid;border-bottom-width: 1px;padding-bottom: 1px\">\n<p align=\"center\" style=\"line-height: 150%;margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0\">\n<font size=\"2\">&nbsp;Page-81 <\/font><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p align=\"justify\" style=\"line-height: 150%;margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0\">unconscious Force in Nature as far as was possible to a seriously reflective Indian mind. Whatever its defects, its main idea<br \/>\nwas so indisputable that it came to be generally accepted. However the phenomenon of consciousness may be explained,<br \/>\nwhether Nature be an inert impulse or a conscious principle, it is certainly Force; the principle of things is a formative<br \/>\nmovement of energies, all forms are born of meeting and mutual adaptation between unshaped forces, all sensation and<br \/>\naction is a response of something in a form of Force to the contacts of other forms of Force. This is the world as we<br \/>\nexperience it and from this experience we must always start.<\/p>\n<p align=\"justify\" style=\"line-height: 150%;margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<br \/>\nPhysical analysis of Matter by modern Science has come to the same general conclusion, even if a few last doubts still<br \/>\nlinger. Intuition and experience confirm this concord of Science and Philosophy. Pure reason finds in it the satisfaction of its<br \/>\nown essential conceptions. For even in the view of the world as essentially an act of consciousness, an act is implied and in<br \/>\nthe act movement of Force, play of Energy. This also, when we examine from within our own experience, proves to be the<br \/>\nfundamental nature of the world. All our activities are the play of the triple force of the old philosophies, knowledge-force,<br \/>\ndesire-force, action-force, and all these prove to be really three streams of one original and identical Power, Adya Shakti.<br \/>\nEven our states of rest are only equable state or equilibrium of the play of her movement.<\/p>\n<p align=\"justify\" style=\"line-height: 150%;margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<br \/>\nMovement of Force being admitted as the whole nature of the Cosmos, two questions arise. And first, how did this<br \/>\nmovement come to take place at all in the bosom of existence? If we suppose it to be not only eternal but the very essence<br \/>\nof all existence, the question does not arise. But we have negatived this theory. We are aware of an existence which is not<br \/>\ncompelled by the movement. How then does this movement alien to its eternal repose come to take place in it? by what<br \/>\ncause? by what possibility? by what mysterious impulsion?<\/p>\n<p align=\"justify\" style=\"line-height: 150%;margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; The answer most approved by<br \/>\nthe ancient Indian mind was that Force is inherent in Existence. Shiva<br \/>\nand Kali,<br \/>\nBrahman and Shakti are one and not two who are separable. Force<br \/>\ninherent in existence may be at rest or it may be in<br \/>\nmotion, but\n<\/p>\n<div style=\"border-bottom-style: solid;border-bottom-width: 1px;padding-bottom: 1px\">\n<p align=\"center\" style=\"line-height: 150%;margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<br \/>\n<font size=\"2\">Page-82<br \/>\n<\/font><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p align=\"justify\" style=\"line-height: 150%;margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0\">when it is at rest, it exists none the less and is not abolished, diminished or in any way essentially altered. This reply is so<br \/>\nentirely rational and in accordance with the nature of things that we need not hesitate to accept it. For it is impossible,<br \/>\nbecause contradictory of reason, to suppose that Force is a thing alien to the one and infinite existence and entered into it<br \/>\nfrom outside or was non-existent and arose in it at some point in Time. Even the Illusionist theory must admit that Maya, the<br \/>\npower of self-illusion in Brahman, is potentially eternal in eternal Being and then the sole question is its manifestation or<br \/>\nnon-manifestation. The Sankhya also asserts the eternal coexistence of Prakriti and Purusha, Nature and Conscious-Soul,<br \/>\nand the alternative states of rest or equilibrium of Prakriti and movement or disturbance of equilibrium.<\/p>\n<p align=\"justify\" style=\"line-height: 150%;margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; But since Force is thus<br \/>\ninherent in existence and it is the nature of Force to have this double<br \/>\nor alternative potentiality of<br \/>\nrest and movement, that is to say, of self-concentration in Force and<br \/>\nself-diffusion in Force, the question of the how of the<br \/>\nmovement, its possibility, initiating impulsion or impelling cause does<br \/>\nnot arise. For we can easily, then, conceive that this<br \/>\npotentiality must translate itself either as an alternative rhythm of<br \/>\nrest and movement succeeding each other in Time or else<br \/>\nas an eternal self-concentration of Force in immutable existence with a<br \/>\nsuperficial play of movement, change and formation<br \/>\nlike the rising and falling of waves on the surface of the ocean. And<br \/>\nthis superficial play&#8212;we are necessarily speaking in<br \/>\ninadequate images&#8212;may be either coeval with the self-concentration and<br \/>\nitself also eternal or it may begin and end in Time<br \/>\nand be resumed by a sort of constant rhythm; it is then not eternal in<br \/>\ncontinuity but eternal in recurrence.\n<\/p>\n<p align=\"justify\" style=\"line-height: 150%;margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; The problem of the how thus<br \/>\neliminated, there presents itself the question of the why. Why should<br \/>\nthis possibility of a<br \/>\nplay of movement of Force translate itself at all? why should not Force<br \/>\nof existence remain eternally concentrated in itself,<br \/>\ninfinite, free from all variation and formation? This question also<br \/>\ndoes not arise if we assume Existence to be non-conscious<br \/>\nand consciousness only a development of material energy which we<br \/>\nwrongly suppose to be immaterial. For then we can say<br \/>\nsimply\n<\/p>\n<div style=\"border-bottom-style: solid;border-bottom-width: 1px;padding-bottom: 1px\">\n<p align=\"center\" style=\"line-height: 150%;margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0\">\n<font size=\"2\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Page-83<\/font><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p align=\"justify\" style=\"line-height: 150%;margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0\">that this rhythm is the nature of Force in existence and there is absolutely no reason to seek for a why, a cause, an initial<br \/>\nmotive or a final purpose for that which is in its nature eternally self-existent. We cannot put that question to eternal<br \/>\nself-existence and ask it either why it exists or how it came into existence; neither can we put it to self-force of existence<br \/>\nand its inherent nature of impulsion to movement. All that we can then inquire into is its manner of self-manifestation, its<br \/>\nprinciples of movement and formation, its process of evolution. Both Existence and Force being inert,&#8212;inert status and inert<br \/>\nimpulsion,&#8212;both of them unconscious and unintelligent, there cannot be any purpose or final goal in evolution or any original<br \/>\ncause or intention.<\/p>\n<p align=\"justify\" style=\"line-height: 150%;margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; But if we suppose or find<br \/>\nExistence to be conscious Being, the problem arises. We may indeed<br \/>\nsuppose a conscious<br \/>\nBeing which is subject to its nature of Force, compelled by it and<br \/>\nwithout option as to whether it shall manifest in the<br \/>\nuniverse or remain unmanifest. Such is the cosmic God of the Tantriks<br \/>\nand the Mayavadins who is subject to Shakti or<br \/>\nMaya, Purusha involved in Maya or controlled by Shakti. But it is<br \/>\nobvious that such a God is not the supreme infinite<br \/>\nExistence with which we have started. Admittedly, it is only a<br \/>\nformulation of Brahman in the cosmos by the Brahman which<br \/>\nis itself logically anterior to Shakti or Maya and takes her back into<br \/>\nits transcendental being when she ceases from her<br \/>\nworks. In a conscious existence which is absolute, independent of its<br \/>\nformations, not determined by its works, we must<br \/>\nsuppose an inherent freedom to manifest or not to manifest the<br \/>\npotentiality of movement. A Brahman compelled by Prakriti is not<br \/>\nBrahman, but an inert Infinite with an active content in it more<br \/>\npowerful than the continent, a conscious holder of Force of whom his<br \/>\nForce is master. If we say that it is compelled by itself as Force, by<br \/>\nits own nature, we do not get rid of the contradiction, the evasion of<br \/>\nour first postulate. We have got back to an Existence which is really<br \/>\nnothing but Force, Force at rest or in movement, absolute Force<br \/>\nperhaps, but not absolute Being. <\/p>\n<p align=\"justify\" style=\"line-height: 150%;margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; It is then necessary to examine into<br \/>\nthe relation between Force and Consciousness. But what do we mean by the latter <\/p>\n<div style=\"border-bottom-style: solid;border-bottom-width: 1px;padding-bottom: 1px\">\n<p align=\"center\" style=\"line-height: 150%;margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0\">\n<font size=\"2\">Page-84<\/font><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p align=\"justify\" style=\"line-height: 150%;margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0\">term? Ordinarily we mean by it our first obvious<br \/>\nidea of a mental waking consciousness such as is possessed by the human<br \/>\nbeing during the major part of his bodily existence, when he is not<br \/>\nasleep, stunned or otherwise deprived of his physical and<br \/>\nsuperficial methods of sensation. In this sense it is plain enough that<br \/>\nconsciousness is the exception and not the rule in the<br \/>\norder of the material universe. We ourselves do not always possess it.<br \/>\nBut this vulgar and shallow idea of the nature of<br \/>\nconsciousness, though it still colours our ordinary thought and<br \/>\nassociations, must now definitely disappear out of philosophical<br \/>\nthinking. For we know that there is something in us which is conscious<br \/>\nwhen we sleep, when we are stunned or drugged or<br \/>\nin a swoon, in all apparently unconscious states of our physical being.<br \/>\nNot only so, but we may now be sure that the old<br \/>\nthinkers were right when they declared that even in our waking state<br \/>\nwhat we call then our consciousness is only a small<br \/>\nselection from our entire conscious being. It is a superficies, it is<br \/>\nnot even the whole of our mentality. Behind it, much vaster<br \/>\nthan it, there is a subliminal or subconscient mind which is the<br \/>\ngreater part of ourselves and contains heights and profundities<br \/>\nwhich no man has yet measured or fathomed. This knowledge gives us a<br \/>\nstarting-point for the true science of Force and its<br \/>\nworkings; it delivers us definitely from circumscription by the<br \/>\nmaterial and from the illusion of the obvious.\n<\/p>\n<p align=\"justify\" style=\"line-height: 150%;margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Materialism indeed insists<br \/>\nthat, whatever the extension of consciousness, it is a material<br \/>\nphenomenon inseparable from<br \/>\nour physical organs and not their utiliser but their result. This<br \/>\northodox contention, however, is no longer able to hold the field<br \/>\nagainst the tide of increasing knowledge. Its explanations are becoming<br \/>\nmore and more inadequate and strained. It is<br \/>\nbecoming always clearer that not only does the capacity of our total<br \/>\nconsciousness far exceed that of our organs, the<br \/>\nsenses, the nerves, the brain, but that even for our ordinary thought<br \/>\nand consciousness these organs are only their habitual<br \/>\ninstruments and not their generators. Consciousness uses the brain<br \/>\nwhich its upward strivings have produced, brain has not<br \/>\nproduced nor does it use the consciousness. There are even abnormal<br \/>\ninstances which go to prove that our organs are not<br \/>\nentirely indispensable instruments,&#8212;that the heart-beats are not<br \/>\nabsolutely essential\n<\/p>\n<div style=\"border-bottom-style: solid;border-bottom-width: 1px;padding-bottom: 1px\">\n<p align=\"center\" style=\"line-height: 150%;margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0\">\n<font size=\"2\">&nbsp;Page-85 <\/font><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p align=\"justify\" style=\"line-height: 150%;margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0\">to life, any more than is breathing, nor the organised brain-cells to thought. Our physical organism no more causes or<br \/>\nexplains thought and consciousness than the construction of an engine causes or explains the motive-power of steam or<br \/>\nelectricity. The force is anterior, not the physical instrument.<\/p>\n<p align=\"justify\" style=\"line-height: 150%;margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Momentous logical<br \/>\nconsequences follow. In the first place we may ask whether, since even<br \/>\nmental consciousness<br \/>\nexists where we see inanimation and inertia, it is not possible that<br \/>\neven in material objects a universal subconscient mind is<br \/>\npresent although unable to act or communicate itself to its surfaces<br \/>\nfor want of organs. Is the material state an emptiness of<br \/>\nconsciousness, or is it not rather only a sleep of consciousness&#8212;even<br \/>\nthough from the point of view of evolution an original<br \/>\nand not an intermediate sleep? And by sleep the human example teaches<br \/>\nus that we mean not a suspension of<br \/>\nconsciousness, but its gathering inward away from conscious physical<br \/>\nresponse to the impacts of external things. And is not<br \/>\nthis what all existence is that has not yet developed means of outward<br \/>\ncommunication with the external physical world? Is<br \/>\nthere not a Conscious Soul, a Purusha who wakes for ever even in all<br \/>\nthat sleeps?<\/p>\n<p align=\"justify\" style=\"line-height: 150%;margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; We may go farther. When we<br \/>\nspeak of subconscious mind, we should mean by the phrase a thing not<br \/>\ndifferent from<br \/>\nthe outer mentality, but only acting below the surface, unknown to the<br \/>\nwaking man, in the same sense if perhaps with a<br \/>\ndeeper plunge and a larger scope. But the phenomena of the subliminal<br \/>\nself far exceed the limits of any such definition. It<br \/>\nincludes an action not only immensely superior in capacity, but quite<br \/>\ndifferent in kind from what we know as mentality in our<br \/>\nwaking self. We have therefore a right to suppose that there is a<br \/>\nsuperconscient in us as well as a subconscient, a range of<br \/>\nconscious faculties and therefore an organisation of consciousness<br \/>\nwhich rise high above that psychological stratum to<br \/>\nwhich we give the name of mentality. And since the subliminal self in<br \/>\nus thus rises in superconscience above mentality, may<br \/>\nit not also sink in subconscience below mentality? Are there not in us<br \/>\nand in the world forms of consciousness which are<br \/>\nsubmental, to which we can give the name of vital and physical<br \/>\nconsciousness? If so, we must suppose in the plant and the<br \/>\nmetal also a force to which we can\n<\/p>\n<div style=\"border-bottom-style: solid;border-bottom-width: 1px;padding-bottom: 1px\">\n<p align=\"center\" style=\"line-height: 150%;margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0\">\n<font size=\"2\">Page-86<\/p>\n<p><\/font><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p align=\"justify\" style=\"line-height: 150%;margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0\">give the name of consciousness although it is not the human or animal mentality for which we have hitherto preserved the<br \/>\nmonopoly of that description.<\/p>\n<p align=\"justify\" style=\"line-height: 150%;margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Not only is this probable<br \/>\nbut, if we will consider things dispassionately, it is certain. In<br \/>\nourselves there is such a vital<br \/>\nconsciousness which acts in the cells of the body and the automatic<br \/>\nvital functions so that we go through purposeful<br \/>\nmovements and obey attractions and repulsions to which our mind is a<br \/>\nstranger. In animals this vital consciousness is an<br \/>\neven more important factor. In plants it is intuitively evident. The<br \/>\nseekings and shrinkings of the plant, its pleasure and pain,<br \/>\nits sleep and its wakefulness and all that strange life whose truth an<br \/>\nIndian scientist has brought to light by rigidly scientific<br \/>\nmethods, are all movements of consciousness, but, as far as we can see,<br \/>\nnot of mentality. There is then a sub-mental, a vital<br \/>\nconsciousness which has precisely the same initial reactions as the<br \/>\nmental, but is different in the constitution of its<br \/>\nself-experience, even as that which is superconscient is in the<br \/>\nconstitution of its self-experience different from the mental<br \/>\nbeing.<br \/>\nD<\/p>\n<p align=\"justify\" style=\"line-height: 150%;margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Does the range of what we<br \/>\ncan call consciousness cease with the plant, with that in which we<br \/>\nrecognise the existence<br \/>\nof a sub-animal life? If so, we must then suppose that there is a force<br \/>\nof life and consciousness originally alien to Matter<br \/>\nwhich has yet entered into and occupied Matter,&#8212;perhaps from another<br \/>\nworld.<font face=\"Times New Roman\">\u00b9<\/font>For<br \/>\nwhence, otherwise, can it have come? The ancient thinkers believed in<br \/>\nthe existence of such other worlds, which<br \/>\nperhaps sustain life and consciousness in ours or even call it out by<br \/>\ntheir pressure, but do not create it by their entry. Nothing<br \/>\ncan evolve out of Matter which is not therein already contained.&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p align=\"justify\" style=\"line-height: 150%;margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<br \/>\nBut there is no reason to suppose that the gamut of life and<br \/>\nconsciousness fails and stops short in that which seems to<br \/>\nus purely material. The development of recent research and thought<br \/>\nseems to point to a sort of obscure beginning of life and<br \/>\nperhaps a sort of inert or suppressed consciousness in the metal and in<br \/>\nthe earth and in other &#8220;inanimate&#8221; forms, or at least<br \/>\nthe first stuff of<\/p>\n<p align=\"justify\" style=\"line-height: 150%;margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0\">&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p align=\"justify\" style=\"line-height: 150%;margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0\"><font face=\"Times New Roman\">&nbsp;&nbsp; <font size=\"2\">&nbsp;<br \/>\n\u00b9<\/font><\/font><font size=\"2\">&nbsp; The curious speculation is now current that<br \/>\nLife entered earth not from another world, but from another planet. To the<br \/>\nthinker that would explain nothing. The essential question is how Life comes<br \/>\ninto Matter at all and not how it enters into the matter of a particular planet.<br \/>\n<\/font><\/p>\n<div style=\"border-bottom-style: solid;border-bottom-width: 1px;padding-bottom: 1px\">\n<p align=\"center\" style=\"line-height: 150%;margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0\">&nbsp;<font size=\"2\">Page-87<\/font><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p align=\"justify\" style=\"line-height: 150%;margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0\">what becomes consciousness in us may be there. Only while in the plant we can dimly recognise and conceive the thing that<br \/>\nI have called vital consciousness, the consciousness of Matter, of the inert form, is difficult indeed for us to understand or<br \/>\nimagine, and what we find it difficult to understand or imagine we consider it our right to deny. Nevertheless, when one has<br \/>\npursued consciousness so far into the depths, it becomes incredible that there should be this sudden gulf in Nature. Thought<br \/>\nhas a right to suppose a unity where that unity is confessed by all other classes of phenomena and in one class only, not<br \/>\ndenied, but merely more concealed than in others. And if we suppose the unity to be unbroken, we then arrive at the<br \/>\nexistence of consciousness in all forms of the Force which is at work in the world. Even if there be no conscient or<br \/>\nsuperconscient Purusha inhabiting all forms, yet is there in those forms a conscious force of being of which even their outer<br \/>\nparts overtly or inertly partake.<\/p>\n<p align=\"justify\" style=\"line-height: 150%;margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Necessarily, in such a<br \/>\nview, the word consciousness changes its meaning. It is no longer<br \/>\nsynonymous with mentality but<br \/>\nindicates a self-aware force of existence of which mentality is a<br \/>\nmiddle term; below mentality it sinks into vital and material<br \/>\nmovements which are for us subconscient; above, it rises into the<br \/>\nsupramental which is for us the superconscient. But in all<br \/>\nit is one and the same thing organising itself differently. This is,<br \/>\nonce more, the Indian conception of Chit which, as energy,<br \/>\ncreates the worlds. Essentially, we arrive at that unity which<br \/>\nmaterialistic Science perceives from the other end when it<br \/>\nasserts that Mind cannot be another force than Matter, but must be<br \/>\nmerely development and outcome of material energy.<br \/>\nIndian thought at its deepest affirms on the other hand that Mind and<br \/>\nMatter are rather different grades of the same energy,<br \/>\ndifferent organisations of one conscious Force of Existence.\n<\/p>\n<p align=\"justify\" style=\"line-height: 150%;margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; But what right have we to<br \/>\nassume consciousness as the just description for this Force? For<br \/>\nconsciousness implies some<br \/>\nkind of intelligence, purposefulness, self-knowledge, even though they<br \/>\nmay not take the forms habitual to our mentality.<br \/>\nEven from this point of view everything supports rather than<br \/>\ncontradicts the idea of a universal conscious Force. We see,<br \/>\nfor instance, in the animal, operations of a perfect purposefulness\n<\/p>\n<div style=\"border-bottom-style: solid;border-bottom-width: 1px;padding-bottom: 1px\">\n<p align=\"center\" style=\"line-height: 150%;margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0\">\n<font size=\"2\">Page-88<\/p>\n<p><\/font><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p align=\"justify\" style=\"line-height: 150%;margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0\">and an exact, indeed a scientifically minute knowledge which are quite beyond the capacities of the animal mentality and<br \/>\nwhich man himself can only acquire by long culture and education and even then uses with a much less sure rapidity. We<br \/>\nare entitled to see in this general fact the proof of a conscious Force at work in the animal and the insect which is more<br \/>\nintelligent, more purposeful, more aware of its intention, its ends, its means, its conditions than the highest mentality yet<br \/>\nmanifested in any individual form on earth. And in the operations of inanimate Nature we find the same pervading<br \/>\ncharacteristic of a supreme hidden intelligence, &#8220;hidden in the modes of its own workings&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p align=\"justify\" style=\"line-height: 150%;margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; The only argument against a<br \/>\nconscious and intelligent source for this purposeful work, this work of<br \/>\nintelligence, of<br \/>\nselection, adaptation and seeking is that large element in Nature&#8217;s<br \/>\noperations to which we give the name of waste. But<br \/>\nobviously this is an objection based on the limitations of our human<br \/>\nintellect which seeks to impose its own particular<br \/>\nrationality, good enough for limited human ends, on the general<br \/>\noperations of the World-Force. We see only part of Nature&#8217;s<br \/>\npurpose and all that does not subserve that part we call waste. Yet<br \/>\neven our own human action is full of an apparent waste,<br \/>\nso appearing from the individual point of view, which yet, we may be<br \/>\nsure, subserves well enough the large and universal<br \/>\npurpose of things. That part of her intention which we can detect,<br \/>\nNature gets done surely enough in spite of, perhaps really<br \/>\nby virtue of her apparent waste. We may well trust to her in the rest<br \/>\nwhich we do not yet detect.<\/p>\n<p align=\"justify\" style=\"line-height: 150%;margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; For the rest, it is<br \/>\nimpossible to ignore the drive of set purpose, the guidance of apparent<br \/>\nblind tendency, the sure<br \/>\neventual or immediate coming to the target sought, which characterise<br \/>\nthe operations of World-Force in the animal, in the plant, in inanimate<br \/>\nthings. So long as Matter was Alpha and Omega to the scientific mind,<br \/>\nthe reluctance to admit intelligence as the mother of intelligence was<br \/>\nan honest scruple. But now it is no more than an outworn paradox to<br \/>\naffirm the emergence of human consciousness, intelligence and mastery<br \/>\nout of an unintelligent, blindly driving unconsciousness in which no<br \/>\nform or substance of them previously existed. Man&#8217;s consciousness can<br \/>\nbe nothing else than a form of Nature&#8217;s consciousness. It is there in<br \/>\nother <\/p>\n<p style=\"margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0;line-height:150%\" align=\"center\">Page -89<\/p>\n<hr size=\"1\">\n<p style=\"margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0;line-height:150%\" align=\"justify\">&nbsp;involved forms below Mind, it emerges in Mind, it shall<br \/>\nascend into yet superior forms beyond Mind. For the Force that builds the worlds<br \/>\nis a conscious Force, the Existence which manifests itself in them is conscious<br \/>\nBeing and a perfect emergence of its potentialities in form is the sole object<br \/>\nwhich we can rationally conceive for its manifestation of this world of forms.<\/p>\n<p style=\"margin-top: 0;margin-bottom: 0;line-height:150%\" align=\"center\">&nbsp;<font size=\"2\">Page-90<\/font><\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>CHAPTER&nbsp; X Conscious Force &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; They beheld the self-force of the Divine Being deep hidden&#8230;<\/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-642","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\/642","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=642"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/642\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=642"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=642"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=642"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}