Conservation and Progress     Mankind thinks naturally in extremes or else reconciles by a patchwork and compromise. It feels at ease in pursuing a single idea to its logical consequences and in viewing things from a single standpoint; but to harmonise different ideas in action and to view the facts from different stand- points is contrary to its native impulse. Oftenest it makes an incongruous patchwork rather than a harmony. The human mind is strong and swift in analysis; it synthesises with labour and imperfectly and does not feel at home in its synthesis. It divides, opposes and, placed between the oppositions it creates, becomes an eager partisan of one side or another; but to thin

The Conservative Mind and Eastern Progress     The arrival of a new radical idea in the minds of men is the sign of a great coming change in human life and society; it may be combated, the reaction of the old idea may triumph for a time, but the struggle never leaves either the thoughts and sentiments or the habits and institutions of the society as they were when it commenced. Whether it knows it or not, it has gone forward and the change is irretrievable. Either new forms replace the old institutions or the old while preserving the aspect of continuity have profoundly changed within, or else these have secured for themselves a period of greater rigidity, increasing corruption, progress

                                                                                     SRI AUROBINDO ON IDEALS AND PROGRESS Sri Aurobindo's Action PONDICHERRY-2. Published with financial assistance from the Government of India, Ministry of Education & Social Welfare. Compiled by Shivabhai G. Amin [It is a compilation from Sri Aurobindo's 'Ideals and Progress', excepting three paragraphs for which reference has been given separately] COPYRIGHT - SRI AUROBINDO ASHRAM TRUST 1972 PUBLISHER - SRI AUROBINDO'S ACTION FILMSET AND PRINTED AT ALL INDI

Yoga and Skill in Works     Yoga, says the Gita, is skill in works, and by this phrase the ancient Scripture meant that the transformation of mind and being to which it gave the name of Yoga brought with it a perfect inner state and faculty out of which the right principle of action and the right spiritual and divine result of works emerged naturally like a tree out of its seed.     The idea of works, in the thought of the Gita, is the widest possible. All action of Nature in man is included, whether it be internal or external, operate in the mind or use the body, seem great or seem little. From the toil of the hero to the toil of the cobbler, from the labour of the sage to the simp

THE HOUR OF GOD     There are moments when the Spirit moves among men and the breath of the Lord is abroad upon the waters of our being; there are others when it retires and men are left to act in the strength or the weakness of their own egoism. The first are periods when even a little effort produces great results and changes destiny; the second are spaces of time when much labour goes to the making of a little result. It is true that the latter may prepare the former, may be the little smoke of sacrifice going up to heaven which calls down the rain of Gods' bounty. - ( The Hour of God - 1970 Edition P. 3 )     Failures must be originally numerous in everything great and diff

Our Ideal     We believe in the constant progression of humanity and we hold that that progression is the working out of a Thought in Life which sometimes manifests itself on the surface and sometimes sinks below and works behind the mask of external forces and interests. When there is this lapse below the surface, humanity has its periods of apparent retrogression or tardy evolution, its long hours of darkness or twilight during which the secret Thought behind works out one of its phases by the pressure mainly of economic, political and personal interests ignorant of any deeper aim within. When the thought returns to the surface, humanity has its periods of light and of rapid efflorescence,