THE MOTHER'S REVEALING TALKS
BEFORE dealing with the year 1939-40, let us have an interlude.
The greatness of a personality lies in its creative power, the power not only to influence but to mould the lives of others. The Ashram is a living example of the Mother's creative power. More eloquent than anything else are the power and presence that radiate from the atmosphere of the Ashram; her environment is redolent of divinity.
A devotee's father on a day's visit from Calcutta (1961) was given only one minute's time for Pranam and no talk. On coming down he said, "For long I had been hearing about the greatness of the Mother. To-day I have learnt what is Brahmatej, Fire of God."
As, charcoal loses its blackness in fire, our nature, however black, is sure to attain snow-white purity if we keep aflame our faith in the Mother's Grace. One must allow all the smoke to pass off and be, in the Vedic terms, tapta tanu.
Among all the Ashram periodicals,1. a quarterly called Bulletin of Physical Education,2 started from February 1949,
1.The Quarterly Advent was the first magazine of the Ashram which began its appearance from Madras in 1942. Now it is printed here along with other periodicals, such as : Monthly Mother India, Purodha (Hindi), Annuals Sri Aurobindo Mandir and Sri Aurobindo Circle; and Quarter lies Bartika and Purodha (Bengali), Dakshina (Gujarati), Sanjivan (Marathi), Vaikarai (Tamil), Arka (Telegu), Dipti (Kannada) and Navajyoti (Oriya).
2.Since the 1st January 1959, Sri Aurobindo International Centre of Education has been the official name of the educational institution of the Ashram instead of the former name, Sri Aurobindo International University Centre. The Bulletin is now the official organ of the institution, and accordingly renamed: Bulletin of Sri Aurobindo International Centre of Education.
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occupies the most important place.
It is regularly published on every Darshan day from our press. The Ashram has a printing press of its own in which there are two up-to-date monotype casting machines. Hymns to the Mystic Fire was the first book printed on the treadle machine in 1946. At that time the cylinder machines were not fitted up. A Heidelberg printing machine of German make was a subsequent addition (1961). The Mother on Sri Aurobindo with its symbolic picture drawn by the Mother herself, all printed on Ashram-made paper, was the first turn-out from this machine. Generally, one ton of paper is required per month; on Darshan occasions two tons. For the Centre of Education Series 5 tons per issue per year.
Just as in the earlier phases of the Ashram Sri Aurobindo's letters guided and stimulated the sadhana of the older generation, similarly in the later phases, when children became almost the dominant feature, the Mother's participation in much of their life had a quickening effect on the creative part of their being and incidentally in the being of the whole Ashram, older people as well as the children. Everybody found in the person of the Mother the very picture of the ideal she set forth in her talks. How she played her human part with divine beauty could abundantly be sensed in her word, in her actions, in her movements.
In all her movements her one aim was to kindle in the children the fire of a higher life and call forth their inherent potentialities.
In the words of a girl student who has been here since 1949 and was then eleven, "Whenever there is any kind of depression or uneasiness I turn to the pages of the Bulletin and come across some passages which turn my thoughts to a different channel and cheer me up."Another girl said , "Whenever there is time I tum to the old issues of the Bulletin. They are so pleasing to read."
Really speaking, it is a handbook of our sadhana. What is
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said in it will never grow old.
A member of the Ashram borrowed a copy of the Bulletin and in the course of his reading came upon a passage which he liked very much and then returned the copy. A few days after, he longed to read the same passage again, and again borrowed the same copy , read and returned it. A third time also he did so. At last he copied out the passage and treasured it. Such is our attraction for the Mother's writings in the Bulletin.
A German professor who was here for more than a year in 1962-63 translated portions of the Bulletin into German and regularly sent them to Germany for a select few there. He has started Integraler Yoga, a quarterly from Germany.
More or less 350 copies of the Bulletin are distributed on every Darshan occasion to sadhaks — teachers of the Education Centre, Playground captains, the Ashram doctors, the engineers and departmental heads of the Ashram. Up to 1958 the Mother used to hold a class thrice a week from 5.15 to about 6 p.m to render Sri Aurobindo's works into French. Later on, these renderings and the Mother's talks in the evening classes passed into the Bulletin.
The high standard that is maintained throughout is unique. The contents are in English and French side by side. For Hindi-knowing readers there is a separate version.
Much of the Mother's literature is in the form of answers to questions. Words of the Mother, Part One, was in answer to questions, put by Miss Maitland who was staying in Balicourt House. Once a week she used to go to Belle Vue House, where an American couple, the Macpheeters, stayed. Pavitra, Nolini, Amrita used to be present when the Mother gave her talks in 1928. Nolini took notes. The result was Words of the Mother, Part One, formerly known as Conversations with the Mother. Just as Sri Aurobindo's The Mother is the first book after the Siddhi of 1926, so is this the first book of the Mother after the Siddhi.
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An American Professor chanced upon this book in the hands of a visiting sadhak of the Ashram who was then on an all-India tour somewhere in North India. The professor borrowed it and spent the whole night over it. The eagerness it aroused led him to the Ashram. When he left, he remarked that one day the spiritual force of the Ashram would spread all over the earth. He was known to Nistha (Miss Wilson) and had come here before her coming.
The Mother's writings are generally in French. A German lady whose repeated visits to India were exclusively for the sake of the Ashram, said: "I have learnt English to read Sri Aurobindo in the original, now I shall learn French to read the Mother in the original."
For the same reason most of the adults in the Ashram learn this beautiful language.
In the Playground, whenever any of the youngsters spoke to the Mother in English, she would invariably reply in French. All this inspired Tara and Usha, the then captains of the smaller group, to speak among themselves in French. When the Mother was informed she wanted to see what they had learnt. She put short questions. The youngest ones of the group were Kokila and Poornima. On the first day there was some fun. The Mother asked Kokila:
"Quel age as-tu ?" "How old are you ?"
"Je m'appelle Kokila." "My name is Kokila."
"Et comment t'appelles-tu?" "And what's your name?"
"J'ai huit ans." "I am eight."
Whenever an answer required some explanation the Mother sat down to give it. This is how her talks started in the Children's Courtyard, with the youngest of all groups, the Green Group, on November 17,1950. In the beginning it was a daily class. On the 19th she spoke on I'abeille, the bee. On and from the 17th the Mother gave readings from her Belles Histories, Later on, three
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days a week were fixed: Tuesday—recitation; Friday—story-telling by the Mother; Sunday—dictation. From 1955 or so the class was held once a week.
The Red Group joined later. The Prayers and Meditations class of the Red Group started on June 6, 1951, with seven little girls.
As a rule, children below three are not allowed to enter the Playground or go to the Mother. But a young boy, P of one year and eight months, was permitted to see her the very day he came here in August 1948. That was his first visit. From the day of his second visit he was allowed to go to the Mother daily with his sister. He started to prattle with the Mother in English when he was two and a half years old. Stretching forth his little hand he would say, "Mader—toffee." And the Mother gave him toffees one after another but not more than four.
In August 1950 he asked for Darsan of Sri Aurobindo. The Mother gave him a special written permit. That was the only Darsan he could have of Sri Aurobindo. Back in Delhi the boy wrote, " Mother come Delhi." The Mother wrote back, "You come here."
He was allowed to stay in the Children's Home when he was three and a half years old, the youngest boy to join the Green Group.
One or two instances of how he was free with the Mother: During those days the Mother used to sit in a small chair all through the marching exercises. P would come and stand by the side of the Mother or catch her by the hand or gently pull her gown. One day he pulled the footstool kept for the Mother's use and sat on it. When his sister dissuaded him, the Mother said : "Don't tell him anything." He would often come and sit.
There was a time when people frequently had individual talks with the Mother till 9.30 p.m. in the Playground. One day she left the Playground at 11.30.
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Once X was talking and talking for 45 minutes when P came up and took the Mother away by the hand to his Group. The child's unexpected move was a relief to all !
When he first learnt running and walking races he wanted to play the very same games with the Mother and the Mother actually played with him. But when he asked the Mother to join him in the rabbit race, she smilingly refused.
To check the playful habit in little children of telling lies, the Mother had asked each member of the Green Group to keep count of the lies they spoke in the course of the day. When his turn came P made a gesture with his hand amidst laughter and said, "But, I have not counted."
Apropos of the counting of lies we may tell an anecdote. A child had kept concealed the cycle-key of another simply for fun. As the owner looked about here and there he kept on chuckling. After a time the owner left the place. The moment the child (the culprit) remembered he had acted a lie, he ran to give him the key.
P had his first lesson in handwriting by copying a waving line drawn by the Mother.
Would it be believed that the Mother could come down to such trifles to give delight to the children?
To a question : "Why do we not profit as much as we should by our presence here in the Ashram ? The Mother said in a stirring tone : "Ah! It is very simple! Because it is too easy. When you have to go round the world to find a teacher, when you have to abandon everything in order to get only the first words of teaching, then this teaching, this spiritual aid becomes a very precious thing, like all things that are difficult to obtain, and you try hard to deserve it.
"Here, most of you came quite young, at an age when there was no question of spiritual life or spiritual teaching; that would have been quite premature. You have indeed lived in the atmosphere but without even perceiving it; you are accustomed
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to see me, hear me, I speak to you as one speaks to children, I have even played with you as people play with children; you have only to come and sit down and hear me speak, you have only to put a question to me and I answer you, I have never refused to say anything to anybody, it is so easy. It is enough to live, sleep, eat, take exercises and go to school. You live here as you would anywhere else. So you have got the habit....
"One day you will say: "Well, I was here so long, I could have learnt so much, realised so much, and I did not even think of it'...
"That day you will go quick, you will advance with a giant's step."
The questions the children put give an insight into the working of their minds.
"When does the spiritual life begin ?"
"When one is united with one's psychic being and conscious of the divine presence, when one gets the impulse for action from this divine presence, when one's will has become a conscious collaborator with the divine will, then that is the starting-point.
"Before this, one can be an aspirant for the spiritual life, but has not got the spiritual life."
N once asked the Mother, "When far away I utter to myself your name and call for your aid, do you hear the call?"
The Mother: "When in the midst of my work I make an abrupt halt and give you the answer, do yo hear me ?"
We find in the Bulletin a question of the same type :
" 'I am with you'—what does it exactly mean ?
"When we pray or struggle with a problem within ourselves, are we really heard, always in spite of our clumsiness and imperfection, in spite of even our bad will and our error? And who hears ? You who are with us ?"
"And is it you in your supreme consciousness, an impersonal divine force, the force of yoga or you, the Mother in a body with your physical consciousness ? A personal presence that knows our each thought and each act and not some anonymous force?
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Can you tell us how and in what way you are present with us?
"Sri Aurobindo and you, it is said, form one and the same consciousness, but is there a personal presence of Sri Aurobindo and your personal presence, two things distinct, each playing its own role?"
The Mother : "I am with you because I am you or you are I.
"I am with you, that signifies a world of things, because I am with you on all levels, in all planes, from the supreme consciousness down to the most physical. Here, at Pondicherry, you cannot breathe without breathing my consciousness. It saturates the atmosphere almost materially, in the subtle physical and extends to the Lake, 10 kilometres from here. Further, my consciousness can be felt in the material vital, then on the mental planes, everywhere.....
"But that apart, there is a special personal tie between you and me, between all who have turned to Sri Aurobindo's and my teaching,—it is well understood, distance does not count here, you may be in France, you may be at the other end of the world or at Pondicherry, the tie is always true and living. And each time there comes a call, each time there is a need for me to know so that I may send out a force, an inspiration, protection or any other thing, a sort of message comes to me all of a sudden and I do the needful. These communications reach me evidently at any moment, and you must have seen me more than once stop suddenly in the middle of a sentence or work, it is because something comes to me, a communication and I concentrate.
"With those whom I have accepted as disciples, to whom I have said "yes", there is more than a tie, there is an emanation of me. This emanation warns me whenever it is necessary and tells me what is happening. Indeed I receive intimations constantly but all are not recorded in my active memory. I would be flooded;
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the physical consciousness acts like a filter."3
II
Peace was the first thing that the Yogis of the past sougth for. X had frequent descents of peace during the days when there was correspondence with Sri Aurobindo. But the mind had its own way after a time. He could not find a clue to stop thoughts peeping in.
The trouble had started since he had taken up Yoga. When ever he tried to meditate his mind became a playfield of random thoughts. Years passed without any sign of improvement. He then thought of making the mind vacant at least for a minute. He tried but failed and tried again. Hundreds of failures did not deter him from trying again. He would stand at the door of the mind like a sentinel or persuade it like a child to be still for a time. What he found most difficult was to avoid sex thoughts. In the Bulletin of November 1956 he came across the following question and answer:
Question : "I think I am sometimes on the point of having this experience but I always fall back into the ordinary consciousness. Why?"
The Mother: "Probably you have still maintained a division in you. One part of your being refuses to advance with the rest, a part that clings to itself does not want to move, insists on being what it is. It is that which pulls you back.
"One part of yourself delays, stops; and instead of compelling it to follow, you leave it on the way. You close your eyes, you blind yourself, you do not want to see that you have this difficulty, this ignorance or this stupidity. You do not want to see, because it is not very pretty to see, you prefer to ignore it. But simply because you ignore it, it does not cease to exist.
3. Bulletin, February, 1958, p. 75.
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"It serves no purpose to play the ostrich; one day or another you must face it, you have to.
"Otherwise, you see the goal there approaching. Something in you moves forward, you are about to touch it, but never will you touch it if you have these fetters dragging you back..."
The passage led X inward to search within. One by one he began to detect his defects. There arose a resolution 4 from within; this division must go. The result was immediate but short-lived. He could now check his thoughts but only for a while. The initial success gave him the necessary strength and enthusiasm to keep up the attempt despite frequent failures.
Two years later he read in another issue of the Bulletin:
"So long as one has not cut the last root of man's desire for woman, one possesses only a captive mind and is as bound as a calf sucking its Mother."
The words sank into his being. He felt the heavy chain so long weighing upon him snap. Now it is so easy for him often to make the mind empty at will.
A friend of mine wondered why God should put His seeker in the middle of a sea of sorrows, or fling him into a furnace or make his life miserable in a thousand ways, Does He delight in throwing him like an insect into a spider's web and watching his struggle to get out. If He likes man to seek and find Him, why does He subject him to such suffering ?
None of his friends, none of the saints, sages and yogis whom he met could give him a convincing reply. Sri Aurobindo has dealt with the problem at great length in The Life Divine, Chapter XI, "Delight of Existence : The Problem", and Chapter XII, "Delight of Existence : The Solution". According to
4. "Of course the length of time depends on each individual, but it can be very much shortened if you make a really firm resolve. Resolution is the one thing required—resolution is the master-key"—Words of the Mother, Third Series, P. 9.
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Sri Aurobindo : "If then evil and suffering exist, it is He that bears the evil and suffering in the creature in whom He has embodied Himself."5
And again : "Himself the play, Himself the player, Himself the playground."6
When I lighted on the following passage in the Bulletin of April, 1959,1 thought that no more beautiful answer could there be than the Mother's exposition.
The Mother herself raised the question, "....What is the use of having struggled so much, suffered so much, created something which, at least in its outward appearance, is so tragic and dramatic, if it is only to teach you how to come out of it,—better not to have begun at all."
She gave the answer : "But if you go down to the bottom of things, if, rid not only of all egoism but also of ego, you give yourself totally, unreservedly, so completely, so disinterestedly as to enable you to know the Purpose of the Lord Supreme, then you know that it is not a bad joke, it is not a tortuous path simply to come back—somewhat bruised—to the starting point. It is, quite on the contrary, in order that the whole creation may learn the delight of being, the beauty of being, the greatness of being, the majesty of a sublime life, and the perpetual, ever-progressive growth of this delight and beauty and grandeur."
Do we not find concerning each problem the approaches and the solutions by Sri Aurobindo and the Mother essentially the same, yet complementary to each other ?
Ours is not a yoga having nothing to do with life and its associations. If one accepts life one must accept its trials and tribulations. Families are allowed to stay in the Ashram. But families or no families, tensions are bound to arise between person and person so long as they are in their common human nature.
5. The Life Divine (American Edition), P.89. 6. The Life Divine (American Edition), P.
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Victory is to those who emerge out of its grip.
When Y's troubles in the daytime with his office assistants and with others would tell upon his nerves in the night and make him walk restlessly up and down the verandah (for he would not let his passion burst out but suffer within himself), he would seek relief in the divine words of the Gita and Sri Aurobindo and other sources.
The Gita says :
"He who can bear unperturbed here in the body the velocity of wrath and desire, is the Yogin, the happy man."
Sri Aurobindo counsels : "Do not be troubled by your surroundings and their oppositions. These conditions are often imposed at first as a kind of ordeal. If you remain tranquil and undisturbed and continue your sadhana without allowing yourself to be inwardly troubled under these circumstances, it will help to give you a much needed strength; for the path of Yoga is always beset with inner and outer difficulties and the sadhaks must develop a quiet, firm and solid strength to meet them."
The Mother's precept is practical, direct and dynamic:
"This, you may say, is the ultimate end, the crown of the effort, the final victory. But what is to be done to reach there? What is the path to follow and what are the first steps on the way?
"Since we have decided to reserve love in its full splendour for our personal relation with the Divine, we shall, in our relation with others, replace it by a whole-hearted, unchanging, constant and egoless kindness and goodwill. It shall not expect any reward or gratitude or even recognition. Whatever the way the others treat you, you will not allow yourself to be carried away by resentment: and in your puse unmixed love for the Divine you shall leave him the sole judge as to how he is to protect you and defend you against the misunderstanding and bad will of others.
"Your joys and your pleasures you will await from the
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Divine alone. In him alone you will seek and find help and support. He will comfort you in all your pain, lead you on the path, lift you up if you stumble, and if there are moments of faint-ness and exhaustion, he will take you in his strong arms of love and wrap you in his soothing sweetness."
Another instance. A professor intimately connected with the Ashram learnt that one of his colleagues whom he had helped on several occasions was trying to spoil his chances of promotion out of sheer jealousy. He also came to know that that man made fun of his sadhana and even imputed ulterior motives to his frequent visits to the Ashram and even went so far as to spread the rumour that he was getting mad and, therefore, unfit for the post he was holding. Naturally this enraged the professor and he began to think how to take suitable revenge upon him He was determined to teach him the lesson of his life. And then in the course of his reading the Bulletin, he came across the passage quoted above.
At onec he realised that it was wrong of him to think of taking revenge. He resolved not to think much of how others treat him and has made it a part of his sadhana to see that he is not carried away by resentment even under the greatest provocations. He is slowly growing unmindful of what others speak about him.
III
An account of the far-reaching effect of the pictures of the Bulletin will be of interest.
A young girl of 5 or 6 would ask her parents from time to time to take her to someone of white complexion. No one could make out what she meant. Her father used to pay visits to various saints and sages. Once he visited the Ashram. On return he spoke to his daughter about the Mother, showing her at the same time a picture in the Bulletin, Seeing the picture the girl at once exclaimed. "Yes, it is she, I want to go to her."
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She came with her father in December, 1956. In those days the Mother gave prasad to everyone in the Playground. All would file past her, taking her gift. There was no pranam, The girl's father followed the rule, took the prasad and walked on. The girl, just behind, instead of following her father and others in the same way, sat down before the Mother with folded hands and kept looking her in the eyes and then fell at her feet. She had had no such example to imitate. Her movements were her own, prompted from within.
Thereafter she insisted upon staying in the Ashram for good. The father could not decide what to do. Next day he went to the Playground with a seven-page letter setting forth the whole situation. When he was about to hand it to the Mother she withdrew into herself. A few seconds after, she received it with a smile.
After two years' stay in the Ashram, they had to go back to dispose of some home affairs. One day the father of the girl called together some of the playmates of his daughter who were there and said, "Let us see how long you can all meditate." While the other children could not keep their eyes shut even for two minutes, his daughter sat motionless, eyes closed, for 20 minutes.
Another day her father saw that the girl was swinging her body from side to side, with eyes shut. On enquiry she said that she saw herself sitting in a boat which the Mother was rowing. The swinging was due to the waves.
About the middle of the forties there was a talk in the air that very fine souls were descending on earth. When a question was put to Sri Aurobindo he confirmed it.
Here is an instance of a very little boy in Calcutta. While he was still in his mother's womb she dreamt of Sri Ramakrishna. Even when very young, whatever he spoke about the duration of his own illness or of other people's affairs would come true. Out of a heap of pictures given to the boy X, the moment his eyes fell upon the photo of Sri Aurobindo he said: "This is God," and
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added, "There are two Gods (Bhagawan) there." And, turning to X who had given him the pictures, he said, "Go and live there." When the case of this boy was referred to Sri Aurobindo he wrote back : "It is certainly remarkable. But there are a number of children bom recently who have their psychic being already awake as if from birth and seem to have a knowledge already acquired in them. This may be one of these children."
A one-year old girl, when taken to the Mother on her first birth-day let herself fall at the Mother's feet and then began to clap her little hands, with her lips lit up with smiles. The Mother remarked: "What a pretty girl!"
Again on May 5,1967, at the age of two when she went to the Mother she spoke out in her mother-tongue, "Make me good, make me wise."At this the Mother said: "She is a remarkable girl."
The mother of this girl whom we shall call B had received a message from the Mother just on her wedding day:
"To be a true wife is as difficult as to be a true disciple. Love and Blessings.
Two incidents about her early life : When B first came to the Ashram she was seven months old, so she was not allowed in. At the time there used to be evening meditation, when the main-gate remained closed. A bell announced the beginning of meditation. The moment the bell was gone B, then only seven months old, would bow her head in reverence.
Her next visit to the Ashram was at the age of two. Leaving her under the care of servants B's parents went up for Darshan. When they returned they saw the girl sitting before the photo with incense sticks burning. To the parents B said, "See, I too had the Darshan."
Once the Mother remarked about the girl: "She is very conscious of her previous life."
What led wandering X to the Ashram is an interesting story. Once he was travelling by train in the same compartment with
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Tibbati Baba, reputedly then 200 years old. He told X that he would come in contact with a great Yogi. At the time X did not care much about such things. Then he made up his mind to go out on an all -India tour. At Amarnath he perceived in the image of Shiva the image of Sri Aurobindo.
On another occasion during his tour an old woman pressed him to perform Puja in her Shiva temple. He refused outright but being pressed again and again he agreed. While offering his last Pranam after the Puja the Mantra that came out of his lips was :
Om namo bhagavate Sriaravindaya !
and as he raised his head he saw the figure of Sri Aurobindo !
After his first experience at Amarnath he had written for a photo of Sri Aurobindo. Photos were rare in those days. The negative answer threw him into a mood of disappointment. While sitting quietly on the bank of the Jhelum he saw a man walking past. After having gone 50 steps or so ahead, he turned back and drew out of his bundle an autographed photo of Sri Aurobindo and gave it to him.
When he wrote to his friend at Pondicherry how his prayer for a photo was fulfilled, his friend wrote to the Master. The reply he received was: 'The vision at Amarnath was Shiva's answer to X's prayer and in the nature of a Call. The bringing of a photograph must have been a continuance of the same Grace. But there are different parts of the nature which can answer to different forces and very often immediately after the call has come..."(11-11-1935)
Regarding the vision of Linga in the same letter, he wrote : "The significance is clear—our identity with what is present in the Linga."
While offering lotuses, one by one, to the Ganga at Hardwar, X saw in each floating flower the figures of the Mother and of Sri Aurobindo. To a question Whether this had any symbolic
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significance, the Master wrote : 'The lotuses are souls opening to the Truth with ourselves seated in their consciousness." (30.8.1937)
From Amarnath to Pondieherry he did the journey on foot. On coming here he was given permission for permanent stay. One of his first impressions of the Ashram was that even its trees and plants were absorbed in meditation.
One day (1937) while in meditation he saw Sri Aurobindo seated on a snow-white mountain-top and the Mother on her rounds on a lion. On being asked Sri Aurobindo explained:
'The lion is the force at work and the movement signifies the Mother's spiritual activity—myself on the summit of Consciousness supporting her action."(30.9.1937)
Sri Aurobindo's writings are part of his missioned work. The Mother is writing new Shastras7 in the Bulletin. Day in, day out, we hear stories of people from far and near drawn towards the Ashram, led by the light from the books of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother.
A German, Justice of Frankfort, spent one full year on the study of the tiny book, The Mother before he came here once for all. He called it the Upanishad of our age.
7. Hundreds and thousands of extracts can be given to show how their teachings are revolutionary. Renunciation has a high place in the religious world. But in her talks of 1930 the Mother said :
"There is in books a lot of talk about renunciation,—that you must renounce possessions, renounce attachments, renounce desires. But I have come to the conclusion that so long as you have to renounce anything you are not on this path; for, so long as you are not thoroughly disgusted with things as they are, and have to make an effort to reject them, you are not ready for the supramental realisation ... Only when you find such a world disgusting, unbearable and unac ceptable are you fit for the change of consciousness."
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The periodicals of the Ashram serve,8 each in its own way, to spread the thought of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother. A visitor from Panna said: "Now the idea has caught on that it is not necessary to burn one's boats in order to seek the Divine. Living in the world one can serve the Divine, surrender himself to the Divine. It is so pleasing to hear about the Mother whenever anyone from the Ashram visits us."
The priest of a family temple came here with the children of his master. In the course of a talk he said, "The age of Saint Kabir is now a thing of the past. Kabir taught: 'He who can turn his back upon his home for ever can follow me !' Now the time has come to make the home itself the abode of God. Not to run about in search of God leaving the home to its fate."
On being asked, "What is it that charms you the most here?" He said : "What is not here with which one is not charmed ?" These are simple utterances of the common run of men.
8. "The object is to make the reading public better acquainted with the nature of this Yoga and the principle of what is being done in the Ashram ...I come in only so far as it is necessary for the public to know my thought and what I stand for." 24.9.1935—Sri Aurobindo on Himself and on the Mother, P-340.
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