6

Rishabhchand Writes to Parichand

(Rishabhchand was not only a close friend but also his spiritual mentor before Parichand joined the Ashram in 1934. All the following letters were written before that year. The first letter, which shows remarkable intellectual maturity, had a decisive influence on his life. Rishabhchand was just twenty-four when he wrote it.)

"Uplands"

Shillong (Assam)

25.1.24

Dear Parichand,

I have received your letter. If I have to comply with your request fully, then I will have to write a Mahabharata; but neither have I the capacity for that nor have you the time to read it, therefore my answer will be as brief as possible.

What you want from me is a description of Shillong, a pen-picture. This is a photographer's or a litterateur's job — I would certainly fail if I venture to do it; because the essentials for this work are i) absolute fidelity to detail and, ii) range and minuteness of observation. I do not have either of these. You may say that I had — perhaps I had, but not any longer now.

Indeed the day I reached Shillong leaving the stuffy atmosphere of Calcutta, I heaved, as if, a sigh of relief. I saw Shillong the very next day. Since then, the idea of looking around in that sense did not occur to me till to-day. I saw open pale-blue sky above, everything green all around, and numerous pine-clad hills — big and small — leaning against the sky! The snow-silvered woods and pathways were sparkling brilliantly in the morning sunlight. The roads were very neat and clean — at some places they merged in the hills as in a total offering and again at some other places they spiralled up the hills as in an affectionate embrace. Here the sunrise and sunset were not like those in Puri.

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It is difficult to know exactly when the sun rises here and when it sets — all of a sudden it will appear from behind a hill, again at the end of the day it will similarly disappear behind some other hill. The beauty of Puri has a limitless expanse, a calm infinitude — those are missing here; here you find a rugged massiveness, a motionless magnificence, a strength, a silence. This is the Shillong I saw. I only know that I liked it immensely, no poetry however came to my mind — my communion with poets ceased long time back, they remain packed in the almirahs at Shibpur. I am not writing about what I saw or intended to see since then as they will not be of much interest to you.

Now, a different topic. On reading your letter I remembered my Presidency College days. There I was also immersed in poetry like you. Whenever I read a poet, modern and ancient, I cherished him in the solitude of my heart. I entwined my thoughts with his thoughts, my imaginations with his and laughed and wept together. I had wept more because those were more prone to tears. For no reason, I used to feel morose all of a sudden — how many parallel passages came to my mind. While looking indifferently at the moon, I thought myself to be like Shelley — how beautifully he has depicted similar moods in his poems. Again suddenly my heart fluttered, tears streamed down, many fading memories started coming back with their ever fresh charm reminding me of those matchless lines of Keats,

"To know the change and feel it,

When there is none to heal it."

I remembered the "Bright Star" of Keats looking at the evening star. Sometimes I rushed like mad after, "Alastor", "Endymion", again sometimes I slowly dissolved in the moonlit enchantment of "Kubla Khan". This was my condition at that time. Studies seemed quite dry, the struggle in earthly life was something that never crossed my mind. But let go of those dreamlands — "woven only dreams in the air". That wonderful scene depicted by Homer, the last farewell of Hector from Andromache — both of them outwardly evinced such hope, such

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enthusiasm yet in their hearts such deep sorrow — the speechless agony of a last farewell — the tearful sad look in the wide beautiful eyes of Andromache, her heaving heart and longing, lingering look after Hector was departed — there is no count as to how many times I have mentally enacted this scene on "bright moonlit enchanted nights" at the Outram Ghat. Then that startled look of Dante on ascending the "Third Sphere" — everything in the universe suddenly stopped for a moment, as if a gentle hand had all of a sudden covered up everything. Dante observed in spaceless wonder that he appeared to be no longer moving and his progress was arrested; deceived by the uniformity of everybody's speed he thought he had arrived. Then he looked at Beatrice, the lovely divine Beatrice standing in front of him with her flower-like figure; that fascinating angel of light and love has grown more beautiful, he had never seen her so beautiful, so sweet! Then at once Dante understood that his progress was not suspended, he was proceeding. Such thoughts used to frequent my mind's horizon all the time and their contact gave rise to so many ripples of which there was no limit.

Then I went to Berhampore to study B.A. At that time my poetry reading began to ebb. But I developed a strong inclination to teach poetry and assume a poet-like posture (one may say in common parlance "put up a poetic pose"). Have long hair parted in American style, keep the shirt buttons open in a carefully careless way, walk with a particular swaying gait stepping delicately that seemed to say, "Hold me dear, my body is quivering", and a constant half-smiling, half-tearful look in the face (pronounced by competent judges as very poetic!). To look at others in an oblique manner, to talk to people in a spirit of indifferent condescension, to fall in love ten times a day and fret twenty times in unbearable pangs of estrangement — these unmanly, unholy, un-Indian attitudes hummed like bees in my mind. Nobody keeps any count as to how many young men of Bengal who came in contact of Byron, Shelley but being unable to imbibe their good qualities aped these weak points instead and undermined their golden adolescence and youth. I used to receive lot of praises — everybody said, "Rishabhbabu under-

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stands poetry very well"; I also used to whisper in my mind's ears, "Yes, Rishabhbabu is a connoisseur of poetry". At its time Browning suddenly appeared on the canvas of my mind. During my LA. course, I had a glimpse of Browning but not much acquaintance, now he arrived to dominate my life. He weaned me away substantially from Byron, Keats and Shelley.

My demeanour seemed to be getting chastened gradually and I seemed to be having some living conception of religion, purity and God. I felt as if Browning's militant optimism, his clear insight into human nature, robust and severe conception of life were having a tonic effect on my mind. Yet I continued to languish almost in the same darkness as before.

Soon after this started the historic college boycott, I also left college. Then I could not understand that it would mean an altogether new turn in my life. There was then only a meaningless unaccountable indifferent attitude. I could not decide at all as to what I should do. Life held out no very bright prospect for me and literature failed to give me the calm I sought! I was in great trouble. The four years which I had spent in the company of poetry had a romantic element, even in its most acute sentimental sorrows there was a luxury. But those things did not seem to enthral me anymore — I no longer liked to run after shadows, as I wanted something tangible, substantial and real. I wanted to intensify that thing, of which I got just a hint from Browning, in all its plenitude and realise it in life. I was no longer satisfied to look at dreams as mere dreams, I wanted to actualise them, to materialise them in life. I had no truck with that dream that refuses to become real, I too refused to dally with it in fancy. This state continued for some time but not for long, however this time I am not writing about what happened thereafter.

You can easily find from this history of my life how terrible, how harmful is the consequence of having such an abnormal craze (this is in you also) for poetry!

Perhaps you will say, "Does it mean it is not right to read poetry?" Certainly it is right but one must know how to read and should read only proper poetry. Bathing in river water is definitely good for health but everybody knows that if one bathes

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in any river without any discrimination at all then one is bound to fall ill.

You see, it is time now for you to reflect what you will do in life. If you have decided to spend your life in dreaming then I have nothing much to say, because I know from my own experience that this illusion will not last long, you will have to wake up after a terrible jolt. If you are thinking of earning a name as a pleader or barrister and becoming a prominent "Babusahib" then also I have no comments because I have no experience at all in this matter; but if you have ever felt proud to be an Indian, if you have ever felt it an honour to be a follower of Mahabir Swami's religion then I welcome you to a life diametrically different from the one you have been accustomed to live — a life in which there is abundant poetry and abundant dream, but a poetry and dream which is of the essence of truth, and which finds its only fulfilment in the unblighted blossom of life.

A poet (kavi) in his rarest moment of inspiration transcends the commonplace things of daily life and realises for once the true magnitude of his divine Self — standing on the sea-shore he can hear the music from "beyond the ocean" — gets a glimpse of the infinity, the immensity of the soul, — this is his greatest delight, his soul's delight. According to Aristotle and Schopenhauer this is the spiritual and highest function of art. This delight a poet releases in versified form in the world. Whoever comes in contact with this delight feels exalted and tries to enrich his life on getting a hint of the True (Satyam), the Right (Ritam) and the Vast (Brihat). That is why what they understand by a 'Poet' is not the same as what the term 'Kavi' means to an Indian. Of all the definitions I have come across in English, the one by Pater is the best — "a poet is one who contemplates the spectacle of life with appropriate emotions". But this definition also does not satisfy me. In the term "kavirmanishi" appearing in Isha Upanishad, the kavi (poet) has been accorded a status higher than that of the manishi (thinker). A kavi or a seer, in the words of Aurobindo Ghosh, "having the divine supra-intellectual knowledge which by direct vision and illumination sees the

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reality, the principles and the forms of things in their true relation." Now the point is who can be a seer? Who can venture out on a love tryst with the eve r-beautiful? Who is able to enjoy the "joy for ever" of "a thin g of beauty" ?

Byron? No, I admire the cyclonic spirit of Byron found in 'Manfred' or 'Child Harold', but when I look at his immoral, imbecile, wretched life I comprehend that I must dissociate myself after admiring, otherwise I will possibly fall under evil influence.

I admire the revolutionary spirit of Shelley even more, but here too there is a danger. Here there is no sunlight, only twilight, only haze, only mist, at times there is so much darkness that it is difficult to recognise even one's own self. That is why Matthew Arnold's criticism of Shelley is very apt: "an ineffectual angel fluttering his wings in the void".

Coleridge is better; there was a spark, as if there was a man in the making but suddenly for some reason "was wrecked in a mist of opium" — yet it was quite beautiful.

Wordsworth is like an Indian to a great extent. There is a placidity of mind, a tolerable knowledge of good and evil, pure and impure, but very narrow, limited, ideas consistently poor.

How much more shall I write, you will see that you will never find a complete man in any Western poet. They deal only with intellectual and emotional matters. Only weaving nets, thought-weaving and word-weaving, hardly any depth within. Their ideas do not have any superconscious splendour. They are satisfied with the sensations of pleasure or pain, have no conception of bliss. (Of course do not conclude from the sweep of mine that I am flatly denouncing all the western poets, there are many honourable exceptions and these are not aimed at them.)

On the other hand look at Valmiki, look at Vedavyasa, which character is there in Ramayana that does not exalt you? Is there any woman in India who is not exalted even once by the character of Sita? Is there any man who is not charmed by the unearthly valour, nobility, sacrifice and magnanimity of Lakshman? How the mighty prowess, the titanic strength, the unlimited wealth of Ravana vanished in a moment like moving

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mist at the hands of Narayana in human form in the departure of ignorance on the advent of wisdom, the downfall of vice by the power of virtue — yet even after purging us with such a great tragedy "pity and terror" (functions of Greek tragedy), how it opens up in front of our eyes the panorama of a mortal world. We were left, as it were, face-to-face with the grand evolution of a certain moral law, gradual unfoldment of a fixed and immutable principle of God's world.

You may say, "That is an idealistic picture. I want one which is true to life, realistic." I would say that I have not seen anything more realistic than this. When I see before my eyes the picture of ancient India then I realise that the chastity of Sita may seem idealistic to the West but not to us. It is the most true representation of Indian womanhood, and not a distant overdrawn type. Judging by the criterion of the inferior culture of the West India calls its own glorious past a myth and wants to forget it — Indian women do not worship Sita any more and the consequence is the present state of India. Sita is now an anachronism, Ram-Lakshman, Vishnu, Yudhisthir are each a fantastic invention (!) and "Don Juan of Byron is very realistic".

One must not forget that in order to worship beauty one must make oneself beautiful. The ugly does not ever know how to worship beauty. If you read Ruskin you will understand that the only important refrain of all his art criticism is, "You must be good men before you can either paint or sing." To view nature through one's own passing moods, soundly abusing pathetic fallacy to force out tears from nature's eyes in one's own sorrow or to make it laugh in one's own joy is not the highest level of excellence in art. I do not call that person an artist if he has not accepted art as a Religion. And to me Religion means realisation, life, whole of life. I will be entitled to worship beauty only on that day when my interior and exterior are beautiful, pure and calm — one cannot create pure beauty with an impure heart. The beauty of Nature will truly enchant you on that day when you are bright like the moonlight, tender like a flower, gentle like the dew and again vast, wide, infinite like the sky. Instead of making Nature a companion in your ugly forms,

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instead of encumbering Nature with the dirty burden of your humdrum joys and sorrow, free yourself from the smallness of your habits and merge into the largeness, the sublimity of Nature, release yourself into the eternity of Nature, and you will find that you have an inseparable kinship with nature, that in every layer of your being Nature's greatness and transcendental vastness are blooming like roses, the resonance of its joyous melody in your heart-strings is becoming clearer. Rise above all the sentimentality of your nature, throw away all the morbidity, become thoroughly filled with knowledge, love, health, beauty, and you will see that the whole world rests in marvellous bliss and is contained in eternal supreme knowledge. The more you come in contact with Nature, the more you are in touch with great human nature, the more all the smallness, all the vileness of your heart will disappear, all the darkness will be dispelled — your own beauty will be reflected in Nature's beauty. Oscar Wilde has said, "Christ is just like a work of art." Look at the life of Gandhi — how beautiful, how poetic! Forget that sickly slumbrous form of poetry which you are accustomed to — search out the hidden springs of everlasting poetry in the lives of Christ, Gandhi and Buddha, you will find that Byron and Shelley would have been gratified had they received even a drop of the undercurrent of poetry of love and beauty and delight that ceaselessly flowed in the lives of Christ, Gandhi and Buddha and continued to regenerate mankind. There is no cloud, no sunset, no ebbtide in their delight. So I say, try to unplug the fountain-head of that beauty of poetry that is within you, and you will notice that all the levels of creation are linked within you, all the mysteries of the universe are concealed within you.

I feel like saying with Keats, "Two things fill my spirit with ever fresh and increasing wonder and awe, the oftener and the more steadfastly my thoughts occupy themselves therewith — the starry heavens above me and the moral law within me."

Maeterlinck understood after many attempts that neither creation of art nor appreciation of art is possible without the artist having inner moral beauty — "all that the mind has treasured must be bathed in the greatness of soul". Perhaps you know about

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Tolstoy, to him art meant that which elevates, exalts, enlightens and glorifies human being — that which lifts man out of his immediate surrounding and causes him to experience spiritual magnitude momentarily, makes him perceive that, "We are greater than we know", and that which debases, depresses is not art but a parody of art. In this context, bear in mind the following few lines of Browning:—

"And choose the pure;

And look where the healing waters run

And strive and strain to be good again,

And a place in the other world ensure,

All glass and gold, with God for its sun."

I will not write more. I had started by saying that I will not write a Mahabharata, but in the end I find that Mahabharata is nothing, I have produced instead its huge forefather. But I would consider this labour worthwhile to the day I see that you have outgrown this morbidity. To-day India needs you, your own Society, your religion wants you. Now you do not have the time or the right to stay back as a weakling. The new age that is beginning in India calls for innumerable votaries like you and me. We have to again develop in the mould of Vyasa — Valmiki — Vashishtha — in all the ashrams of India the worship of 'Satyam', 'Sivam' and 'Sundaram' must start anew. Will you be able to do it?

Yours

Sri Rishabhchand Samsukha

(Translated from the Bengali by Ashish Majumdar)

My dear Parichand,

Out of several I shall mention only a few most important reasons that made me decide in favour of the Asram life:

The first and foremost reason was a call from within, urgent and imperative, which I had not the power to resist. The second

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was a growing attraction of the atmosphere which seems to me to be surcharged with spiritual power. In fact, to breathe in such an atmosphere is to progress in Yoga. The third was the somewhat amazing rapidity of my own spiritual progress wrung out of a miraculously accelerated struggle in the nature. I do not know what it was precisely due to, but I suspect the electric pressure of the atmosphere must have been one of the causes. And the fourth reason was the physical touch of the Mother every morning at Pranam time which, I have no doubt, is a positive transmission of power. These, together with some minor contributory reasons, drove me to the decision.

I sent your letter to Sri Aurobindo asking for his opinion on the point raised by you. I am sending herewith a copy of his reply which will very likely clear the issues, lighten your path and instil fresh hope and courage into your heart to enable you to pursue yoga through the normal round of your worldly activities. It is silly diffidence, unpardonable in a sadhaka, to think that where I have failed you cannot succeed. Indeed, I do not think I failed there; I had been plodding on and progressing all through in my own way, struggling and fighting often against heavy odds no doubt, but still marching on, even with bleeding wounds, undismayed and unbeaten. Yours, if I mistake not, is a stronger nature than mine, especially that part of it — I mean the vital — which has always to bear the brunt of the whole encounter. There is a progressive psychic opening in you and marked widening and clarification of the intellect. I see no reason why you should despair. Go on intensifying your aspiration, pray for Light and Power whenever difficulties arise and, believe me, you will not find the labour impossible for you. You may also write to Sri Aurobindo as often as you desire, seeking help and guidance and protection and you will not fail to get them.

May God be with you! May you be the master of the field where I had been but an ambitious fighter!

18.3.32

Rishabhchand

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My dear Parichand,

Curiously, your letter came at a time when I was just rallying from a passing fit of depression, and it had a fine, bracing effect on my mind. It is a really beautiful letter — none more beautiful perhaps you have ever written — redolent of an exquisite sweetness, freshness and fragrance of a noble and sincere soul. I am delighted to find that you have made such a great progress. Let us always be pressing forward, not worrying over the falls, failures and even temporary set-backs. These things, you know, are inevitable. They have their purpose to serve in the economy of sadhaka's life. They come and go, leaving the sadhaka all the wiser and stronger for their coming. Each fit of depression or a period of struggle is succeeded by a greater calm and a richer experience in the evolving nature.

It would be better if you could control your desire to communicate your yogic experiences to your friends and fellow sadhakas; but that is extremely difficult, if not well nigh impossible, at the present stage. You can, however, write to me, if you like; but, — always at the breaking point, when the experience is of an original and remarkable character and reticence seems almost impossible. My personal experience is that this desire to speak about our realisations, to help our friends and admirers with spiritual instructions, to engage in discussions on spiritual subjects, spring, more often than not, from egoism, and the sooner we detect and give it up the better for us. We must not allow any habit to stand in the way of our spiritual growth. Nothing, I think, is so much needed for an ordered inner progress as perfect silence. It is the sadhaka's stronghold at once of security and strength. And all expression means expenditure until you get the Infinite to express itself through you. And when you get That, expression becomes a spontaneous outflow, an ever-developing, divine manifestation that knows no end or exhaustion. Helping others? — fancy the preposterous fun of a blind man's righteous ardour to guide his blind comrades! Yet, we have all been doing that.

But there is one way in which we can help others — a very difficult way. It is to see the Divine in them and offer our help,

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when asked for, as a sacrifice to Him without the slightest taint of egoism in the mind. But we had rather not be overeager to attempt it now. All we can do at present when advice or help is sought by our friends to let the inner being speak in its characteristic measured accents, taking good care to keep the wily ego at an arm's length. And as soon as the help is given, we should let the matter pass from our mind without creating any reactions. That is the safest course.

15.4.32

Rishabhchand

My dear Parichand,

"Even if the inner movements are quite encouraging and the whole atmosphere is calm and serene, the apprehension remains etc."

The very nature of the movements and the unmistakable reign of peace and calm ought to disarm all doubts and dissipate all apprehension.

But there are certain things which need some elucidation. I prayed to Sri Aurobindo to let me know what to write in reply to your letter but he says that he has no time and has asked me to write as best as I can.

In our yoga which is at once an unprecedented fusion and transcendence of Tantra and Vedanta (I mean the Upanishads), we aim at an integral union with the Divine Personality who is the supreme Reality eternally manifest and beyond all manifestation. That is also the implied sense of the Yoga propounded in the Geeta. But what the Geeta, obviously in the absence of the crowning realisation as well as of any testimony in the spiritual heritage of the race, could not expound in all its ultimate bearings and profound significances but was content to leave only a distant shining goal for future explorers, what even the Vedas could not fulfil but only glimpsed in rare moments and realised more or less imperfectly in exceptional individuals, Sri Aurobindo is bringing down to the earth-consciousness and rivetting it there in all its luminous amplitude. We have,

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therefore, to set sail to the vast undiscovered realms of the Spirit, steering clear of all the lures of past traditions with our Master as the only Pilot and captain of our souls.

In this Yoga, until the very highest consummation, it is the Divine Mother who does all the sadhana and it is Her Power alone that transforms the frail human vessel into a marvellous radiating centre of divine magnificence. Surrender to Her, unflinching reliance on Her are, then, to be our sole aim and endeavour.

First, as soon as the egoistic being turns away from the blind rut and sheer fatuity of the mechanical nature and abandons itself to a higher ideal of a free and unbounded existence, the Mother's Power comes down as shafts of fire to burn out all the filth and soils of past accretion and prepare the ground for an eventual deployment of Her higher energies. First, then in response to the call of the psychic being, the descent of the Shakti into the human adhara followed by a subtly graded action of purification mild or violent, short or prolonged according to the characteristic demand and previous preparation of the human nature and the progressive establishment of a transparent peace and purity. This is the decisive denouement, the final lifting of the midnight veil and the victorious emergence of the Purusha into the full blaze of his untrammelled existence. The Purusha stands out white and still, stark and sublime in its unconditioned self-delight, but if there is no stress in it for a further uprising and a more marvellous perfection, it stops short, becomes inevitably rapt in itself and, therefore lost to the plenitudes of the integral Divine.

This tendency, it seems to me, grows upon you fostered by the traditions of the past, specially by the quietistic elements of Jainism covertly active in the subconscious planes of your being. And that is why you tend to be absorbed with a spontaneous ease in the exclusive silence of the Purusha and lose the consciousness of the Mother.

But this has to be avoided, and the attraction of the absolute silence as the ultimate goal to be combated and replaced by a large and joyous assent to and enjoyment of the Mother's

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working in you. The Mother releases her child from its age-long coils not to lose it in the void of the colourless Impersonal, but to lead it to a blissful union with Her in Her eternal double status of self-transcendence and self-manifestation. We must, therefore, always maintain the attitude of a child bare and naked of all earthly appendage and aspiring for an integral union with Her.

A lucid calm and peace in the beginning — that is also Her gift, an indispensable base She prepares for the rapturous unravelling of Her supernal mysteries. But this calm defeats its own object if it becomes an end in itself. The Purusha, even in the midst of the most luminous stillness of its free self-existence must be constantly concentrated on the highest Divine and will the highest transformation and perfectioning of the universal nature. It is this Will which is a reflex of the Will of the Transcendent Divine to manifest His divinity in the world and carries within it the seed of its fulfilment.

So far as I think, the best course for you to follow would be to reject all the obscure movements of the lower nature with an uncompromising thoroughness and steadily call down, watch and enjoy the working of the Mother's Power in your instrumental nature. If it is followed with faith, patience, a wide vigilance and an unflagging sincerity, it is bound to lead to a double result — on one side a smiling peace and serenity in the whole consciousness and on the other a progressive transformation and a heightened activity in the whole nature. Persistence in it will dissolve the knots of the ego and the perception of the Mother as the sovereign mistress and ruler of the nature will crystallise into a solid and permanent realisation.

Another thing of importance that can be kept in view is this, that all insistences of the nature are to be completely silenced. Insistence on results, on certain mental formations of spiritual experiences, on Power and Vision as the ignorant mental being conceive them — this insistence, though an unavoidable and somewhat useful factor in the initial stages of the Yoga, becomes a great hindrance to any radical change. You must not ask but only give — this is surrender. No hope, no stipulation, no preference

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but a glad and devoted consecration of your entire being to the transforming Force of the Divine Mother and an unresting aspiration for the perfect fulfilment of Her Will.

You will find the philosophy of this yoga outlined in "The Essays on the Gita", but not quite developed even there; for its philosophy, the revealing word of its supreme import and significance, can only be uttered when its highest objective has fully materialised. But for its science we can always turn to "The Mother" which gives in a pregnant brevity of form all the salient features of its evolution and a firm and sure direction on its many-runged ladder of ascent.

This, I hope, will help you to a certain extent to set your unmeaning doubts at rest. From what I feel in regard to your sadhana, I can very well assure you that you are making admirable progress in spite of the buffet of such uncongenial surrounding and even in spite of such recurrent attacks of mental misgivings. The Mother's Power is always within you and the wide wings of Her protection are spread over you. You have only to be conscious of them to set them working with a sovereign effectivity.

Yours sincerely

Rishabhchand

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