PHYSICAL TRANSFORMATION SRI Aurobindo insists so much on physical transformation, because without it the spiritual achievements of the human soul cannot be manifested in earthly life, individual and collective. It has been possible up to now to purify the mind and the heart to a certain extent and even to discipline and regulate (more by suppression or repression than otherwise) the life-parts of man, but the physical nature has been left almost unreclaimed. Its customary habits and tendencies, its crude appetites and impulses, its mechanical reactions and responses to outward impacts have always been the disgust and despair of even the greatest of spiritual

THE HUMAN BODY No part of the psycho-physical organism of man has been more misunderstood and mishandled than the body. Either it has been unduly coddled and cossetted, and its coarse demands and pleasures inordinately indulged, or a severe asceticism has ridden rough-shod over it, denying even its elementary need and depressing or damaging its motor powers. Man's dealing with his body has usually swung between these two ignorant extremes, and it is only in rare individual cases that it has been able to strike a balance and steer a middle course. And even this balance has been a rather poor and precarious makeshift, there being always an unsuspected disproportion or a wrong

THE BRAZIER OF LOVE WHAT is the central truth and essence of the Mother's life and the secret of her spiritual achievement ? What is the key to the synthesis of her vast and complex personality, her irresistible magnetism and the unlimited sway she holds over the hearts of thousands of God-seekers ? What has created the divine beauty of her form, imparted the divine rhythm to her movements and the divine fire to her will ? Those who know her or have only read her Prayers and Meditations will at once reply in a chorus : Love is the truth and essence of the Mother's life and love the nuclear force of her personality. In the Chandi (a portion of the Markendya Puran

THE LIFE OF LIFE Man's Eternal Quest—the Absolute WHAT do men seek in life ? In their desires and dreams, in their hopes and ambitions, as well as in their eagle flights of spiritual aspiration, what is it they have all been seeking since Time began ? Is it not an Absolute ? The scientist in his laboratory, the philosopher in his ivory tower of thought, the artist and the poet in their moments of creative inspiration, the mystic in his ecstatic contemplation, the politician on his plat- form, the farmer in his field, the soldier in the fury of battle, the grocer in his shop, the beggar in the street, do they not all —all, without exception,—seek an Absolute

PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION The book has been thoroughly revised and considerably enlarged by the addition of The Divine Collaborators, which appeared separately in its first edition. A few essays, written later, have also been incorporated. RISHABHCHAND PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION Most of these essays were originally published in the Mother India of Bombay, one in Sri Aurobindo Mandir Annual, and one in the Advent, all organs devoted to the exposition of Sri Aurobindo’s vision of the future. Here they are reproduced with slight revisions by the courtesy of the editors of these journals, to whom I owe a debt of gratitude. RISHABHCHAND

-35_The Mother^s Work.htm THE MOTHER'S WORK* WHEN Sri Aurobindo left his body in the year 1950, most of his disciples and devotees, living in the world outside, made anxious enquiries as to what would now be the fate of the Ashram and the great work of the supramental transformation which he had laboured for during the forty long years of his strenuous seclusion at Pondicherry. Sri Aurobindo had asserted time and again that the descent of the Supermind and its establishment in the earth-consciousness as a principle and power of the infinite Knowledge-Will, superseding and completing the mind of man, was inevitable, and that a divine life on earth was the crowning glory of human destiny. How w

THE RAINBOW BRIDGE EVEN those who have only a smattering of Sri Aurobindo's Yoga and philosophy know that they aim at these three signal achievements : (1) ascent of the consciousness of man from mind to Supermind, which is the Truth-consciousness, the Rita-chit, of the Veda, (2) descent of the Supermind into Matter and the conversion and transformation of the integral nature of man—physical, vital and mental,—by the Light- Force of the Supermind, and (3) the perfect manifestation of Sachchidananda on earth through the transformed and divinised human nature. Sri Aurobindo does not subscribe to the world-shunning asceticism of the old schools of spiritual discipline, nor d

THE EARTH AND HER DESTINY "The material world in its darkness and ignorance had forgotten the Divine. Love came into the darkness; it awakened all that lay there asleep; it whispered, opening the ears that were sealed, 'There is something that is worth waking to, worth living for, and it is love !' And with the awakening to love, there entered into the world the possibility of coming back to the Divine. The creation moves upward through love towards the Divine and in answer there leans downward to meet the creation the Divine Love and Grace. Love cannot exist in its pure beauty, love cannot put on its native power and intense joy of fullness until there is thi

THE SOUL OR THE PSYCHIC (II) How to Realise the Psychic? IF it is true that the psychic is our true self, and that it is only when we identify ourselves with it that we can become real individuals, then it is obvious that nothing should be regarded as more pressingly important in life than the discovery and realisation of the psychic. Of what avail our humanitarian strivings, our struggles to reform others, to help others, to enlighten others, so long as we are ourselves unregenerate, helplessly tossed between the dualities of good and evil, success and failure, gain and loss, honour and dishonour, and pain and pleasure; so long as we are floundering in ignora

MONEY AND ITS PROPER USE THE place and importance of money in the creative economy of life cannot be overestimated. Without it nothing can be achieved in the material field. Whether it is the formation and growth of a society, or the promotion of its culture and civilisation and commerce and industry, or the stimulation and progress of scientific research and discovery, in the great undertakings, in the works of destruction as much as in those of creation and construction, the one indispensable means (but only a means) is money. Even the ascetic, who studiously avoids all contact with money, has perforce to depend upon the money of others for the sustenance of hi