CHAPTER 16 Man, A Transitional Being Sri Aurobindo lived in great poverty during his first years in Pondicherry. He was on the police blacklist, far away from those who could have helped him, his mail censored, his every move surveyed by British spies, who were attempting to get him extradited through all sorts of devious maneuvers, including planting compromising papers in his house and then denouncing him to the French police.* Once they even tried to kidnap him. Sri Aurobindo would finally be left in peace the day the French police superintendent came to search his room and discovered in his desk drawers the works of Homer. After inquiring whether these writings

CHAPTER 14 The Secret We can try to say something of this Secret, though keeping in mind that the experience is in progress. Sri Aurobindo began; he found the Secret in Chandernagore in 1910 and worked on it for forty years; he gave up his life to it. And so did Mother. Sri Aurobindo has never told us the circumstances of his discovery. He was always extraordinarily silent about himself, not out of reserve but simply because the "I" did not exist. "One felt," his Chandernagore host reports with naive surprise, "one felt when he spoke as if somebody else were speaking through him. I placed the plate of food before him,--he simply gazed at it, then ate a little, just mechanically!

The Great Sense This "message to youth" was originally written in French for the Italian television, by the author of The Adventure of Consciousness (Sri Aurobindo Ashram Press, Pondicherry, 1968). It is addressed to students, to those who want to bring about the revolution of the future by the means of the future. For indeed, if we want to build a new world, it is not by the means of the past that we shall succeed — neither by violence nor by non violence. But by something else. Page-11 THE GREAT SENSE This is the time of the Great Sense. We look to the right or left, we build theories, reform our Churches, invent super-machines and we go o

Preface Ce "message à la jeunesse" fut primitivement écrit en français pour la télévision italienne. L'auteur de L'Aventure de la Conscience (Buchet- Chastel, Paris, 1964) s'adresse aux étudiants, à ceux qui veulent faire la révolution de l'avenir par les moyens de l'avenir. Car en vérité, si nous voulons construire un monde nouveau, ce n'est pas par les moyens du passé que nous y par- viendrons — ni par la violence ni par la non violence. Mais par autre chose. Page-1 LE GRAND SENS C'est le temps du Grand Sens. Nous regardons à droite ou à gauche, nous construisons des théories, réformons nos Églises, inventons des super-machines, et nous descendons dans la rue po

Note de l'Éditeur Ce texte a été écrit pour AU India Radio émission du 5 février 1972, à l'occasion du Centenaire de Sri Aurobindo. SRI AUROBINDO ET L'AVENIR DE LA TERRE Parfois, une grande Pensée errante voit les âges encore inaccomplis, saisit la Force dans sa coulée éternelle et précipite sur la terre la vision puissante qui est comme un pouvoir de rendre réel ce qu'elle voit — le monde est une vision qui devient- vraie, son passé et son présent ne sont pas vraiment le résultat d'une obscure poussée qui remonte du fond des temps, d'une lente accumulation de sédiments qui peu à peu nous façonnent — et nous étouffent et nous enfermen

10 Harmony We might be tempted to say that these are fantasies, unbelievable miracles. But in fact it is all very simple. There are no miracles. There is a vast Harmony which governs the world with a precision and delicacy as faultless in the meeting of atoms and the cycle of flowering and the return of migrating birds as in the meeting of men and the unfolding of events at a particular juncture. There is a vast, unique movement we thought we were separated from because we had built our little mental turrets on the frontier of our comprehension and black dotted lines on the softness of a great earthly hill, as others had built their hunting grounds, and the sea gulls, t

References & Notes Most quotations from Sri Aurobindo refer to the complete edition of his works in 30 volumes (the Centenary Edition) and are indicated by the volume number followed by the page. Reference is made in particular to the following volumes: 5- Collected Poems 15- The Ideal of Human Unity 17- The Hour of God 20- The Synthesis of Yoga 26- On Himself 28- Savitri 29- Savitri 1.Savitri, 28:256. 2.Sri Aurobindo, Savitri, 28:370. 3.Sri Aurobindo, The Hour of God, 17:1. 4.The Synthesis of Yoga, 20:82. 5.Sri Aurobindo, "Musa Spiritus," 5:589. 6.Sri Aurobindo, "Journey's End," 5:570. 7.This as

1 The Mental Fortress Our difficulties always stem from the belief that we alone remedy them. As long as our intellectual power (or inadequacy) does not play a role and our greater or lesser capacities are not actively involved, we feel that our endeavor is doomed to failure. Such is the deep-seated belief of mental man. We know its results all too well. But even if they were flawless within their own scope, they would still conceal a supreme flaw, which is to bring in only what is contained in our own intelligence or muscles-except when life or happenstance frustrates our plans. In other words, our mental existence is a closed system. Nothing gets into it but w