5 May 1929 What is the proper function of the intellect? Is it a help or a hindrance to Sadhana? Whether the intellect is a help or a hindrance depends upon the person and upon the way in which it is used. There is a true movement of the intellect and there is a wrong movement; one helps, the other hinders. The intellect that believes too much in its own importance and wants satisfaction for its own sake, is an obstacle to the higher realisation. But this is true not in any special sense or for the intellect alone, but generally and of other faculties as well. For example, people do not regard an all-engrossing satisfaction of the vital desires or the animal appetit

 Anger                    One should cast away anger, one should reject pride, one should break all bonds. One who is not attached to name or form, who possesses nothing, is delivered from suffering. Whosoever masters rising anger, as one who controls a moving chariot, that one indeed is worthy of being called a good charioteer. Others merely hold the reins. Oppose anger with serenity, evil with good; conquer a miser by generosity and a liar by the truth. Speak the truth; do not give way to anger; give the little you possess to one who asks of you; by these three attributes, men can approach the gods. The sage

Vital Conversion – Rebirth and Personal Survival It is very important that the vital should agree to change: it must learn to accept conversion. The vital is not in itself anything to be decried: in fact, all energy, dynamism and push comes from it – without it you may be calm and wise and detached, but you will be absolutely immobile and uncreative. The body would be inert, just like a stone, without the force infused into it by the vital. If the vital is left out, you would be able to realise nothing. But like a spirited horse it is liable to be refractory and, therefore, requires good control. You have to keep your reins tight and your whip ready in order to kee

 Victory over Falsehood The lords of Falsehood hold, at present, almost complete sway over poor humanity. Not only the lower life-energy, the lower vital being, but also the whole mind of man accepts them. Countless are the ways in which they are worshipped, for they are most subtle in their cunning and seek their ends in variously seductive disguises. The result is that men cling to their falsehood as if it were a treasure, cherishing it more than even the most beautiful things of life. Apprehensive of its safety, they take care to bury it deep down in themselves; but unless they take it out and surrender it to the Divine they will never find true happiness.

Surrender, Self-offering and Consecration Surrender is the decision taken to hand over the responsibility of your life to the Divine. Without this decision nothing is at all possible; if you do not surrender, the Yoga is entirely out of the question. Everything else comes naturally after it, for the whole process starts with surrender. You can surrender either through knowledge or through devotion. You may have a strong intuition that the Divine alone is the truth and a luminous conviction that without the Divine you cannot manage. Or you may have a spontaneous feeling that this line is the only way of being happy, a strong psychic desire to belong exclusively to the Div

Miscellany                   If renouncing the slightest happiness enables him to realise a greater one, the intelligent man should re- nounce the lesser for the sake of the greater. If he seeks his own happiness by harming others, bound by hate, he remains the slave of hatred. To neglect what should be done and to do what should be neglected is to increase in arrogance and negli- gence. To be constantly mindful of the true nature of the body, not to seek what is evil, to pursue with perse- verance what is good, is to have right understanding; thus, all one's impurity disappears. Having killed his father

26 May 1929 If our will is only an expression or echo of the uni versal will, where is the place of individual initiative? Is the individual only an instrument to register uni versal movements? Has he no power of creation or origination? All depends upon the plane of consciousness from which you are looking at things and speaking of them or on the part of the being from which you act. If you look from one plane of consciousness, the individual will appear to you as if he were not only an instrument and recorder, but a creator. But look from another and higher plane of consciousness with a wider view of things and you will see that this is only an

The Mind Just as the arrow-maker straightens his arrows, so also the intelligent man straightens his thoughts, wavering and fickle, difficult to keep straight, difficult to master. Just as a fish cast out of the water, our mind quivers and gasps when it leaves behind the kingdom of Mara. Difficult to master and unstable is the mind, forever in search of pleasure. It is good to govern it. A mind that is controlled brings happiness. The sage should remain master of his thoughts, for they are subtle and difficult to seize and always in search of pleasure. A mind that is well guided brings happiness. Wandering

Craving The craving of a heedless man grows like the Maluva creeper. Like a monkey seeking fruits in the forest, he leaps from life to life. For one who in the world is overcome by the craving that clings, his miseries increase like Birana grass after the rains. For one who in this world can overcome this craving that clings and is so difficult to master, his sorrows fall away like water from a lotus leaf. To all who are gathered here, I say for your welfare: pull out the roots of your craving, as you uproot Birana grass. Do not let Mara crush you again and again as a flood crushes a reed. As a tree, tho

* THE MOTHER - Tokyo 1917