And do you know how he received me when I arrived there?... It was the first time in my life I had traveled alone and the first time I had crossed the Mediterranean. Then there was a fairly long train ride between Oran and Tlemcen - anyway, I managed rather well: I got there. He met me at the station and we set off for his place by car (it was rather far away). Finally we reached his estate - a wonder! It spread across the hillside overlooking the whole valley of Tlemcen. We arrived from below and had to climb up some wide pathways. I said nothing - it was truly an experience from a material standpoint. When we came in sight of the house, he stopped: 'That's m

Do you know little S.?[[A twelve-year-old Tamil child, very dark-skinned, adopted three years earlier by a European disciple. ]] Have you ever spoken to her? ... I've heard she beats sixteen- and seventeen-year-old boys at logic and new mathematics. I saw her today. She is obviously quite remarkably intelligent. And yesterday was her birthday. You know that Y. [her adoptive mother] has gone into hospital; and when she went she asked me to send something to Thoth every day (you know who's Thoth, [[Thoth is an ape adopted by that same European disciple and would be, according to her, a reincarnation of the Egyptian god Thoth. ]] don't you?), because it seems that wh

All this [the world, the Ashram] is held in my consciousness with a kind of essential compassion applying equally to all things, all difficulties, all obstacles. I receive letters by the dozens, as you know, and each person comes to me with his own little misery or problem, inner or outer (a tiny pimple becomes ... a mountain). When people come to me, my inner consciousness always responds in the same way, with a kind of ... equality and compassion for all. But when people are talking to me or I am reading a letter and my body grows conscious of what it calls the 'to-do' they make over their miseries, it has a kind of feeling (I mean there is a feeling in th

Another one is Communist. He is a Russian who lives in Paris. He asked me if all the Auroville workers shouldn't meet and "talk over" (Mother laughs) the necessity of a "moral conduct"! (I have heard he keeps them all talking away till 3 in the morning.) So I answered him (laughing) that morality has only a very relative value from the standpoint of the Truth; that it changes with countries, climates and ages! I also told him that discussions were generally sterile and nonproductive. And so as not to be only critical, I answered him that if everyone made an effort to be perfectly sincere, straightforward and goodwilled, that would be enough to create quite a suffic

I believe he even came here to Pondicherry to see you. He hasmade a statement on the radio, and you know, he's a man who carries a lot of weight internationally: when he says some thing, he is listened to all over the world. So on French radio, he made a statement (you know that he was a minister under de Gaulle for a long time), a statement in favor of Bangladesh. He says: The Indian Express, September 20, 1971 At 69, Malraux offers to fight in the ranks of Bangladesh.He says, "I receive many letters from young people who write: if you form a foreign legion, we are ready to fight for Bangladesh." Malrau

-429_The Mother's flag and India.html (On 1 November 1954 Pondicherry and the other French settlements in India were transferred to the Indian Union. To celebrate the occasion the flag with Mother's symbol at its centre was hoisted at the Ashram at 6.20 a.m., when Mother read out the following message.) For us the 1st November has a deep significance. We have a flag which Sri Aurobindo called the Spiritual Flag of United India. Its square form, its colour and every detail of its design have a symbolic meaning. It was hoisted on the 15th August 1947 when India became free. It will now be hoisted on the 1st November 1954 when these settlements get united with India and

A peach should ripen on the tree; it's a fruit that should be picked when the sun is upon it. Just as the sun falls on it, you come along, pluck it and bite into it. Then it is absolute paradise. There are two such fruits - peaches and golden green plums. It is the same for both. You must take them warm from the tree, bite into them, and you are filled with the taste of paradise. Every fruit should be eaten in a special way. At heart, this is the symbol of the earthly Paradise and the tree of Knowledge: by biting into the fruit of Knowledge, one loses the spontaneity of movement and begins objectivizing, learning, questioning

Now, there has come a message for February 29 [third anniversary of the supramental manifestation]. The message for the 21st is a jest, and this is the charitable explanation ... which comes a week later! Oh, it's very simple (Mother reads): Truth alone can give to the world the power of receiving and manifesting the Divine's Love. page 20 , Mother's Agenda , volume 9 , 10th Jan - 1968 It is only when the Supramentalmanifests in the body-mind that its presence can be permanent. [[Mother's translation from the French. ]] Mother This message comes fro

It was about the Word, the primal sound. Sri Aurobindo speaks of it in Savitri: the essence of the Word and how it will express itself, how it will bring in the possibility of a supramental expression that will take the place of languages.... I began by speaking to him about the different languages, their limitations and possibilities; and I warned him against the deformations imposed on languages with the idea of making them a more flexible means of expressing something else. I told him how completely ridiculous it all was, and that it didn't correspond at all to the truth. Then little by little I began ascending to the Origin. So yesterday again, I h

"The importance of the body is obvious; it is because he has developed or been given a body and brain capable of receiving and serving a progressive mental illumination that man has risen above the animal. Equally, it can only be by developing a body or at least a functioning of the physical instrument capable of receiving and serving a still higher illumination that he will rise above himself and realise, not merely in thought and in his internal being but in life, a perfectly divine manhood. Otherwise either the promise of Life is cancelled, its meaning annulled and earthly being can only realise Sachchidananda by abolishing itself, by shedding from it