III   THE SUPREME DIVINE*   ALREADY WHAT has been said in the seventh chapter provides us with the starting-point of our new and fuller position and fixes it with sufficient precision. Substantially it comes to this that we are to move inwardly towards a greater consciousness and a supreme existence, not by a total exclusion of our cosmic nature, but by a higher, a spiritual fulfilment of all that we now essentially are. Only there is to be a change from our mortal imperfection to a divine perfection of being. The first idea on which this possibility is founded, is the conception of the individual soul in man as in its eternal essence and its original po

X   THE YOGA OF THE INTELLIGENT WILL   I HAVE had to deviate in the last two essays and to drag the reader with me into the arid tracts of metaphysical dogma,—however cursorily and with a very insufficient and superficial treatment,—so that we might understand why the Gita follows the peculiar line of development it has taken, working out first a partial truth with only subdued hints of its deeper meaning, then returning upon its hints and bringing out their significance until it rises to its last great suggestion, its supreme mystery which it does not work out at all, but leaves to be lived out, as the later ages of Indian spirituality tried

V   THE DIVINE TRUTH AND WAY   THE GITA then proceeds to unveil the supreme and integral secret, the one thought and truth in which the seeker of perfection and liberation must learn to live and the one law of perfection of his spiritual members and of all their movements. This supreme secret is the mystery of the transcendent Godhead who is all and everywhere, yet so much greater and other than the universe and all its forms that nothing here contains him, nothing expresses him really, and no language which is borrowed from the appearances of things in space and time and their relations can suggest the truth of his unimaginable being. The consequent l

CANTO TWO   THE GROWTH OF THE FLAME     A LAND of mountains and wide sun-beat plains And giant rivers pacing to vast seas, A field of creation and spiritual hush, Silence swallowing life's acts into the deeps, Of thought's transcendent climb and heavenward leap, A brooding world of reverie and trance, Filled with the mightiest works of God and man, Where Nature seemed a dream of the Divine And beauty and grace and grandeur had their home, Harboured the childhood of the incarnate Flame.  Over her watched millennial influences And the deep godheads of a grandiose past Looked on her and saw the future's godheads com

BOOK TWELVE Epilogue   EPILOGUE   THE RETURN TO EARTH     OUT of abysmal trance her spirit woke. Lain on the earth-mother's calm inconscient breast She saw the green-clad branches lean above Guarding her sleep with their enchanted life, And overhead a blue-winged ecstasy Fluttered from bough to bough with high-pitched call. Into the magic secrecy of the woods Peering through an emerald lattice-window of leaves, In indolent skies reclined, the thinning day Turned to its slow fall into evening's peace. She pressed the living body of Satyavan: On her body's wordless joy to be an

BOOK FIVE   The Book of Love   CANTO ONE   THE DESTINED MEETING-PLACE     RUT now the destined spot and hour were close; Unknowing she had neared her nameless goal. For though a dress of blind and devious chance Is laid upon the work of all-wise Fate, Our acts interpret an omniscient Force That dwells in the compelling stuff of things, And nothing happens in the cosmic play But at its time and in its foreseen place. To a space she came of soft and delicate air That seemed a sanctuary of youth and joy, A highland world of free and green delight Where spring and summer lay together and strove In indolent and amica

CANTO THREE   THE DEBATE OF LOVE AND DEATH     A SAD destroying cadence the voice sank; It seemed to lead the advancing march of Life Into some still original Inane. But Savitri answered to almighty Death: "O dark-browed sophist of the universe Who veilst the Real with its own Idea, Hiding with brute objects Nature's living face, Masking eternity with thy dance of death, Thou hast woven the ignorant Mind into a screen And made of Thought error's purveyor and scribe, And a false witness of mind's servant sense. An aesthete of the sorrow of the world, Champion of a harsh and sad philosoph

CANTO TWO   THE PARABLE OF THE SEARCH FOR THE SOUL     AS in the vigilance of the sleepless night Through the slow heavy-footed silent hours, Repressing in her bosom its load of grief, She sat staring at the dumb tread of Time And the approach of ever-nearing Fate, A summons from her being's summit came, A sound, a call that broke the seals of Night. Above her brows where will and knowledge meet A mighty Voice invaded mortal space. It seemed to come from inaccessible heights And yet was intimate with all the world And knew the meaning of the steps of Time And saw eternal destiny's changeless scene Filling