NOVEMBER, 1940 28th November, 1940 Letters from Kabul and from Ella Maillard; change in attitude to Gabriel; effective representation of Ella. Gandhi's will – or political will was read (brought by Abhaya Deva) distributed to Gandhi Seva Sangh – spoken orally and taken down; after hearing the whole letter Sri Aurobindo said : Something in him takes delight in suffering for its own sake. Even the prospect of suffering seems to please him though he puts in a lot of ethics with his justification, the fact is that something in him enjoys suffering. 2. Secondly, if he knows that to the British Government 50 Gandhis would not matter – wha

15th December, 1939 Disciple X was laughing and Y was present. Sri Aurobindo turned his head inquiringly as to mean: What is the cause of the laughter. Disciple : My presence acts as a catalytic agent, so I myself do not know the cause nor what is the joke. Sri Aurobindo : That is how the subliminal self acts, without your knowledge, while your surface consciousness is ignorant about it. Disciple : But to return to N's question. If one takes the standpoint of reason and wants to decide about the validity of spiritual experience he will find the experiences also differ. So how can experience be a criterion. Sri Aurobindo : Experience is not a criterion; it is

23rd December, 1938 We have assembled as usual, and are eager to resume the talk. But nobody could begin without some hint or gesture from Sri Aurobindo. He was lying calmly in his bed. A disciple made an approach to Sri Aurobindo half-hesitatingly. This made another disciple roar with laughter.  (Sri Aurobindo heard the laughter) Disciple : X. is roaring with laughter. Sri Aurobindo : Descent of Ananda? This primary breaking of the ice made the atmosphere a little encouraging So, X catching the chance shot the following question with a beaming face : Disciple : Because the hostile forces offer resistance to the Divine manifestation in the world and s

JANUARY, 1939 1st January, 1939 Disciple : How can one succeed in meditation? Sri Aurobindo :  By quietude of the mind. Above the Mind there is not only the Infinite in itself but infinite sea of peace, joy, light, etc. – above the head. The golden lid – Hiranmaya patra – intervenes between that which is above Mind and what is below. Once one can break that lid those elements can come down at any time one wills, and for that, quietude is necessary. There are people who get those things without quietude, but it is very difficult.  Disciple : It is said that there is also a veil in the heart, is it true? Sri Aurobindo :  Yes, a veil or a wall, if you like. Th

SEPTEMBER, 1940 15th September, 1940 Disciple : Has the individual no reality except as a puppet? Sri Aurobindo : That is Shanker's stand. Disciple : Another question is "If the Divine is already there and does everything then why yoga?" Because Sri Krishna says to Arjuna in the Gita that you have only to become Nimitta – instrument. So the Christian's criticism is that the Individual is meaningless – without any justification or fulfillment. Gita is preaching pure mechanism or unconsciousness. Sri Aurobindo : But Gita does not say that you are "compelled" to become the Nimitta. It says "Bhava" – “become!" but it does not say that you have no existence

3rd January, 1939 There was hearty laugh over the thesis of a Marathi writer with Socialistic tendencies who tried to prove that Swami Ramdas was a socialist! Disciple : Some of the Sadhaks seem to become too delicate, – a small cut or even smell of burning ghee upsets them. Sometimes other people who cannot understand this say this is mere feinting. Sri Aurobindo :  They used to brand the body with hot iron to see if the man was in trance or not! They thought perhaps that it might be only deep trance and not Nirvikalpa Samadhi! (Laughter) Disciple : Can it be that the man would not feel anything? Page – 83 Sri Aurobindo :  There are cases of people who

FEBRUARY, 1939 3rd February, 1939 A letter from a lady disciple was read to Sri Aurobindo in which she related some of her experiences. She is losing consciousness, finds the mind floating about as it were, lightning strokes in the head and a feeling of some presence. But these experiences give her very great fear and she complains of bad health.  Sri Aurobindo : You can tell her that what she calls losing of consciousness is its movement inwards. It is rather unusual to get these experiences. Usually, one takes months and months to make the mind quiet and she did it at the first sitting. The lightning strokes is the action of the Higher Power, or Yoga Shakti to

14th January, 1941 Sri Aurobindo had seen a volume of Cezanne and one of the painters of the 20th Century representing the most modern trends of artistic movement in France. Page – 302  Cezanne had found "remarkable" models for his portraits. All of them were very fine and showed power. He didn't know drawing and so some of his things were imperfect. Colour is everything. (I showed him the small volume on Cezanne). He liked it better because of the colour plates. In the evening he said he had liked Matisse also. He found three things in modern art - 1. Ugliness, 2. Vulgarity, or what might be called coarseness,  3.  Absurdity. In their nu

19th January, 1939 Dr. R's visit : In course of his talk he remarked in connection with the swelling at the knee joint that all diseases are of the nature of inflammations. After he departed, Sri Aurobindo asked : "In what sense are all illnesses inflammations?  There could be any setisfactory explanation of it." The topic of Aldous Huxley's book "Ends & Means" was taken up by a disciple. Disciple : Huxley suggests two ways of solving the problems of man. One by changing the existing institutions of education, industries, in fact by modifying social, political, economic and religious institutions. This would bring about a change in the individual. So far as

JULY, 1940 21st July, 1940 There was a reference to C. R's article about the necessity of force for maintaining a state. Disciple : Blunchli in his book called "The State" puts it down as a fundamental principle. Every state is founded on force and President Wilson in his book also maintains, a little apologetically, that all human states are founded on force. Sri Aurobindo : Of course, so long as man is not too much cowed down or has not evolved beyond his present condition and is too high to use force, force will be indispensable. Disciple : In the Supramental creation will there be any force? Sri Aurobindo : No. Because there you are supposed to go be