The Inconscient   THE FIRST or superficial view which the observing mind takes on any object of knowledge is always an illusory view; all science, all true knowledge comes by going behind the superficies and discovering the inner truth and the hidden law It is not that the thing itself is illusory, but that it is not what it superficially appears to be; nor is it that the operations and functionings we observe on the surface do not take place, but that we cannot find their real motive-power, process, relations by the simple study of them as they offer themselves to the observing senses. In the realm of physical science this is obvious enough

The Three Purushas   THE GREATEST of all the philosophical problems which human thought has struggled to solve, is the exact nature and relation to us of the conscious Intelligence in the phenomenal existence around The idealist denies the phenomenal existence, the materialist denies the conscious Intelligence To the former, phenomenon is a passing shadow on the luminous calm of the single universal Spirit: to the latter, intelligence is a temporary result of the motions of Matter The idealist can give no satisfactory explanation of the existence of the shadow; he admits that it is inexplicable, a thing that is and yet is not: the materialist can

'Essays in Philosophy and Yoga' by Sri Aurobindo - Page1 of 50 Arguments to The Life Divine     Chapter XIX   Life   ARGUMENT   Mind as a final action of Supermind is a creative and not only a perceptive power; in fact, material force itself being only a Will in things working darkly as the expression of subconscious Mind, Mind is the immediate creator of the material universe But the real creator is Supermind; for wherever there is Mind conscious or subconscious, there must be Supermind regulating from behind the veil its activities and educing from them their truth of inevitable r

Perfection of the Body   THE PERFECTION of the body, as great a perfection as we can bring about by the means at our disposal, must be the ultimate aim of physical culture Perfection is the true aim of all culture, the spiritual and psychic, the mental, the vital and it must be the aim of our physical culture also If our seeking is for a total perfection of the being, the physical part of it cannot be left aside; for the body is the material basis, the     body is the instrument which we have to use Sarīram khalu  dharmasādhanam, says the old Sanskrit adage, —the body is the means of fulfilment of dharma, and dharma means every ideal w

Yoga and Human Evolution   THE WHOLE burden of our human progress has been an attempt to escape from the bondage to the body and the vital impulses According to the scientific theory, the human being began as the animal, developed through the savage and consummated in the modern civilised man The Indian theory is different God created the world by developing the many out of the One and the material out of the spiritual From the beginning, the objects which compose the physical world were arranged by Him in their causes, developed under the law of their being in the subtle or psychical world and then manifested in the gross or material world From kārana to sū

APPENDIX I   The Tangle of Karma   OBVIOUSLY we must leave far behind us the current theory of Karma and its shallow attempt to justify the ways of the Cosmic Spirit by forcing on them a crude identity with the summary notions of law and justice, the crude and often savagely primitive methods of reward and punishment, lure and deterrent dear to the surface human mind There is here a more authentic and spiritual truth at the base of Nature's action and a far less mechanically calculable movement Here is no rigid and narrow ethical law bound down to a petty human significance, no teaching of a child soul by a mixed system of blows and lollipops, no unpr

Stead and the Spirits   CONSIDERABLE attention has been attracted and excitement created by the latest development of Mr W T Stead's agency for communicant spirits which he calls Julia's Bureau The supposed communications of Mr Gladstone, Lord Beaconsfield and other distinguished politicians on the question of the Budget have awakened much curiosity, ridicule and even indignation The ubiquitous eloquence of Lord Curzon has been set flowing by what he considers this unscrupulous method of pressing the august departed into the ranks of Liberal electioneering agents, and he has penned an indignant letter to the papers in which there is much orn

The Principle of Evil   THE PROBLEM of evil is one that has taxed human thought and evolved various and conflicting solutions To the rationalist who does not believe in anything not material, the problem does not exist Everything is in nature as the result of evolution Nature is blind and unintelligent and has therefore no conception of good or evil; the conception belongs to the human mind and is the result of the social sense and the ideas of pleasure and pain developed in human beings by a perfectly intelligible natural process It is to men who believe in Intelligence as governing and developing the world that the problem exists Why did evi

Thoughts and Glimpses   Some think it presumption to believe in a special Providence or to look upon oneself as an instrument in the hands of God, but I find that every man has a special.   Providence and I see that God uses the mattock of the labourer and babbles in the mouth of a little child Providence is not only that which saves me from the shipwreck in which everybody else has foundered Providence is also that which while all others are saved snatches away my last plank of safety and drowns me in the solitary ocean.   The delight of victory is sometimes less than the attraction of struggle and suffering; nevertheless the laurel

'Essays in Philosophy and Yoga' by Sri Aurobindo - Page1 of 50 Part Two   The Yoga and Its Objects   Circa 1912         The Yoga and Its Objects   THE YOGA we practise is not for ourselves alone, but for the Divine; its aim is to work out the will of the Divine in the world, to effect a spiritual transformation and to bring down a divine nature and a divine life into the mental, vital and physical nature and life of humanity Its object is not personal Mukti, although Mukti is a necessary condition of the yoga, but the liberation and transformation of the human being It is not personal A