TERMS STARTING WITH
colaborer ::: n. --> One who labors with another; an associate in labor.
colander ::: n. --> A utensil with a bottom perforated with little holes for straining liquids, mashed vegetable pulp, etc.; a strainer of wickerwork, perforated metal, or the like.
col- ::: --> A prefix signifying with, together. See Com-.
colation ::: n. --> The act or process of straining or filtering.
colatitude ::: n. --> The complement of the latitude, or the difference between any latitude and ninety degrees.
colature ::: n. --> The process of straining; the matter strained; a strainer.
colbertine ::: n. --> A kind of lace.
colchicine ::: n. --> A powerful vegetable alkaloid, C17H19NO5, extracted from the Colchicum autumnale, or meadow saffron, as a white or yellowish amorphous powder, with a harsh, bitter taste; -- called also colchicia.
colchicum ::: n. --> A genus of bulbous-rooted plants found in many parts of Europe, including the meadow saffron.
colcothar ::: n. --> Polishing rouge; a reddish brown oxide of iron, used in polishing glass, and also as a pigment; -- called also crocus Martis.
cold-blooded ::: a. --> Having cold blood; -- said of fish or animals whose blood is but little warmer than the water or air about them.
Deficient in sensibility or feeling; hard-hearted.
Not thoroughbred; -- said of animals, as horses, which are derived from the common stock of a country.
cold boot "operating system" A {boot} from {power off}. Contrast {warm boot}. [{Jargon File}] (1995-11-27)
coldfinch ::: n. --> A British wagtail.
cold-hearted ::: a. --> Wanting passion or feeling; indifferent.
cold-hearted ::: lacking sympathy or feeling; indifferent; unkind, unfeeling.
coldish ::: a. --> Somewhat cold; cool; chilly.
coldly ::: adv. --> In a cold manner; without warmth, animation, or feeling; with indifference; calmly.
cold ::: n. --> Deprived of heat, or having a low temperature; not warm or hot; gelid; frigid.
Lacking the sensation of warmth; suffering from the absence of heat; chilly; shivering; as, to be cold.
Not pungent or acrid.
Wanting in ardor, intensity, warmth, zeal, or passion; spiritless; unconcerned; reserved.
Unwelcome; disagreeable; unsatisfactory.
coldness ::: n. --> The state or quality of being cold.
cold-short ::: a. --> Brittle when cold; as, cold-short iron.
cold-shut ::: a. --> Closed while too cold to become thoroughly welded; -- said of a forging or casting. ::: n. --> An imperfection caused by such insufficient welding.
colegoose ::: n. --> See Coalgoose.
colemanite ::: n. --> A hydrous borate of lime occurring in transparent colorless or white crystals, also massive, in Southern California.
colemouse ::: n. --> See Coletit.
cole ::: n. --> A plant of the Brassica or Cabbage genus; esp. that form of B. oleracea called rape and coleseed.
coleopteral ::: a. --> Alt. of Coleopterous
coleopteran ::: n. --> One of the order of Coleoptera.
coleoptera ::: n. pl. --> An order of insects having the anterior pair of wings (elytra) hard and horny, and serving as coverings for the posterior pair, which are membranous, and folded transversely under the others when not in use. The mouth parts form two pairs of jaws (mandibles and maxillae) adapted for chewing. Most of the Coleoptera are known as beetles and weevils.
coleopterist ::: n. --> One versed in the study of the Coleoptera.
coleopter ::: n. --> One of the Coleoptera.
coleopterous ::: a. --> Having wings covered with a case or sheath; belonging to the Coleoptera.
coleorhiza ::: n. --> A sheath in the embryo of grasses, inclosing the caulicle.
coleperch ::: n. --> A kind of small black perch.
colera ::: n. --> Bile; choler.
coleridgian ::: a. --> Pertaining to Samuel Taylor Coleridge, or to his poetry or metaphysics.
coleseed ::: n. --> The common rape or cole.
coleslaw ::: n. --> A salad made of sliced cabbage.
colestaff ::: n. --> See Colstaff.
colet ::: --> Alt. of Collet
coletit ::: n. --> Alt. of Coaltit
coleus ::: n. --> A plant of several species of the Mint family, cultivated for its bright-colored or variegated leaves.
colewort ::: n. --> A variety of cabbage in which the leaves never form a compact head.
Any white cabbage before the head has become firm.
colfox ::: n. --> A crafty fox.
colical ::: a. --> Of, pertaining to, or of the nature of, colic.
colicky ::: a. --> Pertaining to, or troubled with, colic; as, a colicky disorder.
colic ::: n. --> A severe paroxysmal pain in the abdomen, due to spasm, obstruction, or distention of some one of the hollow viscera. ::: a. --> Of or pertaining to colic; affecting the bowels.
Of or pertaining to the colon; as, the colic arteries.
colicroot ::: n. --> A bitter American herb of the Bloodwort family, with the leaves all radical, and the small yellow or white flowers in a long spike (Aletris farinosa and A. aurea). Called sometimes star grass, blackroot, blazing star, and unicorn root.
colies ::: pl. --> of Coly
colin ::: n. --> The American quail or bobwhite. The name is also applied to other related species. See Bobwhite.
coliseum ::: n. --> The amphitheater of Vespasian at Rome, the largest in the world.
colitis ::: n. --> An inflammation of the large intestine, esp. of its mucous membrane; colonitis.
collaborateur ::: n. --> See Collaborator.
collaboration ::: co-operation; working together harmoniously, especially in a joint intellectual effort.
collaboration ::: n. --> The act of working together; united labor.
collaborator ::: n. --> An associate in labor, especially in literary or scientific labor.
collagen ::: n. --> The chemical basis of ordinary connective tissue, as of tendons or sinews and of bone. On being boiled in water it becomes gelatin or glue.
collagenous ::: a. --> Containing or resembling collagen.
colla ::: pl. --> of Collum
collapse ::: 1. To fall or cave in; crumble suddenly. 2. Fig. To break down suddenly in strength or health and thereby cease to function. collapsed, collapsing.
collapsed ::: imp. & p. p. --> of Collapse
collapse ::: v. i. --> To fall together suddenly, as the sides of a hollow vessel; to close by falling or shrinking together; to have the sides or parts of (a thing) fall in together, or be crushed in together; as, a flue in the boiler of a steam engine sometimes collapses.
To fail suddenly and completely, like something hollow when subject to too much pressure; to undergo a collapse; as, Maximilian&
collapsing ::: p. pr. & vb. n. --> of Collapse
collapsion ::: n. --> Collapse.
collar bone ::: --> The clavicle.
collards ::: n. pl. --> Young cabbage, used as "greens"; esp. a kind cultivated for that purpose; colewort.
collared ::: imp. & p. p. --> of Collar ::: a. --> Wearing a collar.
Wearing a collar; -- said of a man or beast used as a bearing when a collar is represented as worn around the neck or loins.
Rolled up and bound close with a string; as, collared
collaring ::: p. pr. & vb. n. --> of Collar
collar ::: n. --> Something worn round the neck, whether for use, ornament, restraint, or identification; as, the collar of a coat; a lady&
collatable ::: a. --> Capable of being collated.
collated ::: imp. & p. p. --> of Collate
collateral ::: a. --> Coming from, being on, or directed toward, the side; as, collateral pressure.
Acting in an indirect way.
Related to, but not strictly a part of, the main thing or matter under consideration; hence, subordinate; not chief or principal; as, collateral interest; collateral issues.
Tending toward the same conclusion or result as something else; additional; as, collateral evidence.
collaterally ::: adv. --> Side by side; by the side.
In an indirect or subordinate manner; indirectly.
In collateral relation; not lineally.
collateralness ::: n. --> The state of being collateral.
collate ::: v. t. --> To compare critically, as books or manuscripts, in order to note the points of agreement or disagreement.
To gather and place in order, as the sheets of a book for binding.
To present and institute in a benefice, when the person presenting is both the patron and the ordinary; -- followed by to.
To bestow or confer.
collating ::: p. pr. & vb. n. --> of Collate
collationer ::: n. --> One who examines the sheets of a book that has just been printed, to ascertain whether they are correctly printed, paged, etc.
collation ::: v. t. --> The act of collating or comparing; a comparison of one copy er thing (as of a book, or manuscript) with another of a like kind; comparison, in general.
The gathering and examination of sheets preparatory to binding.
The act of conferring or bestowing.
A conference.
The presentation of a clergyman to a benefice by a
collatitious ::: a. --> Brought together; contributed; done by contributions.
collative ::: a. --> Passing or held by collation; -- said of livings of which the bishop and the patron are the same person.
collator ::: n. --> One who collates manuscripts, books, etc.
One who collates to a benefice.
One who confers any benefit.
collaud ::: v. t. --> To join in praising.
colleague ::: n. --> A partner or associate in some civil or ecclesiastical office or employment. It is never used of partners in trade or manufactures. ::: v.t & i. --> To unite or associate with another or with others.
colleagueship ::: n. --> Partnership in office.
collectanea ::: v. t. --> Passages selected from various authors, usually for purposes of instruction; miscellany; anthology.
collected ::: brought or placed together; forming an aggregation from various sources.
collected ::: imp. & p. p. --> of Collect ::: a. --> Gathered together.
Self-possessed; calm; composed.
collectedly ::: adv. --> Composedly; coolly.
collectedness ::: n. --> A collected state of the mind; self-possession.
collectible ::: a. --> Capable of being collected.
collecting ::: p. pr. & vb. n. --> of Collect
collectional ::: a. --> Of or pertaining to collecting.
collection ::: n. --> The act or process of collecting or of gathering; as, the collection of specimens.
That which is collected
A gathering or assemblage of objects or of persons.
A gathering of money for charitable or other purposes, as by passing a contribution box for freewill offerings.
That which is obtained in payment of demands.
An accumulation of any substance.
collective ::: a. --> Formed by gathering or collecting; gathered into a mass, sum, or body; congregated or aggregated; as, the collective body of a nation.
Deducing consequences; reasoning; inferring.
Expressing a collection or aggregate of individuals, by a singular form; as, a collective name or noun, like assembly, army, jury, etc.
Tending to collect; forming a collection.
collectively ::: adv. --> In a mass, or body; in a collected state; in the aggregate; unitedly.
collectiveness ::: n. --> A state of union; mass.
collectivism ::: n. --> The doctrine that land and capital should be owned by society collectively or as a whole; communism.
collectivist ::: n. --> An advocate of collectivism. ::: a. --> Relating to, or characteristic of, collectivism.
collectivity (gnostic) ::: a true community...which can exist only by the inner realisation of every one of its members, by a real, concrete unity and identity of everyone with the other members of the community. [M9:140]
collectorate ::: n. --> The district of a collector of customs; a collectorship.
collector ::: n. --> One who collects things which are separate; esp., one who makes a business or practice of collecting works of art, objects in natural history, etc.; as, a collector of coins.
A compiler of books; one who collects scattered passages and puts them together in one book.
An officer appointed and commissioned to collect and receive customs, duties, taxes, or toll.
One authorized to collect debts.
collectorship ::: n. --> The office of a collector of customs or of taxes.
collect ::: v. t. --> To gather into one body or place; to assemble or bring together; to obtain by gathering.
To demand and obtain payment of, as an account, or other indebtedness; as, to collect taxes.
To infer from observed facts; to conclude from premises.
A short, comprehensive prayer, adapted to a particular day, occasion, or condition, and forming part of a liturgy.
collegatary ::: n. --> A joint legatee.
college ::: n. --> A collection, body, or society of persons engaged in common pursuits, or having common duties and interests, and sometimes, by charter, peculiar rights and privileges; as, a college of heralds; a college of electors; a college of bishops.
A society of scholars or friends of learning, incorporated for study or instruction, esp. in the higher branches of knowledge; as, the colleges of Oxford and Cambridge Universities, and many American colleges.
collegial ::: n. --> Collegiate.
collegian ::: n. --> A member of a college, particularly of a literary institution so called; a student in a college.
collegiate ::: a. --> Of or pertaining to a college; as, collegiate studies; a collegiate society. ::: n. --> A member of a college.
collembola ::: n. pl. --> The division of Thysanura which includes Podura, and allied forms.
collenchyma ::: n. --> A tissue of vegetable cells which are thickend at the angles and (usually) elongated.
collet ::: --> An inferior church servant. [Obs.] See Acolyte. ::: n. --> A small collar or neckband.
A small metal ring; a small collar fastened on an arbor; as, the collet on the balance arbor of a watch; a small socket on a stem, for holding a drill.
colleterial ::: a. --> Of or pertaining to the colleterium of insects.
colleterium ::: n. --> An organ of female insects, containing a cement to unite the ejected ova.
colletic ::: a. --> Agglutinant. ::: n. --> An agglutinant.
colley ::: n. --> See Collie.
collide ::: v. i. --> To strike or dash against each other; to come into collision; to clash; as, the vessels collided; their interests collided. ::: v. t. --> To strike or dash against.
collidine ::: n. --> One of a class of organic bases, C8H11N, usually pungent oily liquids, belonging to the pyridine series, and obtained from bone oil, coal tar, naphtha, and certain alkaloids.
collied ::: p. & a. --> Darkened. See Colly, v. t. ::: imp. & p. p. --> of Colly
collie ::: n. --> The Scotch shepherd dog. There are two breeds, the rough-haired and smooth-haired. It is remarkable for its intelligence, displayed especially in caring for flocks.
collieries ::: pl. --> of Colliery
collier ::: n. --> One engaged in the business of digging mineral coal or making charcoal, or in transporting or dealing in coal.
A vessel employed in the coal trade.
colliery ::: n. --> The place where coal is dug; a coal mine, and the buildings, etc., belonging to it.
The coal trade.
colliflower ::: n. --> See Cauliflower.
colligated ::: imp. & p. p. --> of Colligate
colligate ::: v. t. --> To tie or bind together.
To bring together by colligation; to sum up in a single proposition. ::: a. --> Bound together.
colligating ::: p. pr. & vb. n. --> of Colligate
colligation ::: n. --> A binding together.
That process by which a number of isolated facts are brought under one conception, or summed up in a general proposition, as when Kepler discovered that the various observed positions of the planet Mars were points in an ellipse.
collimated ::: imp. & p. p. --> of Collimate
collimate ::: v. t. --> To render parallel to a certain line or direction; to bring into the same line, as the axes of telescopes, etc.; to render parallel, as rays of light.
collimating ::: p. p. & vb. n. --> of Collimate
collimation ::: n. --> The act of collimating; the adjustment of the line of the sights, as the axial line of the telescope of an instrument, into its proper position relative to the other parts of the instrument.
collimator ::: n. --> A telescope arranged and used to determine errors of collimation, both vertical and horizontal.
A tube having a convex lens at one end and at the other a small opening or slit which is at the principal focus of the lens, used for producing a beam of parallel rays; also, a lens so used.
collineation ::: n. --> The act of aiming at, or directing in a line with, a fixed object.
colline ::: n. --> A small hill or mount.
collingly ::: adv. --> With embraces.
collingual ::: a. --> Having, or pertaining to, the same language.
colling ::: v. t. --> An embrace; dalliance.
collin ::: n. --> A very pure form of gelatin.
colliquable ::: a. --> Liable to melt, grow soft, or become fluid.
colliquament ::: n. --> The first rudiments of an embryo in generation.
colliquated ::: imp. & p. p. --> of Colliquate
colliquate ::: v. t. & i. --> To change from solid to fluid; to make or become liquid; to melt.
colliquating ::: p. pr. & vb. n. --> of Colliquate
colliquation ::: n. --> A melting together; the act of melting; fusion.
A processive wasting or melting away of the solid parts of the animal system with copious excretions of liquids by one or more passages.
colliquative ::: a. --> Causing rapid waste or exhaustion; melting; as, colliquative sweats.
colliquefaction ::: n. --> A melting together; the reduction of different bodies into one mass by fusion.
collish ::: n. --> A tool to polish the edge of a sole.
collision 1. "networking" When two {hosts} transmit on a {network} at once causing their {packets} to corrupt each other. See {collision detection}. 2. "programming" {hash collision}. (1995-01-06)
collision detection "networking" A class of methods for sharing a data transmission medium in which {hosts} transmit as soon as they have data to send and then check to see whether their transmission has suffered a {collision} with another host's. If a collision is detected then the data must be resent. The resending algorithm should try to minimise the chance that two hosts's data will repeatedly collide. For example, the {CSMA/CD} protocol used on {Ethernet} specifies that they should then wait for a random time before re-transmitting. See also {backoff}. This contrasts with {slotted protocols} and {token passing}. (1997-03-18)
collision ::: n. --> The act of striking together; a striking together, as of two hard bodies; a violent meeting, as of railroad trains; a clashing.
A state of opposition; antagonism; interference.
collisive ::: a. --> Colliding; clashing.
collitigant ::: a. --> Disputing or wrangling. ::: n. --> One who litigates or wrangles.
collocate ::: a. --> Set; placed. ::: v. t. --> To set or place; to set; to station.
collocated ::: imp. & p. p. --> of Collocate
collocating ::: p. pr. & vb. n. --> of Collocate
collocation {co-location}
collocation ::: n. --> The act of placing; the state of being placed with something else; disposition in place; arrangement.
collocution ::: n. --> A speaking or conversing together; conference; mutual discourse.
collocutor ::: n. --> One of the speakers in a dialogue.
collodionize ::: v. t. --> To prepare or treat with collodion.
collodion ::: n. --> A solution of pyroxylin (soluble gun cotton) in ether containing a varying proportion of alcohol. It is strongly adhesive, and is used by surgeons as a coating for wounds; but its chief application is as a vehicle for the sensitive film in photography.
collodiotype ::: n. --> A picture obtained by the collodion process; a melanotype or ambrotype.
collodium ::: n. --> See Collodion.
collogue ::: v. i. --> To talk or confer secretly and confidentially; to converse, especially with evil intentions; to plot mischief.
colloidal ::: a. --> Pertaining to, or of the nature of, colloids.
colloidality ::: n. --> The state or quality of being colloidal.
colloid ::: a. --> Resembling glue or jelly; characterized by a jellylike appearance; gelatinous; as, colloid tumors. ::: n. --> A substance (as albumin, gum, gelatin, etc.) which is of a gelatinous rather than a crystalline nature, and which diffuses itself through animal membranes or vegetable parchment more slowly than
colloped ::: a. --> Having ridges or bunches of flesh, like collops.
collophore ::: n. --> A suckerlike organ at the base of the abdomen of insects belonging to the Collembola.
An adhesive marginal organ of the Lucernariae.
collop ::: n. --> A small slice of meat; a piece of flesh.
A part or piece of anything; a portion.
colloques ::: converses with; holds colloquy.
colloquial ::: a. --> Pertaining to, or used in, conversation, esp. common and familiar conversation; conversational; hence, unstudied; informal; as, colloquial intercourse; colloquial phrases; a colloquial style.
colloquialism ::: n. --> A colloquial expression, not employed in formal discourse or writing.
colloquialize ::: v. t. --> To make colloquial and familiar; as, to colloquialize one&
colloquies ::: pl. --> of Colloquy
colloquist ::: n. --> A speaker in a colloquy or dialogue.
colloquy ::: a formal conversation, dialogue or conference. colloquies.
colloquy ::: n. --> Mutual discourse of two or more persons; conference; conversation.
In some American colleges, a part in exhibitions, assigned for a certain scholarship rank; a designation of rank in collegiate scholarship.
collow ::: n. --> Soot; smut. See 1st Colly.
colluctancy ::: n. --> A struggling to resist; a striving against; resistance; opposition of nature.
colluctation ::: n. --> A struggling; a contention.
colluded ::: imp. & p. p. --> of Collude
colluder ::: n. --> One who conspires in a fraud.
collude ::: v. i. --> To have secretly a joint part or share in an action; to play into each other&
colluding ::: p. pr. & vb. n. --> of Collude
collum ::: n. --> A neck or cervix.
Same as Collar.
collusion ::: n. --> A secret agreement and cooperation for a fraudulent or deceitful purpose; a playing into each other&
collusive ::: a. --> Characterized by collusion; done or planned in collusion.
Acting in collusion.
collusory ::: a. --> Collusive.
collutory ::: n. --> A medicated wash for the mouth.
coll ::: v. t. --> To embrace.
collybist ::: n. --> A money changer.
collying ::: p. pr. & vb. n. --> of Colly
colly ::: n. --> The black grime or soot of coal.
A kind of dog. See Collie. ::: v. t. --> To render black or dark, as of with coal smut; to begrime.
collyria ::: pl. --> of Collyrium
collyrium ::: n. --> An application to the eye, usually an eyewater.
collyriums ::: pl. --> of Collyrium
col ::: n. --> A short ridge connecting two higher elevations or mountains; the pass over such a ridge.
colocolo ::: n. --> A South American wild cat (Felis colocolo), of the size of the ocelot.
colocynthin ::: n. --> The active medicinal principle of colocynth; a bitter, yellow, crystalline substance, regarded as a glucoside.
colocynth ::: n. --> The light spongy pulp of the fruit of the bitter cucumber (Citrullus, / Cucumis, colocynthis), an Asiatic plant allied to the watermelon; coloquintida. It comes in white balls, is intensely bitter, and a powerful cathartic. Called also bitter apple, bitter cucumber, bitter gourd.
cologne earth ::: --> An earth of a deep brown color, containing more vegetable than mineral matter; an earthy variety of lignite, or brown coal.
cologne ::: n. --> A perfumed liquid, composed of alcohol and certain aromatic oils, used in the toilet; -- called also cologne water and eau de cologne.
colombier ::: n. --> A large size of paper for drawings. See under Paper.
colombin ::: n. --> See Calumbin.
colombo ::: n. --> See Calumba.
colon "character" ":" {ASCII} character 58. Common names: {ITU-T}: colon. Rare: dots; {INTERCAL}: two-spot. (1995-09-25)
colonelcy ::: n. --> The office, rank, or commission of a colonel.
colonel ::: n. --> The chief officer of a regiment; an officer ranking next above a lieutenant colonel and next below a brigadier general.
colonelship ::: n. --> Colonelcy.
coloner ::: n. --> A colonist.
colonial ::: a. --> Of or pertaining to a colony; as, colonial rights, traffic, wars.
colonical ::: a. --> Of or pertaining to husbandmen.
colonies ::: people or territories separated from but subject to a ruling power.
colonies ::: pl. --> of Colony
colonise ::: to settle as colonists or establish a colony (in). colonised.
colonist ::: a person who settles in a new colony or moves into and helps found a colony or new country.
colonist ::: Madhav: “King Aswapathy had come to birth on earth with a special mission from the higher realms of the Spirit: to prepare the conditions for a divine advent, to embody in himself the soul of evolving humanity and to develop its aspiration for the Divine Life. he was conscious of the purpose for which he had sojourned in this mortal Nature and strove to extend here the reign of his native country of Infinity and Immortality.
colonist ::: n. --> A member or inhabitant of a colony.
colonitis ::: n. --> See Colitis.
colonizationist ::: n. --> A friend to colonization, esp. (U. S. Hist) to the colonization of Africa by emigrants from the colored population of the United States.
colonization ::: n. --> The act of colonizing, or the state of being colonized; the formation of a colony or colonies.
colonized ::: imp. & p. p. --> of Colonize
colonizer ::: n. --> One who promotes or establishes a colony; a colonist.
colonize ::: v. t. --> To plant or establish a colony or colonies in; to people with colonists; to migrate to and settle in. ::: v. i. --> To remove to, and settle in, a distant country; to make a colony.
colonizing ::: p. pr. & vb. n. --> of Colonize
colonnade ::: n. --> A series or range of columns placed at regular intervals with all the adjuncts, as entablature, stylobate, roof, etc.
colonnade ("s) ::: a series of columns placed at regular intervals.
colon ::: n. --> That part of the large intestines which extends from the caecum to the rectum. [See Illust of Digestion.]
A point or character, formed thus [:], used to separate parts of a sentence that are complete in themselves and nearly independent, often taking the place of a conjunction.
colony ::: a group of emigrants or their descendants who settle in a distant territory but remain subject to or closely associated with the parent country. colonies.
colony ::: n. --> A company of people transplanted from their mother country to a remote province or country, and remaining subject to the jurisdiction of the parent state; as, the British colonies in America.
The district or country colonized; a settlement.
A company of persons from the same country sojourning in a foreign city or land; as, the American colony in Paris.
A number of animals or plants living or growing together, beyond their usual range.
colophany ::: n. --> See Colophony.
colophene ::: n. --> A colorless, oily liquid, formerly obtained by distillation of colophony. It is regarded as a polymeric form of terebenthene. Called also diterebene.
colophonite ::: n. --> A coarsely granular variety of garnet.
colophon ::: n. --> An inscription, monogram, or cipher, containing the place and date of publication, printer&
colophony ::: n. --> Rosin.
coloquintida ::: n. --> See Colocynth.
colorable ::: a. --> Specious; plausible; having an appearance of right or justice.
colorado beetle ::: --> A yellowish beetle (Doryphora decemlineata), with ten longitudinal, black, dorsal stripes. It has migrated eastwards from its original habitat in Colorado, and is very destructive to the potato plant; -- called also potato beetle and potato bug. See Potato beetle.
colorado group ::: --> A subdivision of the cretaceous formation of western North America, especially developed in Colorado and the upper Missouri region.
coloradoite ::: n. --> Mercury telluride, an iron-black metallic mineral, found in Colorado.
colorate ::: a. --> Colored.
coloration ::: n. --> The act or art of coloring; the state of being colored.
colorature ::: n. --> Vocal music colored, as it were, by florid ornaments, runs, or rapid passages.
color {colour}
color-blind ::: a. --> Affected with color blindness. See Color blindness, under Color, n.
colored ::: imp. & p. p. --> of Color ::: a. --> Having color; tinged; dyed; painted; stained.
Specious; plausible; adorned so as to appear well; as, a highly colored description.
Of some other color than black or white.
colorific ::: a. --> Capable of communicating color or tint to other bodies.
colorimeter ::: n. --> An instrument for measuring the depth of the color of anything, especially of a liquid, by comparison with a standard liquid.
coloring ::: p. pr. & vb. n. --> of Color ::: n. --> The act of applying color to; also, that which produces color.
Change of appearance as by addition of color; appearance; show; disguise; misrepresentation.
colorist ::: n. --> One who colors; an artist who excels in the use of colors; one to whom coloring is of prime importance.
colorless ::: a. --> Without color; not distinguished by any hue; transparent; as, colorless water.
Free from any manifestation of partial or peculiar sentiment or feeling; not disclosing likes, dislikes, prejudice, etc.; as, colorless music; a colorless style; definitions should be colorless.
colorman ::: n. --> A vender of paints, etc.
colormen ::: pl. --> of Colorman
color model {colour model}
color ::: n. --> A property depending on the relations of light to the eye, by which individual and specific differences in the hues and tints of objects are apprehended in vision; as, gay colors; sad colors, etc.
Any hue distinguished from white or black.
The hue or color characteristic of good health and spirits; ruddy complexion.
That which is used to give color; a paint; a pigment; as, oil colors or water colors.
color sergeant ::: --> See under Sergeant.
colossal ::: anything of immense size; huge; gigantic.
colossal ::: a. --> Of enormous size; gigantic; huge; as, a colossal statue.
Of a size larger than heroic. See Heroic.
colossean ::: a. --> Colossal.
colosseum ::: n. --> The amphitheater of Vespasian in Rome.
colossi ::: pl. --> of Colossus
colossuses ::: pl. --> of Colossus
colossus ::: n. --> A statue of gigantic size. The name was especially applied to certain famous statues in antiquity, as the Colossus of Nero in Rome, the Colossus of Apollo at Rhodes.
Any man or beast of gigantic size.
colostrum ::: n. --> The first milk secreted after delivery; biestings.
A mixture of turpentine and the yolk of an egg, formerly used as an emulsion.
colotomy ::: n. --> An operation for opening the colon
colour depth {bits per pixel}
colourful ::: 1. Having striking colour; full of colour. 2. Striking in variety and interest.
colour "graphics" (US "color") Colours are usually represented as {RGB} triples in a {digital} {image} because this corresponds most closely to the electronic signals needed to drive a {CRT}. Several equivalent systems ("{colour models}") exist, e.g. {HSB}. A colour {image} may be stored as three separate images, one for each of red, green, and blue, or each {pixel} may encode the colour using separate {bit-fields} for each colour component, or each pixel may store a logical colour number which is looked up in a hardware {colour palette} to find the colour to display. Printers may use the {CMYK} or {Pantone} representations of colours as well as RGB. (1999-08-02)
colour look-up table {colour palette}
colour model "graphics" Any system for representing {colours} as {ordered sets} of numbers. The most common colour models are {RGB}, {CMYK}, and {HSB}. There are several others, e.g. {CMY}, and the "Lab" system(?). See also: {Pantone}. (1999-10-21)
colour ::: n. --> See Color.
colour palette "graphics, hardware" (colour look-up table, CLUT) A device which converts the {logical} colour numbers stored in each {pixel} of {video} memory into {physical} colours, normally represented as {RGB} triplets, that can be displayed on the {monitor}. The palette is simply a block of fast {RAM} which is addressed by the logical colour and whose output is split into the red, green and blue levels which drive the actual display (e.g. {CRT}). The number of entries (logical colours) in the palette is the total number of colours which can appear on screen simultaneously. The width of each entry determines the number of colours which the palette can be set to produce. A common example would be a palette of 256 colours (i.e. addressed by eight-bit pixel values) where each colour can be chosen from a total of 16.7 million colours (i.e. eight bits output for each of red, green and blue). Changes to the palette affect the whole screen at once and can be used to produce special effects which would be much slower to produce by updating pixels. (1997-06-03)
colp ::: n. --> See Collop.
colportage ::: n. --> The distribution of religious books, tracts, etc., by colporteurs.
colporter ::: n. --> Same as Colporteur.
colporteur ::: n. --> A hawker; specifically, one who travels about selling and distributing religious tracts and books.
colstaff ::: n. --> A staff by means of which a burden is borne by two persons on their shoulders. html{color:
colter ::: n. --> A knife or cutter, attached to the beam of a plow to cut the sward, in advance of the plowshare and moldboard.
coltish ::: a. --> Like a colt; wanton; frisky.
colt ::: n. --> The young of the equine genus or horse kind of animals; -- sometimes distinctively applied to the male, filly being the female. Cf. Foal.
A young, foolish fellow.
A short knotted rope formerly used as an instrument of punishment in the navy. ::: v. i.
coltsfoot ::: n. --> A perennial herb (Tussilago Farfara), whose leaves and rootstock are sometimes employed in medicine.
coluber ::: n. --> A genus of harmless serpents.
colubrine ::: a. --> like or related to snakes of the genus Coluber.
Like a snake; cunning; crafty.
colugo ::: n. --> A peculiar East Indian mammal (Galleopithecus volans), having along the sides, connecting the fore and hind limbs, a parachutelike membrane, by means of which it is able to make long leaps, like the flying squirrel; -- called also flying lemur.
columbae ::: n. pl. --> An order of birds, including the pigeons.
columba ::: n. --> See Calumba.
columbaria ::: pl. --> of Columbarium
columbaries ::: pl. --> of Columbary
columbarium ::: n. --> A dovecote or pigeon house.
A sepulchral chamber with niches for holding cinerary urns.
columbary ::: n. --> A dovecote; a pigeon house.
columbate ::: n. --> A salt of columbic acid; a niobate. See Columbium.
columbatz fly ::: --> See Buffalo fly, under Buffalo.
columbella ::: n. --> A genus of univalve shells, abundant in tropical seas. Some species, as Columbella mercatoria, were formerly used as shell money.
columbiad ::: n. --> A form of seacoast cannon; a long, chambered gun designed for throwing shot or shells with heavy charges of powder, at high angles of elevation.
columbia ::: n. --> America; the United States; -- a poetical appellation given in honor of Columbus, the discoverer.
columbian ::: a. --> Of or pertaining to the United States, or to America.
columbic ::: a. --> Pertaining to, or containing, columbium or niobium; niobic.
Pertaining to, or derived from, the columbo root.
columbier ::: n. --> See Colombier.
columbiferous ::: a. --> Producing or containing columbium.
columbine ::: a. --> Of or pertaining to a dove; dovelike; dove-colored. ::: n. --> A plant of several species of the genus Aquilegia; as, A. vulgaris, or the common garden columbine; A. Canadensis, the wild red columbine of North America.
The mistress or sweetheart of Harlequin in pantomimes.
columbin ::: n. --> A white, crystalline, bitter substance. See Calumbin.
columbite ::: n. --> A mineral of a black color, submetallic luster, and high specific specific gravity. It is a niobate (or columbate) of iron and manganese, containing tantalate of iron; -- first found in New England.
columbium ::: n. --> A rare element of the vanadium group, first found in a variety of the mineral columbite occurring in Connecticut, probably at Haddam. Atomic weight 94.2. Symbol Cb or Nb. Now more commonly called niobium.
columbo ::: n. --> See Calumba.
columella ::: n. --> An axis to which a carpel of a compound pistil may be attached, as in the case of the geranium; or which is left when a pod opens.
A columnlike axis in the capsules of mosses.
A term applied to various columnlike parts; as, the columella, or epipterygoid bone, in the skull of many lizards; the columella of the ear, the bony or cartilaginous rod connecting the tympanic membrane with the internal ear.
columelliform ::: a. --> Shaped like a little column, or columella.
column 1. "database" A named slice through a {database} {table} that includes the same field of each {row}. For example, a telephone directory table might have a row for each person with a name column and a telephone number column. 2. "storage" A line of memory cells in a {dynamic random-access memory}, that is selected by a particular column address. (2007-10-12)
columnar ::: a. --> Formed in columns; having the form of a column or columns; like the shaft of a column.
columnarity ::: n. --> The state or quality of being columnar.
columnated ::: a. --> Having columns; as, columnated temples.
columned ::: a. --> Having columns.
columned ::: having or resembling pillars; having pillars of a specified kind.
columniation ::: n. --> The employment or arrangement of columns in a structure.
column ::: n. --> A kind of pillar; a cylindrical or polygonal support for a roof, ceiling, statue, etc., somewhat ornamented, and usually composed of base, shaft, and capital. See Order.
Anything resembling, in form or position, a column in architecture; an upright body or mass; a shaft or obelisk; as, a column of air, of water, of mercury, etc.; the Column Vendome; the spinal column.
A body of troops formed in ranks, one behind the other; --
columns ::: long, narrow formations of troops in which there are more members in line in the direction of movement than at right angles to the direction.—(distinguished from line).
colure ::: n. --> One of two great circles intersecting at right angles in the poles of the equator. One of them passes through the equinoctial points, and hence is denominated the equinoctial colure; the other intersects the equator at the distance of 90¡ from the former, and is called the solstitial colure.
colures ::: pl. --> of Colure
coly ::: n. --> Any bird of the genus Colius and allied genera. They inhabit Africa.
colza ::: n. --> A variety of cabbage (Brassica oleracea), cultivated for its seeds, which yield an oil valued for illuminating and lubricating purposes; summer rape.
COLASL "mathematics, application" An early system for numerical problems on the {IBM 7030}. It used a special {character set} for input of natural mathematical expressions. [Sammet 1969, pp. 265-271]. (1995-01-04)
COLD 1. "language" A {sugar}ed version of {COLD-K}. 2. "storage" Computer Output to Laser Disk - see {Enterprise Report Management}. (2007-07-24)
ColdFusion Markup Language "language, web" (CFML) A {tag} based {markup} language used to create {ColdFusion} {web applications} by embedding ColdFusion commands in {HTML} files. (1999-08-01)
ColdFusion "web, database, tool" {Allaire Corporation}'s commercial {database} application development tool that allows {databases} to have a {web interface}, so a database can be queried and updated using a {web browser}. The ColdFusion Server application runs on the {web server} and has access to a {database}. ColdFusion files on the web server are {HTML} pages with additional ColdFusion commands to {query} or {update} the database, written in {CFML}. When the page is requested by the user, the {web server} passes the page to the Cold Fusion application, which executes the {CFML} commands, places the results of the {CFML} commands in the {HTML} file, and returns the page to the {web server}. The page returned to the {web server} is now an ordinary {HTML} file, and it is sent to the user. Examples of ColdFusion applications include order entry, event registration, catalogue search, directories, calendars, and interactive training. ColdFusion applications are robust because all database interactions are encapsulated in a single industrial-strength {CGI} script. The formatting and presentation can be modified and revised at any time (as opposed to having to edit and recompile {source code}). ColdFusion Server can connect with any database that supports {ODBC} or {OLE DB} or one that has a native database driver. Native database drivers are available for {Oracle} and {Sybase} databases. ColdFusion is available for {Windows}, {Solaris}, and {HP-UX}. A {development environment} for creating ColdFusion files, called ColdFusion Studio, is also available for {Windows}. The {filename extension} for ColdFusion files is .cfm {(http://coldfusion.com/)}. (2003-07-27)
COLD-K "language" A formal design {kernel language} for describing (sequential) software systems in intermediate stages of their design. ["An Introduction to COLD-K", H.B.M. Jonkers in Algebraic Methods: Theory, Tools and Applications, M. Wirsing et al eds, LNCS 394, Springer 1989, pp. 139-205]. (1995-01-04)
Cold ::: Knowledge of the divine Truth ; indicates at its most intense, something from the supramenlal, othenvise overinind truth or intuitive truth deriving ultimately from the suprameotal
Coleridge, Samuel Taylor: (1772-1834) Leading English poet of his generation along with his friend and associate, William Wordsworth. He was for a time a Unitarian preacher and his writings throughout display a keen interest in spiritual affairs. He was among the first to bring the German idealists to the attention of the English reading public. Of greatest philosophic interest among his prose works are Biographia Literaria, Aids to Reflection and Confessions of an Inquiring Spirit. His influence was greit upon his contemporaries and also upon the American transcendentalists. -- L.E.D.
Colilen light is that of the Divine Truth on the higher planes ; the light of the Divine Truth which comes out from the supra- mcntal sunlight and modified according to the level it crosses, creates the ranges from Overraind to Higher Mind. It always means the light o£ Truth ; but the nature of the Truth varies according to the plane to which it belongs.
COLINGO "language" Compile On-LINe and GO. An english-like {query} system from {MITRE Corporation} for the {IBM 1401}. ["The COLINGO System Design Philosophy", Information System Sciences, Proc Second Congress, 1965]. [Sammet 1969, p. 664]. (1995-01-04)
COLLAL sleeves 360
Collective and Distributive Properties: A general term is taken in its collective sense when what is predicated of its applies to its designation as a whole, rather than to each of the individual members belonging to it; the distributive properties are those that apply only in the latter way. Colligation: (Lat. con + ligare, to bind) The assimilation of a number of separately observed facts to a unified conception or formula. The term was introduced by Whewcll who gives the eximple of the idea of an eliptical orbit which "unifies all observations made on the positions of a planet" (see Philosophy of the Inductive Sciences, I Aphorism 1). J. S. Mill appropriates the term and carefully differentiates it from induction: whereas colligation is a simple "description" of observed facts, induction is an extension to the unknown and to the future. See Logic, III, ii, § 4. -- L.W.
Collective Unconscious ::: According to Jung, the content of the unconscious mind that is passed down from generation to generation in all humans.
Color Graphics Adapter "hardware, graphics" (CGA) One of {IBM}'s earliest hardware video {display standards} for use in {IBM PCs}. CGA can display 80*25 or 40*25 text in 16 colors, 640*200 {pixels} of graphics in two colors or 320*200 in four colors (IBM PC video modes 0-6). It is now obsolete. (1995-11-11)
Colossus (A huge and ancient statue on the Greek island of Rhodes). 1. "computer" The Colossus and Colossus Mark II computers used by {Alan Turing} at {Bletchley Park}, UK during the Second World War to crack the "Tunny" cipher produced by the Lorenz SZ 40 and SZ 42 machines. Colossus was a semi-fixed-program {vacuum tube} calculator (unlike its near-contemporary, the freely programmable {Z3}). ["Breaking the enemy's code", Glenn Zorpette, IEEE Spectrum, September 1987, pp. 47-51.] 2. The computer in the 1970 film, "Colossus: The Forbin Project". Forbin is the designer of a computer that will run all of America's nuclear defences. Shortly after being turned on, it detects the existence of Goliath, the Soviet counterpart, previously unknown to US Planners. Both computers insist that they be linked, whereupon the two become a new super computer and threaten the world with the immediate launch of nuclear weapons if they are detached. Colossus begins to give its plans for the management of the world under its guidance. Forbin and the other scientists form a technological resistance to Colossus which must operate underground. {The Internet Movie Database (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0064177)}. (2007-01-04)
Colour and light are always close to each other, colour being more indicative, light more dynamic. Colour incandescent be- comes light.
Colour indicates the pby of forces mental, physical and vital, but forces making for ealigbteiunent of these parts of the being.
Colours ::: , ,
Colours
COLOURS. ::: When the colours begin to lake definite shapes in the visions, it is a sign of some dynamic work of formation in the consciousness. The waves of colour mean a dynamic rush of forces.
Columbia AppleTalk Package "networking" (CAP) An implementation of {Apple Computer}'s {AppleTalk} {protocols} for {Unix} {4.2BSD} and its derivatives, from {Columbia University}. There are two different {LAP} delivery mechanisms for: {IPTalk} and {Ethertalk} (possibly using {UAB}). CAP supports the following {AppleTalk} {protocols}: {AppleTalk Transaction Protocol} (ATP), {Name Binding Protocol} (NBP), {Printer Access Protocol} (PAP), {AppleTalk Session Protocol} (ASP), {AppleTalk Filing Protocol} (AFP) client side. In addition, the {Datagram Delivery Protocol} (DDP) and {Zone Information Protocol} (ZIP) are partially available. The structure of the {Internet Appletalk Bridge} software makes it impossible to provide full DDP service. Only the Get Zone List ATP ZIP command is implemented for ZIP. (1995-01-10)
Column Address Strobe "hardware" (CAS) A signal sent from a processor (or {memory controller}) to a {dynamic random-access memory} (DRAM) (qv) circuit to indicate that the column {address lines} are valid. (1996-10-17)
TERMS ANYWHERE
1. A gradation or variety of a colour; tint. 2. Colour. 3. Form or appearance. 4. The complexion, appearance or aspect of a person. hues, hued, hueless, hue-robed, hue-winged, hundred-hued, many-hued.
1. A loose pliable covering for the head and neck, often attached to a robe or jacket. 2. Something resembling this in shape or use. 3. In animals, a conformation of parts (as in the cobra and the hooded seal), or arrangement of colour about the head or neck, resembling or suggesting a hood. hoods.
1. Disappeared gradually; vanished. 2. Having lost freshness, brilliance of colour, etc.
1. Not moved by emotion or excitement; unaffected, undisturbed; collected, calm. 2. Not moved in position; unstirred; remaining fixed or steady.
1. Not stained or discoloured; spotless, clean, pure. 2. Not morally stained or sullied; unblemished, untarnished.
1. To give light to; illuminate; shine on. 2. Make lighter or brighter. 3. To bestow spiritual enlightenment. 4. To enlighten, as with knowledge. 5. To make lucid or clear; throw light on (a subject). 6. To make resplendent or illustrious. 7. To decorate (a manuscript, book, etc.) with colours and gold or silver, as was often done in the Middle Ages. illumines, illumined, illumining, half-illumined.
1. Touchstone; a very smooth, fine-grained, black or dark-coloured variety of quartz or jasper (also called basanite), used for testing the quality of gold and silver alloys by the colour of the streak produced by rubbing them upon it; a piece of such stone used for this purpose. 2. *fig.* That which serves to test or try the genuineness or value of anything; a test, criterion.
aard-wolf ::: n. --> A carnivorous quadruped (Proteles Lalandii), of South Africa, resembling the fox and hyena. See Proteles. html{color:
abaculus ::: n. --> A small tile of glass, marble, or other substance, of various colors, used in making ornamental patterns in mosaic pavements.
abacus ::: n. --> A table or tray strewn with sand, anciently used for drawing, calculating, etc.
A calculating table or frame; an instrument for performing arithmetical calculations by balls sliding on wires, or counters in grooves, the lowest line representing units, the second line, tens, etc. It is still employed in China.
The uppermost member or division of the capital of a column, immediately under the architrave. See Column.
abbreviator ::: n. --> One who abbreviates or shortens.
One of a college of seventy-two officers of the papal court whose duty is to make a short minute of a decision on a petition, or reply of the pope to a letter, and afterwards expand the minute into official form.
acold ::: a. --> Cold.
acologic ::: a. --> Pertaining to acology.
acology ::: n. --> Materia medica; the science of remedies.
acolothist ::: n. --> See Acolythist.
acolyctine ::: n. --> An organic base, in the form of a white powder, obtained from Aconitum lycoctonum.
acolyte ::: an attendant or junior assistant in any ceremony or operation; a novice; follower. acolytes.
acolyte ::: n. --> One who has received the highest of the four minor orders in the Catholic church, being ordained to carry the wine and water and the lights at the Mass.
One who attends; an assistant.
acolythist ::: n. --> An acolyte.
acolyth ::: n. --> Same as Acolyte.
ablaze ::: 1. Burning; on fire. 2. Gleaming with bright lights, bold colours, etc.
a body of executive officials collectively entrusted with the execution and administration of laws.
A body of mystical Jewish teachings based on an interpretation of hidden meanings in the Hebrew Scriptures. Among its central doctrines are, all creation is an emanation from the Deity and the soul exists from eternity. 2. Any secret or occult doctrine or science. 3.”Esoteric system of interpretation of the Hebrew scriptures based on the assumption that every word, letter, number, and accent in them has an occult meaning. The system, oral at first, claimed great antiquity, but was really the product of the Middle Ages, arising in the 7th century and lasting into the 18th. It was popular chiefly among Jews, but spread to Christians as well. (Col. Enc). Glossary and Index of Proper Names in Sri Aurobindo’s Works
abracadabra ::: n. --> A mystical word or collocation of letters written as in the figure. Worn on an amulet it was supposed to ward off fever. At present the word is used chiefly in jest to denote something without meaning; jargon.
abscess ::: n. --> A collection of pus or purulent matter in any tissue or organ of the body, the result of a morbid process.
absolute reality ::: Sri Aurobindo: "I would myself say that bliss and oneness are the essential condition of the absolute reality, and love as the most characteristic dynamic power of bliss and oneness must support fundamentally and colour their activities; . . . .” Letters on Yoga
abstraction ::: a. --> The act of abstracting, separating, or withdrawing, or the state of being withdrawn; withdrawal.
The act process of leaving out of consideration one or more properties of a complex object so as to attend to others; analysis. Thus, when the mind considers the form of a tree by itself, or the color of the leaves as separate from their size or figure, the act is called abstraction. So, also, when it considers whiteness, softness, virtue, existence, as separate from any particular objects.
academian ::: n. --> A member of an academy, university, or college.
academic ::: a. --> Alt. of Academical ::: n. --> One holding the philosophy of Socrates and Plato; a Platonist.
A member of an academy, college, or university; an academician.
academicals ::: n. pl. --> The articles of dress prescribed and worn at some colleges and universities.
academician ::: n. --> A member of an academy, or society for promoting science, art, or literature, as of the French Academy, or the Royal Academy of arts.
A collegian.
academy ::: n. --> A garden or grove near Athens (so named from the hero Academus), where Plato and his followers held their philosophical conferences; hence, the school of philosophy of which Plato was head.
An institution for the study of higher learning; a college or a university. Popularly, a school, or seminary of learning, holding a rank between a college and a common school.
A place of training; a school.
A society of learned men united for the advancement of the
acantha ::: n. --> A prickle.
A spine or prickly fin.
The vertebral column; the spinous process of a vertebra.
accolade ::: n. --> A ceremony formerly used in conferring knighthood, consisting am embrace, and a slight blow on the shoulders with the flat blade of a sword.
A brace used to join two or more staves.
accoil ::: v. t. --> To gather together; to collect.
To coil together.
accord ::: agreement or harmonious correspondence of things or their properties, as of colours or tints. Of sounds: Agreement in pitch and tone; harmony.
accumulate ::: v. t. --> To heap up in a mass; to pile up; to collect or bring together; to amass; as, to accumulate a sum of money. ::: v. i. --> To grow or increase in quantity or number; to increase greatly.
accumulative ::: a. --> Characterized by accumulation; serving to collect or amass; cumulative; additional.
accumulator ::: n. --> One who, or that which, accumulates, collects, or amasses.
An apparatus by means of which energy or power can be stored, such as the cylinder or tank for storing water for hydraulic elevators, the secondary or storage battery used for accumulating the energy of electrical charges, etc.
A system of elastic springs for relieving the strain upon a rope, as in deep-sea dredging.
acetal ::: n. --> A limpid, colorless, inflammable liquid from the slow oxidation of alcohol under the influence of platinum black.
acetylene ::: n. --> A gaseous compound of carbon and hydrogen, in the proportion of two atoms of the former to two of the latter. It is a colorless gas, with a peculiar, unpleasant odor, and is produced for use as an illuminating gas in a number of ways, but chiefly by the action of water on calcium carbide. Its light is very brilliant.
achillean ::: a. --> Resembling Achilles, the hero of the Iliad; invincible. html{color:
achiote ::: n. --> Seeds of the annotto tree; also, the coloring matter, annotto.
achromatic ::: a. --> Free from color; transmitting light without decomposing it into its primary colors.
Uncolored; not absorbing color from a fluid; -- said of tissue.
achromatize ::: v. t. --> To deprive of color; to make achromatic.
achromatopsy ::: n. --> Color blindness; inability to distinguish colors; Daltonism.
achroodextrin ::: n. --> Dextrin not colorable by iodine. See Dextrin.
achroous ::: a. --> Colorless; achromatic.
acreage ::: n. --> Acres collectively; as, the acreage of a farm or a country.
acritochromacy ::: n. --> Color blindness; achromatopsy.
acrolein ::: n. --> A limpid, colorless, highly volatile liquid, obtained by the dehydration of glycerin, or the destructive distillation of neutral fats containing glycerin. Its vapors are intensely irritating.
actinia ::: n. --> An animal of the class Anthozoa, and family Actinidae. From a resemblance to flowers in form and color, they are often called animal flowers and sea anemones. [See Polyp.].
A genus in the family Actinidae.
actinolite ::: n. --> A bright green variety of amphibole occurring usually in fibrous or columnar masses.
"Action is a resultant of the energy of the being, but this energy is not of one sole kind; the Consciousness-Force of the Spirit manifests itself in many kinds of energies: there are inner activities of mind, activities of life, of desire, passion, impulse, character, activities of the senses and the body, a pursuit of truth and knowledge, a pursuit of beauty, a pursuit of ethical good or evil, a pursuit of power, love, joy, happiness, fortune, success, pleasure, life-satisfactions of all kinds, life-enlargement, a pursuit of individual or collective objects, a pursuit of the health, strength, capacity, satisfaction of the body.” The Life Divine*
“Action is a resultant of the energy of the being, but this energy is not of one sole kind; the Consciousness-Force of the Spirit manifests itself in many kinds of energies: there are inner activities of mind, activities of life, of desire, passion, impulse, character, activities of the senses and the body, a pursuit of truth and knowledge, a pursuit of beauty, a pursuit of ethical good or evil, a pursuit of power, love, joy, happiness, fortune, success, pleasure, life-satisfactions of all kinds, life-enlargement, a pursuit of individual or collective objects, a pursuit of the health, strength, capacity, satisfaction of the body.” The Life Divine
adagio ::: a. & adv. --> Slow; slowly, leisurely, and gracefully. When repeated, adagio, adagio, it directs the movement to be very slow. ::: n. --> A piece of music in adagio time; a slow movement; as, an adagio of Haydn. html{color:
addendum ::: n. --> A thing to be added; an appendix or addition. html{color:
adder ::: n. --> One who, or that which, adds; esp., a machine for adding numbers.
A serpent.
A small venomous serpent of the genus Vipera. The common European adder is the Vipera (/ Pelias) berus. The puff adders of Africa are species of Clotho.
In America, the term is commonly applied to several harmless snakes, as the milk adder, puffing adder, etc. html{color:
adding ::: p. pr. & vb. n. --> of Add html{color:
add ::: v. t. --> To give by way of increased possession (to any one); to bestow (on).
To join or unite, as one thing to another, or as several particulars, so as to increase the number, augment the quantity, enlarge the magnitude, or so as to form into one aggregate. Hence: To sum up; to put together mentally; as, to add numbers; to add up a column.
To append, as a statement; to say further.
adelphia ::: n. --> A "brotherhood," or collection of stamens in a bundle; -- used in composition, as in the class names, Monadelphia, Diadelphia, etc.
ADHYATMA YOGA. ::: The principle of adhyātma yoga is, in knowledge, the realisation of all things that we see or do not see but are aware of, - men, things, ourselves, events, gods, titans, angels, - as one divine Brahman, and in action and attitude, an absolute self-surrender to the Paratpara Purusha, the transcendent, infinite and universal Personality who is at once personal and impersonal, finite and infinite, self-limiting and illimitable, one and many, and informs with his being not only the Gods above, but man and the worm and the cold below.
adipocere ::: n. --> A soft, unctuous, or waxy substance, of a light brown color, into which the fat and muscle tissue of dead bodies sometimes are converted, by long immersion in water or by burial in moist places. It is a result of fatty degeneration.
adj. 1. Lacking in colour or brightness, vividness, clearness, loudness, strength, etc. 2. Indistinct, ill-defined; dim; faded; slight. 3. Feeble through hunger, fear, exhaustion, etc. 4. Inclined to ‘faint" or swoon. faintest, faint-foot. v. 5. To lose strength, brightness, colour, courage etc.; to fade. 6. To grow weak. 7. To feel weak, dizzy or exhausted; falter; about to lose consciousness. 8. To weaken in purpose or spirit. faints, fainted, fainting.
adjunct ::: a. --> Conjoined; attending; consequent. ::: n. --> Something joined or added to another thing, but not essentially a part of it.
A person joined to another in some duty or service; a colleague; an associate.
adjutant ::: n. --> A helper; an assistant.
A regimental staff officer, who assists the colonel, or commanding officer of a garrison or regiment, in the details of regimental and garrison duty.
A species of very large stork (Ciconia argala), a native of India; -- called also the gigantic crane, and by the native name argala. It is noted for its serpent-destroying habits.
administration ::: n. --> The act of administering; government of public affairs; the service rendered, or duties assumed, in conducting affairs; the conducting of any office or employment; direction; management.
The executive part of government; the persons collectively who are intrusted with the execution of laws and the superintendence of public affairs; the chief magistrate and his cabinet or council; or the council, or ministry, alone, as in Great Britain.
admittatur ::: n. --> The certificate of admission given in some American colleges.
admonishing ::: 1. Reproving or scolding, especially in a mild or good-willed manner. 2. Urging to a duty; reminding.
ADVAITA. :::One Existence; the One without a second; non-dual, absolute and indivisible unity; Monism.
People are apt to speak of the Advaita as if it were identical with Mayavada monism, just as they speak of Vedanta as if it were identical with Advaita only; that is not the case. There are several forms of Indian philosophy which base themselves upon the One Reality, but they admit also the reality of the world, the reality of the Many, the reality of the differences of the Many as well as the sameness of the One (bhedābheda). But the Many exist in the One and by the One, the differences are variations in manifestation of that which is fundamentally ever the same. This we actually see in the universal law of existence where oneness is always the basis with an endless multiplicity and difference in the oneness; as for instance there is one mankind but many kinds of man, one thing called leaf or flower, but many forms, patterns, colours of leaf and flower. Through this we can look back into one of the fundamental secrets of existence, the secret which is contained in the one reality itself. The oneness of the Infinite is not something limited, fettered to its unity; it is capable of an infinite multiplicity. The Supreme Reality is an Absolute not limited by either oneness or multiplicity but simultaneously capable of both; for both are its aspects, although the oneness is fundamental and the multiplicity depends upon the oneness.
Wide Realistic Advaita.
adversaria ::: n. pl. --> A miscellaneous collection of notes, remarks, or selections; a commonplace book; also, commentaries or notes.
aemail ombrant ::: --> An art or process of flooding transparent colored glaze over designs stamped or molded on earthenware or porcelain.
aeneous ::: a. --> Colored like bronze.
aeolian ::: a. --> Of or pertaining to Aeolia or Aeolis, in Asia Minor, colonized by the Greeks, or to its inhabitants; aeolic; as, the Aeolian dialect.
Pertaining to Aeolus, the mythic god of the winds; pertaining to, or produced by, the wind; aerial.
aeroscope ::: n. --> An apparatus designed for collecting spores, germs, bacteria, etc., suspended in the air.
aeruginous ::: a. --> Of the nature or color of verdigris, or the rust of copper.
affinity ::: n. --> Relationship by marriage (as between a husband and his wife&
afoul ::: adv. & a. --> In collision; entangled.
africander ::: n. --> One born in Africa, the offspring of a white father and a "colored" mother. Also, and now commonly in Southern Africa, a native born of European settlers.
agalmatolite ::: n. --> A soft, compact stone, of a grayish, greenish, or yellowish color, carved into images by the Chinese, and hence called figure stone, and pagodite. It is probably a variety of pinite.
agate ::: adv. --> On the way; agoing; as, to be agate; to set the bells agate. ::: n. --> A semipellucid, uncrystallized variety of quartz, presenting various tints in the same specimen. Its colors are delicately arranged in stripes or bands, or blended in clouds.
agglomerated ::: imp. & p. p. --> of Agglomerate ::: a. --> Collected into a ball, heap, or mass.
Collected into a rounded head of flowers.
agglomerate ::: v. t. --> To wind or collect into a ball; hence, to gather into a mass or anything like a mass. ::: v. i. --> To collect in a mass. ::: a.
agglomeration ::: n. --> The act or process of collecting in a mass; a heaping together.
State of being collected in a mass; a mass; cluster.
agglomerative ::: a. --> Having a tendency to gather together, or to make collections.
aggravate ::: v. t. --> To make heavy or heavier; to add to; to increase.
To make worse, or more severe; to render less tolerable or less excusable; to make more offensive; to enhance; to intensify.
To give coloring to in description; to exaggerate; as, to aggravate circumstances.
To exasperate; to provoke; to irritate.
aggregately ::: adv. --> Collectively; in mass.
aggregate ::: v. t. --> To bring together; to collect into a mass or sum. "The aggregated soil."
To add or unite, as, a person, to an association.
To amount in the aggregate to; as, ten loads, aggregating five hundred bushels. ::: a.
aggregation ::: n. --> The act of aggregating, or the state of being aggregated; collection into a mass or sum; a collection of particulars; an aggregate.
aggregative ::: a. --> Taken together; collective.
Gregarious; social.
agistor ::: n. --> Formerly, an officer of the king&
agist ::: v. t. --> To take to graze or pasture, at a certain sum; -- used originally of the feeding of cattle in the king&
AGNI. ::: Fire; Fire of Sacrifice; the Fire-God; Flame of Divine Force; illumined will; Divine Will; Fire of human aspiration; flame of purification or transformation in the psychic being; psychic fire.
The psychic fire is the fire of aspiration, purification and Tapasya.
Without Agni the sacrificial flame cannot bum on the altar of the soul. That flame of Agni is the seven-tongued power of the Will, a Force of God instinct with Knowledge. This conscious and forceful will is the immortal guest in our mortality, a pure priest and a divine worker, the mediator between earth and heaven. It carries what we offer to the higher Powers and brings back in return their force and light and joy into our humanity.
Agni and colours ::: the principle of Fire can manifest all the colours and the pure white fire is that which contains in itself all the colours.
agricolation ::: n. --> Agriculture.
agricolist ::: n. --> A cultivator of the soil; an agriculturist.
ague ::: n. --> An acute fever.
An intermittent fever, attended by alternate cold and hot fits.
The cold fit or rigor of the intermittent fever; as, fever and ague.
A chill, or state of shaking, as with cold. ::: v. t.
aguish ::: a. --> Having the qualities of an ague; somewhat cold or shivering; chilly; shaky.
Productive of, or affected by, ague; as, the aguish districts of England.
aiblins ::: adv. --> Alt. of Ablins html{color:
aimless ::: a. --> Without aim or purpose; as, an aimless life. html{color:
air ::: n. --> The fluid which we breathe, and which surrounds the earth; the atmosphere. It is invisible, inodorous, insipid, transparent, compressible, elastic, and ponderable.
Symbolically: Something unsubstantial, light, or volatile.
A particular state of the atmosphere, as respects heat, cold, moisture, etc., or as affecting the sensations; as, a smoky air, a damp air, the morning air, etc.
Any aeriform body; a gas; as, oxygen was formerly called vital
aisle ::: n. --> A lateral division of a building, separated from the middle part, called the nave, by a row of columns or piers, which support the roof or an upper wall containing windows, called the clearstory wall.
Improperly used also for the have; -- as in the phrases, a church with three aisles, the middle aisle.
Also (perhaps from confusion with alley), a passage into which the pews of a church open.
alabaster ::: n. --> A compact variety or sulphate of lime, or gypsum, of fine texture, and usually white and translucent, but sometimes yellow, red, or gray. It is carved into vases, mantel ornaments, etc.
A hard, compact variety of carbonate of lime, somewhat translucent, or of banded shades of color; stalagmite. The name is used in this sense by Pliny. It is sometimes distinguished as oriental alabaster.
A box or vessel for holding odoriferous ointments, etc.;
albino ::: n. --> A person, whether negro, Indian, or white, in whom by some defect of organization the substance which gives color to the skin, hair, and eyes is deficient or in a morbid state. An albino has a skin of a milky hue, with hair of the same color, and eyes with deep red pupil and pink or blue iris. The term is also used of the lower animals, as white mice, elephants, etc.; and of plants in a whitish condition from the absence of chlorophyll.
alburn ::: n. --> The bleak, a small European fish having scales of a peculiarly silvery color which are used in making artificial pearls.
aldehyde ::: n. --> A colorless, mobile, and very volatile liquid obtained from alcohol by certain processes of oxidation.
aldermanity ::: n. --> Aldermen collectively; the body of aldermen.
The state of being an alderman.
alderney ::: n. --> One of a breed of cattle raised in Alderney, one of the Channel Islands. Alderneys are of a dun or tawny color and are often called Jersey cattle. See Jersey, 3.
alectoromancy ::: n. --> See Alectryomancy. html{color:
alength ::: adv. --> At full length; lengthwise. html{color:
algaroba ::: n. --> The Carob, a leguminous tree of the Mediterranean region; also, its edible beans or pods, called St. John&
algid ::: a. --> Cold; chilly.
algidity ::: n. --> Chilliness; coldness
coldness and collapse.
algific ::: a. --> Producing cold.
algor ::: n. --> Cold; chilliness.
alizarin ::: n. --> A coloring principle, C14H6O2(OH)2, found in madder, and now produced artificially from anthracene. It produces the Turkish reds.
alkanet ::: n. --> A dyeing matter extracted from the roots of Alkanna tinctoria, which gives a fine deep red color.
A boraginaceous herb (Alkanna tinctoria) yielding the dye; orchanet.
The similar plant Anchusa officinalis; bugloss; also, the American puccoon.
allanite ::: n. --> A silicate containing a large amount of cerium. It is usually black in color, opaque, and is related to epidote in form and composition.
allantoin ::: n. --> A crystalline, transparent, colorless substance found in the allantoic liquid of the fetal calf; -- formerly called allantoic acid and amniotic acid.
All depends upon the order of thin gs which the colours indi- cate in a particular case. There is an order of significances in which they indicate various psycbolo^cal dynamisms, c.g. faith, love, protection, etc. There is another order of significances In which they indicate the aura or the activity of divine beings,
allegory ::: n. --> A figurative sentence or discourse, in which the principal subject is described by another subject resembling it in its properties and circumstances. The real subject is thus kept out of view, and we are left to collect the intentions of the writer or speaker by the resemblance of the secondary to the primary subject.
Anything which represents by suggestive resemblance; an emblem.
A figure representation which has a meaning beyond notion
alleyway ::: n. --> An alley. html{color:
allochroic ::: a. --> Changeable in color.
allochroous ::: a. --> Changing color.
alloxan ::: n. --> An oxidation product of uric acid. It is of a pale reddish color, readily soluble in water or alcohol.
all-possessed ::: a. --> Controlled by an evil spirit or by evil passions; wild. html{color:
all saints ::: --> Alt. of All Saints&
alma mater ::: --> A college or seminary where one is educated.
aloft ::: adv. --> On high; in the air; high above the ground.
In the top; at the mast head, or on the higher yards or rigging; overhead; hence (Fig. and Colloq.), in or to heaven. ::: prep. --> Above; on top of.
altercative ::: a. --> Characterized by wrangling; scolding.
alternation ::: n. --> The reciprocal succession of things in time or place; the act of following and being followed by turns; alternate succession, performance, or occurrence; as, the alternation of day and night, cold and heat, summer and winter, hope and fear.
Permutation.
The response of the congregation speaking alternately with the minister.
Although the noun when capitalized refers to an officer of the British judiciary or one of several officials of the Exchequer, formally titled the Queen’s or the King’s Remembrancer, who has the responsibility of collecting debts that are owed to the Crown or an official representing the City of London, especially on various ceremonial occasions, or to represents the inters of Parliament, when defined in lower case the first definition given is person who reminds.
alumna ::: n. fem. --> A female pupil; especially, a graduate of a school or college.
alumnus ::: n. --> A pupil; especially, a graduate of a college or other seminary of learning.
alutaceous ::: a. --> Leathery.
Of a pale brown color; leather-yellow.
Amal: “In occult vision the colour of the mind is either yellow or blue. The yellow intensifies into the gold of the Supramental and the blue into the Divine Mother’s compassionate infinity.”
Amal: “It’s a reference to a supra-terrestrial region. As far as I remember, Sri Aurobindo added another similar line when I wrote to him some Latin lines from Virgil about a region where everything was ‘purple’. The adjective ‘purple’ in Latin means a region beyond the earth, which has either this colour or is simply ‘shining’. Sri Aurobindo’s new line: ‘And griefless countries under purple suns’.”
amandine ::: n. --> The vegetable casein of almonds.
A kind of cold cream prepared from almonds, for chapped hands, etc.
amaranthine ::: a. --> Of or pertaining to amaranth.
Unfading, as the poetic amaranth; undying.
Of a purplish color.
amaranth ::: n. --> An imaginary flower supposed never to fade.
A genus of ornamental annual plants (Amaranthus) of many species, with green, purplish, or crimson flowers.
A color inclining to purple.
amassette ::: n. --> An instrument of horn used for collecting painters&
amassment ::: n. --> An amassing; a heap collected; a large quantity or number brought together; an accumulation.
amass ::: v. t. --> To collect into a mass or heap; to gather a great quantity of; to accumulate; as, to amass a treasure or a fortune; to amass words or phrases. ::: n. --> A mass; a heap.
amazon stone ::: n. --> A variety of feldspar, having a verdigris-green color.
amber ::: A pale yellow, sometimes reddish or brownish, fossil resin of vegetable origin, translucent, brittle, and capable of gaining a negative electrical charge by friction and of being an excellent insulator. 2. The yellowish-brown colour of resin.
amber ::: a pale yellow, sometimes reddish or brownish, fossil resin of vegetable origin, translucent, brittle, and capable of gaining a negative electrical charge by friction and of being an excellent insulator. 2. The yellowish-brown colour of resin.
ambergris ::: n. --> A substance of the consistence of wax, found floating in the Indian Ocean and other parts of the tropics, and also as a morbid secretion in the intestines of the sperm whale (Physeter macrocephalus), which is believed to be in all cases its true origin. In color it is white, ash-gray, yellow, or black, and often variegated like marble. The floating masses are sometimes from sixty to two hundred and twenty-five pounds in weight. It is wholly volatilized as a white vapor at 212¡ Fahrenheit, and is highly valued in perfumery.
amber ::: n. --> A yellowish translucent resin resembling copal, found as a fossil in alluvial soils, with beds of lignite, or on the seashore in many places. It takes a fine polish, and is used for pipe mouthpieces, beads, etc., and as a basis for a fine varnish. By friction, it becomes strongly electric.
Amber color, or anything amber-colored; a clear light yellow; as, the amber of the sky.
Ambergris.
amethyst ::: A purple or violet quartz; having the clear colour as of the precious stone. (Sri Aurobindo employs the word as an adj.)
amethyst ::: a purple or violet quartz; having the clear colour as of the precious stone. Sri Aurobindo uses the word as an adj."for Amethyst (the Mother)she has revealed that it has a power of protection” Huta
amethyst ::: A purple or violet quartz; having the clear colour as of the precious stone. Sri Aurobindo uses the word as an adj.
amethyst ::: --> A variety of crystallized quartz, of a purple or bluish violet color, of different shades. It is much used as a jeweler&
amethystine ::: a. --> Resembling amethyst, especially in color; bluish violet.
Composed of, or containing, amethyst.
amidin ::: n. --> Start modified by heat so as to become a transparent mass, like horn. It is soluble in cold water.
amnicolist ::: n. --> One who lives near a river.
amontillado ::: n. --> A dry kind of cherry, of a light color.
amphibole ::: n. --> A common mineral embracing many varieties varying in color and in composition. It occurs in monoclinic crystals; also massive, generally with fibrous or columnar structure. The color varies from white to gray, green, brown, and black. It is a silicate of magnesium and calcium, with usually aluminium and iron. Some common varieties are tremolite, actinolite, asbestus, edenite, hornblende (the last name being also used as a general term for the whole species). Amphibole is a constituent of many crystalline rocks, as syenite,
amphichroic ::: a. --> Exhibiting or producing two colors, as substances which in the color test may change red litmus to blue and blue litmus to red.
amphiprostyle ::: a. --> Doubly prostyle; having columns at each end, but not at the sides. ::: n. --> An amphiprostyle temple or edifice.
amylene ::: n. --> One of a group of metameric hydrocarbons, C5H10, of the ethylene series. The colorless, volatile, mobile liquid commonly called amylene is a mixture of different members of the group.
amzel ::: n. --> The European ring ousel (Turdus torquatus). html{color:
anacoluthic ::: a. --> Lacking grammatical sequence.
anacoluthon ::: n. --> A want of grammatical sequence or coherence in a sentence; an instance of a change of construction in a sentence so that the latter part does not syntactically correspond with the first part.
analecta ::: n. pl. --> A collection of literary fragments.
anamnesis ::: n. --> A recalling to mind; recollection.
anchusin ::: n. --> A resinoid coloring matter obtained from alkanet root.
androecium ::: n. --> The stamens of a flower taken collectively.
androphore ::: n. --> A support or column on which stamens are raised.
The part which in some Siphonophora bears the male gonophores.
anecdotage ::: n. --> Anecdotes collectively; a collection of anecdotes.
anecdotist ::: n. --> One who relates or collects anecdotes.
anglo-saxon ::: n. --> A Saxon of Britain, that is, an English Saxon, or one the Saxons who settled in England, as distinguished from a continental (or "Old") Saxon.
The Teutonic people (Angles, Saxons, Jutes) of England, or the English people, collectively, before the Norman Conquest.
The language of the English people before the Conquest (sometimes called Old English). See Saxon.
anhydrite ::: n. --> A mineral of a white or a slightly bluish color, usually massive. It is anhydrous sulphate of lime, and differs from gypsum in not containing water (whence the name).
aniline ::: n. --> An organic base belonging to the phenylamines. It may be regarded as ammonia in which one hydrogen atom has been replaced by the radical phenyl. It is a colorless, oily liquid, originally obtained from indigo by distillation, but now largely manufactured from coal tar or nitrobenzene as a base from which many brilliant dyes are made. ::: a.
annealing ::: p. pr. & vb. n. --> of Anneal ::: n. --> The process used to render glass, iron, etc., less brittle, performed by allowing them to cool very gradually from a high heat.
The burning of metallic colors into glass, earthenware,
anneal ::: v. t. --> To subject to great heat, and then cool slowly, as glass, cast iron, steel, or other metal, for the purpose of rendering it less brittle; to temper; to toughen.
To heat, as glass, tiles, or earthenware, in order to fix the colors laid on them.
annulated ::: a. --> Furnished with, or composed of, rings; ringed; surrounded by rings of color.
Of or pertaining to the Annulata.
annulet ::: n. --> A little ring.
A small, flat fillet, encircling a column, etc., used by itself, or with other moldings. It is used, several times repeated, under the Doric capital.
A little circle borne as a charge.
A narrow circle of some distinct color on a surface or round an organ.
antechapel ::: n. --> The outer part of the west end of a collegiate or other chapel.
anthelion ::: n. --> A halo opposite the sun, consisting of a colored ring or rings around the shadow of the spectator&
anthokyan ::: n. --> The blue coloring matter of certain flowers. Same as Cyanin.
anthology ::: n. --> A discourse on flowers.
A collection of flowers; a garland.
A collection of flowers of literature, that is, beautiful passages from authors; a collection of poems or epigrams; -- particularly applied to a collection of ancient Greek epigrams.
A service book containing a selection of pieces for the festival services.
anthomania ::: n. --> A extravagant fondness for flowers. html{color:
anthophyllite ::: n. --> A mineral of the hornblende group, of a yellowish gray or clove brown color.
antiphonary ::: n. --> A book containing a collection of antiphons; the book in which the antiphons of the breviary, with their musical notes, are contained.
antiquist ::: n. --> An antiquary; a collector of antiques.
antirenter ::: n. --> One opposed to the payment of rent; esp. one of those who in 1840-47 resisted the collection of rents claimed by the patroons from the settlers on certain manorial lands in the State of New York.
antiscoletic ::: a. --> Alt. of Antiscolic
antiscolic ::: a. --> Anthelmintic.
apatite ::: n. --> Native phosphate of lime, occurring usually in six-sided prisms, color often pale green, transparent or translucent.
aphanite ::: n. --> A very compact, dark-colored /ock, consisting of hornblende, or pyroxene, and feldspar, but neither of them in perceptible grains.
aphthae ::: n. pl. --> Roundish pearl-colored specks or flakes in the mouth, on the lips, etc., terminating in white sloughs. They are commonly characteristic of thrush.
aplysia ::: n. --> A genus of marine mollusks of the order Tectibranchiata; the sea hare. Some of the species when disturbed throw out a deep purple liquor, which colors the water to some distance. See Illust. in Appendix.
apophyge ::: n. --> The small hollow curvature given to the top or bottom of the shaft of a column where it expands to meet the edge of the fillet; -- called also the scape.
apothegmatist ::: n. --> A collector or maker of apothegms.
apparatus ::: pl. --> of Apparatus ::: n. --> Things provided as means to some end.
Hence: A full collection or set of implements, or utensils, for a given duty, experimental or operative; any complex instrument or appliance, mechanical or chemical, for a specific action
append ::: v. t. --> To hang or attach to, as by a string, so that the thing is suspended; as, a seal appended to a record; the inscription was appended to the column.
To add, as an accessory to the principal thing; to annex; as, notes appended to this chapter.
applique ::: a. --> Ornamented with a pattern (which has been cut out of another color or stuff) applied or transferred to a foundation; as, applique lace; applique work.
appreciation ::: n. --> A just valuation or estimate of merit, worth, weight, etc.; recognition of excellence.
Accurate perception; true estimation; as, an appreciation of the difficulties before us; an appreciation of colors.
A rise in value; -- opposed to depreciation.
apricot ::: n. --> A fruit allied to the plum, of an orange color, oval shape, and delicious taste; also, the tree (Prunus Armeniaca of Linnaeus) which bears this fruit. By cultivation it has been introduced throughout the temperate zone.
apteral ::: a. --> Apterous.
Without lateral columns; -- applied to buildings which have no series of columns along their sides, but are either prostyle or amphiprostyle, and opposed to peripteral.
aquarelle ::: n. --> A design or painting in thin transparent water colors; also, the mode of painting in such colors.
aquarellist ::: n. --> A painter in thin transparent water colors.
aquatinta ::: n. --> A kind of etching in which spaces are bitten by the use of aqua fortis, by which an effect is produced resembling a drawing in water colors or India ink; also, the engraving produced by this method.
araeostyle ::: a. & n. --> See Intercolumniation.
araeosystyle ::: a. & n. --> See Intercolumniation.
arboretum ::: n. --> A place in which a collection of rare trees and shrubs is cultivated for scientific or educational purposes.
arboricole ::: a. --> Tree-inhabiting; -- said of certain birds.
arcade ::: n. --> A series of arches with the columns or piers which support them, the spandrels above, and other necessary appurtenances; sometimes open, serving as an entrance or to give light; sometimes closed at the back (as in the cut) and forming a decorative feature.
A long, arched building or gallery.
An arched or covered passageway or avenue.
archery ::: n. --> The use of the bow and arrows in battle, hunting, etc.; the art, practice, or skill of shooting with a bow and arrows.
Archers, or bowmen, collectively.
architrave ::: n. --> The lower division of an entablature, or that part which rests immediately on the column, esp. in classical architecture. See Column.
The group of moldings, or other architectural member, above and on both sides of a door or other opening, especially if square in form.
arc ::: n. --> A portion of a curved line; as, the arc of a circle or of an ellipse.
A curvature in the shape of a circular arc or an arch; as, the colored arc (the rainbow); the arc of Hadley&
arenicolite ::: n. --> An ancient wormhole in sand, preserved in the rocks.
areola ::: n. --> An interstice or small space, as between the cracks of the surface in certain crustaceous lichens; or as between the fibers composing organs or vessels that interlace; or as between the nervures of an insect&
areolation ::: n. --> Division into areolae.
Any small space, bounded by some part different in color or structure, as the spaces bounded by the nervures of the wings of insects, or those by the veins of leaves; an areola.
areostyle ::: a. & n. --> See Intercolumniation, and Araeostyle.
areosystyle ::: a. & n. --> See Intercolumniation, and Araeosystyle.
argentite ::: n. --> Sulphide of silver; -- also called vitreous silver, or silver glance. It has a metallic luster, a lead-gray color, and is sectile like lead.
argent ::: n. --> Silver, or money.
Whiteness; anything that is white.
The white color in coats of arms, intended to represent silver, or, figuratively, purity, innocence, beauty, or gentleness; -- represented in engraving by a plain white surface. ::: a.
aristocracy ::: the class to which a ruling body belongs, a patrician order; the collective body of those who form a privileged class; also used fig. of those who are superior.
assembled ::: gathered together; brought together into one place, collected.
associates ::: partners, comrades, companions, colleagues.
As Sri Aurobindo once wrote to Dilip Kumar Roy, (I paraphrase) ‘ The earth is a conscious being and the world is only the form it takes to manifest.’ This statement of the Avatar, predating the GAIA theory by many years and far surpassing it in its infinite scope, promises an earth returned to beauty to manifest, unknown to man, an inconceivable perfection. I once wrote to Mother with a question about what would happen to plants and flowers in the New Creation. Her reply filled me with joy and gratitude for She said that the flowers would be among the first to change (be transformed) because their entire life is an aspiration for light. Imagine the beauty to come with flowers brilliant with the Divine Light, colours such as never seen before, fragrances that can transofrm suffering and sorrow into a life free of pain and filled with joy.
azure ::: a light shade of blue resembling the colour of the clear sky in the daytime.
basilicas ::: public buildings in ancient Rome having a central nave with an apse at one or both ends and two side aisles formed by rows of columns, which was used as an assembly hall – also Christian churches with a similar design.
cold-hearted ::: lacking sympathy or feeling; indifferent; unkind, unfeeling.
collaboration ::: co-operation; working together harmoniously, especially in a joint intellectual effort.
collapse ::: 1. To fall or cave in; crumble suddenly. 2. Fig. To break down suddenly in strength or health and thereby cease to function. collapsed, collapsing.
collected ::: brought or placed together; forming an aggregation from various sources.
colloques ::: converses with; holds colloquy.
colloquy ::: a formal conversation, dialogue or conference. colloquies.
colonies ::: people or territories separated from but subject to a ruling power.
colonise ::: to settle as colonists or establish a colony (in). colonised.
colonist ::: a person who settles in a new colony or moves into and helps found a colony or new country.
colonist ::: Madhav: “King Aswapathy had come to birth on earth with a special mission from the higher realms of the Spirit: to prepare the conditions for a divine advent, to embody in himself the soul of evolving humanity and to develop its aspiration for the Divine Life. he was conscious of the purpose for which he had sojourned in this mortal Nature and strove to extend here the reign of his native country of Infinity and Immortality.
colonnade ("s) ::: a series of columns placed at regular intervals.
colony ::: a group of emigrants or their descendants who settle in a distant territory but remain subject to or closely associated with the parent country. colonies.
colossal ::: anything of immense size; huge; gigantic.
colourful ::: 1. Having striking colour; full of colour. 2. Striking in variety and interest.
columned ::: having or resembling pillars; having pillars of a specified kind.
-columnist ::: see **fifth-columnist.**
columns ::: long, narrow formations of troops in which there are more members in line in the direction of movement than at right angles to the direction.—(distinguished from line).
beam ::: 1. A ray of light. 2. A ray or collection of parallel rays. 3. A column of light, a gleam, emanation. Also fig. **beams.**
beauty ::: the quality present in a thing or person that gives intense pleasure or deep satisfaction to the mind, whether arising from sensory manifestations (as shape, colour, sound, etc.), a meaningful design or pattern, or something else, (as a personality in which high spiritual qualities are manifest). Beauty, beauty"s, Beauty"s, beauty-drenched, earth-beauty"s.
benumbed ::: made (any part of the body) insensible, torpid, or powerless; made numb, deprived of sensation; stupefied or stunned, as by a blow or shock; now mostly used for the effects of cold.
binding posts ::: stakes, stout poles, columns, or the like, that are set upright in or on the ground; (with prefixed word indicating special purpose).
blaze ::: n. 1. A brilliant burst of fire, a bright glowing flame. 2. A brilliant, striking display; a brilliant light; resplendent with bright colour. 3. A steady, clear light. 4. Fig. An intense outburst of passion, etc. ::: sun-blaze. v. 5. blazed.
bleak ::: 1. Exposed to the elements; unsheltered and barren; desolate; cold and cutting; raw, windswept. 2. Offering little or no hope or encouragement.
Bliss and oneness are the essential condition of the absolute reality, and love as the most characteristic dynamic power of bliss and oneness must support fundamentally and colour their activities.
Blue ::: Fundamental colour of the Ananda ; Krishna’s special and significant colour, the colour of his aura when he manifests ;
bright ::: 1. Emitting or reflecting light readily or in large amounts; shining; radiant. 2. Magnificent; glorious. 3. Favourable or auspicious. 4. Fig. Characterized by happiness or gladness; full of promise and hope. 5. Distinct and clear to the mind, etc. 6. Intensely clear and vibrant in tone or quality. 7. Polished; glistening as with brilliant color. brighter, brightest, bright-hued, bright-pinioned, flame-bright, moon-bright, pearl-bright, sun-bright.
bronze ::: 1. Any of various alloys of copper and tin in various proportions. 2. A moderate yellowish to olive brown color.
“But this cosmic self is spiritual in essence and in experience; it must not be confused with the collective existence, with any group soul or the life and body of a human society or even of all mankind.” The Synthesis of Yoga
cabbala ::: 1 A body of mystical Jewish teachings based on an interpretation of hidden meanings in the Hebrew Scriptures. Among its central doctrines are, all creation is an emanation from the Deity and the soul exists from eternity. 2. Any secret or occult doctrine or science. 3. "Esoteric system of interpretation of the Hebrew scriptures based on the assumption that every word, letter, number, and accent in them has an occult meaning. The system, oral at first, claimed great antiquity, but was really the product of the Middle Ages, arising in the 7th century and lasting into the 18th. It was popular chiefly among Jews, but spread to Christians as well. (Col. Enc.)” Glossary and Index of Proper Names in Sri Aurobindo"s Works
Central faith ::: A faith in the soul or the central being behind, a faith which is there even when the mind doubts and (he vital despairs and the physical wants to collapse, and after the attack is over, reappears and pushes on the path again.
chameleon ::: any of numerous Old World lizards of the family Chamaeleontidae, characterized by the ability to change the colour of their skin, very slow locomotion, and a projectile tongue.
chequerboard ::: a board on which chess and checkers are played, divided into 64 squares of two alternating colours.
chequered ::: 1. Marked by numerous and various shifts and changes. 2. Marked by dubious episodes; suspect in character or quality. 3. Diversified in colour, variegated.
chides ::: expresses disapproval of; scolds; reproaches. chiding.
chill ::: adj. 1. Cold, often unpleasantly so; numbing. 2. Discouraging; dispiriting. 3. Unduly formal; unfriendly; unfeeling. v. 4. To lower in temperature; cool; make cold. 5. Fig. To depress (enthusiasm, etc.); discourage. chilled, chilling.
chrysoprase ::: a brittle, translucent, semiprecious chalcedony (q.v.), a variety of the silica mineral quartz. It owes its bright apple-green colour to colloidally dispersed hydrated nickel silicate. Valued in ancient times as it shone in the dark.
clamour ::: 1. A loud uproar, as from a crowd of people. 2. A vehement expression of collective feeling or outrage. 3. A loud and persistent noise. clamours. clamouring.
clash ::: n. 1. A loud, harsh noise, such as that made by two metal objects in collision. 2. An encounter between hostile forces; a battle or skirmish. 3. A conflict, as between opposing or irreconcilable ideas. v. 4. To engage in a physical conflict or contest, as in a game or a battle (often followed by with). 5. To come into conflict; be in opposition. clashes, clashed, clashing.
cloisters ::: 1. Covered walks with an open colonnade on one side, running along the walls of buildings that face a quadrangle. 2. Secluded, quiet places. cloister"s, cloisters.
cloud ::: 1. A visible collection of particles of water or ice suspended in the air, usually at an elevation above the earth"s surface. 2. Any similar mass, esp. of smoke or dust. 3. Something fleeting or unsubstantial. 4. Anything that obscures or darkens something, or causes gloom, trouble, suspicion, disgrace, etc. clouds, clouds", cloud-veils.
code ::: 1. A system of symbols, letters, or words given certain arbitrary meanings, used for transmitting messages requiring secrecy or brevity. 2. A systematic collection of regulations and rules of procedure or conduct. codes.
Cold ::: Knowledge of the divine Truth ; indicates at its most intense, something from the supramenlal, othenvise overinind truth or intuitive truth deriving ultimately from the suprameotal
Colilen light is that of the Divine Truth on the higher planes ; the light of the Divine Truth which comes out from the supra- mcntal sunlight and modified according to the level it crosses, creates the ranges from Overraind to Higher Mind. It always means the light o£ Truth ; but the nature of the Truth varies according to the plane to which it belongs.
Colour and light are always close to each other, colour being more indicative, light more dynamic. Colour incandescent be- comes light.
Colour indicates the pby of forces mental, physical and vital, but forces making for ealigbteiunent of these parts of the being.
Colours ::: , ,
Colours
COLOURS. ::: When the colours begin to lake definite shapes in the visions, it is a sign of some dynamic work of formation in the consciousness. The waves of colour mean a dynamic rush of forces.
compeer ::: 1. An equal in rank, ability, accomplishment, etc.; peer; colleague. 2. A comrade, companion, or associate. compeers.
::: "Consciousness is usually identified with mind, but mental consciousness is only the human range which no more exhausts all the possible ranges of consciousness than human sight exhausts all the gradations of colour or human hearing all the gradations of sound — for there is much above or below that is to man invisible and inaudible. So there are ranges of consciousness above and below the human range, with which the normal human has no contact and they seem to it unconscious, — supramental or overmental and submental ranges.” *Letters on Yoga
“Consciousness is usually identified with mind, but mental consciousness is only the human range which no more exhausts all the possible ranges of consciousness than human sight exhausts all the gradations of colour or human hearing all the gradations of sound—for there is much above or below that is to man invisible and inaudible. So there are ranges of consciousness above and below the human range, with which the normal human has no contact and they seem to it unconscious,—supramental or overmental and submental ranges.” Letters on Yoga
Contemplate, for a moment, this wondrous reply in six lines, of Satyavan to his father’s gentle scolding of Savitri.”at noon leaving this house of clay”, for in the epic his death in the forest takes place at noon, not a departure of an early morning soul or one who leaves enfolded in the dark rooms of night, but at a time when the sun is at its most brilliant, showering the earth with light.
cosmic Self ::: Sri Aurobindo: "When one has the cosmic consciousness, one can feel the cosmic Self as one"s own self, one can feel one with other beings in the cosmos, one can feel all the forces of Nature as moving in oneself, all selves as one"s own self. There is no why except that it is so, since all is the One.” Letters on Yoga (See also Cosmic Spirit)
"Impersonality is the first character of cosmic self; . . . .” *The Life Divine
"An eternal infinite self-existence is the supreme reality, but the supreme transcendent eternal Being, Self and Spirit, — an infinite Person, we may say, because his being is the essence and source of all personality, — is the reality and meaning of self-existence: so too the cosmic Self, Spirit, Being, Person is the reality and meaning of cosmic existence; the same Self, Spirit, Being or Person manifesting its multiplicity is the reality and meaning of individual existence.” The Life Divine
"But this cosmic self is spiritual in essence and in experience; it must not be confused with the collective existence, with any group soul or the life and body of a human society or even of all mankind.” The Synthesis of Yoga
"It is the Cosmic Self and Spirit that is in and behind all things and beings, from which and in which all is manifested in the universe — although it is now a manifestation in the Ignorance.” Letters on Yoga*
cracks ::: breaks apart; breaks into pieces, collapses.
Creen is the vital energy of work and action. Green light is a vital force, a dynamic force of the emotional vital which has the force to purify, harmonise or cure. Active energy of the divine Truth for work. It can signify various things according to the context ::: in the emotional vital. It is the colour of a cer- tain form of emotional generosity; in the vital proper, an activity with vital abundance or vital generosity behind it ; in the vital physical, it signifies a force of health.
Crimson ::: Light of Love in (he vital and physical. Usually the colour of the physical (force).
CRIMSON, vide Colours.
dark ::: adj. 1. Lacking or having very little light. 2. Concealed or secret; mysterious. 3. Difficult to understand; obscure. 4. Characterized by gloom; dismal. 5. Fig. Sinister; evil; absent moral or spiritual values. 6. (used of color) Having a dark hue; almost black. 7. Showing a brooding ill humor. 8. Having a complexion that is not fair; swarthy. darker, darkest, dark-browed, dark-robed.* n. 9. Absence of light; dark state or condition; darkness, esp. that of night. 10. A dark place: a place of darkness. 11. The condition of being hidden from view, obscure, or unknown; obscurity. *in the dark: in concealment or secrecy.
delicate ::: 1. Distinguishing subtle differences. 2. Of instruments: precise, skilled, or sensitive in action or operation. 3. Marked by sensitivity of discrimination and skillful in expression, technique, etc. 4. Exquisitely or beautifully fine in texture, construction, or finish. 5. Exquisite, fine, or subtle in quality, character, construction, etc. 6. (of colour, tone, taste, etc.) Pleasantly subtle, soft, or faint.
dingy ::: 1. Of a dark, dull, or dirty colour or aspect; lacking brightness or freshness. 2. Shabby; dismal.
discolouring ::: changing or causing to change in colour; fading or staining, often in an undesired manner.
“Divine Love, in my view of it, is again not something ethereal, cold and far, but a love absolutely intense, intimate and full of unity, closeness and rapture using all the nature for its expression.” Letters on Yoga
divine love ::: Sri Aurobindo: "Divine Love, in my view of it, is again not something ethereal, cold and far, but a love absolutely intense, intimate and full of unity, closeness and rapture using all the nature for its expression.” *Letters on Yoga
“ . . . Divine Love which is at the heart of all creation and the most powerful of all redeeming and creative forces has yet been the least frontally present in earthly life, the least successfully redemptive, the least creative. Human nature has been unable to bear it in its purity for the very reason that it is the most powerful, pure, rare and intense of all the divine energies; what little could be seized has been corrupted at once into a vital pietistic ardour, a defenceless religious or ethical sentimentalism, a sensuous or even sensual erotic mysticism of the roseate coloured mind or passionately turbid life-impulse and with these simulations compensated its inability to house the Mystic Flame that could rebuild the world with its tongues of sacrifice. The Synthesis of Yoga
dove ::: 1. Any bird of the family Columbid, esp. the smaller species with pointed tails. 2. A pure white member of this species, used as a symbol of innocence, gentleness, tenderness, and peace. dove"s, doves.
draw ::: 1. To cause to move in a given direction or to a given position, as by leading. 2. To bring towards oneself or itself, as by inherent force or influence; attract. 3. To cause to come by attracting; attract. 4. To cause to move in a particular direction by or as by a pulling force; pull; drag. 5. To get, take or obtain as from a source; to derive. 6. To bring, take, or pull out, as from a receptacle or source. 7. To draw a (or the) line (fig.) to determine or define the limit between two things or groups; in modern colloquial use (esp. with at), to lay down a definite limit of action beyond which one refuses to go. 8. To make, sketch (a picture or representation of someone or something) in lines or words; to design, trace out, delineate; depict; also, to mould, model. 9. To mark or lay out; trace. 10. To compose or write out in legal format. 11. To write out (a bill of exchange or promissory note). 12. To disembowel. 13. To move or pull so as to cover or uncover something. 14. To suck or take in (air, for example); inhale. 15. To extend, lengthen, prolong, protract. 16. To cause to move after or toward one by applying continuous force; drag. draws, drew, drawn, drawing, wide-drawn.
drawing ::: a picture or plan made by means of lines on a surface, esp. one made with a pencil or pen without the use of colour; a sketch, plan or outline.
dream ::: 1. A series of images, ideas, emotions, and sensations occurring involuntarily in the mind during certain stages of sleep. 2. A vision occurring to a person while awake. 3. A person or thing that is as pleasant, or seemingly unreal, as a dream 4. An ideal or aspiration; goal; aim. 5. A wild or vain fancy. Dream, dream"s, Dream"s, dreams, dream-brood, dream-brush, dream-built, dream-caught, dream-fact, dream-fate, dream-god"s, dream-happiness, dream-hued, dream-life, dream-light, dream-made, dream-mind, dream-notes, dream-print, dream-sculptured, dream-shores, dream-smiles, dream-splendour, dream-truth, dream-vasts, dream-white, dream-world, half-dream, self-dream, sun-dream, world-dream. *adj. 6. Of a colour: misty, dim, or cloudy. v. 7. To have an image (of) or fantasy (about) in or as if in a dream. dreams, dreamed, *dreaming.
dull ::: adj. **1. Causing boredom; tedious; uninteresting. 2. Not brisk or rapid; sluggish. 3. Lacking responsiveness or alertness; insensitive. 4. Not clear and resonant; sounding as if striking with or against something relatively soft. 5. (of color) Very low in saturation; highly diluted; 6. Slow to learn or understand; lacking intellectual acuity. duller, dull-eyed, dull-hued, dull-visioned. v. 7. To make numb or insensitive. 8. To make or become dull or sluggish. 9. To make less lively or vigorous. dulls, dulled.**
ebony ::: a deep, lustrous black (after the wood of the same colour).
elite ::: the choice or best of anything considered collectively, as of a group or class of persons.
“Empty and cold is the chamber of the Bride;”
enrich ::: to improve in quality, colour, flavour, etc.; to add greater value or significance to; to enhance. enriched.
Experiences of sounds, lights etc . ::: The sounds of bells and the seeing of lights and colours are signs of the opening of the inner consciousness which brings with it an opening also to sights and sounds of other planes than the physical. Some of these things like the sound of bells, crickets, etc. seem even to help the opening.
fifth-columnist ::: one who acts traitorously and subversively out of a secret sympathy with an enemy; a spy.
fish- or insect-eating birds that have a large head and a long, stout bill and are usually crested and brilliantly coloured.
Flamelike, inscrutable the almighty Guest” From: The Guest - Collected Poems of Sri Aurobindo
Flamelike, inscrutable the almighty Guest” From: The Guest—Collected Poems of Sri Aurobindo
flame ::: n. 1. Burning gas or vapor, as from wood or coal, that is undergoing combustion; a portion of ignited gas or vapor. 2. Fig. A brilliant light; fiery glow. 3. Fig. Intense ardour, zeal, passion, vitality. 4. Spiritual fire. 5. Inner fire. 6. Bright colouring; a streak or patch of color. Flame, flames, flame-ascensions, flame-born, flame-bright, flame-child, flame-discovery, flame-edge, flame-eyed, flame-foot, flame-hills, flame-pure, flame-signs, flame-stabs, flame-throw, flame-white, flame-wrapped, moon-flame. v. 8. To burn with a flame or flames; burst into flames; blaze. 7. To burn or glow as if with fire; become red or fiery 8. To burn or burst forth with strong emotion. flames, flamed. ::: flames out. Bursts out in or as if in flames.
flaming ::: adj. 1. Emitting flames; blazing; burning; fiery. 2. Glowing brightly; brilliant. 3. Intensely ardent or passionate. 4. Resembling a flame in brilliance, color, or form. 5. Like a flame in brilliance, heat or shape. 6. Very intense, ardent; fiery, as a disposition. flaming-silent.* n. 7. The action of burning or being on fire. Also fig. *flamings.
flecks ::: a spot or small patch of colour, light, etc. wonder-flecks.
flickered ::: 1. To shine with, or be illuminated by, an unsteady or wavering light; flare, shimmer. 2. To quiver, vibrate unsteadily; flutter. 3. To appear or occur briefly. flickers, flickering, flickering-coloured.
foundered ::: 1. Fell or sunk down, collapsed. 2. Failed utterly.
Fury ::: Jhumur: “These are the Greek forces of retribution. Fury is a kind of collective noun.”
gather ::: v. 1. To accumulate something (things or people) gradually; amass. 2. To summon up; muster. 3. To come together around a single point; collect, assemble. 4. To accumulate; increase. 5. To draw and bring closer. 6. To draw around or close. gathers, gathered, gathering, fast-gathering.
genii ::: 1. A rendering of Arab., jinn, the collective name of a class of spirits (some good, some evil) supposed to interfere powerfully in human affairs. 2. Spirits, often appearing in human form, that when summoned carry out the wishes of the summoner.
gif: is not a freak or an abnormaiity ; it is a universal faculty present in all human beings, but latent in most, in some rarely or intermittently active, occurring as if by accident in others, frequent or normally active in a few. But just as anyone can, uith some training, learn science and do things which would have seemed miracles to his forefathers, so almost anyone, if he wants, can with a little concentration and training develop the faculty of supraphjsical vision. When one starts Yoga, this power is often, though not in\'ariably — for some find it difficult — one of the first to come out from its latent condition and manifest itself, most often without any efTori, Intention or previous know- ledge on the part of the sadhaka. It comes more easily with the eyes shut than with the eyes open, but it does come in both ways. Tlic first sign of its opening in the externalised way is very often that seeing of “sparkles’* or small luminous dots, shapes, etc. ; a second is, often enough, most easily, round lumi- nous objects like a star ; seeing of colours 1$ a third initial experi- cnee — but (hey do not alw'ay's come in that order.
gift is not a freak or an abnonnality ; it is a universal faculty present in all human beings, but latent In most, in some rarely or intermittently active, occurring as if by accident in others, frequent or normally active in a few. But just as aayoas can, with some training, learn sdence and do things which would have seemed miracles to his forefathers, so almost anyone, if he wants, can with a little concentration and training develop the faculty of supraphysical rision. When one starts Yoga, this power is often, though not invariably — for some find it diScult — one of the first to come out from its latent condition and manifest itself, most often without any effort, intention or previous know- ledge on the part of the sadbaka. It comes more easily with the eyes shut than with the eyes open, but it does come in both ways. The first sign of its opening in the externalised way is very often that seeing of “ sparkles ” or small luminous dots, shapes, etc. ; a second is, often enough, most easily, round lumi- nous objects like a star ; seeing of colours is a third initial experi- ence'— but they do not always come in that order.
gilded ::: 1. Made from or covered with gold. 2. Having a deep golden colour.
glow ::: n. 1. A light emitted by or as if by a substance heated to luminosity; incandescence. 2. Brilliance or warmth of colour. 3. Intensity of emotion; ardour. joy-glow, petal-glow. v. 4. To shine intensely, as if from great heat. 5. To show a strong bright colour. glows, glowed, glowing.
GREEN, vide Colours.
haze ::: 1. An aggregation in the atmosphere of very fine, widely dispersed, solid or liquid particles, or both, giving the air an opalescent appearance that subdues colours. 2. Reduced visibility in the air as a result of condensed water vapour, dust, etc., in the atmosphere. 3. Vagueness of obscurity, as of the mind or perception; confused or vague thoughts, feelings, etc.
herding ::: to gather together or be collected into or as if into a herd.
history ::: “History teaches us nothing; it is a confused torrent of events and personalities or a kaleidoscope of changing institutions. We do not seize the real sense of all this change and this continual streaming forward of human life in the channels of Time. What we do seize are current or recurrent phenomena, facile generalisations, partial ideas. We talk of democracy, aristocracy and autocracy, collectivism and individualism, imperialism and nationalism, the State and the commune, capitalism and labour; we advance hasty generalisations and make absolute systems which are positively announced today only to be abandoned perforce tomorrow; we espouse causes and ardent enthusiasms whose triumph turns to an early disillusionment and then forsake them for others, perhaps for those that we have taken so much trouble to destroy. For a whole century mankind thirsts and battles after liberty and earns it with a bitter expense of toil, tears and blood; the century that enjoys without having fought for it turns away as from a puerile illusion and is ready to renounce the depreciated gain as the price of some new good. And all this happens because our whole thought and action with regard to our collective life is shallow and empirical; it does not seek for, it does not base itself on a firm, profound and complete knowledge. The moral is not the vanity of human life, of its ardours and enthusiasms and of the ideals it pursues, but the necessity of a wiser, larger, more patient search after its true law and aim.” The Human Cycle etc.
“I certainly won’t have ‘attracted’ [in place of ‘allured’]—there is an enormous difference between the force of the two words and merely ‘attracted by the Ecstasy’ would take away all my ecstasy in the line—nothing so tepid can be admitted. Neither do I want ‘thrill’ [in place of ‘joy’] which gives a false colour—precisely it would mean that the ecstasy was already touching him with its intensity which is far from my intention.
**"I certainly won"t have ‘attracted" [in place of ‘allured"] — there is an enormous difference between the force of the two words and merely ‘attracted by the Ecstasy" would take away all my ecstasy in the line — nothing so tepid can be admitted. Neither do I want ‘thrill" [in place of ‘joy"] which gives a false colour — precisely it would mean that the ecstasy was already touching him with its intensity which is far from my intention.Your statement that ‘joy" is just another word for ‘ecstasy" is surprising. ‘Comfort", ‘pleasure", ‘joy", ‘bliss", ‘rapture", ‘ecstasy" would then be all equal and exactly synonymous terms and all distinction of shades and colours of words would disappear from literature. As well say that ‘flashlight" is just another word for ‘lightning" — or that glow, gleam, glitter, sheen, blaze are all equivalents which can be employed indifferently in the same place. One can feel allured to the supreme omniscient Ecstasy and feel a nameless joy touching one without that Joy becoming itself the supreme Ecstasy. I see no loss of expressiveness by the joy coming in as a vague nameless hint of the immeasurable superior Ecstasy.” Letters on Savitri*
If we would understand the difference of this global Overmind Consciousness from our separative and only imperfectly synthetic mental consciousness, we may come near to it if we compare the strictly mental with what would be an overmental view of activities in our material universe. To the Overmind, for example, all religions would be true as developments of the one eternal religion, all philosophies would be valid each in its own field as a statement of its own universe-view from its own angle, all political theories with their practice would be the legitimate working out of an Idea Force with its right to application and practical development in the play of the energies of Nature. In our separative consciousness, imperfectly visited by glimpses of catholicity and universality, these things exist as opposites; each claims to be the truth and taxes the others with error and falsehood, each feels impelled to refute or destroy the others in order that itself alone may be the Truth and live: at best, each must claim to be superior, admit all others only as inferior truth-expressions. An overmental Intelligence would refuse to entertain this conception or this drift to exclusiveness for a moment; it would allow all to live as necessary to the whole or put each in its place in the whole or assign to each its field of realisation or of endeavour. This is because in us consciousness has come down completely into the divisions of the Ignorance; Truth is no longer either an Infinite or a cosmic whole with many possible formulations, but a rigid affirmation holding any other affirmation to be false because different from itself and entrenched in other limits. Our mental consciousness can indeed arrive in its cognition at a considerable approach towards a total comprehensiveness and catholicity, but to organise that in action and life seems to be beyond its power. Evolutionary Mind, manifest in individuals or collectivities, throws up a multiplicity of divergent viewpoints, divergent lines of action and lets them work themselves out side by side or in collision or in a certain intermixture; it can make selective harmonies, but it cannot arrive at the harmonic control of a true totality. Cosmic Mind must have even in the evolutionary Ignorance, like all totalities, such a harmony, if only of arranged accords and discords; there is too in it an underlying dynamism of oneness: but it carries the completeness of these things in its depths, perhaps in a supermind-overmind substratum, but does not impart it to individual Mind in the evolution, does not bring it or has not yet brought it from the depths to the surface. An Overmind world would be a world of harmony; the world of Ignorance in which we live is a world of disharmony and struggle. …
In a sense each man is a colonist here from the Kingdom of the Spirit. His original and permanent home is there on the Divine summits; he has come to establish on earth the rule of the Spirit.” Readings in Savitri, Vol. I.
inconscient ::: Sri Aurobindo: "The Inconscient and the Ignorance may be mere empty abstractions and can be dismissed as irrelevant jargon if one has not come in collision with them or plunged into their dark and bottomless reality. But to me they are realities, concrete powers whose resistance is present everywhere and at all times in its tremendous and boundless mass.” *Letters on Savitri
". . . in its actual cosmic manifestation the Supreme, being the Infinite and not bound by any limitation, can manifest in Itself, in its consciousness of innumerable possibilities, something that seems to be the opposite of itself, something in which there can be Darkness, Inconscience, Inertia, Insensibility, Disharmony and Disintegration. It is this that we see at the basis of the material world and speak of nowadays as the Inconscient — the Inconscient Ocean of the Rigveda in which the One was hidden and arose in the form of this universe — or, as it is sometimes called, the non-being, Asat.” Letters on Yoga
"The Inconscient itself is only an involved state of consciousness which like the Tao or Shunya, though in a different way, contains all things suppressed within it so that under a pressure from above or within all can evolve out of it — ‘an inert Soul with a somnambulist Force".” Letters on Yoga
"The Inconscient is the last resort of the Ignorance.” Letters on Yoga
"The body, we have said, is a creation of the Inconscient and itself inconscient or at least subconscient in parts of itself and much of its hidden action; but what we call the Inconscient is an appearance, a dwelling place, an instrument of a secret Consciousness or a Superconscient which has created the miracle we call the universe.” Essays in Philosophy and Yoga :::
"The Inconscient is a sleep or a prison, the conscient a round of strivings without ultimate issue or the wanderings of a dream: we must wake into the superconscious where all darkness of night and half-lights cease in the self-luminous bliss of the Eternal.” The Life Divine
"Men have not learnt yet to recognise the Inconscient on which the whole material world they see is built, or the Ignorance of which their whole nature including their knowledge is built; they think that these words are only abstract metaphysical jargon flung about by the philosophers in their clouds or laboured out in long and wearisome books like The Life Divine. Letters on Savitri :::
"Is it really a fact that even the ordinary reader would not be able to see any difference between the Inconscient and Ignorance unless the difference is expressly explained to him? This is not a matter of philosophical terminology but of common sense and the understood meaning of English words. One would say ‘even the inconscient stone" but one would not say, as one might of a child, ‘the ignorant stone". One must first be conscious before one can be ignorant. What is true is that the ordinary reader might not be familiar with the philosophical content of the word Inconscient and might not be familiar with the Vedantic idea of the Ignorance as the power behind the manifested world. But I don"t see how I can acquaint him with these things in a single line, even with the most. illuminating image or symbol. He might wonder, if he were Johnsonianly minded, how an Inconscient could be teased or how it could wake Ignorance. I am afraid, in the absence of a miracle of inspired poetical exegesis flashing through my mind, he will have to be left wondering.” Letters on Savitri
**inconscient, Inconscient"s.**
inky ::: resembling ink, esp. in colour; dark or black.
INTEGRAL YOGA ::: This yoga accepts the value of cosmic existence and holds it to be a reality; its object is to enter into a higher Truth-Consciousness or Divine Supramental Consciousness in which action and creation are the expression not of ignorance and imperfection, but of the Truth, the Light, the Divine Ānanda. But for that, the surrender of the mortal mind, life and body to the Higher Consciousnessis indispensable, since it is too difficult for the mortal human being to pass by its own effort beyond mind to a Supramental Consciousness in which the dynamism is no longer mental but of quite another power. Only those who can accept the call to such a change should enter into this yoga.
Aim of the Integral Yoga ::: It is not merely to rise out of the ordinary ignorant world-consciousness into the divine consciousness, but to bring the supramental power of that divine consciousness down into the ignorance of mind, life and body, to transform them, to manifest the Divine here and create a divine life in Matter.
Conditions of the Integral Yoga ::: This yoga can only be done to the end by those who are in total earnest about it and ready to abolish their little human ego and its demands in order to find themselves in the Divine. It cannot be done in a spirit of levity or laxity; the work is too high and difficult, the adverse powers in the lower Nature too ready to take advantage of the least sanction or the smallest opening, the aspiration and tapasyā needed too constant and intense.
Method in the Integral Yoga ::: To concentrate, preferably in the heart and call the presence and power of the Mother to take up the being and by the workings of her force transform the consciousness. One can concentrate also in the head or between the eye-brows, but for many this is a too difficult opening. When the mind falls quiet and the concentration becomes strong and the aspiration intense, then there is the beginning of experience. The more the faith, the more rapid the result is likely to be. For the rest one must not depend on one’s own efforts only, but succeed in establishing a contact with the Divine and a receptivity to the Mother’s Power and Presence.
Integral method ::: The method we have to pursue is to put our whole conscious being into relation and contact with the Divine and to call Him in to transform Our entire being into His, so that in a sense God Himself, the real Person in us, becomes the sādhaka of the sādhana* as well as the Master of the Yoga by whom the lower personality is used as the centre of a divine transfiguration and the instrument of its own perfection. In effect, the pressure of the Tapas, the force of consciousness in us dwelling in the Idea of the divine Nature upon that which we are in our entirety, produces its own realisation. The divine and all-knowing and all-effecting descends upon the limited and obscure, progressively illumines and energises the whole lower nature and substitutes its own action for all the terms of the inferior human light and mortal activity.
In psychological fact this method translates itself into the progressive surrender of the ego with its whole field and all its apparatus to the Beyond-ego with its vast and incalculable but always inevitable workings. Certainly, this is no short cut or easy sādhana. It requires a colossal faith, an absolute courage and above all an unflinching patience. For it implies three stages of which only the last can be wholly blissful or rapid, - the attempt of the ego to enter into contact with the Divine, the wide, full and therefore laborious preparation of the whole lower Nature by the divine working to receive and become the higher Nature, and the eventual transformation. In fact, however, the divine strength, often unobserved and behind the veil, substitutes itself for the weakness and supports us through all our failings of faith, courage and patience. It” makes the blind to see and the lame to stride over the hills.” The intellect becomes aware of a Law that beneficently insists and a Succour that upholds; the heart speaks of a Master of all things and Friend of man or a universal Mother who upholds through all stumblings. Therefore this path is at once the most difficult imaginable and yet in comparison with the magnitude of its effort and object, the most easy and sure of all.
There are three outstanding features of this action of the higher when it works integrally on the lower nature. In the first place, it does not act according to a fixed system and succession as in the specialised methods of Yoga, but with a sort of free, scattered and yet gradually intensive and purposeful working determined by the temperament of the individual in whom it operates, the helpful materials which his nature offers and the obstacles which it presents to purification and perfection. In a sense, therefore, each man in this path has his own method of Yoga. Yet are there certain broad lines of working common to all which enable us to construct not indeed a routine system, but yet some kind of Shastra or scientific method of the synthetic Yoga.
Secondly, the process, being integral, accepts our nature such as it stands organised by our past evolution and without rejecting anything essential compels all to undergo a divine change. Everything in us is seized by the hands of a mighty Artificer and transformed into a clear image of that which it now seeks confusedly to present. In that ever-progressive experience we begin to perceive how this lower manifestation is constituted and that everything in it, however seemingly deformed or petty or vile, is the more or less distorted or imperfect figure of some elements or action in the harmony of the divine Nature. We begin to understand what the Vedic Rishis meant when they spoke of the human forefathers fashioning the gods as a smith forges the crude material in his smithy.
Thirdly, the divine Power in us uses all life as the means of this integral Yoga. Every experience and outer contact with our world-environment, however trifling or however disastrous, is used for the work, and every inner experience, even to the most repellent suffering or the most humiliating fall, becomes a step on the path to perfection. And we recognise in ourselves with opened eyes the method of God in the world, His purpose of light in the obscure, of might in the weak and fallen, of delight in what is grievous and miserable. We see the divine method to be the same in the lower and in the higher working; only in the one it is pursued tardily and obscurely through the subconscious in Nature, in the other it becomes swift and selfconscious and the instrument confesses the hand of the Master. All life is a Yoga of Nature seeking to manifest God within itself. Yoga marks the stage at which this effort becomes capable of self-awareness and therefore of right completion in the individual. It is a gathering up and concentration of the movements dispersed and loosely combined in the lower evolution.
Key-methods ::: The way to devotion and surrender. It is the psychic movement that brings the constant and pure devotion and the removal of the ego that makes it possible to surrender.
The way to knowledge. Meditation in the head by which there comes the opening above, the quietude or silence of the mind and the descent of peace etc. of the higher consciousness generally till it envelops the being and fills the body and begins to take up all the movements.
Yoga by works ::: Separation of the Purusha from the Prakriti, the inner silent being from the outer active one, so that one has two consciousnesses or a double consciousness, one behind watching and observing and finally controlling and changing the other which is active in front. The other way of beginning the yoga of works is by doing them for the Divine, for the Mother, and not for oneself, consecrating and dedicating them till one concretely feels the Divine Force taking up the activities and doing them for one.
Object of the Integral Yoga is to enter into and be possessed by the Divine Presence and Consciousness, to love the Divine for the Divine’s sake alone, to be tuned in our nature into the nature of the Divine, and in our will and works and life to be the instrument of the Divine.
Principle of the Integral Yoga ::: The whole principle of Integral Yoga is to give oneself entirely to the Divine alone and to nobody else, and to bring down into ourselves by union with the Divine Mother all the transcendent light, power, wideness, peace, purity, truth-consciousness and Ānanda of the Supramental Divine.
Central purpose of the Integral Yoga ::: Transformation of our superficial, narrow and fragmentary human way of thinking, seeing, feeling and being into a deep and wide spiritual consciousness and an integrated inner and outer existence and of our ordinary human living into the divine way of life.
Fundamental realisations of the Integral Yoga ::: The psychic change so that a complete devotion can be the main motive of the heart and the ruler of thought, life and action in constant union with the Mother and in her Presence. The descent of the Peace, Power, Light etc. of the Higher Consciousness through the head and heart into the whole being, occupying the very cells of the body. The perception of the One and Divine infinitely everywhere, the Mother everywhere and living in that infinite consciousness.
Results ::: First, an integral realisation of Divine Being; not only a realisation of the One in its indistinguishable unity, but also in its multitude of aspects which are also necessary to the complete knowledge of it by the relative consciousness; not only realisation of unity in the Self, but of unity in the infinite diversity of activities, worlds and creatures.
Therefore, also, an integral liberation. Not only the freedom born of unbroken contact of the individual being in all its parts with the Divine, sāyujya mukti, by which it becomes free even in its separation, even in the duality; not only the sālokya mukti by which the whole conscious existence dwells in the same status of being as the Divine, in the state of Sachchidananda ; but also the acquisition of the divine nature by the transformation of this lower being into the human image of the divine, sādharmya mukti, and the complete and final release of all, the liberation of the consciousness from the transitory mould of the ego and its unification with the One Being, universal both in the world and the individual and transcendentally one both in the world and beyond all universe.
By this integral realisation and liberation, the perfect harmony of the results of Knowledge, Love and Works. For there is attained the complete release from ego and identification in being with the One in all and beyond all. But since the attaining consciousness is not limited by its attainment, we win also the unity in Beatitude and the harmonised diversity in Love, so that all relations of the play remain possible to us even while we retain on the heights of our being the eternal oneness with the Beloved. And by a similar wideness, being capable of a freedom in spirit that embraces life and does not depend upon withdrawal from life, we are able to become without egoism, bondage or reaction the channel in our mind and body for a divine action poured out freely upon the world.
The divine existence is of the nature not only of freedom, but of purity, beatitude and perfection. In integral purity which shall enable on the one hand the perfect reflection of the divine Being in ourselves and on the other the perfect outpouring of its Truth and Law in us in the terms of life and through the right functioning of the complex instrument we are in our outer parts, is the condition of an integral liberty. Its result is an integral beatitude, in which there becomes possible at once the Ānanda of all that is in the world seen as symbols of the Divine and the Ānanda of that which is not-world. And it prepares the integral perfection of our humanity as a type of the Divine in the conditions of the human manifestation, a perfection founded on a certain free universality of being, of love and joy, of play of knowledge and of play of will in power and will in unegoistic action. This integrality also can be attained by the integral Yoga.
Sādhanā of the Integral Yoga does not proceed through any set mental teaching or prescribed forms of meditation, mantras or others, but by aspiration, by a self-concentration inwards or upwards, by a self-opening to an Influence, to the Divine Power above us and its workings, to the Divine Presence in the heart and by the rejection of all that is foreign to these things. It is only by faith, aspiration and surrender that this self-opening can come.
The yoga does not proceed by upadeśa but by inner influence.
Integral Yoga and Gita ::: The Gita’s Yoga consists in the offering of one’s work as a sacrifice to the Divine, the conquest of desire, egoless and desireless action, bhakti for the Divine, an entering into the cosmic consciousness, the sense of unity with all creatures, oneness with the Divine. This yoga adds the bringing down of the supramental Light and Force (its ultimate aim) and the transformation of the nature.
Our yoga is not identical with the yoga of the Gita although it contains all that is essential in the Gita’s yoga. In our yoga we begin with the idea, the will, the aspiration of the complete surrender; but at the same time we have to reject the lower nature, deliver our consciousness from it, deliver the self involved in the lower nature by the self rising to freedom in the higher nature. If we do not do this double movement, we are in danger of making a tamasic and therefore unreal surrender, making no effort, no tapas and therefore no progress ; or else we make a rajasic surrender not to the Divine but to some self-made false idea or image of the Divine which masks our rajasic ego or something still worse.
Integral Yoga, Gita and Tantra ::: The Gita follows the Vedantic tradition which leans entirely on the Ishvara aspect of the Divine and speaks little of the Divine Mother because its object is to draw back from world-nature and arrive at the supreme realisation beyond it.
The Tantric tradition leans on the Shakti or Ishvari aspect and makes all depend on the Divine Mother because its object is to possess and dominate the world-nature and arrive at the supreme realisation through it.
This yoga insists on both the aspects; the surrender to the Divine Mother is essential, for without it there is no fulfilment of the object of the yoga.
Integral Yoga and Hatha-Raja Yogas ::: For an integral yoga the special methods of Rajayoga and Hathayoga may be useful at times in certain stages of the progress, but are not indispensable. Their principal aims must be included in the integrality of the yoga; but they can be brought about by other means. For the methods of the integral yoga must be mainly spiritual, and dependence on physical methods or fixed psychic or psychophysical processes on a large scale would be the substitution of a lower for a higher action. Integral Yoga and Kundalini Yoga: There is a feeling of waves surging up, mounting to the head, which brings an outer unconsciousness and an inner waking. It is the ascending of the lower consciousness in the ādhāra to meet the greater consciousness above. It is a movement analogous to that on which so much stress is laid in the Tantric process, the awakening of the Kundalini, the Energy coiled up and latent in the body and its mounting through the spinal cord and the centres (cakras) and the Brahmarandhra to meet the Divine above. In our yoga it is not a specialised process, but a spontaneous upnish of the whole lower consciousness sometimes in currents or waves, sometimes in a less concrete motion, and on the other side a descent of the Divine Consciousness and its Force into the body.
Integral Yoga and other Yogas ::: The old yogas reach Sachchidananda through the spiritualised mind and depart into the eternally static oneness of Sachchidananda or rather pure Sat (Existence), absolute and eternal or else a pure Non-exist- ence, absolute and eternal. Ours having realised Sachchidananda in the spiritualised mind plane proceeds to realise it in the Supramcntal plane.
The suprcfhe supra-cosmic Sachchidananda is above all. Supermind may be described as its power of self-awareness and W’orld- awareness, the world being known as within itself and not out- side. So to live consciously in the supreme Sachchidananda one must pass through the Supermind.
Distinction ::: The realisation of Self and of the Cosmic being (without which the realisation of the Self is incomplete) are essential steps in our yoga ; it is the end of other yogas, but it is, as it were, the beginning of outs, that is to say, the point where its own characteristic realisation can commence.
It is new as compared with the old yogas (1) Because it aims not at a departure out of world and life into Heaven and Nir- vana, but at a change of life and existence, not as something subordinate or incidental, but as a distinct and central object.
If there is a descent in other yogas, yet it is only an incident on the way or resulting from the ascent — the ascent is the real thing. Here the ascent is the first step, but it is a means for the descent. It is the descent of the new coosdousness attain- ed by the ascent that is the stamp and seal of the sadhana. Even the Tantra and Vaishnavism end in the release from life ; here the object is the divine fulfilment of life.
(2) Because the object sought after is not an individual achievement of divine realisation for the sake of the individual, but something to be gained for the earth-consciousness here, a cosmic, not solely a supra-cosmic acbievement. The thing to be gained also is the bringing of a Power of consciousness (the Supramental) not yet organised or active directly in earth-nature, even in the spiritual life, but yet to be organised and made directly active.
(3) Because a method has been preconized for achieving this purpose which is as total and integral as the aim set before it, viz., the total and integral change of the consciousness and nature, taking up old methods, but only as a part action and present aid to others that are distinctive.
Integral Yoga and Patanjali Yoga ::: Cilia is the stuff of mixed mental-vital-physical consciousness out of which arise the movements of thought, emotion, sensation, impulse etc.
It is these that in the Patanjali system have to be stilled altogether so that the consciousness may be immobile and go into Samadhi.
Our yoga has a different function. The movements of the ordinary consciousness have to be quieted and into the quietude there has to be brought down a higher consciousness and its powers which will transform the nature.
iridescent ::: displaying a play of lustrous colors like those of the rainbow.
iris-coloured ::: a rainbow-like or iridescent appearance; a circle or halo of prismatic colours; a combination or alternation of brilliant colours.
irised ::: having colours like those of the rainbow; iridescent.
iron ::: n. 1. A silver-white metal, usually an admixture of some other substance, usually carbon, rendering it extremely hard and useful for tools, implements, machinery, constructions, and in many other applications. adj. 2. Inflexible; unyielding; firm. 3. Stern; harsh; cruel. 4. *Fig.* Resembling iron in firmness, strength, colour, etc.
I -The’thousand'petalled lotus, sahasradala, commands the higher thinking mind, houses the still higher illumined mind and at the highest opens to the intuition through which or else by an over- flooding directness the ovennind can have with the rest com- munication or .an liramediate contact,, (Colour ::: .blue with' gold light around.) i. ' j i i . n ,•,,/! i, ,i i i
I would myself say that bliss and oneness are the essential condition of the absolute reality, and love as the most characteristic dynamic power of bliss and oneness must support fundamentally and colour their activities; …” Letters on Yoga
Jhumur: “She (Savitri) has gone into this world of light not having really left her body. It is not an experience that is beyond the body. It is in the physical life that she has attained this plane, so topaz, a yellow colour, is the colour of the mind, stone is the consciousness in matter, so physical life, body, life, mind. Mother had told us I remember that a precious stone symbolises consciousness that is lodged in matter. It shows how blazing light is present even in the hardest matter. So you have the image of the physical light, like a kind of a wall, a barrier.”
Jhumur: “You have the same word in French, capte—like a receiver that catches signals. I believe Sri Aurobindo often uses French words with the French connotation. Particularly I have noticed that sometimes he uses the word amour instead of love. When I asked myself why did he have to use a French word here, perhaps because it was a different kind of love, not the usual, something other. Time’s amour-song he says, and not a love song. There is something different about that song. It is not just a love song. It suggests something other when he uses a word from another language. It is not love that we ordinarily understand, he has added a quality of something special or rare or unusual by utilizing the same word but in another language. It gives it another colour.”
Krishna’s colours ::: Violet is the colour of Krishna's face. It is also the radiance of Krishna’s protection. Blue is bis special and significant colour, the colour of his aura when he manifests ; that is why he is called Nila Kr^na.
Light is a manifestation of Force, the nature of the force being indicated by the colour of the Light.
lintel ::: a horizontal structural member, such as a beam or stone, that spans an opening, as between the uprights of a door or window or between two columns or piers.
lotus (as chakra) ::: Sri Aurobindo: "This arrangement of the psychic body is reproduced in the physical with the spinal column as a rod and the ganglionic centres as the chakras which rise up from the bottom of the column, where the lowest is attached, to the brain and find their summit in the brahmarandhra at the top of the skull. These chakras or lotuses, however, are in physical man closed or only partly open, with the consequence that only such powers and only so much of them are active in him as are sufficient for his ordinary physical life, and so much mind and soul only is at play as will accord with its need. This is the real reason, looked at from the mechanical point of view, why the embodied soul seems so dependent on the bodily and nervous life, — though the dependence is neither so complete nor so real as it seems. The whole energy of the soul is not at play in the physical body and life, the secret powers of mind are not awake in it, the bodily and nervous energies predominate. But all the while the supreme energy is there, asleep; it is said to be coiled up and slumbering like a snake, — therefore it is called the kundalinî sakti, — in the lowest of the chakras, in the mûlâdhâra.” *The Synthesis of Yoga
lurid ::: 1. Sallow or pallid, or murky in colour. 2. Glowing with an unnatural glare as fire through a haze.
lutely necessary. Otherwise* although the body may go on for a very long time, yet in the end there can be a danger of a collapse. The body can be sustained for a long time when there is the full influence and there is a single-minded faith and call in the mind and the vital ; but if the mind or the vital is dis- turbed by other influences or opens itself to forces which are not the Mother’s, then there will be a mixed condition and there will be sometimes strength, sometimes fatigue, exhaustion or illness or a mixture of the two at the same time. Finally, If not only the mind and the vital, but the body also is open and can absorb the Force, it can do extraordinary things in the way of work without breaking down. Still even then rest is necessary.
Madhav: “A kakemono is a Japanese painting which is hung on the wall. It is a print in many colours, many designs. And this world picture is compared to a kakemono of significant forms. Each form is significant, each line is meaningful.” The Book of the Divine Mother
Madhav: “The universe is always seen and experienced as concealed by a coloured veil. The veil is a deceptive veil.” The Book of the Divine Mother
Madhav: “When Aswapathy lifts the curtain of the flesh i.e. when he gets through the barrier of his physical existence, he comes to the threshold of another domain, subtle and occult. He sees a serpent watching, guarding the entrance. In all traditions, especially the ancient, at the doors of every subtle kingdom there is a sentinel and that sentinel is imaged as a serpent. In spiritual symbolism the serpent stands for Energy. Depending on the colour of the serpent, it is physical energy or vital energy, mental energy, spiritual energy. Unless this serpent allows one to pass one cannot enter. The serpent, in this context, is the guard whose consent is necessary before one can pass. The Book of the Divine Mother
MAHAKALI ::: Goddess of the supreme strength ; with her are all mights and spiritual force and severest austerity of lapas and swiftness to the battle and the victory and the laughter, the attahosya, that makes light of defeat and death and the powers of the ignorance. .*
Afa/ifliflh' and Kdh are not the same. Kali is a lesser form.
Mahakali in the higher planes appears usually with the golden colour.
marble ::: n. 1. A hard crystalline metamorphic rock resulting from the recrystallization of a limestone: takes a high polish and is used for building and sculpture. adj. 2. Resembling metamorphic rock in consistency, texture, venation, color, or coldness, smoothness, whiteness, etc. 3. Hard, rigid and inflexible, as marble.
memory ::: 1. The mental faculty of retaining and recalling past experience. 2. The act or an instance of remembering; recollection. 3. The cognitive processes whereby past experience is remembered. Memory, memory"s, memories.
monotone ::: 1. Of or having a single colour or tone. 2. Sameness or dull repetition in sound, style, manner, or color.
mortality ::: 1. The quality or condition of being mortal. 2. Mortal beings collectively; humanity. mortality"s.
mosaic ::: 1. A picture or decorative design made by setting small colored pieces, as of stone or tile, into a surface. 2. Something resembling such a picture or decoration in composition, esp. in being made up of diverse elements.
mottled ::: spotted or blotched with different shades or colors.
movement ::: 1. The act or an instance of moving; a change in place or position. A particular manner of moving. 2. Usually, movements, actions or activities, as of a person or a body of persons. ::: movement"s, movements, many-movemented.
Sri Aurobindo: "When we withdraw our gaze from its egoistic preoccupation with limited and fleeting interests and look upon the world with dispassionate and curious eyes that search only for the Truth, our first result is the perception of a boundless energy of infinite existence, infinite movement, infinite activity pouring itself out in limitless Space, in eternal Time, an existence that surpasses infinitely our ego or any ego or any collectivity of egos, in whose balance the grandiose products of aeons are but the dust of a moment and in whose incalculable sum numberless myriads count only as a petty swarm." *The Life Divine
". . . the purest, freest form of insight into existence as it is shows us nothing but movement. Two things alone exist, movement in Space, movement in Time, the former objective, the latter subjective.” The Life Divine
"The world is a cyclic movement (samsâra ) of the Divine Consciousness in Space and Time. Its law and, in a sense, its object is progression; it exists by movement and would be dissolved by cessation of movement. But the basis of this movement is not material; it is the energy of active consciousness which, by its motion and multiplication in different principles (different in appearance, the same in essence), creates oppositions of unity and multiplicity, divisions of Time and Space, relations and groupings of circumstance and Causality. All these things are real in consciousness, but only symbolic of the Being, somewhat as the imaginations of a creative Mind are true representations of itself, yet not quite real in comparison with itself, or real with a different kind of reality.” The Upanishads*
movement ::: “When we withdraw our gaze from its egoistic preoccupation with limited and fleeting interests and look upon the world with dispassionate and curious eyes that search only for the Truth, our first result is the perception of a boundless energy of infinite existence, infinite movement, infinite activity pouring itself out in limitless Space, in eternal Time, an existence that surpasses infinitely our ego or any ego or any collectivity of egos, in whose balance the grandiose products of aeons are but the dust of a moment and in whose incalculable sum numberless myriads count only as a petty swarm.” The Life Divine
Nolini: “Amber colour representing a particular plane of consciousness. Yellow + red + touch of brown—physico-vital or even subtle physical plane—the New Creation come down on that plane. Mother India—Nolini’s reply to a question from Huta.
Nolini: “This world of absolute light which Savitri names ‘everlasting day’ is what the Upanishadic Rishi sees and describes as the golden lid upon the face of the Sun. The Sun is the complete integral light of the Truth in its fullness. The golden covering has be removed if one is to see the Sun itself—to live the integral life, one has to possess the integral truth.” Collected Works, Vol. 4.
obscure ::: 1. Not bright or lustrous; dull or darkish, as colour or appearance. 2. Hidden, secret, or remote. 3. Not clearly understood or expressed; ambiguous or vague. 4. Not readily noticed or seen; inconspicuous. 5. So faintly perceptible as to lack clear delineation; indistinct. 6. Gloomy, dark, clouded, or dim. 7. Pertaining to darkness. obscurest.
ORANGE. ::: Vide colours.
"Ordinarily we mean by it [consciousness] our first obvious idea of a mental waking consciousness such as is possessed by the human being during the major part of his bodily existence, when he is not asleep, stunned or otherwise deprived of his physical and superficial methods of sensation. In this sense it is plain enough that consciousness is the exception and not the rule in the order of the material universe. We ourselves do not always possess it. But this vulgar and shallow idea of the nature of consciousness, though it still colours our ordinary thought and associations, must now definitely disappear out of philosophical thinking. For we know that there is something in us which is conscious when we sleep, when we are stunned or drugged or in a swoon, in all apparently unconscious states of our physical being. Not only so, but we may now be sure that the old thinkers were right when they declared that even in our waking state what we call then our consciousness is only a small selection from our entire conscious being. It is a superficies, it is not even the whole of our mentality. Behind it, much vaster than it, there is a subliminal or subconscient mind which is the greater part of ourselves and contains heights and profundities which no man has yet measured or fathomed.” Letters on Yoga
“Ordinarily we mean by it [consciousness] our first obvious idea of a mental waking consciousness such as is possessed by the human being during the major part of his bodily existence, when he is not asleep, stunned or otherwise deprived of his physical and superficial methods of sensation. In this sense it is plain enough that consciousness is the exception and not the rule in the order of the material universe. We ourselves do not always possess it. But this vulgar and shallow idea of the nature of consciousness, though it still colours our ordinary thought and associations, must now definitely disappear out of philosophical thinking. For we know that there is something in us which is conscious when we sleep, when we are stunned or drugged or in a swoon, in all apparently unconscious states of our physical being. Not only so, but we may now be sure that the old thinkers were right when they declared that even in our waking state what we call then our consciousness is only a small selection from our entire conscious being. It is a superficies, it is not even the whole of our mentality. Behind it, much vaster than it, there is a subliminal or subconscient mind which is the greater part of ourselves and contains heights and profundities which no man has yet measured or fathomed.” Letters on Yoga
Or we can feel the symptoms of illness, fever or cold for instance, in the subtle physical sheath before they are manifest in the gross body and destroy them there, preventing them from mani- festing in the body.
pageant ::: something comparable to a procession in colourful variety, splendour, or grandeur.
pallid ::: 1. Lacking intensity of colour or luminousness. 2. Lacking in vitality or interest.
passionless ::: not feeling or moved by passion; cold or unemotional; calm, detached or unimpassioned.
patience to develop. For instance, the neutral quiet so dissatis- fying to five vital eagerness of the sadhaka is the first step towards the peace that passeth all understanding, the small current or thrill of inner delight the first trickling of the ocean of Ananda, the play of tights or colours the key of the doors of the inner vision and experience, the descent that stifTens the body into a concentrated stillness that first touch of something at the end of which is the presence of the Divine.
pearl ::: 1. A smooth, lustrous, variously colored deposit, chiefly calcium carbonate, formed around a grain of sand or other foreign matter in the shells of certain molluscs and valued as a gem. 2. Something similar in form, luster, etc., as a dewdrop or a capsule of medicine. pearls, pearl-bright, pearl-hued, pearl-winged. pearl-bright, pearl-hued, pearl-winged.
pedestal ::: 1. An architectural support or base, as for a column or statue. 2. A support or foundation.
pillar ::: 1. A slender, freestanding, vertical support; a column. 2. *Fig. A supporter; one who sustains or supports; a mainstay. *pillars, pillar-posts, pillar-rocks.
Pink or Pale-Rose ::: characteristic colour of the psychic ; psychic love. Reddish pink rose; psychic love or surrender.
PINK. ::: Vide Colours.
planes each with its own colour. The red stm is a symbol of the true, illumined physical consciousness.
plinth ::: a block or slab on which a pedestal, column, or statue is placed.
pointillage ::: A word coined by Sri Aurobindo. The suffix age, originally in words adopted from Fr., is typically used in abstract nouns to indicate”aggregate”. Hence, pointillage indicates something made up of minute details; particularized. The root word, pointillism, refers to a method, invented by French impressionist painters, of producing luminous effects by crowding a surface with small spots of various colours, which are blended by the eye.
pointillage ::: a word coined by Sri Aurobindo. The suffix age, originally in words adopted from Fr., is typically used in abstract nouns to indicate "aggregate”. Hence, pointillage indicates something made up of minute details; particularized. The root word, pointillism, refers to a method, invented by French impressionist painters, of producing luminous effects by crowding a surface with small spots of various colours, which are blended by the eye.
press ::: n. 1. A crowd, throng, or multitude. 2. A crowding, thronging, or pressing together; a collective force. 3. Pressure or demands of affairs; urgency, haste, hurry. v. 4. To exert weight, force or pressure. 5. To advance or carry on vigorously despite obstacles in one"s way. 6. To impress (a thing) upon the mind, etc., emphasize, inculcate. 7. To beset or harass; afflict. 8. To cause to move in some direction or into some position by pressure; to push, drive, thrust. 9. To compress or squeeze. 10. To squeeze out or express, as juice. 11. To urge or entreat strongly or insistently. 12. To hold closely as in an embrace; clasp. presses, pressed, pressing.
Psydtlc light ::: The colour of the psychic light is according to what it manifests, e.g. psychic love is pink or rose, the psychic purity is white etc.
Purani: “—a fine expressive word coined by the poet. Fluttering indicates movement, a changing movement and hue suggests colour. The movement of ‘desire’ is very nicely indicated by this word—an unsteady movement, constantly changing colour.”
purple ::: 1. Any of a group of colors with a hue between that of violet and red. 2. Imperial, regal or princely.
purple ::: Amal: “It’s [violet valleys of the Blest] a reference to a supra-terrestrial region. As far as I remember, Sri Aurobindo added another similar line when I wrote to him some Latin lines from Virgil about a region where everything was ‘purple’. The adjective ‘purple’ in Latin means a region beyond the earth, which has either this colour or is simply ‘shining’. Sri Aurobindo’s new line: ‘And griefless countries under purple suns’.”
Purple ::: colour of the vital force. Light near to purple; light of a power in the vital.
purpled ::: Amal: “To become richly manifest, beautifully intense, colourfully deep.” (Bk. II, Canto 10, Line 403)
"Purple is the colour of vital power.” *Letters on Yoga
“Purple is the colour of vital power.” Letters on Yoga
PURPLE. ::: Vide Colours. *
quieted and brought under control; muted, as in colour or voice.
Radha’s colour. Usually the deeper blue is Higher Mind, a paler blue is Illumined Mind (or something of the Intuition), whitish blue is Sri Krishna’s light. Whitish blue like moonlight :::
recollect ::: to recall to mind; remember. recollecting.
recall ::: n. 1. The act of remembering; recollecting. v. 2. To summon back to awareness of or concern with the subject or situation at hand. 3. To revoke or withdraw. recalled, recalling.
Red ::: Colour of the physical. Red diamond is the Mother’s consciousness in the physical.
Red ; Deep red is the Divine Love. Deep red light is tlic light that comes down into the physical for its change. It is associated with the sunlight and the golden light. Golden red is the colour of the supramcntal physical light. The golden red light has a strong transforming power. Rosy red is the psychic love.
red ::: Jhumur: “In general it is the play of the vital forces. Mother always uses red as a symbol of the physical, the colour of blood, the early stage of the developing
Red lotus is either the consciousness reddening to the colour of Divine Love or else the symbol of the Divine Presence on earth.
RED. ::: The colour of the physical ; touched by the higher
relief ::: 1. Projection of a figure or part from the ground or plane on which it is formed, as in sculpture or similar work. 2. Prominence, distinctness or vividness of outline due to contrast of colour.
remembrance ::: a retained mental impression; memory; recollection.
reminiscences ::: remembrances, recollections of things past.
rich ::: 1. Abounding in desirable elements or qualities. 2. Having great worth or value. 3. Abundant. 4. Possessing great material wealth: Also fig. **5. Expensively elegant, elaborate, or fine; costly. 6. Magnificent; sumptuous. 7. Warm and strong in colour. 8. Of sounds: Pleasantly full and mellow. Also fig. richer, richest, richly, rich-coloured, rich-hearted, rich-plumaged.**
rickety ::: likely to fall or collapse; shaky.
romance ::: 1. A long medieval narrative in prose or verse that tells of the adventures and heroic exploits of chivalric heroes. 2. The colourful world, life, or conditions as in novels and other prose narratives depicting heroic or marvellous deeds and pageantry. 3. A love affair.
roseate ::: 1. Rose-colored. 2. Bright or promising. 3. Incautiously optimistic.
rose ::: Sri Aurobindo: "The rose is among the first of flowers because of the richness of its colour, the intensity of sweetness of its scent and the grace and magnificence of its form.”
rose ::: “The rose is not the only beautiful flower, there are hundreds of others; most flowers are beautiful. There are degrees and kinds of beauty, that is all. The rose is among the first of flowers because of the richness of its colour, the intensity of sweetness of its scent and the grace and magnificence of its form.” Letters on Yoga , Volume—22 , SABCL
ROSE. ::: Vide Colours.
ruby-eyed ::: having eyes the colour of the ruby; a glowing purple-tinged red.
rule ::: n. 1. Action, procedure, arrangement, etc. 2. Governing power or its possession or use; authority. 3. A usual, customary, or generalized course of action or behaviour. 4. The customary or normal circumstance, occurrence, manner, practice, quality, etc. 5. A thin metal strip of various widths and designs, used to print borders or lines, as between columns. Chiefly fig. rules, rule-maker, self-rule. *v. 6. To control or direct; exercise dominating power, authority, or influence over; govern. *rules, ruled, ruling.
sapphire ::: 1. The blue colour of the gemstone sapphire. 3. Resembling the sapphire; deep-blue. pale-sapphire.
scale ::: n. 1. A progressive or graduated series or classification. 2. An ascending or descending collection of pitches proceeding by a specified scheme of intervals. 3. A standard of measurement or judgment; a criterion. 4. Relative or proportionate size or extent; degree, proportion. slow-scaled. *v. 5. To climb; ascend; move upward; mount. *scales.
settlement ::: the establishment, as of a person or persons in a business or of people in a new region; colonization.
shade ::: 1. The comparative darkness caused by the interception or screening of rays of light from an object, place, or area. 2. A place or an area of comparative darkness, as one sheltered from the sun. 3. A shadow. 4. A spectre; a shadow. 5. Something that provides a shield or protection from a direct source of light. 6. A colour that varies slightly from a standard colour due to a difference in hue, saturation, or luminosity. 7. Fig. Something resembling a ghost or a disembodied spirit; something insubstantial or fleeting. 8. shades. Darkness gathering at the close of day. Shade, shades.
shelter ::: n. 1. Something that provides cover or protection, as from the weather, danger, etc. v. 2. To provide with refuge as by shelter, to harbour; to take under (one"s) protection. adj. **3. Protected from troubles, annoyances, sordidness, etc. 4. Protected or shielded from storms, cold, the sun, etc. by a wall, roof, barrier, or the like. sheltered, sheltering.**
shock ::: 1. A violent collision or impact; a heavy blow. 2. Something that jars the mind or emotions as if with a violent, unexpected blow. 3. A sudden disturbance of function, equilibrium or mental faculties caused by such a blow; violent agitation. shocks.
shot ::: spread or streaked with colour.
shudder ::: to tremble with a sudden convulsive movement as from horror, fear, or cold. shuddered.
signal ::: n. 1. An indicator, such as a gesture or colored light, that serves as a means of communication. 2. Anything that acts as an incitement to action. Also fig. **signals. adj. 3. Used to give or act as a signal. signalling. 4. Serving as a warning, direction, command, or the like. signal fires, signal flares, signal light.**
silver ::: 1. The metal characterized in a pure state by its lustrous white colour and regarded as a valuable possession or medium of exchange; hence, silver coin; also money in general. 2. Having a soft, clear, resonant, melodious sound. 3. Resembling silver, especially in having a lustrous shine; silvery. Chiefly poet. **silver-grey, silver-winged, moon-silver.**
silvering ::: giving a silvery colour to; suffusing with a silvery hue or lustre.
silvery ::: resembling silver in color or luster.
Since the Consciousness-Force of the eternal Existence is the universal creatrix, the nature of a given world will depend on whatever self-formulation of that Consciousness expresses itself in that world. Equally, for each individual being, his seeing or representation to himself of the world he lives in will depend on the poise or make which that Consciousness has assumed in him. Our human mental consciousness sees the world in sections cut by the reason and sense and put together in a formation which is also sectional; the house it builds is planned to accommodate one or another generalised formulation of Truth, but excludes the rest or admits some only as guests or dependents in the house. Overmind Consciousness is global in its cognition and can hold any number of seemingly fundamental differences together in a reconciling vision. Thus the mental reason sees Person and the Impersonal as opposites: it conceives an impersonal Existence in which person and personality are fictions of the Ignorance or temporary constructions; or, on the contrary, it can see Person as the primary reality and the impersonal as a mental abstraction or only stuff or means of manifestation. To the Overmind intelligence these are separable Powers of the one Existence which can pursue their independent self-affirmation and can also unite together their different modes of action, creating both in their independence and in their union different states of consciousness and being which can be all of them valid and all capable of coexistence. A purely impersonal existence and consciousness is true and possible, but also an entirely personal consciousness and existence; the Impersonal Divine, Nirguna Brahman, and the Personal Divine, Saguna Brahman, are here equal and coexistent aspects of the Eternal. Impersonality can manifest with person subordinated to it as a mode of expression; but, equally, Person can be the reality with impersonality as a mode of its nature: both aspects of manifestation face each other in the infinite variety of conscious Existence. What to the mental reason are irreconcilable differences present themselves to the Overmind intelligence as coexistent correlatives; what to the mental reason are contraries are to the Overmind intelligence complementaries. Our mind sees that all things are born from Matter or material Energy, exist by it, go back into it; it concludes that Matter is the eternal factor, the primary and ultimate reality, Brahman. Or it sees all as born of Life-Force or Mind, existing by Life or by Mind, going back into the universal Life or Mind, and it concludes that this world is a creation of the cosmic Life-Force or of a cosmic Mind or Logos. Or again it sees the world and all things as born of, existing by and going back to the Real-Idea or Knowledge-Will of the Spirit or to the Spirit itself and it concludes on an idealistic or spiritual view of the universe. It can fix on any of these ways of seeing, but to its normal separative vision each way excludes the others. Overmind consciousness perceives that each view is true of the action of the principle it erects; it can see that there is a material world-formula, a vital world-formula, a mental world-formula, a spiritual world-formula, and each can predominate in a world of its own and at the same time all can combine in one world as its constituent powers. The self-formulation of Conscious Force on which our world is based as an apparent Inconscience that conceals in itself a supreme Conscious-Existence and holds all the powers of Being together in its inconscient secrecy, a world of universal Matter realising in itself Life, Mind, Overmind, Supermind, Spirit, each of them in its turn taking up the others as means of its self-expression, Matter proving in the spiritual vision to have been always itself a manifestation of the Spirit, is to the Overmind view a normal and easily realisable creation. In its power of origination and in the process of its executive dynamis Overmind is an organiser of many potentialities of Existence, each affirming its separate reality but all capable of linking themselves together in many different but simultaneous ways, a magician craftsman empowered to weave the multicoloured warp and woof of manifestation of a single entity in a complex universe. …
skiey ::: of, from, or resembling the sky, esp. in color.
sombre ::: 1. Dim, gloomy, shadowy. 2. Extremely serious; grave. 3. Of a colour, sober, dull, or dark. 3. Gloomy, depressing, melancholy, dismal. 4. Of persons, their appearance, etc., gloomy, lowering, dark and sullen or dejected.
splendid ::: 1. Glorious or illustrious; having great beauty and splendour. 2. Distinguished or glorious, as a name, reputation, victory, etc. 3. Imposing by reason of showiness or grandeur; magnificent. 4. Brilliant with light or colour; radiant. (Sometimes used, by way of contrast, to qualify nouns having an opposite or different connotation.) splendidly.
spot ::: 1. A mark on a surface differing sharply in colour from its surroundings. 2. A stain or blot. 3. A location; a locale. spots.
Sri Aurobindo: " . . . Divine Love which is at the heart of all creation and the most powerful of all redeeming and creative forces has yet been the least frontally present in earthly life, the least successfully redemptive, the least creative. Human nature has been unable to bear it in its purity for the very reason that it is the most powerful, pure, rare and intense of all the divine energies; what little could be seized has been corrupted at once into a vital pietistic ardour, a defenceless religious or ethical sentimentalism, a sensuous or even sensual erotic mysticism of the roseate coloured mind or passionately turbid life-impulse and with these simulations compensated its inability to house the Mystic Flame that could rebuild the world with its tongues of sacrifice. The Synthesis of Yoga
Sri Aurobindo: "History teaches us nothing; it is a confused torrent of events and personalities or a kaleidoscope of changing institutions. We do not seize the real sense of all this change and this continual streaming forward of human life in the channels of Time. What we do seize are current or recurrent phenomena, facile generalisations, partial ideas. We talk of democracy, aristocracy and autocracy, collectivism and individualism, imperialism and nationalism, the State and the commune, capitalism and labour; we advance hasty generalisations and make absolute systems which are positively announced today only to be abandoned perforce tomorrow; we espouse causes and ardent enthusiasms whose triumph turns to an early disillusionment and then forsake them for others, perhaps for those that we have taken so much trouble to destroy. For a whole century mankind thirsts and battles after liberty and earns it with a bitter expense of toil, tears and blood; the century that enjoys without having fought for it turns away as from a puerile illusion and is ready to renounce the depreciated gain as the price of some new good. And all this happens because our whole thought and action with regard to our collective life is shallow and empirical; it does not seek for, it does not base itself on a firm, profound and complete knowledge. The moral is not the vanity of human life, of its ardours and enthusiasms and of the ideals it pursues, but the necessity of a wiser, larger, more patient search after its true law and aim.” *The Human Cycle etc.
Sri Aurobindo: "‘Violet" is the colour of benevolence or compassion, but also more vividly of the Divine Grace. . . .” *Letters on Yoga
stained ::: marked, dyed or discolored with foreign matter. blood-stained.
stain ::: n. 1. A discolored or soiled spot or smudge. 2. Fig. A blemish on one"s moral character or reputation. v. **3. To discolor, soil, or spot. 4. To taint or tarnish. lit. and fig. stained.**
steely ::: resembling steel, as in color or hardness.
stone-eyed ::: with the eyes hardened and coldly fixed on something.
stone ::: n. 1. A small piece of rock. 2. Fig. Something resembling stone in shape or hardness. stones, stone-bound, hearth-stone, stepping-stone, stepping-stones, term-stones. 3. Of a person"s expression etc.), like a stone in coldness, hardness, stillness, etc. stone-calm, stone-still. adj. 4. Made of, pertaining to or having the characteristics of stone. Also fig. stone-grip, stone-laws. adv. 5. Completely; totally (usually used in combination).
streak ::: n. 1. A long thin mark or trace of some contrasting colour or texture different from the background. 2. A flash leaving a visible line or after effect, as of lightening; bolt. 3. A ray or flash of light or the faint line of he dawn"s light. Also fig. **streaks. v. streaked. 3.** Went quickly; advanced; went at full speed.
suit ::: a group of things used together; a set or collection; a sequence.
sullen ::: 1. Sombre; gloomy; dismal; sluggish; slow. 2. Gloomy or sombre in tone, color, or portent. Chiefly poet.
summing ::: 1. Amounting to; adding up to; totalling. 2. Collecting into or embracing in a small compass.
Sun is the direct light of the Truth ; when it gets fused into the vital, it takes the mi.Tcd colour — gold and green — just as in the phj'sical it becomes golden red or in the mental golden yellow.
swarm ::: a very large or dense body or collection of persons, things, insects or other small creatures, esp. flying or moving about. swarms, swarm-work.
symphonies ::: 1. Harmonies, especially of sound or color. 2. Extended large-scale orchestral compositions, usually with several movements. 3. Anything characterized by a harmonious combination of elements.
table ::: 1. An article of furniture supported by one or more vertical legs and having a flat horizontal surface. 2. An engraved slab or tablet bearing an inscription or a device. 3. tables. The engraved tablets carrying sacred laws, etc. 4. An orderly arrangement of data, especially one in which the data are arranged in columns and rows in an essentially rectangular form.
tapestry ::: n. 1. A heavy cloth woven with rich, often varicolored designs or scenes, usually hung on walls for decoration. tapestries. v. 2. To hang or decorate with or as with tapestry.
tawny ::: of a dark yellowish or dull yellowish-brown colour.
termite ::: any of numerous pale-colored, usually soft-bodied social insects of the order Isoptera that live mostly in warm regions and many species of which feed on wood, often destroying trees and wooden structures. Also called white ant.
The abdominal centre, svadhijihana, commanding the small vital movements, the little creeds, lusts, desires, the small sense- movements, governs the lower vital. (Colour ::: deep purple red ; petals ::: six.)
"The collectivity is a mass, a field of formation; the individual is the diviner of truth, the form-maker, the creator.” The Life Divine
“The collectivity is a mass, a field of formation; the individual is the diviner of truth, the form-maker, the creator.” The Life Divine
"The colours of the lotuses and the numbers of petals are respectively, from bottom to top: — (1) the Muladhara or physical consciousness centre, four petals, red; (2) the abdominal centre, six petals, deep purple red; (3) the navel centre, ten petals, violet; (4) the heart centre, twelve petals, golden pink; (5) the throat centre, sixteen petals, grey; (6) the forehead centre between the eye-brows, two petals, white; (7) the thousand-petalled lotus above the head, blue with gold light around. The functions are, according to our yoga, — (1) commanding the physical consciousness and the subconscient; (2) commanding the small vital movements, the little greeds, lusts, desires, the small sense-movements; (3) commanding the larger life-forces and the passions and larger desire-movements; (4) commanding the higher emotional being with the psychic deep behind it; (5) commanding expression and all externalisation of the mind movements and mental forces; (6) commanding thought, will, vision; (7) commanding the higher thinking mind and the illumined mind and opening upwards to the intuition and overmind. The seventh is sometimes or by some identified with the brain, but that is an error — the brain is only a channel of communication situated between the thousand-petalled and the forehead centre. The former is sometimes called the void centre, sunya , either because it is not in the body, but in the apparent void above or because rising above the head one enters first into the silence of the self or spiritual being.” Letters on Yoga*
“The colours of the lotuses and the numbers of petals are respectively, from bottom to top:—(1) the Muladhara or physical consciousness centre, four petals, red; (2) the abdominal centre, six petals, deep purple red; (3) the navel centre, ten petals, violet; (4) the heart centre, twelve petals, golden pink; (5) the throat centre, sixteen petals, grey; (6) the forehead centre between the eye-brows, two petals, white; (7) the thousand-petalled lotus above the head, blue with gold light around. The functions are, according to our yoga,—(1) commanding the physical consciousness and the subconscient; (2) commanding the small vital movements, the little greeds, lusts, desires, the small sense-movements; (3) commanding the larger life-forces and the passions and larger desire-movements; (4) commanding the higher emotional being with the psychic deep behind it; (5) commanding expression and all externalisation of the mind movements and mental forces; (6) commanding thought, will, vision; (7) commanding the higher thinking mind and the illumined mind and opening upwards to the intuition and overmind. The seventh is sometimes or by some identified with the brain, but that is an error—the brain is only a channel of communication situated between the thousand-petalled and the forehead centre. The former is sometimes called the void centre, sunya , either because it is not in the body, but in the apparent void above or because rising above the head one enters first into the silence of the self or spiritual being.” Letters on Yoga
the cosmological theory holding that the universe is expanding, based on the interpretation of the color shift in the spectra of all the galaxies as being the result of the Doppler effect and indicating that all galaxies are moving away from one another.
The heart centre, hrdpadma or andJiata, commanding the high- er emotional being with the psychic deep behind it, governs the emotional being. (Colour: golden pinV ; petals: twelve.)
the human race; human beings collectively; mankind.
“The Inconscient and the Ignorance may be mere empty abstractions and can be dismissed as irrelevant jargon if one has not come in collision with them or plunged into their dark and bottomless reality. But to me they are realities, concrete powers whose resistance is present everywhere and at all times in its tremendous and boundless mass.” Letters on Savitri
". . . the individual is not a mere cell of the collective existence; he would not cease to exist if separated or expelled from the collective mass.” The Life Divine
“… the individual is not a mere cell of the collective existence; he would not cease to exist if separated or expelled from the collective mass.” The Life Divine
::: ". . . the modern man, even the modern cultured man, is or tends to be to a degree quite unprecedented politikon zôon, a political, economic and social being valuing above all things the efficiency of the outward existence and the things of the mind and spirit mainly, when not exclusively, for their aid to humanity"s vital and mechanical progress: he has not that regard of the ancients which looked up towards the highest heights and regarded an achievement in the things of the mind and the spirit with an unquestioning admiration or a deep veneration for its own sake as the greatest possible contribution to human culture and progress. And although this modern tendency is exaggerated and ugly and degrading in its exaggeration, inimical to humanity"s spiritual evolution, it has this much of truth behind it that while the first value of a culture is its power to raise and enlarge the internal man, the mind, the soul, the spirit, its soundness is not complete unless it has shaped also his external existence and made of it a rhythm of advance towards high and great ideals. This is the true sense of progress and there must be as part of it a sound political, economic and social life, a power and efficiency enabling a people to survive, to grow and to move securely towards a collective perfection, and a vital elasticity and responsiveness that will give room for a constant advance in the outward expression of the mind and the spirit.” The Renaissance in India
“… the modern man, even the modern cultured man, is or tends to be to a degree quite unprecedented politikon zôon, a political, economic and social being valuing above all things the efficiency of the outward existence and the things of the mind and spirit mainly, when not exclusively, for their aid to humanity’s vital and mechanical progress: he has not that regard of the ancients which looked up towards the highest heights and regarded an achievement in the things of the mind and the spirit with an unquestioning admiration or a deep veneration for its own sake as the greatest possible contribution to human culture and progress. And although this modern tendency is exaggerated and ugly and degrading in its exaggeration, inimical to humanity’s spiritual evolution, it has this much of truth behind it that while the first value of a culture is its power to raise and enlarge the internal man, the mind, the soul, the spirit, its soundness is not complete unless it has shaped also his external existence and made of it a rhythm of advance towards high and great ideals. This is the true sense of progress and there must be as part of it a sound political, economic and social life, a power and efficiency enabling a people to survive, to grow and to move securely towards a collective perfection, and a vital elasticity and responsiveness that will give room for a constant advance in the outward expression of the mind and the spirit.” The Renaissance in India
The Mother: "The Truth is something living, moving, expressing itself at each second, and it is one way of approaching the Supreme.” Collected Works of the Mother, Vol. 15.*
The Mother: “The Truth is something living, moving, expressing itself at each second, and it is one way of approaching the Supreme.” Collected Works of the Mother, Vol. 15.
The Mother (to a young person): “It is very simple, as you will see. 1) The Infinite is the inexhaustible storehouse of forces. The individual is a battery, a storage cell which runs down after use. Consecration is the wire that connects the individual battery to the infinite reserve of forces. Or 2) The Infinite is the river that flows without cease; the individual is the little pond that dries up slowly in the sun. Consecration is the canal that connects the river to the pond and prevents the pond from drying up.” The Mother—Collected Works, Centenary Ed., Vol. 16—Some Answers from the Mother
::: The Mother (to a young person): "It is very simple, as you will see. 1) The Infinite is the inexhaustible storehouse of forces. The individual is a battery, a storage cell which runs down after use. Consecration is the wire that connects the individual battery to the infinite reserve of forces. Or 2) The Infinite is the river that flows without cease; the individual is the little pond that dries up slowly in the sun. Consecration is the canal that connects the river to the pond and prevents the pond from drying up.” The Mother - Collected Works, Centenary Ed., Vol. 16 - Some Answers from the Mother*
The navel centre, nabhlpadma or manipura, commanding the larger life-forces and the passions and larger desire-movements, governs the larger vital. (Colour ::: violet ; petals ::: ten.)
The physical consciousness centre, mCtladhdra, commanding the physical consciousness and the' subconscienl, 'governs the physical down to the subconscienl. (Colour of the lotus ::: red ; number of petals ::: four.)
The throat centre, \iiuddha, commanding expression and all cxtemalisation of the mind movements and mental forces, governs the expressive and externalising mind, (Colour ::: grey ; petals ::: sixteen.)
"The Truth is not linear but global: it is not successive but simultaneous. Therefore it cannot be expressed in words: it has to be lived.” Collected Works of the Mother, Vol. 15.
“The Truth is not linear but global: it is not successive but simultaneous. Therefore it cannot be expressed in words: it has to be lived.” Collected Works of the Mother, Vol. 15.
The universe removed its coloured veil,
"The Veda is a book of esoteric symbols, almost of spiritual formulae, which masks itself as a collection of ritual poems.” The Secret of the Veda
“The Veda is a book of esoteric symbols, almost of spiritual formulae, which masks itself as a collection of ritual poems.” The Secret of the Veda
"The Vedas are the oldest holy books of India, perhaps the oldest of such works in the world. They are the foundation of the Hindu religion. The hymns they contain, written in an old form of Sanskrit, are said to have been ‘revealed" to the Rishis and subsequently were transmitted orally from generation to generation. They continued to be so handed down even after they had been collected and arranged by Krishna Dwaipayana (Veda Vyasa). It is not known when they were committed to writing. The Vedas are four in number: Rig, Yajur, Sama, and Atharva. In reality the Rig-Veda is the Veda; many of its hymns occur with a different arrangement in the other three Vedas. According to some scholars, each Veda is divided into four parts: Samhita, Brahmana, Aranyaka, and Upanisad. But generally the term ‘Veda" is reserved for the Samhita, the metrical hymns. (Dow)” *Glossary and Index of Proper Names in Sri Aurobindo"s Works
“The Vedas are the oldest holy books of India, perhaps the oldest of such works in the world. They are the foundation of the Hindu religion. The hymns they contain, written in an old form of Sanskrit, are said to have been ‘revealed’ to the Rishis and subsequently were transmitted orally from generation to generation. They continued to be so handed down even after they had been collected and arranged by Krishna Dwaipayana (Veda Vyasa). It is not known when they were committed to writing. The Vedas are four in number: Rig, Yajur, Sama, and Atharva. In reality the Rig-Veda is the Veda; many of its hymns occur with a different arrangement in the other three Vedas. According to somescholars, each Veda is divided into four parts: Samhita, Brahmana, Aranyaka, and Upanisad. But generally the term ‘Veda’ is reserved for the Samhita, the metrical hymns. (Dow)” Glossary and Index of Proper Names in Sri Aurobindo’s Works
The waves of colour mean a dynamic rush of forces and the star in such a context indicates the promise of the new thing that is to be formed.
the whole of created or existing things regarded collectively; all things (including the earth, the heavens, and all the phenomena of space) considered as constituting a systematic whole, esp. as created or existing by Divine power; the whole world or creation; the cosmos. universe"s, universes.
“This arrangement of the psychic body is reproduced in the physical with the spinal column as a rod and the ganglionic centres as the chakras which rise up from the bottom of the column, where the lowest is attached, to the brain and find their summit in the brahmarandhra at the top of the skull. These chakras or lotuses, however, are in physical man closed or only partly open, with the consequence that only such powers and only so much of them are active in him as are sufficient for his ordinary physical life, and so much mind and soul only is at play as will accord with its need. This is the real reason, looked at from the mechanical point of view, why the embodied soul seems so dependent on the bodily and nervous life,—though the dependence is neither so complete nor so real as it seems. The whole energy of the soul is not at play in the physical body and life, the secret powers of mind are not awake in it, the bodily and nervous energies predominate. But all the while the supreme energy is there, asleep; it is said to be coiled up and slumbering like a snake,—therefore it is called the kundalinî sakti,—in the lowest of the chakras, in the mûlâdhâra.” The Synthesis of Yoga
thought, iwill, t vision, !govenisi*the dynamic . mind, will, vision, mental formation. (Colour: white ;• petals ::: two.), Iv n
thread ::: n. 1. A fine cord of flax, cotton, or other fibrous material spun out to considerable length, especially when composed of two or more filaments twisted together. 2. Any fine line, stream, mark, or piece. 3. Fig. Likened to a thread in passing (one"s way) through or over (something). 4. Something having the fineness or slenderness of a filament, as a thin continuous stream of liquid, a fine line of colour, etc. threads. *v. 5. To make one"s way, as through a passage or between obstacles. 6. To pass (thread, film, magnetic tape, etc.) through (something. Also fig. 7. To pervade. *threaded, threading.
tinge ::: n. **1. A trace, or slight amount, most of as of a colour. Also fig. v. 2. To apply a trace of color to; tint. 3. To affect as in thought or feeling. tinged, tinging, fire-tinged, many-tinged.**
tinted ::: shaded or coloured lightly.
tints ::: n. **1. A shade of a color, especially a pale or delicate variation. v. 2.** Colours slightly.
Titan ::: “In Greek mythology, one of a family of gigantic beings, the twelve primordial children of Uranus (Heaven) and Gaea (Earth); also certain of the offspring of these Titans. The names of the twelve Titans, the ancestors of the Olympian gods, were Oceanus, Coeus, Crius, Hyperion, Iapetos, Theia, Rhea, Themis, Mnemosyne, Phoebe, Tethys, and Cronos. Cronos, the youngest of them, ruled the world after overthrowing and castrating Uranus. He swallowed each of his own children at birth but Zeus escaped. Cronos was made to vomit up the others (including Hera, Demeter, Poseidon, and Hades) and, after a protracted struggle, he and the other Titans were vanquished, all of them but Atlas imprisoned in Tartarus, and the reign of Zeus was established. More broadly, the word Titan may be applied to any being of a colossal force or grandiose and lawless self-assertion, or even to whatever is huge or mighty.” Glossary and Index of Proper Names in Sri Aurobindo’s Works.
titan ::: "In Greek mythology, one of a family of gigantic beings, the twelve primordial children of Uranus (Heaven) and Gaea (Earth); also certain of the offspring of these Titans. The names of the twelve Titans, the ancestors of the Olympian gods, were Oceanus, Coeus, Crius, Hyperion, Iapetos, Theia, Rhea, Themis, Mnemosyne, Phoebe, Tethys, and Cronos. Cronos, the youngest of them, ruled the world after overthrowing and castrating Uranus. He swallowed each of his own children at birth but Zeus escaped. Cronos was made to vomit up the others (including Hera, Demeter, Poseidon, and Hades) and, after a protracted struggle, he and the other Titans were vanquished, all of them but Atlas imprisoned in Tartarus, and the reign of Zeus was established. More broadly, the word Titan may be applied to any being of a colossal force or grandiose and lawless self-assertion, or even to whatever is huge or mighty.” *Glossary and Index of Proper Names in Sri Aurobindo"s Works.
To bear extreme heat and cold it is necessary to have peace in the cells first, then consolidated force. Pain and discomfort come from a physical consciousness not forceful enough to deter- mine its own reaction to things.
tone ::: 1. Sound with reference to quality, pitch, or volume. 2. The characteristic quality or timbre of a particular instrument or voice. 3. (US and Canadian) Another word for note. 4. A color variation with more variations than a shade—having to do with the value (brightness) of a hue (position in the spectrum) or its chroma (saturation or purity).5. A general quality, effect, or atmosphere. tones, many-toned, hundred-toned, sweet-toned.
topaz ::: a highly valued precious stone, transparent and lustrous, usually of a deep yellow but occasionally other colours.
"Truth is a difficult and strenuous conquest. One must be a real warrior to make this conquest, a warrior who fears nothing, neither enemies nor death, for with or against everybody, with or without a body, the struggle continues and will end by Victory.” Collected Works of the Mother, Vol. 15.*
“Truth is a difficult and strenuous conquest. One must be a real warrior to make this conquest, a warrior who fears nothing, neither enemies nor death, for with or against everybody, with or without a body, the struggle continues and will end by Victory.” Collected Works of the Mother, Vol. 15.
Types of illnesses ::: An illness which comes in the ordinary course as the result of physical causes — even though adverse universal forces are the first cause — is an ordinary illness. One brought by the forces hostile to yoga to upset the system and prevent or disturb progress — without any adequate physical reason — is a hostile attack. It may have the appearance of a cold or other illness, but to the eye which sees the action of the forces and not only the outward symptoms or results, the diHerence is clear.
Vide Colours.
vide Colours.
Vide Visions ; Colours.
"Violet is the colour of the light of Divine Compassion, as also of Krishna"s Grace. It is also the radiance of Krishna"s protection.” Letters on Yoga
violet ::: reddish-blue, a colour at the opposite end of the visible spectrum from red.
VIOLET. ::: Vide Colours.
violet ::: “‘Violet’ is the colour of benevolence or compassion, but also more vividly of the Divine Grace….” Letters on Yoga
Visions — colours: When i!»c colours begin lo take definite shapes in the >jslons, it is a sign of some dynamic work of formation in the consciousness ::: a square, for instance, means that some kind of creation is in process in some field of the being ; the square indicates that the creation is to be complete in itself ; while the rectangle indicates somcihws partial and preliminary.
vivid ::: 1. Full of life; lively; animated. 2. Strikingly bright or intense, as colour, light, etc. 3. Making a powerful impact on the emotions or senses. 4. Uttered, operating, or acting with vigour. 5. Strong, distinct, or clearly perceptible.
waxen ::: resembling wax in colour or texture; pale or smooth as wax.
When 'we go very deeply asleep, we have what appears to us as a dreamless slumber; but in fact dreams arc going on, but they are either too deep dowu to toeh the recordmg surface or am forgotten ail recollection of their having existed even rs wiped oS fa Se transition to the waling eo^etousness. Ordmary dreams are for the most part or semn to be mcobemnt, h^use they are either woven by the snbeonsceat out of dcep-lymc
whirlwind ::: n. 1. A rapidly rotating, generally vertical column of air, such as a tornado, dust devil, or waterspout. Hence, anything resembling a whirlwind as in violent action or destructive force. adj. 2. Like a whirlwind, as in speed or force.
whiteness ::: the quality or state of the colour of greatest lightness; purity. Also fig.
WHITE. ::: Vide Colours.
Yeilow * charactensuc colour of the mind It is the light of the rmnd growmg bnghter as one goes higher till it meets the golden light of the Divine Truth
YELLOW. ::: Vide Colours.
Your statement that ‘joy’ is just another word for ‘ecstasy’ is surprising. ‘Comfort’, ‘pleasure’, ‘joy’, ‘bliss’, ‘rapture’, ‘ecstasy’ would then be all equal and exactly synonymous terms and all distinction of shades and colours of words would disappear from literature. As well say that ‘flashlight’ is just another word for ‘lightning’—or that glow, gleam, glitter, sheen, blaze are all equivalents which can be employed indifferently in the same place. One can feel allured to the supreme omniscient Ecstasy and feel a nameless joy touching one without that Joy becoming itself the supreme Ecstasy. I see no loss of expressiveness by the joy coming in as a vague nameless hint of the immeasurable superior Ecstasy.” Letters on Savitri
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*** WISDOM TROVE ***
*** NEWFULLDB 2.4M ***
1:Stop being a cockface.” Caydon can’t contain his grin. ~ Ella Col, #NFDB
2:Once more, the door has been locked. My heart is locked. ~ Ella Col, #NFDB
3:L'uovo ha una forma perfetta benché sia fatto col culo. ~ Bruno Munari, #NFDB
4:work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men” (Col. 3:23). ~ Anonymous, #NFDB
5:Il vero odio è un sentimento che si impara col tempo. ~ Carlos Ruiz Zaf n, #NFDB
6:quando passaron dentro col favore degli occhi di colei, ~ Giovanni Boccaccio, #NFDB
7:E col passare degli anni, il tempo si allunga sempre di più. ~ Haruki Murakami, #NFDB
8:Encara que sobrevivim al col·lapse del sol, no viurem per sempre. ~ John Green, #NFDB
9:Ma gli occhi sono ciechi. Bisogna cercare col cuore. ~ Antoine de Saint Exup ry, #NFDB
10:A volte ci sono prezzi che non si possono pagare col denaro. ~ Carlos Ruiz Zaf n, #NFDB
11:never know how strong you are until being strong is the only choice you have. ~ Ella Col, #NFDB
12:I matrimoni hanno sempre a che fare col denaro, che lo si ammetta o meno. ~ Carrie Bebris, #NFDB
13:Who was Col. Sussex? Just some guy who had to shit like the rest of us. ~ Charles Bukowski, #NFDB
14:Accidenti ai quattrini. Finiscono sempre col darvi una malinconia del diavolo. ~ J D Salinger, #NFDB
15:Non si vede bene che col cuore, l'essenziale è invisibile agli occhi. ~ Antoine de Saint Exup ry, #NFDB
16:What is initially displaced by a familiar colloquialism is excavated by a pun. ~ Anonymous, #NFDB
17:Siederemo accanto un'altra volta, a spinger sassi col piede, e fantasie col pensiero. ~ Giovanni Verga, #NFDB
18:I think Col. North is first a U.S. citizen and he has the same rights as you yourself do, sir. ~ Fawn Hall, #NFDB
19:It urges us to set our minds “on things that are on earth,” not on things above (Col. 3:2). ~ Nancy R Pearcey, #NFDB
20:It is said by the rebels at Roxbury that Col. Watson has given his quota to support the people. ~ Peter Oliver, #NFDB
21:You can't handle the truth . You can't handle the sad but historic reality. - Lt.Col Nathan Jessep ~ Aaron Sorkin, #NFDB
22:Simplicity is single-hearted obedience, as opposed to halfhearted eye-service (Eph. 6:5; Col. 3:22). ~ Tony Reinke, #NFDB
23:Dylan Nice's Other Kinds is the most extraordinary short-story-col lection debut I have read in years. ~ Gary Lutz, #NFDB
24:[...] una persona di animo nobile non cerca di apparire a tutti i costi, col rischio di danneggiare gli altri. ~ Takashi Hiraide, #NFDB
25:Il mondo era così recente, che molte cose erano prive di nome, e per citarle bisognava indicarle col dito. ~ Gabriel Garc a M rquez, #NFDB
26:Scese, evitando di guardarla a lungo, come si fa col sole; ma vedeva lei, come si vede il sole, anche senza guardare. ~ Leo Tolstoy, #NFDB
27:Un'interpretazione è dotata di significato nella misura in cui riflette fedelmente un isomorfismo col mondo reale. ~ Douglas R Hofstadter, #NFDB
28:Nor shall any partake of the benefit of Christ's sacrifice, or feast upon it, who are not first circumcised in heart, Col. 2:11. ~ Matthew Henry, #NFDB
29:Anche se ero ancora una bambina, sapevo bene che quando si sentono più o meno le stesse cose, si comunica meglio col silenzio. ~ Banana Yoshimoto, #NFDB
30:[...] Però, ecco... magari ricordare la strada che hai fatto per arrivare a questo punto ti aiuta a camminare col cuore più leggero. ~ Zerocalcare, #NFDB
31:Cominciate col fare ciò che è necessario, poi ciò che è possibile. E all'improvviso vi sorprenderete a fare l'impossibile. ~ Saint Francis of Assisi, #NFDB
32:War does not determine who is right; only who is left.
Unknown.
Possibly Col. Frank P. Hobgood. Feb 1932
"The Montreal Star ~ Anonymous,#NFDB
33:divertirli quanto più si potesse dal conversare col proprio animo, o almeno col desiderio di quella loro incognita e vana felicità. ~ Giacomo Leopardi, #NFDB
34:Ingmar riuscì ad intrecciarsi a tal punto col filo del telefono che per liberarsi strappó il cavo e tutto l'apparecchio dalla parete. ~ Jonas Jonasson, #NFDB
35:Ci tenevamo per mano mentre percorrevamo il sentiero di pan di zenzero dentro la foresta, col sangue che ci gocciolava dalle dita. ~ Laurie Halse Anderson, #NFDB
36:E' questione di misura, contentarsi. Uno si contenta di tanto, (fa segno col pollice sul mignolo) un altro ha tutto e non se ne contenta. ~ Luigi Pirandello, #NFDB
37:Lasciar compiere quell'abbaglio del destino e degli uomini, non impedirlo, prestarvisi col proprio silenzio e non far nulla, era come far tutto! ~ Victor Hugo, #NFDB
38:Perché io credo che l'anima agisca sul corpo, che lo vivifichi col suo soffio e lo ricopra di un velo che lo fa sembrare più bello di quanto non sia. ~ Mary Webb, #NFDB
39:Uomo dell'aria, tu colora col sangue le ore sontuose del tuo passaggio fra noi. I limiti esistono soltanto nell'anima di chi è a corto di sogni. ~ Philippe Petit, #NFDB
40:In thought and practice we are far from holy, but in the new nature we are perfectly holy: “In Him [we] have been made complete” (Col. 2:10). ~ John F MacArthur Jr, #NFDB
41:La linea fragile delle sue labbra era agitata da un lieve tremito che sembrava in accordo col battito del suo cuore e le vibrazioni della sua anima. ~ Haruki Murakami, #NFDB
42:LETTERA 25 DIVERSI MODI DI EDUCAZIONE
Col peccatore inveterato penso che bisogni agire con un certo tatto, perché non giunga a disperare di sé stesso. ~ Seneca,#NFDB
43:God’s people need to understand Him, which demands knowing His Word of Truth (2 Tim. 2:15) and allowing that Word to dwell in them richly (Col. 3:16). ~ John F MacArthur Jr, #NFDB
44:Se uno legge quello che leggono gli altri, finisce col pensare allo stesso modo.
Queste cose lasciamole al mondo dei provinciali, alle mezze calzette. ~ Haruki Murakami,#NFDB
45:Eppure le donne – le donne che valevano qualcosa – mi spaventavano perché finivano col volere la mia anima, e io volevo tenere per me quello che ne restava. ~ Charles Bukowski, #NFDB
46:In another life, Col, I-I think it could be you. I swear."
"I guess our timing is off, then, because I think it could be you, too. In this life. ~ Megan Erickson,#NFDB
47:Paul himself affirms later that idolatry may take such forms as trusting in money: "Immorality, uncleanness, passion, evil desire and greed ... is idolatry (Col 3:5). ~ G K Beale, #NFDB
48:I conti si faranno alla fine. A destra la colonna col segno più, a sinistra quella col segno meno e in mezzo quella enorme e vuota delle intenzioni e dei rimorsi. ~ Antonio Manzini, #NFDB
49:How about,” Jane suggested, “some dumb question as to what a refinery does?” “Good idea,” fired back Col. “What does a refinery do?” Connie asked. Anneena and Col groaned. ~ Julia Golding, #NFDB
50:Buona notte, Lisa. Dormi con gli angeli... Poi torna sulla terra e dormi col tuo diavolo, che sarebbe disposto a bruciare all'inferno, per una notte tra le tue braccia ~ Karen Marie Moning, #NFDB
51:LETTERA 21 LA VERA GLORIA
In questi giardini gli stimoli della fame non si eccitano, ma si estinguono; né la sere aumenta col bere, ma è sedata da un rimedio naturale e gratuito. ~ Seneca,#NFDB
52:Jesus is the Lord of my life. Sickness and disease have no power over me. I am forgiven and free from SIN AND GUILT. I am dead to sin and alive unto righteousness. (Col. 1:21,22.) ~ Charles Capps, #NFDB
53:La memoria. Sacca piena di cianfrusaglie che rotolano fuori per caso e finiscono col meravigliarti, come se non fossi stato tu a raccoglierle, a trasformarle in oggetti preziosi. ~ Luther Blissett, #NFDB
54:Lo raccontò in maniera semplice ma precisa, come un buon soldato rievoca una battaglia, non più col sapore della vittoria o della sconfitta ma unicamente con l'emozione del ricordo. ~ John le Carr, #NFDB
55:Trust in Him Faith in Jesus is “the leaning of your entire personality on Him in absolute trust and confidence in His power, wisdom, and goodness” (Col. 1:4). Are you leaning on Him? ~ Joyce Meyer, #NFDB
56:Attraverso i libri ho appreso che i cieli non sono affatto umani e che un uomo che sa pensare, anche lui non è umano, non che non lo voglia, ma ciò contrasta col giusto modo di pensare. ~ Bohumil Hrabal, #NFDB
57:Il silenzio sa essere ostile.
Se non impari a tenerlo lontano, si insinua nelle fessure del rapporto, riempie le crepe e le allarga.
Col tempo crea una distanza e non te ne accorgi. ~ Donato Carrisi,#NFDB
58:Religion is man’s attempt to make peace with God on his own terms. Redemption is God’s offer of peace through Jesus Christ. But this is “peace through the blood of His cross” (Col. 1:20). ~ Warren W Wiersbe, #NFDB
59:E ritornò dalla volpe.
"Addio", disse.
"Addio", disse la volpe. "Ecco il mio segreto. È molto semplice: non si vede bene che col cuore. L'essenziale è invisibile agli occhi". ~ Antoine de Saint Exup ry,#NFDB
60:La felicità della vita è fatta di frazioni infinitesimali: di piccole elemosine, presto dimenticate, di un bacio, di un sorriso, di uno sguardo gentile, di un complimento fatto col cuore. ~ Samuel Taylor Coleridge, #NFDB
61:Upon the education of the people of this country the fate of this country depends. ~ Benjamin Disraeli, speech, House of Commons (June 15, 1874). Parliamentary Debates (Commons), 3d series, vol. 219, col. 1618 (1874)., #NFDB
62:[Col. 4:5, 6] Be wise in the way you act toward outsiders; make the most of every opportunity. Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone. ~ Anonymous, #NFDB
63:If then you were raised with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ is, sitting at the right hand of God. Set your mind on things above, not on things on the earth” (Col. 3:1–2 NKJV). ~ Warren W Wiersbe, #NFDB
64:Fortuna, ma ci sono fortune che vanno in braccio al primo che incontrano, fortune puttane che piantano subito e vanno col prossimo e invece ci sono fortune sagge che spiano una persona e la collaudano lentamente ~ Erri De Luca, #NFDB
65:Finché anche le donne non hanno cominciato a scrivere libri era possibile vedere solo un lato della questione. Dagli albori della storia fino a oggi i libri sono stati scritti con lo sperma, non col sangue mestruale. ~ Erica Jong, #NFDB
66:Quando ti porti dietro un libro avviene qualcosa di straordinario: le sue pagine raccoglieranno i tuoi ricordi. E un giorno ti basterà risfogliarle per tornare col pensiero al luogo dove le hai lette per la prima volta. ~ Cornelia Funke, #NFDB
67:The experience of war never quite leaves a young man or woman. A great many are utterly destroyed by it. All are indelibly and subtly marked by it, because, for good or evil, the memory never quite leaves any of us.” Col. ~ Jerry Pournelle, #NFDB
68:Votare scheda bianca è un diritto irrinunciabile, nessuno ve lo negherà, ma proprio come proibiamo ai bambini di giocare col fuoco, così abbiamo avvisato i popoli che va contro la loro sicurezza cincischiare con la dinamite. ~ Jos Saramago, #NFDB
69:Lauren," he began gravely, "I would like four daughters with wobbly blue eyes and studious horn-rimmed glasses on their little noses. Also, I've become very partial to your honey-colored hair, so if you could manage… ~ Judith McNaught, #NFDB
70:La libertà costa cara. Molto più cara della schiavitù. E non si paga né con l'oro, né col sangue, né con i più nobili sacrifici: ma con la vigliaccheria, la prostituzione, il tradimento, con tutto il marciume dell'animo umano. ~ Curzio Malaparte, #NFDB
71:LETTERA 15: BISOGNA ESERCITARE LO SPIRITO, PIU' CHE IL CORPO
Né il freddo, né il caldo, e neppure la vecchiaia, potrà impedire di esercitare le forze dell'animo: cura dunque questo bene, che diventa migliore col passare del tempo. ~ Seneca,#NFDB
72:The lead gray of the sky mixed ever so slowly with 60 black, finally blending into night. Just another quality of melancholy. As if there were only two col-ors in the world, gray and black, shifting back and forth at regular intervals. ~ Anonymous, #NFDB
73:Mortification of any sin must be by a supply of grace. Of ourselves we cannot do it. Now, "it hath pleased the Father that in Christ should all fullness dwell," Col. 1:19; that "of his fullness we might receive grace for grace," John 1:16. ~ John Owen, #NFDB
74:Ma chi capisce tutto e tutti finisce con l’assolvere tutto e tutti. Chi assolve tutto e tutti finisce col perdonare tutto e tutti. Chi perdona tutto e tutti non crede a nulla. E chi non crede a nulla, mia cara, è un cinico. Tout court. ~ Oriana Fallaci, #NFDB
75:I think that we Americans, at least in the Southern col[onie]s, cannot contend with a good grace for liberty until we shall have enfranchised our slaves,” Laurens told a friend right before the signing of the Declaration of Independence.64 ~ Ron Chernow, #NFDB
76:Una volta la Battaglia mi ha detto che il suo dolce preferito sono le fragole con la panna senza le fragole, che la sua merenda preferita è un panino col prosciutto senza pane, e la sua colazione preferita il latte coi biscotti senza latte. ~ Paolo Nori, #NFDB
77:Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for human masters, since you know that you will receive an inheritance from the Lord as a reward. It is the Lord Christ you are serving” (Col. 3:23–24). ~ Candace Cameron Bure, #NFDB
78:That was my big break [Lonesome Dove]. My first real kind of adult role on something really well-written. It was a spin-off of the miniseries, and I played Col. Mosby, a very dangerous, Southern colonel in post-Civil War, wandering the West. ~ Eric McCormack, #NFDB
79:Col. Lloyd's plantation resembles what the baronial domains were during the middle ages in Europe. Grim, cold, and unapproachable by all genial influences from communities without, there it stands; full three hundred years behind the age, ~ Frederick Douglass, #NFDB
80:The third kind of worship is that of thanksgiving for the goods we have received. We must thank God for all created things, and show Him perpetual worship, as from Him and through Him all creation takes its being and subsists. (Col. 1.16-17) ~ John of Damascus, #NFDB
81:Lottate, ragionate col vostro cervello, ricordate che ciascuno è qualcuno, un individuo prezioso, responsabile, artefice di se stesso, difendetelo il vostro io, nocciolo di ogni libertà, la libertà è un dovere, prima che un diritto è un dovere. ~ Oriana Fallaci, #NFDB
82:Potete chiedermi tutto quello che volete. Le parole rimasero in sospeso sulle sue labbra. Avrebbe voluto pronunciarle. Dio solo sapeva quanto fossero vere. Ma era col suo padrone che stava parlando e non poteva dire ciò che davvero aveva nel cuore. ~ K J Charles, #NFDB
83:What my life really is even now is “hid with Christ in God” (Col. 3:3). What I “treasure” in heaven is not just the little that I have caused to be there. It is what I love there and what I place my security and happiness in there. It is God who ~ Dallas Willard, #NFDB
84:The spiritual blessings that we need are not abstractions that elude our grasp; they are all in a person, Jesus Christ. He is our wisdom (Col. 2:3), our righteousness (2 Cor. 5:21), our sanctification (John 17:19), and our redemption (Rom. 3:24). ~ Warren W Wiersbe, #NFDB
85:[Col. 4:2–4] Devote yourselves to prayer, being watchful and thankful. And pray for us, too, that God may open a door for our message, so that we may proclaim the mystery of Christ, for which I am in chains. Pray that I may proclaim it clearly, as I should. ~ Anonymous, #NFDB
86:I desideri erano come un veleno, pensò Jimmy. Quando uno li esprime sono tutti luminosi e splendono, dolci come caramelle. Ma poi restano lì a languire, e finiscono col marcire. Diventano tossici. Era per quel motivo che non esprimeva mai nessun desiderio. ~ Kim Fielding, #NFDB
87:Col senno di poi, sono contenta di non essermi resa conto di quanto fossi vulnerabile: ero come l'ambasciatore di un paese inesistente, venuta a reclamare, con la mia piccola collezione di libri e la mia sporta di sogni, un paese che credevo mi appartenesse. ~ Azar Nafisi, #NFDB
88:Cominciai a non abboccare più a tutte le cose che mi dicevano. L'unico spazio nel quale esprimevo un entusiasmo incondizionato era quello dei libri e della musica. E così, come forse era inevitabile, ho finito col diventare una persona piuttosto solitaria. ~ Haruki Murakami, #NFDB
89:Sia detto alla sfuggita, il successo è una cosa piuttosto lurida; la sua falsa somiglianza col merito inganna gli uomini. Per la folla, la riuscita ha quasi lo stesso profilo della supremazia. Il successo, sosia della capacità, sa ingannare per bene la storia. ~ Victor Hugo, #NFDB
90:I was getting money for showing one man killing another. Two lives were destroyed and I was getting paid for it. (On his 1968 photograph of the summary street corner execution of prisoner Nguyen Van Lem by South Vietnam's police chief, Lt. Col. Nguyen Ngoc Loan.) ~ Eddie Adams, #NFDB
91:You should always say your prayers with tireless diligence, as the Apostle directs, saying: 'Continue in prayer and watch in the same' (Col. 4:2). For humble patience, tirelessness and persistence in prayer conquer the unconquerable God and incline Him to mercy. ~ Lorenzo Scupoli, #NFDB
92:E se tu stessi dormendo
E dormendo facessi un sogno
E in quel sogno vedessi te stesso in Paradiso
E li cogliessi uno strano e bellissimo fiore
E, una volta svegliato, ti ritrovassi
Col fiore in mano?
Oh, e se così fosse, che faresti allora? ~ Samuel Taylor Coleridge,#NFDB
93:Come potrebbe un uomo prigioniero nella ragnatela della routine ricordarsi che è un uomo, un individuo ben distinto, uno al quale è concessa un'unica occasione di vivere, con speranze e delusioni, dolori e timori, col desiderio di amare e il terrore della solitudine e del nulla? ~ Erich Fromm, #NFDB
94:Ha sempre sospettato che la signora madre, in un lontano passato in cui era giovanissima e immaginosa, ha scelto di farsi morta per non dovere morire. Da lì deve venire quella sua speciale capacità di accettare ogni noia col massimo della condiscendenza e il minimo dello sforzo. ~ Dacia Maraini, #NFDB
95:the knowledge of the Son of God. This does not refer to salvation knowledge but to the deep knowledge of Christ that a believer comes to have through prayer, faithful study of his word, and obedience to his commands (cf. Phil. 3:8–10, 12; Col. 1:9–10; 2:2; see note on 1 John 2:12–14). ~ Anonymous, #NFDB
96:Non credo rivedrà mai più la sua amica Laura. E se mai la rivedrà non penso che sarà in grado di riconoscerla"
"Ma lei è riuscito a capire se era almeno felice?"
"Felice? Non saprei, forse non è la parola giusta. Era... in armonia, ecco. In armonia con se stessa. E col mondo ~ Andrea Camilleri,#NFDB
97:Egli osservò: “La segregazione le dona, le fa bene e conferisce molta più distinzione al dolore! Uno di questi giorni farò lo stesso anch'io: mi chiuderò col berretto da notte e la vestaglia, dando più disturbo che potrò... Forse, posso rimandare tutto questo a quando scapperà Kitty...”. ~ Jane Austen, #NFDB
98:...God will be 'all in all' (I Cor. 15:28) when we are no longer what we are now, a multiplicity of impulses and emotions, with little or nothing of God in us, but are fully like God , with room for God and God alone. This is the 'maturity' (cf. Col. 1:28) towards which we speed. ~ Gregory of Nazianzus, #NFDB
99:L'olezzo di una carneficina, credono alcuni, può aleggiare su un luogo per anni. Dicono che s'infiltri nel suolo e venga lentamente assorbito dall'intrico delle radici finché, col passare del tempo, tutto ciò che vi cresce, dal più piccolo lichene all'albero più alto, ne viene impregnato. ~ Nicholas Evans, #NFDB
100:Non ci si può mettere il passato in tasca; bisogna avere una casa per sistemarvelo. Io non possiedo che il mio corpo; un uomo completamente solo, col suo corpo soltanto, non può fermare i ricordi, gli passano attraverso. Non dovrei lagnarmi: il mio solo desiderio è stato d'esser libero. ~ Jean Paul Sartre, #NFDB
101:Aveva appreso, col tempo, che seguire l'istinto non era altro che dare ascolto a una parte del pensiero che continuava a lavorare sotto il limite della coscienza. E spesso, proprio per questo, era il pensiero migliore, quello che poteva concentrarsi senza le distrazioni del mondo esterno. ~ Maurizio de Giovanni, #NFDB
102:Bella guerra ha detto lui, sconfortato. Contro che cosa sono in guerra? Col mio cancro. E che cos'è il mio cancro? Il mio cancro sono io. I miei tumori sono fatti di me. Sono fatti di me tanto quanto il mio cervello e il mio cuore. E' una guerra civile, Hazel Grace, con un vincitore predeterminato. ~ John Green, #NFDB
103:Penso che la bellezza sia un inganno". "Come il giardino leopardiano?". Non sapevo niente di giardini leopardiani, ma risposi: "Sì. Come il mare in un giorno sereno. O come un tramonto. O come il cielo di notte. è cipria passata sopra l'orrore. Se la si toglie, restiamo soli col nostro spavento". ~ Elena Ferrante, #NFDB
104:Se ci fosse un cacciavite per togliere le idee sbagliate e un martello per fissare le buone intenzioni, una chiave inglese per stringere per sempre l'amore e una sega per tagliare col passato! Ma questa attrezzeria non ce l'hanno data e, dopo aver tentennato e scricchiolato, prima o poi ci romperemo. ~ Stefano Benni, #NFDB
105:that scripture came into my mind, Having made peace through the blood of His cross. Col. i. 20. By which I was made to see, both again and again, that God and my soul were friends by His blood; yea, I saw that the justice of God, and my sinful soul could embrace and kiss each other, through His blood. ~ John Bunyan, #NFDB
106:The Mosaic Law, with all its ceremonies and rituals and its priesthood and sacrifices, was given until Christ came. It was all a shadow pointing to a substance (Col 2:17). Everything in the law was shouting, “Look to Christ!” As Paul says in Romans 10:4, “For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness. ~ David Platt, #NFDB
107:Se neghiamo la necessità del pensiero, come fanno alcuni, perdiamo i poteri di riflessione: non possiamo definire ciò che ci segnalano i nostri sensi. Se rinneghiamo la carne, togliamo le ruote al veicolo che ci trasporta. Ma se rinneghiamo i sentimenti, perdiamo ogni contatto col nostro universo interiore. ~ Frank Herbert, #NFDB
108:Però, vedete, se voi desiderate prendere una lepre, che le diate la caccia con i cani o col falco, a piedi o a cavallo, resterà sempre una lepre. La libertà, invece, non rimane mai la stessa, cambia a seconda della caccia. E se addestrate dei cani a catturarla per voi, è facile che vi riportino una libertà da cani. ~ Wu Ming, #NFDB
109:Ascoltare qualcuno che legge ad alta voce è molto diverso che leggere in silenzio. Quando leggi, puoi fermarti o sorvolare sulle frasi: il tempo sei tu che lo decidi. Quando è un altro che legge è difficile far coincidere la tua attenzione col tempo della sua lettura: la voce va o troppo svelta o troppo piano. ~ Italo Calvino, #NFDB
110:La maggior parte delle discipline nascondono effetti negativi, essendo concepite non per liberare, bensì per limitare. Non chiedete Perché? E siate cauti col Come? Perché? conduce inesorabilmente al paradosso. Come? v’intrappola in un universo di causa ed effetto. Entrambi negano l’infinito. Gli Apocrifi di Arrakis ~ Frank Herbert, #NFDB
111:Looking around the workbench Colin spotted a device that looked like a complex handgun. "What's this?" He grabbed it and started aiming it at various objects around the room.
That's a glue gun." Razor replied.
Wow! How's it work?"
It's not a weapon, Col. We use it to glue things to other things. ~ Michael Carroll,#NFDB
112:«A volte, se stringi troppo a te la persona che ami, finisci col soffocarla. Si può amare qualcuno così tanto da perdere se stessi. E il rischio è proprio questo: non abbandonarsi all’amore, ma perdere se stessi. Perché cosa succede se le cose vanno male? Che di te resta solo un guscio vuoto. Non hai più niente....» ~ Rachel Van Dyken, #NFDB
113:Ci tenevamo per mano mentre percorrevamo il sentiero di pan di zenzero dentro la foresta, col sangue che ci gocciolava dalle dita. Danzavamo con le streghe e baciavamo i mostri. Ci trasformammo in ragazze d'inverno e, quando lei cercò di andar via, la spinsi di nuovo nella neve perché avevo paura di restare da sola. ~ Laurie Halse Anderson, #NFDB
114:First, we are born in the same galaxy. Born of the same species. Our lifetimes overlap. The meetings between humans are so unlikely as to be miraculous. To laugh, to cry, and to fall in love. Everyone is made up of a collection of 1% chances. Thus, I am dazzled by the fact that there are so many miracles in this world. ~ Hikaru Nakamura, #NFDB
115:Avrebbe voluto vivere in qualche vecchio maniero, come quelle castellane dal lungo corsetto che passavano le loro giornate sotto i trifogli delle ogive, col gomito sulla pietra e il mento appoggiato sulla mano, a veder arrivare, dall'estremo orizzonte della campagna, un cavaliere dalla piuma bianca galoppante su un cavallo nero! ~ Gustave Flaubert, #NFDB
116:Scattava subito, pregiudizialmente, quali che fossero le persone che le rappresentavano, una irriducibile disparità di punti di vista tra le due istituzioni: l’arma dei carabinieri, il corpo di polizia. Un lungo, storico contenzioso li divideva: e tutti i cittadini che ci cadevano in mezzo finivano col dibattervisi drammaticamente ~ Leonardo Sciascia, #NFDB
117:We let the human image of Christ mislead us into downsizing Him. “If He'd just stoop a little and we stood on our tiptoes, we'd be just about side by side. One at His left. One at His right.” Negatory, good buddy. When the Word became flesh to dwell among us, human flesh wrapped its way around “the fulness of the Godhead bodily” (Col. 2:9 KJV). ~ Beth Moore, #NFDB
118:New Testament passages make plain that this kingdom is not something to be “accepted” now and enjoyed later, but something to be entered now (Matt. 5:20; 18:3; John 3:3, 5). It is something that already has flesh-and-blood citizens (John 18:36; Phil. 3:20) who have been transformed into it (Col. 1:13) and are fellow workers in it (Col. 4:11). ~ Dallas Willard, #NFDB
119:Risero alcuni di quel mutamento, ma egli li lasciava ridere e non vi badava; perché sapeva bene che molte cose buone, su questo mondo, cominciano sempre col muovere il riso in certa gente. Poiché ciechi aveano da essere, meglio valeva che stringessero gli occhi in una smorfia di ilarità, anzi che essere attaccati da qualche male meno attraente. ~ Charles Dickens, #NFDB
120:Stagger onward rejoicing;
And even then if, perhaps
Having actually got
To the last col, you collapse
With all Atlantis shining
Below you yet you cannot
Descend, you should still be proud
Even to have been allowed
Just to peep at Atlantis
In a poetic vision:
Give thanks and lie down in peace,
Having seen your salvation. ~ W H Auden,#NFDB
121:Con l’andar del tempo, più le attività di convivenza e gli scambi genetici, abbiamo finito col ficcare la coscienza nel colore del sangue e nel sale delle lacrime, e, come se non bastasse, degli occhi abbiamo fatto una sorta di specchi rivolti all’interno, con il risultato che, spesso, ci mostrano senza riserva ciò che stavamo cercando di negare con la bocca. ~ Jos Saramago, #NFDB
122:Aveva occhi vuoti, del tutto incongrui col parlottio frenetico, rotto da risarelle, con cui attaccò a raccontare a me, solo a me che ancora non sapevo, ciò che i fascisti le avevano fatto. Si espresse come se recitasse una filastrocca atroce che era il modo secondo cui, per ora, s'era sedimentato l'orrore a forza di ripeterlo a chiunque venisse a farle visita. ~ Elena Ferrante, #NFDB
123:Volevo che tu imparassi una cosa da lei: volevo che tu vedessi che cosa è il vero coraggio, tu che credi che sia rappresentato da un uomo col fucile in mano. Aver coraggio significa sapere di essere sconfitti prima ancora di cominciare, e cominciare egualmente e arrivare fino in fondo, qualsiasi cosa succeda. È raro vincere, in questi casi, ma qualche volta si vince. ~ Harper Lee, #NFDB
124:Abbiamo tutti dentro un mondo di cose: ciascuno un suo mondo di cose! E come possiamo intenderci, signore, se nelle parole ch'io dico metto il senso e il valore delle cose come sono dentro di me; mentre chi le ascolta, inevitabilmente le assume col senso e col valore che hanno per sé, del mondo com'egli l'ha dentro? Crediamo di intenderci; non ci intendiamo mai! ~ Luigi Pirandello, #NFDB
125:Prendi la posizione più comoda: seduto, sdraiato, raggomitolato, coricato. Coricato sulla schiena, su un fianco, sulla pancia. In poltrona, sul divano, sulla sedia a dondolo, sulla sedia a sdraio, sul pouf. Sull'amaca, se hai un'amaca. Sul letto, naturalmente, o dentro il letto. Puoi anche metterti a testa in giù, in posizione yoga, col libro capovolto, si capisce. ~ Italo Calvino, #NFDB
126:L'amore non è soltanto una relazione con una particolare persona: è un'attitudine, un orientamento di carattere che determina i rapporti di una persona col mondo, non verso un "oggetto" d'amore. Se una persona ama solo un'altra persona ed è indifferente nei confronti dei suoi simili, il suo non è amore, ma un attaccamento simbiotico, o un egotismo portato all'eccesso. ~ Erich Fromm, #NFDB
127:E, Dio santo, avevano dieci, al massimo vent’anni più di me. Tuttavia parevano aver perso i connotati femminili a cui noi ragazze tenevamo tanto e che evidenziavamo con gli abiti, col trucco. Erano state mangiate dal corpo dei mariti, dei padri, dei fratelli, a cui finivano sempre più per assomigliare, o per le fatiche o per l’arrivo della vecchiaia, della malattia. Quando ~ Elena Ferrante, #NFDB
128:Amor tremendo è il mio. Tu nol conosci ancora, oh!.
Tutto ancora non tel mostrai; tu eri mio: secura nel mio gaudio io tacea; nè tutto mai questo labbro pudico osato avria dirti l'ebbrezza del mio cor segreto"
"Sparsa le trecce morbide sull'affannoso petto, lenta le palme, e rorido di morte il bianco aspetto, giace la pia, col tremolo sguardo cercando il ciel". ~ Alessandro Manzoni,#NFDB
129:Sono un succubo. Sono una vampira che invece di succhiare sangue si nutre di sesso, e se non mi nutro assorbo l'energia di Damian e di Nathaniel, col rischio di ucciderli. Io stessa morirei senza nutrirmi. Credo che Jean-Claude possa proteggere se stesso e Richard da me. Nonostante questo, potrei ucciderci tutti se non imparassi ad amministrare il mio triumvirato di potere. ~ Laurell K Hamilton, #NFDB
130:quando muoveva il corpo a tempo di musica, dimentico di tutto, aveva la forte sensazione che il ritmo naturale dentro di lui entrasse in sintonia e si fondesse col ritmo fondamentale del mondo. Gli pareva che il flusso e riflusso delle maree, il vento che danzava nei campi, il movimento delle stelle, tutte queste cose, non potessero non essere in qualche modo in rapporto con lui. ~ Haruki Murakami, #NFDB
131:Now they needed a man to go across the line. Col. T.B. Hargis, Jr. called in Capt. Tom Stewart. Stewart, 30, was lanky, bookish and witty, a devout Christian and the son of a semi-famous senator from Tennessee. It’s likely he was chosen because he was decisive and smart. He knew a smattering of German — plus he could ride a horse. That was more than enough to qualify him for the job. ~ Stephan Talty, #NFDB
132:Era semplicemente il fiume. Improvvisamente mi colpì il pensiero che era proprio come la vita, quel fiume. Tu ci navighi semplicemente sopra e, se arriva una pioggia forte, un'inondazione o qualcosa del genere e una parte viene spazzata via, col tempo tutto torna al suo posto. Be', magari con qualcosa di diverso, ma in sostanza resta lo stesso. Il fiume non cambia, ma la gente su quel fiume sì. ~ Joe R Lansdale, #NFDB
133:«Hai rischiato la vita per me mezza dozzina di volte, D.
Immagino che ora sia il mio turno.»
«Non è compito tuo.»
«Col cavolo.» Jack gli afferrò la mano, il fuoco nello sguardo. «Sei il mio uomo, no?»
«Lo sono?» chiese D, scrutando i suoi occhi. Il tono sembrava quello di un bambino, persino alle sue stesse orecchie.
«Sì, lo sei. Qualsiasi cosa accada, fino alla fine dei miei giorni.» ~ Jane Seville,#NFDB
134:To Whom does our God say, 'in our image' (Gen. 1:26), to whom if it is not to Him who is 'the brightness of His glory and the express image of His Person' (Heb. 1:3), 'the image of the invisible God' (Col. 1:15)? It is then to His living image, to Him Who has said 'I and My Father are one' (Jn. 10:30), 'He who has seen Me has seen the Father' (Jn. 14:9), that God says, 'Let us make man in our image'. ~ Saint Basil, #NFDB
135:Cercai di percorrere col pensiero la rivoluzione attraverso la quale passeremo tutti, il cuore che s'arresta, il cervello che rinuncia al pensiero, i polmoni che cessano di aspirare la vita. Anch'io subirò uno sconvolgimento analogo: morirò, un giorno. Ma ogni agonia è diversa; i miei sforzi per figurarmi quella di Antinoo non pervenivano che a una costruzione priva di valore: era morto solo. ~ Marguerite Yourcenar, #NFDB
136:La sola risposta al nulla sta nell'illusione. E' quasi un fatto biologico. È la nostra sostanza stessa. Non è illusione, è qualcosa di più. Ma ciò vuole anche dire che il pericolo della vita consiste nell'esagerare col rigore, nello spingersi troppo oltre. Questione di temperamento. Un'altra cosa spiacevole nella vita è l'astio. L'astioso è un incattivito che si attribuisce una sorta di superiorità. ~ Emil M Cioran, #NFDB
137:Cenerentola aveva mai pensato di confessare tutto al principe quella notte in cui si stava tanto divertendo col suo favoloso abito da ballo? Aveva mai pensato di dirgli: "Oh, a proposito, principe, la carrozza non è mia, in realtà sono una servetta sporca che va sempre in giro a piedi nudi e ha i minuti contati?" No. Lei si era goduta il suo momento.
E poi era sgattaiolata via di nascosto dopo mezzanotte. ~ Lissa Price,#NFDB
138:The Church was redeemed at the price of Christ's blood. Jew or Greek, it makes no difference; but if he has believed, he must circumcise himself from his sins [in baptism (Col. 2:11-12)] so that he can be saved . . . for no one ascends into the kingdom of heaven except through the sacrament of baptism . . . "Unless a man be born again of water and the Holy Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God" ~ Saint Ambrose of Milan, #NFDB
139:I mean it wasn’t an empty hole, there was always something in it, but it was never right. It never fit. I went to college for a short time, until I sat back one day and said to myself: Andrew, what the fuck are you doing here? And it clicked in my head that I wasn’t there because it’s what I wanted, I was there because it’s what people expected, even people I don’t know, society. It’s what people do. ~ J A Redmerski, #NFDB
140:Se ti ricordi tutto, volevo dirgli, e se sei davvero come me, allora domani prima di partire o quando sei pronto per chiudere la portiera del taxi e hai già salutato gli altri e non c'è più nulla da dire in questa vita, allora, una volta soltanto, girati verso di me, anche per scherzo, o perché ci hai ripensato, e, come avevi già fatto allora, guardami negli occhi, trattieni il mio sguardo, e chiamami col tuo nome. ~ Andr Aciman, #NFDB
141:Se ti ricordi tutto, volevo dirgli, e se sei davvero come me, allora domani prima di partire o quando sei pronto per chiudere la portiera del taxi e hai già salutato gli altri e non c’è più nulla da dire in questa vita, allora, una volta soltanto, girati verso di me, anche per scherzo, o perché ci hai ripensato, e, come avevi già fatto allora, guardami negli occhi, trattieni il mio sguardo, e chiamami col tuo nome. ~ Andr Aciman, #NFDB
142:Si mette a letto dalla propria parte, ma prima col piede, poi con tutto il corpo, si sposta tutto nella nicchia di tepore lasciata dalla moglie. Quando lei torna la sera, lui è alzato da un pezzo ad aspettarla. Mangiano qualcosa, con lo struggimento di avere così poco tempo per stare insieme, tanto che non riescono quasi a portarsi il cucchiaio alla bocca, dalla voglia che avrebbero "di star lì a tenersi per mano". ~ Italo Calvino, #NFDB
143:Ciertos alimentos aumentan la capacidad del hígado de desintoxicar toxinas dañinas; alimentos como el wasabe, el brócoli, la col, las coles de bruselas, la col rizada y la coliflor. (El wasabe es la pasta de especias verdes que normalmente se sirve con el sushi.) Los alimentos verdes, incluyendo las microalgas, las verduras y las algas marinas, son también estupendos desintoxicadores. Los suplementos que son importantes ~ Don Colbert, #NFDB
144:The Bible addresses two distinct reactions to hostility in parents: Fathers are told not to “embitter [their] children, or they will become discouraged” (Col. 3:21). Some children respond to harshness with compliance and depression. At the same time, fathers are told not to “exasperate [their] children” (Eph. 6:4). Other children react to hostility with rage. Many grow up to be just like the hostile parent who hurt them. ~ Henry Cloud, #NFDB
145:Father Col, an intrepid defender of the Faith during the French Revolution and the pastor of Bourg-d'Oisans where these good people were married [M/M Eymard], had foretold to them that they would have a son who would become a priest and founder of the Order of the Blessed Sacrament. During the months she bore Peter Julian, Mrs. Eymard used to visit the parish church and offer him to the hidden God of the tabernacle. ~ Peter Julian Eymard, #NFDB
146:Avrei tanto voluto che la giornata fosse tutta come la colazione, quando le persone sono ancora sintonizzate sui loro sogni e non è previsto che debbano affrontare il mondo esterno. Mi sono reso conto che io sono sempre così; per me non arriva mai il momento in cui, dopo una tazza di caffè o una doccia, mi sento improvvisamente pieno di vita, sveglio e in sintonia col mondo. Se si fosse sempre a colazione, io sarei a posto. ~ Peter Cameron, #NFDB
147:Quando dice Cucciamelo sta dicendo È una gabbia di matti, tesorino bello, quindi spacchiamogli il culo a questi stronzi. E quando la mia risposta è Dai tiratelo fuori sto dicendo Eccoci qua, belli tosti e sempre col sorrisone in faccia nonostante tutta la merda che ci piove addosso.
Ci stiamo dicendo Se hai qualcosa che ti fa star male, un rimorso o un dolore, mangiatelo, bevitelo, pippatelo, scopatelo, usalo, ciuccialo, ammazzalo. ~ Merritt Tierce,#NFDB
148:Love dictates that you refrain from waving something obnoxious under the nose of a brother with scruples about it. Christ died for him, so you may not do that (Rom. 14:15). At the same time, we need to reject, and reject with godly vehemence, every attempt to bind the consciences of the saints with regard to what they may eat (Col. 2:20–23). We defer to the weaker brothers at lunch, which is not the same thing as letting them teach on this. ~ Douglas Wilson, #NFDB
149:The covetous man feareth not God. This also is plain from the word because it setteth covetousness and the fear of God in direct opposition. Men that fear God are said to hate covetousness, Exod. xviii. 21. Besides the covetous man is called an idolater and is said to have no part in the kingdom of Christ and of God, Col. iii. 5. And again; 'The wicked boasteth of his heart's desire and blesseth the covetous whom the Lord abhorreth,' Psa. x. 3. ~ John Bunyan, #NFDB
150:Love is the all-or-nothing of the kingdom of God. Above all we are to love (Col. 3:14; 1 Peter 4:8). Everything we do is to be done in love and, thus, communicate love (1 Cor. 16:14). We are to imitate God by living in Christlike love (Eph. 5:1–2), and if we do this, we fulfill the whole law (Matt. 22:37–40; Rom. 13:8–10). If we lack this, everything else we do is devoid of kingdom value, however impressive it might otherwise be (1 Cor. 13:1–3). ~ Gregory A Boyd, #NFDB
151:La dottrina semita rifiuta il principio aristocratico della natura e pone al posto dell'eterno diritto della forze e della potenza, il numero col suo peso morto. Essa rinnega nell'uomo il valore della persona, mette in dubbio l'importanza del popolo e della razza, togliendo così all'umanità le premesse della sua conservazione e della sua cultura. Essa, se posta a base dell'universo, porterebbe alla fine in ogni ordine umano comprensibile alla ragione ~ Adolf Hitler, #NFDB
152:Tutta Parigi era ai suoi piedi, coi mille pennacoli dei suoi edifici e l'orizzonte circolare delle sue molli colline, col fiume serpeggiante sotto i suoi ponti e il popolo, formicolante per le sue strade, con la nube dei suoi vapori, la catdna montuosa dei suoi tetti che rinserra Notre Dame tra le sue gambe accavallate. Ma di tutta quella città l'arcidiacono non guardava chs un punto: la piazza del Sagrato; di tutta quella folla, una figura: la zingara. ~ Victor Hugo, #NFDB
153:Non è che ci sarebbe voluto tutto questo tempo, ma il fatto è che quando hai sbancato i cassetti trovi una quantità di carte vecchie, scordate, alcune delle quali, quasi a forza, vogliono essere lette e tu, inevitabilmente, finisci col precipitare sempre più in fondo al gorgo della memoria e ti tornano in mente macari cose che per anni e anni hai fatto di tutto per scordare. E' un gioco tinto quello dei ricordi, nel quale finisci sempre per perdere. ~ Andrea Camilleri, #NFDB
154:The jukebox is a common symbol in country music; it’s only natural for such a self-reflexive rhetorical style to identify the material circumstances of its existence. Beneath the vulgarity of its vessel, the jukebox is inscrutably complex: a source of testimony, a proliferation of voices, a collection of sensations—all available for a price. The jukebox, like the songs within it, is a commodity suffused with a mess of meaning. ~ Anonymous, #NFDB
155:Perché piangono gli uomini? Per colpa delle lotte e delle gesta e della maratona delle promozioni, perché vogliono la mamma, perché restano ciechi anche col passar del tempo, per colpa di tutte le erezioni che debbono inventarsi sul più bello dal nulla, per colpa di tutto ciò che hanno fatto. Perché non possono più essere felici o tristi – solo sbronzi o pazzi. E perché non sanno che pesci pigliare quando sono svegli.
E poi c'è l'informazione, che arriva di notte. ~ Martin Amis,#NFDB
156:After Col. Henry Bouquet defeated the Ohio Indians at Bushy Run in 1763, he demanded the release of all white captives. Most of them, especially the children, had to be “bound hand and foot” and forcibly returned to white society. Meanwhile, the Native prisoners “went back to their defeated relations with great signs of joy,” in the words of the anthropologist Frederick Turner (in Beyond Geography, 245). Turner rightly calls these scenes “infamous and embarrassing. ~ James W Loewen, #NFDB
157:Per esempio: «Nucleo ardente della terra... Asse celeste... Stormo di pleiadi... Fecondazione dei fiori...». Queste magnifiche parole sembravano elevassero l’anima di Krikór sopra se stessa, avvicinandola alla causa prima di tutte le cose. Egli le gettava nell’aria e quelle rimanevano sospese sopra di lui. Con esse costruiva una vòlta di cupola d’uno scintillante mosaico di scienza, nel centro della quale egli stava seduto col sorriso interiore di un sacerdote buddista. ~ Franz Werfel, #NFDB
158:Quello fu per me un giorno memorabile perché da allora molte cose mutarono nella mia vita. Ma così accade a tutti gli esseri umani. Cercate col pensiero di eliminare un dato giorno speciale della vostra vita e pensate a come diverso potrebbe essere stato il suo corso! Fermati, tu che leggi, e medita per un momento sulla lunga catena di bronzo o d'oro, di spine o di fiori, che mai ti avrebbe soggiogato se in un solo memorabile giorno non si fosse formato e chiuso il primo anello. ~ Charles Dickens, #NFDB
159:Sono come te" ha detto. "Mi ricordo tutto."
Mi sono fermato un secondo. Se ti ricordi tutto, volevo dirgli, e se sei davvero me, allora domani prima di partire o quando sei pronto per chiudere la portiera del taxi e hai già salutato gli altri e non c'è più nulla da dire in questa vita, allora, una volta soltanto, girati verso di me, anche per scherzo, o perché ci hai ripensato, e, come avevi già fatto allora, guardami negli occhi, trattieni il mio sguardo, e chiamami col tuo nome. ~ Andr Aciman,#NFDB
160:prayer flows best from those who are in strong kingdom relationships—sharing deeply with one another, partnering together in kingdom activities, and relating to one another in humility, honor, and forgiveness in the grace of God. Paul admonishes us in Colossians to “put on tender mercies, kindness, humility, meekness, longsuffering; bearing with one another, and forgiving one another.” Then he adds, “But above all these things put on love, which is the bond of perfection” (Col. 3:12–14). ~ Mike Bickle, #NFDB
161:¿Cuáles son los valores que determinan tu horario? ¿Qué punto de vista sobre la vida determina cómo tomas decisiones? ¿Qué perspectiva sobre la naturaleza y el propósito de tu existencia forman tus prioridades diarias? ¿Cómo moldea tu pensamiento lo que haces y dices cada día? Pablo escribe: “Ya que han resucitado con Cristo, busquen las cosas de arriba, donde está Cristo sentado a la derecha de Dios. Concentren su atención en las cosas de arriba, no en las de la tierra” (Col 3:1-2). ~ Paul David Tripp, #NFDB
162:Toltosi il berretto, la salutò profondamente come una principessa e se n'andò col cuore oppresso; doveva lasciarla perire. Rimase a lungo turbato, non aveva voglia di parlare con nessuno. Per quanto poco si assomigliassero, quella fiera e povera israelita gli ricordava in certo modo Lidia, la figlia del cavaliere. Amare donne come quelle era fonte di dolore. Ma per qualche tempo gli parve di non aver mai amato altre che queste due, la povera, inquieta Lidia e l'ombrosa, amara israelita. ~ Hermann Hesse, #NFDB
163:Our hope doesn't rest on our finally getting it together. Our hope rests in Jesus. Jesus in us. It's Christ in us, the hope of glory. Paul says, “To them God has chosen to make known among the Gentiles the glorious riches of this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory” (Col 1:27). We won't be perfect on this side of heaven. But Jesus is perfect. Always. We are becoming more holy and true. Jesus already is. His name isn't “Becoming.” It is “I Am.” Perfection isn't the goal. Jesus is. ~ Stasi Eldredge, #NFDB
164:4:14) Holy One in your midst (Hos. 11:9) righteous Judge (2 Tim. 4:8) King of kings (1 Tim. 6:15) our life (Col. 3:4) light of life (John 8:12) Lord of lords (1 Tim. 6:15) Lord of the harvest (Matt. 9:38) mediator (1 Tim. 2:5) our peace (Eph. 2:14) Prince of Peace (Isa. 9:6) my Redeemer (Ps. 19:14) refuge and strength (Ps. 46:1) my salvation (Exod. 15:2) my help (Ps. 42:5) the Good Shepherd (John 10:11) Lord (Luke 2:29) my stronghold (Ps. 18:2) my support (2 Sam. 22:19) Good Teacher (Mark 10:17) ~ Henry T Blackaby, #NFDB
165:Ma ricordati, cuore e corpo ci vengono dati una volta sola. La maggior parte di noi non riesce a fare a meno di vivere come se avesse a disposizione due vite, la versione temporanea e quella definitiva, più tutte quelle che stanno in mezzo. Invece di vita ce n’è una sola, e prima che tu te ne accorga ti ritrovi col cuore esausto e arriva un momento in cui nessuno lo guarda più, il tuo corpo, e tantomeno vuole avvicinarglisi. Adesso soffri. Non invidio il dolore in sé. Ma te lo invidio, questo dolore.» ~ Andr Aciman, #NFDB
166:Some of the Scriptures you may want to include in your study are: Matt. 5:13–16; 9:35; 11:28–30; 16:15–19; 18:19–20; 22:36–40; 24:14; 25:34–40; 28:18–20; Mark 10:43–45; Luke 4:18–19; 4:43–45; John 4:23; 10:14–18; 13:34–35; 20:21; Acts 1:8; 2:41–47; 4:32–35; 5:42; 6:1–7; Rom. 12:1–8; 15:1–7; 1 Cor. 12:12–31; 2 Cor. 5:17–6:1; Gal. 5:13–15; 6:1–2; Eph. 1:22–23; 2:19–22; 3:6; 3:14–21; 4:11–16; 5:23–24; Col. 1:24–28; 3:15–16; 1 Thess. 1:3; 5:11; Heb. 10:24–25; 13:7, 17; 1 Peter 2:9–10; 1 John 1:5–7; 4:7–21. ~ Rick Warren, #NFDB
167:Estatico, cadde a sedere sul suo carico, davanti alla buca. Eccola, eccola là, eccola là, la Luna... C'era la Luna! La Luna!
E Ciàula si mise a piangere, senza saperlo, senza volerlo, dal gran conforto, dalla grande dolcezza che sentiva, nell'averla scoperta, là, mentr'ella saliva pel cielo, la Luna, col suo ampio velo di luce ignara dei monti, dei piani, delle valli che rischiarava, ignara di lui, che pure per lei non aveva più paura, né si sentiva più stanco, nella notte ora piena del suo stupore. ~ Luigi Pirandello,#NFDB
168:Christ is a pattern of holiness for us in His holy humility (Phil. 2:5-13), holy compassion (Mark 1:41), holy forgiveness (Col. 3:13), holy unselfishness (Rom. 15:3), holy indignation against sin (Matt. 23), and holy prayer (Heb. 5:7). Holiness that resembles God and is patterned after Christ saves us from hypocrisy and resorting to a "Sunday only" Christianity. It gives vitality, purpose, meaning, direction, and contentment to daily living. "The holy person is the only contented man in the world," Gurnall writes.49 ~ Joel R Beeke, #NFDB
169:Sono pochi, di questi tempi, i buoni libri" sospirò Monsignor Airoldi.
"Pochi? Non ce ne sono addirittura... Tutta roba che vuole sconvolgere il mondo, corrompere ogni virtù... Non c'è imbrattacarte, ormai, che non voglia dire la sua sull'organizzazione dello Stato, dell'amministrazione della giustizia, sui diritti dei re e su quelli dei popoli... Perciò io ammiro gente come voi, che se ne sta a cercare le cose del passato campando in santa pace col presente, senza il prurito di mettere sottosopra il mondo... ~ Leonardo Sciascia,#NFDB
170:Mentre sedevano vicini o mangiavano o camminavano, lui condivideva liberamente con lei i suoi pensieri e le sue idee sulla vita, la storia, l’arte. Le parlava di ogni cosa. Sapeva che lei non si interessava a quegli argomenti, però capiva e col tempo avrebbe imparato. Lui non l’amava soltanto per quello che era, ma per quello che poteva essere, e l’idea che potesse essere diversa non gli passava per la testa, oppure non gliene importava. Perché avrebbe dovuto pensarci? Quando ami qualcuno vedi il futuro come lo sogni. ~ James Salter, #NFDB
171:Zarek era stato forte per tutta la vita e voleva continuare a esserlo. Non l'avrebbe mai legata a sé. Non sarebbe stato giusto.
A volte una stella cade sulla terra.
Sentì le parole di Acheron in testa. Aveva ragione; a volte succedeva, ma col tempo quella stella si omologava alla banalità e alla sporcizia del mondo.
La sua era speciale.
Non avrebbe permesso che diventasse come le altre. Non avrebbe permesso che venisse infangata e perdesse la sua unicità.
No, il suo posto era nel cielo. Con la sua famiglia. ~ Sherrilyn Kenyon,#NFDB
172:¿Cuál es la responsabilidad del predicador? Primero, el predicador necesita percatarse de que la Palabra de Dios no es la palabra del predicador. Sino más bien, euaggelizo]). Es un mensajero, no el creador (eu,aggeli,zo [euaggelizo Es un sembrador, no la fuente (Mt 13.3, 19). Es un sembrador, no la fuente (Mt 13.3, 19). Es un heraldo, no la autoridad (khru,ssw [kerusso]). Es un mayordomo, no el propietario (Col 100.25). Es la guía, no el autor (Hch 8.31). Es el servidor de comida espiritual, no el cocinero Jn 21.15, 17). ~ John F MacArthur Jr, #NFDB
173:[On Du Bois] Celebrated Negro scholar and organizer. 70 years old, but looks 50. Dusky face, grizzled goatee, nice wrinkles, big ears — prodigiously like a White Russian General in mufti played sympathetically by Emil Jannings. Piebald hands. Brilliant talker, with an old-world touch. Très gentilhomme. Smokes special Turkish cigarettes. Charming and distinguished in other, more important, ways. Told me that when he went to England he was listed as “Colonel” on the Channel boat, because his name bore the addition “Col.” on his passport. ~ Vladimir Nabokov, #NFDB
174:The prayer of the Christian reaches beyond its set time and extends into the heart of his work. It includes the whole day, and in doing so, it does not hinder the work; it promotes it, affirms it, and lends it meaning and joy. Thus every word, every work, every labor of the Christian becomes a prayer; not in the unreal sense of a constant turning away from the task that must be done, but in a real breaking through the hard "it" to the gracious Thou. "Whatsoever ye do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus" (Col. 3: 17). ~ Dietrich Bonhoeffer, #NFDB
175:When one has looked upon Jesus, though he be of little stature like Zacchaeus of old (cf. Lk. 19:3), and climb up on the top of the sycamore tree by mortifying his members which are upon the earth (cf. Col. 3:5), and having risen above the body of humiliation, then he shall receive the Word, and it shall be said to him, This day has salvation come to this house (cf. Lk. 19:9). Then let him lay hold on the salvation, and bring forth fruit more perfectly, scattering and pouring forth rightly that which as a publican he wrongly gathered. ~ Gregory of Nazianzus, #NFDB
176:La poveretta pensava poi anche ch’egli poteva bene impedire che si facesse monaca; ma lì finiva la sua autorità sopra di lei, e la sua protezione. Partito che fosse, essa rimarrebbe sola col principe. E qualunque cosa avesse poi a patire in quella casa il buon prete non n’avrebbe saputo nulla, o sapendolo, con tutta la sua buona intenzione, non avrebbe potuto far altro che aver compassione di lei, quella compassione tranquilla e misurata che, in generale, s’accorda, come per cortesia,a chi abbia dato cagione o pretesto al male che gli fanno. ~ Alessandro Manzoni, #NFDB
177:For him who is perfect in love and has reached the summit of dispassion there is no difference between his own or another's, or between Christians and unbelievers, or between slave and free, or between male and female. But because he has risen above the tyranny of the passions and has fixed his attention on the single nature of man, he looks on all in the same way and shows the same disposition to all. For in him there is neither Greek nor Jew, male nor female, bond not free, but Christ who 'is all, and in all' (Col. 3:11; cf. Gal. 3:28). ~ Saint Maximus the Confessor, #NFDB
178:Beidleman knew they were on the eastern, Tibetan side of the Col and that the tents lay somewhere to the west. But to move in that direction it was necessary to walk directly upwind into the teeth of the storm. Wind-whipped granules of ice and snow struck the climbers’ faces with violent force, lacerating their eyes and making it impossible to see where they were going. “It was so difficult and painful,” Schoening explains, “that there was an inevitable tendency to bear off the wind, to keep angling away from it to the left, and that’s how we went wrong. ~ Jon Krakauer, #NFDB
179:Quando aveva tirato fuori l'acqua dal pozzo a molti usi si era guardato un momento nello specchio del secchio e si era trovato a posto, con quella benda nera sull'occhio destro che ormai serviva a ricordare più che a curare la ferita al sopracciglio buscata tre mesi fa ai combattimenti di Palermo; con quell'altro occhio azzurro che sembrava aver assunto l'incarico di esprimere la malizia anche di quello temporaneamente eclissato; col filetto scarlatto al di sopra della cravatta che discretamente alludeva alla camicia rossa che aveva portato. ~ Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa, #NFDB
180:Me?" said Bragg. "I'm not alive. Revived, from time to time - maybe. but not alive."
Liar."
Try me."
You forget, Mister Bragg - Stu honey - Stuart darling - Bragg baby. I already have."
They had almost reached their destination.
Col said: "I don't have burn marks for nothing, my dear. I don't have these scars by chance. I'm covered with your fingerprints. Covered from head to toe and back again on the other side."
You sound just like Minna," said Bragg.
I know," Col said. "I know I do. I've been practising. ~ Timothy Findley,#NFDB
181:Penso che siamo sempre alla caccia di qualcosa di nascosto o di solo potenziale o ipotetico, di cui seguiamo le tracce che affiorano sulla superficie del suolo. […] La parola collega la traccia visibile alla cosa invisibile, alla cosa assente, alla cosa desiderata o temuta, come un fragile ponte di fortuna gettato sul vuoto.
Per questo il giusto uso del linguaggio per me è quello che permette di avvicinarsi alle cose (presenti o assenti) con discrezione e attenzione e cautela, col rispetto ci ciò che le cose (presenti o assenti) comunicano senza parole. ~ Italo Calvino,#NFDB
182:Gran magistero della natura fu quello d'interrompere, per modo di dire, la vita col sonno. Questa interruzione è quasi una rinnovazione, e il risvegliarsi come un rinascimento. Infatti anche la giornata ha la sua gioventù. Oltre alla gran varietà che nasce da questi continui interrompimenti, che fanno di una vita sola come tante vite. E lo staccare una giornata dall'altra è un sommo rimedio contro la monotonia dell'esistenza. Né questa si poteva diversificare e variare maggiormente, che componendola in gran parte quasi del suo contrario, cioè di una specie di morte. ~ Giacomo Leopardi, #NFDB
183:If the divine Logos of God the Father became son of man and man so that He might make men gods and the sons of God, let us believe that we shall reach the realm where Christ Himself now is; for He is the head of the whole body (cf. Col. 1:18), and endued with our humanity has gone to the Father as forerunner on our behalf. God will stand 'in the midst of the congregation of gods' (Ps. 82:1 LXX) - that is, of those who are saved - distributing the rewards of that realm's blessedness to those found worthy to receive them, not separated from them by any space. ~ Saint Maximus the Confessor, #NFDB
184:Col·locades en fila, l'una darrera l'altra, les enciclopèdie d'avui, d'ahir i d'abans-d'ahir no l'altra representen imatges successives de mons paralitzats, gestos interromputs en el seu moviment, paraules a la recerca del seu últim o penúltim sentit. Les enciclopèdies són com diorames immutables, prodigiosos aparells de projecció les bobines dels quals s'han encallat i exhibeixen amb una mena de maníaca fixesa un paisatge que, condemnat d'aquesta manera a ser tan sols, per sempre més, allò que havia estat, s'anirà tornant a la vegada més vell, més caduc i més innecessari. ~ Jos Saramago, #NFDB
185:... the Lord Jesus said, 'To those who are in bonds, Come out, and to those who are in prison, Go forth' (Isa. 49:9); so your sins are forgiven. All, then, are forgiven, nor is there any one whom He has not loosed. For thus it is written, that He has forgiven 'all transgressions, doing away with the handwriting of the ordinance that was against us' (Col. 2:13-14). Why, then, do we hold the bonds of others, while we enjoy our own remission? He, who forgave all, required of all that what every one remembers to have been forgiven to himself, he also should forgive others. ~ Saint Ambrose of Milan, #NFDB
186:Funes discerneva continuamente il calmo progredire della corruzione, della carie, della fatica. Notava i progressi della morte, dell’umidità. Era il solitario e lucido spettatore d’un mondo multiforme, istantaneo e quasi intollerabilmente preciso. Babilonia, Londra e New York hanno offuscato col loro feroce splendore l’immaginazione degli uomini; nessuno, nelle loro torri popolose e nelle loro strade febbrili, ha mai sentito il calore e la pressione d’una realtà così intangibile come quella che giorno e notte convergeva sul felice Ireneo, nel suo povero sobborgo sudamericano. ~ Jorge Luis Borges, #NFDB
187:Beidleman knew they were on the eastern, Tibetan side of the Col and that the tents lay somewhere to the west. But to move in that direction it was necessary to walk directly upwind into the teeth of the storm. Wind-whipped granules of ice and snow struck the climbers’ faces with violent force, lacerating their eyes and making it impossible to see where they were going. “It was so difficult and painful,” Schoening explains, “that there was an inevitable tendency to bear off the wind, to keep angling away from it to the left, and that’s how we went wrong. “At times you couldn’t even see ~ Jon Krakauer, #NFDB
188:I saw a man walk into my camera viewfinder from the left. He took a pistol out of his holster and raised it. I had no idea he would shoot. It was common to hold a pistol to the head of prisoners during questioning. So I prepared to make that picture - the threat, the interrogation. But it didn't happen. The man just pulled a pistol out of his holster, raised it to the VC's head and shot him in the temple. I made a picture at the same time. (On his 1968 photograph of the summary street corner execution of prisoner Nguyen Van Lem by South Vietnam's police chief, Lt. Col. Nguyen Ngoc Loan.) ~ Eddie Adams, #NFDB
189:Quanto a me, che cosa credevo? Non temevo il mondo, e neppure lo disprezzavo. Ad Avalon avevo imparato una dottrina diversa: mi era stato insegnato a percepire lo spirito in ogni cosa e riconoscere che, nella maggior parte dei casi, il mondo procedeva nel proprio corso, interessandosi ben poco dell'umanità. Il corvo che gracchiava sul tetto non sapeva che l'uomo che lo ascoltava avrebbe interpretato il suo gracchiare come un segno: era l'uomo, dunque, che doveva attribuirgli un significato. Lo spirito pervadeva ogni cosa. Imparare a vivere in armonia col suo movimento era la Via della Saggezza. ~ Marion Zimmer Bradley, #NFDB
190:Se n'era andato, senza darmi il tempo di dirgli ciò che avevo capito solo ora: che lo perdonavo, che lei ci perdonava, che noi tutti dovevamo perdonare, se volevamo sopravvivere nel labirinto. Eravamo così tanti a dover vivere col rimpianto di aver fatto o non fatto certe cose, quella notte. Cose che non erano andate per il verso giusto, o che ci erano sembrate giuste in quel momento perché non potevamo prevedere il futuro. Se solo potessimo prevedere l'infinita catena di conseguenze derivanti da ogni nostro minimo gesto. E invece ce ne rendiamo conto soltanto quando rendersene conto non serve più a nulla. ~ John Green, #NFDB
191:Se ti fermi mi uccidi, se ti fermi mi uccidi, perché era anche il mio modo di chiudere il cerchio tra sogno e fantasia, tra me e lui, parole tanto agognate, dalla sua bocca alla mia e di nuovo alla sua, parole che passavano di bocca in bocca, e forse è stato allora che iniziai a pronunciare oscenità che lui ripeté dopo di me, prima con dolcezza, finché mi disse: «Chiamami col tuo nome e io ti chiamerò col mio», non l’avevo mai fatto prima e, non appena pronunciai il mio nome come se fosse il suo, mi ritrovai trasportato in una dimensione che non avevo mai condiviso con nessuno prima, né mai avrei condiviso dopo. ~ Andr Aciman, #NFDB
192:Là, nel suo schifoso, fetido sottosuolo, il nostro topo offeso, percosso e deriso si immerge subito in un rancore freddo, velenoso e, soprattutto, eterno. Per quarant’anni di fila ricorderà la sua onta fino agli ultimi, più vergognosi particolari, aggiungendoci ogni volta da parte sua dei particolari ancora più vergognosi, stuzzicandosi malignamente e irritandosi con la sua stessa fantasia. Sarà il primo a vergognarsi della sua fantasia, e tuttavia continuerà a ricordare, a rivangare, inventerà contro di sé un sacco di storie, col pretesto che anche quelle avrebbero potuto succedere, e non perdonerà nulla. ~ Fyodor Dostoyevsky, #NFDB
193:Mentre tornavo a casa a piedi col pesante manoscritto, ripensai a quella volta che il professor Kerry aveva cominciato una lezione scrivendo alla lavagna: "Chi scrive la storia?". Lì per lì mi era sembrata una domanda strana. L'idea che avevo degli storici non era umana: erano personaggi simili a mio padre, più profeti che uomini, le cui concezioni sul passato così come sul futuro non potevano essere messe in discussione né tantomeno ampliate. Adesso, mentre attraversavo il King's College all'ombra dell'enorme cappella, la mia vecchia diffidenza mi sembrò quasi buffa. Chi scrive la storia? Pensai. La scrivo io. ~ Tara Westover, #NFDB
194:In Memory Of Col. Charles Young
Along the shore the tall thin grass,
That fringes that dark river,
While sinuously soft feet pass
Beings to bleed and quiver.
The great dark voice breaks with a sob
Across the womb of night;
Above your grave, the tom-toms throb
And the hills are weird with light.
The great dark beast is like a well
Drained bitter by the sky,
And all the honeyed lies they tell
Come there to thirst and die.
No lie is strong enough to kill
The roots that work below,
From your rich dust and slaughtered will
A tree with tongues shall grow.
~ Countee Cullen,#NFDB
195:Il latino è una lingua precisa, essenziale. Verrà abbandonata non perché inadeguata alle nuove esigenze del progresso, ma perché gli uomini nuovi non saranno più adeguati ad essa. Quando inizierà l’era dei demagoghi, dei ciarlatani, una lingua come quella latina non potrà più servire e qualsiasi cafone potrà impunemente tenere un discorso pubblico e parlare in modo tale da non essere cacciato a calci giù dalla tribuna. E il segreto consisterà nel fatto che egli, sfruttando un frasario approssimativo, elusivo e di gradevole effetto “sonoro” potrà parlare per un’ora senza dire niente. Cosa impossibile col latino. ~ Giovannino Guareschi, #NFDB
196:Aveva trattato il rione, i familiari, i Solara, Stefano, ogni persona o cosa, con una precisione spietata. E che dire della libertà che s’era presa con me, con ciò che dicevo, con ciò che pensavo, con le persone che amavo, col mio stesso aspetto fisico. Aveva fissato momenti per lei decisivi senza preoccuparsi di niente e di nessuno. Ecco nitidisssimo il piacere che aveva provato quando a dieci anni aveva scritto quel suo raccontino, La fata blu. Ecco con altrettanto nitore quanto aveva sofferto perché la nostra maestra Oliviero non si era degnata di dire una sola parola su quel racconto, anzi, lo aveva ignorato. Ecco ~ Elena Ferrante, #NFDB
197:Hey, it’s Col. I’m standing in a soybean field outside of Gutshot, Tennessee, which is a long story, and it’s hot. K. I’m standing here sweating like I had hyperhidrosis, that disease where you sweat a lot. Crap. That’s not interesting. But anyway, it’s hot, and so I’m thinking about cold to stay cool. And I was remembering walking through the snow coming back from the ridiculous movie. Do you remember that, K? We were on Giddings, and the snow made it so quiet, I couldn’t hear a thing in the world but you. And it was so cold then, and so silent, and I loved you so much. Now it’s hot, and dead quiet again, and I love you still. ~ John Green, #NFDB
198:La morte è la madre della bellezza" disse Henry.
"E cos'è la bellezza?"
"Terrore."
"Ben detto!" esclamò Julian. "La bellezza è raramente dolce o consolatoria. Quasi l'opposto. La vera bellezza è sempre un po' inquietante."
Guardai Camilla, il suo volto risplendente al sole, e pensai a quel verso dell'"Iliade" che amo tanto, su Pallade Atene e i suoi terribili occhi sfavillanti.
"E se bellezza è terrore," proseguì Julian, "cos'è allora il desiderio? Riteniamo di avere molti desideri, ma di fatto ne abbiamo soltanto uno. Qual è?"
"Vivere" rispose Camilla.
"Vivere per sempre" aggiunse Bunny, col mento sul palmo della mano. ~ Donna Tartt,#NFDB
199:Feci per uscire, ma egli mi trattenne, chiamandomi col cognome:
– Zeitblom! – e anche questo richiamo fu duro. Quando mi volsi, disse:
– Ho trovato che non dev’essere.
– Che cosa, Adrian, non dev’essere?
– Ciò che è buono e nobile, – mi rispose – ciò che si dice umano, benché sia buono e nobile. Ciò per cui gli uomini hanno combattuto, per cui hanno dato l’assalto alle rocche, ciò che i vincitori hanno annunciato trionfanti, ecco, non deve essere. Viene ritirato. Io lo voglio ritirare.
– Scusa, caro, non ti comprendo del tutto. Che cosa vuoi ritirare?
– La Nona Sinfonia – rispose. E non disse altro, per quanto io stessi aspettando. ~ Thomas Mann,#NFDB
200:E in un processo logico, quindi estraneo ai richiami dell'ira o del dolore, mi identificavo con la ferocia del kamikaze in borghese: dirigevo la mia barca verso il comodo porto del cinismo. O della coerenza. Conosco la tua tesi. Sei un intellettuale, e un intellettuale non può permettersi le partigianerie della fede o della passione o della morale. Un intellettuale deve identificarsi con tutti, capire tutto e tutti. D'accordo. Ma chi capisce tutto e tutti finisce con l'assolvere tutto e tutti. Chi assolve tutto e tutti finisce col perdonare tutto e tutti. Chi perdona tutto e tutti non crede a nulla. E chi non crede a nulla, mia cara, è un cinico. Tout court. ~ Oriana Fallaci, #NFDB
201:Mi guardò, e io lo vidi. Vidi ogni cosa: il suo desiderio per gli uomini, il suo senso di colpa e la sua delusione, la sua rabbia. Vidi che per certi aspetti quella rabbia era la rabbia di una donna. Aveva come una donna il senso del tradimento. Credeva di essere stato spinto ingiustamente ai margini, di essere stato amato dalle persone sbagliate e per le ragioni sbagliate. Per un attimo ebbi paura di lui. Paura di mio figlio, lì in quel luogo selvaggio, lontano da ogni altro essere umano. Ci eravamo protetti col silenzio perché la sola alternativa era di azzannarci, di graffiarci e morderci e urlare. Ci vergognavamo troppo, noi due, per una rabbia normale. ~ Michael Cunningham, #NFDB
202:«Lei non è nata col camino, vero?» ha detto Pietro, porgendomi un bicchiere di vino apparso dal nulla.
«No, io... credo di no».
«Non è nata col camino, né col lume a petrolio, né col pozzo. Allora deve sapere che certe storie cambiano, a seconda del posto dove le ascolti. Se lei sente raccontare una favola da suo nonno a voce bassa, davanti al fuoco del camino, quando il nonno dice: "Ed ecco arriva il diavolo", ti sembra di vederlo che balla, tra i ceppi e le faville. E quando vai a letto a lume di candela, la storia viene sotto le lenzuola con te. Ma soprattutto, quando vai al pozzo di notte, da solo, a tirar su il secchio. Allora ogni storia diventa paurosa». ~ Stefano Benni,#NFDB
203:Comme elle l'observait pourtant ! Avec l'application, la méthode d'une femme qui avait dû se dire : « Ce visage va me consoler des minutes misérables qu'il faut vivre dans une voiture publique ; je supprime le monde autour de cette sombre figure angélique. Rien ne peut m'offenser : la contemplation délivre ; il est devant moi comme un pays inconnu ; ses paupières sont les bords ravagés d'une mer ; deux lacs confus sont assoupis aux lisières des cils. L'encre sur les doigts, le col et les manchettes gris, et ce bouton qui manque, cela n'est rien que la terre qui souille le fruit intact, soudain détaché de la branche, et que, d'une main précautionneuse, tu ramasses. » ~ Fran ois Mauriac, #NFDB
204:Addio", disse. "Addio", disse la volpe. "Ecco il mio segreto. È molto semplice: non si vede bene che col cuore. L'essenziale è invisibile agli occhi". "L'essenziale è invisibile agli occhi", ripeté il piccolo principe, per ricordarselo. "È il tempo che tu hai perduto per la tua rosa che ha fatto la tua rosa così importante". "È il tempo che ho perduto per la mia rosa..." sussurrò il piccolo principe per ricordarselo. "Gli uomini hanno dimenticato questa verità. Ma tu non la devi dimenticare. Tu diventi responsabile per sempre di quello che hai addomesticato. Tu sei responsabile della tua rosa..." "Io sono responsabile della mia rosa..." ripeté il piccolo principe per ricordarselo. ~ Anonymous, #NFDB
205:Professor Newcomer
Everyone laughed at Col. Prichard
For buying an engine so powerful
That it wrecked itself, and wrecked the grinder
He ran it with.
But here is a joke of cosmic size:
The urge of nature that made a man
Evolve from his brain a spiritual life -Oh miracle of the world! -The very same brain with which the ape and wolf
Get food and shelter and procreate themselves.
Nature has made man do this,
In a world where she gives him nothing to do
After all -- (though the strength of his soul goes round
In a futile waste of power.
To gear itself to the mills of the gods) -But get food and shelter and procreate himself!
~ Edgar Lee Masters,#NFDB
206:A teacher in Oklahoma reflected on the post-graduation aftermath of student social divisions. “The in crowd always hangs together, even after graduation. They are the ones who will become debutantes after their freshman year in college. The others tend to drift away. They don’t get invited to the parties, they are laughed at because they aren’t wearing designer clothes, etc.,” she said. But when it comes down to the popular students versus the outcasts, the latter “are more sure of themselves (even with the ridicule), and usually turn out to be more successful and well-adjusted. I would take the outcasts in a heartbeat.” So would I. ~ Alexandra Robbins, #NFDB
207:Tu stai bene?"
"Io sì".
"Ѐ vero che non mi ami più?"
"Sì".
"Perché? Perché ti ho mentito? Perché ti ho lasciata? Perché ti ho offesa?".
"No. Proprio quando mi sono sentita ingannata, abbandonata, umiliata, ti ho amato moltissimo, ti ho desiderato più che in qualsiasi altro momento della nostra vita insieme".
"E allora?".
"Non ti amo più perché, per giustificarti, hai detto che eri caduto nel vuoto, nel vuoto di senso, e non era vero".
"Lo era".
"No. Ora so cos'è un vuoto di senso e cosa succede se riesci a tornare in superficie. Tu no, non lo sai. Tu al massimo hai lanciato uno sguardo di sotto, ti sei spaventato e hai turato la falla col corpo di Carla". ~ Elena Ferrante,#NFDB
208:E le volte che mi mostravo in disaccordo prendeva un’aria distratta, o diceva col tono che evidentemente usava con gli studenti: sei cresciuta male, non conosci il valore della democrazia, dello stato, delle leggi, della mediazione tra interessi costituiti, degli equilibri tra nazioni: ti piace l’apocalisse. Ero sua moglie, una moglie colta, e si aspettava che gli prestassi molta attenzione quando mi parlava di politica, dei suoi studi, del nuovo libro a cui stava lavorando pieno d’ansie, logorandosi; ma l’attenzione doveva essere soltanto affettuosa, pareri non ne voleva, specialmente se gli mettevano dei dubbi. Era come se riflettesse ad alta voce, solo per fare il punto tra sé e sé. ~ Elena Ferrante, #NFDB
209:«La mia fantasia ricorrente è che alla Carta dei Diritti dell'Uomo venga aggiunta la voce: diritto all'immaginazione. Ormai mi sono convinta che la vera democrazia non può esistere senza la libertà di immaginazione e il diritto di usufruire liberamente delle opere di fantasia. Per vivere una vita vera, completa, bisogna avere la possibilità di dar forma ed espressione ai propri mondi privati, ai propri sogni, pensieri e desideri; bisogna che il tuo mondo privato possa sempre comunicare col mondo di tutti. Altrimenti, come facciamo a sapere che siamo esistiti? «I fatti concreti di cui parliamo non esistono, se non vengono ricreati e ripetuti attraverso le emozioni, i pensieri e le sensazioni». ~ Azar Nafisi, #NFDB
210:[...] Il professore lasciò la propria camera, armato di quel violino da tasca che si chiama pochette, per essere pronto ad ogni evento; salì lo scalone del palazzo, coi piedi in posizione accademica, come si addice a un maestro di ballo, bussò all'uscio dello studio, entrò, col corpo seminchinato, i gomiti inarcati, la bocca sorridente, e attese in terza posizione, dopo aver incrociato i piedi uno davanti all'altro, alla metà della loro lunghezza, con le caviglie riunite e le punte voltate verso l'esterno.
Chiunque altro, al posto del professore Tartelett, messo in quella specie di equilibrio instabile, avrebbe vacillato sulla sua base, lui invece seppe mantenere una perpendicolarità assoluta. ~ Jules Verne,#NFDB
211:Vi siete mai trovata, dopo una pioggia di autunno, a sbaragliare un esercito di formiche tracciando sbadatamente il nome del vostro ultimo ballerino sulla sabbia del viale? Qualcuna di quelle povere bestioline sarà rimasta attaccata alla ghiera del vostro ombrellino, torcendosi di spasimo; ma tutte le altre, dopo cinque minuti di panico e di viavai, saranno tornate ad aggrapparsi disperatamente al loro monticello bruno.
Voi non ci tornereste davvero, e nemmeno io; ma per poter comprendere siffatta caparbietà, che è per certi aspetti eroica, bisogna farci piccini anche noi, chiudere tutto l'orizzonte fra due zolle, e guardare col microscopio le piccole cause che fanno battere i piccoli cuori. ~ Giovanni Verga,#NFDB
212:è come costruire una stazione. Una cosa bella e di valore, che è stata importante anche per poco tempo, non sparisce nel nulla per un piccolo errore. Cominciamo col costruirla la stazione anche se non è perfetta. Se non ci fossero le stazioni, i treni non potrebbero fermarsi lì e non potremmo vedere le persone a cui vogliamo bene. Se poi si scoprono dei difetti, si può rimediare dopo. Prima di tutto costruisci la stazione. Una stazione speciale per lei, dove il treno desideri fermarsi, in cui trovare un rifugio, così, anche senza uno scopo preciso. Cerca di immaginarla nella tua mente, quella stazione, di darle concretamente forma e colore. Poi incidi il tuo nome sulla base, e soffiaci la vita. ~ Haruki Murakami, #NFDB
213:New Testament Words for Redemption Greek Words English Meanings References agorazō (verb) to purchase or buy in the marketplace 1 Cor. 6:20; 7:23; 2 Peter 2:1; Rev. 5:9; 14:3–4, etc. exagorazō (verb) to purchase from or buy from the marketplace Gal. 3:13; 4:5; Eph. 5:16; Col. 4:5 lytron (noun) a means of release, means of redeeming Matt. 20:28; Mark 10:45 lytroomai (verb) to ransom for release by paying the ransom price Luke 24:21; Titus 2:14; 1 Peter 1:18 lytrōsis (noun) the act of freeing after ransom has been paid Luke 1:68; 2:38; Heb. 9:12 apolytrōsis (noun) an act of setting free, deliverance, release Luke 21:28; Rom. 3:24; 8:23; 1 Cor. 1:30; Eph. 1:7, 14; 4:30; Col. 1:14; Heb. 9:15; 11:35 ~ Norman L Geisler, #NFDB
214:La capacità di misurare e suddividere il tempo ci offre una quasi inesauribile fonte di consolazione. [...]
"Purtroppo sono occupatissimo fino alla fine del mese", dice il dirigente, appoggiandosi voluttuosamente alla guancia il ricevitore del telefono, mentre sfoglia col pollice l'agenda, e in quel momento i suoi occhi e la sua bocca tradiscono un senso di profonda sicurezza. Le pagine nitide suddivise per giorni e fitte di annotazioni che gli stanno di fronte sono la prova che nulla d'imprevisto, nessuna calamità del caso o del fato possono sorprenderlo da quel momento alla fine del mese. Distruzione e pestilenza sono state tenute a vada, e la stessa morte dovrà aspettare: lui è occupatissimo. ~ Richard Yates,#NFDB
215:C'è un punto oltre il quale l'addestramento e la pratica non possono portare. Zeami, lo straordinario
drammaturgo e regista di teatro Noh del quattordicesimo secolo, che era anche sacerdote zen, ha parlato
di questo momento come di una “sorpresa”. È la sorpresa di scoprire di non aver più bisogno di un sé, la
sorpresa di ritrovarsi una cosa sola col proprio lavoro in un movimento pieno di fluida disciplina e grazia.
Allora si capisce che cosa vuol dire essere una palla d'argilla che gira sul tornio, un trucciolo bianco
sollevato dalla punta dello scalpello o una delle molte mani di Kannon, Bodhisattva della Compassione. A
questo punto è possibile essere liberi, nel lavoro e dal lavoro. ~ Gary Snyder,#NFDB
216:Io so perché sono un intellettuale, uno scrittore, che cerca di seguire tutto ciò che succede, di conoscere tutto ciò che se ne scrive, di immaginare tutto ciò che non si sa o che si tace; che coordina fatti anche lontani, che mette insieme i pezzi disorganizzati e frammentari di un intero coerente quadro politico, che ristabilisce la logica là dove sembrano regnare l'arbitrarietà, la follia e il mistero.
Tutto ciò fa parte del mio mestiere e dell'istinto del mio mestiere.
[...]
Il potere e il mondo che, pur non essendo del potere, tiene rapporti pratici col potere, ha escluso gli intellettuali liberi - proprio per il modo in cui è fatto - dalla possibilità di avere prove e indizi. ~ Pier Paolo Pasolini,#NFDB
217:«Sì, era una signora. Aveva le sue idee, sulle cose, idee molto diverse dalle mie, forse. Figliolo, ti ho detto che anche se tu non avessi perso la testa, quel giorno, ti avrei mandato ugualmente a casa sua. Volevo che tu imparassi una cosa: volevo che tu vedessi cosa è il vero coraggio, tu che credi che sia rappresentato da un uomo col fucile in mano. Aver coraggio significa sapere di essere sconfitti prima di cominciare, e cominciare ugualmente e arrivare sino in fondo, qualsiasi cosa succeda. È raro vincere in questi casi, ma qualche volta succede. La signora Dubose ha vinto. È morta come voleva morire, senza essere schiava né degli uomini né delle cose. Era la persona più coraggiosa che io abbia conosciuto.» ~ Harper Lee, #NFDB
218:Even though the gospel is a set of truths to understand and believe, it cannot remain a set of beliefs if it is truly believed and understood. As Lesslie Newbigin states, “The Christian story provides us with such a set of lenses, not something for us to look at, but for us to look through.”2 Paul says as much in Romans 12:1, when he looks back on his rich exposition of the doctrine of justification in chapters 1–11 and states, “Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices.” Scripture teaches that the gospel creates an entire way of life and affects literally everything about us. It is a power (Rom 1:16–17) that creates new life in us (Col 1:5–6; 1 Pet 1:23–25). ~ Timothy J Keller, #NFDB
219:Ultimately, we have to know the heart of the Father based on what we see in the Son, not by shadowy Old Testament passages that, on the surface, seem to show us a different version. Only Christ is the “exact representation” of His Father’s nature and the “visible image of the invisible God” (Col. 1:15, NLT). We have, what Paul calls “a better word than the blood of Abel” (Heb. 12:24). You will fry your brain trying to patch up the apparent inconsistencies between God’s two résumés in the Old and New Testaments. So theologize all you want … at the end of the day, I would recommend you just give up and look at Jesus. All of the Father’s loving plan for humanity is wrapped up in Him – the Author and Finisher of our faith. ~ John Crowder, #NFDB
220:The choicest believers, who are assuredly freed from the condemning power of sin, ought yet to make it their business all their days to mortify the indwelling power of sin. So the apostle, "Mortify therefore your members which are upon the earth" (Col 3:5). To whom does he speak? Such as were "risen with Christ" (v. 1); such as we're dead with him (v. 3); such as whose life Christ was and who should "appear with him in glory" (v. 4). Do you mortify; do you make it your daily work; be always at it whilst you live; cease not a day from this work; be killing sin or it will be killing you. Your being dead with Christ virtually, your being quickened with him, will not excuse you from this work." (Overcoming Sin and Temptation, 50) ~ John Owen, #NFDB
221:Ci siamo trovati tutti coinvolti in una discussione sul genere di software che progetterebbero i cani, se potessero farlo. Secondo Marty, si tratterebbe di programmi per delimitare il territorio, con simulatori di pipì e interfacce lappabili. Antonella ha tirato fuori l'idea di un OssoFinder. Ad Harold è venuta in mente una cuccia fatta col CAD, tutto altamente cartone animato/sensoriale, con un sacco di elementi visuali.
Poi naturalmente è saltata fuori la questione felina del catware. Antonella ha suggerito un programma di segreteria personale in grado di dire al mondo: "No, non voglio essere coccolato. E per favore, controlla tutte le telefonate prima di passarmele". Io ho suggerito un programma che dorme tutto il tempo ~ Douglas Coupland,#NFDB
222:Il Reich tedesco deve racchiudere tutti i Tedeschi, col compito di estrarre e conservare da questo popolo i più preziosi fra gli elementi originari di razza e condurli ad una posizione di dominio. Lo stato nazionale deve mettere la razza al centro della vita generale, preoccuparsi di conservarla pura. Deve fare in modo che solo chi è sano generi figli, che sia scandaloso il mettere al mondo bambini quando si è malati o difettosi, e che nel rinunziare a ciò consista il supremo onore. Deve apparire come il preservatore di un millenario avvenire, di fronte al quale il desiderio e l'egoismo dei singoli non contano nulla. Chi non è sano e degno di corpo e spirito, non ha diritto di perpetuare le sue sofferenze nel corpo del suo bambino ~ Adolf Hitler, #NFDB
223:EMILY SPARKS
Dov'è il mio bambino, il mio bambino -
in quale remota parte del mondo?
il bambino che a scuola amavo più di tutti?-
Io, la maestra, la vecchia zitella, il vergine cuore,
che li sentivo tutti miei figli.
M'ingannai col mio bambino
a giudicarlo uno spirito ardente,
attivo, mai pago?
Oh bambino, bambino, per cui pregai e pregai
in tante ore di veglia la notte,
ricordi la lettera che ti scrissi
sulla bellezza dell'amore di Cristo?
E che tu che l'abbia ricevuta o no,
bambino mio, dovunque tu sia,
opera per la salvezza dell'anima tua,
che tutto il fango, tutta la feccia in te,
ceda finalmente al fuoco che è in te,
finché il fuoco sia solo luce!...
Solo luce! ~ Edgar Lee Masters,#NFDB
224:E poi in taxi, col tassista che si era messo a tacere e chissà a cosa pensava, con intorno una città sconosciuta, e una solitudine che si poteva sentire il rumore, che poi era assenza di rumore, che faceva male ma faceva anche piacere, e, sotto, la sensazione di sentirsi grande, a cinquant'anni, che eri lì, solo, spaesato, in una città grande, che non conoscevi, che c'eri stato in tutto quaranta volte nella tua vita e non c'eri mai entrato in confidenza, e ormai non ci saresti entrato in confidenza mai più, quai momenti lì che ti eri messo nelle mani di un tassista innamorato, che avrebbe potuto fare di te quel che voleva, portarti dove voleva, farti pagare quanto voleva, quei momenti lì eran momenti che sembrava che il mondo levitasse ~ Paolo Nori, #NFDB
225:There is Normal Society and then there is the Abnormal Freaks Who Deserve Our Public Pity and Private Ridicule Society. The first is the world of good jobs and Christmas shopping and marriages and vacations and the scent of new cars. And then there is that other world, the world of the glazed eye, of people who chant at the moon and spout conspiracy theories and get sexually aroused by furry animal costumes. Some dress all in black to carry out vampire rituals and others col ect cats until they’re a furry shoulder-to-shoulder flood on every floor of the house. The Abnormal travel among the Normal and leave behind them a trail of sickeningly awkward conversations and stifled laughter, of hidden smirks and rolled eyes. And worst of all, pity. ~ David Wong, #NFDB
226:[ … ]
Qui l’autore avrebbe voluto porre una pagina di puntini.
− Sarebbe sgraziato −, disse l’editore, − e per uno scritto così frivolo mancar di grazia è la morte.
− La politica – obbietta l’autore – è una pietra attaccata al collo della letteratura, che, in mezzo agli interessi dell’immaginazione è come un colpo di pistola in mezzo a un concerto. È un rumore straziante, senza essere energico. Non s’accorda col suono di nessun istrumento. Questa politica offenderà a morte una metà dei lettori, e annoierà l’altra metà che ne ha trovata di ben più speciale ed energica nel giornale del mattino.
− Se i nostri personaggi non parlano di politica, non sono i Francesi del 1830 e il vostro libro non è più uno specchio, secondo la vostra pretesa… ~ Stendhal,#NFDB
227:E' come costruire una stazione. Una cosa bella e di valore, che è stata importante anche per poco tempo, non svanisce nel nulla per un piccolo errore. Cominciamo col costruirla la stazione, anche se non è perfetta. Se non ci fossero le stazioni, i treni non potrebbero fermarsi lì e non potremmo incontrare le persone a cui vogliamo bene. Se poi si scoprono dei difetti, si può sempre rimediare dopo. Prima di tutto costruisci la stazione. Una stazione speciale per lei, dove il treno desideri fermarsi, in cui trovare un rifugio, così, anche senza uno scopo preciso. Cerca di immaginarla nella tua mente, quella stazione, di darle concretamente forma e colore. Poi incidi con un chiodo il tuo nome sulla base, e soffiaci la vita. Questa forza ce l'hai. ~ Haruki Murakami, #NFDB
228:Quanti visir e ricconi ci sono al mondo, che possano esporre la loro gioia o i loro affanni, il loro diletto o il loro passatempo in un posto come questo? Pochi, molto pochi. E quanti di noi, nel corso dei secoli e di generazione in generazione, se ne sono stati seduti qui in attesa dell'aurora o della preghiera serale oppure durante le ore notturne, quando, con un moto impercettibile, tutta la volta stellata si sposta al di sopra delle nostre teste! Molti e molti di noi sono stati seduti qui, col capo poggiato sul gomito, o adagiati sulla liscia pietra squadrata e, dinanzi all'eterno giuoco delle luci sulle montagne e delle nuvole in cielo, hanno dipanato le fila, sempre le stesse e sempre imbrogliate in maniera diversa, dei destini della nostra città. ~ Ivo Andri, #NFDB
229:Scrivere non c'entra niente col fare soldi, diventare famoso, crearsi occasioni galanti, agganciare una scopata o stringere amicizie. Alla fine è sopratutto un modo per arricchire la vita di coloro che leggeranno i tuoi lavori e arricchire al contempo la propria. Scrivere è tirarsi su, mettersi a posto e stare bene. Darsi felicità, va bene? Darsi felicità. Parte di questo libro, forse una parte eccessiva, ha raccontato come ho imparato il mestiere. Molta parte l'ho dedicata a come voi potete farlo meglio. Il resto, forse la parte migliore, è un incitamento: potete, dovreste, e se siete abbastanza coraggiosi da cominciare, scriverete. Scrivere è magia, è acqua della vita come qualsiasi altra attività creativa. L'acqua è gratuita. Dunque bevete. Bevete e dissetatevi ~ Stephen King, #NFDB
230:Lorsque cinq semaines plus tard ces hommes quittèrent Moscou, ils ne formaient plus une armée; c'était une foule de maraudeurs, chacun portait sur lui ou transportait en voiture quantité d'objets qui lui sembaient précieux ou nécessaires. Leur but à tous en quittant Moscou n'était pas de conquérir, comme autrefois, mais de garder ce qu'ils avaient pris. Comme un singe qui, ayant introduit sa main dans l'étroit col d'une cruche et saisi une poignée de noix, se refuse à ouvrir son poing pour ne pas lâcher ce qu'il a saisi, et par là périt, ainsi les Français devaient périr parce qu'ils traînaient avec eux leur butin, et qu'abandonner ce butin leur était aussi impossible qu'au singe de lâcher la poignée de noix. (Guerre et Paix, livre troisième, 3ième partie, ch. XXVI) ~ Leo Tolstoy, #NFDB
231:Amo tutto ciò che scorre, tutto ciò che ha in sé tempo e divenire, che ci riporta al principio dove non c’è mai fine: la violenza dei profeti, l’oscenità che è estasi, la saggezza del fanatico, il prete con la sua gommosa litania, le parole sozze della puttana, lo sputo portato via nella fogna, il latte della mammella e l’amaro miele che si riversa dall’utero, tutto ciò che è fluido, fuso, dissoluto e dissolvente, tutto il pus e il sudiciume che scorrendo si purifica, che perde il suo senso originario, che fa il grande circuito verso la morte e la dissoluzione. Il grande desiderio incestuoso è scorrere all’unisono col tempo, fondere la grande immagine dell’aldilà con quella dell’hic et nunc. Un desiderio fatuo, suicida, reso stitico dalle parole e paralizzato dal pensiero. ~ Henry Miller, #NFDB
232:EPILOGO
Detto da PROSPERO.
Ora i miei incantesimi si sono tutti spenti,
la forza che possiedo è solo mia, ed è poca.
Ora sta a voi tenermi qui confinato o mandarmi a Napoli.
Poiché ho riavuto il Ducato e perdonato il traditore,
Non fatemi rimanere col vostro potere in quest'isola nuda,
ma scioglietemi da ogni legame con mani generose.
Il vostro fiato gentile colmi le mie vele
altrimenti fallisce Il mio progetto che era di dar piacere.
Ora mi mancano spiriti da comandare,
arte per incantare,
e la mia fine è la disperazione,
a meno che non sia salvato dalla preghiera
Che va tanto a fondo da vincere la pietà e liberare dal peccato.
Come voi per ogni colpa implorate il perdono,
Così la vostra indulgenza metta me in libertà. ~ William Shakespeare,#NFDB
233:In Ephesians 3:14 – 21, Paul prays that the Spirit will strengthen his readers with power in their inner being. For what? “So that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith” and so we may know the love of Christ “that surpasses knowledge — that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.” But elsewhere Paul states that Christians already have Christ dwelling in them (Eph 2:22) and already have come to fullness in him (Col 2:9 – 10). Taken together, these passages must mean that while these things are objectively true of Christians, the Spirit can make the love of God so spiritually real and affecting that it changes how we live. He wants us not just to know the fact of Christ’s love but to have power to grasp the infinity and wonder of it (Eph 3:18 – 19). ~ Timothy J Keller, #NFDB
234:Ernestina aveva esattamente il viso che andava bene per quell'epoca, cioè ovale, col mento piccolo, delicato come una violetta. Potete ancora vederlo nei disegni dei grandi illustratori di allora, nell'opera di Phiz o di John Leech. Il grigio degli occhi e il pallore della pelle non facevano che accentuare la delicatezza del resto. A un primo incontro sapeva abbassare gli occhi con molta grazia, quasi avesse temuto di svenire se un uomo le avesse rivolto la parola. Ma c'era una minuscola inclinazione all'angolo delle palpebre, cui ne corrispondeva un'altra all'angolo delle labbra - per conservare la stessa similitudine. lieve come la fragranza delle violette di febbraio - che smentiva, sottilissimamente ma inconfondibilmente, la sua apparente obbedienza totale al grande dio Maschio. ~ John Fowles, #NFDB
235:Ehi!” sbotta lui. “Non puoi continuare a darmi il tormento solo perché non sapevo cosa fosse una diga dentale! Neanche tu lo sapevi.” “Mi hai detto che secondo te era una specie di filo interdentale sexy che la gente usava per scene di bondage nel sadomaso! Per un anno intero, dopo quella spiegazione, non sono riuscito a essere serio col dottor Kao perché me lo immaginavo sempre come una specie di eccentrico Dominatore.” E non mi aveva per niente aiutato il fatto che l’uomo in questione avesse almeno quattrocento anni e mi avesse estratto i denti del giudizio subito dopo; ero assolutamente certo di aver partecipato a qualche scena innominabile mentre dormivo sotto anestesia. “Forse lo è sul serio,” dice Otter con aria speculativa. “Ce lo vedrei bene vestito tutto di pelle.” Lo fissiamo sconcertati. ~ T J Klune, #NFDB
236:The infamous South Col awaited me over the top.
I longed to see this place I had heard and read so much about. The highest camp in the world at twenty-six thousand feet--deep in Everest’s Death Zone.
I had always winced at the term Death Zone. Mountaineers are renowned for playing things down, yet mountaineers had coined the phrase--I didn’t like that.
I put the thought aside, pulled the last few steps over the spur, and the gradient eased. I turned around and swore that I could see halfway around the world.
A think blanket of cloud was moving in beneath me, obscuring the lower faces of the mountain. But above these, I could see a vast horizon of dark blue panned out before me.
Adrenaline filled my tired limbs, and I started to move once more.
I knew I was entering another world. ~ Bear Grylls,#NFDB
237:Di mafia non si parlava mai allora, tutti sapevano che esisteva una forza maligna capace di imporre la sua volontà col coltello e col fucile. Ma chi stringesse quel coltello e chi imbracciasse quel fucile era difficile dirlo. D'altronde, per chi lo sapeva, era meglio fare finta di non averlo mai saputo. I maggiorenti del paese, signori che giravano per i marciapiedi in giacca di pigiama col cappello a larghe falde in testa, negavano che esistesse questa mafia. E quando pronunciavano la parola, piegavano le labbra in giù, come per sputare. Portavano le mani all'aria e dicevano ridacchiando: favole sunnu… roba per turisti… E con questo il paese si richiudeva nella sua vita quotidiana, fatta di soprusi, di sofferenze, di torti subiti in silenzio, di cose taciute e mai dette, come fosse il più felice dei paesi. ~ Dacia Maraini, #NFDB
238:Shadows in the Jungle, by Larry Alexander; Bataan Death March, by Lt. Col. William E. Dyess; American Guerrilla: The Forgotten Heroics of Russell W. Volckmann, by Mike Guardia; Lapham’s Raiders, by Robert Lapham and Bernard Norling; Some Survived, by Manny Lawton; Escape from Davao, by John D. Lukacs; Lieutenant Ramsey’s War, by Edwin Price Ramsey and Stephen J. Rivele; My Hitch in Hell, by Lester I. Tenney; Escape from Corregidor, by Edgar D. Whitcomb. Tears in the Darkness, by Michael Norman and Elizabeth M. Norman, is a thorough and engaging history of the Bataan Death March as seen from both American and Japanese perspectives. The Doomed Horse Soldiers of Bataan, by Raymond G. Woolfe, Jr., is a compelling account of the famous Twenty-Sixth Cavalry and its final charge. I highly recommend both books. What’s next on ~ John Grisham, #NFDB
239:Sia detto alla sfuggita, il successo è una cosa piuttosto lurida; la sua falsa somiglianza col merito inganna gli uomini. Per la folla, la riuscita ha quasi lo stesso profilo della supremazia. Il successo, sosia della capacità, sa ingannare per bene la storia; solo Giovenale e Tacito gli mormorano contro. Oggidì, una filosofia quasi ufficiale addomesticatasi col successo ne porta la livrea e serve nella sua anticamera. Se riuscite, è teoria; la prosperità suppone la capacità. Se guadagnate al lotto, eccovi diventato un uomo abile. Chi trionfa è venerato; tutto sta nel nascere colla camicia, ma se avete fortuna, avrete il resto. Siete fortunati e vi si crederà grandi. All'infuori delle cinque o sei immense eccezioni che formano lo splendore d'un secolo, l'ammirazione dei contemporanei è soltanto miopia; la doratura è oro. ~ Victor Hugo, #NFDB
240:There were more than fifty people camped on the Col that night, huddled in shelters pitched side by side, yet an odd feeling of isolation hung in the air. The roar of the wind made it impossible to communicate from one tent to the next. In this godforsaken place, I felt disconnected from the climbers around me—emotionally, spiritually, physically—to a degree I hadn’t experienced on any previous expedition. We were a team in name only, I’d sadly come to realize. Although in a few hours we would leave camp as a group, we would ascend as individuals, linked to one another by neither rope nor any deep sense of loyalty. Each client was in it for himself or herself, pretty much. And I was no different: I sincerely hoped Doug got to the top, for instance, yet I would do everything in my power to keep pushing on if he turned around. In ~ Jon Krakauer, #NFDB
241:Deploying LOGCAP or other contractors instead of military personnel can alleviate the political and social pressures that have come to be a fact of life in the U.S. whenever military forces are deployed,” wrote Lt. Col. Steven Woods in his Army War College study about the effects of LOGCAP. “While there has been little to no public reaction to the deaths of five DynCorp employees killed in Latin America or the two American support contractors from Tapestry Solutions attacked (and one killed) in Kuwait … U.S. forces had to be withdrawn from Somalia after public outcry following the deaths of U.S. soldiers in Mogadishu.… “Additionally, military force structure often has a force cap, usually for political reasons. Force caps impose a ceiling on the number of soldiers that can be deployed into a defined area. Contractors expand this limit. ~ Rachel Maddow, #NFDB
242:Credetti di capire che, tra la Fotografia, la Follia e qualcosa di cui non sapevo bene il nome, ci fosse una sorta di legame (di nodo). Cominciai col dare un nome a quel qualcosa: la pena d'amore. [...] Tuttavia, non era ancora questo. Era un'ondata più grande del sentimento amoroso. Nell'amore fatto nascere dalla Fotografia (da certe fotografie), un'altra musica dal nome stranamente demodé si faceva udire: la Pietà. Raccoglievo in un ultimo pensiero le immagini che mi avevano «ferito». [...] Attraverso ognuna di quelle immagini, infallibilmente, io andavo oltre l'irrealtà della cosa raffigurata, entravo follemente nello spettacolo, nell'immagine, cingendo con le mie braccia ciò che è morto, ciò che sta per morire, proprio come Nietzsche quando, il 3 gennaio 1889, si gettò piangendo al collo di un cavallo martoriato: impazzito per la Pietà. ~ Roland Barthes, #NFDB
243:«Non ti rendi conto, vero? Si tratta di convivere con questo problema, o con l’eventualità che possa manifestarsi, ogni giorno. Pensi sul serio che uno come te possa riuscirci?»«Non lo so.» Darian scrollò le spalle. «Magari non ha niente a che fare col conviverci o non conviverci. Magari ha a che fare col volere stare con una persona.»
«Sei così maledettamente ingenuo.» Darian si alzò in piedi. Era più alto di Niall e cupo in volto. «Non credo di esserlo. Credo che tu ne sei convinto solo perché non la penso come te.» Fece una pausa. «Ecco cosa penso.» Non ce la facevo più. Ero circondato da un turbinio di voci che parlando di me, ma non a me.
«Non puoi aiutarlo, Darian. Non puoi farlo stare meglio.»
«Non ho detto che lo avrei fatto.»
«Non puoi neanche farlo felice.»
Darian si strinse nelle spalle. «Credo di avere il diritto di provare.» ~ Alexis Hall,#NFDB
244:Stanley Woodworth, my high school French teacher, once described the peculiar passion for his own vocation in the following terms: “The joy of teaching lies not in one’s own enthusiasm for the students, or even for the subject matter, but rather for the privilege of introducing the one to the other.” If this is true of French, chemistry, or history, how much more is it true of the pastor’s passion, which is not simply love of God or love of people, but rather the love of introducing the one (people) to the other (God)? The pastor’s special charge is to care for the people of God by speaking and showing and by being and doing God’s truth and love. Success in ministry is determined not by numbers (e.g., people, programs, dollars) but by the increase of people’s knowledge and love of God. This is the only way “to present everyone mature in Christ” (Col. 1:28). ~ Kevin J Vanhoozer, #NFDB
245:The South Col is a vast, rocky area, maybe the size of four football pitches, strewn with the remnants of old expeditions.
It was here in 1996, in the fury of the storm, that men and women had struggled for their lives to find their tents. Few had managed it. Their bodies still lay here, as cold as marble, many now partially buried beneath snow and ice.
It was a somber place: a grave that their families could never visit.
There was an eeriness to it all--a place of utter isolation; a place unvisited by all but those strong enough to reach it. Helicopters can barely land at base camp, let alone up here.
No amount of money can put a man up here. Only a man’s spirit can do that.
I liked that.
The wind now blew in strong gusts over the lip of the col and ruffled the torn material of the wrecked tents.
It felt as if the mountain were daring me to proceed. ~ Bear Grylls,#NFDB
246:Dunque, pare che alle anime viventi possano toccare due sorti: c'è chi nasce ape, e chi nasce rosa...
Che fa lo sciame delle api, con la sua regina? Va, e ruba a tutte le rose un poco di miele, per portarselo nell'arnia, nelle sue stanzette. E la rosa? La rosa l'ha in se stessa, il proprio miele: miele di rose, il più adorato, il più prezioso! La cosa più dolce che innamora essa l'ha già in se stessa: non le serve cercarla altrove. Ma qualche volta sospirano di solitudine, le rose, questi esseri divini! Le rose ignoranti non capiscono i propri misteri.
La prima di tutte le rose è Dio.
Fra le due: la rosa e l'ape, secondo me, la più fortunata è l'ape. E l'Ape Regina, poi, ha una fortuna sovrana! Io, per esempio, sono nato Ape Regina. E tu, Wilhelm? Secondo me, tu, Wilhelm mio, sei nato col destino più dolce e col destino più amaro:
tu sei l'ape e sei la rosa. ~ Elsa Morante,#NFDB
247:These three or four scriptures also have been great refreshments in this condition to me: John xiv. 1-4; John xvi. 33; Col. iii. 3, 4; Heb. xii. 22-24. So that sometimes when I have been in the savour of them, I have been able to laugh at destruction, and to fear neither the horse nor his rider. I have had sweet sights of the forgiveness of my sins in this place, and of my being with Jesus in another world: Oh! the mount Sion, the heavenly Jerusalem, the innumerable company of angels, and God the Judge of all, and the spirits of just men made perfect, and Jesus, have been sweet unto me in this place: I have seen that here, that I am persuaded I shall never, while in this world, be able to express: I have seen a truth in this scripture, Whom having not seen, ye love; in whom, though now you see Him not, yet believing, ye rejoice with joy unspeakable, and full of glory. 1 Pet. i. 8. ~ John Bunyan, #NFDB
248:You have heard of the old woman who lay dying. Her rector heard of it and called upon her. "They tell me," he said, "that you are dying." "Yes," she replied. "And have you made your peace with God?" "No," came the answer. "And are you not afraid to meet God without making your peace with Him?" "Not at all," was the answer and startled the minister. The minister grew earnest. "Woman, do you realize that you have but a short time to live and that you must soon meet a holy God?" "Yes, I realize it perfectly." "And you are not afraid?" "Not at all." "And you have not made your peace with God?" "No." "What do you mean?" cried the astonished rector. A smile passed over the features of the dying woman. "I have not made my peace with God because I do not need to. Christ made peace more than eighteen hundred years ago by the blood of His cross (Col. 1: 20), and I am simply resting in the peace he made. ~ R A Torrey, #NFDB
249:Non importa dove si trova, com’è fatta: purché sia una cucina, un posto dove si fa da mangiare, io sto bene.
Se possibile le preferisco funzionali e vissute.
Magari con tantissimi strofinacci asciutti e puliti e le piastrelle bianche che scintillano. Anche le cucine incredibilmente sporche mi piacciono da morire.
Mi piacciono col pavimento disseminato di pezzettini di verdura, così sporche che suola delle pantofole diventa subito nera, e grandi, di una grandezza esagerata.
Con un frigo enorme pieno di provviste che basterebbero tranquillamente per un intero inverno, un frigo imponente, al cui grande sportello metallico potermi appoggiare. E se per caso alzo gli occhi dal fornello schizzato di grasso o dai coltelli un po’ arrugginiti, fuori le stelle che splendono tristi.
Siamo rimaste solo io e la cucina. Mi sembra un po’ meglio che pensare che sono rimasta proprio sola. ~ Banana Yoshimoto,#NFDB
250:the priests and the Levites and the Nethinim and the children of Solomon’s servants. 4. And certain of the children of Judah and of the children of Benjamin lived in Jerusalem. Of the children of Judah were: Athaiah the son of Uzziah, the son of Zechariah, the son of Amariah, the son of Shephatiah, the son of Mahalaleel. Of the children of Perez were: 5. and Maaseiah the son of Baruch, the son of Col-hozeh, the son of Hazaiah, the son of Adaiah, the son of Joiarib, the son of Zechariah, the son of Shiloni. 6. All the sons of Perez who lived in Jerusalem were four hundred sixty-eight valiant men. 7. And these are the sons of Benjamin: Sallu the son of Meshullam, the son of Joed, the son of Pedaiah, the son of Kolaiah, the son of Maaseiah, the son of Ithiel, the son of Jesaiah. 8. And after him Gabbai, Sallai, nine hundred twenty-eight. 9. And Joel the son of Zichri was their overseer, and Judah the son of ~ Anonymous, #NFDB
251:Così il piccolo principe addomesticò la volpe. E quando l'ora della partenza fu vicina:
« Ah! » disse la volpe, « piangerò.»
« La colpa è tua », disse il piccolo principe,
« io non ti volevo far del male, ma tu hai voluto che ti addomesticassi...»
« E' vero », disse la volpe.
« Ma piangerai! » disse il piccolo principe.
« E' certo », disse la volpe.
« Ma allora che ci guadagni? »
« Ci guadagno », disse la volpe, « il colore del grano. »
«Da te, gli uomini», disse il piccolo principe,
«coltivano cinquemila rose
nello stesso giardino...
e non trovano quello
che cercano...»
«Non lo trovano», ripetei.
«E tuttavia quello che cercano potrebbe essere
trovato in una sola rosa o in un po' d'acqua...»
«Certo», confermai.
E il piccolo principe soggiunse:
«Ma gli occhi sono ciechi. Bisogna cercare col cuore.» ~ Antoine de Saint Exup ry,#NFDB
252:Vorrei, per essere proprio tranquillo, che tu non ti spaventassi o ti turbassi troppo qualunque condanna siano per darmi. Che tu comprendessi bene, anche col sentimento, che io sono un detenuto politico e sarò un condannato politico, che non ho e non avrò mai da vergognarmi di questa situazione. Che, in fondo, la detenzione e la condanna le ho volute io stesso, in certo modo, perché non ho mai voluto mutare le mie opinioni, per le quali sarei disposto a dare la vita e non solo a stare in prigione. Che perciò io non posso che essere tranquillo e contento di me stesso. Cara mamma, vorrei proprio abbracciarti stretta stretta perché sentissi quanto ti voglio bene e come vorrei consolarti di questo dispiacere che ti ho dato ma non potevo fare diversamente. La vita è così, molto dura, e i figli qualche volta devono dare dei grandi dolori alle loro mamme, se vogliono conservare il loro onore e la loro dignità di uomini ~ Antonio Gramsci, #NFDB
253:Io pensavo che i fumatori potrebbero dividersi in due categorie, quelli che fanno attenzione al destino della loro cenere e quelli che non ci badano per niente. I secondi di solito hanno il vizio di gesticolare. I primi tendono a rovinarsi la vita preoccupandosi troppo delle emozioni altrui, e delle conseguenze delle proprie azioni. Conoscevo bene questa categoria di persone: non solo danno ragione a tutti, ma se litigano con qualcuno finiscono col dire più di quello che dopo, ripensandoci, vorrebbero avere detto, e nel chiedere scusa cedono a toni sentimentali. Questa categoria di persona schiaccia i propri mozziconi e anche quelli degli altri, quando restano a languire nei piattini da caffè, e poi mette i piattini a lavare. Gli sbadati, invece, con il tempo dimostrano altri segni di trascuratezza. Scarsa cura di sé, che pure è una forma di distrazione. Sbattono contro i mobili, si fanno male da soli. Questa era Sofia. ~ Paolo Cognetti, #NFDB
254:Col,
Here's to all the places we went. And all the places we'll go And here's me, whispering again and again and again and again: iloveyou. yrs forever, K-a-t-h-e-r-i-n-e
Eventually, he found the bed too comfortable for his state of mind, so he lay down on his back, his legs sprawled across the carpet. He anagrammed "yrs forever" until he found one he liked: sorry fever. And then he lay there in his fever of sorry and repeated the now memorized note in his head and wanted to cry, but instead he only felt this aching behind his solar plexus. Crying adds something: crying is you, plus tears. But the feeling Colin had was some horrible opposite of crying. It was you, minus somthing. He kept thinking about one word -forever-and felt the burning ache just beneath his rib cage.
It hurt like the worst ass-kicking- he'd ever gotten. And he'd gotten plenty."
1.Greek: "I have found it."
2.More on that later. ~ John Green,#NFDB
255:V'è uno spettacolo più grande del mare, ed è il cielo;
v'è uno spettacolo più grande del cielo, ed è l'interno dell'anima.
Far il poema della coscienza umana, foss'anco d'un sol uomo, del più infimo fra gli uomini, sarebbe come fondere tutte le epopee in un'epopea superiore e definitiva. La coscienza è il caos delle chimere, delle cupidigie e dei tentativi, la fornace dei sogni, l'antro delle idee di cui si ha vergogna; è il pandemonio dei sofismi, è il campo di battaglia delle passioni. Penetrate, in certe ore, attraverso la faccia livida d'un uomo che sta riflettendo, guardate in quell'anima, in quell'oscurità; sotto il silenzio esteriore, vi sono combattimenti di giganti come in Omero, mischie di dragoni ed idre e nugoli di fantasmi, come in Milton, visioni ultraterrene come in Dante. Oh, qual abisso è mai quest'infinito che ogni uomo porta in sé e col quale confronta disperatamente la volontà del cervello e gli atti della vita! ~ Victor Hugo,#NFDB
256:«Col peggiorare delle sofferenze, tutta la vita è andata peggiorando» pensava. [...] E l'immagine della pietra che rotolava verso il basso con velocità accelerata gli entrò nell'anima.
«Io precipito...» sussultava, si agitava, voleva opporre resistenza, ma ormai sapeva ch'era impossibile resistere, e di nuovo, con gli occhi stanchi di guardare, ma incapaci di non guardare ciò che avevano davanti, fissava lo schienale del divano e aspettava quell'ultima, terribile caduta, il colpo, la distruzione. «Se soltanto potessi capire il perché di tutto questo! Ma è impossibile. Lo sarebbe se non avessi vissuto come si doveva. Ma non si può certo affermare una cosa simile» diceva a se stesso, rammentando la propria vita corretta, decorosa, ligia alle regole. «Non si può ammettere una cosa del genere» e sorrideva a fior di labbra, come se qualcuno potesse vedere quel sorriso e restarne ingannato. «Non c'è spiegazione! La sofferenza, la morte... perché?» ~ Leo Tolstoy,#NFDB
257:Paul told the Colossians that in Jesus Christ, the whole fullness of the Godhead lives in bodily form (Col. 2:9). That means Holy Spirit was in Jesus; the Father was in Jesus; and of course, there was Jesus Himself. The entire triune God. Paul continues to write: And, by your union with Him, you also are filled with it (Col. 2:10, TCNT). What are you filled with? Just Holy Spirit alone? No. Your mystical union with Christ fills you with the entire Godhead. That means Jesus is in you. It also means the Father of Lights lives within you – the One who breathed the very stars into existence. He’s right here, fully inside of you! You don’t just have a little portion of God. Not just one percent of Him. Not just a little Bobby or Suzy sized version. You have the fullness of the Godhead in there. All thanks to your union with Christ. If you started to actually believe how much heat you’re packing inside of you, you could change the world in a single day. ~ John Crowder, #NFDB
258:Stai per cominciare a leggere il nuovo romanzo Se una notte d’inverno un viaggiatore di Italo Calvino. Rilassati. Raccogliti. Allontana da te ogni altro pensiero. Lascia che il mondo che ti circonda sfumi nell’indistinto. La porta è meglio chiuderla; di là c’è sempre la televisione accesa. Dillo subito, agli altri: «No, non voglio vedere la televisione!» Alza la voce, se no non ti sentono: «Sto leggendo! Non voglio essere disturbato!» Forse non ti hanno sentito, con tutto quel chiasso; dillo più forte, grida: «Sto cominciando a leggere il nuovo romanzo di Italo Calvino!» O se non vuoi non dirlo; speriamo che ti lascino in pace.
Prendi la posizione più comoda: seduto, sdraiato, raggomitolato, coricato. Coricato sulla schiena, su un fianco, sulla pancia. In poltrona, sul divano, sulla sedia a dondolo, sulla sedia a sdraio, sul pouf. Sull’amaca se ne hai una. Sul letto, naturalmente, o dentro il letto. Puoi anche metterti a testa in giù, in posizione yoga. Col libro capovolto, si capisce. ~ Italo Calvino,#NFDB
259:«Certo. Se non fosse la spia ad avvertire i poliziotti, converrebbe avvertirli noi.» «E perché?» «Nel caso di dimostrazioni come questa, bada bene. Se non c'è scontro con la forza pubblica, la gente non si accorge neppure dell'agitazione, lo capisci? Perde di efficacia politica.» «Insomma mandate la gente a buscarle?» «Non sempre. Vedi là, quel celerino? Lo stanno pestando. Quando si può picchiare, si picchia anche noi.» «Anche le donne?» «Si capisce. Anzi, specialmente le donne. Perché in tribunale, dopo, come fa la polizia ad ammettere di averle prese da una donna?» «E come picchiate, con la borsetta?» «Macché. Coi piedi.» «Coi piedi?» «Sì. Coi tacchetti pestoni, di punta calci negli stinchi. Ma anche meglio si fa col ginocchio.» «Col ginocchio?» «Sì. Quando il poliziotto ti prende per un braccio e sta di fronte, basta alzare il ginocchio, e lo colpisci al basso ventre.» «Ma funziona?» «Altro che. Ne ho visti stendere una decina in questo modo, da ragazzette che a vederle non gli daresti due soldi.» ~ Luciano Bianciardi, #NFDB
260:Ha 38 anni Bartleboom, lui pensa che da qualche parte, nel mondo, incontrerà un giorno una donna che, da sempre, è la sua donna. Ogni tanto si rammarica che il destino si ostini a farlo attendere con tanta indelicata tenacia, ma col tempo ha imparato a considerare le cosa con grande serenità. Quasi ogni giorno ormai da anni, prende la penna in mano e le scrive. Non ha nomi e non ha indirizzi da mettere sulle buste: ma ha una vita da raccontare. E a chi se non a lei?
Lui pensa che quando si incontreranno sarà bello posarle in grembo una scatola di mogano piena di lettere e dirle: "ti aspettavo!"
Lei aprirà la scatola e lentamente quando vorrà leggerà le lettere una ad una e risalendo un chilometrico filo di inchiostro blu, si prenderà gli anni, i giorni gli istanti, che quell'uomo prima ancora di conoscerla le aveva regalato.
O forse, più semplicemente, capovolgerà la scatola e attonita davanti quella buffa nevicata di lettere sorriderà dicendo a quell'uomo: "tu sei matto!"... e per sempre lo amerà! ~ Alessandro Baricco,#NFDB
261:Do you ever feel like someone is telling you that you can’t measure up? That something is wrong with you? It’s because sometimes that is what is happening. Sadly, we often believe Satan’s lies and live like they are true. Rarely do we stop to ask, “Who is saying these things? Who is causing me to doubt myself? Is it me? Is there something from my past that led me to believe this? Or is it the enemy of my soul disguising his voice as my own?” Satan’s plot is the same for you and me as it was for Eve, but we don’t have to go along with him. Instead we can refute his lies and temptations with truth. If we have put our trust in Christ as our Savior, we can stand on the promises of who we are in Him—chosen, holy, and dearly loved (Col. 3:12). In his book, Victory Over the Darkness, Dr. Neil T. Anderson says, “The more you reaffirm who you are in Christ, the more your behavior will begin to reflect your true identity!”[5] Here is a compilation of Scriptures Dr. Anderson’s ministry created to remind us of who we are in Christ. ~ Renee Swope, #NFDB
262:IAGO: [...] Non tutti possono essere padroni, né tutti i padroni avere fedeli servitori. Ne conoscerete parecchi di devoti e deferenti, rimbambiti a forza di servire, che passano la propria vita come l'asino del padrone, per un po' di biada, e da vecchi vengono messi da parte.
Onesti furfanti, da prendersi a frustate! Altri, con la meschina apparenza del dovere badano solo al proprio interesse, e facendo gran mostra di fedeltà verso i padroni, ne traggono gran frutto, e una volta riempitesi le tasche non rendono omaggio che a se stessi. Queste sono persone di talento, ed io mi professo uno di loro... Signore, quant'è vero che siete Roderigo, se io fossi il Moro, non vorrei esser Iago. Stando al suo servizio, servo me stesso.
Lo sa il cielo, non è né per amore né per dovere, ma solo in apparenza per i miei fini particolari. E quando le mie azioni esteriori riveleranno l'intima natura e intento del mio animo, allora sì mi mostrerò col cuore in mano per darlo in pasto alle tortorelle. Io non sono quel che sono. ~ William Shakespeare,#NFDB
263:SHERLOCK HOLMES - I SUOI LIMITI
1. Conoscenza della letteratura - Zero.
2. Conoscenza della filosofia - Zero.
3. Conoscenza dell'astronomia - Zero.
4. Conoscenza della politica - Scarsa.
5. Conoscenza della botanica - Variabile. Sa molte cose sulla belladonna, l'oppio e i veleni in genere. Non sa niente di giardinaggio.
6. Conoscenza della geologia - Pratica, ma limitata. Distingue a colpo d'occhio un tipo di terreno da un altro. Rientrando da qualche passeggiata mi ha mostrato delle macchie di fango sui pantaloni e, in base al colore e alla consistenza, mi ha detto in quale parte di Londra se l'era fatte.
7. Conoscenza della chimica - Profonda.
8. Conoscenza dell'anatomia - Accurata, ma non sistematica.
9. Conoscenza della letteratura scandalistica - Immensa. Sembra conoscere ogni particolare di tutti i misfatti più orrendi perpetrati in questo secolo.
10. Buon violinista.
11. Esperto schermidore col bastone, pugile, spadaccino.
12. Ha una buona conoscenza pratica del diritto britannico. ~ Arthur Conan Doyle,#NFDB
264:Elles disent, n'est-ce pas magnifique en vérité? Les vases sont debout, les potiches ont attrapé des jambes. Les vases sacrés sont en marche. Elles disent, la pente des collines ne va-t-elle pas repousser leur assaut? Elles disent, les vases désormais vides de semence resserrent leurs flancs. Ils se déplacent lentement d'abord puis de plus en plus vite. Elles disent, c'est le sacrilège, la violation de tous les règlements. Les vases enterrés jusqu'au col et réceptacles des objets les plus divers, spermatozoïdes humains pièces de monnaie fleurs terre messages, elles disent qu'ils se déplacent, lentement d'abord puis de plus en plus vite. A qui demande, pourquoi ces excès? Ne doivent-ils pas avoir la violence en dégoût? Leur constitution n'est-elle pas fragile et dès le premier assaut ne se briseront-ils pas s'ils ne sont pas déjà en miettes pour s'être entrechoqués? Elles disent, écoutez, écoutez, elles crient évohé, évohé, en sautant comme des jeunes chevaux sur les bords de l'Eurotas. En frappant la terre, elles accélèrent leurs mouvements. ~ Monique Wittig, #NFDB
265:micel walcan wolde we do from that daeg micel walcan in the great holt the brunnesweald but though we walced for wices months years though this holt becum ham to me for so long still we did not see efen a small part of it so great was this deop eald wud. so great was it that many things dwelt there what was not cnawan to man but only in tales and in dreams. wihts for sure the boar the wulf the fox efen the bera it was saed by sum made this holt their ham. col beorners and out laws was in here as they was in all wuds but deop deoper efen than this was the eald wihts what was in angland before men
here i is meanan the aelfs and the dweorgs and ents who is of the holt who is the treows them selfs. my grandfather he telt me he had seen an aelf at dusc one daeg he seen it flittan betweon stoccs of treows thynne it was and grene and its eages was great and blaec and had no loc of man in them. well he was blithe to lif after that for oft it is saed that to see an aelf is to die for they sceots their aelf straels at thu and aelfscot is a slow death ~ Paul Kingsnorth,#NFDB
266:Margheritina, se qualcosa ci dovesse separare, devi pensare a me nella luce migliore, caro ragazzo. Su! Facciamo questo patto. Pensa a me nella luce migliore, se mai le circostanze ci separeranno!"
"Per me, Steerforth, tu non puoi avere luce migliore, né peggiore" affermai. "Tu sei sempre egualmente amato e hai sempre lo stesso posto... nel mio cuore."
[...]
Mi alzai con l'alba incolore e, dopo essermi vestito il più silenziosamente possibile, m'affacciai alla sua camera. Egli era profondamente addormentato: giaceva, tranquillo, col capo appoggiato al braccio, come lo avevo spesso visto giacere a scuola.
Venne, a suo tempo, il momento (e fu prestissimo) in cui quasi mi meravigliai che nulla turbasse il suo riposo, mentre lo guardavo. Ma dormiva (lasciate che io lo ripensi così!) come spesso lo avevo visto dormire a scuola; e così, in quell'ora silenziosa, lo lasciai.
... Per mai più, oh, Dio ti perdoni, Steerforth! Mai più toccare con atto di amore e di amicizia quella mano abbandonata, mai più!
[Charles Dickens; 'David Copperfield] ~ Charles Dickens,#NFDB
267:Quando ad andarsene erano i sessantenni, accorrevano i colleghi di lavoro. I novantenni erano specializzati nel trascinarsi dietro interi paesi. Ma erano i trentenni la tragedia. I trentacinquenni, non di rado i quarantenni. Non c’erano colleghi di lavoro perché spesso non c’era un lavoro. E quando il lavoro c’era, i colleghi erano troppo impegnati nella lotta per la sopravvivenza. Gli amici – quelli veri, quelli che un tempo lo erano stati – erano lontani, persi nelle città del Nord, dentro i pantani delle loro vite. Forse la notizia era arrivata anche a loro, e il cordoglio (da centinaia, forse migliaia di chilometri) provocava minuscole torsioni nelle fiamme delle candele elettriche. Così in quei casi il corpo restava alla mercé della famiglia. Col risultato (la beffa, pensò il sacerdote preparandosi alla comunione) che a gestirlo erano coloro contro cui il morto doveva aver lottato per emanciparsi quando era in vita – madri e padri e nonni e zie dei quali non sopportava neanche più la dentatura deformata attraverso il vetro del bicchiere da cui bevevano. ~ Nicola Lagioia, #NFDB
268:Non voleva lasciarsi prendere dallo squallore dell'ambiente, e per far ciò si concentrava sullo squallore dei loro arnesi elettorali--quella cancelleria, quei cartelli, il libriccino ufficiale del regolamento consultato a ogni dubbio dal presidente, già nervoso prima di cominciare--perché questo era per lui uno squallore ricco, ricco di segni, di significati, magari in contrasto uno con l'altro.
La democrazia si presentava ai cittadini sotto queste spoglie dimesse, grige, disadorne; ad Amerigo a tratti ciò pareva sublime, nell'Italia da sempre ossequiente a ciò che è pompa, fasto, esteriorità, ornamento; gli pareva finalmente la lezione d'una morale onesta e austera; e una perpetua silenziosa rivincita sui fascisti, su coloro che la democrazia avevano creduto di poter disprezzare proprio per questo suo squallore esteriore, per questa sua umile contabilità, ed erano caduti in polvere con tutte le loro frange e i loro fiocchi, mentre essa, col suo scarno cerimoniale di pezzi di carta ripiegati come telegrammi, di matite affidate a dita callose o malferme, continuava la sua strada. ~ Italo Calvino,#NFDB
269:Secular history, far from controlling sacred history, is controlled by it, must directly or indirectly subserve its ends, and can only be fully understood in the central light of Christian truth and the plan of salvation. The Father, who directs the history of the world, "draws to the Son," who rules the history of the church, and the Son leads back to the Father, that "God may be all in all." "All things," says St. Paul, "were created through Christ and unto Christ: and He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together. And He is the head of the body, the Church: who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in all things He may have the pre-eminence." Col. 1:16–18. "The Gospel," says John von Müller, summing up the final result of his lifelong studies in history, "is the fulfilment of all hopes, the perfection of all philosophy, the interpreter of all revolutions, the key of all seeming contradictions of the physical and moral worlds; it is life—it is immortality." The history of the church is the rise and progress of the kingdom of heaven upon earth, for the glory of God and the salvation of the world. ~ Philip Schaff, #NFDB
270:Un giorno, stava guardando alcuni contadini del luogo, occupatissimi a strappare ortiche. Diede un'occhiata a quel mucchio di piante sradicate e già secche e disse: «È morta: eppure, sarebbe una buona cosa che si sapesse servirsene. Quando l'ortica è giovane, la foglia è un ortaggio eccellente; quando invecchia, ha fili e fibre come la canapa e il lino, e la tela d'ortica vale quella di canapa. Tritata, l'ortica è buona per le galline e, triturata, per il bestiame; il grano dell'ortica, misto al foraggio, dà lucentezza al pelo degli animali, mentre la radice mescolata col sale, dà un bel colore giallo. Del resto, è un fieno eccellente, che può essere falciato due volte. E che cosa occorre all'ortica? Poca terra, nessuna cura e nessuna coltivazione; solo, il grano cade a mano a mano ch'essa matura ed è difficile da raccogliere. Ecco quanto, con lieve briga, l'ortica sarebbe utile, mentre, se la si trascura, diventa nociva, ed allora la si uccide. Quanti uomini somigliano all'ortica!» E soggiunse, dopo una pausa: «Tenete presente, amici miei, che non vi sono né cattive erbe né cattivi uomini: vi sono soltanto cattivi coltivatori.» ~ Victor Hugo, #NFDB
271:Gospel renewal does not simply seek to convert nominal church members; it also insists that all Christians — even committed ones — need the Spirit to bring the gospel home to their hearts for deepened experiences of Christ’s love and power. In Paul’s great prayer for the Ephesians in chapter 3, he prays for his readers that Christ will dwell in their hearts and they may be filled with all the fullness of God. This is noteworthy, since he is writing to Christians, not nonbelievers. By definition, all Christians already have Christ dwelling in them (1 Cor 6:19; Col 1:27) and have the fullness of God (Col 2:9–10) by virtue of their union with Christ through faith (see sidebar on “A Biblical Theology of Revival” on pp. 58 – 59). What does Paul mean, then, by his prayer? He must be saying that he hopes the Ephesians will experience what they already believe in and possess — the presence and love of Christ (Eph 3:16–19). But how does this experience happen? It comes through the work of the Spirit, strengthening our “inner being” and our “hearts” so that as believers we can know Christ’s love (see v. 16). It happens, in other words, through gospel renewal. ~ Timothy J Keller, #NFDB
272:- E com’è fatto un orobilogio? -
- Non si può vedere, è fatto di tante parti insieme che mescolandosi diventano invisibili. Vuoi un esempio? La tua casa, la guardi dal di fuori e dici: questa è la mia casa. Ma la casa ha sotto la cantina, la tinaia buia con le botti, la muffa sulle pareti quell’odore di anni e secoli, ma in quel passato oscuro fermenta il vino e i formaggi maturano. Sopra c’è il granaio, con la farina, le mele, le noci e i pomodori secchi, e ci frullano i topi rosicchioni e i ghiri ladruncoli, lì ci sono le provviste per il futuro. Poi c’è la casa dove abiti, col camino caldo, la cucina che fuma e il cesso che scroscia, e il letto ti accoglie e prepara i sogni, ma anche gli incubi, e le lenzuola gelate d’inverno, e la febbre e le ore che non dormi la notte. E a volte tutto cambia: dal camino entra la notte, le faville dei fantasmi del passato, o la paura di ciò che sta dietro la porta, nella cantina il vino e il buio ti fanno immaginare viaggi e abbordaggi, nel granaio sbattono la testa uccelli imprigionati, come brutti pensieri. Ecco, questa è la tua casa, non quella che vedi dal di fuori, con le finestre, il portone e l’edera sul muro. ~ Stefano Benni,#NFDB
273:«Portaci indietro fino al rottamaio» le ordinò. «Se quest’auto non ti convincerà che è meglio vivere la vita al posto di guida, niente ci riuscirà.»
«Non ho la patente» disse lei.
«Non ho la patente!» la prese in giro Cash. «Non ho soldi per il college! Mio padre non mi capisce! Non voglio deluderlo e seguire la strada che mi farebbe più felice! Sai quanta gente in questo momento vorrebbe tirarti una sberla? Zitta e guida!»
Ancora una volta, Cash sapeva esattamente quale tasto toccare. Mo fissò l’autostrada sgombra e gli occhi le brillarono di una luce nuova. Strinse le dita attorno al volante e schiacciò l’acceleratore col piede, lanciando l’auto sportiva sulla strada a tutta velocità. Era divertente essere il passeggero sulla Porsche, ma guidarla era un’esperienza del tutto diversa. Cash controllava ancora la leva del cambio, ma per il resto l’automobile era in mano sua e questo fece provare a Mo una sensazione inebriante: stava comandando lei, e ci stava prendendo gusto!
«È fantastico!» esclamò Mo.
«Te l’ho detto» osservò Cash. «È così che dovrebbe sembrarti la vita!»
«Fanculo a Stanford!» gridò Mo al cielo.
«Sì, così!» la incitò Cash. ~ Chris Colfer,#NFDB
274:Ma Molly lo spinse da parte e andò verso l'unicorno, sgridandola come se fosse una mucca da latte smarrita. – Dove sei stata? –. Davanti al suo candore e al corno rilucente, Molly rimpicciolì come un trillante insetto, ma stavolta furono gli antichi occhi neri dell'unicorno che guardarono in basso.
– Ora sono qui – disse alla fine.
Molly rise con le sue labbra sottili. – E che me ne faccio del fatto che tu sei qui ora? Dov'eri venti anni fa? Dieci anni fa? Come osi tu, come osi tu venire da me ora, ora che sono così? –. Riassunse tutto ciò che era con un movimento della mano: viso arido, occhi deserti e un cuore ingiallito. – Vorrei che non fossi mai arrivata, perché sei qui ora? –. Le lacrime iniziarono a scorrere giù lungo i lati del suo naso.
L'unicorno non rispose nulla e Schmendrick disse: – Lei è l'ultima. L'ultimo unicorno al mondo.
– Potrebbe esserlo –. Molly tirò su col naso. – Sarebbe l'ultimo unicorno al mondo che è venuto da Molly Grue –. Dopo di che si protese in avanti per poggiare la mano sulla guancia dell'unicorno, ma entrambe trasalirono un po' e il tocco venne a fermarsi sul punto teso e vibrante sotto la mascella. Molly disse: – È tutto a posto. Ti perdono. ~ Peter S Beagle,#NFDB
275:Ho una religione, la mia religione; e anzi ne ho più di loro, tutti quanti sono, con le loro commedie e le loro ciarlatanerie! Io adoro Dio, invece! Credo nell'Essere supremo, in un Creatore, qualunque esso sia, poco m'importa, che ci ha messi quaggiù per fare il nostro dovere di cittadini e di padri di famiglia; ma non sento il bisogno di andare in chiesa a baciare piatti d'argento e ingrassare di tasca mia una massa di buffoni che mangiano meglio di noi! Dio Lo si può onorar benissimo in un bosco, in un campo, o magari contemplando la volta celeste, come gli antichi. Il mio Dio, è il Dio di Socrate, di Franklin, di Voltaire e di Béranger! Sono per la Professione di fede del vicario savoiardo e per gli immortali princìpi dell'89! Perciò non voglio saperne di un Dio brav'uomo che fa la passeggiatina nel suo giardino col bastone in mano, alloggia i suoi amici nel ventre delle balene; muore lanciando un grido, e risuscita dopo tre giorni: cose assurde in se stesse e contrarie completamente a tutte le leggi della fisica; ciò che ci dimostra, incidentalmente, come i preti siano sempre rimasti a imputridire in un'ignoranza torpida, nella quale si sforzano di immergere, con loro, anche le popolazioni". ~ Gustave Flaubert, #NFDB
276:È il petto di un'altra persona a spalleggiarci, ci sentiamo realmente spalleggiati solo quando abbiamo qualcuno dietro, lo dice la parola stessa, alle nostre spalle, come in inglese, to back, qualcuno che magari non vediamo e che ci copre le spalle col petto che è sul punto di sfiorarci e che alla fine sempre ci sfiora, e a volte, addirittura, questo qualcuno ci mette una mano sulla spalla con la quale ci tranquillizza e al tempo stesso ci sottomette. In questo modo dormono o credono di dormire gran parte delle coppie, dopo la buonanotte i due si girano dallo stesso lato, di modo che uno dà le spalle all'altro per tutto il tempo e si sente spalleggiato da lui o da lei, e quando nel pieno della notte si sveglia di soprassalto per un incubo o non riesce a prender sonno, soffre per la febbre o si crede solo e abbandonato al buio, non deve far altro che voltarsi e vedere, di fronte a sé, il volto di colui che lo protegge, che si lascerà baciare quel che si può baciare in un volto (naso, occhi e bocca; mento, fronte e guance, tutto il volto) o che magari, mezzo addormentato, gli metterà una mano sulla spalla per tranquillizzarlo, o per sottometterlo, o forse per aggrapparsi. (da Un cuore così bianco, pag. 72) ~ Javier Mar as, #NFDB
277:Sicché andò a finire che feci il tema sul guantone da baseball di mio fratello Allie. […] Mio fratello Allie, dunque aveva quel guantone da prenditore, il sinistro. Lui era mancino. La cosa descrittiva di quel guanto, però, era che c’erano scritte delle poesie su tutte le dita e il palmo e dappertutto. In inchiostro verde. Ce le aveva scritte lui, così aveva qualcosa da leggere quando stava ad asp...ettare e nessuno batteva. Ora è morto. Gli è venuta la leucemia ed è morto quando stavamo nel Maine, il 18 luglio del 1946. Vi sarebbe piaciuto. Aveva due anni meno di me, ma era cinquanta volte più intelligente di me. Era di un’intelligenza fantastica. […] Aveva solo tredici anni e loro volevano farmi psicanalizzare e compagnia bella perché avevo spaccato tutte le finestre del garage. Non posso biasimarli. Ho dormito nel garage la notte che lui è morto, e ho spaccato col pugno tutte quelle dannate finestre, così, tanto per farlo. Ho tentato anche di spaccare tutti i finestrini della giardinetta che avevamo quell’estate, ma a quel punto mi ero già rotto la mano eccetera eccetera, e non ho potuto. È stata una cosa proprio stupida, chi lo nega, ma io quasi non sapevo nemmeno quello che stavo facendo, e poi voi non conoscevate Allie. ~ J D Salinger, #NFDB
278:«Hai letto la lettera a Grindelwald, vero?»
«Sì, io... sì». Esitò, turbata, cullando la tazza di tè nelle mani fredde. «È la parte peggiore. Lo so che Bathilda credeva che fossero solo parole, ma ‘Per il Bene Superiore’ è diventato il motto di Grindelwald, il suo alibi per tutte le atrocità che ha commesso in seguito. E... dalla lettera... sembra che sia stato Silente a dargli l’idea. Dicono che ‘Per il Bene Superiore’ fosse inciso anche all’ingresso di Nurmengard».
«Cos’è Nurmengard?»
«La prigione che Grindelwald aveva costruito per rinchiudervi gli oppositori. Ci finì anche lui, quando Silente lo catturò. Comunque è... è un pensiero orribile che le idee di Silente abbiano aiutato Grindelwald a salire al potere. Ma nemmeno Rita può sostenere che si siano frequentati per più di qualche mese di una sola estate, quando erano tutti e due molto giovani e...»
«Sapevo che l’avresti detto». Harry non voleva sfogare la sua rabbia contro di lei, ma dovette fare uno sforzo per controllare il tono di voce. «Sapevo che avresti detto ‘erano giovani’. Avevano la nostra stessa età. Noi siamo qui a rischiare la vita per combattere le Arti Oscure e lui era pappa e ciccia col suo nuovo migliore amico, a tramare l’ascesa al potere sui Babbani». ~ J K Rowling,#NFDB
279:Non posso più ascoltare in silenzio. Devo parlarle usando i mezzi a disposizione che ho in questo momento. Lei strazia la mia anima. Provo a un tempo agonia e speranza. Non mi dica che è troppo tardi, che quei preziosi sentimenti son per sempre svaniti. Mi offro nuovamente a lei col cuore che è suo ancor più di quando lo ha quasi spezzato otto anni e mezzo fa. Non osi più dire che gli uomini dimenticano prima delle donne, che l'amore di un uomo muore più rapidamente. Ho amato solo lei. Posso essere stato ingiusto, debole, schiavo di risentimenti, ma mai incostante. Lei sola mi ha indotto a venire a Bath. Penso solo a lei, per lei sola faccio progetti per l'avvenire. Non se n'è accorta? È possibile che non abbia compreso i miei desideri? Non avrei atteso neppure questi dieci giorni se solo avessi potuto leggere nei suoi sentimenti, come lei, penso abbia visto in fondo ai miei. Quasi non riesco a scrivere. Ogni istante sento qualcosa che mi soggioga. Lei abbassa la voce, ma io so distinguerne toni che altri non saprebbero cogliere. Creatura troppo buona, troppo eccelsa! Lei ci rende davvero giustizia. Lei crede veramente che gli uomini possano provare vero amore ed essere costanti. Mi creda, in me questi sentimenti sono i più fervidi, i più incrollabili. ~ Jane Austen, #NFDB
280:È la tempesta perfetta, papà, e colpisce come un’enorme palla da demolizione che compare dal nulla e sbatte dritta contro il cervello. Distrugge tutto. Le tue emozioni sono un macello: un attimo piangi, l’attimo dopo ridi, quello dopo ancora riesci a malapena a sollevare la testa per l’agonia in cui sei caduto. La vita si restringe: non ti interessano più le stesse cose di prima e reagisci in modo esagerato alle cose che per te contano adesso. Hai bisogno di sostegno ma vuoi rimanere solo. Addio memoria a breve termine. Ogni passo è come farsi strada a fatica in una fossa piena di fango. Ti senti improvvisamente esausta e riesci solo a dormire. Ti giudichi di continuo col senno di poi. Non riesci a guardare nessuno negli occhi, per paura di trovarci il biasimo, o il sospetto o il giudizio. Ti senti piccolo, debole, in colpa. Fai pensieri strani, fai cose strane. Hai tutti i nervi a fior di pelle, ma il cervello diventa un casino indistinto e inaffidabile. Piangi tanto che non ci vedi più e il cibo perde sapore, ma all'improvviso riesci a sentire l’odore di un calzino sporco tre camere più in là. L’umore va su, va giù, giù, su, come sulle montagne russe impazzite, a folle velocità, fuori controllo, e non puoi scendere, non importa quanto lunga o tremenda sia la corsa. ~ Laura Wiess, #NFDB
281:E lì, nel mezzo del mio salotto, c’era un coyote a quattro zampe con il pelo giallastro; la porta d’ingresso era ancora spalancata. Rimasi pietrificato. Il coyote alzò la testa, mi studiò per qualche secondo e sollevò una zampa tinta di bianco per grattare l’aria tra noi. Non saprei dire quanto siamo rimasti in quella posizione ad annusarci, ma alla fine ho avuto il buon senso di dire con voce tagliente: «Vattene, via, sciò.» Temevo che la mia voce non avrebbe funzionato. E il coyote lo fece, voltandosi lentamente come un cane che aveva ricevuto una ramanzina; tornò verso la porta principale in quella che era diventata un’andatura spavalda, prima di lanciarsi in una corsa vera e propria sulle strisce di prato che separavano la casa dal vialetto e di infiltrarsi nell’erba alta dove vidi il suo pelo bianco-giallo spuntare di tanto in tanto in mezzo ai fiori selvatici. Poi chiusi la porta col lucchetto, una cosa che faccio raramente, eppure la feci. Mi sedetti, e rimasi immobile a lungo. Mi fissai le mani. Mi sentivo vivo, sentivo ogni fibra del corpo che vibrava, ogni atomo energizzato, il sangue che scorreva spavaldo. Vivo qui, ho scelto di vivere qui, perché qui la vita mi sembra reale. Autentica, genuina... non lo so, fattibile. Magari si sentono tutti così, magari no. ~ Nickolas Butler, #NFDB
282:Libertà e uguglianza sono tra gli scopi primari perseguiti dagli esseri umani per secoli; ma libertà totale per i lupi significa morte per gli agnelli; una totale libertà dei potenti, dei capaci, non è compatibile col diritto che anche i deboli e i meno capaci hanno a una vita decente. Un artista che voglia creare un capolavoro è indifferente alla miseria e allo squallore a cui condanna col suo tipo di esistenza la propria famiglia: noi possiamo condannarlo e sostenere che il capolavoro dev'essere sacrificato ai bisogni umani, oppure possiamo schierarci dalla parte dell'artista; ma in entrambi i casi ci troviamo davanti a valori che per certi uomini e donne sono valori assoluti e che sono intelleggibili a tutti noi se abbiamo immaginazione o solidarietà o comprensione per gli esseri umani. L'uguaglianza può esigere la limitazione della libertà di coloro che vorrebbero dominare. Senza un minimo di libertà ogni scelta è esclusa e perciò non c'è possibilità di restare umani nel senso che attribuiamo a questa parola; ma può essere necessario mettere limiti alla libertà per fare spazio al benessere sociale, per sfamare gli affamati, per vestire gli ignudi, per dare un alloggio ai senza tetto, per consentire agli altri di essere liberi, per non ostacolare la giustizia e l'equità. ~ Isaiah Berlin, #NFDB
283:Belleville would have us believe that homeowners could bypass all the qualifications for elders in 1 Timothy 3 and Titus 1, and, simply by virtue of having a church meet in their home, become overseers or elders. She would also have us believe that Lydia, who was a brand-new convert and who had just been baptized, became the overseer of the church at Philippi simply because she said to Paul, “come to my house and stay” (Acts 16:15). This claim is going far beyond the evidence in Scripture. The extra-biblical references that Belleville cites do not prove anything about homeowners having such a leadership role in the churches either.3 This claim is speculation with no facts to support it, and several factors in Scripture contradict it. But by making this unsubstantiated claim, Belleville leads readers to think that “Mary (Acts 12:12), Lydia (16:15), Chloe (1 Cor 1:11), and Nympha (Col 4:15)” were “overseers of house churches.”4 She leads readers to believe that several such women were overseers or elders. And so she makes these verses say something they do not say. This leads people to disbelieve or seek some way to explain away the passages that restrict the office of elder to men, and so it undermines the authority of Scripture. Therefore this claim takes another step on the path to liberalism. ~ Wayne Grudem, #NFDB
284:Intanto il compito di tutti coloro che considerano le arti con serietà è semplicemente quello di fare del loro meglio per salvare il mondo da quella che nel migliore dei casi sarà una perdita, risultante dall'ignoranza e dalla sconsideratezza: impedire il più scoraggiante fra tutti i mutamenti, quello che a una brutalità estinta ne sostituisce un'altra; anzi, anche se coloro che hanno veramente a cuore le arti sono così deboli e pochi da non poter fare nient'altro, il loro ufficio può esser quello di mantenere viva una traccia di tradizione, di memoria del passato, in modo tale che quando la nuova vita giungerà possa non disperdersi più di tanto nel conferire forme del tutto nuove al proprio spirito.
Dove si volgeranno allora per chiedere aiuto, coloro che ben comprendono quale vantaggio una grande arte possa apportare al mondo, e quali danni alla pace e al quieto vivere derivino da una sua assenza? Penso che essi dovranno cominciare col riconoscere che l'arte antica – l'arte dell'intelligenza inconscia, come la si dovrebbe chiamare, che cominciò in una data imprecisata, remota almeno quanto lo sono quegli strani e magistrali graffiti sulle ossa di mammut e oggetti di tal genere ritrovati or è poco nelle stratificazioni del terreno – che quest'arte dell'intelligenza inconscia è definitivamente scomparsa. ~ William Morris,#NFDB
285:When parents greet their children’s disagreement, disobedience, or practicing with simple hostility, the children are denied the benefit of being trained. They don’t learn that delaying gratification and being responsible have benefits. They only learn how to avoid someone’s wrath. Ever wonder why some Christians fear an angry God, no matter how much they read about his love? The results of this hostility are difficult to see because these children quickly learn how to hide under a compliant smile. When these children grow up they suffer depression, anxiety, relationship conflicts, and substance-abuse problems. For the first time in their lives, many boundary-injured individuals realize they have a problem. Hostility can create problems in both saying and hearing no. Some children become pliably enmeshed with others. But some react outwardly and become controlling people—just like the hostile parent. The Bible addresses two distinct reactions to hostility in parents: Fathers are told not to “embitter [their] children, or they will become discouraged” (Col. 3:21). Some children respond to harshness with compliance and depression. At the same time, fathers are told not to “exasperate [their] children” (Eph. 6:4). Other children react to hostility with rage. Many grow up to be just like the hostile parent who hurt them. ~ Henry Cloud, #NFDB
286:Così fan tozzi Intervista a Paolo Villaggio di Fulvia Caprara a pagina 27 Massimo Gramellini | 220 parole Quarant’anni fa domani, nelle sale usciva il primo film di Fantozzi e l’Italia si metteva allo specchio, almeno quella parte che già non lo aveva fatto nei libri in cui il genio di Paolo Villaggio si era inventato non soltanto una maschera, ma una lingua. Chi è il ragionier Ugo Fantozzi? Uno sconfitto che si scopre migliore, o comunque non peggiore, degli altri. I megadirettori galattici si rivelano meschini, le contesse con sei cognomi avide, gli intellettuali da cineforum una massa di barbe frustrate, i colleghi viscidi o entusiasti dei traditori potenziali. E l’Italia in genere un Paese di servi cinici e cattivi che infieriscono sul più debole in una sorta di catena alimentare dove esiste sempre qualcuno più fantozzi di te. Col passare degli anni la caricatura concepita da Villaggio si sta trasformando (tragicamente, direbbe lui) in una fotografia. Per fortuna Fantozzi è anche altro. Al di là, forse, delle intenzioni del suo creatore, sotto quel cappotto siberiano batte un cuore. Il ragioniere ama la frivola signorina Silvani e, in fondo, persino la moglie dimessa e la figlia bertuccia. Incarna il perdente inesauribile e indomabile come un eroe dei fumetti. Ed è questa energia che lo riscatta e lo rende immortale. ~ Anonymous, #NFDB
287:Passando fra gli insorti che si scostavano con religioso rispetto, [papà Mabeuf] continuò dritto verso Enjolras che indietreggiava impietrito, gli strappò la bandiera, e senza che nessuno osasse trattenerlo né aiutarlo, quel vecchio ottuagenario col capo vacillante, ma col piede fermo, salì lentamente la scala di pietre costruita nella barricata. Lo spettacolo era così serio che tutto all'intorno dissero: «Giù il cappello!». A ogni gradino che saliva diventava sempre più terribile: i suoi capelli canuti, il volto decrepito, l'ampia fronte calma e rugosa, gli occhi incavati, la bocca attonita e semiaperta, il vecchio braccio che sosteneva la bandiera rossa, uscivano dall'ombra e ingigantivano nel sanguinoso chiarore della torcia, e sembrava di vedere lo spettro del 1793 sorgere dalla terra inalberando la bandiera del terrore.
Quando fu all'ultimo gradino, quando quel fantasma tremante e terribile, ritto su quel mucchio di rovine dinanzi a milleduecento fucili invisibili, si drizzò in faccia alla morte come se fosse più forte di essa, tutta la barricata assunse nelle tenebre un aspetto colossale e soprannaturale. Vi fu uno di quegli istanti di silenzio che accompagnano i prodigi. In mezzo a quel silenzio il vegliardo sventolò la bandiera rossa e gridò:
«Viva la Rivoluzione! Viva la Repubblica! Fratellanza! Uguaglianza! E morte!». ~ Victor Hugo,#NFDB
288:Tu, tu che non vuoi ch'io mi renda conto della tua posizione, e hai la vanità di mantenere a me la mia; tu che, conservandomi il lusso nel quale vivevo, conservi la distanza morale che ci separa; tu, infine, che non giudichi il mio affetto abbastanza disinteressato per dividere con me quello che possiedi, e basterebbe a vivere insieme felici, mentre preferisci rovinarti, schiavo di un pregiudizio ridicolo. E credi tu davvero ch'io possa paragonare una carrozza e alcuni gioielli col tuo amore? E che il mio bene consista in vanità che accontentano quando non si ha amore per nulla, ma diventano subito meschine quando si ama? Tu pagherai i miei debiti, impegnerai il tuo patrimonio e insomma mi manterrai! Quanto potrà durare tutto ciò? Due o tre mesi, e sarà troppo tardi allora vivere come ti propongo, perché allora tu dovrai accettare tutto da me, ciò che un gentiluomo non può fare. Oggi invece, con i tuoi otto o diecimila franchi di rendita, possiamo vivere. Io venderò il mio superfluo, e da questa sola vendita ricaverò duemila franchi di reddito. Affitteremo un bell'appartamento per tutti e due. L'estate andremo in campagna, non in una casa con questa, ma in una casetta che basti a due persone. Tu sei indipendente, io libera, e siamo giovani: in nome di Dio, Armando, non ricacciarmi nella vita che fui costretta a condurre un giorno. ~ Alexandre Dumas fils, #NFDB
289:The New Testament teaches that Jesus was God come in the flesh- "in him all the fullness of the Godhead dwelled bodily" (Col 2:9). He was God yet he suffered. He experienced weakness, a life filled "with fervent cries and tears" (Heb 5:7). He knew firsthand rejection and betrayal, poverty and abuse, disappointment and despair, bereavement, torture, and death. And so he is "able to empathize with our weaknesses" for he "has been tempted in every way, just as we are- yet without sin" (Heb 4:15). On the cross, he went beyond even the worse human suffering and experienced cosmic rejection and a pain that exceeds ours as infinitely as his knowledge and power exceeds ours. There is no greater inner agony than the loss of a love relationship. We cannot imagine, however, what it would be like to lose not just a human relationship that has lasted for some years but the infinite love of the Father that Jesus had from all eternity. The separation would have been infinitely unbearable. And so Jesus experienced Godforsakenness itself on the cross when he cried out, "My God, my God! Why have you forsaken me?"
Here we see the ultimate strength- a God who is strong enough to voluntarily become weak and plunge himself into vulnerability and darkness out of love for us. And here we see the greatest possible glory- the willingness to lay aside all his glory out of his love for us. ~ Timothy J Keller,#NFDB
290:The Firstborn Over All Creation (Col. 1:15–20) This passage includes a powerful defense of Christ’s deity. Apparently, a central component of the heresy that threatened the Colossian church was the denial of the deity of Christ. Ironically, throughout the centuries some cults have used the phrase “firstborn over all creation” (1:15) to undermine Christ’s deity. The assumption is that if Jesus was born at creation, then He is more like us than He is like God. The Greek word for firstborn, however, can refer to one who was born first chronologically, but it most often refers to preeminence in position or rank (Heb.1:6; Rom. 8:9). Firstborn in this context clearly means highest in rank, not first created (Ps. 89:27; Rev. 1:5) for several reasons: • Christ cannot be both “first begotten” and “only begotten” (see John 1:14, 18; 3:16, 18; 1 John 4:9); and, when the firstborn is one of a class, the class is in the plural form (1:18; Rom. 8:29), but “creation,” the class here, is in a singular form. • If Paul were teaching that Christ was a created being, he would be agreeing with the heresy that he was writing to refute. • It is impossible for Christ to be both created and the Creator of everything (1:16). Thus, Jesus is the firstborn in the sense that He has the preeminence (1:18) and that He possesses the right of inheritance “over all creation” (Heb. 1:2; Rev. 5:1–7, 13). ~ John F MacArthur Jr, #NFDB
291:17. According as circumstances are favorable, one should modify one’s plans. [Sun Tzu, as a practical soldier, will have none of the “bookish theoric.” He cautions us here not to pin our faith to abstract principles; “for,” as Chang Yu puts it, “while the main laws of strategy can be stated clearly enough for the benefit of all and sundry, you must be guided by the actions of the enemy in attempting to secure a favorable position in actual warfare.” On the eve of the battle of Waterloo, Lord Uxbridge, commanding the cavalry, went to the Duke of Wellington in order to learn what his plans and calculations were for the morrow, because, as he explained, he might suddenly find himself Commander-in-chief and would be unable to frame new plans in a critical moment. The Duke listened quietly and then said: “Who will attack the first tomorrow—I or Bonaparte?” “Bonaparte,” replied Lord Uxbridge. “Well,” continued the Duke, “Bonaparte has not given me any idea of his projects; and as my plans will depend upon his, how can you expect me to tell you what mine are?”75] 18. All warfare is based on deception. [The truth of this pithy and profound saying will be admitted by every soldier. Col. Henderson tells us that Wellington, great in so many military qualities, was especially distinguished by “the extraordinary skill with which he concealed his movements and deceived both friend and foe.”] 19. ~ Sun Tzu, #NFDB
292:La prima volta che aveva avuto il ciclo, all’età di dodici anni, la madre le aveva detto che il senso di quel sangue era “la sicurezza dei figli”. Nella non aveva mai pensato ci fosse molto di cui sentirsi sicuri a giudicare dalle urla, nel villaggio, delle donne in travaglio, a volte seguite da un corteo dietro a una bara.
L’amore era molto più nebuloso di qualche macchia su uno straccio di lino. Il ciclo non le era mai parso legato a ciò che lei sospettava significasse la parola amore, che aveva a che fare sì col corpo, ma andava anche oltre. “È amore, Petronella,” aveva detto la signora Oortman osservando il modo in cui Arabella stringeva a sé Occhionero ancora cucciolo, fino quasi a togliergli la vita. Quando cantavano l’amore nel villaggio, i musicisti parlavano in effetti del dolore che la ricompensa nascondeva. Il vero amore era un fiore nella pancia, con i petali che uscivano fuori. Per amore si rischiava tutto: era uno stato di beatitudine mai privo di perle di sgomento.
La signora Oortman si era sempre lamentata che non c’erano pretendenti abbastanza buoni nel giro di miglia e miglia, “mangiafieno” definiva i ragazzi del circondario. La città, e Johannes Brandt, racchiudevano il futuro di sua figlia.
“Ma l’amore, madre. Lo amerò?”
“La ragazza vuole l’amore,” aveva gridato in modo teatrale la signora Oortman alle pareti scrostate di Assendelft. “Vuole le pesche e anche la panna! ~ Jessie Burton,#NFDB
293:Venus Anadyomene
Out of what seems a coffin made of tin
A head protrudes; a woman's, dark with grease Out of a bathtub! - slowly; then a fat face
With ill-concealed defects upon the skin.
Then streaked and grey, a neck; a shoulder-blade,
A back - irregular, with indentations Then round loins emerge, and slowly rise;
The fat beneath the skin seems made of lead;
The spine is somewhat reddish; then, a smell,
Strangely horrible; we notice above all
Some microscopic blemishes in front…
Horribly beautiful! A title: Clara Venus;
Then the huge bulk heaves, and with a grunt
She bends and shows the ulcer on her anus.
Original French
Vénus Anadyomène
Comme d'un cercueil vert en fer-blanc, une tête
De femme à cheveux bruns fortement pommadés
D'une vieille baignoire émerge, lente et bête,
Avec des déficits assez mal ravaudés ;
Puis le col gras et gris, les larges omoplates
Qui saillent ; le dos court qui rentre et qui ressort ;
Puis les rondeurs des reins semblent prendre l'essor ;
La graisse sous la peau paraît en feuilles plates :
L'échine est un peu rouge, et le tout sent un goût
Horrible étrangement ; on remarque surtout
Des singularités qu'il faut voir à la loupe.....
Les reins portent deux mots gravés : Clara Venus ;
- Et tout ce corps remue et tend sa large croupe
226
Belle hideusement d'un ulcère à l'anus.
~ Arthur Rimbaud,#NFDB
294:A church that truly understands the implications of the biblical gospel, letting the “word of Christ dwell in [it] richly” (Col 3:16), will look like an unusual hybrid of various church forms and stereotypes. Because of the inside-out, substitutionary atonement aspect, the church will place great emphasis on personal conversion, experiential grace renewal, evangelism, outreach, and church planting. This makes it look like an evangelical-charismatic church. Because of the upside-down, kingdom/incarnation aspect, the church will place great emphasis on deep community, cell groups or house churches, radical giving and sharing of resources, spiritual disciplines, racial reconciliation, and living with the poor. This makes it look like an Anabaptist “peace” church. Because of the forward-back, kingdom/restoration aspect, the church will place great emphasis on seeking the welfare of the city, neighborhood and civic involvement, cultural engagement, and training people to work in “secular” vocations out of a Christian worldview. This makes it look like a mainline church or, perhaps, a Kuyperian Reformed church. Very few churches, denominations, or movements integrate all of these ministries and emphases. Yet I believe that a comprehensive view of the biblical gospel — one that grasps the gospel’s inside-out, upside-down, and forward-back aspects — will champion and cultivate them all. This is what we mean by a Center Church. ~ Timothy J Keller, #NFDB
295:Vrònskij andò nella vettura dietro al capotreno e all'entrata dello scompartimento si fermò, per lasciare il passo a una signora che usciva.
Col tatto abituale dell'uomo di mondo, da una sola occhiata all'aspetto esteriore di questa signora Vrònskij giudicò in modo certo ch'ella apparteneva all'alta società. Egli si scusò e stava per andare nella vettura, ma provò la necessità di guardarla ancora una volta, non perché ella fosse molto bella, non per quell'eleganza e quella grazia modesta che si vedevano in tutta la sua persona, ma perché nell'espressione del volto leggiardo, quand'ella gli era passata vicino, c'era qualcosa di particolarmente carezzevole e tenero.
Quand'egli si volse a guardarla, ella pure voltò il capo. I scintillanti occhi grigi, che sembravan neri per le ciglia folte, si fermarono amichevolmente, con attenzione sul volto di lui, come se ella lo riconoscesse, e immediatamente si portarono sulla folla che passava, come cercando qualcuno. Vrònskij fece a tempo a notare l'animazione rattenuta che balenava sul volto di lei e svolazzava fra gli occhi scintillanti e il sorriso appena percettibile, che incurvava le sue labbra vermiglie. Come se un'abbondanza di qualcosa colmasse talmente il suo essere, da esprimersi all'infuori della sua volontà ora nello scintillio dello sguardo, ora nel sorriso. Ella aveva spento deliberatamente quella luce nei suoi occhi, ma essa splendeva suo malgrado nel sorriso appena percettibile. ~ Leo Tolstoy,#NFDB
296:A me m'ha sempre colpito questa faccenda dei quadri. Stanno su per anni, poi senza che accada nulla, ma nulla dico, fran, giù, cadono. Stanno lì attaccati al chiodo, nessuno gli fa niente, ma loro a un certo punto, fran, cadono giù, come sassi. Nel silenzio più assoluto, con tutto immobile intorno, non una mosca che vola, e loro, fran. Non c'è una ragione. Perché proprio in quell'istante? Non si sa. Fran. Cos'è che succede a un chiodo per farlo decidere che non ne può più? C'ha un'anima, anche lui, poveretto? Prende delle decisioni? Ne ha discusso a lungo col quadro, erano incerti sul da farsi, ne parlavano tutte le sere, da anni, poi hanno deciso una data, un'ora, un minuto, un istante, è quello, fran. O lo sapevano già dall'inizio, i due, era già tutto combinato, guarda io mollo tutto tra sette anni, per me va bene, okay allora intesi per il 13 maggio, okay, verso le sei, facciamo sei meno un quarto, d'accordo, allora buonanotte, 'notte. Sette anni dopo, 13 maggio, sei meno un quarto, fran.
Non si capisce. È una di quelle cose che è meglio che non ci pensi, se no ci esci matto. Quando cade un quadro. Quando ti svegli un mattino, e non la ami più. Quando apri il giornale e leggi che è scoppiata la guerra. Quando vedi un treno e pensi io devo andarmene da qui. Quando ti guardi allo specchio e ti accorgi che sei vecchio. Quando, in mezzo all'Oceano, Novecento alzò lo sguardo dal piatto e mi disse: "A New York, fra tre giorni, io scenderò da questa nave". Ci rimasi secco. Fran. ~ Alessandro Baricco,#NFDB
297:Il processo durò tre anni, nientemeno! tre anni di prigione e senza vedere il sole. Sicché quegli accusati parevano tanti morti della sepoltura, ogni volta che li conducevano ammanettati al tribunale. [...] Li facevano alzare in piedi ad uno ad uno. - Voi come vi chiamate? - E ciascuno si sentiva dire la sua, nome e cognome e quel che aveva fatto. Gli avvocati armeggiavano, fra le chiacchiere, coi larghi maniconi pendenti, e si scalmanavano, facevano la schiuma alla bocca, asciugandosela subito col fazzoletto bianco, tirandoci su una presa di tabacco. I giudici sonnecchiavano, dietro le lenti dei loro occhiali, che agghiacciavano il cuore. Di faccia erano seduti in fila dodici galantuomini, stanchi, annoiati, che sbadigliavano, si grattavano la barba, o ciangottavano fra di loro. Certo si dicevano che l'avevano scappata bella a non essere stati dei galantuomini di quel paesetto lassù, quando avevano fatto la libertà. E quei poveretti cercavano di leggere nelle loro facce. Poi se ne andarono a confabulare fra di loro, e gli imputati aspettavano pallidi, e cogli occhi fissi su quell'uscio chiuso. Come rientrarono, il loro capo, quello che parlava colla mano sulla pancia, era quasi pallido al pari degli accusati, e disse: - Sul mio onore e sulla mia coscienza!...
Il carbonaio, mentre tornavano a mettergli le manette, balbettava: - Dove mi conducete? - In galera? - O perché? Non mi è toccato neppure un palmo di terra! Se avevano detto che c'era la libertà!... -
[Libertà, 1882] ~ Giovanni Verga,#NFDB
298:Aspetta qua, - disse il Bandi al D’Andrea. - Vado a prevenirla. Se s’ostina ancora, entrerai per forza. Miopi tutti e due, parlavano vicinissimi, in piedi, l’uno di fronte all’altro. Parevano fratelli, della stessa età, della stessa corporatura: alti, magri, rigidi, di quella rigidezza angustiosa di chi fa tutto a puntino, con meticolosità. Ed era raro il caso che, parlando così tra loro, l’uno non aggiustasse all’altro col dito il sellino delle lenti sul naso, o il nodo della cravatta sotto il mento, oppure, non trovando nulla da aggiustare, non toccasse all’altro i bottoni della giacca. Parlavano, del resto, pochissimo. E la tristezza taciturna della loro indole si mostrava chiaramente nello squallore dei volti. Cresciuti insieme, avevano studiato ajutandosi a vicenda fino all’Università, dove poi l’uno s’era laureato in legge, l’altro in medicina. Divisi ora, durante il giorno, dalle diverse professioni, sul tramonto facevano ancora insieme quotidianamente la loro passeggiata lungo il viale all’uscita del paese. Si conoscevano così a fondo, che bastava un lieve cenno, uno sguardo, una parola, perché l’uno comprendesse subito il pensiero dell’altro. Dimodoché quella loro passeggiata principiava ogni volta con un breve scambio di frasi e seguitavano poi in silenzio, come se l’uno avesse dato all’altro da ruminare per un pezzo. E andavano a testa bassa, come due cavalli stanchi; entrambi con le mani dietro la schiena. A nessuno dei due veniva mai la tentazione di volgere un po’ il capo verso la ~ Luigi Pirandello, #NFDB
299:God GOD, noun [Saxon god; German gott; Dutch god; Swedish and Danish gud; Gothic goth or guth; Pers. goda or choda; Hindoo, khoda, codam. As this word and good are written exactly alike in Saxon, it has been inferred that God was named from his goodness. But the corresponding words in most of the other languages, are not the same, and I believe no instance can be found of a name given to the Supreme Being from the attribute of goodness. It is probably an idea too remote from the rude conceptions of men in early ages. Except the word Jehovah, I have found the name of the Supreme Being to be usually taken from his supremacy or power, and to be equivalent to lord or ruler, from some root signifying to press or exert force. Now in the present case, we have evidence that this is the sense of this word, for in Persic goda is rendered dominus, possessor, princeps, as is a derivative of the same word. See Cast. Lex. Col. 231.] 1. The Supreme Being; Jehovah; the eternal and infinite spirit, the creator, and the sovereign of the universe. God is a spirit; and they that worship him, must worship him in spirit and in truth. John 4. 2. A false god; a heathen deity; an idol. Fear not the gods of the Amorites. Judges 6. 3. A prince; a ruler; a magistrate or judge; an angel. Thou shalt not revile the gods, nor curse the ruler of thy people. Exodus 22. Psalm 97. [Gods here is a bad translation.] 4. Any person or thing exalted too much in estimation, or deified and honored as the chief good. Whose god is their belly. Philippians 3. ~ Noah Webster, #NFDB
300:1 JOHN—NOTE ON 2:15 Do not love the world. Although John often repeats the importance of love and that God is love (4:7–8), he also reveals that God hates a certain type of love: love of the world (John 15:18–20). In this text, John expresses a particular form of the fourth test (i.e., the test of love). Positively, the Christian loves God and fellow Christians. Negatively, an absence of love for the world must habitually characterize the love life of those to be considered genuinely born again. “Love” here signifies affection and devotion. God, not the world, must have the first place in the Christian’s life (Matt. 10:37–39; Phil. 3:20). the world. This is not a reference to the physical, material world but the invisible spiritual system of evil dominated by Satan (see notes on 2 Cor. 10:3–5) and all that it offers in opposition to God, his word, and his people (cf. 1 John 5:19; John 12:31; 1 Cor. 1:21; 2 Cor. 4:4; James 4:4; 2 Pet. 1:4). the love of the Father is not in him. Either one is a genuine Christian marked by love and obedience to God, or one is a non-Christian in rebellion against God, i.e., in love with and enslaved by the satanically controlled world system (Eph. 2:1–3; Col. 1:13; James 4:4). No middle ground between these two alternatives exists for someone claiming to be born again. The false teachers had no such singular love, but were devoted to the world’s philosophy and wisdom, thereby revealing their love for the world and their unsaved state (cf. Matt. 6:24; Luke 16:13; 1 Tim. 6:20; 2 Pet. 2:12–22). ~ Anonymous, #NFDB
301:«Gesù» disse «non avrò dunque il mio altoparlante?»
«Se è stabilito che tu lo abbia lo avrai. Ma se lo avrai non sarà certo perché tu abbia indotto Dio a mutare quanto prestabilito per farti un favore personale. E Lo dovrai ringraziare solo perché ti avrà concesso la grazia di compiere una azione in accordo con la divina armonia che regola ogni cosa dell'universo. Don Camillo, tu cammini soprappensiero ed ecco che, nell'attraversare la ferrovia,
finisci con un piede impigliato non si sa come in una rotaia e, per quanti sforzi tu faccia, non riesci a toglierti di là e nessuno ti può aiutare. La linea ferroviaria è doppia e ha due binari affiancati e tu non sai su quale dei due binari passerà il treno. E tu domandi aiuto al tuo Dio. E, poco dopo, ecco un fischio: il treno passa sull'altro binario. Tu sei salvo e ringrazi Dio di aver predisposto le cose in modo tale che tu non finissi impigliato nell'altro binario. Non puoi ringraziare Iddio di aver fatto passare il treno dove tu volevi che passasse. Il treno era già in viaggio, quando tu sei finito col piede nella rotaia. E il treno camminava sull'altro binario. Tu non puoi pensare che Dio, per favorirti, lo abbia tolto da un binario per metterlo in quello vicino. Lo devi perciò ringraziare soltanto perché il treno camminava nell'altra rotaia.»
Don Camillo si inchinò e si segnò:
«Se vincerò al totocalcio Vi ringrazierò non di avermi fatto vincere, ma perché ho vinto» disse.
«E quindi non mi rimprovererai nel caso che tu non vincessi» concluse il Cristo sorridendo. ~ Giovannino Guareschi,#NFDB
302:In 1996 Dorothy Mackey wrote an Op-ed piece, “Violence from comrades a fact of life for military women.” ABC News 20/ 20 did a segment on rape in the military. By November four women came forward at Aberdeen Proving Ground, in Maryland, about a pattern of rape by drill sergeants. In 1997 the military finds three black drill sergeants to scapegoat. They were sent to prison and this left the commanding generals and colonels untouched to retire quietly. The Army appointed a panel to investigate sexual harassment. One of the panelists was the sergeant Major of the Army, Eugene McKinney.
On hearing his nomination, former associates and one officer came forward with charges of sexual coercion and misconduct. In 1998 he was acquitted of all charges after women spoke (of how they were being stigmatized, their careers stopped, and their characters questioned. A Congressional panel studied military investigative practices. In 1998, the Court of Appeals ruled against Dorothy Mackay. She had been outspoken on media and highly visible. There is an old Arabic saying “When the hen crows cut off her head.”“This court finds that Col. Milam and Lt. Col. Elmore were acting in the scope of their duties” in 1991-1992 when Capt. Mackey alleged they harassed, intimidated and assaulted her. A legislative remedy was asked for and she appealed to the Supreme Court. Of course the Supreme Court refused to hear the case in 1999, as it always has under the feres doctrine. Her case was cited to block the suit of one of the Aberdeen survivors as well! ~ Diane Chamberlain,#NFDB
303:Western people today may have acquaintances, but few have relationships that even remotely approximate the honest, vulnerable, committed, covenantal relationships that weave the body of Christ together in the New Testament. Related to this, while the New Testament views the church as a community of people who unite around a mission, who spend significant amounts of time together in study, worship, and ministry, and who help one another become “fully mature in Christ” (Col. 1:28; cf. Eph. 4:13; James 1:4), most Westerners assume church is a place they go to once a week to sit alongside strangers, sing a few songs, and listen to a message before returning to their insulated lives. So too, whereas the New Testament envisions the bride of Christ as a community of people who convince the world that Jesus is for real by the way our unity reflects and participates in the loving unity of the Trinity (John 17:20–23), the Western church today has been reduced to little more than a brief gathering of consumers who are otherwise unconnected and who attend the weekend event with hopes of getting something that will benefit their lives. From a kingdom perspective, this individualistic and impoverished consumer-driven view of the church is nothing short of tragic, as is the perpetual immaturity of the believers who are trapped in it. If we are serious about our covenant with Christ, we have no choice but to get serious about cultivating covenant relationships with other disciples. There are no individual brides of Christ. Jesus is not a polygamist! There ~ Gregory A Boyd, #NFDB
304:O dieses ist das Tier, das es nicht giebt.
Sie wußtens nicht und habens jeden Falls
– sein Wandeln, seine Haltung, seinen Hals,
bis in des stillen Blickes Licht – geliebt.
Zwar war es nicht. Doch weil sie’s liebten, ward
ein reines Tier. Sie ließen immer Raum.
Und in dem Raume, klar und ausgespart,
erhob es leicht sein Haupt und brauchte kaum
zu sein
È questo l’animale favoloso,
che non esiste. Non veduto mai,
ne amaron le movenze, il collo, il passo:
fino la luce dello sguardo calmo.
Pure “non era”. Ma perchè lo amarono,
divenne. Intatto. Gli lasciavan sempre
più spazio. E in quello spazio chiaro, etereo:
serbato a lui – levò, leggiero, il capo.
And here we have the creature that is not.
But they did not allow this , and as it happens
- his gait and bearing, his arched neck,
even the light in his eyes - they loved it all.
Yet truly he was not. But because they loved him
the beast was seen. And always they made room.
And in that space, empty and unbounded,
he raised an elegant head, yet hardly fought
for his existence.
Oh ! C'est elle, la bête qui n'existe pas.
Eux, ils n'en savaient rien, et de toutes façons
- son allure et son port, son col et même la lumière
calme de son regard - ils l'ont aimée.
Elle, c'est vrai, n'existait point. Mais parce qu'ils l'aimaient
bête pure, elle fut. Toujours ils lui laissaient l'espace.
Et dans ce clair espace épargné, doucement,
Elle leva la tête, ayant à peine besoin d'être. ~ Rainer Maria Rilke,#NFDB
305:Truly, I advise you: depart from me, and guard yourselves against Zarathustra! And better still: be ashamed of him! Perhaps he has deceived you.
The man of knowledge must be able not only to love his enemies, but also to hate his friends.
One pays back a teacher badly if one remain merely a scholar. And why will you not pluck at my wreath?
You venerate me; but what if your veneration should some day col- lapse? Take heed lest a statue crush you!
You say, you believe in Zarathustra? But of what account is Zarathustra! you are my believers: but of what account are all believers!
You had not yet sought yourselves: then did you find me. So do all believers; therefore all belief is of so little account.
Now do I bid you lose me and find yourselves; and only when you have all denied me, will I return to you.
Truly, with other eyes, my brothers, shall I then seek my lost ones; with another love shall I then love you.
And once again shall you have become friends to me, and children of one hope: then will I be with you for the third time, to celebrate the great noontide with you.
And it is the great noontide, when man is in the middle of his course between animal and overman, and celebrates his advance to the evening as his highest hope: for it is the advance to a new morning.
At such time will the down-goer bless himself, that he should be an over-goer; and the sun of his knowledge will be at noontide.
"Dead are all the Gods: now do we desire the overman to live." - Let this be our final will at the great noontide! -
Thus spoke Zarathustra. ~ Friedrich Nietzsche,#NFDB
306:594 1 Peter 3:22 concludes that the context of the proclamation Christ made was the subjugation of “angels, authorities, and powers.” Heavenly “principalities, powers, and authorities” is a recurring concept in the New Testament (Col. 1:16, 2:13-15; Eph. 1:20-23). It is a concept that assumes earthly rulers and powers are animated and empowered by spiritual or cosmic rulers and power behind them. Thus, Paul could encourage those Christians who were suffering from the earthly rulers and powers who persecuted them; “For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places” (Eph. 6:12-13). In other words, the real enemies of the persecuted Christians were the spiritual powers behind their earthly persecuting powers. This is not a denial of the human evil, but rather a drawing back of the curtain to see the ultimate enemy with more clarity. These spiritual and earthly “powers, rulers, authorities, and thrones,” are the Seed of the Serpent that had been involved in the cosmic War of the Seed against Messiah. It is these rulers, both heavenly and earthly, who did not understand the mystery of the Gospel of redemption through Messiah’s suffering. They thought that killing the Chosen One, the Messiah, would bring them victory. 1 Corinthians 2:7–9 But we impart a secret and hidden wisdom of God, which God decreed before the ages for our glory. None of the rulers of this age understood this, for if they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory. ~ Brian Godawa, #NFDB
307:E solo per un attimo avevo raggiunto quell'apice d'estasi che avevo sempre desiderato raggiungere, che era il completo passaggio attraverso il tempo cronologico nelle ombre senza tempo, e stupore nella desolazione del regno mortale, e la sensazione di morte che mi batteva ai calcagni perché andassi avanti, con un fantasma che stava alle calcagna di se stesso, e io che correvo verso un trampolino dal quale si tuffavano tutti gli angeli per volare nel vuoto sacro della vacuità non creata, le potenti e inconcepibili radiazioni che splendono nella luminosa Essenza Mentale, innumerevoli regioni del loto che sbocciavano in un magico sciamare di falene nel cielo. Potevo sentire un indescrivibile rombo ribollente che non era nelle mie orecchie ma dovunque e non aveva niente a che fare col suono. Capii che ero morto ed ero tornato alla luce innumerevoli volte ma solo non me lo ricordavo, soprattutto perché i passaggi dalla vita alla morte e di nuovo alla vita sono così fantomaticamente facili, una magica azione per nulla, come cadere addormentati e svegliarsi di nuovo un milione di volte, la pura casualità e la profonda ignoranza di ciò. Capii che era solo a causa della stabilità della Mente intrinseca che aveva luogo questo lieve ondeggiare del nascere e del morire, come l'azione del vento su una distesa di acqua pura, serena, simile a uno specchio. Provavo un senso di benedizione dolce, travolgente, come un grosso getto di eroina nella vena principale; come un sorso di vino nel tardo pomeriggio che ti fa rabbrividire; i piedi mi formicolavano. Mi pareva che sarei morto da un momento all'altro. Ma non morii... ~ Jack Kerouac, #NFDB
308:E cosa c'è di bello nella coppia scusa?"
"La complicità, il senso di appartenenza. A me, per esempio, piace conoscere una persona a memoria"
"Come ti piace conoscere una persona a memoria? E la routine? La monotonia? Che cos'hanno de bello?"
"No, non parlo di routine o monotonia, ma di sapere a memoria una persona. Non so come spiegartelo, è come quando studi le poesie a scuola, in quel senso intendo a memoria"
"Questa non l'ho capita"
"Ma si dai, come una poesia. Sai come si dice in inglese studiare a memoria? By heart, col cuore. Anche in francese si dice par coeur... ecco, in questo senso intendo. Conoscere una persona a memoria, significa, come quando ripeti una poesia, prendere anche un po' di quel ritmo che le appartiene. Una poesia, come una persona, ha dei tempi suoi. Per cui conoscere una persona a memoria significa sincronizzare i battiti del proprio cuore con i suoi, farsi penetrare dal suo ritmo. Ecco, questo mi piace. Mi piace stare con una persona intimamente perché vuol dire correre il rischio di diventare leggermente diversi da se stessi. Alterarsi un po'. Perché non è essere se stessi che mi affascina in un rapporto a due, ma avere il coraggio di essere anche altro da sé. Che poi è quel te stesso che non conoscerai mai. A me piace amare una persona e conoscerla a memoria come una poesia, perché come una poesia non la si può comprendere mai fino in fondo. Infatti ho capito che amando non conoscerai altro che te stesso. Il massimo che puoi capire dell'altro è il massimo che puoi capire di te stesso. Per questo entrare intimamente in relazione con una persona è importante, perché diventa un viaggio conoscitivo esistenziale". ~ Fabio Volo,#NFDB
309:Classe dirigente Massimo Gramellini | 269 parole A poche ore dalla proclamazione dei risultati, in Gran Bretagna i tre leader sconfitti si sono dimessi e quello vittorioso ha già ricevuto l’incarico (reincarico, nel suo caso) dalla Regina. Se fosse solo un problema di leggi, anche noi col brutale Italicum potremmo presto vantare lo stesso genere di chiarezza istituzionale. In realtà le leggi contano molto meno dei caratteri e delle consuetudini. Nemmeno il più perfetto dei sistemi metterà mai un italiano nelle condizioni di accettare l’esito del voto o indurrà gli sconfitti a dimettersi, dichiarandosi sconfitti anziché «non vincitori». E neanche la più straordinaria riforma costituzionale potrà bonificare la vergogna della composizione delle liste elettorali, che attingono a un personale politico scadente e spesso impresentabile. L’infornata delle imminenti Regionali sembra un trattato sociologico sugli orrori della società: si va dal postfascista non pentito all’ex leghista che chiama i gay «culattoni», dal candidato in odore di camorra all’amico di Cosentino nella cui abitazione al momento dell’arresto fu trovato un fucile calibro 12. Se poi si pensa che tutti questi begli esemplari convivono nello stesso partito e che questo partito è quello che esprime un presidente del Consiglio che ha messo la trasparenza e il merito ai primi posti del suo programma, ci sarebbe da chiedere asilo politico alla Regina. O più banalmente da chiedere a Renzi, della cui buona fede resto convinto, di porre mano ai criteri di selezione della nuova classe dirigente, perché un baraccone zavorrato da mediocri, riciclati e inquisiti rischia di mandare a fondo noi, ma anche lui. ~ Anonymous, #NFDB
310:Aveva una paglietta ad ali spioventi, in séguito alle numerose traversie incontrate tanto al mare quanto in montagna, e rotolata giù per pazzi colpi di vento da chine dirute, mentre era lì sudato e felice in meraviglie vocali di «ah!» e di «oh!», per l’aria, per il fresco, per il panorama, e «spiegava» tutti i monti alle ragazze gialle, rosse e celesti, compreso il Finsteraarhorn; le quali si riassettavano il golf e la zazzera, e dopo tre minuti li avevano dimenticati in blocco. Una volta, rapitagli da una folata di città, la paglietta schivò per miracolo vero la zampa anteriore destra d’un enorme cavallo della ditta Fratelli Gondrand, che, fermo da tre ore sui quattro piedi, si era dato a ingannar il tempo con uno scalpito lento, quasi ritmico. Ma siccome questo mastodontico quadrupede aveva appena finito di concedersi un certo suo spettacoloso sollievo (nonostante avesse la bella coda intrecciata, come le trecce d’una educanda di lusso), la paglietta la si era mezzo infradiciata di dentro e di fuori, che poi gocciolò per un pezzo e bisognò lavarla e sbiancarla e diede gran da fare in casa: e i rimproveri di donna Teresa non finivano più: Bubù rise tanto, che la cosa gli finì a scappellotti a letto senza le frutta. «Te l’ho detto cento volte di legartela col cordoncino! Ma quando t’impunti, sei un testone, un vero testone! Guarda un po’ che roba.»
(Difatti l’acido ippurico era stato generoso.)
Allora si avvezzò a legarla davvero: così voleva il destino. E siccome la signora gli mise un cordone proporzionato alla sua corporatura e alla robustezza immortale della bicicletta, pareva la corda del trolley d’un tram d’animo buono, che vada adagio adagio. ~ Carlo Emilio Gadda,#NFDB
311:Personalmente, per quel tanto che conosco della storia dell'lnquisizione spagnola in Sicilia, nella mostra di Madrid mi imbatto in vecchie conoscenze e particolarmente in quella di Luis Rincon de Paramo (o Paramo del Rincon) che, per la verità, prima che nei fasti dell'lnquisizione di Sicilia, ho conosciuto nel Dizionario Filosofico di Voltaire, appunto alla voce Inquisizione. “Questo Paramo — dice Voltaire — era un uomo semplice, esattissimo nelle date, che non trascurava alcun fatto che avesse un qualche interesse, e calcolava col massimo scrupolo il numero delle vittime umane che il Sant’Uffizio aveva immolato in tutti i paesi”; e prima lo aveva proclamato “uno dei più rispettabili scrittori e dei più vivi splendori del Sant’Uffizio”. Il fatto è che il libro di Paramo lo divertiva, gli permetteva di affilarvi sopra la più micidiale ironia. Si direbbe, anzi, che, una volta imbattutosi nel libro di Paramo, Voltaire non abbia sentito il bisogno di cercare altro, sull’Inquisizione; e ragionevolmente. Paramo risponde così pienamente, così esattamente all’avversione laica nei confronti dell’istituzione, del fanatismo su cui si fonda, delle sue procedure e dei suoi uomini, che basta soltanto riassumerlo o citarlo testualmente per conseguire l’effetto di alimentare e ingigantire quell’avversione. Voltaire lo riassume: oggettivamente, impassibilmente. Che è sempre il modo migliore di fronteggiare il fanatismo, anche se ben sappiamo che non sempre il ridicolo uccide (avendo attraversato il fascismo negli anni suoi più comici, tra la conquista dell’Etiopia e la seconda guerra mondiale, abbiamo coi nostri occhi constatato che al ridicolo non solo si sopravvive ma se ne può trarre nutrimento e forza). ~ Leonardo Sciascia, #NFDB
312:Eccola dunque col pensiero laggiù.
Le par d’essere ancora fanciulla, arrampicata sul belvedere del prete, in una sera di maggio. Una grande luna di rame sorge dal mare, e tutto il mondo pare d’oro e di perla. La fisarmonica riempie coi suoi gridi lamentosi il cortile illuminato da un fuoco d’alaterni il cui chiarore rossastro fa spiccare sul grigio del muro la figura svelta e bruna del suonatore, i visi violacei delle donne e dei ragazzi che ballano il ballo sardo. Le ombre si muovono fantastiche sull’erba calpestata e sui muri della chiesa; brillano i bottoni d’oro, i galloni argentei dei costumi, i tasti della fisarmonica: il resto si perde nella penombra perlacea della notte lunare. Noemi ricordava di non aver mai preso parte diretta alla festa, mentre le sorelle maggiori ridevano e si divertivano, e Lia accovacciata come una lepre in un angolo erboso del cortile forse fin da quel tempo meditava la fuga.
La festa durava nove giorni di cui gli ultimi tre diventavano un ballo tondo continuo accompagnato da suoni e canti: Noemi stava sempre sul belvedere, tra gli avanzi del banchetto; intorno a lei scintillavano le bottiglie vuote, i piatti rotti, qualche mela d’un verde ghiacciato, un vassoio e un cucchiaino dimenticati; anche le stelle oscillavano sopra il cortile come scosse dal ritmo della danza. No, ella non ballava, non rideva, ma le bastava veder la gente a divertirsi perché sperava di poter anche lei prender parte alla festa della vita.
Ma gli anni eran passati e la festa della vita s’era svolta lontana dal paesetto, e per poterne prender parte sua sorella Lia era fuggita di casa…
Lei, Noemi, era rimasta sul balcone cadente della vecchia dimora come un tempo sul belvedere del prete. ~ Grazia Deledda,#NFDB
313:Safety-Clutch
Once I seen a human ruin
In a elevator-well.
And his members was bestrewin'
All the place where he had fell.
And I says, apostrophisin'
That uncommon woful wreck:
'Your position's so surprisin'
That I tremble for your neck!'
Then that ruin, smilin' sadly
And impressive, up and spoke:
'Well, I wouldn't tremble badly,
For it's been a fortnight broke.'
Then, for further comprehension
Of his attitude, he begs
I will focus my attention
On his various arms and legs-How they all are contumacious;
Where they each, respective, lie;
How one trotter proves ungracious,
T' other one an alibi.
These particulars is mentioned
For to show his dismal state,
Which I wasn't first intentioned
To specifical relate.
None is worser to be dreaded
That I ever have heard tell
Than the gent's who there was spreaded
In that elevator-well.
Now this tale is allegoric-It is figurative all,
For the well is metaphoric
And the feller didn't fall.
410
I opine it isn't moral
For a writer-man to cheat,
And despise to wear a laurel
As was gotten by deceit.
For 'tis Politics intended
By the elevator, mind,
It will boost a person splendid
If his talent is the kind.
Col. Bryan had the talent
(For the busted man is him)
And it shot him up right gallant
Till his head began to swim.
Then the rope it broke above him
And he painful came to earth
Where there's nobody to love him
For his detrimented worth.
Though he's living' none would know him,
Or at leastwise not as such.
Moral of this woful poem:
Frequent oil your safety-clutch.
~ Ambrose Bierce,#NFDB
314:Conclusioni futuriste. Per evitare lo spopolamento, terribile per la garanzia futura dell’integrità dei territori nazionali occorre: 1º Abolire il matrimonio perchè dannoso alla libera procreazione e non rispondente ai giusti scopi di umanità e di libertà; 2º Permettere all’uomo maschio il possesso di più femmine e viceversa; 3º Favorire il libero amplesso; 4º Rendere la donna indipendente al pari dell’uomo dando ad essa il mezzo di vivere senza bisogno di fare la mantenuta del maschio. Onorarla se s’approssima a diventare madre, proteggerla, glorificarla perchè essa è il simbolo della proprietà di uno stato; 5º Istituire la tassa di filiatico a carico di tutti quegli uomini atti a procreare figli sani; 6º Col reddito di questa tassa fondare in tutte le città degli Istituti di allevamento e di educazione della prole , la cui gestione appartenga allo stato, ove i figli saranno allevati, educati ed avviati ad un’arte, professione o mestiere secondo le loro tendenze e volontà, tutto a spese del Governo, senza alcuna ingerenza o compartecipazione dei genitori; 7º Eguagliare i figli bastardi ai figli legali; 8º Dichiarare in seguito alla libertà di procreazione l’inutilità dei postriboli ed abolirli e vietarli come pericolosi e nocivi alla salute e agli interessi della Nazione; 9º Spogliarsi dal ridicolo sentimentalismo della santità della famiglia, dell’amore fraterno, paterno, figliale, materno, liberarsi da tutto ciò che significa poesia, sentimentalismo, gelosia, amore ideale o platonico, da tutto ciò che in una parola sola suona convenzioni passatiste, tradizione, usanza, esperienza, sapienza e castità. Arturo Blangino ». ~ Filippo Tommaso Marinetti, #NFDB
315:_Conclusioni futuriste._ Per evitare lo spopolamento, terribile per la garanzia futura dell’integrità dei territori nazionali occorre: 1º Abolire il matrimonio perchè dannoso alla libera procreazione e non rispondente ai giusti scopi di umanità e di libertà; 2º Permettere all’uomo maschio il possesso di più femmine e viceversa; 3º Favorire il libero amplesso; 4º Rendere la donna indipendente al pari dell’uomo dando ad essa il mezzo di vivere senza bisogno di fare la mantenuta del maschio. Onorarla se s’approssima a diventare madre, proteggerla, glorificarla perchè essa è il simbolo della proprietà di uno stato; 5º Istituire la _tassa di filiatico_ a carico di tutti quegli uomini atti a procreare figli sani; 6º Col reddito di questa tassa fondare in tutte le città degli _Istituti di allevamento e di educazione della prole_, la cui gestione appartenga allo stato, ove i figli saranno allevati, educati ed avviati ad un’arte, professione o mestiere secondo le loro tendenze e volontà, tutto a spese del Governo, senza alcuna ingerenza o compartecipazione dei genitori; 7º Eguagliare i figli bastardi ai figli legali; 8º Dichiarare in seguito alla libertà di procreazione l’inutilità dei postriboli ed abolirli e vietarli come pericolosi e nocivi alla salute e agli interessi della Nazione; 9º Spogliarsi dal ridicolo sentimentalismo della santità della famiglia, dell’amore fraterno, paterno, figliale, materno, liberarsi da tutto ciò che significa poesia, sentimentalismo, gelosia, amore ideale o platonico, da tutto ciò che in una parola sola suona convenzioni passatiste, tradizione, usanza, esperienza, sapienza e castità. _Arturo Blangino_». ~ Filippo Tommaso Marinetti, #NFDB
316:Non credo che la pratica della scienza possa andar disgiunta dal coraggio. Essa tratta il sapere, che è un pro¬dotto del dubbio; e col procacciare sapere a tutti su ogni cosa, tende a destare il dubbio in tutti. […] I moti dei corpi celesti ci sono divenuti più chiari; ma i moti dei potenti restano pur sempre imperscruta-¬bili ai popoli. […] Finché l'umanità continuerà a brancolare nella sua nebbia millenaria di superstizioni e di venerande sentenze, finché sarà troppo ignorante per sviluppare le sue proprie energie, non sarà nemmeno capace di svilup¬pare le energie della natura che le vengono svelate. […] Se gli uomini di scienza non reagiscono all'intimidazione dei potenti egoisti e si li¬mitano ad accumulare sapere per sapere, la scienza può rimanere fiaccata per sempre, ed ogni nuova macchina non sarà fonte che di nuovi triboli per l'uomo. E quan¬do, coll'andar del tempo, avrete scoperto tutto lo scopribile, il vostro progresso non sarà che un progressivo allontanamento dall'umanità. Tra voi e l'umanità può scavarsi un abisso così grande, che ad ogni vostro eureka rischierebbe di rispondere un grido di dolore universa¬le... […] Se io avessi resistito, i naturalisti avrebbero po¬tuto sviluppare qualcosa di simile a ciò che per i medici è il giuramento d'Ippocrate: il voto solenne di far uso della scienza ad esclusivo vantaggio dell'umanità. Così stando le cose, il massimo in cui si può sperare è una progenie di gnomi inventivi, pronti a farsi assoldare per qualsiasi scopo. […] Per alcuni anni ebbi la forza di una pubblica autorità; e misi la mia sapienza a disposizione dei potenti perché la usassero, o non la usassero, o ne abusassero, a seconda dei loro fini.. Ho tradito la mia professione; e quando un uomo ha fatto ciò che ho fatto io, la sua presenza non può es-sere tollerata nei ranghi della scienza ~ Bertolt Brecht, #NFDB
317:28. Do not repeat the tactics which have gained you one victory, but let your methods be regulated by the infinite variety of circumstances. [As Wang Hsi sagely remarks: “There is but one root-principle underlying victory, but the tactics which lead up to it are infinite in number.” With this compare Col. Henderson: “The rules of strategy are few and simple. They may be learned in a week. They may be taught by familiar illustrations or a dozen diagrams. But such knowledge will no more teach a man to lead an army like Napoleon than a knowledge of grammar will teach him to write like Gibbon.”] 29. Military tactics are like unto water; for water in its natural course runs away from high places and hastens downwards. 30. So in war, the way is to avoid what is strong and to strike at what is weak. [Like water, taking the line of least resistance.] 31. Water shapes its course according to the nature of the ground over which it flows; the soldier works out his victory in relation to the foe whom he is facing. 32. Therefore, just as water retains no constant shape, so in warfare there are no constant conditions. 33. He who can modify his tactics in relation to his opponent and thereby succeed in winning, may be called a heaven-born captain. 34. The five elements (water, fire, wood, metal, earth) are not always equally predominant; [That is, as Wang Hsi says: “they predominate alternately.”] the four seasons make way for each other in turn. [Literally, “have no invariable seat.”] There are short days and long; the moon has its periods of waning and waxing. [Cf. V. ss. 6. The purport of the passage is simply to illustrate the want of fixity in war by the changes constantly taking place in Nature. The comparison is not very happy, however, because the regularity of the phenomena which Sun Tzu mentions is by no means paralleled in war.] ~ Sun Tzu, #NFDB
318:One wonders why no one in church history has ever been considered a heretic for being unloving. People were anathematized and often tortured and killed for disagreeing on matters of doctrine or on the authority of the church. But no one on record has ever been so much as rebuked for not loving as Christ loved.
Yet if love is to be placed above all other considerations (Col. 3:14; 1 Peter 4:8), if nothing has any value apart from love (1 Cor. 13:1–3), and if the only thing that matters is faith working in love (Gal. 5:6), how is it that possessing Christlike love has never been considered the central test of orthodoxy? How is it that those who tortured and burned heretics were not themselves considered heretics for doing so? Was this not heresy of the worst sort? How is it that those who perpetrated such things were not only not deemed heretics but often were (and yet are) held up as “heroes of the faith”?
If there is an answer to this question, I believe it lies in the deceptive power of the sword. While God uses the sword of governments to preserve law, order, and justice, as we have seen, there is a corrupting principality and power always at work. Much like the magical ring in Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings, the sword has a demonic power to deceive us. When we pick it up, we come under its power. It convinces us that our use of violence is a justified means to a noble end. It intoxicates us with the unquenchable dream of redemptive violence and blinds us to our own iniquities, thereby making us feel righteous in overpowering the unrighteousness of others. Most of the slaughtering done throughout history has been done by people who sincerely believed they were promoting “the good.” Everyone thinks their wars are just, if not holy. Marxists, Nazis, the Khmer Rouge, Islamic terrorists, and Christian crusaders have this in common. ~ Gregory A Boyd,#NFDB
319:It was awfully quiet. Chicago only gets this quiet when it snows, he thought. And then he flipped open the phone, pressed the voice button, and said “Katherine.” He said it softly, reverently.
Five rings and then her voice mail. Hey, it’s Katherine, he heard, and in the background cars rushed by. They’d been walking home together from the RadioShack when she recorded the message. I’m not, uh. And she uhed, he remembered, because he’d goosed her butt as she tried to talk. Uh, at my cell phone, I guess. Leave me a message and I’ll call you back. And he remembered everything about it, and also everything about everything else, and why couldn’t he forget and beep.
“Hey, it’s Col. I’m standing in a soybean field outside of Gutshot, Tennessee, which is a long story, and it’s hot. K. I’m standing here sweating like I had hyperhidrosis, that disease where you sweat a lot. Crap. That’s not interesting. But anyway, it’s hot, and so I’m thinking about cold to stay cool. And I was remembering walking through the snow coming back from the ridiculous movie. Do you remember that, K? We were on Giddings, and the snow made it so quiet, I couldn’t hear a thing in the world but you. And it was so cold then, and so silent, and I loved you so much. Now it’s hot, and dead quiet again, and I love you still.”
Five minutes later, he was trudging back when his phone began vibrating. He raced back to the spot with good reception and, breathless answered.
“Did you listen to the message?” he asked immediately.
“I don’t think I need to,” she answered. “I’m sorry, Colin. But I think we made a really good decision.” And he didn’t even care to point out that they hadn’t made a decision, because the sound of her voice felt so good –well not good exactly. It felt like the mysterium tremedum et fascinans, the fear and the fascination. The great and terrible awe. ~ John Green,#NFDB
320:Naturalmente questa invasione della campagna creò da principio complessi problemi di organizzazione, che avrebbero portato a un'enorme miseria, se il popolo fosse stato ancora schiavo del monopolio di classe. Ma così come stavano le cose, la situazione si assestò presto da sola. Una per una le persone scoprirono quali erano i loro interessi e rinunciarono a imporsi occupazioni in cui non avrebbero assolutamente potuto riuscire. È vero che la città invase la campagna, ma gli invasori, come gli antichi guerrieri, si lasciarono influenzare dal nuovo ambiente e si trasformarono in agricoltori; diventando poi più numerosi dei cittadini, a loro volta finirono per influenzare anche questi ultimi; così la differenza fra campagna e città si attenuò sempre di più. E fu proprio questo mondo agricolo, vivificato dal pensiero e dall'attività della gente di città, che permise il sorgere di questa vita serena, agiata ma produttiva, di cui voi stesso avete avuto una prima esperienza. Come vi ripeto, abbiamo compiuto molti errori, ma col tempo siamo riusciti a correggerli. Ai tempi della mia infanzia la gente doveva ancora lavorare parecchio. Le idee mature della prima metà del secolo XX, quando gli uomini erano ancora ossessionati dal terrore della miseria e non sapevano apprezzare, come noi oggi, i piaceri della vita di tutti i giorni, distrussero molte delle bellezze ambientali che ci erano state lasciate dall'epoca del commercio; e devo ammettere che gli uomini si risollevarono solo molto lentamente dai danni che essi stessi si erano procurati, anche dopo aver conquistato la libertà. Ma per quanto lentamente, la guarigione venne, doveva venire; e più ci conoscerete, più vi accorgerete di quanto noi oggi siamo felici: viviamo circondati dalla bellezza senza alcun timore di diventare rammolliti, siamo sempre impegnatissimi e la cosa ci riempie di gioia. Che cosa si potrebbe domandare di più dalla vita? ~ William Morris, #NFDB
321:Dunque," chiese, "tu non apprezzi proprio la fedeltà? La fedeltà alle proprie memorie?"
"Io credo che solo il presente abbia importanza, non il passato. Lasciamolo perdere il passato. Se cerchiamo di mantenerlo in vita, lo alteriamo, lo vediamo in una prospettiva sbagliata...esageriamo sempre."
"Ma io ricordo a perfezione ogni parola e ogni incidente di quei giorni!" esclamò David con passione.
"E non dovresti, caro: perché così rivivi quei giorni col sentimento di un ragazzo, mentre dovresti giudicarli con l'equilibrio e la maturità di un uomo."
"E che importa?"
Hilda esitò. Si rendeva conto che non era saggio proseguire, eppure desiderava troppo dire certe cose.
"Ecco...io credo che tu continui a veder tuo padre come un...mostro. Ne fai una specie di personificazione del male...Probabilmente invece, se lo vedessi oggi, ti renderesti conto che è un uomo qualunque, un uomo forse dominato dalle passioni, non esente da biasimo, ma sempre e soltanto un uomo, non una specie di mostro inumano."
"Non capisci...Il modo in cui ha trattato mia madre..."
"Vi è una certa forma di dolcezza, di sottomissione," disse Hilda gravemente, "che stimola i peggiori istinti di un uomo, mentre lo stesso uomo affrontato con spirito deciso diventerebbe una creatura tutta diversa."
"Dunque, secondo te, è colpa della mamma..."
"No, no," lo interruppe Hilda. "Sono certa che tuo padre deve averla trattata molto male, ma...ma il matrimonio è una cosa specialissima e non credo che un estraneo - sia pure un figlio - abbia il diritto di giudicare tra i coniugi. Comunque, il tuo risentimento attuale non può più aiutare in nulla tua madre...Tutto è finito, ormai: non rimane che un vecchio malandato in salute che desidera rivedere suo figlio per Natale."
"E tu vuoi che io vada?"
Ancora una volta Hilda esitò. Poi si decise.
"Sì," disse. "Desidero che tu vada, e la faccia finita una volta per tutte. ~ Agatha Christie,#NFDB
322:For eighteen hours we had neither drunk nor eaten anything. My body and mind both felt strangely distant. Both were aching for some relief.
In the porch of our tiny single-skinned tent, I reached out to hug Neil again. Then--unceremoniously--I collapsed.
“Bear, come on, buddy. You’ve got to get inside the tent properly. Bear, can you hear me?” Michael’s voice brought me round. He had been waiting for us at the col--hoping.
I shuffled backward into the tent. My head was pounding. I needed to drink. I hadn’t peed for more than twenty-four hours.
Neil and Alan were slowly shedding their harnesses. Neither had the energy to speak. Michael passed me a warm drink from the stove. I was so happy to see him and Geoffrey in one piece.
As the afternoon turned to evening we talked.
I hadn’t really known fully why Michael and Geoffrey had retreated. They told their story. Of the impending storm and their growing fatigue, as they struggled in the deep snow and thin air. Their retreat had been a decision based on sound mountain judgment.
A good call. Hence they were alive.
We, though, had kept going. That decision had been based on an element of recklessness. But we got lucky, and that storm never came.
Daring had won out--this time.
It doesn’t always.
Knowing when to be reckless and when to be safe is the great mountaineering game. I knew that.
Michael turned to me later as we were getting ready for our last night in the Death Zone. He told me something that I have never forgotten. It was the voice of twenty years’ climbing experience in the wild Rockies of Canada.
“Bear, do you realize the risk you guys were taking up there? It was more recklessness than good judgment, in my opinion.” He smiled and looked right at me.
“My advice: from now on in your life, rein it back a fraction--and you will go far. You’ve survived this time--now go use that good fortune.”
I have never forgotten those words. ~ Bear Grylls,#NFDB
323:Dice: «Ho bisogno di te, Pat Peoples; ho un bisogno maledetto di te»,
poi si mette a piangere e le sue lacrime mi scendono calde sulla pelle mentre mi bacia il collo
dolcemente, tirando su col naso.
È strano che mi dica una cosa simile, così lontana dal solito «ti amo» delle donne, eppure
forse più vera. Provo una bella sensazione mentre la abbraccio, e ricordo ciò che mi ha detto
mia madre tempo fa, quando cercavo di liberarmi di Tiffany invitandola alla tavola calda. «Tu hai
bisogno di amici, Pat. Tutti ne hanno bisogno».
E poi ricordo che Tiffany mi ha mentito per molte settimane; ricordo quella storia tremenda
che mi ha raccontato Ronnie su come è stata licenziata, e ciò che mi ha confessato lei nella sua
ultima lettera; ricordo quanto è stata stramba la nostra amicizia, ma poi ricordo che nessuno, a
parte lei, potrebbe mai avvicinarsi a capire cosa provo ad aver perso Nikki per sempre. Ricordo
che il periodo di lontananza è finalmente finito e che, se Nikki se n’è andata definitivamente, ho
pur sempre fra le braccia una donna che ha sofferto molto, e ha un bisogno disperato di sentirsi
di nuovo bella. Fra le mie braccia c’è una donna che mi ha regalato l’Atlante delle nuvole per
l’osservazione del cielo, una donna che conosce tutti i miei segreti, una donna che sa quanto è
incasinata la mia mente, quante pillole devo prendere, e tuttavia si lascia abbracciare da me. In
tutto questo c’è qualcosa di onesto, e non riesco a immaginarmi nessun’altra donna coricata
insieme a me nel bel mezzo di un campo da calcio congelato – in piena tormenta, addirittura – a
sperare che accada l’impossibile: che una nuvola si liberi da un nembostrato.
Nikki questo non l’avrebbe mai fatto, per me, neppure nei suoi giorni migliori.
Perciò stringo un po’ di più Tiffany, la bacio fra le sopracciglia perfettamente depilate e dopo
un profondo respiro dico: «Credo di aver bisogno anch’io di te». ~ Matthew Quick,#NFDB
324:No, Sonja, non è quello!” egli rispose, sollevando d’un tratto il capo, come se un improvviso nuovo giro di pensieri lo avesse colpito e di nuovo eccitato, “non è quello! Ma piuttosto… supponi (sì! così infatti è meglio!) supponi che io sia egoista, invidioso, malvagio, abietto, vendicativo, e… magari anche incline alla pazzia. (Tutto questo insieme! Della pazzia si parlava già prima, me n’ero accorto!) Dunque ti ho detto poc’anzi che non potevo mantenermi all’università. Ma sai tu che forse lo potevo anche? Mia madre mi avrebbe mandato di che pagare quel che occorreva, e quanto alle scarpe, ai vestiti e al pane, avrei provveduto col mio lavoro, di sicuro! Lezioni se ne presentavano; mi si offriva mezzo rublo per ciascuna. Lavora pure Razumichin! Ma io m’incattivii e non volli. Per l’appunto mi incattivii (ecco una bella parola!) Allora, come un ragno, mi ficcai nel mio cantuccio. Tu sei stata nel mio canile, hai veduto… E sai, Sonja, che i soffitti bassi e le camere strette opprimono l’anima e l’intelligenza? Oh, quanto odiavo quel canile! E tuttavia non ne volevo uscire. Apposta non lo volevo! Per interi giorni non ne uscivo e non volevo lavorare, e non volevo neppur mangiare, stavo sempre disteso. Se Nastas’ja me ne portava, mangiavo; se non me ne portava, la giornata passava così; apposta, per rabbia, non ne chiedevo! Di notte non avevo lume, stavo coricato al buio, non volevo lavorare per comprarmi delle candele! Bisognava studiare e io avevo venduto tutti i libri; e sulla mia tavola, sugli appunti e sui quaderni, c’è anche adesso un dito di polvere. Preferivo stare sdraiato e pensare. E pensavo sempre. E facevo sempre certi sogni, una quantità di sogni strani, non è il caso di dir quali! Solo che allora cominciò anche a sembrarmi che… No, non è così! Di nuovo non racconto bene! vedi, allora mi domandavo sempre: perché sono così stupido? Perché, se sono stupidi gli altri, ed io so di sicuro che sono stupidi, non cerco di essere più intelligente di loro? ~ Fyodor Dostoyevsky, #NFDB
325:Finché l’uomo vive nel suo ambiente e in condizioni normali, gli elementi del curriculum vitae rappresentano per lui periodi importanti e svolte significative della sua vita. Ma appena il caso o il lavoro o le malattie lo separano dagli altri e lo isolano, questi elementi di colpo cominciano a scolorirsi, si inaridiscono e si decompongono con incredibile rapidità, come una maschera di cartone o di lacca senza vita, usata una volta sola. Sotto questa maschera comincia a intravedersi un’altra vita, conosciuta solo a noi, ossia la “vera” storia del nostro spirito e del nostro corpo, che non è scritta da nessuna parte, di cui nessuno suppone l’esistenza, una storia che ha molto poco a che fare con i nostri successi in società, ma che è, per noi, per la nostra felicità o infelicità, l’unica valida e la sola davvero importante.
Sperduto in quel luogo selvaggio, durante le lunghe notti, quando tutti i rumori erano cessati, Daville pensava alla sua vita passata come a una lunga serie di progetti audaci e di scoraggiamenti noti a lui solo, di lotte, di atti eroici, di fortune, di successi e di crolli, di disgrazie, di contraddizioni, di sacrifici inutili e di vani compromessi. Nelle tenebre e nel silenzio di quella città che ancora non aveva visto ma in cui lo attendevano, senza dubbio, preoccupazioni o difficoltà, sembrava che nulla al mondo si potesse risolvere né conciliare. In certi momenti gli pareva che per vivere fossero necessari sforzi enormi e per ogni sforzo una sproporzionata dose di coraggio. E, visto nel buio di quelle notti, ogni sforzo gli sembrava infinito. Per non fermarsi e rinunciare, l’uomo inganna se stesso, sostituendo gli obiettivi che non è riuscito a raggiungere con altri, che ugualmente non raggiungerà; ma le nuove imprese e i nuovi tentativi lo obbligheranno a cercare dentro di sé altre energie e maggiore coraggio. Così l’uomo si autoinganna e col passare del tempo diviene sempre più e senza speranza debitore verso se stesso e verso tutto quello che lo circonda. ~ Ivo Andri,#NFDB
326:«Non ti capisco, Kreacher» disse infine.
«Voldemort ha cercato di ucciderti, Regulus è morto per lottare contro di lui, ma tu sei stato contento lo stesso di tradire Sirius e consegnarlo a Voldemort? Sei andato da Narcissa e Bellatrix e hai passato informazioni a Voldemort attraverso di loro...»
«Harry, Kreacher non ragiona così» intervenne Hermione, asciugandosi gli occhi col dorso della mano. «È uno schiavo; gli elfi domestici sono abituati a subire un trattamento sgarbato, perfino violento; ciò che gli ha fatto Voldemort non era poi fuori dal normale. Che cosa sono le guerre magiche per un elfo come Kreacher? Lui è fedele a chi lo tratta con gentilezza, come la signora Black e Regulus, quindi li ha serviti volentieri e ha imparato a ripetere come un pappagallo tutte le loro convinzioni. Lo so che cosa stai per dire» aggiunse, quando Harry fece per protestare, «che Regulus aveva cambiato idea... ma non si direbbe che l’abbia spiegato a Kreacher, no? Io credo di sapere perché: la sua famiglia e Kreacher erano più al sicuro se si attenevano alla vecchia storia dei Purosangue. Regulus stava cercando di proteggerli tutti».
«Sirius...»
«Sirius è stato tremendo con Kreacher, Harry, e non serve a niente fare quella faccia, sai che è vero. Kreacher era rimasto solo da tanto tempo quando Sirius venne a vivere in questa casa, e probabilmente aveva bisogno di un po’ di affetto. Sono sicura che ‘la signorina Cissy’ e ‘la signorina Bella’ sono state assolutamente deliziose con Kreacher quando è ricomparso, quindi lui è stato gentile e ha raccontato loro tutto quello che volevano sapere. Ho sempre detto che i maghi alla fine pagano per come trattano i loro elfi domestici. Be’, è successo a Voldemort... e anche a Sirius».
Harry non seppe ribattere. Guardando Kreacher che singhiozzava sul pavimento, gli vennero in mente le parole di Silente, poche ore dopo la morte di Sirius: ‘Io temo che Sirius non abbia mai visto Kreacher come una creatura dotata di sentimenti profondi quanto quelli di un essere umano... ~ J K Rowling,#NFDB
327:Con un salto il commissario fu sulla verandina. E lo vide, un puntolino a ripa di mare che si dirigeva verso Vigàta. In mutande com’era, si lanciò all’inseguimento. François non correva, camminava deciso. Quando sentì alle sue spalle i passi di qualcuno appresso a lui, si fermò senza manco voltarsi. Montalbano, col fiato grosso, gli si accoccolò davanti, ma non gli spiò niente.
Il picciliddro non piangeva, gli occhi erano fermi, taliavano al di là di Montalbano.
«Je veux maman» disse.
Vide arrivare Livia di corsa, s’era infilata una sua camicia, la fermò con un gesto, le fece capire di tornare a casa. Livia obbedi. Il commissario pigliò il picciliddro per mano e principiarono a caminare a lento a lento. Per un quarto d’ora non si dissero una parola. Arrivati a una barca tirata a sicco, Montalbano s’assittò sulla rena, François gli si mise allato e il commissario gli passò un braccio attorno alle spalle.
«Iu persi a me matri ch’era macari cchiù nicu di tia» esordì.
E iniziarono a parlare, il commissario in siciliano e François in arabo, capendosi perfettamente.
Gli confidò cose che mai aveva detto a nessuno, manco a Livia.
Il pianto sconsolato di certe notti, con la testa sotto il cuscino perché suo padre non lo sentisse; la disperazione mattutina quando sapeva che non c’era sua madre in cucina a preparargli la colazione o, qualche anno dopo, la merendina per la scuola. Ed è una mancanza che non viene mai più colmata, te la porti appresso fino in punto di morte. Il bambino gli spiò se lui aveva il potere di far tornare sua madre. No, rispose Montalbano, quel potere non l’aveva nessuno. Doveva rassegnarsi. Ma tu avevi tuo padre, osservò François che era intelligente davvero e non per vanto di Livia. Già, avevo mio padre. E allora, spiò il picciliddro, lui era inevitabilmente destinato ad andare a finire in uno di quei posti dove mettono i bambini che non hanno né padre né madre?
«Questo no. Te lo prometto» disse il commissario. E gli porse la mano. François gliela strinse, taliandolo negli occhi. ~ Andrea Camilleri,#NFDB
328:Le abilità di Thoreau coincidono con la sua cautela morale, dal momento che erano speciose entrambe. Sapeva ritrovare la propria strada nel cuore della notte affidandosi ai piedi. Sapeva afferrare d'un colpo una dozzina di matite e non una di più, percorrere distanze precise e stabilire con uno sguardo le cubature. Il suo odorato era talmente delicato da percepire il fetore delle abitazioni anche passandoci davandi di notte; il suo gusto era così puro che, come un bambino non gradiva il sapore del vino; o forse, vivendo in America, non ne aveva mai assaggiato uno buono; e la sua conoscenza della natura era completa e particolareggiata al punto di riuscire a indovinare, giorno più giorno meno, il periodo dell'anno dall'aspetto delle piante. Nei rapporti con gli animali egli fu il vero Donatello di Hawthorne. Tirava fuori una marmotta dal nascondiglio prendendola per la coda; le volpi braccate cercavano protezione da lui; pare avesse degli scoiattoli annidati nel panciotto; metteva il braccio dentro a uno stagno e lo tirava fuori con un pesce lucido e ansimante, bello disteso sul palmo della mano. Erano poche le cose che non sapesse fare. Sapeva costruire una casa, una barca, una matita e un libro. Era un topografo, uno studioso, un esperto di storia naturale. Sapeva correre veloce, camminare al passo, arrampicare, pattinare, nuotare e governare una barca. L'occasione più insignificante diventava un modo per mettere in mostra le sue abilità fisiche; e una volta un artigiano, osservandolo alle prese col finestrino di un vagone ferroviario, gli offrì subito un lavoro. "L'unico guadagno del vivere a lungo", osserva, "è poter fare sempre meglio una piccola cosa". Ma tale era la precisione dei suoi sensi, così viva la sua fibra, che nel suo caso la massima andrebbe cambiata, perché sapeva fare gran parte delle cose con una perfezione rara. E probabilmente pensò a se stesso quando scrisse: "Sebbene col passare del tempo i giovani diventino indifferenti, le leggi dell'universo non sono incuranti, ma sempre al fianco dei più sensibili". ~ Robert Louis Stevenson, #NFDB
329:Pois Preyatz Me, Senhor
Pois preyatz me, senhor,
qu'eu chan, eu chantarai;
e can cuit chantar, plor
a l'ora c'o essai.
Greu veiretz chantador
be chan, si mal li vai.
Vai me doncs mal d'amor?
Ans mels que no fetz mai!
E doncs, per que m'esmai?
Gran ben e gran onor
conosc que Deus me fai,
qu'eu am la belazor
et ilh me, qu'eu o sai.
Mas eu sui sai, alhor,
e no sai com l'estai!
So m'auci de dolor,
car ochaizo non ai
de soven venir lai.
Amors, e que.m farai?
Si garrai ja ab te?
Ara cuit qu'e.m morrai
del dezirer que.m ve,
bela lai on jai
no m'aizis pres de se,
qu'eu la manei e bai
et estrenha vas me
so cors blanc, gras e le.
Bona domna, merce
del vostre fin aman!
Mas jonchas, ab col cle,
vos m'autrei e.m coman.
Qu' pliu per bona fe
c'anc re no amei tan.
E si locs s'esdeve,
vos me fatz bel semblan,
que molt n'ai gran talan.
26
(Since you request me to sing, my Lords, I shall when I think of singing, I weep
just at the moment when I begin. You will hardly ever here a singer who sings
well, if he is unhappy. Am I thus unhappy in love? No, rather better than ever.
Then why I am I in disarray?
I know that God has done me a great honor, since I love the most beautiful of
women and she me, as far as I know. But I am elsewhere, and I do not know
how she is, which kills me with sorrow, for I do not often have the opportunity to
go there.
Now, Love, what shall I do? Shall I ever be cured of you? Right now I think I will
die of the desire that comes upon me, if the fair one invites me to be near her,
where she sleeps, so that I can caress and kiss and hold next to mine her body,
white, round, and smooth.
Sweet lady, have pity on your faithful lover! Hands joined, head bowed, I
commend myself to your mercy. For I swear to you in faith that I have never
loved anyone as much as you. And if the right moment occurs, show me your
best behavior, for I really desire it so.)
~ Bernard de Ventadorn,#NFDB
330:Certa gente perde una creatura amata e tira dritto e sposta il proprio affetto su un'altra. Ma è doloroso. Troppo doloroso. L'amore supera l'istinto. Quando ami smetti di vivere per te stesso. Vivi per un'altra persona. La sofferenza è l'emozione più forte che un uomo o un bambino o un animale possano provare. E' una buona sensazione. La sofferenza ti spinge a lasciare te stesso. Esci dal tuo piccolo e limitato guscio. E non puoi soffrire se prima non hai amato. La sofferenza è l'esito finale dell'amore, perché è amore perduto. È il completamento del ciclo dell'amore: amare, perdere, soffrire, lasciare e lasciarsi, poi amare di nuovo. Soffrire è la consapevolezza che dovrai essere solo, e al di là di questo non c'è nulla, perché essere solo è il destino ultimo, definitivo di ogni creatura vivente. Ecco cos'è la morte: la grande solitudine. La conoscenza della mancanza di coscienza. Quando moriremo non ce ne accorgeremo, perché morire è perdere tutto quanto. Ma soffrire è morire ed essere vivi allo stesso tempo. L'esperienza più assoluta, più totale che si possa provare. È troppo. Il corpo arriva quasi a distruggersi, con tutti quei sussulti, quelle contorsioni. Ma io voglio provare dolore. Versare lacrime. La sofferenza ti unisce di nuovo a ciò che hai perso. E' una fusione. Te ne vai anche tu con la cosa o la persona amata che scompare. In un certo senso, ti dividi da te stesso e l'accompagni, fai con lei una parte del viaggio. La segui sin dove ti è concesso spingerti. Ma alla fine, la sofferenza se ne a e tu torni in sintonia con il mondo. Senza l'altro. E riesci ad accettarlo. Che altra scelta abbiamo? Piangi, continui a piangere, perché non torni mai del tutto indietro dal posto in cui sei andato con l'altro. Un frammento che si è staccato dal tuo cuore pulsante è ancora là. C'è una lesione. Una ferita che non guarisce mai. E se ti succede una volta e un'altra e un'altra volta ancora, col tempo se ne va una parte troppo grande del tuo cuore e non riesci più a soffrire. E allora tu stesso sei pronto a morire. Salirai la scala in diagonale e qualcun altro resterà indietro a soffrire per te. ~ Philip K Dick, #NFDB
331:I've just come to my room, Livy darling, I guess this was the memorable night of my life. By George, I never was so stirred since I was born. I heard four speeches which I can never forget... one by that splendid old soul, Col. Bob Ingersoll, — oh, it was just the supremest combination of English words that was ever put together since the world began... How handsome he looked, as he stood on that table, in the midst of those 500 shouting men, and poured the molten silver from his lips! What an organ is human speech when it is played by a master! How pale those speeches are in print, but how radiant, how full of color, how blinding they were in the delivery! It was a great night, a memorable night.
I doubt if America has seen anything quite equal to it. I am well satisfied I shall not live to see its equal again... Bob Ingersoll’s music will sing through my memory always as the divinest that ever enchanted my ears. And I shall always see him, as he stood that night on a dinner-table, under the flash of lights and banners, in the midst of seven hundred frantic shouters, the most beautiful human creature that ever lived... You should have seen that vast house rise to its feet; you should have heard the hurricane that followed. That's the only test! People might shout, clap their hands, stamp, wave their napkins, but none but the master can make them get up on their feet.
{Twain's letter to his wife, Livy, about friend Robert Ingersoll's incredible speech at 'The Grand Banquet', considered to be one of the greatest oratory performances of all time} ~ Mark Twain,#NFDB
332:Sam era sempre stato diverso dalle altre ragazze, ma fu solo in terza elementare che passò da sentirsi diverso ad avvertire che c’era qualcosa di profondamente sbagliato. Per la prima volta lui e i suoi compagni di classe non erano più soltanto alunni, ma vennero divisi in due gruppi: maschi e femmine. La separazione sembrò portare con sé una nuova serie di regole, divieti e aspettative invisibili che lui non aveva mai imposto a se stesso. Tutto ciò lo metteva a disagio, ma non riusciva a capire il perché. Sapeva di essere una femmina, era ovvio, ma perché non si sentiva donna? Perché dentro di sé sentiva di essere un maschio? Perché voleva essere trattato come un ragazzo?
Era confuso, frustrato e si sentiva sbagliato, e quel sentimento diventò sempre più forte col passare del tempo.
L’infanzia di Sam fu tormentata da domande cui non riusciva a trovare risposta.
Era uno scherzo della natura? C’era qualcosa di guasto dentro di lui? Dio aveva fatto un errore? Era andato a catechismo con il suo amico Joey, e sapeva di poter imparare come pregare e chiedere a Dio di aggiustarlo. Tutte le sere Sam pregava di svegliarsi il giorno dopo nel corpo giusto, ma le sue preghiere non vennero mai esaudite.
Qualche anno più tardi, le prime fasi della pubertà gli sembrarono più un dirottamento che una naturale evoluzione. Il suo corpo stava crescendo, ma sembrava tradirlo ogni giorno di più. Stava diventando qualcosa che non andava d’accordo con quello che provava. Non importava quanti video sull’argomento guardasse, l’idea di emergere dai suoi anni da teenager come donna sembrava estranea e innaturale, come un bruco che da crisalide si trasforma in ragno.
Sam pensò che se avesse ignorato i cambiamenti, il suo corpo avrebbe potuto respingerli o invertirli. Invece di procurarsi un reggiseno, Sam si avvolse intorno al seno una benda elastica, in modo che il torace apparisse piatto. Più i seni crescevano più stringeva la benda, tanto che finì per ferirsi. A un certo punto comprò un reggiseno sportivo che aveva lo stesso effetto, ma fu per lui un momento di sconfitta: stava perdendo la battaglia con il proprio corpo ~ Chris Colfer,#NFDB
333:The Son of God
The New Testament recounts few instances when God was heard speaking from heaven. When He did, it was normally
to announce something startling. God was zealous to announce that Jesus Christ was His Son. At Jesus' baptism, the heavens opened and God's voice was heard, saying, "This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased" (Matt. 3:17). Elsewhere, the Father declared from heaven, "This is my beloved Son; listen to him" (Mark 9:7). Thus, the title conferred from on high to Jesus is Son of God.
This title has engendered a great deal of controversy in the history of the church, particularly in the fourth century, when the Arian movement, taking its cue from its leader, Arius, denied the Trinity by arguing that Jesus was a created being. References to Jesus as "the firstborn of all creation" (Col. 1:15) and "the only begotten of the Father" (John 1:14, KJV) led Arius to argue that Jesus had a beginning in time and was thus a creature. In Arias' mind, if Jesus was begotten, it could only mean that He was not eternal, and if He was not eternal, then He was a creature. Thus, to ascribe deity to Jesus was to be guilty of blasphemy, because it involved the idolatrous worship of a created being. The same controversy exists today between Christian believers and the Mormons and Jehovahs Witnesses, both of whom acknowledge a lofty view of Jesus over angels and other creatures but deny His full deity.
This controversy precipitated in the great ecumenical
Council of Nicea. The Nicene Creed provides an interesting answer to the charges of Arianism. The answer is found in the strange statement that Jesus is "begotten, not made." To the Greek, such a statement was a contradiction in terms. In normal terms, begotten implies a beginning, but when applied to Jesus, there is a uniqueness to the way in which He is begotten that separates Him from all other creatures. Jesus is called the monogenes, the "only begotten" of the Father. There is a sense in which Jesus and Jesus alone is begotten of the Father. This is what the church was getting at when it spoke of Jesus being eternally begotten-that He was begotten, not made. ~ R C Sproul,#NFDB
334:Eventually, two Swedish climbers and a Sherpa called Babu Chiri found Mick. By chance--by God’s grace--Babu was carrying a spare canister of oxygen.
Neil and Pasang had also now descended, and met up with Mick and the others. Neil then located an emergency cache of oxygen half-buried in the snow nearby. He gave one to Alan and forced both him and Mick to their feet.
Slow and tired, his mind wandering in and out of consciousness, Mick remembers little about the next few hours. It was just a haze of delirium, fatigue, and cold.
Descending blue sheet ice can be lethal. Much more so than ascending it. Mick staggered on down, the debilitating effects of thin air threatening to overwhelm him.
Somewhere beneath the Balcony Mick suddenly felt the ground surge beneath him. There was a rush of acceleration as the loose topping of snow--covering the blue ice--slid away under him.
He began to hurtle down the sheer face on his back, and then made the all-too-easy error of trying to dig in his crampons to slow the fall. The force catapulted him into a somersault, hurtling him ever faster down the steep ice and snow face.
He resigned himself to the fact that he would die.
He bounced and twisted, over and over, and then slid to a halt on a small ledge. Then he heard voices. They were muffled and strange.
Mick tried to shout to them but nothing came out. The climbers who were now at the col then surrounded him, clipped him in, and held him. He was shaking uncontrollably.
When Mick and Neil reached us at camp two, forty-eight hours later, they were utterly shattered. Different men. Mick just sat and held his head in his hands.
That said it all.
That evening, as we prepared to sleep, he prodded me. I sat up and saw a smile spread across his face.
“Bear, next time, let me choose where we go on holiday--all right?”
I began to laugh and cry at the same time. I needed to. So much had been kept inside.
The next morning, Mick, Neil, and Geoffrey left for base camp. Their attempt was over. Mick just wanted to be off this forsaken mountain--to be safe.
I watched them head out into the glacier and hoped I had made the right decision to stay up at camp two without them all. ~ Bear Grylls,#NFDB
335:Part Ii: The Fields Of Coleraine
On the fields of Col'raine there'll be labour in vain
Before the Great Western is ended,
The nags will have toil'd, and the silks will be soil'd.
And the rails will require to be mended.
For the gullies are deep, and the uplands are steep,
And mud will of purls be the token,
And the tough stringy-bark, that invites us to lark,
With impunity may not be broken.
Though Ballarat's fast, and they say he can last,
And that may be granted hereafter,
Yet the judge's decision to the Border division
Will bring neither shouting nor laughter.
And Blueskin, I've heard that he goes like a bird,
And I'm told that to back him would pay me ;
He's a good bit of stuff, but not quite good enough,
'Non licuit credere famae.'
Alfred ought to be there, we all of us swear
By the blood of King Alfred, his sire ;
He's not the real jam, by the blood of his dam,
So I shan't put him down as a flyer.
Now, Hynam, my boy, I wish you great joy,
I know that when fresh you can jump, sir ;
But you'll scarce be in clover, when you're ridden all over,
And punish'd from shoulder to rump, sir.
Archer goes like a shot, they can put on their pot,
And boil it to cover expenses ;
Their pot will boil over, the run of his Dover
He'll never earn over big fences.
There's a horse in the race, with a blaze on his face,
And we know he can gallop a docker !
He's proved himself stout, of his speed there's no doubt,
And his jumping's according to Cocker.
212
When Hynam's outstripp'd, and when Alfred is whipp'd,
To keep him in sight of the leaders,
While Blueskin runs true, but his backers look blue,
For his rider's at work with the bleeders ;
When his carcase of beef brings 'the bullock' to grief,
And the rush of the tartan is ended ;
When Archer's in trouble—who's that pulling double,
And taking his leaps unextended ?
He wins all the way, and the rest—sweet, they say,
Is the smell of the newly-turn'd plough, friend,
But you smell it too close when it stops eyes and nose,
And you can't tell your horse from your cow, friend.
~ Adam Lindsay Gordon,#NFDB
336:Comunque ho lasciato gli altri a pallavolare in palestra e sono uscita dalla scuola, c'era un sole pallido color miele. Sono andata al bar di fronte, a vedere le facce. Come faccio spesso, mi sono tappata le orecchie per concentrarmi e capire cosa succedeva intorno. E mi sono sentita strana. Qual'era il motivo del mio disagio? E quale segrato nascondeva la gente seduta?
L'uomo corpulento con la fronte sudata, che sbarrava gli occhi in segno di meraviglia, e disegnava rabbia con la mano. E l'uomo piccolo che ne seguiva il discorso scuotendo la testa e ricalcando i gesti dell'altro. E la giovane carica di gioielli come una Cleopatra che sibilava a bassa voce contro qualcuno, un veleno d'astio che le sue amiche assorbivano come un balsamo ristoratore, ammiccando tra loro per dividere il piacere. O il ragazzo che litigava ad alta voce con la ragazza, costringendola a guardarlo negli occhi, mentre lei si mordeva la mano per la vergogna, col volto rigato di lacrime. O la tavolata dove un giovane zerbinotto raccontava e tutti ridevano. O i due ragazzi che parlavano probabilmente di sport, uno battendo le mani su un giornale, l'altro interrompendolo con una voce roca.
E di colpo ho capito.
Quei signori e signore e ragazzi e ragazze seduti, tutti avevano ragione. E parlandone, si rafforzavano in questa loro certezza. E la loro ragione era costruita sul dileggio, sulla rovina, sul disprezzo degli altri. E più parlavano, più la ragione cresceva e chiedeva il suo tributo di parole, di minacce, di gesti. E sempre di più gli altri, quelli dalla parte del torto, diventavano lontani e miserabili. Ma guardando oltre la strada, nei bar di fronte, altra gente era seduta e anche loro avevano ragione. Una gigantesca, unica ragione divideva il mondo in quelli che l'avevano, cioè tutti, e gli altri, e cioè tutti.
E io, che sentivo di non avere ragione, cosa avrei fatto?
Sono tornata in classe e c'era aria pesante. Marra e Gasparrone avevano insultato Zagara chiamandolo terrone e figlio di galeotto. Lui li aveva assaltati con un tirapugni fatto con la maniglia di una porta. Erano finiti tutti e tre dal preside. Quante battaglie stupide e quante nobili e giuste ci sono nella giornata media di ognuno? ~ Stefano Benni,#NFDB
337:Già nella vetrina della libreria hai individuato la copertina col titolo che cercavi. Seguendo questa traccia visiva ti sei fatto largo nel negozio attraverso il fitto sbarramento di Libri Che Non Hai Letto che ti guardavao accigliati dai banchi e dagli scaffali cercando d'intimidirti. Ma tu sai che non devi lasciarti mettere in soggezione, che tra loro s'estendono per ettari ed ettari i Libri Che Puoi Fare A Meno Di Leggere, i Libri Fatti Per Altri Usi Che La Lettura, i Libri Già Letti Senza Nemmeno Bisogno D'Aprirli In Quanto Appartenenti Alla Categoria Del Già Letto Prima Ancora D'Essere Stato Scritto. E così superi la prima cinta dei baluardi e ti piomba addosso la fanteria dei Libri Che Se Tu Avessi Più Vite Da Vivere Certamente Anche Questi Li Leggeresti Volentieri Ma Purtroppo I Giorni Che Hai Da Vivere Sono Quelli Che Sono. Con rapida mossa li scavalchi e ti porti in mezzo alle falangi dei Libri Che Hai Intenzione Di Leggere Ma Prima Ne Dovresti Leggere Degli Altri, dei Libri Troppo Cari Che Potresti Aspettare A Comprarli Quando Saranno Rivenduti A Metà Prezzo, dei Libri Idem Come Sopra Quando Verranno Ristampati Nei Tascabili, dei Libri Che Potresti Domandare A Qualcuno Se Te Li Presta, dei Libri Che Tutti Hanno Letto Dunque E' Quasi Come Se Li Avessi Letti Anche Tu. Sventando questi attacchi, ti porti sotto le torri del fortilizio, dove fanno resistenza
i Libri Che Da Tanto Tempo Hai In Programma Di Leggere,
i Libri Che Da Anni Cercavi Senza Trovarli,
i Libri Che Riguardano Qualcosa Di Cui Ti Occupi In Questo Momento,
i Libri Che Vuoi Avere Per Tenerli A Portata Di Mano In Ogni Evenienza,
i Libri Che Potresti Mettere Da Parte Per Leggerli Magari Quest'Estate,
i Libri Che Ti Mancano Per Affiancarli Ad Altri Libri Nel Tuo Scaffale,
i Libri Che Ti Ispirano Una Curiosità Improvvisa, Frenetica E Non Chiaramente Giustificabile.
Ecco che ti è stato possibile ridurre il numero illimitato di forze in campo a un insieme certo molto grande ma comunque calcolabile in un numero finito, anche se questo relativo sollievo ti viene insidiato dalle imboscate dei Libri Letti Tanto Tempo Fa Che Sarebbe Ora Di Rileggerli e dei Libri Che Hai Sempre Fatto Finta D'Averli Letti Mentre Sarebbe Ora Ti Decidessi A Leggerli Davvero. ~ Italo Calvino,#NFDB
338:Nessuna imbracatura. Nessuna rete di sicurezza. Se fossi scivolato oltre quella linea sottile come un rasoio, saremmo entrambi precipitati nell’ignoto. Ma dall’espressione sul viso di Allie, che molto probabilmente rispecchiava la mia, capii che lo sapeva bene quanto me.Deglutii, senza mai distogliere lo sguardo dalla sua bocca. Era una bocca perfetta.«No» dissi, ma venne fuori come una domanda piena di incertezza.Le sue labbra si curvarono lievemente. «Sei sicuro?»«No.» Nessuna incertezza stavolta.La lieve curva della sua bocca si trasformò in un vero e proprio sorriso che lasciò intravedere i suoi denti bianchi e uno sprazzo della sua lingua rosea. Ero sicuro che la sua lingua sarebbe stata morbida e bagnata.«Bé, sembra un bel dilemma personale, Luke.»Perché il suono del mio nome sulle sue labbra mi piaceva così tanto?Quando rimasi in silenzio, Allie si girò e svoltò a destra; la stessa direzione in cui si trovava la mia stanza. Cosa stavo facendo? Questa cosa era complicata in una maniera completamente diversa da quello a cui ero abituato. Mi presi la testa fra le mani e mi costrinsi a tirare un profondo respiro col naso.Ma complicato o no, la volevo.Questo non era affatto complicato. Era piuttosto semplice.Allie voleva me e io volevo lei.Normalmente, questo era il momento in cui rammentavo a me stesso tutte le ragioni per cui non potevo indulgere in una notte di passione sfrenata, completo abbandono e corpi sudati. Le conseguenze non valevano mai la pena per me.Ma questo era diverso.Lei era diversa.In pochi secondi, mi resi conto che Allie poteva essere l’unica donna in grado di capire la nostra precaria posizione. Non mi voleva per i miei soldi o per il mio status sociale; io non la volevo semplicemente perché era disponibile e compiacente. Malgrado le complicazioni, mi attraeva inesorabilmente, facendo leva su qualsiasi cosa avesse messo radici sotto la mia pelle, e sotto la sua.E non volevo più resistere a quell’attrazione.Avanzai con passo deciso, svoltando anch’io a destra. Lei era ferma davanti alla porta aperta della sua camera, la chiave appena fuori dalla serratura, gli occhi fissi sul punto esatto in cui avevo girato l’angolo.«Hai cambiato idea?»Non risposi.«Bene» disse come se l’avessi fatto. Poi entrò nella sua stanza d’albergo ~ Karla Sorensen, #NFDB
339:Alì dagli Occhi Azzurri
uno dei tanti figli di figli,
scenderà da Algeri, su navi
a vela e a remi. Saranno
con lui migliaia di uomini
coi corpicini e gli occhi
di poveri cani dei padri
sulle barche varate nei Regni della Fame. Porteranno con sè i bambini,
e il pane e il formaggio, nelle carte gialle del Lunedì di Pasqua.
Porteranno le nonne e gli asini, sulle triremi rubate ai porti coloniali.
Sbarcheranno a Crotone o a Palmi,
a milioni, vestiti di stracci
asiatici, e di camicie americane.
Subito i Calabresi diranno,
come da malandrini a malandrini:
«Ecco i vecchi fratelli,
coi figli e il pane e formaggio!»
Da Crotone o Palmi saliranno
a Napoli, e da lì a Barcellona,
a Salonicco e a Marsiglia,
nelle Città della Malavita.
Anime e angeli, topi e pidocchi,
col germe della Storia Antica
voleranno davanti alle willaye.
Essi sempre umili
Essi sempre deboli
essi sempre timidi
essi sempre infimi
essi sempre colpevoli
essi sempre sudditi
essi sempre piccoli,
essi che non vollero mai sapere, essi che ebbero occhi solo per implorare,
essi che vissero come assassini sotto terra, essi che vissero come banditi
in fondo al mare, essi che vissero come pazzi in mezzo al cielo,
essi che si costruirono
leggi fuori dalla legge,
essi che si adattarono
a un mondo sotto il mondo
essi che credettero
in un Dio servo di Dio,
essi che cantavano
ai massacri dei re,
essi che ballavano
alle guerre borghesi,
essi che pregavano
alle lotte operaie...
... deponendo l’onestà
delle religioni contadine,
dimenticando l’onore
della malavita,
tradendo il candore
dei popoli barbari,
dietro ai loro Alì
dagli Occhi Azzurri - usciranno da sotto la terra per uccidere –
usciranno dal fondo del mare per aggredire - scenderanno
dall’alto del cielo per derubare - e prima di giungere a Parigi
per insegnare la gioia di vivere,
prima di giungere a Londra
per insegnare a essere liberi,
prima di giungere a New York,
per insegnare come si è fratelli
- distruggeranno Roma
e sulle sue rovine
deporranno il germe
della Storia Antica.
Poi col Papa e ogni sacramento
andranno su come zingari
verso nord-ovest
con le bandiere rosse
di Trotzky al vento... ~ Pier Paolo Pasolini,#NFDB
340:In quel preciso momento, Karla è entrata nella stanza. Ha spento la televisione, ha guardato Todd fisso negli occhi e ha detto: "Todd, tu esisti non soltanto come membro di una famiglia o di una compagnia o di una nazione, ma come membro di una specie... sei un essere umano. Sei parte dell'umanità. Attualmente la nostra specie ha problemi profondi e stiamo cercando di sognare un modo per uscirne e stiamo usando i computer per cavarcela. La costruzione di hardware e software è il campo in cui la specie ha deciso di investire energie per la sua sopravvivenza e questa costruzione richiede zone di pace, bambini nati dalla pace, e l'assenza di distrazioni che interferiscano col codice. Non possiamo acquisire conoscenza attraverso l'informatica, ma riusciremo a usarla per tenerci fuori dalla merda. Quello che tu percepisci come un vuoto è un paradiso terrestre: alla lettera, linea per linea, la libertà di impedire all'umanità di diventare non lineare".
Si è seduta sul divano e c'era il rumore della pioggia che tamburellava sul soffitto e mi sono reso conto del fatto che non c'era abbastanza luce nella stanza e che noi eravamo tutti in silenzio.
Karla ha detto: "Abbiamo avuto una vita discreta. Nessuno di noi, a quanto mi risulta, è mai stato maltrattato. Non abbiamo mai desiderato niente, né abbiamo mai voluto possedere qualcosa. I nostri genitori sono tutti ancora insieme, a parte quelli di Susan. Ci hanno trattato bene, ma la vera moralità, qui. Todd consiste nel sapere se le loro mani sono state sprecate in vite non creative, o se queste mani sono utilizzate per portare avanti il sogno dell'umanità".
Continuava a piovere.
"Non è una coincidenza che come specie abbiamo inventato la classe media. Senza la classe media, non avremmo potuto avere quel particolare tipo di configurazione mentale che contribuisce in misura consistente a sputar fuori i sistemi informatici e la nostra specie non avrebbe mai potuto farcela ad arrivare allo stadio evolutivo successivo, qualunque esso sia. Ci sono buone probabilità che la classe media non rientri neanche parzialmente nella prossima fase evolutiva. Ma non è né qui né là. Che ti piaccia o no, Todd, tu, io, Dan, Abe, Bug, e Susan... tutti noi siamo fabbricanti del prossimo ciclo Rem del sogno umano. Tutti gli altri ne saranno attratti. Non metterli in discussione, Todd, e non crogiolartici dentro, ma non permettere mai a te stesso di dimenticarlo". ~ Douglas Coupland,#NFDB
341:The Dream
Lord Byron
Our life is twofold; Sleep hath its own world,
A boundary between the things misnamed
Death and existence: Sleep hath its own world,
And a wide realm of wild reality,
And dreams in their development have breath,
And tears, and tortures, and the touch of joy;
They leave a weight upon our waking thoughts,
They take a weight from off waking toils,
They do divide our being; they become
A portion of ourselves as of our time,
And look like heralds of eternity;
They pass like spirits of the past -they speak
Like sibyls of the future; they have power -
The tyranny of pleasure and of pain;
They make us what we were not -what they will,
And shake us with the vision that's gone by,
The dread of vanished shadows -Are they so?
Is not the past all shadow? -What are they?
Creations of the mind? -The mind can make
Substances, and people planets of its own
With beings brighter than have been, and give
A breath to forms which can outlive all flesh.
I would recall a vision which I dreamed
Perchance in sleep -for in itself a thought,
A slumbering thought, is capable of years,
And curdles a long life into one hour.
----------
Il sogno
Lord Byron
Duplice è la nostra vita: il Sonno ha il suo proprio mondo,
un confine tra le cose chiamate impropriamente
morte e esistenza: il Sonno ha il proprio mondo,
e un vasto reame di sfrenata realtà;
e nel loro svolgersi i sogni hanno respiro,
e lacrime e tormenti e sfiorano la gioia;
lasciano un peso sui nostri pensieri da svegli,
tolgono un peso dalle nostre fatiche da svegli,
dividono il nostro essere; diventano
parte di noi stessi e del nostro tempo,
e sembrano gli araldi dell'eternità;
passano come fantasmi del passato, parlano
come Sibille dell'avvenire; hanno potere -
la tirannia del piacere e del dolore;
ci rendono ciò che non fummo, secondo il loro volere,
e ci scuotono con dissolte visioni,
col terrore di svanite ombre. Ma sono veramente così?
Non è forse tutto un'ombra il passato? Cosa sono?
Creazioni della mente? La mente sa creare
sostanza, e popolare pianeti, di sua fattura,
di esseri più splendenti di quelli mai esistiti, e dare
respiro e forma che sopravvivono alla carne.
Vorrei richiamare una visione che ho sognato
forse nel sonno, poiché in sé un pensiero,
un pensiero assopito, racchiude anni,
e in un'ora condensa una lunga vita. ~ Lord Byron,#NFDB
342:Tutta quella città… non se ne vedeva la fine… /
La fine, per cortesia, si potrebbe vedere la fine? /
E il rumore /
Su quella maledettissima scaletta… era molto bello, tutto… e io ero grande con quel cappotto, facevo il mio figurone, e non avevo dubbi, era garantito che sarei sceso, non c’era problema /
Col mio cappello blu /
Primo gradino, secondo gradino, terzo gradino /
Primo gradino, secondo gradino, terzo gradino /
Primo gradino, secondo /
Non è quel che vidi che mi fermò /
È quel che non vidi /
Puoi capirlo, fratello?, è quel che non vidi… lo cercai ma non c’era, in tutta quella sterminata città c’era tutto tranne /
C’era tutto /
Ma non c’era una fine. Quel che non vidi è dove finiva tutto quello. La fine del mondo /
Ora tu pensa: un pianoforte. I tasti iniziano. I tasti finiscono. Tu sai che sono 88, su questo nessuno può fregarti. Non sono infiniti, loro. Tu, sei infinito, e dentro quei tasti, infinita è la musica che puoi fare. Loro sono 88. Tu sei infinito. Questo a me piace. Questo lo si può vivere. Ma se tu /
Ma se io salgo su quella scaletta, e davanti a me /
Ma se io salgo su quella scaletta e davanti a me si srotola una tastiera di milioni di tasti, milioni e miliardi /
Milioni e miliardi di tasti, che non finiscono mai e questa è la vera verità, che non finiscono mai e quella tastiera è infinita /
Se quella tastiera è infinita, allora /
Su quella tastiera non c’è musica che puoi suonare. Ti sei seduto su un seggiolino sbagliato: quello è il pianoforte su cui suona Dio /
Cristo, ma le vedevi le strade? /
Anche solo le strade, ce n’era a migliaia, come fate voi laggiù a sceglierne una /
A scegliere una donna /
Una casa, una terra che sia la vostra, un paesaggio da guardare, un modo di morire /
Tutto quel mondo /
Quel mondo addosso che nemmeno sai dove finisce /
E quanto ce n’è /
Non avete mai paura, voi, di finire in mille pezzi solo a pensarla, quell’enormità, solo a pensarla? A viverla… /
Io sono nato su questa nave. E qui il mondo passava, ma a duemila persone per volta. E di desideri ce n’erano anche qui, ma non più di quelli che ci potevano stare tra una prua e una poppa. Suonavi la tua felicità, su una tastiera che non era infinita.
Io ho imparato così. La terra, quella è una nave troppo grande per me. È un viaggio troppo lungo. È una donna troppo bella. È un profumo troppo forte. È una musica che non so suonare. ~ Alessandro Baricco,#NFDB
343:Zhi yin. Una volta Jem aveva detto a Tessa che significava capire la musica, nonché un legame che era più profondo dell’amicizia. Jem aveva suonato, e aveva suonato gli anni della vita di Will così come li aveva visti. Aveva suonato due ragazzi in una sala delle esercitazioni, uno dei quali mostrava all’altro come lanciare i coltelli, e aveva suonato il rituale dei parabatai: il fuoco e i voti e le rune ardenti. Aveva suonato due ragazzi che correvano per le strade di Londra al buio, fermandosi per appoggiarsi al muro e ridere insieme. Aveva suonato il giorno in cui, nella biblioteca, lui e Will avevano scherzato con Tessa a proposito delle anatre, e aveva suonato il treno diretto nello Yorkshire, dove lui aveva detto che i parabatai erano destinati ad amarsi a vicenda come amavano le proprie anime. Aveva suonato quell’amore, e aveva suonato il loro amore per Tessa, e il suo per loro, e aveva sentito Will che diceva: Soltanto nei tuoi occhi trovavo la grazia. Aveva suonato le volte – troppo poche – in cui li aveva visti da quando era entrato nella fratellanza, i brevi incontri all’Istituto; la volta in cui Will era stato morso da un demone Shax ed era stato per morire, e lui era accorso dalla Città Silente ed era stato tutta la notte al suo fianco, rischiando di essere scoperto e punito. E aveva suonato la nascita del loro primo figlio, e la cerimonia di protezione che era stata eseguita sul piccolo nella Città Silente. Will non aveva voluto altro Fratello Silente che Jem per compierla. E aveva suonato il modo in cui aveva nascosto il viso pieno di cicatrici tra le mani e si era girato, quando aveva scoperto che il nome del bambino era James. Aveva suonato l’amore e la perdita e gli anni di silenzio, le parole non dette e i voti non espressi, e tutti gli spazi tra il suo cuore e il loro; e quando ebbe finito ed ebbe riposto di nuovo il violino nell’astuccio, gli occhi di Will erano chiusi, ma quelli di Tessa erano pieni di lacrime. Jem aveva posato l’archetto e si era avvicinato al letto, tirando indietro il cappuccio, in modo che lei vedesse i suoi occhi chiusi e il suo viso deturpato. E si era seduto accanto a loro sul letto e aveva preso la mano di Will, quella che Tessa non teneva, e sia Will sia Tessa avevano sentito la voce nelle loro menti. Ti prendo la mano, fratello, così che tu possa andare in pace. Will aveva aperto gli occhi azzurri, che col passare degli anni non avevano mai perso il loro colore, e aveva guardato Jem e Tessa, e aveva sorriso, ed era morto, con la testa di Tessa sulla spalla e la mano in quella di Jem. ~ Cassandra Clare, #NFDB
344:Tante volte era rimasto in ammirazione di fronte a un paesaggio, a un monumento, a una piazza, a uno scorcio di strada, a un giardino, a un interno di chiesa, a una rupe, a un viottolo, a un deserto. Solo adesso, finalmente, si rendeva conto del segreto.
Un segreto molto semplice: l'amore. Tutto ciò che ci affascina nel mondo inanimato, i boschi, le pianure, i fiumi, le montagne, i mari, le valli, le steppe, di più, di più, le città, i palazzi, le pietre, di più, il cielo, i tramonti, le tempeste, di più, la neve, di più, la notte, le stelle, il vento, tutte queste cose, di per sé vuote e indifferenti, si caricano di significato umano perché, senza che noi lo sospettiamo, contengono un presentimento d'amore.
Quanto era stato stupido a non essersene mai accorto finora. Che interesse avrebbe una scogliera, una foresta, un rudere se non vi fosse implicata una attesa? E attesa di che se non di lei, della creatura che ci potrebbe fare felici? Che senso avrebbe la valle romantica tutta rupi e scorci misteriosi se il pensiero non potesse condurci lei in una passeggiata del tramonto tra flebili richiami di uccelli? Che senso la muraglia degli antichi faraoni se nell'ombra dello speco non potessimo fantasticare di un incontro? E l'angolo del borgo fiammingo che ci potrebbe importare o il caffè del 'boulevard' o il 'suk' di Damasco se non si potesse supporre che anche lei un giorno vi passerà, impigliandovi un lembo di vita? E l'erma cappelletta al bivio col suo lumino, perché avrebbe tanto patos se non vi fosse nascosta un'allusione? E a che cosa allusione se non a lei, alla creatura che ci potrebbe fare felici?
[...]
Le torri antiche, le nuvole, le cateratte, le enigmatiche tombe, il singhiozzo della risacca sullo scoglio, il piegarsi dei rami alla tempesta, la solitudine dei greti nel pomeriggio, tutto è un'indicazione precisa a lei, la donna nostra che ci incenerirà. Ogni cosa del mondo congiurando con le altre cose del mondo in complotto sapientissimo per promuovere la perpetuazione della specie.
Era una intuizione così bella e geniale che in altre circostanze egli ne avrebbe avuto soddisfazione. Ma, proprio per la sua esattezza, oggi a lui procurava solamente dolore. L'espressione degli alberi fuggenti corrispondeva infatti alla condizione del suo amore; il quale era stolto e disperato. Egli correva in direzione di lei benché sapesse che laggiù lo aspettavano soltanto nuovi affanni, umiliazioni e lacrime. Ma lui correva a perdifiato ugualmente, il piede premuto con tutta la forza sul pedale, per la paura di perdere un minuto. ~ Dino Buzzati,#NFDB
345:- Siediti, Stirkoff.
- grazie , signore.
- distendi pure le gambe.
- molto gentile da parte sua, signore.
- Stirkoff, mi hanno informato che hai scritto articoli sulla giustizia, sull'eguaglianza; anche sul diritto alla gioia e alla sopravvivenza. Stirkoff?
- sissignore.
- pensi che ci sarà mai una giustizia totale e ragionevole sulla terra?
- non esattamente, signore.
- ma allora perché scrivi quelle stronzate? sei forse malato?
- mi sento strano da un po' di tempo a questa parte, signore, come se stessi per impazzire.
- bevi molto, Stirkoff?
- naturalmente, signore.
- e fai cosaccine da solo?
- di continuo, signore.
- come?
- non capisco, signore.
- cioè, com'é che te le fai?
- quattro o cinque uova e mezzo chilo di carne trita in un vaso di fiori col collo stretto mentre ascolto Vaughn Williams o Darius Milhaud.
- di vetro?
- no, di dietro, signore.
- volevo dire, il vaso è di vetro?
- naturalmente no, signore.
- ti sei mai sposato?
- molte volte, signore.
- siediti, Stirkoff.
- grazie , signore.
- Cos'è che non ha funzionato?
- tutto, signore.
- qual è stato il più bel pezzo di fica che tu abbia mai avuto?
- quattro o cinque uova e mezzo chilo di carne trita in un...
- d'accordo, d'accordo!
- sissignore.
- ma capisci che il tuo desiderio di giustizia e di un mondo migliore è solo una scusa per nascondere la decadenza, la vergogna, e il fallimento che sono dentro di te?
- eggià.
- tuo padre era cattivo?
- non so, signore.
- cosa vuol dire non so?
- voglio dire che è difficile fare paragoni. vede, di padre ne ho avuto uno solo.
- stai cercando di fare il furbo con me, Stirkoff?
- oh, no, signore: come lei dice la giustizia è impossibile.
- ti picchiava tuo padre?
- facevano i turni.
- pensavo che avessi avuto un solo padre.
- come tutti, volevo dire che s'alternava con mia madre.
- ti voleva bene tua madre?
- ero solo un prolungamento della sua persona.
- che altro può essere l'amore?
- il luogo comune secondo cui si ha grande cura di una cosa molto buona. non è necessariamente legato alla consanguineità. può essere un palloncino rosso o un toast imburrato.
- vuoi dire che potresti amare un toast imburrato?
- solo pochi, signore. in certe mattine particolari. sotto certi raggi del sole. l'amore arriva e scompare senza preavviso.
- è possibile amare un essere umano?
- naturalmente, soprattutto se non lo si conosce troppo bene. mi piace guardare la gente da dietro la finestra, quando cammina per strada.
- sei un vigliacco, Stirkoff.
- naturalmente, signore. ~ Charles Bukowski,#NFDB
346:Poi", continuò Marguerite, "tu eri l'unica persona davanti alla quale avevo subito intuito che potevo pensare e parlare liberamente. Tutti coloro che stanno intorno alle donne come me analizzano tutto quello che diciamo, cercano di trarre delle conclusioni dalle nostre azioni più insignificanti. Per natura, non abbiamo amici. Abbiamo amanti egoisti, che dilapidano il patrimonio non certo per noi, come dicono, ma per la loro vanità.
Per questi amanti, dobbiamo essere gaie quando sono allegri, in buona salute quando vogliono cenare, scettiche come loro. Ci è proibito avere un cuore, per non essere beffate e perdere il nostro credito.
Noi non ci apparteniamo più. Non siamo più esseri umani, ma cose. Siamo le prime nel loro amor proprio, le ultime nella loro stima. Abbiamo amiche, ma sempre del genere di Prudence, ex mantenute, che hanno conservato il gusto dello scialo senza poterselo permettere, data l'età. Allora diventano le nostre amiche, o meglio, le nostre commensali. La loro amicizia arriva fino al servilismo, mai fino al disinteresse. Mai ci daranno un consiglio, se non venale. A loro poco importa se abbiamo dieci amanti, purché ci ricavino qualche vestito, o un braccialetto, e possano ogni tanto passeggiare nella nostra carrozza o andare al teatro nel nostro palco. Prendono i mazzi di fiori che abbiamo ricevuto il giorno prima, e si fanno prestare i nostri scialle di cachemire. Non ci fanno mai il minimo piacere senza farselo pagare il doppio di quello che vale. L'hai visto tu stesso, la sera in cui Prudence mi ha portato i seimila franchi che l'avevo pregata di chiedere da parte mia al duca: se n'è fatta prestare cinquecento che non mi restituirà mai, o che mi pagherà in cappelli che resteranno eternamente nelle loro scatole.
Noi non possiamo avere, o meglio io non potevo avere che una gioia, triste come sono talvolta, sofferente come sono sempre: trovare un uomo abbastanza superiore da non chiedermi conto della mia vita, ed essere l'amante dei miei sentimenti molto più che del mio corpo. Un uomo così l'avevo trovato nel duce, ma il duca è vecchio, e la vecchiaia non protegge né consola. Avevo creduto di poter accettare la vita che mi offriva, ma che vuoi? morivo di noia, e per finire con l'uccidersi è meglio gettarsi in un incendio che asfissiarsi col carbone.
Allora ho incontrato te, giovane, ardente, felice, e ho cercato di fare di te l'amante che avevo invocato nella mia rumorosa solitudine. Ciò che amavo in te non era l'uomo che eri, ma quello che dovevi essere. Tu non accetti questo ruolo, lo respingi come indegno di te, sei un amante volgare; fai come gli altri: pagami, e non ne parliamo più. ~ Alexandre Dumas fils,#NFDB
347:Io mi diverto ad avere trent’anni, io me li bevo come un liquore i trent’anni: non li appassisco in una precoce vecchiaia ciclostilata su carta carbone. Ascoltami, Cernam, White, Bean, Armstrong, Gordon, Chaffee: sono stupendi i trent’anni, ed anche i trentuno, i trentadue, i trentatré, i trentaquattro, i trentacinque! Sono stupendi perché sono liberi, ribelli, fuorilegge, perchè è finita l’angoscia dell’attesa, non è incominciata la malinconia del declino, perché siamo lucidi, finalmente, a trent’anni! Se siamo religiosi, siamo religiosi convinti. Se siamo atei, siamo atei convinti. Se siamo dubbiosi, siamo dubbiosi senza vergogna. E non temiamo le beffe dei ragazzi perché anche noi siamo giovani, non temiamo i rimproveri degli adulti perchè anche noi siamo adulti. Non temiamo il peccato perché abbiamo capito che il peccato è un punto di vista, non temiamo la disubbidienza perché abbiamo scoperto che la disubbidienza è nobile. Non temiamo la punizione perché abbiamo concluso che non c’è nulla di male ad amarci se ci incontriamo, ad abbandonarci se ci perdiamo: i conti non dobbiamo più farli con la maestra di scuola e non dobbiamo ancora farli col prete dell’olio santo. Li facciamo con noi stessi e basta, col nostro dolore da grandi. Siamo un campo di grano maturo, a trent’anni, non più acerbi e non ancora secchi: la linfa scorre in noi con la pressione giusta, gonfia di vita. È viva ogni nostra gioia, è viva ogni nostra pena, si ride e si piange come non ci riuscirà mai più, si pensa e si capisce come non ci riuscirà mai più. Abbiamo raggiunto la cima della montagna e tutto è chiaro là in cima: la strada per cui siamo saliti, la strada per cui scenderemo. Un po’ ansimanti e tuttavia freschi, non succederà più di sederci nel mezzo a guardare indietro e in avanti, a meditare sulla nostra fortuna: e allora com’è che in voi non è così? Com’è che sembrate i miei padri schiacciati di paure, di tedio, di calvizie? Ma cosa v’hanno fatto, cosa vi siete fatti? A quale prezzo pagate la Luna? La Luna costa cara, lo so. Costa cara a ciascuno di noi: ma nessun prezzo vale quel campo di grano, nessun prezzo vale quella cima di monte. Se lo valesse, sarebbe inutile andar sulla Luna: tanto varrebbe restarcene qui. Svegliatevi dunque, smettetela d’essere così razionali, ubbidienti, rugosi! Smettetela di perder capelli, di intristire nella vostra uguaglianza! Stracciatela la carta carbone. Ridete, piangete, sbagliate. Prendetelo a pugni quel Burocrate che guarda il cronometro. Ve lo dico con umilità, con affetto, perché vi stimo, perché vi vedo migliori di me e vorrei che foste molto migliori di me. Molto: non così poco. O è ormai troppo tardi? O il Sistema vi ha già piegato, inghiottito? Sì, dev’esser così. ~ Oriana Fallaci, #NFDB
348:RICCARDO - Continuo a chiedermi come paragonare questa prigione dove vivo al resto del mondo, e siccome il mondo è pieno di gente e qui non c'è anima viva, fuori che me, non posso farlo. Pure, continuo a battere su quel chiodo.
La mia immaginazione farà da femmina al mio spirito, il mio spirito è il maschio, e fra tutti e due concepiranno una generazione di pensieri prolifici, e saranno essi a popolare questo microcosmo di personaggi irrequieti quanto la gente di questo mondo: poiché nessun pensiero è mai contento. I migliori, come i pensieri del divino, sono frammisti ai dubbi: tali da mettere il Verbo stesso in conflitto col Verbo.
Come "Venite, pargoli"; oppure ancora "È difficile per un cammello passare per la cruna d'un ago".
I pensieri che spronano all'ambizione, progettano imprese irrealizzabili: come queste vane, fragili unghie possano aprirsi una breccia tra le strutture granitiche di questo duro universo - le mura scabre della mia prigione.
E poiché non possono, si annullano nella loro superbia.
I pensieri che aspirano alla rassegnazione si consolano di non essere i primi, fra gli schiavi della Fortuna, e neppure gli ultimi: come stolti mendichi che, inchiodati alla gogna, si sentono meno umiliati perché è toccato a tanti, e toccherà a tanti altri. E in questo pensiero trovano una sorta di sollievo, caricando le proprie sventure sul dosso di quelli che prima di loro ebbero simile sorte.
Così io recito in un sol personaggio la parte di molti: e nessuno contento. Qualche volta faccio il re: allora il tradimento mi fa sospirare di essere un poveraccio - ed io tale divento. Poi però l'opprimente miseria mi convince che me la passavo meglio da re.
Ed eccomi rimesso sul trono: solo che di lì a poco mi vedo bello e detronizzato da Bolingbroke, e subito non sono più nulla. Ma chiunque io sia, né io né alcun uomo che possa dirsi uomo sarà contento di nulla finché non avrà il sollievo di non esser più nulla.
Suono di musica.
Sento della musica. Ah, ah! Andate a tempo! Come è aspra la dolce musica quando non tiene il ritmo e non rispetta il tempo.
Così è per la musica delle umane vite: e qui io ho un orecchio talmente affinato da avvertire la stonatura in una corda non bene accordata.
Ma per accordare il mio regno ai bisogni del tempo, non ebbi orecchio da avvertire le mie stonature.
Ho fatto pessimo uso del tempo, e il tempo fa pessimo uso di me, ché ora il tempo ha fatto di me il suo orologio.
I miei pensieri sono minuti, che i miei sospiri vanno ritmando sul quadrante dei miei occhi; mentre il mio dito, come la punta della lancetta, continua a segnare il tempo, nettandoli delle lacrime.
Ora, signore, il suono che indica lo scadere dell'ora è il clamore dei gemiti che mi squassano il cuore - che è la campana. Così sospiri, e lacrime, e gemiti, scandiscono i minuti, i quarti e le ore; mentre il tempo mio va galoppando a portare la gioia del superbo Bolingbroke, e io me ne sto qui a fare il pupazzo, a guardia del suo orologio.
Questa musica mi fa uscir di senno. Fatela smettere! Può darsi abbia ricondotto dei folli a rinsavire, ma io dico che può portare chi è savio alla follia.
Pure, benedetta l'anima buona che me la infligge, poiché essa è segno d'affetto, e l'affetto per Riccardo è un ben raro gioiello, in un mondo così saturo d'odio. ~ William Shakespeare,#NFDB
349:Mandati a zappare la terra invece di andare a scuola Calabria, registri esaminati dai carabinieri. Genitori denunciati Il paese Piazza Filottete nel centro storico di Petilia Policastro Gaetano Mazzuca | 563 parole La lotta alla criminalità in Calabria si fa anche spulciando tra i registri di classe. Fermare l’emorragia della dispersione scolastica, infatti, vuol dire non solo garantire il diritto all’istruzione, ma anche bloccare il reclutamento di nuove leve da parte dei clan locali. Così anche quest’anno, come accade già da qualche tempo, a fare gli scrutini negli istituti di Petilia Policastro, il paese di Lea Garofalo la testimone di giustizia trucidata dagli uomini della ’ndrangheta, non c’erano solo i professori, ma anche i carabinieri. Scrutini con i carabinieri La verifica condotta dai carabinieri, guidati dal capitano Claudio Martino, ha portato al deferimento in stato di libertà alla Procura della Repubblica di Crotone di 20 genitori, responsabili della mancata frequentazione delle scuole dell’obbligo da parte dei loro figli. I minori frequentavano, o meglio avrebbero dovuto frequentare, le scuole medie e il biennio delle superiori dei comuni di Petilia, Mesoraca e Cotronei. Le scuse dei genitori, come ad esempio improbabili ( e senza alcuna certificazione medica) malattie dei giovani, non sono state sufficienti per giustificare quello che per molti ragazzi è stato un vero e proprio abbandono scolastico, con la conseguente, naturale, perdita dell’anno. Giovani italiani Si tratta nella quasi totalità di famiglie italiane (solo una coppia è di nazionalità romena). In alcuni casi i minori sono figli di contadini che rinunciano ad andare a scuola per aiutare i genitori nei campi. Così invece di studiare storia o imparare l’aritmetica, si ritrovano a 11 anni a lavorare la terra in quest’angolo di Calabria. Una drammatica necessità, spiegano. Ma c’è di peggio. In alcune case semplicemente all’istruzione non viene dato alcun valore, anzi la scuola dell’obbligo è vista come un inutile impiccio. Il sentiero per questi ragazzini è già stato tracciato dalle loro famiglie: andranno a ingrossare le fila della criminalità locale. Le regole le impareranno per strada e non seduti davanti a un banco. Insomma, la lotta per la legalità inizia a questa età. Lo sanno bene i carabinieri di Petilia che da quattro anni controllano i registri delle scuole. Tutto è iniziato quando i militari hanno notato il figlio di un esponente della cosca petilina passare tutte le mattine nel bar del centro del paese. Sono andati a controllare nella scuola dove risultava iscritto, hanno dovuto battere la ritrosia e forse anche la paura dei vertici scolastici prima di mettere le mani sul registro e scoprire che quel ragazzino in classe non ci andava da tre mesi. Assenze ingiustificate Da quel momento l’attenzione delle forze dell’ordine è rimasta sempre alta ottenendo col tempo la massima collaborazione di presidi e docenti. Ora dopo due settimane di assenza senza certificazione medica parte la segnalazione e i risultati iniziano a vedersi. Il primo anno le denunce erano state 28, l’anno seguente 26, poi 22 e infine quest’anno 20. Ma non c’è solo la repressione. La caserma ha aperto le sue porte a 500 studenti, si è discusso di legalità, codice della strada, droga. Un momento di condivisione suggellato dal panino con nutella offerto ai ragazzi. Una “ricetta” semplice che sembra funzionare. ~ Anonymous, #NFDB
350:Variante. Tu sei un autore, non sai ancora quanto grande, colei che amavi ti ha tradito, la vita per te non ha più senso e un giorno, per dimenticare, fai un viaggio sul Titanic e naufraghi nei mari del sud, ti raccoglie (unico superstite) una piroga di indigeni e passi lunghi anni ignorato da tutti, su di un'isola abitata solo da papuasi, con le ragazze che ti cantano canzoni di intenso languore, agitando i seni appena coperti dalla collana di fiori di pua. Cominci ad abituarti, ti chiamano Jim, come fanno coi bianchi, una ragazza dalla pelle ambrata ti si introduce una sera nella capanna e ti dice: "Io tua, io con te." In fondo è bello, la sera, stare sdraiato sulla veranda a guardare la Croce del Sud mentre lei ti accarezza la fronte.
Vivi secondo il ciclo delle albe e dei tramonti, e non sai d'altro. Un giorno arriva una barca a motore con degli olandesi, apprendi che sono passati dieci anni, potresti andare via con loro, ma esiti, preferisci scambiare noci di cocco con derrate, prometti che potresti occuparti della raccolta della canapa, gli indigeni lavorano per te, tu cominci a navigare da isolotto a isolotto, sei diventato per tutti Jim della Canapa. Un avventuriero portoghese rovinato dall'alcool viene a lavorare con te e si redime, tutti parlano ormai di te in quei mari della Sonda, dai consigli al marajà di Brunei per una campagna contro i dajaki del fiume, riesci a riattivare un vecchio cannone dei tempi di Tippo Sahib, caricato a chiodaglia, alleni una squadra di malesi devoti, coi denti anneriti dal betel in uno scontro presso la Barriera Corallina il vecchio Sampan, i denti anneriti dal betel, ti fa scudo col proprio corpo - Sono contento di morire per te, Jim della Canapa. - Vecchio, vecchio Sampan, amico mio.
Ormai sei famoso in tutto l'arcipelago tra Sumatra e Port-au-Prince, tratti con gli inglesi, alla capitaneria del di Darwin sei registrato come Kurtz, e ormai sei Kurtz per tutti - Jim della Canapa per gli indigeni. Ma una sera, mentre la ragazza ti accarezza sulla veranda e la Croce del Sud sfavilla come non mai, ahi quanto, diversa dall'Orsa, tu capisci: vorresti tornare. Solo per poco, per vedere che cosa sia rimasto di te, laggiù.
Prendi la barca a motore, raggiungi Manila, di là un aereo a elica ti porta a Bali. Poi Samoa, Isole dell'Ammiragliato, Singapore, Tananarive, Timbuctu, Aleppo, Samarcanda, Bassora, Malta e sei a casa.
Sono passati diciott'anni, la vita ti ha segnato, il viso è abbronzato dagli alisei, sei più vecchio, forse più bello. Ed ecco che appena arrivato scopri che le librerie ostentano tutti i tuoi libri, in riedizioni critiche, c'è il tuo nome sul frontone della vecchia scuola dove hai imparato a leggere e a scrivere. Sei il Grande Poeta Scomparso, la coscienza della generazione. Fanciulle romantiche si uccidono sulla tua tomba vuota.
E poi incontro te, amore, con tante rughe intorno agli occhi, e il volto ancora bello che si strugge di ricordo, e tenero rimorso. Quasi ti ho sfiorata sul marciapiede, sono là a due passi, e tu mi hai guardato come guardi tutti, cercando un altro oltre la loro ombra. Potrei parlare, cancellare il tempo. Ma a che scopo? Non ho già avuto quello che volevo? Io sono Dio, la stessa solitudine, la stessa vanagloria, la stessa disperazione per non essere una delle mie creature come tutti. Tutti che vivono nella mia luce e io che vivo nello scintillio insopportabile della mia tenebra. ~ Umberto Eco,#NFDB
351:Romance
When you are seventeen you aren't really serious.
- One fine evening, you've had enough of beer and lemonade,
And the rowdy cafes with their dazzling lights!
- You go walking beneath the green lime trees of the promenade.
The lime trees smell good on fine evenings in June!
The air is so soft sometimes, you close your eyelids;
The wind, full of sounds, - the town's not far away Carries odours of vines, and odours of beer...
II
- Then you see a very tiny rag
Of dark blue, framed by a small branch,
Pierced by an unlucky star which is melting away
With soft little shivers, small, perfectly white...
June night! Seventeen! - You let yourself get drunk.
The sap is champagne and goes straight to your head...
You are wandering; you feel a kiss on your lips
Which quivers there like something small and alive...
III
Your mad heart goes Crusoeing through all the romances,
- When, under the light of a pale street lamp,
Passes a young girl with charming little airs,
In the shadow of her father's terrifying stiff collar...
And because you strike her as absurdly naif,
As she trots along in her little ankle boots,
She turns, wide awake, with a brisk movement...
And then cavatinas die on your lips...
IV
You're in love. Taken until the month of August.
You're in love - Your sonnets make Her laugh.
All your friends disappear, you are not quite the thing.
- Then your adored one, one evening, condescends to write to you...!
128
That evening,... - you go back again to the dazzling cafes,
You ask for beer or for lemonade...
- You are not really serious when you are seventeen
And there are green lime trees on the promenade...
Original French
Roman
On n'est pas sérieux, quand on a dix-sept ans.
- Un beau soir, foin des bocks et de la limonade,
Des cafés tapageurs aux lustres éclatants !
- On va sous les tilleuls verts de la promenade.
Les tilleuls sentent bon dans les bons soirs de juin !
L'air est parfois si doux, qu'on ferme la paupière ;
Le vent chargé de bruits - la ville n'est pas loin A des parfums de vigne et des parfums de bière....
II
-Voilà qu'on aperçoit un tout petit chiffon
D'azur sombre, encadré d'une petite branche,
Piqué d'une mauvaise étoile, qui se fond
Avec de doux frissons, petite et toute blanche...
Nuit de juin ! Dix-sept ans ! - On se laisse griser.
La sève est du champagne et vous monte à la tête...
On divague ; on se sent aux lèvres un baiser
Qui palpite là, comme une petite bête....
III
Le coeur fou Robinsonne à travers les romans,
Lorsque, dans la clarté d'un pâle réverbère,
129
Passe une demoiselle aux petits airs charmants,
Sous l'ombre du faux col effrayant de son père...
Et, comme elle vous trouve immensément naïf,
Tout en faisant trotter ses petites bottines,
Elle se tourne, alerte et d'un mouvement vif....
- Sur vos lèvres alors meurent les cavatines...
IV
Vous êtes amoureux. Loué jusqu'au mois d'août.
Vous êtes amoureux. - Vos sonnets La font rire.
Tous vos amis s'en vont, vous êtes mauvais goût.
- Puis l'adorée, un soir, a daigné vous écrire...!
- Ce soir-là,... - vous rentrez aux cafés éclatants,
Vous demandez des bocks ou de la limonade..
- On n'est pas sérieux, quand on a dix-sept ans
Et qu'on a des tilleuls verts sur la promenade.
~ Arthur Rimbaud,#NFDB
352:Romance
When you are seventeen you aren't really serious.
- One fine evening, you've had enough of beer and lemonade,
And the rowdy cafes with their dazzling lights!
- You go walking beneath the green lime trees of the promenade.
The lime trees smell good on fine evenings in June!
The air is so soft sometimes, you close your eyelids;
The wind, full of sounds, - the town's not far away Carries odours of vines, and odours of beer...
II
- Then you see a very tiny rag
Of dark blue, framed by a small branch,
Pierced by an unlucky star which is melting away
With soft little shivers, small, perfectly white...
June night! Seventeen! - You let yourself get drunk.
The sap is champagne and goes straight to your head...
You are wandering; you feel a kiss on your lips
Which quivers there like something small and alive...
III
Your mad heart goes Crusoeing through all the romances,
- When, under the light of a pale street lamp,
Passes a young girl with charming little airs,
In the shadow of her father's terrifying stiff collar...
And because you strike her as absurdly naif,
As she trots along in her little ankle boots,
She turns, wide awake, with a brisk movement...
And then cavatinas die on your lips...
IV
You're in love. Taken until the month of August.
You're in love - Your sonnets make Her laugh.
All your friends disappear, you are not quite the thing.
- Then your adored one, one evening, condescends to write to you...!
128
That evening,... - you go back again to the dazzling cafes,
You ask for beer or for lemonade...
- You are not really serious when you are seventeen
And there are green lime trees on the promenade...
Original French
Roman
On n'est pas sérieux, quand on a dix-sept ans.
- Un beau soir, foin des bocks et de la limonade,
Des cafés tapageurs aux lustres éclatants !
- On va sous les tilleuls verts de la promenade.
Les tilleuls sentent bon dans les bons soirs de juin !
L'air est parfois si doux, qu'on ferme la paupière ;
Le vent chargé de bruits - la ville n'est pas loin A des parfums de vigne et des parfums de bière....
II
-Voilà qu'on aperçoit un tout petit chiffon
D'azur sombre, encadré d'une petite branche,
Piqué d'une mauvaise étoile, qui se fond
Avec de doux frissons, petite et toute blanche...
Nuit de juin ! Dix-sept ans ! - On se laisse griser.
La sève est du champagne et vous monte à la tête...
On divague ; on se sent aux lèvres un baiser
Qui palpite là, comme une petite bête....
III
Le coeur fou Robinsonne à travers les romans,
Lorsque, dans la clarté d'un pâle réverbère,
129
Passe une demoiselle aux petits airs charmants,
Sous l'ombre du faux col effrayant de son père...
Et, comme elle vous trouve immensément naïf,
Tout en faisant trotter ses petites bottines,
Elle se tourne, alerte et d'un mouvement vif....
- Sur vos lèvres alors meurent les cavatines...
IV
Vous êtes amoureux. Loué jusqu'au mois d'août.
Vous êtes amoureux. - Vos sonnets La font rire.
Tous vos amis s'en vont, vous êtes mauvais go��t.
- Puis l'adorée, un soir, a daigné vous écrire...!
- Ce soir-là,... - vous rentrez aux cafés éclatants,
Vous demandez des bocks ou de la limonade..
- On n'est pas sérieux, quand on a dix-sept ans
Et qu'on a des tilleuls verts sur la promenade.
~ Arthur Rimbaud,#NFDB
353:Una recente statistica diceva che le donne forniscono 45 miliardi di ore di lavoro domestico contro i 43 miliardi di ore di lavoro salariato.
Il volume del lavoro domestico supera dunque di gran lunga il lavoro salariato. Se la società dovesse pagare quel lavoro è evidente che ciò aumenterebbe enormemente tutte le sue spese. È un grandissimo vantaggio per la società avere donne che fanno questo enorme lavoro per niente.
Come ottenere allora che la donna faccia questo lavoro? Bisogna condizionarla. Dato che è difficile convincerla che essa ha la vocazione di lavare i patti, si è trovato qualcosa di meglio.
Si esalta la maternità, perché la maternità offre il modo di tenere la donna in casa e di farle fare le faccende domestiche. Invece di dire alla bambina di due, tre o quattro anni: «Sei destinata a lavare i piatti» le si dice «Sei destinata ad essere madre»; le regalano bambole, si esalta la maternità, in modo che quando diventa una ragazza non pensa ad altro, pensa soltanto a sposarsi e ad avere bambini. La si è convinta che non sarà una donna completa se non avrà bambini. Quando una donna non ha figli, si dice: «Non è una vera donna», ma quando un uomo non ha figli non si dice: «Non è un vero uomo».
Bisogna dunque che la donna sia asservita alla maternità. Se almeno avesse la libertà di essere madre quando vuole, nella misura in cui lo vuole, pianificando le nascite dei figli, avrebbe molta piú libertà in tutti i campi. Potrebbe rivaleggiare con l’uomo sul piano professionale, non sarebbe per tutta la vita inchiodata in casa; e cosí si porrebbe il problema di perché non debba essere l’uomo a lavare i piatti.
Per evitare che ciò avvenga, bisogna dunque imporre la maternità alla donna e imporgliela suo malgrado. Per questa ragione da quando esiste la possibilità di controllare le nascite, non si è mai cercato di facilitarne la messa in pratica, al punto che in Francia attualmente c’è solo il 7 per cento di donne che si servono di metodi anticoncezionali. È anche per questo che il governo, in questo momento, sta ritirando tutte le sovvenzioni alla Pianificazione familiare, la sola organizzazione che si è occupata di informare le donne. Il governo, tuttavia, riconosce di non avere alcuna soluzione di ricambio; ed è una cosa molto grave. Non solo si sopprime la Pianificazione familiare e le si tolgono le possibilità di agire, ma non si prevede niente al suo posto. Si impedisce dunque alle donne di difendersi dal concepimento quando non lo desiderano. E cosí rimangono incinte loro malgrado.
Non resta allora altro che procurarsi l’aborto, e cosí fanno un milione di donne francesi ogni anno, malgrado questa legge che di fatto non impedisce niente e che quindi non ha alcun senso. Ogni tanto si dà ad essa un’apparenza di esistenza, accusando qualche donna, sempre scelta tra le piú diseredate, perché non si è mai vista la moglie di un magistrato, di un ministro o di un grande industriale seduta al posto in cui stanno le accusate di oggi.
Eppure si può essere sicuri che ci sono altrettanti aborti in quegli ambienti come negli altri. La legge opprime tutte le donne, anche quelle che sono privilegiate.
Nella mia vita ho visto arrivare a casa mia in lacrime non solo operaie o impiegate, ma donne borghesi che avevano denaro; una volta ho perfino aiutato la moglie di un grande direttore di banca. Nonostante tutto, le donne sono isolate; anche col denaro, non si hanno sempre gli indirizzi che occorrono e non si sa a chi rivolgersi.
Come dicevo in principio, si è inculcato nell’animo delle donne un tale senso di colpa, che l’aborto diviene per loro qualcosa di traumatizzante, mentre non lo sarebbe affatto se avvenisse in condizioni legali. ~ Simone de Beauvoir,#NFDB
354:Una recente statistica diceva che le donne forniscono 45 miliardi di ore di lavoro domestico contro i 43 miliardi di ore di lavoro salariato.
Il volume del lavoro domestico supera dunque di gran lunga il lavoro salariato. Se la società dovesse pagare quel lavoro è evidente che ciò aumenterebbe enormemente tutte le sue spese. È un grandissimo vantaggio per la società avere donne che fanno questo enorme lavoro per niente.
Come ottenere allora che la donna faccia questo lavoro? Bisogna condizionarla. Dato che è difficile convincerla che essa ha la vocazione di lavare i patti, si è trovato qualcosa di meglio.
Si esalta la maternità, perché la maternità offre il modo di tenere la donna in casa e di farle fare le faccende domestiche. Invece di dire alla bambina di due, tre o quattro anni: «Sei destinata a lavare i piatti» le si dice «Sei destinata ad essere madre»; le regalano bambole, si esalta la maternità, in modo che quando diventa una ragazza non pensa ad altro, pensa soltanto a sposarsi e ad avere bambini. La si è convinta che non sarà una donna completa se non avrà bambini. Quando una donna non ha figli, si dice: «Non è una vera donna», ma quando un uomo non ha figli non si dice: «Non è un vero uomo».
Bisogna dunque che la donna sia asservita alla maternità. Se almeno avesse la libertà di essere madre quando vuole, nella misura in cui lo vuole, pianificando le nascite dei figli, avrebbe molta piú libertà in tutti i campi. Potrebbe rivaleggiare con l’uomo sul piano professionale, non sarebbe per tutta la vita inchiodata in casa; e cosí si porrebbe il problema di perché non debba essere l’uomo a lavare i piatti.
Per evitare che ciò avvenga, bisogna dunque imporre la maternità alla donna e imporgliela suo malgrado. Per questa ragione da quando esiste la possibilità di controllare le nascite, non si è mai cercato di facilitarne la messa in pratica, al punto che in Francia attualmente c’è solo il 7 per cento di donne che si servono di metodi anticoncezionali. È anche per questo che il governo, in questo momento, sta ritirando tutte le sovvenzioni alla Pianificazione familiare, la sola organizzazione che si è occupata di informare le donne. Il governo, tuttavia, riconosce di non avere alcuna soluzione di ricambio; ed è una cosa molto grave. Non solo si sopprime la Pianificazione familiare e le si tolgono le possibilità di agire, ma non si prevede niente al suo posto. Si impedisce dunque alle donne di difendersi dal concepimento quando non lo desiderano. E cosí rimangono incinte loro malgrado.
Non resta allora altro che procurarsi l’aborto, e cosí fanno un milione di donne francesi ogni anno, malgrado questa legge che di fatto non impedisce niente e che quindi non ha alcun senso. Ogni tanto si dà ad essa un’apparenza di esistenza, accusando qualche donna, sempre scelta tra le piú diseredate, perché non si è mai vista la moglie di un magistrato, di un ministro o di un grande industriale seduta al posto in cui stanno le accusate di oggi.
Eppure si pu�� essere sicuri che ci sono altrettanti aborti in quegli ambienti come negli altri. La legge opprime tutte le donne, anche quelle che sono privilegiate.
Nella mia vita ho visto arrivare a casa mia in lacrime non solo operaie o impiegate, ma donne borghesi che avevano denaro; una volta ho perfino aiutato la moglie di un grande direttore di banca. Nonostante tutto, le donne sono isolate; anche col denaro, non si hanno sempre gli indirizzi che occorrono e non si sa a chi rivolgersi.
Come dicevo in principio, si è inculcato nell’animo delle donne un tale senso di colpa, che l’aborto diviene per loro qualcosa di traumatizzante, mentre non lo sarebbe affatto se avvenisse in condizioni legali. ~ Simone de Beauvoir,#NFDB
355:Nessun limite a Parigi. Nessuna città ha avuto questa dominazione che dileggiava talvolta coloro ch'essa soggioga: Piacervi o ateniesi! esclamava Alessandro. Parigi fa più che la legge, fa la moda; e più che la moda, l'abitudine. Se le piace, può esser stupida, e talvolta si concede questo lusso, allora l'universo è stupido con lei. Poi Parigi si sveglia, si frega gli occhi e dice: «Come sono sciocca!» e sbotta a ridere in faccia al genere umano. Quale meraviglia, una simile città! Quanto è strano che questo grandioso e questo burlesco si faccian buona compagnia, che tutta questa maestà non sia turbata da tutta questa parodia e che la stessa bocca possa oggi soffiare nella tromba del giudizio finale e domani nello zufolo campestre! Parigi ha una giocondità suprema: la sua allegrezza folgora e la sua farsa regge uno scettro. Il suo uragano esce talvolta da una smorfia; le sue esplosioni, le sue giornate, i suoi capolavori, i suoi prodigi e le sue epopee giungono fino in capo al mondo, e i suoi spropositi anche. La sua risata è una bocca di vulcano che inzacchera tutta la terra, i suoi lazzi sono faville; essa impone ai popoli le sue caricature, così come il suo ideale, ed i più alti monumenti della civiltà umana ne accettano le ironie e prestano la loro eternità alle sue monellerie. È superba: ha un 14 luglio prodigioso, che libera l'universo; fa fare il giuramento della palla corda a tutte le nazioni; la sua notte del 4 agosto dissolve in tre ore mille anni di feudalismo; fa della sua logica il muscolo della volontà unanime; si moltiplica sotto tutte le forme del sublime; riempie del suo bagliore Washington, Kosciusko, Bolivar, Botzaris, Riego, Bem, Manin, Lopez, John Brown, Garibaldi; è dappertutto dove s'accende l'avvenire, a Boston nel 1779, all'isola di Leon nel 1820, a Budapest nel 1848, a Palermo nel 1860; sussurra la possente parola d'ordine: Libertà, all'orecchio degli abolizionisti americani radunati al traghetto di Harper's Ferry ed all'orecchio dei patrioti d'Ancona, riuniti nell'ombra degli Archi, davanti all'albergo Gozzi, in riva al mare; crea Canaris, Quiroga, Pisacane; irraggia la grandezza sulla terra; e Byron muore a Missolungi e Mazet muore a Barcellona, andando là dove il suo alito li spinge; è tribuna sotto i piedi di Mirabeau, cratere sotto i piedi di Robespierre; i suoi libri, il suo teatro, la sua arte, la sua scienza, la sua letteratura, la sua filosofia sono i manuali del genere umano; vi sono Pascal, Régnier, Corneille, Descartes, Gian Giacomo; Voltaire per tutti i minuti, Molière per tutti i secoli; fa parlar la sua lingua alla bocca universale e questa lingua diventa il Verbo; costruisce in tutte le menti l'idea del progresso; i dogmi liberatori da lei formulati sono per le generazioni altrettanti cavalli di battaglia, e appunto coll'anima dei suoi pensatori e dei suoi poeti si sono fatti dal 1789 in poi gli eroi di tutti i popoli. Il che non le impedisce d'esser birichina; e quel genio enorme che si chiama Parigi, mentre trasfigura il mondo colla sua luce, disegna col carboncino il naso di Bourginier sul muro del tempio di Teseo e scrive Crédeville, ladro, sulle piramidi.
Parigi mostra sempre i denti; quando non brontola, ride.
Siffatta è questa Parigi. I fumacchi dei suoi tetti sono le idee dell'universo. Mucchio di fango e di pietre, se si vuole; ma, soprattutto, essere morale: è più che grande, è immensa. Perché? Perché osa.
Osare: il più progresso si ottiene a questo prezzo. Tutte le conquiste sublimi sono, più o meno, premî al coraggio, perché la rivoluzione sia, non basta che Montesquieu la presagisca, che Diderot la predichi, che Beaumarchais l'annunci, che Condorcet la calcoli, che Arouet la prepari e che Rousseau la premediti: bisogna che Danton l'osi. ~ Victor Hugo,#NFDB
356:ospedale Marco Bresolin | 642 parole «Grazie all’intervento degli assistenti veniva impedito il contatto fisico». «Nell’uscire di corsa dall’aula investiva la collega». «Dopo aver ripetutamente inveito contro la Presidenza, lanciava verso i banchi un bavaglio». «Protendeva il braccio destro colpendola con la mano tra il collo e il volto». «Lanciavano nella direzione dei banchi della Presidenza monete di cioccolata». «Rivolgeva gravissime offese di natura sessista». Potrebbe sembrare un registro di classe (e che classe!). O il referto arbitrale di una «combattuta» partita di Terza Categoria. No, sono i resoconti delle sedute di Camera e Senato. Il Parlamento, il luogo in cui si scrivono le leggi. Il luogo in cui, sempre più spesso, vengono violate. Quelle elette nella primavera del 2013 dovevano essere le Camere più giovani, più rosa e più rinnovate di sempre. Dunque, si pensava, le migliori. Quelle che avrebbero (anzi, hanno) il compito di non solo di scrivere le leggi, ma addirittura di riscrivere la Costituzione. Ma dopo un anno e mezzo, una decina di espulsioni dall’Aula, altrettanti parlamentari «censurati», un’occupazione dell’emiciclo e - addirittura - del tetto di Montecitorio per una notte, una deputata schiaffeggiata da un collega, una senatrice finita in ospedale con una spalla lussata e un senatore steso tra i banchi per un malore «post bagarre», vien da pensare che, forse, questo non è proprio il migliore dei parlamenti possibili. Anzi. Il regolamento del Senato scagliato contro Pietro Grasso dell’altro giorno è l’ultimo di una serie di episodi imbarazzanti. E infatti il presidente ora è deciso a istituire la linea dura: «Basta - si è sfogato coi suoi collaboratori - a ogni seduta sembra che si voglia alzare il livello dello scontro, non lo permetterò». Non che in passato siano mancate le intemperanze dei senatori (la mortadella di Nino Strano, nel 2008, per fare un esempio), ma il confronto con i provvedimenti presi in questa legislatura mostra un’escalation. Svettano Lega e M5S. E se Grasso non ce la fa più, figuriamoci Laura Boldrini. Alla Camera la gazzarra è all’ordine del giorno. L’apice - al netto delle già citate occupazioni grilline - si è toccato nell’ultima settimana di gennaio, i giorni della «ghigliottina». Montecitorio sembrava un ring. L’onorevole Di Battista duellava a favor di telecamera con il capogruppo Pd Roberto Speranza. Poi, come ha raccontato Mattia Feltri su La Stampa, «credendo di essere stato chiuso fuori dalla commissione Giustizia, aveva minacciato di buttare giù la vetrata col busto di Giovanni Giolitti». Peccato fosse aperta. Addirittura 5 deputati M5S venivano espulsi dall’Aula (la notizia è che a estrarre il cartellino rosso è stato il collega Luigi Di Maio). Ma nonostante la stretta decisa dall’ufficio di Presidenza, la musica non è mai cambiata. Nemmeno dopo l’elezione all’Europarlamento di Gianluca Buonanno, praticamente un incubo a forma di Sole delle Alpi per la Boldrini. In Aula aveva sventolato di tutto: manette, un forcone, una palla da carcerato, un finocchio, una spigola. Poi si era pitturato di nero il volto ed era stato richiamato perché «parlava in dialetto piemontese e metteva platealmente le mani dietro la schiena». Insomma: il peggiore, disciplinarmente parlando. A Strasburgo si è presentato indossando un burqa. Un simile Parlamento non poteva che far registrare il record di sospensioni. La più alta è toccata a Stefano Dambruoso (che è pure un questore alla Camera): 15 giorni per lo schiaffo alla grillina Lupo. In passato la pena massima era stata inflitta solo due volte: nel 1995 a Teodoro Buontempo (An) per aver occupato l’emiciclo e nel 2012 a Franco Barbato (Idv) per aver detto una parolaccia in Aula. In confronto con i loro successori, due gentiluomini. ~ Anonymous, #NFDB
357:Mujica, un marziano a Genova “Non si fa politica per soldi” L’ex presidente dell’Uruguay in Liguria sulle tracce degli antenati “I migranti che arrivano in Europa le fanno un favore: la svecchiano” Patrizia Albanese | 827 parole Scorte e lampeggianti? Ma quando mai. Arrivano quasi alla chetichella, in una giornata uggiosa. Non fosse per l’auto dell’ambasciata, che dal porto di Genova ieri mattina li ha discretamente portati fin quassù in Val Fontanabuona, sembrerebbero due turisti normali. Perdipiù con poco bagaglio. Già perché a José Alberto Mujica Cordano e a sua moglie Lucia Topolansky - sposata nel 2005 - non serve poi molto. Sebbene lui, figlio di emigranti liguri, fino al primo marzo fosse l’amatissimo presidente dell’Uruguay, del quale è tutt’ora senatore, al pari della moglie. Che non porta manco un gioiello, neppure la fede dopo le nozze. Pure quelle anomale. In stile col personaggio. Racconta, Lucia, sua compagna da quarant’anni: «Non mi ha fatto una dichiarazione, ha fatto un annuncio. In televisione, un giorno, ha comunicato che si sarebbe sposato. Io stavo ascoltando in cucina e l’ho saputo così…». Pausa. «Era sicuro che gli avrei detto sì». Sempre al suo fianco. Carcere compreso. Esperienza, che «Pepe» ricorda tranquillo perché gli «ha insegnato tanto» spiega puntandoti addosso gli occhi nerissimi e scintillanti. Sempre con un diktat: «Essere al servizio degli altri, questo è il significato della politica». Servizio alla società In Italia, veramente, mica tanto… Tra indagati e corrotti, la politica non appassiona. «Ah, no? È molto triste. E in cosa crede la gente?- domanda stupefatto - Se non si crede nel futuro non c’è niente. L’uomo è un animale politico. Diceva Aristotele, che non può vivere da solo, ma nella società. Tu come faresti senza penna e taccuino? Ci vuole qualcuno che li faccia. E che faccia vestiti, auto... Dipendiamo tutti dalla società. La politica è occuparsi della società e dei diritti». Lei da presidente ogni mese dei suoi 8.900 euro, ne devolveva 8.100 agli uruguaiani. Qui non va proprio così. Sospira: «La gente che ama troppo i soldi non deve entrare in politica. Che è servizio. È questa la felicità: servire la gente che ha bisogno. La bara non ha tasche per portarsi via i soldi». Lei e Lucia non avete mai abitato il palazzo presidenziale. «È un museo» scandisce mulinando il braccio verso il soffitto in legno dell’Osteria Fonte Bona, tre camere in tutto - e servizi al piano - dove l’ex presidente ha prenotato quindici giorni fa: online. E tanto per capire che in questa vallata è planato un marziano – anzi due – basti dire che il proprietario, Giovanni Bottino, dopo aver preparato il pranzo «a base di affettati, ravioli col tocco e vino “tinto”», ha lasciato amabilmente riposare «Pepe e Lucia». L’ex presidente è sbarcato «in cerca delle radici», della casa dei nonni materni, dopo una sosta a Muxyka, nei Paesi Baschi, terra paterna. Un viaggio-regalo, che dopo la Val Fontanabuona e Genova, porterà la coppia a Roma, dal Papa. I due mondi «Vedrò Francesco il 28. È il secondo incontro, con quest’uomo che si è spogliato di tutto». Credente? «No – replica divertito sotto i baffi alla Marquez – Ateo. Per il Cristianesimo la vita è una valle di lacrime. Non sono d’accordo: è bellissima. E il Paradiso è qua, è questa vita. Però, la religione aiuta a morire bene. Voglio parlare al Papa di molte cose. Principalmente della difficoltà d’integrazione tra tutti i Paesi dell’America Latina». Europa e Italia sono alle prese con i migranti e la strage dei barconi. «L’Europa diventerà caffelatte. Una miscela di razze – commenta placido – La soluzione non è combattere, ma andare in Africa ad aiutarli. L’Europa avrebbe dovuto farlo da tempo. Quanta ricchezza s’è presa dalle colonie? Poi li ha mollati… Non è giusto». Abbattere Saddam e Gheddafi? «Un errore enorme. La democraz ~ Anonymous, #NFDB
358:Ippoterapia, zoo ucraini e soap opera Le interpellanze assurde in Europa I parlamentari italiani sfornano quesiti a raffica per non passare da “fannulloni” Ma ogni interrogazione costa 1500 euro tra registrazione e traduzioni Marco Zatterin | 692 parole Lara Comi ha avuto un martedì da grafomane. La contabilità dell’Europarlamento rivela che ieri mattina sono state recepite 82 interrogazioni scritte alla Commissione Ue dalla deputata forzista, il 15% di quelle catalogate a Strasburgo in 24 ore. Spaziano dalla Garanzia Giovani alle imprese cipriote, dalla lotta alla disoccupazione spagnola e alla crisi olandese. Una crisi di attivismo? «L’ho fatto apposta» dice lei. Vuol far saltare le classifiche «falsate» del lavoro degli onorevoli europei in cui si fanno punti per ogni domanda, qualunque essa sia. «Ci sono colleghi sempre assenti che sono in vetta», accusa. Difficile contraddirla. Avviene proprio così. Da anni. Il costo della democrazia L’interrogazione parlamentare è un dono democratico. Consente agli eletti di controllare il potere a dodici stelle e farsi voce degli elettori. Possono essere orali o scritte, le prime vengono risolte in emiciclo, le seconde tornano sul pc dopo un paio di mesi. Nell’Ue hanno un solo difetto. Costano. Perché ogni testo va registrato, tradotto, studiato dall’esecutivo Ue, spedito al Parlamento, ritradotto. Un conto della commissione Bilancio è che ogni «question» pesa circa 1500 euro. Implica che per le 82 domande della Comi sono partiti 120 mila euro. «Lo so, sono molti - ammette lei -, ma è una guerra per la meritocrazia». Come sempre è meglio non esagerare, pure nella consapevolezza che se l’interrogazione è buona, pagare per renderla disponibile a tutti è un dovere. Il guaio è quando i numeri diventano alti e i testi vani. Dal luglio del reinsediamento in Europa, la leghista Mara Bizzotto ha firmato 228 testi (340 mila euro), quasi uno al giorno, dopo i 1344 nella passata legislatura. Sono questioni importanti, l’immigrazione e l’economia, in mezzo a altre bizzarre e fuori dallo spettro Ue: il 17 aprile ha chiesto notizie sugli animali dello zoo di Kharkiv in pericolo; le hanno fatto sapere che «la Commissione non ha competenze in merito per quanto riguarda l’Ucraina». Scalare la vetta C’è un motivo valido e due meno per scrivere un’interrogazione. Il primo lo si è visto, si fa pressione e si scruta l’operato dell’Europa. Gli altri lasciano a desiderare. Uno è che la mossa diventa pezza da appoggio per il collegio, col rischio di sollevare casi che fuori dalla pista Ue. L’altro è quello del ranking. I siti «Votewatch» e «MepRanking» misurano l’attività dei deputati con vari criteri omogenei. Presentare un’interrogazione vale quando essere relatore. Il che, ovviamente, non funziona: si sembra e non si è. Nell’Europa, genere trascurato, i deputati tendono a scomparire dai radar e molti cercano di recuperare spingendo sulle interrogazioni, principio anche nobile. Salta all’occhio la gara, interessante, fra i due grillini Corrao e Castaldo, entrambi con 127 domande da luglio, concreti sebbene non privi di sbavature. Come quando si interroga la Commissione su se sia consapevole del fatto che «la soap opera Agrodolce cofinanziata da Rai e da Regione Siciliana attraverso i fondi Fas si è conclusa bruscamente nel marzo 2011». Ce n’è per tutti i gusti. Solo qualche esempio: Michela Giuffrida (Pd) che si occupa del «cedimento di un pilone dell’A19 Palermo-Catania»; il leghista Buonanno che denuncia gli auricolari sporchi e paventa un rischio Ebola (!); Raffaele Fitto che parla delle migrazioni come d’un deliberato tentativo islamista di destabilizzare l'Italia; e la stessa Comi che domanda a Bruxelles se non abbia piani per l’ippoterapia, ottenendo una replica asciutta: «I programmi non prevedono azioni in materia». A 1500 euro a colpo si fa presto a spender troppo, così c’è anche chi immagina di regolamentar ~ Anonymous, #NFDB
359:I voraci figli di Achille: tutto a spese di Ferrovie Nord Auto, multe e scommesse sportive: a pagare era il papà presidente E nelle carte dell’inchiesta spuntano anche i quadri per Formigoni Norberto Achille, l’ex presidente di Ferrovie Nord destituito con un provvedimento del Gip Paolo Colonnello | 675 parole La famiglia prima di tutto. Ma poi anche gli amici, gli sponsor politici e perfino i magistrati. Con la carta di credito aziendale delle Ferrovie Nord, Norberto Achille, presidente della società quotata in Borsa, destituito l’altra sera con un provvedimento del gip di Milano e l’accusa di peculato e truffa aggravata, pagava davvero di tutto: dalle multe alle scommesse sportive dei figli, fino a dei quadri che sarebbero finiti a casa di Roberto Formigoni e «pranzi e cene a magistrati». Quasi 17 anni ai vertici di Ferrovie Nord, la società che ogni mattina scodella milioni di pendolari in Lombardia, non passano invano: negli ultimi 4 anni, le spese «pazze» dell’ex presidente e della sua «family» ammonterebbero a oltre 300 mila euro. Le multe del figlio Commercialista, inserito in diversi Cda, il figlio Marco amava usare la Bmw aziendale destinata a papà, e con questa avrebbe accumulato, solo di multe per eccesso di velocità, spese per oltre 120 mila euro. L’altro figlio, Filippo, invece alternava all’altra Bmw direttamente l’auto presidenziale con autista, al quale toccava anticipare anche gli spiccioli: «Non più di 50 però, eh?», si raccomanda Norberto. Auto, telefoni e benzina «Quel pezzo di m... se l’è goduta per cinque anni quella macchina, eh?», inveisce Filippo che ha problemi di gelosia col fratello Marco e non solo. Perchè mentre lui è da un po’ che non può più usare l’auto, Marco, un giorno che rimane con una gomma a terra, pretende dal padre che la Bmw gli venga sostituita con l’Audi A6 della presidenza. Auto che, testimoniano gli autisti, di solito «viene consegnata il venerdì sera a Norberto Achille con il pieno e restituita il lunedì con il serbatoio vuoto». Tutta colpa dei week end settimanali a Forte dei Marmi dove la simpatica famigliola si reca a spese della società partecipata da Regione Lombardia e Ferrovie dello Stato, caricando pure 900 euro di benzina delle altre auto di famiglia. Al telefono Marco Achille sostiene che «i giornalisti tirano conclusioni affrettate». Però suo padre un giorno esplode: «Ma non ti vergogni?» e minaccia di fargli staccare il telefono, aziendale pure quello, ovviamente. Un benefit che il «presidente» ha esteso a tutta la famiglia, dalla moglie ai figli, costo per la collettività: 124 mila e 296 euro. Poi si calma e dà un buon consiglio a Marco: «Non andare in giro col Rolex d’oro, hai capito?». Chissà cosa dirà adesso la Rolex. Carte di credito aziendali La ricostruzione delle spese fatta dai Carabinieri non lascia scampo: «Ristoranti e locali notturni: 17.232 euro; pay tv: 7634 euro; spese varie: 30 mila euro; connessioni internet: 934 euro; abbigliamento: 14mila e 500 euro; spese effettuate per scommesse: 3749 euro». Da segnalare, ad esempio, 900 euro pagate al Twiga di Briatore a Forte dei Marmi per una serata. La cosa bella è che alcuni scontrini sono stati presentati anche per ottenere un rimborso dalla tesoreria della società per un totale di 21 mila euro. Quadri a Formigoni Sarà perché è stato nominato dall’ex governatore ciellino, ma Norberto Achille non si dimentica del suo sponsor politico e pare gli regali quattro quadri «che si troverebbero presso l’abitazione dell’ex presidente» (due da 4000 euro nel 2010, uno da 9000 nel 2011, uno da 1400 nel 2012) come risulta a quelli dell’Audit che, per tutelarsi dalle pressioni interne, registrano le conversazioni con i membri del Cda. Altri 30 mila euro finiscono alla Regione non si sa bene a che titolo. Achille spiega anche di essersi «trovato a pagare cene e pranzi per Pomodoro, Grechi e anche diversi magistrati», ovvero gli ex president ~ Anonymous, #NFDB
360:E-commerce e tv digitale, parte la sfida Ue dei tablet senza frontiere L’Europa vuole creare un mercato unico del web, ma finora chi ha un abbonamento per film e partite di calcio non può usarlo su smartphone e computer se si trova all’estero Marco Zatterin | 801 parole Il nemico si chiama «geoblocking» e colpisce un consumatore europeo su due. Gli appassionati di calcio, ad esempio. Succede a chi ha comprato un abbonamento per vedere le partite della squadra del cuore sul tablet, perché vuol essere sicuro di non perdere neanche un match, ovunque si trovi. Ha firmato un contratto con l’operatore nazionale e lo ha pagato con la gioia delle grandi occasioni. Poi, un giorno, decide di regalarsi un viaggio all’estero, convinto che i suoi campioni lo seguiranno. Invece no. Appena passato il confine, la sua tavoletta diventa «straniera» e il servizio inaccessibile. Inutile aver pagato, inutile arrabbiarsi. I diritti finiscono con la frontiera nazionale, sono bloccati dalla geografia. Dal «geoblocking», per l’appunto. Il danno per i consumatori «E’ un male per i consumatori e non aiuta lo sviluppo dell’industria», tuona Andrus Ansip, ex premier estone, responsabile Ue per tutto ciò che è digitale. Bruxelles vorrebbe che il mercato comunitario - dove circolano liberamente cittadini, merci e capitali - fosse un terreno di gioco senza limitazioni ingiustificate anche per il digitale. Se lo immagina come gli Usa, dove Internet e telefonia non cambiano se si è a New York o San Francisco. Da noi i navigatori del web sono 315 milioni, ma solo il 4% dell’offerta di beni e servizi è transfrontaliera. Comandano i mercati nazionali. Se così non fosse, si avrebbero 415 miliardi di affari in più. Il che conviene a tutti. Il progetto di Bruxelles La Commissione si dà cinque anni per creare un «mercato unico digitale» e riformare tutto, dagli acquisti «on line» alle telefonate. Il primo problema che si pone è quello dei diritti. Riguarda la televisione «on demand», quella che si può ordinare lì per lì col telecomando, come il calcio, «il settore più complesso da affrontare». Ogni emittente acquista i diritti della singola serie tv o di un campionato puntando a una fetta precisa di continente. Al contempo, si protegge per evitare che la regola venga violata e «geoblocca». Anche se il limite viene aggirato grazie a furbizie informatiche semplici come Anonymox che cambia la nazionalità dell’indirizzo Internet. Bruxelles propone di aprire il mercato rivedendo le regole del diritto d’autore, ferme al 2001, anno in cui la «tv on demand» era quasi fantascienza. Suggerisce di elaborare schemi in grado di attraversare le frontiere nel rispetto di creativi e produttori. Si tratta di studiare un meccanismo perché ovunque in Europa si possa accedere a qualunque contenitore digitale pagando il giusto. «Si amplia la platea e si scoraggia la pirateria», assicurano alla Commissione. Dove si ammette che il caso pesa di più per le emittenti di lingua inglese che italiana, data l’audience potenziale. Ma che, questo, non modifica l’esigenza. Il «geoblocking» riguarda molti siti commerciali. In Belgio, per esempio, è impossibile comprare un computer dal sito francese di una grande marca che ha un frutto come simbolo: si viene reindirizzati alla pagina bruxellese; la geografia blocca l’acquisto e limita la scelta. Se invece si affitta un’auto in Spagna, ci sono possibilità che - letto l’indirizzo di provenienza del contatto - la stessa vettura costi di più per un tedesco piuttosto che per uno sloveno. In questo caso, la geografia penalizza. In generale, il 52% tutte le esigenze di acquisti transfrontalieri non viene esaudito in un altro paese. «Meno clienti, meno incassi», sottolinea Ansip. Il freno all’e-commerce Lo shopping online viene frenato pure dalla posta. Il 57% dei cittadini dice che il prezzo della spedizione è la ragion per cui non comprano all’estero. Colpa del mercato che non ~ Anonymous, #NFDB
361:Dalla festa del nonno ai mulini ecco il catalogo delle spese folli Secondo Confcommercio si buttano 82 miliardi l’anno C’è chi ha uffici in Nicaragua e chi paga corsi di merletto Nella foto a sinistra le «mutande verdi» acquistate dall’ex governatore del Piemonte Cota. A destra Franco Fiorito, in passato capogruppo Pdl nel Lazio, condannato a 3 anni e 4 mesi di reclusione Mattia Feltri | 752 parole Nel cassetto è rimasto un vecchio servizio dell’Espresso, giugno 2000. Un po’ più di quattordici anni fa e comunque non era una primizia: vi si leggeva, già con un margine di scoramento, dei 410 milioni (di lire) spesi dal Molise per commissionare alla Pontificia fonderia Marinelli la campana col rintocco adatto alle celebrazioni giubilari, oppure dei 65 stanziati dal Lazio a sovvenzione della festa del nonno di Ariccia, dove qualche notorietà la si deve alla porchetta più che al vecchierello. Poi c’erano i dieci milioni della Calabria per la cipolla rossa di Tropea, e avanti così, ma non era soltanto un festival dello strano ma vero: la Sicilia tirò fuori quattro miliardi per la valorizzazione dei mulini a vento e sei per l’individuazione di spiagge libere. Da allora i quotidiani e i periodici e la tv d’inchiesta coprono gli spazi e i momenti di noia con servizi di questo tipo, che hanno il pregio di essere infallibili; in fondo sono il modo superpop di cogliere l’attimo carnevalesco e, attimo dopo attimo, di spiegare come le Regioni siano in grado di sprecare 82,3 miliardi di euro all’anno, secondo lo studio presentato a marzo da Confcommercio. Vi si dice, fra l’altro, che il Lazio ne butta oltre undici, la Campania dieci abbondanti e la Sicilia - record - è lì per toccare quota quattordici. Il mondo è pieno di resoconti di questa natura. Il sempreverde è l’articolo sulle sedi di rappresentanza delle Regioni, con l’aneddoto strepitoso delle ventuno sedi regionali a Bruxelles, tutte indispensabili a mantenere il filo diretto fra Bari e l’Ue, Cagliari e l’Ue, Genova e l’Ue; piccolo dettaglio: le Regioni sono ventuno, ma Trento e Bolzano ritennero doveroso farsi una sede per provincia. Ai tempi di Giulio Tremonti si venne a sapere, con molta fatica e qualche approssimazione, che queste sedi sono 178 sparse nel mondo, il Piemonte ne ha una in Nicaragua e un’altra a Minsk, il Veneto in India e in Vietnam, la Puglia in Albania, le Marche a Ekaterinburg, dove ci fu l’eccidio dei Romanov e altro non si sa. Ha provato a metterci mano anche Carlo Cottarelli, il commissario alla spending review, e gli raccontarono (ne scrisse il Fatto) di quel consigliere regionale della Basilicata che voleva aprire a Potenza un ufficio di rappresentanza della Regione, e nonostante la Regione Basilicata abbia sede a Potenza. Insomma, se c’era un affare su cui si raggiungeva l’unanimità della nazione, era questo: le Regioni sono il tombino dei nostri soldi. Eravamo andati a vedere le consulenze distribuite in splendida allegria, i consulenti piemontesi sulla qualità percepita dagli utenti delle reti ferroviarie, i consulenti friulani sulle biblioteche nel deserto della Mauritania e su un corso di merletto, quello umbro sul monitoraggio delle tv locali. Siamo andati a verificare che la Valle d’Aosta (Regione e altri enti locali) ancora lo scorso anno aveva 493 auto blu, una ogni 260 residenti, mentre il Molise ne aveva 368 (tre soltanto a Montenero di Bisaccia, il paese di Antonio Di Pietro) ed era l’unica Regione, insieme col Trentino, che nel 2013 aveva aumentato anziché diminuito il parco macchine. Nel settore, una specie di bibbia è il divertente libro di Mario Giordano (Spudorati, Mondadori) che al capitolo sulle Regioni racconta che la Lombardia ha tirato fuori 75 mila euro nell’osservazione degli scoiattoli e cifre varie nel sovvenzionamento della Fiera della Possenta di Ceresara, dell’International Melzo Film Festival, della festa Cià che gìrum, del gemellaggio Pero-Fuscaldo. E la Lomb ~ Anonymous, #NFDB
362:Sempre più lento andava il pensieroso e si chiedeva frattanto: « Ma che è dunque ciò che avevi voluto apprendere dalle dottrine e dai maestri, e che essi, pur avendoti rivelato tante cose, non sono riusciti a insegnarti? ». Ed egli trovò: « L'Io era, ciò di cui volevo apprendere il senso e l'essenza. L'Io era, ciò di cui volevo liberarmi, ciò che volevo superare. Ma non potevo superarlo, potevo soltanto ingannarlo, potevo soltanto fuggire o nascondermi davanti a lui. In verità, nessuna cosa al mondo ha tanto occupato i miei pensieri come questo mio Io, questo enigma ch'io vivo, d'essere uno, distinto e separato da tutti gli altri, d'essere Siddharta! E su nessuna cosa al mondo so tanto poco quanto su di me, Siddharta!».
Colpito da questo pensiero s'arrestò improvvisamente nel suo lento cammino meditativo, e tosto da questo pensiero ne balzò fuori un altro, che suonava: « Che io non sappia nulla di me, che Siddharta mi sia rimasto così estraneo e sconosciuto, questo dipende da una causa fondamentale, una sola: io avevo paura di me, prendevo la fuga davanti a me stesso! L'Atman cercavo, Brahma cercavo, e volevo smembrare e scortecciare il mio Io, per trovare nella sua sconosciuta profondità il nocciolo di tutte le cortecce, l'Atman, la vita, il divino, l'assoluto. Ma proprio io, intanto, andavo perduto a me stesso ».
Siddharta schiuse gli occhi e si guardò intorno, un sorriso gli illuminò il volto, e un profondo sentimento, come di risveglio da lunghi sogni, lo percorse fino alla punta dei piedi. E appena si rimise in cammino, correva in fretta, come un uomo che sa quel che ha da fare.
« Oh! » pensava respirando profondamente « ora Siddharta non me lo voglio più lasciar scappare! Basta! cominciare il pensiero e la mia vita con l'Atman e col dolore del mondo! Basta! uccidermi e smembrarmi, per scoprire un segreto dietro le rovine! Non sarà più lo Yoga-Veda a istruirmi, né l'Atharva-Veda, né gli asceti, né alcuna dottrina. Dal mio stesso Io voglio andare a scuola, voglio conoscermi, voglio svelare quel mistero che ha nome Siddharta ».
Si guardò attorno come se vedesse per la prima volta il mondo. Bello era il mondo, variopinto, raro e misterioso era il mondo! Qui era azzurro, là giallo, più oltre verde, il cielo pareva fluire lentamente come i fiumi, immobili stavano il bosco e la montagna, tutto bello, tutto enigmatico e magico, e in mezzo v'era lui, Siddharta, il risvegliato, sulla strada che conduce a se stesso. Tutto ciò, tutto questo giallo e azzurro, fiume e bosco penetrava per la prima volta attraverso la vista in Siddharta, non era più l'incantesimo di Mara, non era più il velo di Maya, non era più insensata e accidentale molteplicità del mondo delle apparenze, spregevole agli occhi del Brahmino, che, tutto dedito ai suoi profondi pensieri, scarta la molteplicità e solo dell'unità va in cerca. L'azzurro era azzurro, il fiume era fiume, e anche se nell'azzurro e nel fiume vivevan nascosti come in Siddharta l'uno e il divino, tale era appunto la natura e il senso del divino, d'esser qui giallo, là azzurro, là cielo, là bosco e qui Siddharta. Il senso e l'essenza delle cose erano non in qualche cosa oltre e dietro loro, ma nelle cose stesse, in tutto.
« Come sono stato sordo e ottuso! » pensava, e camminava intanto rapidamente. «Quand'uno legge uno scritto di cui vuoi conoscere il senso, non ne disprezza i segni e le lettere, né li chiama illusione, accidente e corteccia senza valore, bensì li decifra, li studia e li ama, lettera per lettera. Io invece, io che volevo leggere il libro del mondo e il libro del mio proprio Io, ho disprezzato i segni e le lettere, a favore d'un significato congetturato in precedenza, ho chiamato illusione il mondo delle apparenze, ho chiamato il mio occhio e la mia lingua fenomeni accidentali e senza valore. No, tutto questo è finito, ora son desto, mi sono risvegliato nella realtà e oggi nasco per la prima volta. ~ Hermann Hesse,#NFDB
363:Inferno Canto03
Per me si va ne la città dolente,
per me si va ne l'etterno dolore,
per me si va tra la perduta gente .
THROUGH ME THE WAY INTO THE SUFFERING CITY,
THROUGH ME THE WAY TO THE ETERNAL PAIN,
THROUGH ME THE WAY THAT RUNS AMONG THE LOST.
Giustizia mosse il mio alto fattore:
fecemi la divina podestate,
la somma sapienza e 'l primo amore .
JUSTICE URGED ON MY HIGH ARTIFICER;
MY MAKER WAS DIVINE AUTHORITY,
THE HIGHEST WISDOM, AND THE PRIMAL LOVE.
Dinanzi a me non fuor cose create
se non etterne, e io etterno duro.
Lasciate ogne speranza, voi ch'intrate ".
BEFORE ME NOTHING BUT ETERNAL THINGS
WERE MADE, AND I ENDURE ETERNALLY.
ABANDON EVERY HOPE, WHO ENTER HERE.
Queste parole di colore oscuro
vid'io scritte al sommo d'una porta;
per ch'io: «Maestro, il senso lor m'è duro ».
These words-their aspect was obscure-I read
inscribed above a gateway, and I said:
"Master, their meaning is difficult for me."
Ed elli a me, come persona accorta:
«Qui si convien lasciare ogne sospetto;
ogne viltà convien che qui sia morta .
262
And he to me, as one who comprehends:
"Here one must leave behind all hesitation;
here every cowardice must meet its death.
Noi siam venuti al loco ov'i' t'ho detto
che tu vedrai le genti dolorose
c'hanno perduto il ben de l'intelletto ».
For we have reached the place of which I spoke,
where you will see the miserable people,
those who have lost the good of the intellect."
E poi che la sua mano a la mia puose
con lieto volto, ond'io mi confortai,
mi mise dentro a le segrete cose .
And when, with gladness in his face, he placed
his hand upon my own, to comfort me,
he drew me in among the hidden things.
Quivi sospiri, pianti e alti guai
risonavan per l'aere sanza stelle,
per ch'io al cominciar ne lagrimai .
Here sighs and lamentations and loud cries
were echoing across the starless air,
so that, as soon as I set out, I wept.
Diverse lingue, orribili favelle,
parole di dolore, accenti d'ira,
voci alte e fioche, e suon di man con elle
Strange utterances, horrible pronouncements,
accents of anger, words of suffering,
and voices shrill and faint, and beating hands-
263
facevano un tumulto, il qual s'aggira
sempre in quell'aura sanza tempo tinta,
come la rena quando turbo spira .
all went to make a tumult that will whirl
forever through that turbid, timeless air,
like sand that eddies when a whirlwind swirls.
E io ch'avea d'error la testa cinta,
dissi: «Maestro, che è quel ch'i' odo?
e che gent'è che par nel duol sì vinta ?».
And I-my head oppressed by horror-said:
"Master, what is it that I hear? Who are
those people so defeated by their pain?"
Ed elli a me: «Questo misero modo
tegnon l'anime triste di coloro
che visser sanza 'nfamia e sanza lodo .
And he to me: "This miserable way
is taken by the sorry souls of those
who lived without disgrace and without praise.
Mischiate sono a quel cattivo coro
de li angeli che non furon ribelli
né fur fedeli a Dio, ma per sé fuoro .
They now commingle with the coward angels,
the company of those who were not rebels
nor faithful to their God, but stood apart.
Caccianli i ciel per non esser men belli,
né lo profondo inferno li riceve,
ch'alcuna gloria i rei avrebber d'elli ».
The heavens, that their beauty not be lessened,
have cast them out, nor will deep Hell receive them-
264
even the wicked cannot glory in them."
E io: «Maestro, che è tanto greve
a lor, che lamentar li fa sì forte?».
Rispuose: «Dicerolti molto breve .
And I: "What is it, master, that oppresses
these souls, compelling them to wail so loud?"
He answered: "I shall tell you in few words.
Questi non hanno speranza di morte
e la lor cieca vita è tanto bassa,
che 'nvidiosi son d'ogne altra sorte .
Those who are here can place no hope in death,
and their blind life is so abject that they
are envious of every other fate.
Fama di loro il mondo esser non lassa;
misericordia e giustizia li sdegna:
non ragioniam di lor, ma guarda e passa ».
The world will let no fame of theirs endure;
both justice and compassion must disdain them;
let us not talk of them, but look and pass."
E io, che riguardai, vidi una 'nsegna
che girando correva tanto ratta,
che d'ogne posa mi parea indegna ;
And I, looking more closely, saw a banner
that, as it wheeled about, raced on-so quick
that any respite seemed unsuited to it.
e dietro le venìa sì lunga tratta
di gente, ch'i' non averei creduto
che morte tanta n'avesse disfatta .
265
Behind that banner trailed so long a file
of people-I should never have believed
that death could have unmade so many souls.
Poscia ch'io v'ebbi alcun riconosciuto,
vidi e conobbi l'ombra di colui
che fece per viltade il gran rifiuto .
After I had identified a few,
I saw and recognized the shade of him
who made, through cowardice, the great refusal.
Incontanente intesi e certo fui
che questa era la setta d'i cattivi,
a Dio spiacenti e a' nemici sui .
At once I understood with certainty:
this company contained the cowardly,
hateful to God and to His enemies.
Questi sciaurati, che mai non fur vivi,
erano ignudi e stimolati molto
da mosconi e da vespe ch'eran ivi .
These wretched ones, who never were alive,
went naked and were stung again, again
by horseflies and by wasps that circled them.
Elle rigavan lor di sangue il volto,
che, mischiato di lagrime, a' lor piedi
da fastidiosi vermi era ricolto .
The insects streaked their faces with their blood,
which, mingled with their tears, fell at their feet,
where it was gathered up by sickening worms.
266
E poi ch'a riguardar oltre mi diedi,
vidi genti a la riva d'un gran fiume;
per ch'io dissi: «Maestro, or mi concedi
And then, looking beyond them, I could see
a crowd along the bank of a great river;
at which I said: "Allow me now to know
ch'i' sappia quali sono, e qual costume
le fa di trapassar parer sì pronte,
com'io discerno per lo fioco lume ».
who are these people-master-and what law
has made them seem so eager for the crossing,
as I can see despite the feeble light."
Ed elli a me: «Le cose ti fier conte
quando noi fermerem li nostri passi
su la trista riviera d'Acheronte ».
And he to me: "When we have stopped along
the melancholy shore of Acheron,
then all these matters will be plain to you."
Allor con li occhi vergognosi e bassi,
temendo no 'l mio dir li fosse grave,
infino al fiume del parlar mi trassi .
At that, with eyes ashamed, downcast, and fearing
that what I said had given him offense,
I did not speak until we reached the river.
Ed ecco verso noi venir per nave
un vecchio, bianco per antico pelo,
gridando: «Guai a voi, anime prave !
And here, advancing toward us, in a boat,
an aged man-his hair was white with years-
267
was shouting: "Woe to you, corrupted souls!
Non isperate mai veder lo cielo:
i' vegno per menarvi a l'altra riva
ne le tenebre etterne, in caldo e 'n gelo .
Forget your hope of ever seeing Heaven:
I come to lead you to the other shore,
to the eternal dark, to fire and frost.
E tu che se' costì, anima viva,
pàrtiti da cotesti che son morti».
Ma poi che vide ch'io non mi partiva ,
And you approaching there, you living soul,
keep well away from these-they are the dead."
But when he saw I made no move to go,
disse: «Per altra via, per altri porti
verrai a piaggia, non qui, per passare:
più lieve legno convien che ti porti ».
he said: "Another way and other harborsnot here-will bring you passage to your shore:
a lighter craft will have to carry you."
E 'l duca lui: «Caron, non ti crucciare:
vuolsi così colà dove si puote
ciò che si vuole, e più non dimandare ».
My guide then: "Charon, don't torment yourself:
our passage has been willed above, where One
can do what He has willed; and ask no more."
Quinci fuor quete le lanose gote
al nocchier de la livida palude,
che 'ntorno a li occhi avea di fiamme rote .
268
Now silence fell upon the wooly cheeks
of Charon, pilot of the livid marsh,
whose eyes were ringed about with wheels of flame.
Ma quell'anime, ch'eran lasse e nude,
cangiar colore e dibattero i denti,
ratto che 'nteser le parole crude .
But all those spirits, naked and exhausted,
had lost their color, and they gnashed their teeth
as soon as they heard Charon's cruel words;
Bestemmiavano Dio e lor parenti,
l'umana spezie e 'l loco e 'l tempo e 'l seme
di lor semenza e di lor nascimenti .
they execrated God and their own parents
and humankind, and then the place and time
of their conception's seed and of their birth.
Poi si ritrasser tutte quante insieme,
forte piangendo, a la riva malvagia
ch'attende ciascun uom che Dio non teme .
Then they forgathered, huddled in one throng,
weeping aloud along that wretched shore
which waits for all who have no fear of God.
Caron dimonio, con occhi di bragia,
loro accennando, tutte le raccoglie;
batte col remo qualunque s'adagia .
The demon Charon, with his eyes like embers,
by signaling to them, has all embark;
his oar strikes anyone who stretches out.
269
Come d'autunno si levan le foglie
l'una appresso de l'altra, fin che 'l ramo
vede a la terra tutte le sue spoglie ,
As, in the autumn, leaves detach themselves,
first one and then the other, till the bough
sees all its fallen garments on the ground,
Aen.VI.
similemente il mal seme d'Adamo
gittansi di quel lito ad una ad una,
per cenni come augel per suo richiamo .
similarly, the evil seed of Adam
descended from the shoreline one by one,
when signaled, as a falcon-called-will come.
Così sen vanno su per l'onda bruna,
e avanti che sien di là discese,
anche di qua nuova schiera s'auna .
So do they move across the darkened waters;
even before they reach the farther shore,
new ranks already gather on this bank.
«Figliuol mio», disse 'l maestro cortese,
«quelli che muoion ne l'ira di Dio
tutti convegnon qui d'ogne paese :
"My son," the gracious master said to me,
"those who have died beneath the wrath of God,
all these assemble here from every country;
e pronti sono a trapassar lo rio,
ché la divina giustizia li sprona,
sì che la tema si volve in disio .
270
and they are eager for the river crossing
because celestial justice spurs them on,
so that their fear is turned into desire.
Quinci non passa mai anima buona;
e però, se Caron di te si lagna,
ben puoi sapere omai che 'l suo dir suona ».
No good soul ever takes its passage here;
therefore, if Charon has complained of you,
by now you can be sure what his words mean."
Finito questo, la buia campagna
tremò sì forte, che de lo spavento
la mente di sudore ancor mi bagna .
And after this was said, the darkened plain
quaked so tremendously-the memory
of terror then, bathes me in sweat again.
La terra lagrimosa diede vento,
che balenò una luce vermiglia
la qual mi vinse ciascun sentimento ;
A whirlwind burst out of the tear-drenched earth,
a wind that crackled with a bloodred light,
a light that overcame all of my senses;
e caddi come l'uom cui sonno piglia.
and like a man whom sleep has seized, I fell.
~ Dante Alighieri,#NFDB
1131 Integral Yoga
814 Poetry
202 Fiction
197 Occultism
176 Philosophy
130 Christianity
93 Mysticism
77 Yoga
74 Psychology
35 Science
24 Philsophy
20 Hinduism
17 Mythology
16 Integral Theory
13 Theosophy
13 Islam
11 Zen
11 Education
10 Buddhism
8 Kabbalah
7 Sufism
7 Cybernetics
4 Baha i Faith
1 Thelema
1 Taoism
1 Alchemy
617 The Mother
484 Sri Aurobindo
422 Satprem
229 Nolini Kanta Gupta
109 Percy Bysshe Shelley
106 H P Lovecraft
93 William Wordsworth
77 Carl Jung
74 Aleister Crowley
72 Walt Whitman
57 Pierre Teilhard de Chardin
49 William Butler Yeats
49 James George Frazer
47 Sri Ramakrishna
44 Rabindranath Tagore
42 Friedrich Nietzsche
40 Robert Browning
38 John Keats
36 Plotinus
29 Friedrich Schiller
26 Jorge Luis Borges
26 A B Purani
25 Saint Augustine of Hippo
25 Jalaluddin Rumi
24 Ralph Waldo Emerson
20 Rudolf Steiner
20 Lucretius
18 Lalla
16 Franz Bardon
15 Li Bai
15 Aldous Huxley
14 Vyasa
14 Swami Krishnananda
13 Swami Vivekananda
13 Ovid
13 Muhammad
13 Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
12 Nirodbaran
11 Plato
11 Anonymous
10 Saint John of Climacus
10 Edgar Allan Poe
9 George Van Vrekhem
8 Rabbi Moses Luzzatto
8 Hakim Sanai
7 Sri Ramana Maharshi
7 Saint Teresa of Avila
7 Norbert Wiener
7 Henry David Thoreau
6 Jordan Peterson
6 Al-Ghazali
5 Thubten Chodron
5 Swami Sivananda Saraswati
5 Rainer Maria Rilke
5 Hafiz
5 Bokar Rinpoche
5 Baha u llah
4 Solomon ibn Gabirol
4 Mirabai
4 Matsuo Basho
4 Joseph Campbell
4 Alice Bailey
3 Thomas Merton
3 Tao Chien
3 Shih-te
3 R Buckminster Fuller
3 Patanjali
3 Ken Wilber
3 Han-shan
3 Aristotle
2 Taigu Ryokan
2 Shiwu (Stonehouse)
2 Rabbi Abraham Abulafia
2 Peter J Carroll
2 Paul Richard
2 Nachmanides
2 Muso Soseki
2 Moses de Leon
2 Mahendranath Gupta
2 Jorge Luis Borges
2 Jean Gebser
2 Italo Calvino
2 Ikkyu
2 H. P. Lovecraft
2 Genpo Roshi
2 Farid ud-Din Attar
2 Dogen
2 Bulleh Shah
2 Boethius
128 Record of Yoga
109 Shelley - Poems
106 Lovecraft - Poems
93 Wordsworth - Poems
69 Whitman - Poems
57 The Synthesis Of Yoga
49 Yeats - Poems
49 The Golden Bough
46 The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna
45 Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 01
44 Agenda Vol 08
43 Tagore - Poems
42 Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 07
40 Magick Without Tears
40 Browning - Poems
39 Questions And Answers 1957-1958
38 Keats - Poems
38 Agenda Vol 04
38 Agenda Vol 01
37 Thus Spoke Zarathustra
37 Agenda Vol 10
36 Agenda Vol 03
35 Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 03
34 The Life Divine
34 Savitri
33 Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 04
33 Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 02
31 Mysterium Coniunctionis
30 Agenda Vol 11
30 Agenda Vol 02
29 Schiller - Poems
29 Agenda Vol 09
28 Liber ABA
28 Essays In Philosophy And Yoga
28 Agenda Vol 05
27 Questions And Answers 1953
27 Collected Poems
26 Evening Talks With Sri Aurobindo
26 Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 05
25 Questions And Answers 1950-1951
24 Questions And Answers 1956
24 Letters On Yoga IV
24 Emerson - Poems
24 Agenda Vol 13
21 The Human Cycle
21 The Future of Man
21 Agenda Vol 06
20 Of The Nature Of Things
19 Questions And Answers 1955
18 The Practice of Psycho therapy
18 On Thoughts And Aphorisms
18 City of God
18 Agenda Vol 12
17 Words Of Long Ago
17 Sri Aurobindo or the Adventure of Consciousness
17 Questions And Answers 1954
17 Prayers And Meditations
17 Agenda Vol 07
15 The Perennial Philosophy
15 The Archetypes and the Collective Unconscious
15 On the Way to Supermanhood
15 Li Bai - Poems
14 Vishnu Purana
14 The Study and Practice of Yoga
14 The Phenomenon of Man
14 The Divine Comedy
14 Let Me Explain
14 Labyrinths
13 Quran
13 Metamorphoses
13 Essays On The Gita
13 Essays Divine And Human
13 Aion
12 Twelve Years With Sri Aurobindo
12 The Secret Of The Veda
11 The Bible
11 Talks
11 Plotinus - Complete Works Vol 01
11 Borges - Poems
10 Vedic and Philological Studies
10 The Ladder of Divine Ascent
10 Some Answers From The Mother
10 Plotinus - Complete Works Vol 02
10 On Education
9 The Practice of Magical Evocation
9 Theosophy
9 Questions And Answers 1929-1931
9 Preparing for the Miraculous
9 Poe - Poems
9 Knowledge of the Higher Worlds
9 A Garden of Pomegranates - An Outline of the Qabalah
8 The Confessions of Saint Augustine
8 Plotinus - Complete Works Vol 03
8 Letters On Yoga II
8 Letters On Yoga I
8 Hymn of the Universe
8 General Principles of Kabbalah
8 Crowley - Poems
8 5.1.01 - Ilion
7 Walden
7 The Problems of Philosophy
7 Plotinus - Complete Works Vol 04
7 Initiation Into Hermetics
7 Faust
7 Cybernetics
7 Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 08
7 Anonymous - Poems
6 Words Of The Mother III
6 Twilight of the Idols
6 The Secret Doctrine
6 The Alchemy of Happiness
6 Raja-Yoga
6 Maps of Meaning
6 Goethe - Poems
6 Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 06
5 The Way of Perfection
5 Tara - The Feminine Divine
5 Rilke - Poems
5 Isha Upanishad
5 How to Free Your Mind - Tara the Liberator
4 Words Of The Mother II
4 The Red Book Liber Novus
4 The Mother With Letters On The Mother
4 The Hero with a Thousand Faces
4 Letters On Yoga III
4 Letters On Poetry And Art
4 Bhakti-Yoga
4 Basho - Poems
4 A Treatise on Cosmic Fire
3 Words Of The Mother I
3 The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People
3 Synergetics - Explorations in the Geometry of Thinking
3 Sex Ecology Spirituality
3 Sefer Yetzirah The Book of Creation In Theory and Practice
3 Poetics
3 Patanjali Yoga Sutras
3 Han-shan - Poems
3 Hafiz - Poems
3 Amrita Gita
2 Writings In Bengali and Sanskrit
2 The Zen Teaching of Bodhidharma
2 The Integral Yoga
2 The Ever-Present Origin
2 The Essentials of Education
2 The Castle of Crossed Destinies
2 The Book of Certitude
2 The Blue Cliff Records
2 Symposium
2 Song of Myself
2 Selected Fictions
2 Ryokan - Poems
2 Rumi - Poems
2 Liber Null
2 Kena and Other Upanishads
2 Hymns to the Mystic Fire
2 God Exists
2 Dogen - Poems
2 Dark Night of the Soul
2 Beating the Cloth Drum Letters of Zen Master Hakuin
2 Advanced Dungeons and Dragons 2E
00.00 - Publishers Note, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 02, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
We have pleasure in presenting the Second Volume of the collected Works of Sri Nolini Kanta Gupta. The six books in this volume were originally published separately. The Essays are mainly concerned with Mysticism and Poetry.
We are happy to note that the Government of India have given to our Centre of Education a grant to meet the cost of publication of this volume.
0 0.01 - Introduction, #Agenda Vol 1, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Spirit nor even an improved Matter, but ... it could be called 'nothing,' so contrary was it to all we know. For the caterpillar, a butterfly is nothing, it is not even visible and has nothing in common with caterpillar heavens nor even caterpillar matter. So there we were, trapped in an impossible adventure. One does not return from there: one must cross the bridge to the other side. Then one day in that seventh year, while we still believed in liberations and the collected Upanishads, highlighted with a few glorious visions to relieve the commonplace (which remained appallingly commonplace), while we were still considering 'the Mother of the Ashram' rather like some spiritual super-director (endowed, albeit, with a disarming yet ever so provocative smile, as though
She were making fun of us, then loving us in secret), She told us, 'I have the feeling that ALL we have lived, ALL we have known, ALL we have done is a perfect illusion ... When I had the spiritual experience that material life is an illusion, personally I found that so marvelously beautiful and happy that it was one of the most beautiful experiences of my life, but now it is the entire spiritual structure as we have lived it that is becoming an illusion! - Not the same illusion, but an illusion far worse. And I am no baby: I have been here for forty-seven years now!' Yes, She was eighty-three years old then. And that day, we ceased being 'the enemy of our own conception of the Divine,' for this entire Divine was shattered to pieces - and we met Mother, at last. This mystery we call
00.01 - The Mother on Savitri, #Sweet Mother - Harmonies of Light, #unset, #Zen
All this is His own experience, and what is most surprising is that it is my own experience also. It is my sadhana which He has worked out. Each object, each event, each realisation, all the descriptions, even the colours are exactly what I saw and the words, phrases are also exactly what I heard. And all this before having read the book. I read Savitri many times afterwards, but earlier, when He was writing He used to read it to me. Every morning I used to hear Him read Savitri. During the night He would write and in the morning read it to me. And I observed something curious, that day after day the experiences He read out to me in the morning were those I had had the previous night, word by word. Yes, all the descriptions, the colours, the pictures I had seen, the words I had heard, all, all, I heard it all, put by Him into poetry, into miraculous poetry. Yes, they were exactly my experiences of the previous night which He read out to me the following morning. And it was not just one day by chance, but for days and days together. And every time I used to compare what He said with my previous experiences and they were always the same. I repeat, it was not that I had told Him my experiences and that He had noted them down afterwards, no, He knew already what I had seen. It is my experiences He has presented at length and they were His experiences also. It is, moreover, the picture of Our joint adventure into the unknown or rather into the Supermind.
These are experiences lived by Him, realities, supracosmic truths. He experienced all these as one experiences joy or sorrow, physically. He walked in the darkness of inconscience, even in the neighborhood of death, endured the sufferings of perdition, and emerged from the mud, the world-misery to brea the the sovereign plenitude and enter the supreme Ananda. He crossed all these realms, went through the consequences, suffered and endured physically what one cannot imagine. Nobody till today has suffered like Him. He accepted suffering to transform suffering into the joy of union with the Supreme. It is something unique and incomparable in the history of the world. It is something that has never happened before, He is the first to have traced the path in the Unknown, so that we may be able to walk with certitude towards the Supermind. He has made the work easy for us. Savitri is His whole Yoga of transformation, and this Yoga appears now for the first time in the earth-consciousness.
00.03 - Upanishadic Symbolism, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 02, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
Apart from the question whether the biological phenomenon described is really a symbol and a cloak for another order of reality, and even taking it at its face value, what is to be noted here is the idea of a cosmic cycle, and a cosmic cycle that proceeds through the principle of sacrifice. If it is asked what there is wonderful or particularly spiritual in this rather naf description of a very commonplace happening that gives it an honoured place in the Upanishads, the answer is that it is wonderful to see how the Upanishadic Rishi takes from an event its local, temporal and personal colour and incorporates it in a global movement, a cosmic cycle, as a limb of the Universal Brahman. The Upanishads contain passages which a puritanical mentality may perhaps describe as 'pornographic'; these have in fact been put by some on the Index expurgatorius. But the ancients saw these matters with other eyes and through another consciousness.
We have, in modern times, a movement towards a more conscious and courageous, knowledge of things that were taboo to puritan ages. Not to shut one's eyes to the lower, darker and hidden strands of our nature, but to bring them out into the light of day and to face them is the best way of dealing with such elements, which otherwise, if they are repressed, exert an unhealthy influence on the mind and nature. The Upanishadic view runs on the same lines, but, with the unveiling and the natural and not merely naturalisticdelineation of these under-worlds (concerning sex and food), it endows them with a perspective sub specie aeternitatis. The sexual function, for example, is easily equated to the double movement of ascent and descent that is secreted in nature, or to the combined action of Purusha and Prakriti in the cosmic Play, or again to the hidden fount of Delight that holds and moves the universe. In this view there is nothing merely secular and profane, but all is woven into the cosmic spiritual whole; and man is taught to consider and to mould all his movementsof soul and mind and bodyin the light and rhythm of that integral Reality.11
00.04 - The Beautiful in the Upanishads, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 02, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
The form of a thing can be beautiful; but the formless too has its beauty. Indeed, the beauty of the formless, that is to say, the very sum and substance, the ultimate essence, the soul of beauty that is what suffuses, with in-gathered colour and enthusiasm, the realisation and poetic creation of the Upanishadic seer. All the forms that are scattered abroad in their myriad manifest beauty hold within themselves a secret Beauty and are reflected or projected out of it. This veiled Name of Beauty can be compared to nothing on the phenomenal hemisphere of Nature; it has no adequate image or representation below:
na tasya pratimsti
--
The rich and sensuous beauty luxuriating in high colour and ample decoration that one meets often in the creation of the earlier Vedic seers returned again, in a more chiselled and polished and stylised manner, in the classical poets. The Upanishads in this respect have a certain kinship with the early poets of the intervening ageVyasa and Valmiki. Upam KlidsasyaKalidasa revels in figures and images; they are profusely heaped on one another and usually possess a complex and composite texture. Valmiki's images are simple and elemental, brief and instinct with a vast resonance, spare and full of power. The same brevity and simplicity, vibrant with an extraordinary power of evocation, are also characteristic of the Upanishadic mantra With Valmiki's
kamiva dupram
0.00a - Introduction, #A Garden of Pomegranates - An Outline of the Qabalah, #Israel Regardie, #Occultism
Those who, armed with the tools provided by the Qabalah, have made the journey within and crossed beyond the barriers of illusion, have returned with an impressive quantity of knowledge which conforms strictly to the definition of "science" in Winston's college Dictionary: "Science: a body of knowledge, general truths of particular facts, obtained and shown to be correct by accurate observation and thinking; knowledge condensed, arranged and systematized with reference to general truths and laws."
Over and over their findings have been confirmed, proving the Qabalah contains within it not only the elements of the science itself but the method with which to pursue it.
--
Each letter of the Qabalistic alphabet has a number, color, many symbols and a Tarot card attributed to it. The Qabalah not only aids in an understanding of the Tarot, but teaches the student how to classify and organize all such ideas, numbers and symbols. Just as a knowledge of Latin will give insight into the meaning of an unfamiliar English word with a Latin root, so the knowledge of the Qabalah with the various attri butions to each character in its alphabet will enable the student to understand and correlate ideas and concepts which otherwise would have no apparent relation.
A simple example is the concept of the Trinity in the Christian religion. The student is frequently amazed to learn through a study of the Qabalah that Egyptian mythology followed a similar concept with its trinity of gods, Osiris the father, Isis the virgin-mother, and Horus the son. The Qabalah indicates similar correspondences in the pantheon of Roman and Greek deities, proving the father-mother (Holy Spirit) - son principles of deity are primordial archetypes of man's psyche, rather than being, as is frequently and erroneously supposed a development peculiar to the Christian era.
--
A good many attri butions in other symbolic areas, I feel are subject to the same criticism. The Egyptian Gods have been used with a good deal of carelessness, and without sufficient explanation of motives in assigning them as I did. In a recent edition of Crowley's masterpiece Liber 777 (which au fond is less a reflection of Crowley's mind as a recent critic claimed than a tabulation of some of the material given piecemeal in the Golden Dawn knowledge lectures), he gives for the first time brief explanations of the motives for his attri butions. I too should have been far more explicit in the explanations I used in the case of some of the Gods whose names were used many times, most inadequately, where several paths were concerned. While it is true that the religious coloring of the Egyptian Gods differed from time to time during Egypt's turbulent history, nonetheless a word or two about just that one single point could have served a useful purpose.
Some of the passages in the book force me today to emphasize that so far as the Qabalah is concerned, it could and should be employed without binding to it the partisan qualities of any one particular religious faith. This goes as much for Judaism as it does for Christianity. Neither has much intrinsic usefulness where this scientific scheme is concerned. If some students feel hurt by this statement, that cannot be helped. The day of most contemporary faiths is over; they have been more of a curse than a boon to mankind. Nothing that I say here, however, should reflect on the peoples concerned, those who accept these religions. They are merely unfortunate. The religion itself is worn out and indeed is dying.
000 - Humans in Universe, #Synergetics - Explorations in the Geometry of Thinking, #R Buckminster Fuller, #Science
000.100 Introduction to 10 color Posters
000.101 The combined land areas of Africa, Europe, and Asia embrace within
--
militarily sustained and protected by Great Britain's Royal Navy and colonial
troops. In England the East India Company college was established to train the
officers of the enterprise for their world-wide deployment; that college and its
handsome campus are still in operation as of 1979. The British Empire became the
--
000.107 As professor of economics at the East India Company college in 1810
Thomas Malthus became the first economic authority ever to receive in toto the
--
000.131 In complement with Synergetics 1 and 2 the posters at color plates 1-10
may clarify for everyone the few scientific conceptions and mathematical tools
0.00 - INTRODUCTION, #The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna, #Sri Ramakrishna, #Hinduism
Ramkumar could hardly understand the import of his young brother's reply. He described in bright colours the happy and easy life of scholars in Calcutta society. But Gadadhar intuitively felt that the scholars, to use one of his own vivid illustrations, were like so many vultures, soaring high on the wings of their uninspired intellect, with their eyes fixed on the charnel-pit of greed and lust. So he stood firm and Ramkumar had to give way.
--- KALI TEMPLE AT DAKSHINESWAR
--
and collapsed, unconscious. What was happening in the outside world I did not know; but within me there was a steady flow of undiluted bliss, altogether new, and I felt the presence of the Divine Mother." On his lips when he regained consciousness of the world was the word "Mother".
--- GOD-INTOXICATED STATE
Yet this was only a foretaste of the intense experiences to come. The first glimpse of the Divine Mother made him the more eager for Her uninterrupted vision. He wanted to see Her both in meditation and with eyes open. But the Mother began to play a teasing game of hide-and-seek with him, intensifying both his joy and his suffering. Weeping bitterly during the moments of separation from Her, he would pass into a trance and then find Her standing before him, smiling, talking, consoling, bidding him be of good cheer, and instructing him. During this period of spiritual practice he had many uncommon experiences. When he sat to meditate, he would hear strange clicking sounds in the joints of his legs, as if someone were locking them up, one after the other, to keep him motionless; and at the conclusion of his meditation he would again hear the same sounds, this time unlocking them and leaving him free to move about. He would see flashes like a swarm of fire-flies floating before his eyes, or a sea of deep mist around him, with luminous waves of molten silver. Again, from a sea of translucent mist he would behold the Mother rising, first Her feet, then Her waist, body, face, and head, finally Her whole person; he would feel Her breath and hear Her voice. Worshipping in the temple, sometimes he would become exalted, sometimes he would remain motionless as stone, sometimes he would almost collapse from excessive emotion. Many of his actions, contrary to all tradition, seemed sacrilegious to the people. He would take a flower and touch it to his own head, body, and feet, and then offer it to the Goddess. Or, like a drunkard, he would reel to the throne of the Mother, touch Her chin by way of showing his affection for Her, and sing, talk, joke, laugh, and dance. Or he would take a morsel of food from the plate and hold it to Her mouth, begging Her to eat it, and would not be satisfied till he was convinced that She had really eaten. After the Mother had been put to sleep at night, from his own room he would hear Her ascending to the upper storey of the temple with the light steps of a happy girl, Her anklets jingling. Then he would discover Her standing with flowing hair. Her black form silhouetted against the sky of the night, looking at the Ganges or at the distant lights of Calcutta.
Naturally the temple officials took him for an insane person. His worldly well-wishers brought him to skilled physicians; but no-medicine could cure his malady. Many a time he doubted his sanity himself. For he had been sailing across an uncharted sea, with no earthly guide to direct him. His only haven of security was the Divine Mother Herself. To Her he would pray: "I do not know what these things are. I am ignorant of mantras and the scriptures. Teach me, Mother, how to realize Thee. Who else can help me? Art Thou not my only refuge and guide?" And the sustaining presence of the Mother never failed him in his distress or doubt. Even those who criticized his conduct were greatly impressed with his purity, guilelessness, truthfulness, integrity, and holiness. They felt an uplifting influence in his presence.
--
Mathur had faith in the sincerity of Sri Ramakrishna's spiritual zeal, but began now to doubt his sanity. He had watched him jumping about like a monkey. One day, when Rani Rasmani was listening to Sri Ramakrishna's singing in the temple, the young priest abruptly turned and slapped her. Apparently listening to his song, she had actually been thinking of a law-suit. She accepted the punishment as though the Divine Mother Herself had imposed it; but Mathur was distressed. He begged Sri Ramakrishna to keep his feelings under control and to heed the conventions of society. God Himself, he argued, follows laws. God never permitted, for instance, flowers of two colours to grow on the same stalk. The following day Sri Ramakrishna presented Mathur Babu with two hibiscus flowers growing on the same stalk, one red and one white.
Mathur and Rani Rasmani began to ascribe the mental ailment of Sri Ramakrishna in part, at least, to his observance of rigid continence. Thinking that a natural life would relax the tension of his nerves, they engineered a plan with two women of ill fame. But as soon as the women entered his room, Sri Ramakrishna beheld in them the manifestation of the Divine Mother of the Universe and went into samadhi uttering Her name.
--
But the most remarkable experience during this period was the awakening of the Kundalini Sakti, the "Serpent Power". He actually saw the Power, at first lying asleep at the bottom of the spinal column, then waking up and ascending along the mystic Sushumna canal and through its six centres, or lotuses, to the Sahasrara, the thousand-petalled lotus in the top of the head. He further saw that as the Kundalini went upward the different lotuses bloomed. And this phenomenon was accompanied by visions and trances. Later on he described to his disciples and devotees the various movements of the Kundalini: the fishlike, birdlike, monkeylike, and so on. The awaken- ing of the Kundalini is the beginning of spiritual consciousness, and its union with Siva in the Sahasrara, ending in samadhi, is the consummation of the Tantrik disciplines.
About this time it was revealed to him that in a short while many devotees would seek his guidance.
--
Thus, after nirvikalpa samadhi, Sri Ramakrishna realized maya in an altogether new role. The binding aspect of Kali vanished from before his vision. She no longer obscured his understanding. The world became the glorious manifestation of the Divine Mother. Maya became Brahman. The Transcendental Itself broke through the Immanent. Sri Ramakrishna discovered that maya operates in the relative world in two ways, and he termed these "avidyamaya" and "vidyamaya". Avidyamaya represents the dark forces of creation: sensuous desires, evil passions, greed, lust, cruelty, and so on. It sustains the world system on the lower planes. It is responsible for the round of man's birth and death. It must be fought and vanquished. But vidyamaya is the higher force of creation: the spiritual virtues, the enlightening qualities, kindness, purity, love, devotion. Vidyamaya elevates man to the higher planes of consciousness. With the help of vidyamaya the devotee rids himself of avidyamaya; he then becomes mayatita, free of maya. The two aspects of maya are the two forces of creation, the two powers of Kali; and She stands beyond them both. She is like the effulgent sun, bringing into existence and shining through and standing behind the clouds of different colours and shapes, conjuring up wonderful forms in the blue autumn heaven.
The Divine Mother asked Sri Ramakrishna not to be lost in the featureless Absolute but to remain, in bhavamukha, on the threshold of relative consciousness, the border line between the Absolute and the Relative. He was to keep himself at the "sixth centre" of Tantra, from which he could see not only the glory of the seventh, but also the divine manifestations of the Kundalini in the lower centres. He gently oscillated back and forth across the dividing line. Ecstatic devotion to the Divine Mother alternated with serene absorption in the Ocean of Absolute Unity. He thus bridged the gulf between the Personal and the Impersonal, the immanent and the transcendent aspects of Reality. This is a unique experience in the recorded spiritual history of the world.
--
Sri Ramakrishna used to say that when the flower blooms the bees come to it for honey of their own accord. Now many souls began to visit Dakshineswar to satisfy their spiritual hunger. He, the devotee and aspirant, became the Master. Gauri, the great scholar who had been one of the first to proclaim Sri Ramakrishna an Incarnation of God, paid the Master a visit in 1870 and with the Master's blessings renounced the world. Narayan Shastri, another great pundit, who had mastered the six systems of Hindu philosophy and had been offered a lucrative post by the Maharaja of Jaipur, met the Master and recognized in him one who had realized in life those ideals which he himself had encountered merely in books. Sri Ramakrishna initiated Narayan Shastri, at his earnest request, into the life of sannyas. Pundit Padmalochan, the court pundit of the Maharaja of Burdwan, well known for his scholarship in both the Vedanta and the Nyaya systems of philosophy, accepted the Master as an Incarnation of God. Krishnakishore, a Vedantist scholar, became devoted to the Master. And there arrived Viswanath Upadhyaya, who was to become a favourite devotee; Sri Ramakrishna always addressed him as "Captain". He was a high officer of the King of Nepal and had received the title of colonel in recognition of his merit. A scholar of the Gita, the Bhagavata, and the Vedanta philosophy, he daily performed the worship of his Chosen Deity with great devotion. "I have read the Vedas and the other scriptures", he said. "I have also met a good many monks and devotees in different places. But it is in Sri Ramakrishna's presence that my spiritual yearnings have been fulfilled. To me he seems to be the embodiment of the truths of the scriptures."
The Knowledge of Brahman in nirvikalpa samadhi had convinced Sri Ramakrishna that the gods of the different religions are but so many readings of the Absolute, and that the Ultimate Reality could never be expressed by human tongue. He understood that all religions lead their devotees by differing paths to one and the same goal. Now he became eager to explore some of the alien religions; for with him understanding meant actual experience.
--
On January 27, 1868, Mathur Babu with a party of some one hundred and twenty-five persons set out on a pilgrimage to the sacred places of northern India. At Vaidyanath in Behar, when the Master saw the inhabitants of a village reduced by poverty and starvation to mere skeletons, he requested his rich patron to feed the people and give each a piece of cloth. Mathur demurred at the added expense. The Master declared bitterly that he would not go on to Benares, but would live with the poor and share their miseries. He actually left Mathur and sat down with the villagers. Whereupon Mathur had to yield. On another occasion, two years later, Sri Ramakrishna showed a similar sentiment for the poor and needy. He accompanied Mathur on a tour to one of the latter's estates at the time of the collection of rents. For two years the harvests had failed and the tenants were in a state of extreme poverty. The Master asked Mathur to remit their rents, distribute help to them, and in addition give the hungry people a sumptuous feast. When Mathur grumbled, the Master said: "You are only the steward of the Divine Mother. They are the Mother's tenants. You must spend the Mother's money. When they are suffering, how can you refuse to help them? You must help them." Again Mathur had to give in. Sri Ramakrishna's sympathy for the poor sprang from his perception of God in all created beings. His sentiment was not that of the humanist or philanthropist. To him the service of man was the same as the worship of God.
The party entered holy Benares by boat along the Ganges. When Sri Ramakrishna's eyes fell on this city of Siva, where had accumulated for ages the devotion and piety of countless worshippers, he saw it to be made of gold, as the scriptures declare. He was visibly moved. During his stay in the city he treated every particle of its earth with utmost respect. At the Manikarnika Ghat, the great cremation ground of the city, he actually saw Siva, with ash-covered body and tawny matted hair, serenely approaching each funeral pyre and breathing into the ears of the corpses the mantra of liberation; and then the Divine Mother removing from the dead their bonds. Thus he realized the significance of the scriptural statement that anyone dying in Benares attains salvation through the grace of Siva. He paid a visit to Trailanga Swami, the celebrated monk, whom he later declared to be a real paramahamsa, a veritable image of Siva.
--
Keshab was the leader of the Brahmo Samaj, one of the two great movements that, during the latter part of the nineteenth century, played an important part in shaping the course of the renascence of India. The founder of the Brahmo movement had been the great Raja Rammohan Roy (1774-1833). Though born in an orthodox brahmin family, Rammohan Roy had shown great sympathy for Islam and Christianity. He had gone to Tibet in search of the Buddhist mysteries. He had extracted from Christianity its ethical system, but had rejected the divinity of Christ as he had denied the Hindu Incarnations. The religion of Islam influenced him, to a great extent, in the formulation of his monotheistic doctrines. But he always went back to the Vedas for his spiritual inspiration. The Brahmo Samaj, which he founded in 1828, was dedicated to the "worship and adoration of the Eternal, the Unsearchable, the Immutable Being, who is the Author and Preserver of the Universe". The Samaj was open to all without distinction of colour, creed, caste, nation, or religion.
The real organizer of the Samaj was Devendranath Tagore (1817-1905), the father of the poet Rabindranath. His physical and spiritual beauty, aristocratic aloofness, penetrating intellect, and poetic sensibility made him the foremost leader of the educated Bengalis. These addressed him by the respectful epithet of Maharshi, the "Great Seer". The Maharshi was a Sanskrit scholar and, unlike Raja Rammohan Roy, drew his inspiration entirely from the Upanishads. He was an implacable enemy of image worship ship and also fought to stop the infiltration of Christian ideas into the Samaj. He gave the movement its faith and ritual. Under his influence the Brahmo Samaj professed One Self-existent Supreme Being who had created the universe out of nothing, the God of Truth, Infinite Wisdom, Goodness, and Power, the Eternal and Omnipotent, the One without a Second. Man should love Him and do His will, believe in Him and worship Him, and thus merit salvation in the world to come.
--
^The term "woman and gold", which has been used throughout in a collective sense, occurs again and again in the teachings of Sri Ramakrishna to designate the chief impediments to spiritual progress. This favourite expression of the Master, "kaminikanchan", has often been misconstrued. By it he meant only "lust and greed", the baneful influence of which retards the aspirant's spiritual growth. He used the word "kamini", or "woman", as a concrete term for the sex instinct when addressing his man devotees. He advised women, on the other hand, to shun "man". "Kanchan", or "gold", symbolizes greed, which is the other obstacle to spiritual life.
Sri Ramakrishna never taught his disciples to hate any woman, or womankind in general. This can be seen clearly by going through all his teachings under this head and judging them collectively. The Master looked on all women as so many images of the Divine Mother of the Universe. He paid the highest homage to womankind by accepting a woman as his guide while practising the very profound spiritual disciplines of Tantra. His wife, known and revered as the Holy Mother, was his constant companion and first disciple. At the end of his spiritual practice he literally worshipped his wife as the embodiment of the Goddess Kali, the Divine Mother. After his passing away the Holy Mother became the spiritual guide not only of a large number of householders, but also of many monastic members of the Ramakrishna Order.
--- THE MASTER'S YEARNING FOR HIS OWN DEVOTEES
--
As he read in college the rationalistic Western philosophers of the nineteenth century, his boyhood faith in God and religion was unsettled. He would not accept religion on mere faith; he wanted demonstration of God. But very soon his passionate nature discovered that mere Universal Reason was cold and bloodless. His emotional nature, dissatisfied with a mere abstraction, required a concrete support to help him in the hours of temptation. He wanted an external power, a guru, who by embodying perfection in the flesh would still the commotion of his soul. Attracted by the magnetic personality of Keshab, he joined the Brahmo Samaj and became a singer in its choir. But in the Samaj he did not find the guru who could say that he had seen God.
In a state of mental conflict and torture of soul, Narendra came to Sri Ramakrishna at Dakshineswar. He was then eighteen years of age and had been in college two years. He entered the Master's room accompanied by some light-hearted friends. At Sri Ramakrishna's request he sang a few songs, pouring his whole soul into them, and the Master went into samadhi. A few minutes later Sri Ramakrishna suddenly left his seat, took Narendra by the hand, and led him to the screened verandah north of his room. They were alone. Addressing Narendra most tenderly, as if he were a friend of long acquaintance, the Master said: "Ah! You have come very late. Why have you been so unkind as to make me wait all these days? My ears are tired of hearing the futile words of worldly men. Oh, how I have longed to pour my spirit into the heart of someone fitted to receive my message!" He talked thus, sobbing all the time. Then, standing before Narendra with folded hands, he addressed him as Narayana, born on earth to remove the misery of humanity. Grasping Narendra's hand, he asked him to come again, alone, and very soon. Narendra was startled. "What is this I have come to see?" he said to himself. "He must be stark mad. Why, I am the son of Viswanath Dutta. How dare he speak this way to me?"
When they returned to the room and Narendra heard the Master speaking to others, he was surprised to find in his words an inner logic, a striking sincerity, and a convincing proof of his spiritual nature. In answer to Narendra's question, "Sir, have you seen God?" the Master said: "Yes, I have seen God. I have seen Him more tangibly than I see you. I have talked to Him more intimately than I am talking to you." Continuing, the Master said: "But, my child, who wants to see God? People shed jugs of tears for money, wife, and children. But if they would weep for God for only one day they would surely see Him." Narendra was amazed. These words he could not doubt. This was the first time he had ever heard a man saying that he had seen God. But he could not reconcile these words of the Master with the scene that had taken place on the verandah only a few minutes before. He concluded that Sri Ramakrishna was a monomaniac, and returned home rather puzzled in mind.
--
Hariprasanna, a college student, visited the Master in the company of his friends Sashi and Sarat. Sri Ramakrishna showed him great favour by initiating him into spiritual life. As long as he lived, Hariprasanna remembered and observed the following drastic advice of the Master: "Even if a woman is pure as gold and rolls on the ground for love of God, it is dangerous for a monk ever to look at her."
--- KALI
--
Subodh visited the Master in 1885. At the very first meeting Sri Ramakrishna said to him: "You will succeed. Mother says so. Those whom She sends here will certainly attain spirituality." During the second meeting the Master wrote something on Subodh's tongue, stroked his body from the navel to the throat, and said, "Awake, Mother! Awake." He asked the boy to meditate. At once Subodh's latent spirituality was awakened. He felt a current rushing along the spinal column to the brain. Joy filled his soul.
--- SARADA AND TULASI
Two more young men, Sarada Prasanna and Tulasi, complete the small band of the Master's disciples later to embrace the life of the wandering monk. With the exception of the elder Gopal, all of them were in their teens or slightly over. They came from middle-class Bengali families, and most of them were students in school or college. Their parents and relatives had envisaged for them bright worldly careers. They came to Sri Ramakrishna with pure bodies, vigorous minds, and uncontaminated souls. All were born with unusual spiritual attributes. Sri Ramakrishna accepted them, even at first sight, as his children, relatives, friends, and companions. His magic touch unfolded them. And later each according to his measure reflected the life of the Master, becoming a torch-bearer of his message across land and sea.
--- WOMAN DEVOTEES
0.00 - Publishers Note C, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 05, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
The Fifth Volume concludes the first collected edition of the published works of Sri Nolini Kanta Gupta. His more recent as well as unpublished writings await publication.
The present volume consists of three books: Light of Lights, Eight Talks and Sweet Mother; there are also translations from Sanskrit, Pali, Bengali and French. These, along with the translations of the Dhammapada and Charyapada, have been mostly serialised in Ashram journals.
0.00 - The Book of Lies Text, #The Book of Lies, #Aleister Crowley, #Philosophy
Wide is the world and cold.
Get out.
--
red colour of Geburah.
The chapter is a new and more elaborate version of
--
A red rose absorbs all colours but red; red is therefore
the one colour that it is not.
This Law, Reason, Time, Space, all Limitation blinds
--
through the colleagues of FRATER PER-
DURABO.
--
referred to in the note; for the eye of Horus (see 777, col.
XXI, line 10, "the blind
--
"Yet the last height of consolation's cold:
Its pinnacle is-not to be consoled!
--
since blue is the colour of devotion, and the triangle,
kinetically considered, is the symbol of directed force.
--
KING'S colLEGE CHAPEL
For mind and body alike there is no purgative like
--
puns and colloquialisms of lines 9 and 10.
[155]
--
Berashith. coll. Works, II, 233.
The Vision and The Voice (Liber 418). The Eqx.,
--
71. King's college Chapel.
72. Hashed Pheasant.
0.00 - THE GOSPEL PREFACE, #The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna, #Sri Ramakrishna, #Hinduism
Sri Mahendra Nath Gupta, familiary known to the readers of the Gospel by his pen name M., and to the devotees as Master Mahashay, was born on the 14th of July, 1854 as the son of Madhusudan Gupta, an officer of the Calcutta High Court, and his wife, Swarnamayi Devi. He had a brilliant scholastic career at Hare School and the Presidency college at Calcutta. The range of his studies included the best that both occidental and oriental learning had to offer. English literature, history, economics, western philosophy and law on the one hand, and Sanskrit literature and grammar, Darsanas, Puranas, Smritis, Jainism, Buddhism, astrology and Ayurveda on the other were the subjects in which he attained considerable proficiency.
He was an educationist all his life both in a spiritual and in a secular sense. After he passed out of college, he took up work as headmaster in a number of schools in succession Narail High School, City School, Ripon college School, Metropolitan School, Aryan School, Oriental School, Oriental Seminary and Model School. The causes of his migration from school to school were that he could not get on with some of the managements on grounds of principles and that often his spiritual mood drew him away to places of pilgrimage for long periods. He worked with some of the most noted public men of the time like Iswar Chandra Vidysgar and Surendranath Banerjee. The latter appointed him as a professor in the City and Ripon colleges where he taught subjects like English, philosophy, history and economics. In his later days he took over the Morton School, and he spent his time in the staircase room of the third floor of it, administering the school and preaching the message of the Master. He was much respected in educational circles where he was usually referred to as Rector Mahashay. A teacher who had worked under him writes thus in warm appreciation of his teaching methods: "Only when I worked with him in school could I appreciate what a great educationist he was. He would come down to the level of his students when teaching, though he himself was so learned, so talented. Ordinarily teachers confine their instruction to what is given in books without much thought as to whether the student can accept it or not. But M., would first of all gauge how much the student could take in and by what means. He would employ aids to teaching like maps, pictures and diagrams, so that his students could learn by seeing. Thirty years ago (from 1953) when the question of imparting education through the medium of the mother tongue was being discussed, M. had already employed Bengali as the medium of instruction in the Morton School." (M The Apostle and the Evangelist by Swami Nityatmananda Part I. P. 15.)
Imparting secular education was, however, only his profession ; his main concern was with the spiritual regeneration of man a calling for which Destiny seems to have chosen him. From his childhood he was deeply pious, and he used to be moved very much by Sdhus, temples and Durga Puja celebrations. The piety and eloquence of the great Brahmo leader of the times, Keshab Chander Sen, elicited a powerful response from the impressionable mind of Mahendra Nath, as it did in the case of many an idealistic young man of Calcutta, and prepared him to receive the great Light that was to dawn on him with the coming of Sri Ramakrishna into his life.
This epoch-making event of his life came about in a very strange way. M. belonged to a joint family with several collateral members. Some ten years after he began his career as an educationist, bitter quarrels broke out among the members of the family, driving the sensitive M. to despair and utter despondency. He lost all interest in life and left home one night to go into the wide world with the idea of ending his life. At dead of night he took rest in his sister's house at Baranagar, and in the morning, accompanied by a nephew Siddheswar, he wandered from one garden to another in Calcutta until Siddheswar brought him to the Temple Garden of Dakshineswar where Sri Ramakrishna was then living. After spending some time in the beautiful rose gardens there, he was directed to the room of the Paramahamsa, where the eventful meeting of the Master and the disciple took place on a blessed evening (the exact date is not on record) on a Sunday in March 1882. As regards what took place on the occasion, the reader is referred to the opening section of the first chapter of the Gospel.
The Master, who divined the mood of desperation in M, his resolve to take leave of this 'play-field of deception', put new faith and hope into him by his gracious words of assurance: "God forbid! Why should you take leave of this world? Do you not feel blessed by discovering your Guru? By His grace, what is beyond all imagination or dreams can be easily achieved!" At these words the clouds of despair moved away from the horizon of M.'s mind, and the sunshine of a new hope revealed to him fresh vistas of meaning in life. Referring to this phase of his life, M. used to say, "Behold! where is the resolve to end life, and where, the discovery of God! That is, sorrow should be looked upon as a friend of man. God is all good." ( Ibid P.33.)
--
Sri Ramakrishna was a teacher for both the Orders of mankind, Sannysins and householders. His own life offered an ideal example for both, and he left behind disciples who followed the highest traditions he had set in respect of both these ways of life. M., along with Nag Mahashay, exemplified how a householder can rise to the highest level of sagehood. M. was married to Nikunja Devi, a distant relative of Keshab Chander Sen, even when he was reading at college, and he had four children, two sons and two daughters. The responsibility of the family, no doubt, made him dependent on his professional income, but the great devotee that he was, he never compromised with ideals and principles for this reason. Once when he was working as the headmaster in a school managed by the great Vidysgar, the results of the school at the public examination happened to be rather poor, and Vidysgar attri buted it to M's preoccupation with the Master and his consequent failure to attend adequately to the school work. M. at once resigned his post without any thought of the morrow. Within a fortnight the family was in poverty, and M. was one day pacing up and down the verandah of his house, musing how he would feed his children the next day. Just then a man came with a letter addressed to 'Mahendra Babu', and on opening it, M. found that it was a letter from his friend Sri Surendra Nath Banerjee, asking whether he would like to take up a professorship in the Ripon college. In this way three or four times he gave up the job that gave him the wherewithal to support the family, either for upholding principles or for practising spiritual Sadhanas in holy places, without any consideration of the possible dire worldly consequences; but he was always able to get over these difficulties somehow, and the interests of his family never suffered. In spite of his disregard for worldly goods, he was, towards the latter part of his life, in a fairly flourishing condition as the proprietor of the Morton School which he developed into a noted educational institution in the city. The Lord has said in the Bhagavad Git that in the case of those who think of nothing except Him, He Himself would take up all their material and spiritual responsibilities. M. was an example of the truth of the Lord's promise.
Though his children received proper attention from him, his real family, both during the Master's lifetime and after, consisted of saints, devotees, Sannysins and spiritual aspirants. His life exemplifies the Master's teaching that an ideal householder must be like a good maidservant of a family, loving and caring properly for the children of the house, but knowing always that her real home and children are elsewhere. During the Master's lifetime he spent all his Sundays and other holidays with him and his devotees, and besides listening to the holy talks and devotional music, practised meditation both on the Personal and the Impersonal aspects of God under the direct guidance of the Master. In the pages of the Gospel the reader gets a picture of M.'s spiritual relationship with the Master how from a hazy belief in the Impersonal God of the Brahmos, he was step by step brought to accept both Personality and Impersonality as the two aspects of the same Non-dual Being, how he was convinced of the manifestation of that Being as Gods, Goddesses and as Incarnations, and how he was established in a life that was both of a Jnni and of a Bhakta. This Jnni-Bhakta outlook and way of living became so dominant a feature of his life that Swami Raghavananda, who was very closely associated with him during his last six years, remarks: "Among those who lived with M. in latter days, some felt that he always lived in this constant and conscious union with God even with open eyes (i.e., even in waking consciousness)." (Swami Raghavananda's article on M. in Prabuddha Bharata vol. XXXVII. P. 442.)
0.00 - The Wellspring of Reality, #Synergetics - Explorations in the Geometry of Thinking, #R Buckminster Fuller, #Science
Furthermore, today's hyperspecialization in socioeconomic functioning has come to preclude important popular philosophic considerations of the synergetic significance of, for instance, such historically important events as the discovery within the general region of experimental inquiry known as virology that the as-yet popularly assumed validity of the concepts of animate and inanimate phenomena have been experimentally invalidated. Atoms and crystal complexes of atoms were held to be obviously inanimate; the protoplasmic cells of biological phenomena were held to be obviously animate. It was deemed to be common sense that warm- blooded, moist, and soft-skinned humans were clearly not to be confused with hard, cold granite or steel objects. A clear-cut threshold between animate and inanimate was therefore assumed to exist as a fundamental dichotomy of all physical phenomena. This seemingly placed life exclusively within the bounds of the physical.
The supposed location of the threshold between animate and inanimate was methodically narrowed down by experimental science until it was confined specifically within the domain of virology. Virologists have been too busy, for instance, with their DNA-RNA genetic code isolatings, to find time to see the synergetic significance to society of the fact that they have found that no physical threshold does in fact exist between animate and inanimate. The possibility of its existence vanished because the supposedly unique physical qualities of both animate and inanimate have persisted right across yesterday's supposed threshold in both directions to permeate one another's-previously perceived to be exclusive- domains. Subsequently, what was animate has become foggier and foggier, and what is inanimate clearer and clearer. All organisms consist physically and in entirety of inherently inanimate atoms. The inanimate alone is not only omnipresent but is alone experimentally demonstrable. Belated news of the elimination of this threshold must be interpreted to mean that whatever life may be, it has not been isolated and thereby identified as residual in the biological cell, as had been supposed by the false assumption that there was a separate physical phenomenoncalled animate within which life existed. No life per se has been isolated. The threshold between animate and inanimate has vanished. Those chemists who are preoccupied in synthesizing the particular atomically structured molecules identified as the prime constituents of humanly employed organisms will, even if they are chemically successful, be as remote from creating life as are automobile manufacturers from creating the human drivers of their automobiles. Only the physical connections and development complexes of distinctly "nonlife" atoms into molecules, into cells, into animals, has been and will be discovered. The genetic coding of the design controls of organic systems offers no more explanation of life than did the specifications of the designs of the telephone system's apparatus and operation explain the nature of the life that communicates weightlessly to life over the only physically ponderable telephone system. Whatever else life may be, we know it is weightless. At the moment of death, no weight is lost. All the chemicals, including the chemist's life ingredients, are present, but life has vanished. The physical is inherently entropic, giving off energy in ever more disorderly ways. The metaphysical is antientropic, methodically marshalling energy. Life is antientropic.
0.01f - FOREWARD, #The Phenomenon of Man, #Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, #Christianity
and collectivities.
Without these qualities to illuminate our vision, man will
0.01 - I - Sri Aurobindos personality, his outer retirement - outside contacts after 1910 - spiritual personalities- Vibhutis and Avatars - transformtion of human personality, #Evening Talks With Sri Aurobindo, #unset, #Zen
The Evening Talks collected here may afford to the outside world a glimpse of his external personality and give the seeker some idea of its richness, its many-sidedness, its uniqueness. One can also form some notion of Sri Aurobindo's personality from the books in which the height, the universal sweep and clear vision of his integral ideal and thought can be seen. His writings are, in a sense, the best representative of his mental personality. The versatile nature of his genius, the penetrating power of his intellect, his extraordinary power of expression, his intense sincerity, his utter singleness of purpose all these can be easily felt by any earnest student of his works. He may discover even in the realm of mind that Sri Aurobindo brings the unlimited into the limited. Another side of his dynamic personality is represented by the Ashram as an institution. But the outer, if one may use the phrase, the human side of his personality, is unknown to the outside world because from 1910 to 1950 a span of forty years he led a life of outer retirement. No doubt, many knew about his staying at Pondicherry and practising some kind of very special Yoga to the mystery of which they had no access. To some, perhaps, he was living a life of enviable solitude enjoying the luxury of a spiritual endeavour. Many regretted his retirement as a great loss to the world because they could not see any external activity on his part which could be regarded as 'public', 'altruistic' or 'beneficial'. Even some of his admirers thought that he was after some kind of personal salvation which would have very little significance for mankind in general. His outward non-participation in public life was construed by many as lack of love for humanity.
But those who knew him during the days of the national awakening from 1900 to 1910 could not have these doubts. And even these initial misunderstandings and false notions of others began to evaporate with the growth of the Sri Aurobindo Ashram from 1927 onwards. The large number of books published by the Ashram also tended to remove the idea of the other-worldliness of his Yoga and the absence of any good by it to mankind.
0.01 - Letters from the Mother to Her Son, #Some Answers From The Mother, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
headed! The final collapse, the general bankruptcy seems obvious enough... unless... There is always an "unless" in the history
of the earth; and always, when confusion and destruction seem
0.01 - Life and Yoga, #The Synthesis Of Yoga, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
God. Therefore we see in India that a sharp incompatibility has been created between life in the world and spiritual growth and perfection, and although the tradition and ideal of a victorious harmony between the inner attraction and the outer demand remains, it is little or else very imperfectly exemplified. In fact, when a man turns his vision and energy inward and enters on the path of Yoga, he is popularly supposed to be lost inevitably to the great stream of our collective existence and the secular effort of humanity. So strongly has the idea prevailed, so much has it been emphasised by prevalent philosophies and religions that to escape from life is now commonly considered as not only the necessary condition, but the general object of Yoga. No synthesis of Yoga can be satisfying which does not, in its aim, reunite God and Nature in a liberated and perfected human life or, in its method, not only permit but favour the harmony of our inner and outer activities and experiences in the divine consummation of both. For man is precisely that term and symbol of a higher Existence descended into the material world in which it is possible for the lower to transfigure itself and put on the nature of the higher and the higher to reveal itself in the forms of the lower. To avoid the life which is given him for the realisation of that possibility, can never be either the indispensable condition or the whole and ultimate object of his supreme endeavour or of his most powerful means of self-fulfilment. It can only be a temporary necessity under certain conditions or a specialised extreme effort imposed on the individual so as to prepare a greater general possibility for the race. The true and full object and utility of Yoga can only be accomplished when the conscious
Yoga in man becomes, like the subconscious Yoga in Nature, outwardly conterminous with life itself and we can once more, looking out both on the path and the achievement, say in a more perfect and luminous sense: "All life is Yoga."
0.02 - Letters to a Sadhak, #Some Answers From The Mother, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
In spite of all my efforts at friendly collaboration
with X, I have failed. I pray that you tell me in detail the
0.03 - III - The Evening Sittings, #Evening Talks With Sri Aurobindo, #unset, #Zen
What was talked in the small group informally was not intended by Sri Aurobindo to be the independent expression of his views on the subjects, events or the persons discussed. Very often what he said was in answer to the spiritual need of the individual or of the collective atmosphere. It was like a spiritual remedy meant to produce certain spiritual results, not a philosophical or metaphysical pronouncement on questions, events or movements. The net result of some talks very often was to point out to the disciple the inherent incapacity of the human intellect and its secondary place in the search for the ultimate Reality.
But there were occasions when he did give his independent, personal views on some problems, on events or other subjects. Even then it was never an authoritarian pronouncement. Most often it appeared to be a logically worked out and almost inevitable conclusion expressed quite impersonally though with firm and sincere conviction. This impersonality was such a prominent trait of his personality! Even in such matters as dispatching a letter or a telegram it would not be a command from him to a disciple to carry out the task. Most often during his usual passage to the dining room he would stop on the way, drop in on the company of four or five disciples and, holding out the letter or the telegram, would say in the most amiable and yet the most impersonal way: "I suppose this has to be sent." And it would be for someone in the group instantly to volunteer and take it. The expression he very often used was "It was done" or "It happened", not "I did."
0.03 - Letters to My little smile, #Some Answers From The Mother, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
dressed, then went to collect my notebook from X's
window (I always go there). Then at about 6:30 I
--
Your collection of saris embroidered by us.
Before seeing X's blouse I used to think that my
--
so) as you feel the cold and the heat.
2 February 1934
0.03 - The Threefold Life, #The Synthesis Of Yoga, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
In each of these forms Nature acts both individually and collectively; for the Eternal affirms Himself equally in the single form and in the group-existence, whether family, clan and nation or groupings dependent on less physical principles or the supreme group of all, our collective humanity. Man also may seek his own individual good from any or all of these spheres of activity, or identify himself in them with the collectivity and live for it, or, rising to a truer perception of this complex universe, harmonise the individual realisation with the collective aim. For as it is the right relation of the soul with the Supreme, while it is in the universe, neither to assert egoistically its separate being nor to blot itself out in the Indefinable, but to realise its unity with the Divine and the world and unite them in the individual, so the right relation of the individual with the collectivity is neither to pursue egoistically his own material or mental progress or spiritual salvation without regard to his fellows, nor for the sake of the community to suppress or maim his proper development, but to sum up in himself all its best and completest possibilities and pour them out by thought, action and all other means on his surroundings so that the whole race may approach nearer to the attainment of its supreme personalities.
It follows that the object of the material life must be to fulfil, above all things, the vital aim of Nature. The whole aim of the material man is to live, to pass from birth to death with as much comfort or enjoyment as may be on the way, but anyhow to live.
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But the spiritual life, like the mental, may thus make use of this outward existence for the benefit of the individual with a perfect indifference to any collective uplifting of the merely symbolic world which it uses. Since the Eternal is for ever the same in all things and all things the same to the Eternal, since the exact mode of action and the result are of no importance compared with the working out in oneself of the one great realisation, this spiritual indifference accepts no matter what environment, no matter what action, dispassionately, prepared to retire as soon as its own supreme end is realised. It is so that many have understood the ideal of the Gita. Or else the inner love and bliss may pour itself out on the world in good deeds, in service, in compassion, the inner Truth in the giving of knowledge, without therefore attempting the transformation of a world which must by its inalienable nature remain a battlefield of the dualities, of sin and virtue, of truth and error, of joy and suffering.
But if Progress also is one of the chief terms of worldexistence and a progressive manifestation of the Divine the true sense of Nature, this limitation also is invalid. It is possible for the spiritual life in the world, and it is its real mission, to change the material life into its own image, the image of the Divine. Therefore, besides the great solitaries who have sought and attained their self-liberation, we have the great spiritual teachers who have also liberated others and, supreme of all, the great dynamic souls who, feeling themselves stronger in the might of the Spirit than all the forces of the material life banded together, have thrown themselves upon the world, grappled with it in a loving wrestle and striven to compel its consent to its own transfiguration. Ordinarily, the effort is concentrated on a mental and moral change in humanity, but it may extend itself also to the alteration of the forms of our life and its institutions so that they too may be a better mould for the inpourings of the Spirit. These attempts have been the supreme landmarks in the progressive development of human ideals and the divine preparation of the race. Every one of them, whatever its outward results, has left Earth more capable of Heaven and quickened in its tardy movements the evolutionary Yoga of Nature.
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We have to recognise once more that the individual exists not in himself alone but in the collectivity and that individual perfection and liberation are not the whole sense of God's intention in the world. The free use of our liberty includes also the liberation of others and of mankind; the perfect utility of our perfection is, having realised in ourselves the divine symbol, to reproduce, multiply and ultimately universalise it in others.
Therefore from a concrete view of human life in its threefold potentialities we come to the same conclusion that we had drawn from an observation of Nature in her general workings and the three steps of her evolution. And we begin to perceive a complete aim for our synthesis of Yoga.
0.04 - Letters to a Sadhak, #Some Answers From The Mother, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
are painted in red and blue colour, no work is given and
so on. I am not submitting all this to have permission
0.05 - Letters to a Child, #Some Answers From The Mother, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
and the choice of colours is excellent.
Affectionately.
0.05 - The Synthesis of the Systems, #The Synthesis Of Yoga, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
Hathayoga and Rajayoga are thus successively practised. And in a recent unique example, in the life of Ramakrishna Paramhansa, we see a colossal spiritual capacity first driving straight to the divine realisation, taking, as it were, the kingdom of heaven by violence, and then seizing upon one Yogic method after another and extracting the substance out of it with an incredible rapidity, always to return to the heart of the whole matter, the realisation and possession of God by the power of love, by the extension of inborn spirituality into various experience and by the spontaneous play of an intuitive knowledge. Such an example cannot be generalised. Its object also was special and temporal, to exemplify in the great and decisive experience of a master-soul the truth, now most necessary to humanity, towards which a world long divided into jarring sects and schools is with difficulty labouring, that all sects are forms and fragments of a single integral truth and all disciplines labour in their different ways towards one supreme experience. To know, be and possess
The Conditions of the Synthesis
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In psychological fact this method translates itself into the progressive surrender of the ego with its whole field and all its apparatus to the Beyond-ego with its vast and incalculable but always inevitable workings. Certainly, this is no short cut or easy sadhana. It requires a colossal faith, an absolute courage and above all an unflinching patience. For it implies three stages of which only the last can be wholly blissful or rapid, - the attempt of the ego to enter into contact with the Divine, the wide, full and therefore laborious preparation of the whole lower Nature by the divine working to receive and become the higher Nature, and the eventual transformation. In fact, however, the divine
Strength, often unobserved and behind the veil, substitutes itself for our weakness and supports us through all our failings of faith, courage and patience. It "makes the blind to see and the lame to stride over the hills." The intellect becomes aware of a Law that beneficently insists and a succour that upholds; the heart speaks of a Master of all things and Friend of man or a universal Mother who upholds through all stumblings. Therefore this path is at once the most difficult imaginable and yet, in comparison with the magnitude of its effort and object, the most easy and sure of all.
0.06 - Letters to a Young Sadhak, #Some Answers From The Mother, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Mother dearest, I have caught a cold. Should I take my
bath as usual?
0.07 - Letters to a Sadhak, #Some Answers From The Mother, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
very cold. I still do not feel at home here. I do not know
what I should do. And time waits for no one. Please
01.01 - Sri Aurobindo - The Age of Sri Aurobindo, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 02, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
If one were to be busy about reforming the world and when that was done then alone to turn to other-worldly things, in that case, one would never take the turn, for the world will never be reformed totally or even considerably in that way. It is not that reformers have for the first time appeared on the earth in the present age. Men have attempted social, political, economic and moral reforms from times immemorial. But that has not barred the spiritual attempt or minimised its importance. To say that because an ideal is apparently too high or too great for the present age, it must be kept in cold storage is to set a premium on the present nature of humanity arid eternise it: that would bind the world to its old moorings and never give it the opportunity to be free and go out into the high seas of larger and greater realisations.
The ideal or perhaps one should say the policy of Real-politick is the thing needed in this world. To achieve something actually in the physical and material field, even a lesser something, is worth much more than speculating on high flaunting chimeras and indulging in day-dreams. Yes, but what is this something that has to be achieved in the material world? It is always an ideal. Even procuring food for each and every person, clothing and housing all is not less an ideal for all its concern about actuality. Only there are ideals and ideals; some are nearer to the earth, some seem to be in the background. But the mystery is that it is not always the ideal nearest to the earth which is the easiest to achieve or the first thing to be done first. Do we not see before our very eye show some very simple innocent social and economic changes are difficult to carry outthey bring in their train quite disproportionately gestures and movements of violence and revolution? That is because we seek to cure the symptoms and not touch the root of the disease. For even the most innocent-looking social, economic or political abuse has at its base far-reaching attitudes and life-urgeseven a spiritual outlook that have to be sought out and tackled first, if the attempt at reform is to be permanently and wholly successful. Even in mundane matters we do not dig deep enough, or rise high enough.
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The highest ideal, the very highest which God and Nature and Man have in view, is not and cannot be kept in cold storage: it is being worked out even here and now, and it has to be worked out here and now. The ideal of the Life Divine embodies a central truth of existence, and however difficult or chimerical it may appear to be to the normal mind, it is the preoccupation of the inner being of manall other ways or attempts of curing human ills are faint echoes, masks, diversions of this secret urge at the source and heart of things. That ideal is a norm and a force that is ever dynamic and has become doubly so since it has entered the earth atmosphere and the waking human consciousness and is labouring there. It is always safer and wiser to recognise that fact, to help in the realisation of that truth and be profited by it.
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01.01 - The New Humanity, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 01, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
And the new society will be based not upon competition, nor even upon co-operation. It will not be an open conflict, neither will it be a convenient compromise of rival individual interests. It will be the organic expression of the collective soul of humanity, working and achieving through each and every individual soul its most wide-winging freedom, manifesting the godhead that is, proper to each and every one. It will be an organisation, most delicate and subtle and supple, the members of which will have no need to live upon one another but in and through one another. It will be, if you like, a henotheistic hierarchy in which everyone will be the greatest, since everyone is all and all everyone simultaneously.
The New Humanity will be something in the mould that we give to the gods. It will supply the link that we see missing between gods and men; it will be the race of embodied gods. Man will attain that thing which has been his first desire and earliest dream, for which he coveted the gods Immortality, amritatwam. The mortalities that cut and divide, limit and bind man make him the sorrowful being he is. These are due to his ignorance and weakness and egoism. These are due to his soul itself. It is the soul that requires change, a new birth, as Christ demanded. Ours is a little soul that has severed itself from the larger and mightier self that it is. And therefore does it die every moment and even while living is afraid to live and so lives poorly and miserably. But the age is now upon us when the god-like soul anointed with its immortal royalties is ready to emerge and claim our salutation.
01.01 - The One Thing Needful, #The Integral Yoga, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
The realisation of the Divine is the one thing needful and the rest is desirable only in so far as it helps or leads towards that or when it is realised, extends and manifests the realisation. Manifestation and organisation of the whole life for the divine work, - first, the sadhana personal and collective necessary for the realisation and a common life of God-realised men, secondly, for help to the world to move towards that, and to live in the Light - is the whole meaning and purpose of my Yoga. But the realisation is the first need and it is that round which all the rest moves, for apart from it all the rest would have no meaning.
Yoga is directed towards God, not towards man. If a divine supramental consciousness and power can be brought down and established in the material world, that obviously would mean an immense change for the earth including humanity and its life. But the effect on humanity would only be one result of the change; it cannot be the object of the sadhana. The object of the sadhana can only be to live in the divine consciousness and to manifest it in life.
01.01 - The Symbol Dawn, #Savitri, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
In colour's hieroglyphs of mystic sense,
It wrote the lines of a significant myth
01.02 - Natures Own Yoga, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 03, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
It is not easy, however, nor is it necessary for the moment to envisage in detail what this divinised man would be like, externallyhis mode of outward being and living, kimsita vrajeta kim, as Arjuna queriedor how the collective life of the new humanity would function or what would be the composition of its social fabric. For what is happening is a living process, an organic growth; it is being elaborated through the actions and reactions of multitudinous forces and conditions, known and unknown; the precise configuration of the final outcome cannot be predicted with exactitude. But the Power that is at work is omniscient; it is selecting, rejecting, correcting, fashioning, creating, co-ordinating elements in accordance with and by the drive of the inviolable law of Truth and Harmony that reigns in Light's own homeswe dame the Supermind.
It is also to be noted that as mind is not the last limit of the march of evolution, even so the progress of evolution will not stop with the manifestation and embodiment of the Supermind. There are other still higher principles beyond and they too presumably await manifestation and embodiment on earth. Creation has no beginning in time (andi) nor has it an end (ananta). It is an eternal process of the unravelling of the mysteries of the Infinite. Only, it may be said that with the Supermind the creation here enters into a different order of existence. Before it there was the domain of Ignorance, after it will come the reign of Light and Knowledge. Mortality has been the governing principle of life on earth till now; it will be replaced by the consciousness of immortality. Evolution has proceeded through struggle and pain; hereafter it will be a spontaneous, harmonious and happy flowering.
01.02 - Sri Aurobindo - Ahana and Other Poems, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 02, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
We do not say that poets have never sung of God and Soul and things transcendent. Poets have always done that. But what I say is this that presentation of spiritual truths, as they are in their own home, in other words, treated philosophically and yet in a supreme poetic manner, has always been a rarity. We have, indeed, in India the Gita and the Upanishads, great philosophical poems, if there were any. But for one thing they are on dizzy heights out of the reach of common man and for another they are idolised more as philosophy than as poetry. Doubtless, our Vaishnava poets sang of God and Love Divine; and Rabindranath, in one sense, a typical modern Vaishnava, did the same. And their songs are masterpieces. But are they not all human, too human, as the mad prophet would say? In them it is the human significance, the human manner that touches and moves us the spiritual significance remains esoteric, is suggested, is a matter of deduction. Sri Aurobindo has dealt with spiritual experiences in a different way. He has not clothed them in human symbols and allegories, in images and figures of the mere earthly and secular life: he presents them in their nakedness, just as they are seen and realised. He has not sought to tone down the rigour of truth with contrivances that easily charm and captivate the common human mind and heart. Nor has he indulged like so many poet philosophers in vague generalisations and colourless or too colourful truisms that do not embody a clear thought or rounded idea, a radiant judgment. Sri Aurobindo has given us in his poetry thoughts that are clear-cut, ideas beautifully chiselledhe is always luminously forceful.
Take these Vedantic lines that in their limpidity and harmonious flow beat anything found in the fine French poet Lamartine:
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Indeed it would be wrong to associate any cold ascetic nudity to the spiritual body of Sri Aurobindo. His poetry is philosophic, abstract, no doubt, but every philosophy has its practice, every abstract thing its concrete application,even as the soul has its body; and the fusion, not mere union, of the two is very characteristic in him. The deepest and unseizable flights of thought he knows how to clo the with a Kalidasian richness of imagery, or a Keatsean gusto of sensuousness:
. . . . .O flowers, O delight on the tree-tops burning!
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cold are your rivers of peace and their banks are leafless and lonely.
or,
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From "Ahana" in Sri Aurobindo's Ahana and Other Poems. There is a later version of the poem in collected Poems and Plays, Vol II.
"Reminiscence."
01.02 - The Creative Soul, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 01, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
Now the centre of this energy, the matrix of creativity is the soul itself, one's own soul. If you want to createlive, grow and be real-find yourself, be yourself. The simple old wisdom still remains the eternal wisdom. It is because we fall off from our soul that we wander into side-paths, paths that do not belong to our real nature and hence that lead to imitation and repetition, decay and death. This is what happens to what we call common souls. The force of circumstances, the pressure of environment or simply the momentum of custom or habit compel them to choose the easiest and the readiest way that may lie before them. They do not consult the demand of the inner being but the requirement of the moment. Our bodily needs, our vital hungers and our mental prejudices obsess and obscure the impulsions that thrill the hidden spirit. We hasten to gratify the immediate and forget the eternal, we clutch at the shadow and let go the substance. We are carried away in the flux and tumult of life. It is a mixed and collective whirla Weltgeist that moves and governs us. We are helpless straws drifting in the current. But manhood demands that we stop and pause, pull ourselves out of the Maelstrom and be what we are. We must shape things as we want and not allow things to shape us as they want.
Let each take cognisance of the godhead that is within him for self is Godand in the strength of the soul-divinity create his universe. It does not matter what sort of universe he- creates, so long as he creates it. The world created by a Buddha is not the same as that created by a Napoleon, nor should they be the same. It does not prove anything that I cannot become a Kalidasa; for that matter Kalidasa cannot become what I am. If you have not the genius of a Shankara it does not mean that you have no genius at all. Be and become yourselfma gridhah kasyachit dhanam, says the Upanishad. The fountain-head of creative genius lies there, in the free choice and the particular delight the self-determination of the spirit within you and not in the desire for your neighbours riches. The world has become dull and uniform and mechanical, since everybody endeavours to become not himself, but always somebody else. Imitation is servitude and servitude brings in grief.
01.02 - The Issue, #Savitri, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
A colloquy of the original Gods
Meeting upon the borders of the unknown,
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A dense magnificent coloured self-wrapped life
Draped in the leaves' vivid emerald monotone
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And preen joy in her warmth and colour's rule.
3.37
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Or a vast ignorant mind's colossal work.
4.44
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A living choice reversed fate's cold dead turn,
Affirmed the spirit's tread on Circumstance,
01.03 - Mystic Poetry, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 02, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
Man's consciousness is further to rise from the mental to over-mental regions. Accordingly, his life and activities and along with that his artistic creations too will take on a new tone and rhythm, a new mould and constitution even. For this transition, the higher mentalwhich is normally the field of philosophical and idealistic activitiesserves as the Paraclete, the Intercessor; it takes up the lower functionings of the consciousness, which are intense in their own way, but narrow and turbid, and gives, by purifying and enlarging, a wider frame, a more luminous pattern, a more subtly articulated , form for the higher, vaster and deeper realities, truths and harmonies to express and manifest. In the old-world spiritual and mystic poets, this intervening medium was overlooked for evident reasons, for human reason or even intelligence is a double-edged instrument, it can make as well as mar, it has a light that most often and naturally shuts off other higher lights beyond it. So it was bypassed, some kind of direct and immediate contact was sought to be established between the normal and the transcendental. The result was, as I have pointed out, a pure spiritual poetry, on the one hand, as in the Upanishads, or, on the other, religious poetry of various grades and denominations that spoke of the spiritual but in the terms and in the manner of the mundane, at least very much coloured and dominated by the latter. Vyasa was the great legendary figure in India who, as is shown in his Mahabharata, seems to have been one of the pioneers, if not the pioneer, to forge and build the missing link of Thought Power. The exemplar of the manner is the Gita. Valmiki's represented a more ancient and primary inspiration, of a vast vital sensibility, something of the kind that was at the basis of Homer's genius. In Greece it was Socrates who initiated the movement of speculative philosophy and the emphasis of intellectual power slowly began to find expression in the later poets, Sophocles and Euripides. But all these were very simple beginnings. The moderns go in for something more radical and totalitarian. The rationalising element instead of being an additional or subordinate or contri buting factor, must itself give its norm and form, its own substance and manner to the creative activity. Such is the present-day demand.
The earliest preoccupation of man was religious; even when he concerned himself with the world and worldly things, he referred all that to the other world, thought of gods and goddesses, of after-death and other where. That also will be his last and ultimate preoccupation though in a somewhat different way, when he has passed through a process of purification and growth, a "sea-change". For although religion is an aspiration towards the truth and reality beyond or behind the world, it is married too much to man's actual worldly nature and carries always with it the shadow of profanity.
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Poetry, actually however, has been, by and large, a profane and mundane affair: for it expresses the normal man's perceptions and feelings and experiences, human loves and hates and desires and ambitions. True. And yet there has also always been an attempt, a tendency to deal with them in such a way as can bring calm and puritykatharsisnot trouble and confusion. That has been the purpose of all Art from the ancient days. Besides, there has been a growth and development in the historic process of this katharsis. As by the sublimation of his bodily and vital instincts and impulses., man is gradually growing into the mental, moral and finally spiritual consciousness, even so the artistic expression of his creative activity has followed a similar line of transformation. The first and original transformation happened with religious poetry. The religious, one may say, is the profane inside out; that is to say, the religious man has almost the same tone and temper, the same urges and passions, only turned Godward. Religious poetry too marks a new turn and development of human speech, in taking the name of God human tongue acquires a new plasticity and flavour that transform or give a new modulation even to things profane and mundane it speaks of. Religious means at bottom the colouring of mental and moral idealism. A parallel process of katharsis is found in another class of poetic creation, viz., the allegory. Allegory or parable is the stage when the higher and inner realities are expressed wholly in the modes and manner, in the form and character of the normal and external, when moral, religious or spiritual truths are expressed in the terms and figures of the profane life. The higher or the inner ideal is like a loose clothing upon the ordinary consciousness, it does not fit closely or fuse. In the religious, however, the first step is taken for a mingling and fusion. The mystic is the beginning of a real fusion and a considerable ascension of the lower into the higher. The philosopher poet follows another line for the same katharsisinstead of uplifting emotions and sensibility, he proceeds by thought-power, by the ideas and principles that lie behind all movements and give a pattern to all things existing. The mystic can be of either type, the religious mystic or the philosopher mystic, although often the two are welded together and cannot be very well separated. Let us illustrate a little:
The spacious firmament on high,
01.03 - Rationalism, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 01, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
What is Reason, the faculty that is said to be the proud privilege of man, the sovereign instrument he alone possesses for the purpose of knowing? What is the value of knowledge that Reason gives? For it is the manner of knowing, the particular faculty or instrument by which we know, that determines the nature and content of knowledge. Reason is the collecting of available sense-perceptions and a certain mode of working upon them. It has three component elements that have been defined as observation, classification and deduction. Now, the very composition of Reason shows that it cannot be a perfect instrument of knowledge; the limitations are the inherent limitations of the component elements. As regards observation there is a two-fold limitation. First, observation is a relative term and variable quantity. One observes through the prism of one's own observing faculty, through the bias of one's own personality and no two persons can have absolutely the same manner of observation. So Science has recognised the necessity of personal equation and has created an imaginary observer, a "mean man" as the standard of reference. And this already takes us far away from the truth, from the reality. Secondly, observation is limited by its scope. All the facts of the world, all sense-perceptions possible and actual cannot be included within any observation however large, however collective it may be. We have to go always upon a limited amount of data, we are able to construct only a partial and sketchy view of the surface of existence. And then it is these few and doubtful facts that Reason seeks to arrange and classify. That classification may hold good for certain immediate ends, for a temporary understanding of the world and its forces, either in order to satisfy our curiosity or to gain some practical utility. For when we want to consider the world only in its immediate relation to us, a few and even doubtful facts are sufficient the more immediate the relation, the more immaterial the doubtfulness and insufficiency of facts. We may quite confidently go a step in darkness, but to walk a mile we do require light and certainty. Our scientific classification has a background of uncertainty, if not, of falsity; and our deduction also, even while correct within a very narrow range of space and time, cannot escape the fundamental vices of observation and classification upon which it is based.
It might be said, however, that the guarantee or sanction of Reason does not lie in the extent of its application, nor can its subjective nature (or ego-centric predication, as philosophers would term it) vitiate the validity of its conclusions. There is, in fact, an inherent unity and harmony between Reason and Reality. If we know a little of Reality, we know the whole; if we know the subjective, we know also the objective. As in the part, so in the whole; as it is within, so it is without. If you say that I will die, you need not wait for my actual death to have the proof of your statement. The generalising power inherent in Reason is the guarantee of the certitude to which it leads. Reason is valid, as it does not betray us. If it were such as anti-intellectuals make it out to be, we would be making nothing but false steps, would always remain entangled in contradictions. The very success of Reason is proof of its being a reliable and perfect instrument for the knowledge of Truth and Reality. It is beside the mark to prove otherwise, simply by analysing the nature of Reason and showing the fundamental deficiencies of that nature. It is rather to the credit of Reason that being as it is, it is none the less a successful and trustworthy agent.
01.03 - The Yoga of the King - The Yoga of the Souls Release, #Savitri, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
A colonist from immortality.
A pointing beam on earth's uncertain roads,
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There were high encounters, epic colloquies,
And counsels came couched in celestial speech,
01.04 - The Poetry in the Making, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 02, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
I said that the supreme artist is superconscious: his consciousness withdraws from the normal mental consciousness and becomes awake and alive in another order of consciousness. To that superior consciousness the artist's mentalityhis ideas and dispositions, his judgments and valuations and acquisitions, in other words, his normal psychological make-upserves as a channel, an instrument, a medium for transcription. Now, there are two stages, or rather two lines of activity in the processus, for they may be overlapping and practically simultaneous. First, there is the withdrawal and the in-gathering of consciousness and then its reappearance into expression. The consciousness retires into a secret or subtle worldWords-worth's "re collected in tranquillity"and comes back with the riches gathered or transmuted there. But the purity of the gold thus garnered and stalled in the artistry of words and sounds or lines and colours depends altogether upon the purity of the channel through which it has to pass. The mental vehicle receives and records and it can do so to perfection if it is perfectly in tune with what it has to receive and record; otherwise the transcription becomes mixed and blurred, a faint or confused echo, a poor show. The supreme creators are precisely those in whom the receptacle, the instrumental faculties offer the least resistance and record with absolute fidelity the experiences of the over or inner consciousness. In Shakespeare, in Homer, in Valmiki the inflatus of the secret consciousness, the inspiration, as it is usually termed, bears down, sweeps away all obscurity or contrariety in the recording mentality, suffuses it with its own glow and puissance, indeed resolves it into its own substance, as it were. And the difference between the two, the secret norm and the recording form, determines the scale of the artist's creative value. It happens often that the obstruction of a too critically observant and self-conscious brain-mind successfully blocks up the flow of something supremely beautiful that wanted to come down and waited for an opportunity.
Artists themselves, almost invariably, speak of their inspiration: they look upon themselves more or less as mere instruments of something or some Power that is beyond them, beyond their normal consciousness attached to the brain-mind, that controls them and which they cannot control. This perception has been given shape in myths and legends. Goddess Saraswati or the Muses are, however, for them not a mere metaphor but concrete realities. To what extent a poet may feel himself to be a mere passive, almost inanimate, instrumentnothing more than a mirror or a sensitive photographic plateis illustrated in the famous case of coleridge. His Kubla Khan, as is well known, he heard in sleep and it was a long poem very distinctly recited to him, but when he woke up and wanted to write it down he could remember only the opening lines, the rest having gone completely out of his memory; in other words, the poem was ready-composed somewhere else, but the transmitting or recording instrument was faulty and failed him. Indeed, it is a common experience to hear in sleep verses or musical tunes and what seem then to be very beautiful things, but which leave no trace on the brain and are not recalled in memory.
Still, it must be noted that coleridge is a rare example, for the recording apparatus is not usually so faithful but puts up its own formations that disturb and alter the perfection of the original. The passivity or neutrality of the intermediary is relative, and there are infinite grades of it. Even when the larger waves that play in it in the normal waking state are quieted down, smaller ripples of unconscious or half-conscious habitual formations are thrown up and they are sufficient to cause the scattering and dispersal of the pure light from above.
The absolute passivity is attainable, perhaps, only by the Yogi. And in this sense the supreme poet is a Yogi, for in his consciousness the higher, deeper, subtler or other modes of experiences pass through and are recorded with the minimum aberration or diffraction.
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The modern critical self-consciousness in the artist originated with the Romantics. The very essence of Romanticism is curiosity the scientist's pleasure in analysing, observing, experimenting, changing the conditions of our reactions, mental or sentimental or even nervous and physical by way of discovery of new and unforeseen or unexpected modes of "psychoses" or psychological states. Goethe, Wordsworth, Stendhal represented a mentality and initiated a movement which led logically to the age of Hardy, Housman and Bridges and in the end to that of Lawrence and Joyce, Ezra Pound and Eliot and Auden. On the Continent we can consider Flaubert as the last of the classicists married to the very quintessence of Romanticism. A hard, self-regarding, self-critical mentality, a cold scalpel-like gaze that penetrates and upturns the reverse side of things is intimately associated with the poetic genius of Mallarm and constitutes almost the whole of Valry's. The impassioned lines of a very modern poet like Aragon are also characterised by a consummate virtuosity in chiselled artistry, conscious and deliberate and willed at every step and turn.
The consciously purposive activity of the poetic consciousness in fact, of all artistic consciousness has shown itself with a clear and unambiguous emphasis in two directions. First of all with regard to the subject-matter: the old-world poets took things as they were, as they were obvious to the eye, things of human nature and things of physical Nature, and without questioning dealt with them in the beauty of their normal form and function. The modern mentality has turned away from the normal and the obvious: it does not accept and admit the "given" as the final and definitive norm of things. It wishes to discover and establish other norms, it strives to bring about changes in the nature and condition of things, envisage the shape of things to come, work for a brave new world. The poet of today, in spite of all his effort to remain a pure poet, in spite of Housman's advocacy of nonsense and not-sense being the essence of true Art, is almost invariably at heart an incorrigible prophet. In revolt against the old and established order of truths and customs, against all that is normally considered as beautiful,ideals and emotions and activities of man or aspects and scenes and movements of Natureagainst God or spiritual life, the modern poet turns deliberately to the ugly and the macabre, the meaningless, the insignificant and the triflingtins and teas, bone and dust and dustbin, hammer and sicklehe is still a prophet, a violent one, an iconoclast, but one who has his own icon, a terribly jealous being, that seeks to pull down the past, erase it, to break and batter and knead the elements in order to fashion out of them something conforming to his heart's desire. There is also the class who have the vision and found the truth and its solace, who are prophets, angelic and divine, messengers and harbingers of a new beauty that is to dawn upon earth. And yet there are others in whom the two strains mingle or approach in a strange way. All this means that the artist is far from being a mere receiver, a mechanical executor, a passive unconscious instrument, but that he is supremely' conscious and master of his faculties and implements. This fact is doubly reinforced when we find how much he is preoccupied with the technical aspect of his craft. The richness and variety of patterns that can be given to the poetic form know no bounds today. A few major rhythms were sufficient for the ancients to give full expression to their poetic inflatus. For they cared more for some major virtues, the basic and fundamental qualitiessuch as truth, sublimity, nobility, forcefulness, purity, simplicity, clarity, straightforwardness; they were more preoccupied with what they had to say and they wanted, no doubt, to say it beautifully and powerfully; but the modus operandi was not such a passion or obsession with them, it had not attained that almost absolute value for itself which modern craftsmanship gives it. As technology in practical life has become a thing of overwhelming importance to man today, become, in the Shakespearean phrase, his "be-all and end-all", even so the same spirit has invaded and pervaded his aesthetics too. The subtleties, variations and refinements, the revolutions, reversals and inventions which the modern poet has ushered and takes delight in, for their own sake, I repeat, for their intrinsic interest, not for the sake of the subject which they have to embody and clothe, have never been dream by Aristotle, the supreme legislator among the ancients, nor by Horace, the almost incomparable craftsman among the ancients in the domain of poetry. Man has become, to be sure, a self-conscious creator to the pith of his bone.
01.05 - Rabindranath Tagore: A Great Poet, a Great Man, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 02, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
In an age when Reason was considered as the highest light given to man, Tagore pointed to the Vision of the mystics as always the still greater light; when man was elated with undreamt-of worldly success, puffed up with incomparable material possessions and powers, Tagore's voice rang clear and emphatic in tune with the cry of the ancients: "What shall I do with all this mass of things, if I am not made immortal by that?" When men, in their individual as well as collective egoism, were scrambling for earthly gains and hoards, he held before them vaster and cleaner horizons, higher and deeper ways of being and living, maintained the sacred sense of human solidarity, the living consciousness of the Divine, one and indivisible. When the Gospel of Power had all but hypnotised men's minds, and Superman or God-man came to be equated with the Titan, Tagore saw through the falsehood and placed in front and above all the old-world eternal verities of love and self-giving, harmony and mutuality, sweetness and light. When pessimism, cynicism, agnosticism struck the major chord of human temperament, and grief and frustration and death and decay were taken as a matter of course to be the inevitable order of earthlylifebhasmantam idam shariramhe continued to sing the song of the Rishis that Ananda and Immortality are the breath of things, the birth right of human beings. When Modernism declared with a certitude never tobe contested that Matter is Brahman, Tagore said with the voice of one who knows that Spirit is Brahman.
Tagore is in direct line with those bards who have sung of the Spirit, who always soared high above the falsehoods and uglinesses of a merely mundane life and lived in the undecaying delights and beauties of a diviner consciousness. Spiritual reality was the central theme of his poetic creation: only and naturally he viewed it in a special way and endowed it with a special grace. We know of another God-intoxicated man, the Jewish philosopher Spinoza, who saw things sub specie aeternitatis, under the figure or mode of eternity. Well, Tagore can be said to see things, in their essential spiritual reality, under the figure or mode of beauty. Keats indeed spoke of truth being beauty and beauty truth. But there is a great difference in the outlook and inner experience. A worshipper of beauty, unless he rises to the Upanishadic norm, is prone to become sensuous and pagan. Keats was that, Kalidasa was that, even Shelley was not far different. The spiritual vein in all these poets remains secondary. In the old Indian master, it is part of his intellectual equipment, no doubt, but nothing much more than that. In the other two it comes in as strange flashes from an unknown country, as a sort of irruption or on the peak of the poetic afflatus or enthousiasmos.
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Socrates is said to have brought down Philosophy from Heaven to live among men upon earth. A similar exploit can be ascribed to Tagore. The Spirit, the bare transcendental Reality contemplated by the orthodox Vedantins, has been brought nearer to our planet, close to human consciousness in Tagore's vision, being clothed in earth and flesh and blood, made vivid with the colours and contours of the physical existence. The Spirit, yes and by all means, but not necessarily asceticism and monasticism. So Tagore boldly declared in those famous lines of his:
Mine is not the deliverance achieved through mere renunciation. Mine rather the freedom that tastes itself in a thousand associations.1
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cold are the rivers of peace and their banks are leafless and lonely.3
and sends up this prayer:
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Sri Aurobindo: "Ahana", collected Poems & Plays, Vol. 2
***
01.06 - On Communism, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 01, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
Communism is the synthesis of collectivism and individualism. The past ages of society were characterised more or less by a severe collectivism. In ancient Greece, more so in Sparta and in Rome, the individual had, properly speaking, no separate existence of his own; he was merged in the State or Nation. The individual was considered only as a limb of the collective being, had to live and labour for the common weal. The value attached to each person was strictly in reference to the output that the group to which he belonged received from him. Apart from this service for the general unit the body politicany personal endeavour and achievement, if not absolutely discouraged and repressed, was given a very secondary place of merit. The summum bonum of the individual was to sacrifice at the altar of the res publica, the bonum publicum. In India, the position and function of the State or Nation was taken up by the society. Here too social institutions were so constituted and men were so bred and brought up that individuality had neither the occasion nor the incentive to express itself, it was a thing that remained, in the Kalidasian phrase, an object for the ear onlysrutau sthita. Those who sought at all an individual aim and purpose, as perhaps the Sannyasins, were put outside the gate of law and society. Within the society, in actual life and action, it was a sin and a crime or at least a gross imperfection to have any self-regarding motive or impulse; personal preference was the last thing to be considered, virtue consisted precisely in sacrificing one's own taste and inclination for the sake of that which the society exacts and sanctions.
Against this tyranny of the group, this absolute rule of the collective will, the human mind rose in revolt and the result was Individualism. For whatever may be the truth and necessity of the collective, the Individual is no less true and necessary. The individual has his own law and urge of being and his own secret godhead. The collective godhead derides the individual godhead at its peril. The first movement of the reaction, however, was a run to the other extremity; a stern collectivism gave birth to an intransigent individualism. The individual is sacred and inviolable, cost what it may. It does not matter what sort of individuality one seeks, it is enough if the thing is there. So the doctrine of individualism has come to set a premium on egoism and on forces that are disruptive of all social bonds. Each and every individual has the inherent right, which is also a duty, to follow his own impetus and impulse. Society is nothing but the battle ground for competing individualities the strongest survive and the weakest go to the wall. Association and co-operation are instruments that the individual may use and utilise for his own growth and development but in the main they act as deterrents rather than as aids to the expression and expansion of his characteristic being. In reality, however, if we probe sufficiently deep into the matter we find that there is no such thing as corporate life and activity; what appears as such is only a camouflage for rigorous competition; at the best, there maybe only an offensive and defensive alliancehumanity fights against nature, and within humanity itself group fights against group and in the last analysis, within the group, the individual fights against the individual. This is the ultimate Law-the Dharma of creation.
Now, what such an uncompromising individualism fails to recognise is that individuality and ego are not the same thing, that the individual may have his individuality intact and entire and yet sacrifice his ego, that the soul of man is a much greater thing than his vital being. It is simply ignoring the fact and denying the truth to say that man is only a fighting animal and not a loving god, that the self within the individual realises itself only through competition and not co-operation. It is an error to conceive of society as a mere parallelogram of forces, to suppose that it has risen simply out of the struggle of individual interests and continues to remain by that struggle. Struggle is only one aspect of the thing, a particular form at a particular stage, a temporary manifestation due to a particular system and a particular habit and training. It would be nearer the truth to say that society came into being with the demand of the individual soul to unite with the individual soul, with the stress of an Over-soul to express itself in a multitude of forms, diverse yet linked together and organised in perfect harmony. Only, the stress for union manifested itself first on the material plane as struggle: but this is meant to be corrected and transcended and is being continually corrected and transcended by a secret harmony, a real commonality and brotherhood and unity. The individual is not so self-centred as the individualists make him to be, his individuality has a much vaster orbit and fulfils itself only by fulfilling others. The scientists have begun to discover other instincts in man than those of struggle and competition; they now place at the origin of social grouping an instinct which they name the herd-instinct: but this is only a formulation in lower terms, a translation on the vital plane of a higher truth and reality the fundamental oneness and accord of individuals and their spiritual impulsion to unite.
However, individualism has given us a truth and a formula which collectivism ignored. Self-determination is a thing which has come to stay. Each and every individual is free, absolutely free and shall freely follow his own line of growth and development and fulfilment. No extraneous power shall choose and fix what is good or evil for him, nor coerce and exploit him for its own benefit. But that does not necessarily mean that collectivism has no truth in it; collectivism also, as much as individualism, has a lesson for us and we should see whether we can harmonise the two. collectivism signifies that the individual should not look to himself alone, should not be shut up in his freedom but expand himself and envelop others in a wider freedom, see other creatures in himself and himself in other creatures, as the Gita says. collectivism demands that the individual need not and should not exhaust himself entirely in securing and enjoying his personal freedom, but that he can and should work for the salvation of others; the truth it upholds is this that the individual is from a certain point of view only a part of the group and by ignoring the latter it ignores itself in the end.
Now, a spiritual communism embraces individualism and collectivism, fuses them in a higher truth, establishes them in an intimate and absolute harmony. The individual is the centre, the group is the circumference and the two form one whore circle. The individual by fulfilling the truth of his real individuality fulfils also the truth of a commonality. There are no different laws for the two. The individuals do not stand apart from and against one another, the dharma of one does not clash with the dharma of the other. The ripples in the bosom of the sea, however distinct and discrete in appearance, form but a single mass, all follow the same law of hydrodynamics that the mother sea incarnates. Stars and planets and nebulae, each separate heavenly body has its characteristic form and nature and function and yet all fulfil the same law of gravitation and beat the measure of the silent symphony of spaces. Individualities are the freedoms of the collective being and collectivity the concentration of individual beings. The same soul looking inward appears as the individual being and looking outward appears as the collective being.
Communism takes man not as ego or the vital creature; it turns him upside downurdhomulo' vaksakhah and establishes him upon his soul, his inner godhead. Thus established the individual soul finds and fulfils the divine law that by increasing itself it increases others and by increasing others it increases itself and thus by increasing one another they attain the supreme good. Unless man goes beyond himself and reaches this self, this godhead above, he will not find any real poise, will always swing between individualism and collectivism, he will remain always boundbound either in his freedom or in his bondage.
A commune is a group of individuals having a common self and a common life-intuition. A common self presupposes the realisation by each individual of his deepest being the self which is at once distinct from and instinct with other selves; a common life-intuition presupposes the awakening of each individual to his inmost creative urge, which, pure and true and vast as it is, fulfils itself in and through other creative urges.
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So first the individual and then the commune is not the natural nor the ideal principle. On the other hand, first the commune and then the individual would appear to be an equally defective principle. For first a commune means an organisation, its laws and rules and regulations, its injunctions and prohibitions; all which signifies or comes to signify that every individual is not free to enter its fold and that whoever enters must know how to dovetail himself therein and thus crush down the very life-power whose enhancement and efflorescence is sought. First a commune means necessarily a creed, a dogma, a set form of being and living indelibly marked out from beforehand. The individual has there no choice of finding and developing the particular creed or dogma or mode of being and living, from out of his own self, along his particular line of natural growth; all that is imposed upon him and he has to accept and make it his own by trial and effort and self-torture. Even if the commune be a contractual association, the members having joined together in a common cause to a common end, by voluntarily sacrificing a portion of their personal choice and freedom, even then it is not the ideal thing; the collective soul will be diminished in exact proportion as each individual soul has had to be diminished, be that voluntary or otherwise. That commune is plenary and entire which ensures plenitude and entirety to each of its individuals.
Now how to escape the dilemma? Only if we take the commune and the individual togetheren bloc, as has already been suggested. This means that the commune should be at the beginning a subtle and supple thing, without form and even without name, it should be no more than the circumambient aura the sukshma deha that plays around a group of individuals who meet and unite and move together by a secret affinity, along a common path towards a common goal. As each individual develops and defines himself, the commune also takes a more and more concrete shape; and when at the last stage the individual rises to the full height of his godhead, takes possession of his integral divinity, the commune also establishes its solid empire, vivid and vibrant in form and name.
01.06 - Vivekananda, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 02, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
A personal reminiscence. A young man in prison, accused of conspiracy and waging war against the British Empire. If convicted he might have to suffer the extreme penalty, at least, transportation to the Andamans. The case is dragging on for long months. And the young man is in a solitary cell. He cannot always keep up his spirits high. Moments of sadness and gloom and despair come and almost overwhelm him. Who was there to console and cheer him up? Vivekananda. Vivekananda's speeches, From colombo to Almora, came, as a godsend, into the hands of the young man. Invariably, when the period of despondency came he used to open the book, read a few pages, read them over again, and the cloud was there no longer. Instead there was hope and courage and faith and future and light and air.
Such is Vivekananda, the embodiment of Fearlessnessabh, the Upanishadic word, the mantra, he was so fond of. The life and vision of Vivekananda can be indeed summed up in the mighty phrase of the Upanishads, nyam tm balahnena labhya. 'This soul no weakling can attain.' Strength! More strength! Strength evermore! One remembers the motto of Danton, the famous leader in the French Revolution:De l'audance, encore de l'audace, toujours de l'audace!
01.07 - Blaise Pascal (1623-1662), #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 02, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
"The zeal for the Lord hath eaten me up." Such has indeed been the case with Pascal, almost literally. The fire that burned in him was too ardent and vehement for the vehicle, the material instrument, which was very soon used up and reduced to ashes. At twenty-four he was already a broken man, being struck with paralysis and neuras thenia; he died at the comparatively early age of 39, emulating, as it were, the life career of his Lord the Christ who died at 33. The Fire martyrised the body, but kindled and brought forth experiences and realisations that save and truths that abide. It was the Divine Fire whose vision and experience he had on the famous night of 23 November 1654 which brought about his final and definitive conversion. It was the same fire that had blazed up in his brain, while yet a boy, and made him a precocious genius, a marvel of intellectual power in the exact sciences. At 12 this prodigy discovered by himself the 32nd proposition of Euclid, Book I. At sixteen he wrote a treatise on conic sections. At nineteen he invented a calculating machine which, without the help of any mathematical rule or process, gave absolutely accurate results. At twenty-three he published his experiments with vacuum. At twenty-five he conducted the well-known experiment from the tower of St. Jacques, proving the existence of atmospheric pressure. His studies in infinitesimal calculus were remarkably creative and original. And it might be said he was a pioneer in quite a new branch of mathematics, viz., the mathematical theory of probability. We shall see presently how his preoccupation with the mathematics of chance and probability coloured and reinforced his metaphysics and theology.
But the pressure upon his dynamic and heated brain the fiery zeal in his mindwas already proving too much and he was advised medically to take complete rest. Thereupon followed what was known as Pascal's mundane lifea period of distraction and dissipation; but this did not last long nor was it of a serious nature. The inner fire could brook no delay, it was eager and impatient to englobe other fields and domains. Indeed, it turned to its own field the heart. Pascal became initiated into the mystery of Faith and Grace. Still he had to pass through a terrible period of dejection and despair: the life of the world had given him no rest or relaxation, it served only to fill his cup of misery to the brim. But the hour of final relief was not long postponed: the Grace came to him, even as it came to Moses or St. Paul as a sudden flare of fire which burnt up the Dark Night and opened out the portals of Morning Glory.
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One is not sure if such reasoning is convincing to the intellect; but perhaps it is a necessary stage in conversion. At least we can conclude that Pascal had to pass through such a stage; and it indicates the difficulty his brain had to undergo, the tension or even the torture he made it pass through. It is true, from Reason Pascal went over to Faith, even while giving Reason its due. Still it seems the two were not perfectly synthetised or fused in him. There was a gap between that was not thoroughly bridged. Pascal did not possess the higher, intuitive, luminous mind that mediates successfully between the physical discursive ratiocinative brain-mind and the vision of faith: it is because deep in his consciousness there lay this chasm. Indeed,Pascal's abyss (l' abme de Pascal) is a well-known legend. Pascal, it appears, used to have very often the vision of an abyss about to open before him and he shuddered at the prospect of falling into it. It seems to us to be an experience of the Infinity the Infinity to which he was so much attracted and of which he wrote so beautifully (L'infiniment grand et l'infiniment petit)but into which he could not evidently jump overboard unreservedly. This produced a dichotomy, a lack of integration of personality, Jung would say. Pascal's brain was cold, firm, almost rigid; his heart was volcanic, the faith he had was a fire: it lacked something of the pure light and burned with a lurid glare.
And the reason is his metaphysics. It is the Jansenist conception of God and human nature that inspired and coloured all his experience and consciousness. According to it, as according to the Calvinist conception, man is a corrupt being, corroded to the core, original sin has branded his very soul. Only Grace saves him and releases him. The order of sin and the order of Grace are distinct and disparate worlds and yet they complement each other and need each other. Greatness and misery are intertwined, united, unified with each other in him. Here is an echo of the Manichean position which also involves an abyss. But even then God's grace is not a free agent, as Jesuits declare; there is a predestination that guides and controls it. This was one of the main subjects he treated in his famous open letters (Les Provinciales) that brought him renown almost overnight. Eternal hell is a possible prospect that faces the Jansenist. That was why a Night always over-shadowed the Day in Pascal's soul.
Man then, according to Pascal, is by nature a sinful thing. He can lay no claim to noble virtue as his own: all in him is vile, he is a lump of dirt and filth. Even the greatest has his full share of this taint. The greatest, the saintliest, and the meanest, the most sinful, all meet, all are equal on this common platform; all have the same feet of clay. Man is as miserable a creature as a beast, as much a part and product of Nature as a plant. Only there is this difference that an animal or a tree is unconscious, while man knows that he is miserable. This knowledge or perception makes him more miserable, but that is his real and only greatness there is no other. His thought, his self-consciousness, and his sorrow and repentance and contrition for what he is that is the only good partMary's part that has been given to him. Here are Pascal's own words on the subject:
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Pascal's faith had not the calm, tranquil, serene, luminous and happy self-possession of an Indian Rishi. It was ardent and impatient, fiery and vehement. It had to be so perhaps, since it was to stand against his steely brain (and a gloomy vital or life force) as a counterpoise, even as an antidote. This tension and schism brought about, at least contri buted to his neuras thenia and physical infirmity. But whatever the effect upon his inner consciousness and spiritual achievement, his power of expression, his literary style acquired by that a special quality which is his great gift to the French language. If one speaks of Pascal, one has to speak of his language also; for he was one of the great masters who created the French prose. His prose was a wonderful blend of clarity, precision, serried logic and warmth, colour, life, movement, plasticity.
A translation cannot give any idea of the Pascalian style; but an inner echo of the same can perhaps be caught from the thought movement of these characteristic sayings of his with which we conclude:
01.08 - A Theory of Yoga, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 01, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
What is the reason of this elaboration, this check and constraint upon the natural and direct outflow of the animal instincts in man? It has been said that the social life of man, the fact that he has to live and move as member of a group or aggregate has imposed upon him these restrictions. The free and unbridled indulgence of one's bare aboriginal impulses may be possible to creatures that live a separate, solitary and individual life but is disruptive of all bonds necessary for a corporate and group life. It is even a biological necessity again which has evolved in man a third and collateral primary instinct that of the herd. And it is this herd-instinct which naturally and spontaneously restrains, diverts and even metamorphoses the other instincts of the mere animal life. However, leaving aside for the moment the question whether man's ethical and spiritual ideals are a mere dissimulation of his animal instincts or whether they correspond to certain actual realities apart from and co-existent with these latter, we will recognise the simple fact of control and try to have a glimpse into its mechanism.
There are three lines, as the Psycho-analysts point out along which this control or censuring of the primary instincts acts. First, there is the line of Defence Reaction. That is to say, the mind automatically takes up an attitude directly contrary to the impulse, tries to shut it out and deny altogether its existence and the measure of the insistence of the impulse is also the measure of the vehemence of the denial. It is the case of the lady protesting too much. So it happens that where subconsciously there is a strong current of a particular impulse, consciously the mind is obliged to take up a counteracting opposite impulse. Thus in presence of a strong sexual craving the mind as if to guard and save itself engenders by a reflex movement an ascetic and puritanic mood. Similarly a strong unthinking physical attraction translates itself on the conscious plane as an equally strong repulsion.
01.08 - Walter Hilton: The Scale of Perfection, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 02, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
Indeed, it would be interesting to compare and contrast the Eastern and Western approach to Divine Love, the Christian and the Vaishnava, for example. Indian spirituality, whatever its outer form or credal formulation, has always a background of utter unity. This unity, again, is threefold or triune and is expressed in those great Upanishadic phrases,mahvkyas,(1) the transcendental unity: the One alone exists, there is nothing else than theOneekamevdvityam; (2) the cosmic unity: all existence is one, whatever exists is that One, thereare no separate existences:sarvam khalvidam brahma neha nnsti kincaa; (3) That One is I, you too are that One:so' ham, tattvamasi; this may be called the individual unity. As I have said, all spiritual experiences in India, of whatever school or line, take for granted or are fundamentally based upon this sense of absolute unity or identity. Schools of dualism or pluralism, who do not apparently admit in their tenets this extreme monism, are still permeated in many ways with that sense and in some form or other take cognizance of the truth of it. The Christian doctrine too says indeed, 'I and my Father in Heaven are one', but this is not identity, but union; besides, the human soul is not admitted into this identity, nor the world soul. The world, we have seen, according to the Christian discipline has to be altogether abandoned, negatived, as we go inward and upward towards our spiritual status reflecting the divine image in the divine company. It is a complete rejection, a cutting off and casting away of world and life. One extreme Vedantic path seems to follow a similar line, but there it is not really rejection, but a resolution, not the rejection of what is totally foreign and extraneous, but a resolution of the external into its inner and inmost substance, of the effect into its original cause. Brahman is in the world, Brahman is the world: the world has unrolled itself out of the Brahmansi, pravttiit has to be rolled back into its, cause and substance if it is to regain its pure nature (that is the process of nivitti). Likewise, the individual being in the world, "I", is the transcendent being itself and when it withdraws, it withdraws itself and the whole world with it and merges into the Absolute. Even the Maya of the Mayavadin, although it is viewed as something not inherent in Brahman but superimposed upon Brahman, still, has been accepted as a peculiar power of Brahman itself. The Christian doctrine keeps the individual being separate practically, as an associate or at the most as an image of God. The love for one's neighbour, charity, which the Christian discipline enjoins is one's love for one's kind, because of affinity of nature and quality: it does not dissolve the two into an integral unity and absolute identity, where we love because we are one, because we are the One. The highest culmination of love, the very basis of love, according to the Indian conception, is a transcendence of love, love trans-muted into Bliss. The Upanishad says, where one has become the utter unity, who loves whom? To explain further our point, we take two examples referred to in the book we are considering. The true Christian, it is said, loves the sinner too, he is permitted to dislike sin, for he has to reject it, but he must separate from sin the sinner and love him. Why? Because the sinner too can change and become his brother in spirit, one loves the sinner because there is the possibility of his changing and becoming a true Christian. It is why the orthodox Christian, even such an enlightened and holy person as this mediaeval Canon, considers the non-Christian, the non-baptised as impure and potentially and fundamentally sinners. That is also why the Church, the physical organisation, is worshipped as Christ's very body and outside the Church lies the pagan world which has neither religion nor true spirituality nor salvation. Of course, all this may be symbolic and it is symbolic in a sense. If Christianity is taken to mean true spirituality, and the Church is equated with the collective embodiment of that spirituality, all that is claimed on their behalf stands justified. But that is an ideal, a hypothetical standpoint and can hardly be borne out by facts. However, to come back to our subject, let us ow take the second example. Of Christ himself, it is said, he not only did not dislike or had any aversion for Judas, but that he positively loved the traitor with a true and sincere love. He knew that the man would betray him and even when he was betraying and had betrayed, the Son of Man continued to love him. It was no make-believe or sham or pretence. It was genuine, as genuine as anything can be. Now, why did he love his enemy? Because, it is said, the enemy is suffered by God to do the misdeed: he has been allowed to test the faith of the faithful, he too has his utility, he too is God's servant. And who knows even a Judas would not change in the end? Many who come to scoff do remain to pray. But it can be asked, 'Does God love Satan too in the same way?' The Indian conception which is basically Vedantic is different. There is only one reality, one truth which is viewed differently. Whether a thing is considered good or evil or neutral, essentially and truly, it is that One and nothing else. God's own self is everywhere and the sage makes no difference between the Brahmin and the cow and the elephant. It is his own self he finds in every person and every objectsarvabhtsthitam yo mm bhajati ekatvamsthitah"he has taken his stand upon oneness and loves Me in all beings."2
This will elucidate another point of difference between the Christian's and the Vaishnava's love of God, for both are characterised by an extreme intensity and sweetness and exquisiteness of that divine feeling. This Christian's, however, is the union of the soul in its absolute purity and simplicity and "privacy" with her lord and master; the soul is shred here of all earthly vesture and goes innocent and naked into the embrace of her Beloved. The Vaishnava feeling is richer and seems to possess more amplitude; it is more concrete and less ethereal. The Vaishnava in his passionate yearning seeks to carry as it were the whole world with him to his Lord: for he sees and feels Him not only in the inmost chamber of his soul, but meets Him also in and I through his senses and in and through the world and its objects around. In psychological terms one can say that the Christian realisation, at its very source, is that of the inmost soul, what we call the "psychic being" pure and simple, referred to in the book we are considering; as: "His sweet privy voice... stirreth thine heart full stilly." Whereas the Vaishnava reaches out to his Lord with his outer heart too aflame with passion; not only his inmost being but his vital being also seeks the Divine. This bears upon the occult story of man's spiritual evolution upon earth. The Divine Grace descends from the highest into the deepest and from the deepest to the outer ranges of human nature, so that the whole of it may be illumined and transformed and one day man can embody in his earthly life the integral manifestation of God, the perfect Epiphany. Each religion, each line of spiritual discipline takes up one limb of manone level or mode of his being and consciousness purifies it and suffuses it with the spiritual and divine consciousness, so that in the end the whole of man, in his integral living, is recast and remoulded: each discipline is in charge of one thread as it were, all together weave the warp and woof in the evolution of the perfect pattern of a spiritualised and divinised humanity.
01.09 - The Parting of the Way, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 01, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
So the humanity of man consists in his consciousness of the self or ego. Is there no other higher mode of consciousness? Or is self-consciousness the acme, the utmost limit to which consciousness can raise itself? If it is so, then we are bound to conclude that humanity will remain eternally human in its fundamental nature; the only progress, if progress at all we choose to call it, will consist perhaps in accentuating this consciousness of the self and in expressing it through a greater variety of stresses, through a richer combination of its colour and light and shade and rhythm. But also, this may not be sothere may be the possibility of a further step, a transcending of the consciousness of the self. It seems unnatural and improbable that having risen from un-consciousness to self-consciousness through a series of continuous marches, Nature should suddenly stop and consider what she had achieved to be her final end. Has Nature become bankrupt of her creative genius, exhausted of her upward drive? Has she to remain content with only a clever manipulation, a mere shuffling and re-arranging of the materials already produced?
As a matter of fact it is not so. The glimpses of a higher form of consciousness we can see even now present in self-consciousness. We have spoken of the different stages of evolution as if they were separate and distinct and incommensurate entities. They may be described as such for the purpose of a logical understanding, but in reality they form a single progressive continuum in which one level gradually fuses into another. And as the higher level takes up the law of the lower and evolves out of it a characteristic function, even so the law of the higher level with its characteristic function is already involved and envisaged in the law of the lower level and its characteristic function. It cannot be asserted positively that because man's special virtue is self-consciousness, animals cannot have that quality on any account. We do see, if we care to observe closely and dispassionately, that animals of the higher order, as they approach the level of humanity, show more and more evident signs of something which is very much akin to, if not identical with the human characteristic of self-consciousness.
01.09 - William Blake: The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 02, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
The earliest dream of humanity is also the last fulfilment. The Vedic Rishis sang of the marriage of heaven and earthHeaven is my father and this Earth my mother. And Blake and Nietzsche are fiery apostles of that dream and ideal in an age crippled with doubt, falsehood, smallness, crookedness, impotence, colossal ignorance.
We welcome voices that speak of this ancient tradition, this occult Knowledge of a high Future. Recently we have come across one aspirant in the line, and being a contemporary, his views and reviews in the matter will be all the more interesting to us.2 He is Gustave Thibon, a Frenchman-not a priest or even a religious man in the orthodox sense in any way, but a country farmer, a wholly self-educated laque. Of late he has attracted a good deal of attention from intellectuals as well as religious people, especially the Catholics, because of his remarkable conceptions which are so often unorthodox and yet so often ringing true with an old-world au thenticity.
Touching the very core of the malady of our age he says that our modern enlightenment seeks to cancel altogether the higher values and install instead the lower alone as true. Thus, for example, Marx and Freud, its twin arch priests, are brothers. Both declare that it is the lower, the under layer alone that matters: to one "the masses", to the other "the instincts". Their wild imperative roars: "Sweep away this pseudo-higher; let the instincts rule, let the pro-letariat dictate!" But more characteristic, Monsieur Thibon has made another discovery which gives the whole value and speciality to his outlook. He says the moderns stress the lower, no doubt; but the old world stressed only the higher and neglected the lower. Therefore the revolt and wrath of the lower, the rage of Revanche in the heart of the dispossessed in the modern world. Enlightenment meant till now the cultivation and embellishment of the Mind, the conscious Mind, the rational and nobler faculties, the height and the depth: and mankind meant the princes and the great ones. In the individual, in the scheme of his culture and education, the senses were neglected, left to go their own way as they pleased; and in the collective field, the toiling masses in the same way lived and moved as best as they could under the economics of laissez-faire. So Monsieur Thibon concludes: "Salvation has never come from below. To look for it from above only is equally vain. No doubt salvation must come from the higher, but on condition that the higher completely adopts and protects the lower." Here is a vision luminous and revealing, full of great import, if we follow the right track, prophetic of man's true destiny. It is through this infiltration of the higher into the lower and the integration of the lower into the higher that mankind will reach the goal of its evolution, both individually and collectively.
But the process, Monsieur Thibon rightly asserts, must begin with the individual and within the individual. Man must "turn within, feel alive within himself", re-establish his living contact with God, the source and origin from which he has cut himself off. Man must learn to subordinate having to being. Each individual must be himself, a free and spontaneous expression. Upon such individual , upon individuals grouped naturally in smaller collectivities and not upon unformed or ill-formed wholesale masses can a perfect human society be raised and will be raised. Monsieur Thibon insistsand very rightlyupon the variety and diversity of individual and local growths in a unified humanity and not a dead uniformity of regimented oneness. He declares, as the reviewer of the London Times succinctly puts it: "Let us abolish our insensate worship of number. Let us repeal the law of majorities. Let us work for the unity that draws together instead of idolizing the multiplicity that disintegrates. Let us understand that it is not enough for each to have a place; what matters is that each should be in his right place. For the atomized society let us substitute an organic society, one in which every man will be free to do what he alone is qualified and able to do."
So far so good. For it is not far enough. The being or becoming that is demanded in fulfilment of the divine advent in humanity must go to the very roots of life and nature, must seize God in his highest and sovereign status. No prejudice of the past, no notion of our mental habits must seek to impose its law. Thus, for example, in the matter of redeeming the senses by the influx of the higher light, our author seems to consider that the senses will remain more or less as they are, only they will be controlled, guided, used by the higher light. And he seems to think that even the sex relation (even the institution of marriage) may continue to remain, but sublimated, submitted to the laws of the Higher Order. This, according to us, is a dangerous compromise and is simply the imposition of the lower law upon the higher. Our view of the total transformation and divinisation of the Lower is altogether different. The Highest must come down wholly and inhabit in the Lowest, the Lowest must give up altogether its own norms and lift itself into the substance and form too of the Highest.
0.10 - Letters to a Young Captain, #Some Answers From The Mother, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
This is not good; the collective work should not suffer because
of personal work.
--
single goal - the Divine - through a collective evolution which
is continuous and endless.
--
An epidemic is a collective illness and comes from a collective
impurity. The Ashram as a whole is evidently very far from
--
not, individually and collectively?
It is always preferable not to try to assess the progress one is making because it does not help one to make it - on the contrary.
--
But whatever the progress made, individually or collectively, the
progress still remaining to be made is so considerable that there
--
may be collective or individual, but the principle is the same
- and so is the remedy: to cultivate in oneself order and harmony, peace and equilibrium by surrendering unreservedly to
01.11 - Aldous Huxley: The Perennial Philosophy, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 02, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
This latest work of Aldous Huxley is a collection of sayings of sages and saints and philosophers from all over the world and of all times. The sayings are arranged under several heads such as "That art Thou", "The Nature of the Ground", "Divine Incarnation", "Self-Knowledge", "Silence", "Faith" etc., which clearly give an idea of the contents and also of the "Neo-Brahmin's" own personal preoccupation. There is also a running commentary, rather a note on each saying, meant to elucidate and explain, naturally from the compiler's standpoint, what is obviously addressed to the initiate.
A similar compilation was published in the Arya, called The Eternal Wisdom (Les Paroles ternelles, in French) a portion of which appeared later on in book-form: that was more elaborate, the contents were arranged in such a way that no comments were needed, they were self-explanatory, divided as they were in chapters and sections and subsections with proper headings, the whole thing put in a logical and organised sequence. Huxley's compilation begins under the title of the Upanishadic text "That art Thou" with this saying of Eckhart: "The more God is in all things, the more He is outside them. The more He is within, the more without". It will be interesting to note that the Arya compilation too starts with the same idea under the title "The God of All; the God who is in All", the first quotation being from Philolaus, "The Universe is a Unity".The Eternal Wisdom has an introduction called "The Song of Wisdom" which begins with this saying from the Book of Wisdom: "We fight to win sublime Wisdom; therefore men call us warriors".
01.11 - The Basis of Unity, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 01, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
A modern society or people cannot have religion, that is to say, credal religion, as the basis of its organized collective life. It was mediaeval society and people that were organized on that line. Indeed mediaevalism means nothing more and nothing lessthan that. But whatever the need and justification in the past, the principle is an anachronism under modern conditions. It was needed, perhaps, to keep alive a truth which goes into the very roots of human life and its deepest aspiration; and it was needed also for a dynamic application of that truth on a larger scale and in smaller details, on the mass of mankind and in its day to day life. That was the aim of the Church Militant and the Khilafat; that was the spirit, although in a more Sattwic way, behind the Buddhistic evangelism or even Hindu colonization.
The truth behind a credal religion is the aspiration towards the realization of the Divine, some ultimate reality that gives a permanent meaning and value to the human life, to the existence lodged in this 'sphere of sorrow' here below. Credal paraphernalia were necessary to express or buttress this core of spiritual truth when mankind, in the mass, had not attained a certain level of enlightenment in the mind and a certain degree of development in its life-relations. The modern age is modern precisely because it had attained to a necessary extent this mental enlightenment and this life development. So the scheme or scaffolding that was required in the past is no longer unavoidable and can have either no reality at all or only a modified utility.
A modern people is a composite entity, especially with regard to its religious affiliation. Not religion, but culture is the basis of modern collective life, national or social. Culture includes in its grain that fineness of temperament which appreciates all truths behind all forms, even when there is a personal allegiance to one particular form.
In India, it is well known, the diversity of affiliations is colossal, sui generis. Two major affiliations have today almost cut the country into two; and desperate remedies are suggested which are worse than the malady itself, as they may kill the patient outright. If it is so, it is, I repeat, the mediaeval spirit that is at:, the bottom of the trouble.
The rise of this spirit in modern times and conditions is a phenomenon that has to be explained and faced: it is a ghost that has come out of the past and has got to be laid and laid for good. First of all, it is a reaction from modernism; it is a reaction from the modernist denial of certain fundamental and eternal truths, of God, soul, and immortality: it is a reaction from the modernist affirmation of the mere economic man. And it is also a defensive gesture of a particular complex of consciousness that has grown and lives powerfully and now apprehends expurgation and elimination.
--
The first extremes that met in India and fought and gradually coalesced to form a single cultural and social whole were, as is well known, the Aryan and the non-Aryan. Indeed, the geologists tell us, the land itself is divided into two parts structurally quite different and distinct, the Deccan plateau and the Himalayan ranges with the Indo-Gangetic plain: the former is formed out of the most ancient and stable and, on the whole, horizontally bedded rocks of the earth, while the latter is of comparatively recent origin, formed out of a more flexible and weaker belt (the Himalayan region consisting of a colossal flexing and crumpling of strata). The disparity is so much that a certain group of geologists hold that the Deccan plateau did not at all form part of the Asiatic continent, but had drifted and dashed into it:in fact the Himalayas are the result of this mighty impact. The usual division of an Aryan and a Dravidian race may be due to a memory of the clash of the two continents and their races.
However, coming to historical times, we see wave after wave of the most heterogeneous and disparate elementsSakas and Huns and Greeks, each bringing its quota of exotic materialenter into the oceanic Indian life and culture, lose their separate foreign identity and become part and parcel of the common whole. Even so,a single unitary body was formed out of such varied and shifting materialsnot in the political, but in a socio-religious sense. For a catholic religious spirit, not being solely doctrinal and personal, admitted and embraced in its supple and wide texture almost an infinite variety of approaches to the Divine, of forms and norms of apprehending the Beyond. It has been called Hinduism: it is a vast synthesis of multiple affiliations. It expresses the characteristic genius of India and hence Hinduism and Indianism came to be looked upon as synonymous terms. And the same could be defined also as Vedic religion and culture, for its invariable basis the bed-rock on which it stood firm and erectwas the Vedas, the Knowledge seen by the sages. But there had already risen a voice of dissidence and discord that of Buddha, not so much, perhaps, of Buddha as of Buddhism. The Buddhistic enlightenment and discipline did not admit the supreme authority of the Vedas; it sought other bases of truth and reality. It was a great denial; and it meant and worked for a vital schism. The denial of the Vedas by itself, perhaps, would not be serious, but it became so, as it was symptomatic of a deeper divergence. Denying the Vedas, the Buddhistic spirit denied life. It was quite a new thing in the Indian consciousness and spiritual discipline. And it left such a stamp there that even today it stands as the dominant character of the Indian outlook. However, India's synthetic genius rose to the occasion and knew how to bridge the chasm, close up the fissure, and present again a body whole and entire. Buddha became one of the Avataras: the discipline of Nirvana and Maya was reserved as the last duty to be performed at the end of life, as the culmination of a full-length span of action and achievement; the way to Moksha lay through Dharma and Artha and Kama, Sannyasa had to be built upon Brahmacharya and Garhasthya. The integral ideal was epitomized by Kalidasa in his famous lines about the character of the Raghus:
01.12 - Three Degrees of Social Organisation, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 01, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
Declaration of Rights is a characteristic modern phenomenon. It is a message of liberty and freedom,no doubt of secular liberty and freedomthings not very common in the old world; and yet at the same time it is a clarion that calls for and prepares strife and battle. If the conception of Right has sanctified the individual or a unit collectivity, it has also pari passu developed a fissiparous tendency in human organisation. Society based on or living by the principle of Right becomes naturally and inevitably a competitive society. Where man is regarded as nothing moreand, of course, nothing lessthan a bundle of rights, human aggregation is bound to be an exact image of Darwinian Naturered in tooth and claw.
But Right is not the only term on which an ideal or even a decent society can be based. There is another term which can serve equally well, if not better. I am obviously referring to the conception of duty. I tis an old world conception; it isa conception particularly familiar to the East. The Indian term for Right is also the term for dutyadhikara means both. In Europe too, in more recent times, when after the frustration of the dream of a new world envisaged by the French Revolution, man was called upon again to rise and hope, it was Mazzini who brought forward the new or discarded principle as a mantra replacing the other more dangerous one. A hierarchy of duties was given by him as the pattern of a fulfilled ideal life. In India, in our days the distinction between the two attitudes was very strongly insisted upon by the great Vivekananda.
Vivekananda said that if human society is to be remodelled, one must first of all learn not to think and act in terms of claims and rights but in terms of duties and obligations. Fulfil your duties conscientiously, the rights will take care of themselves; it is such an attitude that can give man the right poise, the right impetus, the right outlook with regard to a collective living. If instead of each one demanding what one considers as one's dues and consequently scrambling and battling for them, and most often not getting them or getting at a ruinous pricewhat made Arjuna cry, "What shall I do with all this kingdom if in regaining it I lose all my kith and kin dear to me?"if, indeed, instead of claiming one's right, one were content to know one's duty and do it as it should be done, then not only there would be peace and amity upon earth, but also each one far from losing anything would find miraculously all that one most needs and must have,the necessary, the right rights and all.
It might be objected here however that actually in the history of humanity the conception of Duty has been no less pugnacious than that of Right. In certain ages and among certain peoples, for example, it was considered the imperative duty of the faithful to kill or convert by force or otherwise as many as possible belonging to other faiths: it was the mission of the good shepherd to burn the impious and the heretic. In recent times, it was a sense of high and solemn duty that perpetrated what has been termed "purges"brutalities undertaken, it appears, to purify and preserve the integrity of a particular ideological, social or racial aggregate. But the real name of such a spirit is not duty but fanaticism. And there is a considerable difference between the two. Fanaticism may be defined as duty running away with itself; but what we are concerned with here is not the aberration of duty, but duty proper self-poised.
--
We may perhaps view the three terms Right, Duty and Dharma as degrees of an ascending consciousness. Consciousness at Its origin and in its primitive formulation is dominated by the principle of inertia (tamas); in that state things have mostly an undifferentiated collective existence, they helplessly move about acted upon by forces outside them. A rise in growth and evolution brings about differentiation, specialisation, organisation. And this means consciousness of oneself of the distinct and separate existence of each and everyone, in other words, self-assertion, the claim, the right of each individual unit to be itself, to become itself first and foremost. It is a necessary development; for it signifies the growth of self consciousness in the units out of a mass unconsciousness or semi-consciousness. It is the expression of rajas, the mode of dynamism, of strife and struggle, it is the corrective of tamas.
In the earliest and primitive society men lived totally in a mass consciousness. Their life was a blind obedienceobedience to the chief the patriarch or pater familiasobedience to the laws and customs of the collectivity to which one belonged. It was called duty; it was called even dharma, but evidently on a lower level, in an inferior formulation. In reality it was more of the nature of the mechanical functioning of an automaton than the exercise of conscious will and deliberate choice, which is the very soul of the conception of duty.
The conception of Right had to appear in order to bring out the principle of individuality, of personal freedom and fulfilment. For, a true healthy collectivity is the association and organisation of free and self-determinate units. The growth of independent individuality naturally means at first clash and rivalry, and a violently competitive society is the result. It is only at this stage that the conception of duty can fruitfully come in and develop in man and his society the mode of Sattwa, which is that of light and wisdom, of toleration and harmony. Then only a society is sought to be moulded on the principle of co-ordination and co-operation.
Still, the conception of duty cannot finally and definitively solve the problem. It cannot arrive at a perfect harmonisation of the conflicting claims of individual units; for, duty, as I have already said, is a child of mental idealism, and although the mind can exercise some kind of control over life-forces, it cannot altogether eliminate the seeds of conflict that lie imbedded in the very nature of life. It is for this reason that there is an element of constraint in duty; it is, as the poet says, the "stern daughter of the Voice of God". One has to compel oneself, one has to use force on oneself to carry out one's dutythere is a feeling somehow of its being a bitter pill. The cult of duty means rajas controlled and coerced by Sattwa, not the transcendence of rajas. This leads us to the high and supreme conception of Dharma, which is a transcendence of the gunas. Dharma is not an ideal, a standard or a rule that one has to obey: it is the law of self-nature that one inevitably follows, it is easy, spontaneous, delightful. The path of duty is heroic, the path of Dharma is of the gods, godly (cf. Virabhava and Divyabhava of the Tantras).
The principle of Dharma then inculcates that each individual must, in order to act, find out his truth of being, his true soul and inmost consciousness: one must entirely and integrally merge oneself into that, be identified with it in such a manner that all acts and feelings and thoughts, in fact all movements, inner and outerspontaneously and irrepressibly well out of that fount and origin. The individual souls, being made of one truth-nature in its multiple modalities, when they live, move and have their being in its essential law and dynamism, there cannot but be absolute harmony and perfect synthesis between all the units, even as the sun and moon and stars, as the Veda says, each following its specific orbit according to its specific nature, never collide or haltna me thate na tas thatuh but weave out a faultless pattern of symphony.
The future society of man is envisaged as something of like nature. When the mortal being will have found his immortal soul and divine self, then each one will be able to give full and free expression to his self-nature (swabhava); then indeed the utmost sweep of dynamism in each and all will not cause clash or conflict; on the contrary, each will increase the other and there will be a global increment and fulfilmentparasparam bhavayantah. The division and conflict, the stress and strain that belong to the very nature of the inferior level of being and consciousness will then have been transcended. It is only thus that a diviner humanity can be born and replace all the other moulds and types that can never lead to anything final and absolutely satisfactory.
01.13 - T. S. Eliot: Four Quartets, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 02, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
Through the dark cold and the empty desolation,
The wave cry, the wind cry, the vast waters
--
Our poet is too self-conscious, he himself feels that he has not the perfect voice. A Homer, even a Milton possesses a unity of tone and a wholeness of perception which are denied to the modern. To the modern, however, the old masters are not subtle enough, broad enough, psychological enough, let us say the word, spiritual enough. And yet the poetic inspiration, more than the religious urge, needs the injunction not to be busy with too many things, but to be centred upon the one thing needful, viz., to create poetically and not to discourse philosophically or preach prophetically. Not that it is impossible for the poet to swallow the philosopher and the prophet, metabolising them into the substance of his bone and marrow, of "the trilling wire in his blood", as Eliot graphically expresses. That perhaps is the consummation towards which poetry is tending. But at present, in Eliot, at least, the strands remain distinct, each with its own temper and rhythm, not fused and moulded into a single streamlined form of beauty. Our poet flies high, very high indeed at times, often or often he flies low, not disdaining the perilous limit of bathos. Perhaps it is all wilful, it is a mannerism which he cherishes. The mannerism may explain his psychology and enshrine his philosophy. But the poet, the magician is to be looked for elsewhere. In the present collection of poems it is the philosophical, exegetical, discursive Eliot who dominates: although the high lights of the subject-matter may be its justification. Still even if we have here doldrums like
That the past has another pattern, and ceases to be a mere sequence
--
Sunlight on a broken column. . . .18
Here the poet is almost grimly tense, concentrated and has not allowed himself to be dissipated by thinkings and arguments, has confined himself wholly to a living experience. That is because the poet has since then moved up and sought a more rarefied air, a more even and smooth temper. The utter and absolute poetic ring of the Inferno is difficult to maintain in the Paradiso, unless and until the poet transforms himself wholly into the Rishi, like the poet of the Gita or the Upanishads.
01.14 - Nicholas Roerich, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 02, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
All teachers journeyed to the mountains. The higher knowledge, the most inspired songs, the most superb sounds and colours are created in the mountains. On the highest mountains there is the Supreme: the highest mountains stand as witnesses of Great Reality.
Indeed, Roerich considers the Himalayas as the very abode, the tabernacle itself thesanctum sanctorumof the Spirit, the Light Divine. Many of Roerich's paintings have mountain ranges, especially snow-bound mountain ranges, as their theme. There is a strange kinship between this yearning artistic soul, which seems solitary in spite of its ardent humanism, and the silent heights, rising white tier upon tier reflecting prism like the fiery glowing colours, the vast horizons, the wide vistas vanishing beyond.
Roerich is one of the prophets and seers who have ever been acclaiming and preparing the Golden Age, the dream that humanity has been dreaming continuously since its very childhood, that is to say, when there will be peace and harmony on earth, when racial, cultural or ideological egoism will no longer divide man and mana thing that seems today a chimera and a hallucinationwhen there will be one culture, one civilisation, one spiritual life welding all humanity into a single unit of life luminous and beautiful. Roerich believes that such a consummation can arrive only or chiefly through the growth of the sense of beauty, of the aesthetic temperament, of creative labour leading to a wider and higher consciousness. Beauty, Harmony, Light, Knowledge, Culture, Love, Delight are cardinal terms in his vision of the deeper and higher life of the future.
0.11 - Letters to a Sadhak, #Some Answers From The Mother, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
of the disciples of the Ashram all belong to the same family. In spite of this, there is often a lack of collaboration
among us. Why is that, Mother?
--
But in any case, mutual misunderstanding and lack of collaboration can only come from the outer physical and vital being
which is formed in this life and is not yet under the rule and
--
By Your Grace, my body is now collaborating to get rid
of its laziness. That even the body has a will of its own
--
When the body is converted, it knows how to collaborate.
29 November 1967
--
on different colours in the light of the psychic flame.
The very notion of good and bad is completely changed.
--
How can one collaborate in the transformation?
Things are now arranged in such a way that as soon as one
--
To have the perception of the Presence, the participation of feeling is indispensable, and when sensation collaborates, then the
perception becomes concrete and tangible.
0.14 - Letters to a Sadhak, #Some Answers From The Mother, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Grant that we may become conscious and effective collaborators in the fulfilment of Thy Will.
5 December 1971
0 1956-05-02, #Agenda Vol 01, #unset, #Zen
Will we benefit collectively or individually from this new manifestation?
Why are you asking this question?
--
Onlyyes, there is an only, I dont want to be so cruel: NOW MAN CAN colLABORATE. That is, he can lend himself to the process, with good will, with aspiration, and help to his utmost. Which is why I said it will go faster. I hope it will go MUCH faster.
But even if it does go much faster, it will still take some time!
0 1957-07-03, #Agenda Vol 01, #unset, #Zen
I have been asked if we are doing a collective yoga and what are the conditions of a collective yoga.
First, I could tell you that to do a collective yoga, there has to be a collectivity! And I could speak to you about the different conditions required to be a collectivity. But last night (smiling), I had a symbolic vision of our collectivity.
This vision took place early in the night and woke me up with a rather unpleasant feeling. Then I fell back to sleep and forgot about it; but a little while ago, when I was thinking of the question put to me, it returned. It returned with a great intensity and so imperatively that now, just as I wanted to tell you what kind of collectivity we wish to realize according to the ideal described by Sri Aurobindo in the last chapter of The Life Divinea gnostic, supramental collectivity, the only kind that can do Sri Aurobindos integral yoga and be realized physically in a progressive collective body becoming more and more divine the re collection of this vision became so imperative that I couldnt speak.
Its symbolism was very clear, though of quite a familiar nature, as it were, and because of its very familiarity, unmistakable in its realism Were I to tell you all the details, you would probably not even be able to follow: it was rather intricate. It was a kind of (how can I express it?)an immense hotel where all the terrestrial possibilities were lodged in different apartments. And it was all in a constant state of transformation: parts or entire wings of the building were suddenly torn down and rebuilt while people were still living in them, such that if you went off somewhere within the immense hotel itself, you ran the risk of no longer finding your room when you wanted to return to it, for it might have been torn down and was being rebuilt according to another plan! It was orderly, it was organized yet there was this fantastic chaos which I mentioned. And all this was a symbola symbol that certainly applies to what Sri Aurobindo has written here1 regarding the necessity for the transformation of the body, the type of transformation that has to take place for life to become a divine life.
--
The symbolism is quite clear in that all the possibilities are there, all the activities are there, but in disorder and confusion. They are neither coordinated nor centralized nor unified around the central and unique truth and consciousness and will. So this brings us back precisely to this question of a collective yoga and of a collectivity capable of realizing it. What should this collectivity be?
It is certainly not an arbitrary construction of the type built by men, where everything is put pell-mell, without any order, without reality, and which is held together by only illusory ties. Here, these ties were symbolized by the hotels walls, while actually in ordinary human constructions (if we take a religious community, for example), they are symbolized by the building of a monastery, an identity of clothing, an identity of activities, an identity even of movementor to put it more precisely: everyone wears the same uniform, everyone gets up at the same time, everyone eats the same thing, everyone says his prayers together, etc.; there is an overall identity. But naturally, on the inside there remains the chaos of many disparate consciousnesses, each one following its own mode, for this kind of group identification, which extends right up to an identity of beliefs and dogma, is absolutely illusory.
Yet it is one of the most common types of human collectivityto group together, band together, unite around a common ideal, a common action, a common realization but in an absolutely artificial way. In contrast to this, Sri Aurobindo tells us that a true communitywhat he terms a gnostic or supramental communitycan be based only upon the INNER REALIZATION of each one of its members, each realizing his real, concrete oneness and identity with all the other members of the community; that is, each one should not feel himself a member connected to all the others in an arbitrary way, but that all are one within himself. For each one, the others should be as much himself as his own bodynot in a mental and artificial way, but through a fact of consciousness, by an inner realization.
(silence)
This means that before hoping to realize such a gnostic collectivity, each one must first of all become (or at least start to become) a gnostic being. It is obvious that the individual work must take the lead and the collective work follow; but the fact remains that spontaneously, without any arbitrary intervention of will the individual progress IS restrained or CHECKED, as It were, by the collective state. Between the collectivity and the individual, there exists an interdependence from which one cannot be totally free, even if one tries. And even he who might try, in his yoga, to free himself totally from the human and terrestrial state of consciousness, would be at least subconsciously bound by the state of the whole, which impedes and PULLS BACKWARDS. One can attempt to go much faster, one can attempt to let all the weight of attachments and responsibilities fall off, but in spite of everything, the realization of even the most advanced or the leader in the march of evolution is dependent upon the realization of the whole, dependent upon the state in which the terrestrial collectivity happens to be. And this PULLS backwards to such an extent that sometimes one has to wait centuries for the earth to be ready before being able to realize what is to be realized.
This is why Sri Aurobindo has also written somewhere else that a double movement is necessary: the effort for individual progress and realization must be combined with the effort of trying to uplift the whole so as to enable it to make a progress indispensable for the greater progress of the individual: a mass progress, if you will, that allows the individual to take a further step forward.
0 1957-12-21, #Agenda Vol 01, #unset, #Zen
This physical consciousness records all it sees, all your reactions, your thoughts, all the factswithout preference, without prejudice, without personal will. Nothing escapes it. Its work is almost mechanical. Therefore I know what to tell or to ask you according to the integral truth of your being and its present possibilities. Ordinarily, in the normal man, the physical consciousness does not see things as they are, for three reasons: because of ignorance, because of preference, and because of an egoistic will. You color what you see, eliminate what displeases you. In short, you see only what you desire to see.
Now, I recently had a very striking experience: a discrepancy occurred between my physical consciousness and the consciousness of the world. In some instances decisions made in the Light and the Truth produced unexpected results, upheavals in the consciousness of others that were neither foreseen nor desired, and I did not understand. No matter how hard I tried, I could not understand and I emphasize this word understand. At last, I had to leave my highest consciousness and pull myself down into the physical consciousness to find out what was happening. And there, in my head, I saw what appeared to be a little cell bursting, and suddenly I understood: the recording had been defective. The physical consciousness had neglected to register certain of your lower reactions. It could not have been through preference or through personal will (these things were eliminated from my consciousness long, long ago). But I saw that this most material consciousness was already completely permeated with the transforming supramental truth, and it could no longer follow the rhythm of normal life. It was much more attuned to the true consciousness than to the world! I couldnt possibly blame it for lagging behind; on the contrary, it was in front, too far ahead! There was a discrepancy between the rhythm of the transformation of my being and the worlds own rhythm. The supramental action on the world is slow, it does not act directlyit acts by infiltration, by traversing the successive layers, and the results are slow to come about. So I had to pull myself violently down in order to wait for the others.
0 1958-01-01, #Agenda Vol 01, #unset, #Zen
thou hast said that thou wilt collaborate
and there is no limit
to the splendor of this collaboration.
(Message of January 1, 1958)
--
Then, from the supreme Reality came this command: Awaken, O Nature, to the joy of collaboration. And suddenly, all Nature rushed forth in an immense bounding of joy, saying, I accept! I will collaborate! And at the same time, there came a calm, an absolute tranquillity, to allow this receptacle, this body, to receive and contain without breaking and without losing anything of the Joy of Nature that was rushing forth in a movement of grateful recognition like an overwhelming flood. She accepted, she sawwith all eternity before her that this supramental consciousness would fulfill her more perfectly and impart a still greater force to her movement and more richness, more possibilities to her play.
And suddenly, as if resounding from every corner of the earth, I heard these great notes which are sometimes heard in the subtle physicalra ther like those of Beethovens Concerto in Dwhich come at moments of great progress, as though fifty orchestras were bursting forth all at once without a single discordant note, to sound the joy of this new communion of Nature and Spirit, the meeting of old friends who, after a long separation, find each other once more.
Then came these words: O Nature, Material Mother, thou hast said that thou wilt collaborate, and there is no limit to the splendor of this collaboration.
And the radiant felicity of this splendor was perceived in a perfect peace.
0 1958-01-22, #Agenda Vol 01, #unset, #Zen
It is an error to confuse Joy and Felicity. They are two very different things. Not only are their vibrations different, but their colors are different. The color of Felicity is blue, a clear silvery blue (the blue of the Ashram flag), very luminous and transparent. And it has a passive and fresh quality that refreshes and rejuvenates.
Whereas Joy is a golden rose color, a pale gold with a tinge of red, a very pale red. It is active, warm, fortifying, intensifying. The first is sweetness, the second is tenderness.
And Blisswhat I spontaneously call Blissis the synthesis of both. It is found in the very heights of the supramental consciousness, in a diamond light, an un colored, sparkling light containing all the colors. Joy and Felicity form two sides of a triangle that has Bliss at its apex.
Bliss contains coolness and warmth, passivity and activity, repose and action, sweetness and tenderness, all at the same time. Divine tenderness is something very different from sweetnessit is a paroxysm of joy, a vibration so strong that the body feels it will burst, so it is forced to widen.
0 1958-02-03b - The Supramental Ship, #Agenda Vol 01, #unset, #Zen
I found myself upon an immense ship, which is the symbolic representation of the place where this work is being carried out. This ship, as big as a city, is thoroughly organized, and it had certainly already been functioning for quite some time, for its organization was fully developed. It is the place where people destined for the supramental life are being trained. These people (or at least a part of their being) had already undergone a supramental transformation because the ship itself and all that was aboard was neither material nor subtle-physical, neither vital nor mental: it was a supramental substance. This substance itself was of the most material supramental, the supramental substance nearest the physical world, the first to manifest. The light was a blend of red and gold, forming a uniform substance of luminous orange. Everything was like that the light was like that, the people were like thateverything had this color, in varying shades, however, which enabled things to be distinguished from one another. The overall impression was of a shadowless world: there were shades, but no shadows. The atmosphere was full of joy, calm, order; everything worked smoothly and silently. At the same time, I could see all the details of the education, the training in all domains by which the people on board were being prepared.
This immense ship had just arrived at the shore of the supramental world, and a first batch of people destined to become the future inhabitants of the supramental world were about to disembark. Everything was arranged for this first landing. A certain number of very tall beings were posted on the wharf. They were not human beings and never before had they been men. Nor were they permanent inhabitants of the supramental world. They had been delegated from above and posted there to control and supervise the landing. I was in charge of all this since the beginning and throughout. I myself had prepared all the groups. I was standing on the bridge of the ship, calling the groups forward one by one and having them disembark on the shore. The tall beings posted there seemed to be reviewing those who were disembarking, allowing those who were ready to go ashore and sending back those who were not and who had to continue their training aboard the ship. While standing there watching everyone, that part of my consciousness coming from here became extremely interested: it wanted to see, to identify all the people, to see how they had changed and to find out who had been taken immediately as well as those who had to remain and continue their training. After awhile, as I was observing, I began to feel pulled backwards and that my body was being awakened by a consciousness or a person from here1and in my consciousness, I protested: No, no, not yet! Not yet! I want to see whos there! I was watching all this and noting it with intense interest It went on like that until, suddenly, the clock here began striking three, which violently jerked me back. There was the sensation of a sudden fall into my body. I came back with a shock, but since I had been called back very suddenly, all my memory was still intact. I remained quiet and still until I could bring back the whole experience and preserve it.
--
Those who were sent back for more training were not of a uniform color; their bodies seemed to have patches of a grayish opacity, a substance resembling the earth substance. They were dull, as though they had not been wholly permeated by the light or wholly transformed. They were not like this all over, but in places.
The tall beings on the shore were not of the same color, at least they did not have this orange tint; they were paler, more transparent. Except for a part of their bodies, only the outline of their forms could be seen. They were very tall, they did not seem to have a skeletal structure, and they could take on any form according to their needs. Only from their waists to their feet did they have a permanent density, which was not felt in the rest of their body. Their color was much more pallid and contained very little red, it verged rather on gold or even white. The parts of whitish light were translucid; they were not absolutely transparent, but less dense, more subtle than the orange substance.
Just as I was called back, when I was saying, Not yet , I had a quick glimpse of myself, of my form in the supramental world. I was a mixture of what these tall beings were and the beings aboard the ship. The top part of myself, especially my head, was a mere silhouette of a whitish color with an orange fringe. The more it approached the feet, the more the color resembled that of the people on the ship, or in other words, orange; the more it went up towards the top, the more translucid and white it was, and the red faded. The head was only a silhouette with a brilliant sun at its center; from it issued rays of light which were the action of the will.
As for the people I saw aboard ship, I recognized them all. Some were here in the Ashram, some came from elsewhere, but I knew them as well. I saw everyone, but as I realized that I would not remember everyone when I came back, I decided not to give any names. Besides, it is unnecessary. Three or four faces were very clearly visible, and when I saw them, I understood the feeling that I have had here, on earth, while looking into their eyes: there was such an extraordinary joy On the whole, the people were young; there were very few children, and their ages were around fourteen or fifteen, but certainly not below ten or twelve (I did not stay long enough to see all the details). There were no very old people, with the exception of a few. Most of the people who had gone ashore were of a middle ageagain, except for a few. Several times before this experience, certain individual cases had already been examined at a place where people capable of being supramentalized are examined; I had then had a few surprises which I had noted I even told some people. But those whom I disembarked today I saw very distinctly. They were of a middle age, neither young children nor elderly people, with only a few rare exceptions, and this quite corresponded to what I expected. I decided not to say anything, not to give any names. As I did not stay until the end, it would be impossible for me to draw an exact picture, for it was neither absolutely clear nor complete. I do not want to say things to some and not say them to others.
0 1958-02-15, #Agenda Vol 01, #unset, #Zen
Last night, I had the vision of what this supramental world could become if men were not sufficiently prepared. The confusion existing at present upon earth is nothing in comparison to what could take place. Imagine that every powerful will has the power to transform matter as it likes! If the sense of collective oneness did not grow in proportion to the development of power, the resulting conflict would be yet more acute and chaotic than our material conflicts.
***
0 1958-03-07, #Agenda Vol 01, #unset, #Zen
As for me, I am totally out of my element in this new life, as though I were uprooted from myself. I am living in the temple, in the midst of pujas,1 with white ashes on my forehead, barefoot dressed like a Hindu, sleeping on cement at night, eating impossible curries, with some good sunburns to complete the cooking. And there I am, clinging to you, for if you were not there I would collapse, so absurd would it all be. You are the only realityhow many times have I repeated this to myself, like a litany! Apart from this, I am holding up quite well physically. But inside and outside, nothing is left but you. I need you, thats all. Mother, this world is so horrifyingly empty. I really feel that I would evaporate if you werent there. Well, no doubt I had to go through this experience Perhaps I will be able to extract some book from it that will be of use to you. We are like children who need a lot of pictures in order to understand, and a few good kicks to realize our complete stupidity.
Swami must soon take to the road again, through Ceylon, towards March 20 or 25. So I shall go wandering with him until May; towards the beginning of May, he will return to India. I hope to have learned my lesson by then, and to have learned it well. Inwardly, I have understood that there is only you but its these problem children on the surface who must be made to toe the line once and for all.
0 1958-05-01, #Agenda Vol 01, #unset, #Zen
I saw there (center of the heart) the Master of the Yoga; he was no different from me, but nevertheless I saw him, and he even seemed slightly imbued with color. Well, he does everything, he decides everything, he organizes everything with an almost mathematical precision and in the smallest detailseverything.
To do the divine Will I have been doing the sadhana for a long time, and I can say that not a day has passed that I have not done the Divines Will. But I didnt know what it was! I was living in all the inner realms, from the subtle physical to the highest regions, yet I didnt know what it was I always had to listen, to refer things, to pay attention. Now, no morebliss! There are no more problems, and everything is done in such harmony! Even if I had to leave my body, I would be in bliss! And it would happen in the best possible way.
0 1958-07-02, #Agenda Vol 01, #unset, #Zen
Each element, let us say each individual element (even though it is not exactly like that), is in its place according to whether the Grace acts on the individual or on the collectivity.
When the Grace acts on the collectivity, each thing, each element, each principle, is put in its place as the result of a karmic logic in the universal movement. This is what gives us the impression of disorder and confusion as we see it.
When the Grace acts on the individual, it gives to each the maximum position according to what he is and what he has realized.
0 1958-07-06, #Agenda Vol 01, #unset, #Zen
And it is always like that. I never ask for anything, but if by chance I say to myself, Hmm, wouldnt it be nice to have that, mountains of them pour in! So last year, I made an experiment, I told Nature, Listen, my little one, you say that you will collaborate, you told me I would never lack anything. Well then, to put it on a level of feelings, it would really be fun, it would give me joy (in the style of Krishnas joy), to have A LOT of money to do everything I feel like doing. Its not that I want to increase things for myself, no; you give me more than I need. But to have some fun, to be able to give freely, to do things freely, to spend freely I am asking you to give me a crore of rupees1 for my birthday!
She didnt do a thing! Nothing, absolutely nothing: a complete refusal. Did she refuse or was she unable to? It may be that I always saw that money was under the control of an asuric force. (I am speaking of currency, cash; I dont want to do business. When I try to do business, it generally succeeds very well, but I dont mean that. I am speaking of cash.) I never asked her that question.
--
But it only happened like that once. And as for Ganesh, that was the end of it. So then I asked Nature. It took her a long time to accept to collaborate. But as for the money, I shall have to ask her about it; because for me personally, it is still going on. I think, Hmm, wouldnt it be nice to have a wristwatch like that. And I get twenty of them! I say to myself, Well, if I had that and I get thirty of them! Things come in from every side, without my even uttering a word I dont even ask, they just come.
The first time I came here and spoke with Sri Aurobindo about what was needed for the Work, he told me (he also wrote it to me) that for the secure achievement of the Work we would need three powers: one was the power over health, the second was the power over government, and the third was the power over money.
--
The experience of Nature's collaboration (November 8, 1957).
In effect, according to tradition, the first divine forces that emanated for the creation were the Asuras, who turned into demons. The gods were created later to repair the disorder engendered by the demons.
0 1958-10-04, #Agenda Vol 01, #unset, #Zen
There is an interdependence between the individual progress and the collective progress, between that which works and that which is worked upon. It proceeds like this (gesture of intermeshing), and as one progresses, the other progresses. The progress above not only hastens the progress below but brings the two nearer together, thus changing the distance in the relationship; that is, the distance will not remain the same, the ratio between the progress here and the progress above wont always be identical.
The progress above follows a certain trajectory, and in some cases the distance increases, in others it decreases (although on the whole, the distance remains relatively unchanged), but my feeling is that the collective receptivity will increase as the action becomes increasingly supramentalized. And the need for an individual receptivitywith all its distortions and alterations and limitationswill decrease in importance as the supramental influence increasingly imposes its power. This influence will impose itself in such a way that it will no longer be subject to the defects in receptivity.
***
0 1958-11-02, #Agenda Vol 01, #unset, #Zen
All this together constitutes one collective entity, and the individual is lost in it. If I had to deal with this person or that person individually, it would be different. But all together, taking them all together as a collective entity, well, its not brilliant.
Mother is referring to the Ashram as a collectivity.
***
0 1958-11-27 - Intermediaries and Immediacy, #Agenda Vol 01, #unset, #Zen
One day I had mentioned this to X1 when he was showing me or describing to me the different movements of the pujas, the procedure, the process of the puja. I said to him, Oh, I see! For the action to be immediate, for the result to be immediate, one must acknowledge, for example, the role or the participation of certain spirits or certain forces and enter into a friendly relationship or collaboration with these forces in order to obtain an immediate result, is it not so? Then he told me, Yes, otherwise it leaves an indefinite time to the play of the forces, and you dont know when you will get the result of your puja.
That interested me very much. Because one of the obstacles I had felt was that although the Force was acting well, there was a time lag that appeared inevitable, a time element in the work which seemed unavoidablea play left to the forces of Nature. But with their knowledge of the processes, the tantrics can dispense with all that. So I understood why those who have studied, who are initiated and follow the prescribed methods are apparently more powerfulmore powerful even than those who are conscious in the highest consciousness.
0 1958-12-15 - tantric mantra - 125,000, #Agenda Vol 01, #unset, #Zen
Mother, things are far from being what they were the first time in Rameswaram, and I am living through certain moments that are hell the enemy seems to have been unleashed with an extraordinary violence. It comes in waves, and after it recedes, I am literally SHATTEREDphysically, mentally and vitally drained. This morning, while going to the temple, I lived through one of these moments. All this suffering that suddenly sweeps down upon me is horrible. Yes, I had the feeling of being BACKED UP AGAINST A WALL, exactly as in your vision I was up against a wall. I was walking among these immense arcades of sculptured granite and I could see myself walking, very small, all alone, alone, ravaged with pain, filled with a nameless despair, for nowhere was there a way out. The sea was nearby and I could have thrown myself into it; otherwise, there was only the sanctuary of Parvati but there was no more Africa to flee to, everything closed in all around me, and I kept repeating, Why? Why? This much suffering was truly inhuman, as if my last twenty years of nightmare were crashing down upon me. I gritted my teeth and went to the sanctuary to say my mantra. The pain in me was so strong that I broke into a cold sweat and almost fainted. Then it subsided. Yet even now I feel completely battered.
I clearly see that the hour has come: either I will perish right here, or else I will emerge from this COMPLETELY changed. But something has to change. Mother, you are with me, I know, and you are protecting me, you love me I have only you, only you, you are my Mother. If these moments of utter darkness return and they are bound to return for everything to be exorcised and conqueredprotect me in spite of myself. Mother, may your Grace not abandon me. I want to be done with all these old phantoms, I want to be born anew in your Light; it has to beotherwise I can no longer go on.
0 1959-01-14, #Agenda Vol 01, #unset, #Zen
Sweet Mother, by what Grace have you guided and protected me through all these years? There are moments when I have the vision of this Grace, bringing me to the verge of tears. I see so clearly that you are doing everything, that you are all that is good in me, my aspiration and my strength. Me is all that is bad, all that resists, me is horribly false and falsifying. If your Grace withdraws for one second, I collapse, I am helpless.2 You alone are my strength, the source of my life, the joy and fulfillment to which I aspire.
I am at your feet, your child eternally.
0 1959-04-13, #Agenda Vol 01, #unset, #Zen
A French publishing house that had asked for a book on Sri Aurobindo to be included in their collection, 'Spiritual Masters.'
***
0 1959-05-19 - Ascending and Descending paths, #Agenda Vol 01, #unset, #Zen
I could have begun this work on the body thirty years ago, but I was constantly caught up in this harassing ashram life. It took this illness2 to enable me truly to begin doing the sadhana of the body. It does not mean that thirty years were wasted, for it is likely that had I been able to start this work thirty years ago, it would have been premature. The consciousness of the others also had to develop the two are linked, the individual progress and the collective progress, and one cannot advance if the other does not advance.
I have also come to realize that for this sadhana of the body, the mantra is essential. Sri Aurobindo gave none; he said that one should be able to do all the work without having to resort to external means. Had he reached the point where we are now, he would have seen that the purely psychological method is inadequate and that a japa is necessary, because only japa has a direct action on the body. So I had to find the method all alone, to find my mantra by myself. But now that things are ready, I have done ten years of work in a few months. That is the difficulty, it requires time
0 1959-05-28, #Agenda Vol 01, #unset, #Zen
So there remains the pure spiritual destiny, pure interiorization. That is what I have been trying to do for the last five years, without much success. There are good periods of collaboration, because one part of my being can be happy in any condition. But in a certain way this achievement remains truncated, especially when you base spiritual life on a principle of integrality. And these three destinies in me have their own good reasons, which are true: they are not inferior, they are not incidental, they are woven from the very threads that created the spiritual life in me. My error is to open the door to revolt when I feel too poignantly one or the other being stifled.
So you see, all this is insoluble. I have only to bow before these unfortunate circumstances. I perceive an injustice somewhere, but I have only to remain silent.
0 1959-06-03, #Agenda Vol 01, #unset, #Zen
Also, I explained to him that a mantra had come to you which you were repeating between 5 and 6 in particular, and I told him about this culminating point where you wanted to express your gratitude, enthusiasm, etc., and about the French mantra. After explaining, I gave him your French and Sanskrit texts. He felt and understood very well what you wanted. His first reaction after reading it was to say, Great meaning, great power is there. It is all right. I told him that apart from the meaning of the mantra, you wanted to know if it was all right from the vibrational standpoint. He told me that he would take your text to his next puja and would repeat it himself to see. He should have done that this morning, but he has a fever (since his return from Madurai, he has not been well because of a cold and sunstroke). I will write you as soon as I know the result of his test.
Regarding me, this is more or less what he said: First of all, I want an agreement from you so that under any circumstances you never leave the Ashram. Whatever happens, even if Yama1 comes to dance at your door, you should never leave the Ashram. At the critical moment, when the attack is the strongest, you should throw everything into His hands, then and then only the thing can be removed (I no longer know whether he said removed or destroyed ). It is the only way. SARVAM MAMA BRAHMAN [Thou art my sole refuge]. Here in Rameswaram, we are going to meditate together for 45 days, and the Asuric-Shakti may come with full strength to attack, and I shall try my best not only to protect but to destroy, but for that, I need your determination. It is only by your own determination that I can get strength. If the force comes to make suggestions: lack of adventure, lack of Nature, lack of love, then think that I am the forest, think that I am the sea, think that I am the wife (!!) Meanwhile, X has nearly doubled the number of repetitions of the mantra that I have to say every day (it is the same mantra he gave me in Pondicherry). X repeated to me again and again that I am not merely a disciple to him, like the others, but as if his son.
0 1959-06-04, #Agenda Vol 01, #unset, #Zen
I am with you and wish to repeat to you: infinite is the Grace and invincible is the Love; be confident and will the victory, for this is what X means by your collaboration.
Signed: Mother
0 1959-08-11, #Agenda Vol 01, #unset, #Zen
The color worn by sannyasis.
***
0 1959-10-06 - Sri Aurobindos abode, #Agenda Vol 01, #unset, #Zen
Shortly before the 15th of August I had a unique experience that exemplifies all this.1 For the first time the supramental light entered directly into my body, without passing through the inner beings. It entered through the feet (a red and gold colormarvelous, warm, intense), and it climbed up and up. And as it climbed, the fever also climbed because the body was not accustomed to this intensity. As all this light neared the head, I thought I would burst and that the experience would have to be stopped. But then, I very clearly received the indication to make the Calm and Peace descend, to widen all this body-consciousness and all these cells, so that they could contain the supramental light. So I widened, and as the light was ascending, I brought down the vastness and an unshakable peace. And suddenly, there was a second of fainting.
I found myself in another world, but not far away (I was not in a total trance). This world was almost as substantial as the physical world. There were roomsSri Aurobindos room with the bed he rests on and he was living there, he was there all the time: it was his abode. Even my room was there, with a large mirror like the one I have here, combs, all kinds of things. And the substance of these objects was almost as dense as in the physical world, but they shone with their own light. It was not translucent, not transparent, not radiant, but self-luminous. The various objects and the material of the rooms did not have this same opacity as the physical objects here, they were not dry and hard as in the physical world we know.
--
It is similar with this japa: an imperceptible little change, and one can pass from a more or less mechanical, more or less efficient and real japa, to the true japa full of power and light. I even wondered if this difference is what the tantrics call the power of the japa. For example, the other day I was down with a cold. Each time I opened my mouth, there was a spasm in the throat and I coughed and coughed. Then a fever came. So I looked, I saw where it was coming from, and I decided that it had to stop. I got up to do my japa as usual, and I started walking back and forth in my room. I had to apply a certain will. Of course, I could do my japa in trance, I could walk in trance while repeating the japa, because then you feel nothing, none of all the bodys drawbacks. But the work has to be done in the body! So I got up and started doing my japa. Then, with each word pronounced the Light, the full Power. A power that heals everything. I began the japa tired, ill, and I came out of it refreshed, rested, cured. So those who tell me they come out of it exhausted, contracted, emptied, it means that they are not doing it in the true way.
I understand why certain tantrics advise saying the japa in the heart center. When one applies a certain enthusiasm, when each word is said with a warmth of aspiration, then everything changes. I could feel this difference in myself, in my own japa.
0 1959-11-25, #Agenda Vol 01, #unset, #Zen
There is one element that remains fixed: for each type of atom, the inner organization of the elements is different, which is what creates the difference in their substance. So perhaps similarly, each individual has a different, particular way of organizing the cells of his body, and it is this particular way that persists through all the outer changes. All the rest is undone and redone, but undone in a forward thrust towards the new instead of collapsing backwards into death, and redone in a constant aspiration to follow the progressive movement of the divine Truth.
But for that, the body the body-consciousness must first learn to widen itself. It is indispensable, for otherwise all the cells become a kind of boiling porridge under the pressure of the supramental light.
0 1960-05-16, #Agenda Vol 01, #unset, #Zen
I was sick two days ago with a cold and fever. I know whya point to be transformed. The body may have put too much zeal into it, so it teetered a little. But thanks to that, I had an interesting experience. X 1 had put his force on me to speed up the healing. And of course, according to each ones nature, the force gets colored, so to speakit clothes itself in a different color. In me, this was translated by a new physical experience which lasted from 4 in the morning till 6:30, when I had to start speaking with people and deal with outer things. It was a kind of eternity, a kind of absolute PHYSICAL immobility which contained no possibility of illness within itas a matter of fact, nothing remained in this immobility, it was a sort of nirvana. But it did not keep me from going through all my usual motions of getting dressed.
I spent the whole day yesterday trying to understand this experience.
0 1960-05-24 - supramental flood, #Agenda Vol 01, #unset, #Zen
It was as vast as the universe, a continuous movement the movement of manifestation of something which was EVERYTHING at once, a single whole. There was no division. And such a variety of colors, vibrations, powersextraordinary! It was one single thing, and everything was within it.
The three Supreme Principles were very clearly there: Existence, Consciousness (an active, realizing consciousness) and Ananda. A universal vastness that kept going on and on and on
--
And during the time my experience lasted, I had no feeling of anything exceptional, but rather simply the fact that after all its preparation, the body consciousness was ready for a total identification with Thatin my consciousness its always the same, a perpetual, constant and eternal state in that it never leaves me. Its like that, and it never varies. What diminishes the immensity of the Vibration are the limitations of the material consciousness which can color it and even sometimes change it by giving it a personal appearance. Thus, when I see someone and speak to him, for example, when my eyes concentrate on the person, I have almost the sensation of this flood flowing from me towards the person or of it passing through me to go onto the person. There is an awareness of the eyes, the body. And it is this which limits or even changes a little the immensity of the thing But already this feeling has almost disappeared; this immensity seems to be acting almost constantly. There are moments when I am less interiorized, when I am more on the surface, and it feels like its passing through a bodymoments when the body consciousness comes back a little. And this is what diminishes the thing.
This experience last night also enabled me to understand what X had felt during one of our meditations. He had explained his experience by way of saying that I was this mystic tree whose roots plunge into the Supreme and whose branches spread forth over the world,3 and he said that one of these branches had entered into himand it had been a unique experience. He had said, this is the Mother.
0 1960-05-28 - death of K - the death process- the subtle physical, #Agenda Vol 01, #unset, #Zen
Once everything had gone out, it naturally became cold, but the body consciousness manages to draw a little energy from the air, from this or that And I spoke in that state. I spoke I spoke very well, and besides, I recounted all I was seeing elsewhere.
So I dont like this habit of burning people very much.
0 1960-06-Undated, #Agenda Vol 01, #unset, #Zen
You sent me this flower, Vital collaboration. I am taking this opportunity to tell you something which has been weighing on my heart for years and which, naturally, comes back up whenever things go badly.
I have been here seven years and I cant count a single concrete experience, not a single vision (the only things that have ever happened were in Ceylon or Rameswaram). I havent even managed to have a few slightly conscious nights.
0 1960-07-12 - Mothers Vision - the Voice, the ashram a tiny part of myself, the Mothers Force, sparkling white light compressed - enormous formation of negative vibrations - light in evil, #Agenda Vol 01, #unset, #Zen
Its form was elongated, slanting downwards (it always has this form). At the top it looked like a head, then the lines disappeared down below. It had no openings. And then, it was surrounded by various dark sheaths, a very dark purple which is the color of protection. A sparkling light was entering into itit kept entering, but without making any holes. It passed right through everything, through the purplethrough everything. It passed through and entered inside, where there were sparklings of every color, like a cascade. There are always these cascades of forcesimilar to a cascading stream whose waters neither flow on nor disappear, but accumulate: an accumulation of energies, a condensation. And they accumulate without taking up any more space through a kind of compression. And inside, its moving, vibrating, vibrating, vibrating, it keeps coming and comingyou dont know where it comes from, but it keeps coming and accumulating.
It was a force with a sparkling white light at its center, the light which is the force of the Divine Mother, and as soon as it was well packed and concentrated inside, or condensed, it took on all the colorsvibrations of every color Like a materialization these colors were like a materialization of the Divine Force when it enters matter. (Just as matter is a condensation of energy, well, this seemed to be a condensation of Divine Force. Thats really the impression it gave.)
It reminded me of tantric things. I have seen tantric formations and how forces are systematically separated by themeach vibration, each color. Its very interesting. They are all one, and yet each is distinct. That is, they are separated in order to be distinguished and for each one to be used individually. Each one represents a particular action for obtaining something in particular. This is the special knowledge the tantrics have, I believe. Or its the reflection of their knowledge. And my impression is that when they do their pujas or say their mantras, what they are trying to do is recombine all that into the white light. Im not sure. I know they use each one separately for a separate purpose, but when they speak of their puja succeeding, it may mean that they have been able to recombine the light. But I say this very guardedly. For I would have to see X do his puja one day to really knowfrom afar Im not so sure. Its merely an impression.
This is what I am constantly seeing now, but along with this Divine Force or this Divine Consciousness that Sri Aurobindo speaks of when he says, Mothers Force is with you. When it comes, it is sparkling white, perfectly white and perfectly luminous. And as it accumulates inside, it makes living vibrations of every color. And it goes on and on and on. Sometimes it lasts half an hour, three-quarters of an hour, an hournothing goes out. And it keeps constantly entering. And it piles up. Its as if it is all being accumulated or compressed together.
So, the observing mind, the intelligence that watches, looked at all thisAh, thats what its like (an intelligence that watches without interfering in the least). Its like a spectator talking to himself.
0 1960-07-23 - The Flood and the race - turning back to guide and save amongst the torrents - sadhana vs tamas and destruction - power of giving and offering - Japa, 7 lakhs, 140000 per day, 1 crore takes 20 years, #Agenda Vol 01, #unset, #Zen
And this vehicle was going faster than the flood (I saw and felt it by its motion)a formidable flood, but the vehicle was going still faster. It was so wonderful. In places there were some especially difficult and dangerous spots, but I ALWAYS got there before the water, just before the water barred the way. And we kept going and going and going. Then, with a final effort (there was no effort, really, it was willed), with a final push, we made it to the other side and the water came rushing just behind! It rushed down at a fantastic speed. We had made it. Then, just on the other side, it changed color. It was it changed in color to a predominant blue, this powerful blue which is the force, the organizing force in the most material world. So there we were, and the vehicle stopped. And then, after having been looking straight ahead the whole time we were speeding along, I turned around and said, Ah, now I can start helping those who are behind.
Here, Ill draw you a little sketch:
--
I turned around and saw all this water rushing down, and I thought, Now lets see if we can do something here. There was someone behind who interested me, someone or somethingit was still something; it was very likable and had something of the blue color that was here on the other side. Not really individuals, but more like beings representative of something that was following me quite closely. When I was there, it also was there, but it could not keep up, it kept losing groundas my speed increased, its decreased. It could not keep up. But it interested me in a special way. Oh, hes so close (he or it); he might just make it, I thought. And at that moment, I saw that all this destructive will with its instrument of water, symbolically water, had rushed past and was spreading out everywhere. But there was still a chance of saving all those who were along this path. And thats immediately what I thought of, it was my first wish: Lets see if they can still get across, if I can manage to get them across. I remembered some especially dangerous spots (while speeding past, I had remarked, Oh, here we might still be able to do this, there that could still be donemy consciousness moved at the same speed, and I noted everything along the way), and once I was firmly there on the other side, I started sending back messages.
Down below, the water was having a grand time; it was it was hopeless. But here, along this path, there was still a hope, even even after the water had passed; I probably had a certain power at my disposal to help others cross these fissured places. But because I woke up, I didnt see what it was. So that stopped everything. Probably because I woke up rather abruptly, I could not see what it meant.
0 1960-08-20, #Agenda Vol 01, #unset, #Zen
There are plenty of them! (Mother indicates a pile of various papers) In another pile there must be as many again! It is a mania for collecting papers.
Oh no, sweet Mother! Fortunately they have been kept.
0 1960-10-11, #Agenda Vol 01, #unset, #Zen
Im just now finishing the Yoga of Self-Perfection When we see what human life is and, even in the best of cases, what it represents in the way of imbecility, stupidity, narrowness, meanness (not to mention ignorance because that is too flagrant) and even those who believe themselves to have generous heart, for example, or liberal ideas, a desire to do good! Each time the consciousness orients itself in one direction to attain some result, everything that was in existence (not just ones personal existence, but this sort of collectivity of existences that each being represents), everything that is contrary to this effort immediately presents itself in its crudest light.
It happened this morning while I was walking back and forth in my room. I had finished my japa I had to stop and hold my head in my hands to keep from bursting into tears. No, it is too dreadful, I said to myself; and to think that we want Perfection!
0 1960-10-22, #Agenda Vol 01, #unset, #Zen
There was a considerable library in the studio; one whole end was given over to the librarymore than two thousand books belonging to my brother. There were even the complete works of several classical writers. And I had my entire collection of the Revue Cosmique, and my post card collection (it was down below)mainly post cards of Algeria, Tlemcen, nearly 200 of them. But there were five years of the Revue Cosmique. And written in such a French! How funny it was!
Theons wife dictated it in English while she was in trance. Another English lady who was there claimed to know French like a Frenchman. Myself, I never use a dictionary, she would say, I dont need a dictionary. But then she would turn out such translations! She made all the classic mistakes of English words that mustnt be translated like that. Then it was sent to me in Paris for correcting. It was literally impossible.
--
But I wasnt speaking to you with words Everything I see at night has a special color and a special vibration. Its strange, but it looks sketched When I said that to you, for example, there was a kind of patch,1 a white patch, as I recallwhite, exactly like a piece of white papera patch with a pink border around it, then this same blue light I keep telling you aboutdeep blueencircling the rest, as it were. And beyond that, it was swarminga swarming of black and dark gray vibrations in a terrible agitation. When I saw this, I said to you, You must repeat your mantra once in my presence so that I may see if there is anything I can do about this swarming. And then I dont know whyyou objected, and this objection was red, like a tongue of fire lashing out from the white, like this (Mother draws an arabesque). So I said, No, dont worry, it doesnt matter, I wont disturb a thing2! (Mother laughs mischievously)
All this took place in a realm which is constantly active, everywhere; it is like a permanent mental transcription of everything that physically takes place They arent actually thoughts; when I see this, I dont really get the impression of thinking, but its a transcription its the result of thoughts on a certain mental atmosphere which records things.
And I see it all the time now. If someone is speaking or if Im doing something, I see the two things at the same time I see the physical thing, his words or my action, and then this colored, luminous transcription at the same time. The two things are superimposed. For example, when someone speaks to me, it gets translated into some kind of picture, a play of light or color (which is not always so luminous!)this is why most of the time, in fact, I dont even know what has been said to me. I recall the first time this phenomenon happened, I said to myself, Ah, so thats what these modern artists see! Only, as they themselves arent very coherent, what they see is not very coherent either!
And thats how it worksit is translated by patches and moving forms, which is how it gets registered in the earths memory. So when things from this realm enter into peoples active consciousness, they get translated into each ones language and the words and thoughts that each one is accustomed tobecause that doesnt belong to any language or to any idea: it is the exact IMPRINT of what is happening.
--
Im going to tell you what I sawits very interesting. First, emanating from here (Mother indicates the chest), a florescence of every color like a peacocks tail spread wide; but it was made of light, and it was very, very delicate, very fine, like this (gesture). Then it rose up and formed what truly seemed like a luminous peacock, up above, and it remained like that. Then, from here (the chest), what looked like a sword of white light climbed straight up. It went up very high and formed a kind of expanse, a very vast expanse, which was like a callthis lasted the longest. And then, in response, a veritable rain, like (no, it was much finer than drops) a golden lightwhite and goldenwith various shades, at times more towards white, at times more golden, at times with a tinge of pink. And all this was descending, descending into you. And here (the chest), it changed into this same deep blue light, with a powdering of green light inside itemerald green. And at that moment, when it reached here (the level of the heart), a number of little divinities of living golda deep, living goldcame, like this, and then looked at you. And just as they looked at you, there was the image of the Mother right at the very center of younot as she is commonly portrayed but as she is in the Indian consciousness Very serene and pure and luminous. And then that changed into a temple, and inside the temple there seemed to be an image of Sri Aurobindo and an image of me but living images in a powdering of light. Then it grew into a magnificent edifice and settled in with an extraordinary power. And it remained motionless.
That is the representation of your japa.
0 1960-10-30, #Agenda Vol 01, #unset, #Zen
But then, just before that, there was this powdering of golden light coming down. And as it descended, it was white with a touch of gold (but it was white) and it came down in a column, with such POWER! And then, just at the end, this powdering of gold came and settled into this white light which had remained there the whole timeoh, it was so abundant. A great power of realization. I had a hard time coming out of it! At the start, I had decided to come out of it at half past, so I came out, but still not completely
So there, my child. And you, what did you feel?
--
But its still not luminous in the dark. What is normally luminous in the dark is something else I had that when I was working with Theon (after returning to France, we had group meditationsthough he didnt call it meditation, he called it repose, and we used to do this in a darkened room), and there was it was like phosphorescence, exactly the color of phosphorescent light, like certain fish in the water at night. It would come out [of the body], spread forth, move about. But that is the vital, it originates in the vital. It is a force from above, but what manifests is vital. Whereas now it is absolutely, clearly the golden supramental light in an extraordinary pulsation, vibrant in intensity But probably it still lacks a what Theon used to call density, an agent that enables it to be seen in the dark and then it would be visibly gold, not phosphorescent.
But it is very, very concrete, very material.
--
And the experience just now (during meditation) was somehow mixed with what I usually see at night (it was not a combinationor maybe it was a combination ), for it had that same light It was a kind of powdering, even finer than tiny dotsa powdering like an atomic dust, but with an EXTREMELY intense vibration but without any shifting of place. And yet its in constant motion Something shifting about within something that vibrates on the same spot without moving (something does move, but its subtler, like a current of tremendous power which passes through a milieu that doesnt move at all: rather, it vibrates on the same spot with an extreme intensity). But I dont exactly know how it is different from the present experience It becomes less golden at night, the gold is less visible, whereas the other colorswhite, blue and a sort of pinkare much more visible.
Oh, now I remember! It was PINK during the second phase, just afterwards, after Egypt! Oh, it was like like at the end of a sunrise when it gets very clear and luminous. A magnificent color. And it kept coming down and down, in a flood that part was new. Its something I see very rarely. It was not there at all the last time we meditated together. And it came filled with such a joy! Oh! It was absolutely ecstatic. It lasted quite a long time. And from there I went into this trance where I saw (laughing) that man congratulating you! I heard him say (his voice is what roused me from my trance, and then I saw him), Congratulations, its a great success! (Mother laughs)
Its good. Well have these little meditations from time to time. For me, its pleasant, for I have neither to restrict nor contain nor veil myself. Its nice.
--
(Mother gives the disciple a carnation, named by her collaboration)
So, I wont see you again? No, too many people come in the afternoon, its not pleasant
0 1960-11-12, #Agenda Vol 01, #unset, #Zen
I listen, I answer. Its not satisfactory! I told them. But theyve kept to their idea, they like it. When that first storm came some time back (you remember, with those terrible bolts of lightning and that asuric being P.K. saw and sketched): Dont you want us to destroy something? I got angry. But it was This influence was so close and acute that it gave you goose bumps! The whole time the storm lasted, I had to hold on tight in my bed, like this (Mother closes her fists tight as in a trance or deep concentration), and I didnt movedidnt movelike a a rock during the entire storm, until he consented to go a bit further away. Then I moved. And even now, it comesfrom others (theres not just one, you see, there are many): How about a good flood? A roof collapsed the other day with someone underneath, but he was able to escape. So roofs are collapsing, houses Arouse public sympathy, we must help the Ashram! Its no good, I said. But maybe thats whats responsible for this interminable rain. And they offer so many other things oh, what they parade past me! You could write books on all this!
But generally and this is something Theon had told me (Theon was very qualified on the subject of hostile forces and the workings of all that resists the divine influence, and he was a great fighteras you might imagine! He himself was an incarnation of an asura, so he knew how to tackle these things!); he was always saying, If you make a VERY SMALL concession or suffer a minor defeat, it gives you the right to a very great victory. Its a very good trick. And I have observed, in practice, that for all things, even for the very little things of everyday life, its trueif you yield on one point (if, even though you see what should be, you yield on a very secondary and unimportant point), it immediately gives you the power to impose your will for something much more important. I mentioned this to Sri Aurobindo and he said that it was true. It is true in the world as it is today, but its not what we want; we want it to change, really change.
0 1960-11-15, #Agenda Vol 01, #unset, #Zen
I dont know if its due to Zs visit1 or simply if the time had come and things converged (because thats what generally happens), but a whole period of the past is coming up again and its not a purely personal past, for it includes all the acquaintances I used to have, a whole collection of things that represents not only my individual life but something rather collective (as it always is; each of us is always a collectivity but we arent aware of it, and if anything were taken away, it would unbalance the whole). A whole set of things that were absolutely wiped clean from the memory (it must have been buried somewhere in the subconscient or the semi-conscientin any case, something more unconscious than the subconscient), and it has all come back up. Oh, things such things If just two weeks ago someone had asked me, Do you remember that? I would have replied, No, not at all! And its coming from every side. Oh, such mediocrity! (mediocre in the way of consciousness, experiences and activities) and so gray, so dull, so flat! Only this morning, while getting ready for the balcony, I thought, Is it possible to live like that?!
And then it became so clear that behind all this there was always the same luminous Presence, this Presence that is everywhere, always, watching over everything.
--
Its quite odd, for this was not a personal consciousness, it was not someone remembering his lifethis is what I found most interesting; what came were pieces, little chunks of lifes construction, a collection of people and circumstances. And it is impossible to separate the individual from all that is around him, its clear! It all holds together like (if you change one thing, everything is changed) it holds together like an agglomerated mass.
I had seen this earlier from another angle. In the beginning, when I started having the consciousness of immortality and when I brought together this true consciousness of immortality and the human conception of it (which is entirely different), I saw so clearly that when a human (even quite an ordinary human, one who is not a collectivity in himselfas is a writer, for example, or a philosopher or statesman) projects himself through his imagination into what he calls immortality (meaning an indefinite duration of time) he doesnt project himself alone but rather, inevitably and always, what is projected along with himself is a whole agglomeration, a collectivity or totality of things which represent the life and the consciousness of his present existence. And then I made the following experiment on a number of people; I said to them, Excuse me, but lets say that through a special discipline or a special grace your life were to continue indefinitely. What you would most likely extend into this indefinite future are the circumstances of your life, this formation you have built around yourself that is made up of people, relationships, activities, a whole collection of more or less living or inert things.
But that CANNOT be extended as it is, for everything is constantly changing! And to be immortal, you have to follow this perpetual change; otherwise, what will naturally happen is what now happensone day you will die because you can no longer follow the change. But if you can follow it, then all this will fall from you! Understand that what will survive in you is something you dont know very well, but its the only thing that can survive and all the rest will keep falling off all the time Do you still want to be immortal?Not one in ten said yes! Once you are able to make them feel the thing concretely, they tell you, Oh no! Oh no! Since everything else is changing, the body might as well change too! What difference would it make! But what remains is THAT; THAT is what you must truly hold on to but then you must BE THAT, not this whole agglomeration. What you now call you is not THAT, its a whole collection of things..
Formerly, that was my first stepa long time ago. Now its so very different I wonder how it was possible to have been so totally blind as to call that oneself at any moment in ones life! Its a collection of things. And what was the link by which that could be called oneself? Thats more difficult to find out. Only when you climb above do you come to realize that THAT is at work here, but it could work there as well, or as well here, or here, or here At times there is suddenly a drop of something (Oh, I saw that this morningit was like a drop, a little drop, but with SUCH an intense and perfect light ), and where THAT falls it makes its center and begins radiating out and acting. THAT is what can be called oneselfnothing else. And THAT precisely is what enabled me to live in such dreadfully uninteresting, such nonexistent circumstances. And at the moment when you ARE that, you see how that has lived and how that has used everything, not only in this body but in all bodies and through all time.
At the core, this is the experience; it is no longer knowledge. I now understand quite clearly the difference between the knowledge of the eternal soul, of life eternal through all its changes, and this CONCRETE experience of the thing.
0 1960-12-17, #Agenda Vol 01, #unset, #Zen
Its beautiful, isnt it? Its all together, but its innumerable. Its ONE thing going in all directions. And what a color! The tree is glorious.
Nature is a marvelous inventoreverything She does is beautiful. I dont believe that man has succeeded in producing anything so perfect. Later, its true, some new species were developed by him, but nevertheless Nature still remains the origin.
0 1960-12-23, #Agenda Vol 01, #unset, #Zen
I came here in that state directly after the meditation, and when I sat down You see, I didnt even have the (naturally there is no question of idea) I dont know, not even the instinct to pick up a flower for you, you understand? And when I sat down here, the consciousness of the column of Light started coming. There was no more personality, no more individuality: there was only a column of Light descending right into the very cells of the body and thats all.
Then it gradually became conscious of itself, conscious of BEING this column of Light. And then the ordinary consciousness slowly returned.
(silence)
0 1961-01-10, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
How can one collaborate in curing the evil and ugliness seen everywhere? By loving? What is the power of love? What effect can an individual consciousness, acting alone, have on the rest of mankind?
How to collaborate in curing evil and ugliness? We can say that theres a kind of hierarchic scale of collaboration or action; a negative cooperation and a positive cooperation.
To begin with, theres what could be called a negative way, the way expounded by Buddhism and similar religions: the refusal to see. To be in a state of such purity and beauty that there is no perception of evil and ugliness. Its like something that doesnt touch you because it doesnt exist in you. This is the perfection of the negative method.
--
Nevertheless, it ought to be a very general rule; yet its critics have a reply: If you dont see evil you can never cure it. If you leave someone to his squalor he will never emerge from it. (Its not exactly true, but its how they legitimize their actions.) In this aphorism, Sri Aurobindo has anticipated these objections: it is not through ignorance or unconsciousness or indifference that you fail to see evilyou can see and even feel it, but you refuse to collaborate in spreading it by giving it the force of your attention or the support of your consciousness. And for that, you must yourself be above the perception and sensationable to see evil or ugliness without suffering, without feeling shocked or troubled. You see them from a height where such things do not exist, yet you have the conscious perception of themthey dont affect you, you are free. This is the first step.
The second step is to be POSITIVELY conscious of the supreme Goodness and Beauty behind all things and supporting all things, permitting them to exist. Once you have seen Him, you can perceive Him behind the mask and the distortioneven ugliness, even cruelty, even evil are a disguise for that Something which is essentially good or beautiful, luminous, pure.
With this comes TRUE collaboration. For when you have this vision, this awareness, when you live in this consciousness, you also get the power to PULL That into the manifestation on earth and put it into contact with what, for the time being, distorts and disguises; thus the deformation and disguise are gradually transformed by the influence of the Truth behind.
Here we are at the top rung on the scale of collaboration.
Put this way, there is no need to bring the principle of love into our explanation. But if we want to know or understand the nature of the Force or Power that permits and accomplishes this transformation (specially in the case of evil, but for ugliness to some extent as well), we see that of all powers, Love is obviously the mightiest, the most integralintegral in that it applies to all cases. Its even mightier than the power of purification which dissolves bad wills and is, in a way, master over the adverse forces, but which doesnt have the direct transforming power; because the power of purification Must FIRST dissolve in order to form again later. It destroys one form to make a better one from it, while Love doesnt need to dissolve in order to transform: it has the direct transforming power. Love is like a flame changing the hard into the malleable, then sublimating even the malleable into a kind of purified vapor. It doesnt destroy: it transforms.
0 1961-01-12, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
You have this experience when for some reason or other, depending on the case, you come into contact with the universal consciousness not in its limitless essence but on any level of Matter. There is an atomic consciousness, a purely material consciousness and an even more generally prevailing psychological consciousness. When, through interiorization or a sort of withdrawal from the ego you enter into contact with that zone of consciousness we can call psychological terrestrial or human collective (there is a difference: human collective is restricted, while terrestrial includes many animal and even plant vibrations; but in the present case, since the moral notion of guilt, sin and evil belongs exclusively to human consciousness, let us simply say human collective psychological consciousness); when you contact that through identification, you naturally feel or see or know yourself capable of any human movement whatsoever. To some extent, this constitutes a Truth-Consciousness, or at such times the egoistical sense of what does or doesnt belong to you, of what you can or cannot do, disappears; you realize that the fundamental construction of human consciousness makes any human being capable of doing anything. And since you are in a truth-consciousness, you are aware at the same time that to feel judgmental or disgusted or revolted would be an absurdity, for EVERYTHING is potentially there inside you. And should you happen to be penetrated by certain currents of force (which we usually cant follow: we see them come and go but we are generally unaware of their origin and direction), if any one of these currents penetrates you, it can make you do anything.
If one always remained in this state of consciousness, keeping alive the flame of Agni, the flame of purification and progress, then after some time, not only could one prevent these movements from taking an active form in oneself and becoming expressed physically, but one could act upon the very nature of the movement and transform it. Needless to say, however, that unless one has attained a very high degree of realization it is virtually impossible to keep this state of consciousness for long. Almost immediately one falls back into the egoistic consciousness of the separate self, and all the difficulties return: disgust, the revolt against certain things and the horror they create in us, and so on.
0 1961-01-22, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
You see, personal surrender and devotion is an excellent solution for the individual, but it doesnt work for the collectivity. For example, as soon as I am alone and lying on my bedpeace! (Ah, I forgot! They had invented yet another thing: making my heartbeats irregular. Every three or four beats it would stop; then it would start up again, pounding as if I had been struck. Three, four beats, a faint little beat, then stop then, bang! Blow after blow. One more of their extraordinary inventions!) But, as soon as I stretch out and make a total surrender of all the cellsno more activity, nothingeverything goes well. But I am well aware that this surrender has an effect on the action only to the extent that the Supreme Lord has decided upon the action, and those movements stretch over long periods of time5: all sorts of things may happen before the final Victory is won. Because, for us, the scale is very small; even if it were of terrestrial proportions, it would be a very small scale; but on a universal scale. These forces have their place and their action, their universe, and as long as their place and their action are maintained, they will be here. So before their action can be exhausted or become useless, many things can happen.
Individually, however, there is almost instantaneous bliss. But this is not a true solution its a solution in the long run, by repercussion. To have true comm and here in this world, all of that must be mastered.
--
Later, on the 27th, Mother remarked: 'I was reading about this very thing yesterday in The Secret of the Veda, in the first hymn translated by Sri Aurobindo (the reference is to the colloquy between Indra and Agastya, Rig Veda I.170cf. The Secret of the Veda, Cent. Ed., X.241 ff.), and it helped me put my finger on the problem. In this hymn there is a dispute between Indra and the Rishi because the Rishi wants to progress too quickly without first passing through Indra [the god of the Mind], and Indra stops him; finally they reach an agreement. Sri Aurobindo's commentary is quite interesting: when one has the INDIVIDUAL power to go directly, but neglects the steps which are still necessary for the whole, for the universal movement, then one is stopped short. That is absolutely my experience.'
***
0 1961-02-04, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Here, I have brought you two flowers. They have two different yet very typically Indian fragrances: this one is Straightforwardness,1 and this is Simplicity.2 I have always found that this one (Mother holds out the Simplicity) has a cleansing fragrance: when you brea the it, ah, everything becomes cleanits wonderful! (Mother breathes in the flowers fragrance.) Once I cured myself of the onset of a cold with itthis can be done when you catch it at the very beginning. It fills you completely, the nose, the throat. And this [Straightforwardness] is right at the other end of the spectrum. I find it very, very powerfulstrange, isnt it?
Its not at all sweet-smelling.
--
I find this very interesting, for WE didnt decide it should be like this: these are conscious vibrations in Nature. The fragrance, the color, the shape, are simply the spontaneous expressions of a true movement.
What does the serpent represent physically? What does it embody in the material world?
--
Theon always told me that the true interpretation of the Biblical story of the serpent in the Garden of Eden is that humanity wanted to pass from a state of animal-like divinity to the state of conscious divinity by means of mental development, symbolized by eating the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge. And this serpent, which Theon always said was iridescent, reflecting all the colors of the prism, was not at all the spirit of evil, but the power of evolution the force, the power of evolution. And it was natural that this power of evolution would make them taste the fruit of knowledge.
Now, according to Theon, Jehovah was the chief of the Asuras,6 the supreme Asura, the egoistic God who wanted to dominate everything and keep everything under his control. And of course this act made him furious, for it enabled mankind to become gods through the power of an evolution of consciousness. And thats why he banished them from Paradise.
--
One day I will find his photo and show it to you; he is there with a big dog he called Little Boy, a dog that could exteriorizehe would dream and go out of his body! This dog had a kind of adoration for me. (I should mention that at a fixed time in the afternoons I used to meditate and go into trance. When it was finished I would go out walking with Theon, and the dog always came with us, usually coming to fetch me in my room.) One day I was lying on a divan in trance when I felt his cold muzzle nudging my hand to wake me. I opened my eyes no dog. Yet I had positively, clearly felt his cold muzzle. So I got ready, went downstairs, and who did I find fast asleep on the landing but Little Boyhe was in trance as well! He had come to wake me in his sleep. When I reached the landing he woke up, shook himself and trotted off.
It was an interesting life.
0 1961-02-18, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Oh, the things that can collect there,2 ugh!
(silence)
--
Sri Aurobindo et la Transformation du Monde [Sri Aurobindo and the Transformation of the World], a book that Editions du Seuil had asked Satprem to write and subsequently refused on the pretext that it did not conform to the 'spirit of the collection.' This book would never see the light of day. Satprem would later write another book entitled Sri Aurobindo or the Adventure of Consciousness.
A long-time disciple (Suzanne Karpeles) and a member of the cole Franaise d'Extrme Orient.
A monthly review published by the Ashram.
0 1961-03-04, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Listen to this appeal: If the opportunity offered by this movement appeals to you, if you have the feeling that you are one of those who have been prepared to collaborate in the spiritual adventure, we invite you to write to us, enrolling yourself as a member of World Union.
Im going to send this to V, asking her innocently, Has this appeared in your journal? Because it would be better if it didnt: we dont make propaganda. Oh, I am hard on them, you know!
0 1961-03-14, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Then there are days when you are in contact with the divine Consciousness, with the Grace, and all is tinged, colored by this Presence, and things which usually seem dull to you become charming and pleasant all is alive, all is vibrant. At other moments you are clouded, closed, you no longer feel anything, everything loses its flavor you are like a walking block of wood.
It comes and goes along the way, you dont keep it permanently; its like crossing a zone, a perfumed zone, and then its past for the moment, its over. A fleeting caress.
--
And within oh! Its like waves, constantly, the equivalent of those nuances of color I was speaking about, waves of this joy of life, the joy of life rippling past, touching; but instead of being. At times, you see, the body is in a sort of equilibrium (what we, in our ordinary outer consciousness, call equilibrium that is, good health), and then this joy is constant, like swells on the sea (Mother shapes great waves): it seems to flow on behind everything; it comes and shows its face for a moment, then vanishes. In the very tiny things of lifeyes, physical life the joy of these things, the joy life contains, this luminous, special kind of vibration, rises up as if to remind us that its here; it is here, it mustnt be forgotten, its here but its kept down by this tension.
Then, from time to time, everything seems to be on the edge of a precipice; the body doesnt fall simply because it keeps its balance but without this higher state of perfect faith, one would surely fall!
0 1961-03-17, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Then I arrived at Sri Aurobindos room with my plates. Oh, said Sri Aurobindo, it has taken so long that I will take my bath first. I looked at my poor breakfast and thought, Well, I went to so much trouble to make it hot and now its going to get cold! All this was so sordid, so sad.
And he seemed to be living in an eternity, yet fully, fully conscious of of our total incapacity.
0 1961-03-21, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
When I came down this morning I didnt want my cold to disturb the meditation with X, and this immobility came (Mother brings down her fists, showing a solid mass descending). Its what he uses for healing and I must say that the same thing happens to me, even when it doesnt come from him: a Force that seizes everything, stops everythingno more vibrations, an immobility.
I had told N. to knock at the door when he arrived with X, but he didnt do itluckily I heard the door opening. I stood up, still in that state and almost fell over! X must have thought I was having a spell of weakness or something, because I was holding onto the arms of the chair, and when I took his flowers, my hands were trembling I wasnt in my body. And afterwards, ah, what a concentration! We remained in it for about thirty-five minutes. It was SOLIDan extraordinary solidity! I didnt want to waste time waiting for it to subside before coming here, and you must have seen how I was when I arrived: like a sleepwalker! I said to the people I passed in the corridor, Im coming back, Im coming back! Thats all I could say, like an idiot.
--
This stupid cold in the middle of the night. It was the start of the attack.
And now the door is open thats not so good! (Satprem gets up to close the door.)
(Mother laughs) No! Im not cold, Im hot!
Yes, but theres a draft.
--
Well see if last nights discovery has any results. This cold was all I needed! Its absolutely ridiculous.
I didnt give it to you, did I?
Do you have a cold?
No but a bit of a bad mood!
--
Im putting everything I can into your foodexcept my cold!
Mother means drawn by a force not his own.
0 1961-04-07, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
But for this to come about, you must remain for a while on those higher reaches and not be constantly, constantly dragged down below where you have to fight each minute simply to LASTto last in all ways: not just personally, but collectively.2 Its a minute-to-minute bout, simply to last. And how long do we have to last for the thing to be done?
It is a difficult period.
--
The universe would be like that, if it had not been for the deviation of the adverse forces I see it very clearly. The perversion, the cold-blooded and cruel perversion of sheer malevolent will keeps it from being like that. Thats what intervenes. They all call it an accident, but a lot of good that does us! The fact is there.
The adverse force is what keeps the Divine from blossoming miraculously whenever He appears. Because I know that wherever Matter is not under the influence of this adverse will to any degree, it blossoms immediately. And everything in the human heart, in human consciousness, in human thought, all that is slightly sheltered from this adverse influencesheltered by the psychic, the divine Presenceblossoms, becomes immediately becomes marvelous, without any obstacleall the obstacles come from that source. So its all very well to call it an accident, but.
0 1961-04-12, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
The first was with a boy who was a Sanskritist and had wanted to come to India with us. He was the son of a French ambassadoran old, noble family. But he learned that his lungs were bad, and so he joined the Army; he enlisted as an officer, just at the start of the 1914 war. And he had the courage of those who no longer cling to life; when he received the order to advance on the enemy trenches (it was incredibly stupid, simply sending people to be slaughtered!), he didnt hesitate. He went. And he was hit between the two lines. For a long time, it was a no mans land; only after some days, when the other trench had been taken, could they go and collect the dead. All this came out in the newspapers AFTERWARDS. But on the day he was killed, of course, no one was aware of it.
I had a nice photo of him with a Sanskrit dedication, placed on top of a kind of wardrobe in my bedroom. I open the door and the photo falls. (There was no draft or anything.) It fell and the glass broke into smithereens. Immediately I said, Oh! Something has happened to Fontenay. (That was his name: Charles de Fontenay.) After that I came back down from my room, and then I hear a miaowing at the door (the door opened onto a large garden courtyard1). I open the door: a cat bursts in and jumps on me, like that (Mother thumps her breast). I speak to him: What is it, whats the matter? He drops to the ground and looks at meFontenays eyes! Absolutely! No one elses. And he just stayed put, he didnt want to go. I said to myself, Fontenay is dead.
--
I had another cat named Kiki. He had a wonderful color and was just like velvet. We used to have meditations and he would come, get up on a chair and go into trance; he would make the brusque movements of trance during the meditation. And I had to rouse him out of it, otherwise he wouldnt wake up!
Once this cat was stung by a scorpion. A foolhardy youngster, he used to play with scorpions. I had to rescue him one day; I came onto the verandah just when he was playing with a big scorpion. I caught the cat, put him on my shoulder and killed the scorpion. But another time I wasnt there, and he was stung. He came inside, done for. I clearly saw the signs that he had been poisoned by a scorpion. I put him on a table and went to call Sri Aurobindo. Kiki has been stung by a scorpion, I said. (He was dying, almost in a coma.) Sri Aurobindo pulled up a chair, sat down facing the table and began to gaze at Kiki. This lasted about twenty or twenty-five minutes. Then suddenly the cat relaxed completely and fell asleep. When he woke up, he was entirely cured.
--
That one too was beautiful, with such a color! Golden chestnut, I have never seen a cat like him. He is buried here beneath the tree I named Service. I put him beneath the roots myself. There had been an old mango tree there that was withering away. We replaced it with a little copper pod tree with yellow flowers.
These animals are so nice when you know how to handle them.
--
Once one of her kittens was ill. She was pretty and gray colored, clear gray like a very soft fur, very pretty. She had caught this cat sickness and was lying down. And the mother was teaching all the little ones not to come near her; she would make them go all the way around, as if her instinct told her it was contagious. And you would see them (the sick kitten was right in their way) going all the way around, never coming near.
These cat stories went on for years and years.
--
And, an incredible thing this cat was very pretty, but she had a wretched tail, a tail like an ordinary cat; and one day when I was with her at the window, one of the neighbors cats wandered into the gardenan angora with three colors, three very prominent colors, and such a beautiful tail trailing behind! So I said (my cat was just beside me), Oh! Just see how beautiful she is! What a beautiful tail she has! And I could see my cat looking at her. My child, in her next litter she had one exactly like that! How did she manage it? I dont know. Three prominent colors and a magnificent tail! Did she hunt up a male angora? Or did she just will for it intensely?
They are really something, you cant imagine! Once, when she was due to give birth and was very heavy, she was walking along the window ledge and I dont know what happened, but she fell. She had wanted to jump from the ledge, but she lost her footing and fell. It must have injured something. The kittens didnt come right away, they came later, but three of them were deformed (there were six in all). Well, when she saw how they were, she simply sat on themkilled them as soon as they were born. Such incredible wisdom! (They were completely deformed: the hind paws were turned the wrong way roundthey would have had an impossible life.)
0 1961-04-18, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
I have had this experience, and I remember it even went on for several days; I saw all material circumstances as an absolutean absolute that we perceive as an unfolding, but which is an eternally existing absolute. I had this experience, and at the same time I had a very clear perception of what falsehood is the lie; what, from the psychological, the mental point of view, Sri Aurobindo, translating from the Sanskrit, called crookedness.3 We attribute the course of circumstances to our psychological reactionsand indeed, they are used momentarily because everything collaborates either consciously or unconsciously to make things be what they have to be but things could be what they have to be without the intervention of this falsehood. I lived in that consciousness for several days, and it became apparent that this was what separated falsehood from truth. In this state of knowledge-consciousness, the distinction can be made between falsehood and truth; and when seen in that truth-consciousness, material circumstances change character.
Now I no longer have the experience of that state except as a memory, so I cant formulate it accurately. But what was very clear and comes very oftenvery oftenis the perception of a superimposition of falsehood over a real fact. This brings us back to what I was telling you some time ago,4 that everything is very simple in its truth, that human consciousness is what complicates everything. But the former was an even more total experience of it.
0 1961-04-25, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Look here, theres a muddle in all this. The Sri Aurobindo Society people had ABSOLUTELY nothing to do with the spiritual life when they began; they didnt at all present themselves as a spiritual groupnothing of the kind; they were people of good will who volunteered to collect money to help the Ashram. So I said, Very well, excellent and as long as its like that, Im behind it. Leaflets can be handed outwhatever people like; its enough if their interest is aroused, if they know there is an Ashram and that it needs some help to go on. But thats all. It has nothing to do with yoga or spiritual progress or anything of the kindit was a strictly practical organization. It was not the same thing as World Union. World Union wanted to do a spiritual work on earth and to create human unity. I told them, You are taking something of an inward nature and you want to externalize it, so naturally it immediately goes rotten.(But its almost over now, Ive pulled the rug out from under them.)
Anyway.
--
But then, they [the S.A.S. people] began posing as almost as teachers! Luckily, the draft of their brochure was brought to me. I said, Nothing doing. If you want to talk to people, tell them what you like, its all the same to me, but I am not publishing this. What you have written about me is not to be printed and you are not to distribute it. Im not in the picture. My name, the fact that I am president, is simply to give my guarantee that the money wont go into the pockets of those who collect it but will be used for the Ashram, the running of the Ashram, and thats all. And on this basis alone I give my guarantee. I am in no way going to help people imagine they are doing a yoga! Its absurd.
The other day, I told N. (and I told him loud enough for everyone to hear): We can dispense with a good half of the ashramites straight-away and not lose a single sadhak.4
--
Only one thing would actually be true, one single thing: to DO it. All this talking and talking and promising and painting things in glowing colorsjust DO it.
(silence)
0 1961-06-02, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
without reserve or coloring, free from
effort and constraint.
0 1961-06-17, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Yesterday I saw N. and he told me, Oh! X had an experience during the meditation with you this morning. Ah! I said to myself, This is going to be interesting. (I was wrong to think so, by the way, even for a quarter of a second.) Yes, he told me, he saw what seemed to be a transparent golden veil descending over you; and by your side were flowers like roses, or colored like roses, with the feet of a child upon them.
All the psychics tell you such stories!
0 1961-06-20, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
For instance, X is completely caught up in all his family affairs; he said to Amrita, In August the girls will go back home to their husbands, the boy will be at college, and Ill be able to live tranquilly. But there will be something else! There is always something else, naturally!
Anyway, it doesnt matter I assure you that for the half-hour he is here with me he is splendid.
0 1961-06-24, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
I will give you a concrete example, then youll understand. When I.B. was killed, I had to gather up all his states of being and activities, which had been dispersed by the violence of the accident2it was terrible, he was in a dreadful state of dispersion. For two or two and a half days the doctors fought in the hope of reviving him, but it was impossible. During those two days I gathered up all his consciousness, all of it; I collected it over his body, to the point where, when it had come and formed itself there, such vitality, such life was coming back into his body that after some hours the doctors believed he would be saved. But it couldnt last (it wasnt possiblea part of the brain had come out). Well, when not only his soul but his mental being, his vital being, and all the rest had been properly collected and organized over his body and had realized that the body had become quite unusable, it was overthey gave up the body and it was over.
I was keeping I.B. near me because I already had the idea of putting him immediately back into another bodyhis soul was not satisfied, it had not finished its experience (there was a whole combination of circumstances) and it wanted to continue to live on earth. Then, that night, his inner being went to find V., lamenting, saying he was dead and hadnt wanted to die, that he had lost his body and wanted to continue to live. V. was very perplexed. He let me know about it in the morning: Heres what has happened. I sent word to him of what I was doing, that I was keeping I.B. in my atmosphere and that he should stay very calm and not get excited, for I was going to put him back into a body as soon as possible I already had something in view. The same evening I.B. again went to find V., with the same complaint. V. told him very clearly, Here is what Mother says, here is what she is going to do; come now, be calm and dont torment yourself. And he saw in I.B.s face that he had understood (the inner being was taking on I.B.s physical appearance, naturally); his face relaxed, he became content.
0 1961-06-27, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
The CONTENT is different, mon petit. I see I see, but. The state of consciousness of the person Im looking at, for instance, changes his physical appearance for my PHYSICAL eyes. And this has nothing to do with the banalities of ordinary psychology, where your physiognomy is said to be changed by the feelings you experience. The CONTENT of what I see is different. And then the eyes of the person I am looking at are not the sameit is rather. I couldnt sketch it, but perhaps if I made a painting it would give some idea (I would need to use a somewhat blurred technique, not too precise). The eyes are not quite the same, and the rest of the face too, even the color and the shape thats what sometimes makes me hesitate. I see people (I see my people every morning) and I recognize them, and yet they are different, they are not the same every day (some are always, always the same, like a rock, but others are not). And I even I hesitate sometimes: Is it really he? But he is very. It is indeed he, but I dont quite know him. This generally coincides with changes in the persons consciousness.
In conclusion: we know nothing.
0 1961-07-15, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
After my interview with Nature, when she told me that she would collaborate,2 I thought this difficulty would cease; many things have improved considerably (ONE part of Nature is collaborating), but not this. Plainly and clearly, it comes from the subconscient and the inconscient (wherever there is consciousness, all is well); its rising up all the time, all the time, and withoh, disgusting persistence!
And then of course its accompanied by all the usual suggestions (but thats nothing, it comes from a domain which is easily controlled). Suggestions of this type: Well, but Sri Aurobindo himself didnt do it! (I know why he didnt. but people in general dont know.) And every adverse vibration naturally takes advantage of this: How do you expect to succeed where he didnt! But my answer is always the same: When the Lord says its all over with, I will know its all over with; that will be the end of it, and so what! This stops them short.
--
In the final analysis, everything obviously depends upon the Supremes Will because, if one looks deeply enough into the question, even physical laws and resistances are nothing for Him. But this kind of direct intervention takes place only at the extreme limit; if His Will is to be expressed in opposition, as it were, to the whole set of laws governing the Manifestationwell, that only comes at the very last second. Sri Aurobindo has expressed this so well in Savitri, so well! At least three times in the book he has expressed this Will that abolishes all established laws, all of them, and all the consequences of these laws, the whole formidable colossus of the Manifestation, so that in the face of it all, That can express itself and this takes place at the very last second, so to speak, at the extreme limit of possibility.
I must say that there was a time when, as Sri Aurobindo had entrusted his work to me, there was a kind of tension to do it (it cant be called an anxiety); a tension in the will. This too has now ended (Mother stretches her arms into the Infinite). Its finished. But there MAY still be something tense lurking somewhere in the subconscient or the inconscient I dont know, its possible. Why? I dont know. I mean I have never been told, at any time, neither through Sri Aurobindo nor directly, whether or not I would go right to the end. I have never been told the contrary, either. I have been told nothing at all. And if at times I turn towards Thatnot to question, but simply to know the answer is always the same: Carry on, its not your problem; dont worry about it. So now I have learned not to worry about it; I am consciously not worried about it.
--
Onlythere is an only in all thisif there were a more liberal proportion between the refreshing (if I may say so) freedom of solitude and the necessity for collective work, there would probably be fewer difficulties. Towards the end of the first year after I retired upstairs3 (perhaps even before, but anyway, some time after I began doing japa while walking), I recall having such sessions up there! Had there been a personal goal, this goal was clearly attained; it is indescribable, absolutely beyond all imaginable or expressible splendor.
And that was when I received the Command from the Supreme, who was right here, this close (Mother presses her face). He told me, This is what is promised. Now the Work must be done.
And not individual but collective work was meant. So naturally, because of the way it came, it was joyously accepted and immediately implemented.
But when I remember that experience and consider what I have now
0 1961-07-18, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
This is quite interesting to me because Sri Aurobindo says the same thing: that nothing is bad, simply things are not in their placetheir place not only in space but in time, their place in the universe, beginning with the planets and stars, each thing exactly in its place. Then when each thing, from the most colossal to the most microscopic, is exactly in place, the whole Will PROGRESSIVELY express the Supreme, without having to be withdrawn and emanated anew. On this also, Sri Aurobindo based the fact that this present creation, this present universe, will be able to manifest the perfection of a divine worldwhat Sri Aurobindo calls the Supermind.
Equilibrium is the essential law of this creationit is what permits perfection to be realized in the manifestation.
--
What would it be like, for instance, to have a small supramental creation as a nucleus of action and influence radiating upon earth (to limit it to the earth)? Is it possible? Its easy to conceive of a superhuman nucleusa creation of supermen, that is, of men who by virtue of evolution and transformation (in the true sense of the word) have succeeded in manifesting the supramental forces; yet since their origin is human, there is inevitably a contact; even if everything is transformed, even if their organs are transformed into centers of force, a sort of human coloration still remains. These are the beings who, according to tradition, will discover the secret of direct, supramental creation, bypassing the process of ordinary Nature. Then through them the true supramental beings will be born, who will necessarily have to live in a supramental world. But how would contact be made between these beings and the ordinary world? How to conceive of a transformation of nature sufficient to enable this supramental creation to take place on earth? I dont know.
Of course, we know that such a thing will require a considerable amount of time to be done, and it will probably go by stages, by degrees, with faculties appearing that at the moment we cant know or imagine, and which will change the conditions of the earththis is looking ahead a few thousand years.
--
Have we ever really known how the first humans were formed, the first mental realization? Were they isolated individuals, or were they in groupsdid the phenomenon take place in a collective milieu or in isolation? I dont know. It may be analogous to the case of the coming supramental creation.
It isnt difficult to conceive of an individual in the solitude of the Himalayas or in a virgin forest beginning to create around himself his miniature supramental worldthis is easy to imagine. But the same thing would be necessary: he would need to have attained such perfection that his power would act automatically to prevent any outside intrusion.
--
Pralaya: The destruction of a universe at the end of a cycle. According to Hindu cosmology, the formation of each universe begins with an 'age of truth' (satya-yuga) which slowly degenerates, like the stars, till there is no truth left at all; it becomes a 'dark age'(kali-yuga) like ours, and ends with a cataclysm. Then a new universe is reborn out of this cataclysm and the cycle begins again. There is a correspondence here with a modern cosmological theory according to which a phase of contraction, of galaxies collapsing upon themselves, follows a phase of expansion and precedes a new explosion ('Big Bang') of the 'primal egg'and so on, in a recurring and apparently endless and aimless series of cosmic births which, like our own human births, develop, attain some sort of 'summit,' then collapse, always to begin again. According to Theon, our present universe is the seventh but where is the 'beginning'?
Note that modern astronomy is divided between the theory of endless phases of contraction-explosion-expansion, and the theory of a universe in infinite expansion starting with a 'Big Bang,' which seems quite as catastrophic, since the universe is then plunging at vertiginous speed into an increasingly cold, empty, and fatal infinity, like a bullet released from all restraints of gravity, until... until what? According to astronomers, an exact measurement of the quantity of matter in a cubic meter of the present universe (one atom for every 400 liters of space) should enable us to decide between these two theories and learn which way it will be best for us to die. If there is more than one atom per 400 liters of space, this quantity of matter will create sufficient gravitation to halt the present expansion of galaxies and induce a contraction, ending with an explosion within an infinitesimal space. If there is less than one atom per 400 liters of space, the quantity of matter and thus the gravitational effect will be insufficient to retain the galaxies within their invisible net, and everything will spin off endlesslyunless we discover, with Mother, a third position, that of a 'progressive equilibrium,' in which the quantity of matter in the universe proves in fact to be a quantity of consciousness, whose contraction or expansion will be regulated by the laws of consciousness.
When the veil of falsehood has gone: the supramental consciousness.
0 1961-07-28, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
All at once, as I gaze above me, I glimpse something roseate; I draw nearer and discern what appears to be a shrub, as large as a tree, held fast to a blue reef. The denizens of the waters glide to and fro, myriad and diverse. Now I find myself standing upon fine, shining sand. I gaze about me in wonder. There are mountains and valleys, fantastic forests, strange flowers that could as well be animals, and fish that might be flowersno separation, no gap is there between stationary beings and mobile. colors everywhere, brilliant and shimmering, or subdued, but always harmonious and refined. I walk upon the golden sands and contemplate all this beauty bathed in a soft, pale blue radiance, tiny, luminous spheres of red, green and gold circulating through it.
How marvelous are the depths of the sea! Everywhere the presence of the One in whom all harmonies reside is felt!
--
Then, wreathed by the splendid colors of the rainbow, enveloped by lulling melodies and exquisite perfumes, beneath his gaze so powerful, so tender, I drift into a beatific repose. And during my sleep I learn many beautiful and useful things.
Of all these marvelous things, understood without the noise of words, I mention only one.
0 1961-08-08, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
X's astonishment raises an extremely important point, drawing the exact dividing line between all the traditional yogas and the new yoga of Sri Aurobindo and Mother. To a tantric, for example, it seems unthinkable that Mother, with a consciousness so powerful as to scoff at the laws of nature and comm and the elements (if she wishes), could be subjected to absurd head colds or an eye hemorrhage or even more serious disorders. For him, it is enough to simply lift a finger and emit a vibration which instantly muzzles the disorderyes, of course, but for Mother it is not a question of 'curing' a head cold by imposing a higher POWER on Matter, but of getting down to the cellular root and curing or transforming the source of the evil (which causes death as easily as head colds, for it is the same root of disorder). It is not a question of imposing oneself on Matter through a 'power,' but of transforming Matter. Such is the yoga of the cells.
***
0 1961-08-25, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Nowadays I always spend a part of the night in the realm of expression, a realm where generally I never used to go at all. Its a very lovely place, very human in the sense that its not a scene from Nature: there are huge rooms and great, highly intellectual arrangements; yet its very lovely, with such a clear and limpid atmosphereall in clear shades (Mother gives up trying to describe it). Oh, its so luminous and lovely, very well organized, as far as the eye can see; it seems as big as the earth. The rooms are roofless, just imagine! Huge roofless rooms flooded with light, and transparent partitions. And the people inside seem very, very awarenot a lot of people, but extremely studious and attentive, and they are creating arrangements of things. They must be people writing books. They are making compositionsoh, if you knew how lovely it was! Its as if they were taking colors and more or less geometrical forms and placing them in relation to one another. There are huge pigeonholes where everything is in order, and yet without doors, not closed upwide open and still completely protected. An interesting place. I dont usually go there Ive gone maybe two or three times in my life, without paying much attention but lately, because of this book you are writing, Sri Aurobindo is taking me there all the time.
And there are people with no countryhe takes me to a place where the people have no country, no race, no special costume they seem very universal. And they move around harmoniously, silently, as though they were gliding and with precision, everything is extremely precise. Some of them have even shown me things: there were some lovely colored papers! But these colors are unearthly, somehow transparent. They were arranging it all, demonstrating and explaining to me how it has to be arranged to give the maximum effect.
I have seen you there several times. You were wearing something similar to what you are wearing now [dhoti]: not European they wear the costume of no particular country. Its usually white, but not made of cloth. Its all on a VERY luminous, very orderly, very clear mental plane-no objects lying around, only things like sheets of paper, which seem to be ideas or compositions of ideas, but no clutter. Its vast, vast, so vast you can see no end to it! And up above its wide open, and a light is constantly descending. What you walk on is a little more solid, but not much more. Its an interesting place.
0 1961-09-23, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
I have the right to 150 pages! The publisher is giving me 150 pages in his collection. Terrible. But in this Sri Aurobindo, you understand, I would like to make his whole poetic aspect stand out, that poetry which is like the Veda, like a revelation, so a bit of space is required: it cant be squeezed into a few lines, or reduced to a skeleton.
This analogy between the ancient form of spiritual revelations and Savitri, this blossoming into poetry of his prophetic revelation is what could be called the most exceptional part of his work. And what is remarkable (I saw him do it) is that he changed Savitri: he went along changing it as his experience changed.
0 1961-10-02, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
And I was giving him the example of BEING the thing you manipulate and sosince you ARE the thinghaving not only the joy of perfect knowledge of manipulation, but the joy of collaboration as well (not collaboration: rather a participation from the thing being utilized). And this from the smallest thing (objects you put in order, for example) right up to the universal transformation that comes with the new Creation and its all the same movement of abolishing limits, the movement of expansion, of a generosity that abolishes limits. It begins with self-giving, it ends in identification.
(silence)
0 1961-10-30, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
It is not surprising, therefore, that exegetes have seen the Vedas primarily as a collection of propitiatory rites centered around sacrificial fires and obscure incantations to Nature divinities (water, fire, dawn, the moon, the sun, etc.), for bringing rain and rich harvests to the tribes, male progeny, blessings upon their journeys or protection against the thieves of the sunas though these shepherds were barbarous enough to fear that one inauspicious day their sun might no longer rise, stolen away once and for all. Only here and there, in a few of the more modern hymns, was there the apparently inadvertent intrusion of a few luminous passages that might have justifiedjust barely the respect which the Upanishads, at the beginning of recorded history, accorded to the Veda. In Indian tradition, the Upanishads had become the real Veda, the Book of Knowledge, while the Veda, product of a still stammering humanity, was a Book of Worksacclaimed by everyone, to be sure, as the venerable Authority, but no longer listened to. With Sri Aurobindo we might ask why the Upanishads, whose depth of wisdom the whole world has acknowledged, could claim to take inspiration from the Veda if the latter contained no more than a tapestry of primitive rites; or how it happened that humanity could pass so abruptly from these so-called stammerings to the manifold richness of the Upanishadic Age; or how we in the West were able to evolve from the simplicity of Arcadian shepherds to the wisdom of Greek philosophers. We cannot assume that there was nothing between the early savage and Plato or the Upanishads.5
***
0 1961-11-05, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Throughout the war Sri Aurobindo and I were in such a CONSTANT tension that it completely interrupted the yoga. And that is why the war started in the first placeto stop the Work. At that time there was an extraordinary descent of the Supermind; it was coming like that (massive gesture), a descent! Exactly in 39. Then the war broke out and stopped everything cold. For had we personally continued [the work of transformation] we were not sure of having enough time to finish it before the other one crushed the earth to a pulp, setting the whole Affair back centuries. The FIRST thing to be done was stop the action of the Lord of Nations.
The Lord of Falsehood.
0 1961-12-16, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Last year there was a conflict between Krishna on one side (he came, I saw him), and some kind of spirit coming from Shiva; Krishna was playing, and the two of them were constantly quarreling! One wanted it to be like this, with roseate colorations, and the other wanted it all in blues and silvers. And then suddenly, as I was playing (in fact, it was the last time I played and it had started off entirely with Krishna and was going quite well) but suddenly something came like the blow of a fist (gesture of a blow to the arm), wham! I completely lost my balancereally I almost.
But then here I am, watching it all, enjoying myself immensely! Its very interesting.
0 1961-12-18, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
I suppose you can return their money and cancel the contract but reserve the right to print the book yourself, changing the presentation to avoid any confusion with their collection.
***
0 1961-12-20, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Dear Sir I must begin by telling you that although this text is an excellent essay, it is not, in its present form, a book for the Spiritual Masters series. Let us enumerate the reasons for this. First of all, the general impression is of an ABSTRACT text. I can straight-away imagine your reaction to this and I dread misunderstandings! But putting myself in the readers place, since, once again, it does involve a collection intended for a wide public that we are beginning to know well, I can assure you that this public will not be able to follow page after page of reflections upon what one is bound to call a philosophical and spiritual system. Obviously this impression is caused primarily by the fact that you have begun with twenty-one pages where the reader is assumed to already know of Sri Aurobindos historical existence and the content of the Vedas and the Upanishads, plus I dont know how many other notions of rite, truth, divinity, wisdom, etc., etc. In my view, and the solution is going to appear cruel to you, for you certainly value these twenty-one pages [on the Secret of the Veda], they should purely and simply be deleted, for everything you say there, which is very rich in meaning, can only become clear when one has read what follows. There are many books in which readers can be asked to make the effort entailed in not understanding the beginning until they have read the end: but not books of popular culture. One could envisage an introduction of three or four pages to situate the spiritual climate and cultural world in which Sri Aurobindos thought has taken place, provided, however, that it is sufficiently descriptive, and not a pre-synthesis of everything to be expounded upon in what follows. In a general way you are going to smile, finding me quite Cartesian! But the readership we address is more or less permeated by a widespread Cartesianism, and you can help them, if you like, to reverse their methodology, but on the condition that you make yourself understood right from the start. Generally, you dont make enough use of analysis and, even before analysis, of a description of the realities being analyzed. That is why the sections of pure philosophical analysis seem much too long to us, and, even apart from the abstract character of the chapter on evolution (which should certainly be shorter), one feels at a positive standstill! After having waited patiently, and sometimes impatiently, for some light to be thrown on Sri Aurobindos own experience, one reads with genuine amazement that one can draw on energies from above instead of drawing on them from the material nature around oneself, or from an animal sleep, or that one can modify his sleep and render it conscious master illnesses before they enter the body. All of that in less than a page; and you conclude that the spirit that was the slave of matter becomes again the master of evolution. But how Sri Aurobindo was led to think this, the experiences that permitted him to verify it, those that permit other men to consider the method transmittable, the difficulties, the obstacles, the realizationsdoesnt this constitute the essence of what must be said to make the reader understand? Once again, it is the question of a pedagogy intimately tied in with the spirit of the collection. Let me add as well that I always find it deplorable when a thought is not expressed purely for its own sake, but is accompanied by an aggressive irony towards concepts which the author does not share. This is pointless and harms the ideas being presented, all the more so because they are expressed in contrast with caricatured notions: the allusions you make to such concepts as you think yourself capable of evoking the soul, creation, virtue, sin, salvationwould only hold some interest if the reader could find those very concepts within himself. But, as they are caricatured by your pen, the reader is given the impression of an all too easily obtained contrast between certain ideas admired and others despised. Whereas it would be far more to the point if they corresponded to something real in the religious consciousness of the West. I have too much esteem for you and the spiritual world in which you live to avoid saying this through fear of upsetting you.
Amen.
--
I feel that it will be done one daywhen that Person does the writing. But now there is still too much mixture, too much of this (Mother touches her body), this collection of little theres still too much reaction from the small physical personnot in what I might say but in the BRAIN that would have to transcribe it.
But something else could be done. Its a great pity you never met him. Perhaps its best. Its very difficult to rise above appearances.3
--
You understand, none of my certitudesnone, without exceptionhave EVER come through the mind. The intellectual comprehension of each of these experiences came much later. Little by little, little by little, came the higher understanding of the intellectual consciousness, long after the experience (I dont mean philosophical knowledge thats nothing but scholarly mumbo-jumbo and leaves me cold). Since my earliest childhood, experiences have come like that: something massive takes hold of you and you dont need to believe or disbelieve, know or not knowbam! Theres nothing to say; you are facing a fact.
Once, during those last difficult years, Sri Aurobindo told me that this was precisely what gave me my advantage and why (how to put it?) there were greater possibilities that I would go right to the end.
0 1962-01-09, #Agenda Vol 03, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
But following that, and because of the overwork, an old thing I thought I had cured has come back. It was originally brought on by overwork when I was going to the Playground and resting only two hours out of twenty-four, which wasnt enougha sort of ulcer formed between my nose and throat. Its an old complaint, dating from the removal of adenoids in my childhood; the operation left a kind of small cavity, which was nothing in itself, except that occasionally it would give me a cold. But as a result of overwork it came back in the form of an ulcer, and gave me artificial colds; it was so sour and corrosive, a terrible irritation in the throat and nose. It got much worse when I was giving classes at the Playground, and once I showed it to the doctor. Why, you have an ulcer! he said. A big fuss. He offered to treat me. No thanks! I said. Dont worry, it will pass. And I began my own yogic treatment. It was over in a week and for three years there was no further sign of it. Recently (the last two or three months) I had felt it trying to come back, for exactly the same reason of overwork. And with that little adventure the other day, it did come backit gave me one of those stupid colds: sneezing, coughing. Its not quite over yet. But its nothing, it just gives me an excuse (laughing) to tell people I am still not quite well!
I am resting.
0 1962-02-03, #Agenda Vol 03, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
This woman a collective karma! What rubbishabsolute humbug.
It may be true for some people, but not for her. If I hadnt seen her I might have been intrigued and tried to find out, but. A collective karma. Of course, there are all the links you have with people youve known in past lives; in that sense, yes, there is a collective karma! But really, people use such big words and big ideas for things that are actually quite natural.
Yet I found it helpful to have some understanding of what happened in my other lives.
--
And if one adds to this, as I do, a mantric program, that is, a sort of prayer or invocation, a program for both personal development and helping the collective, then it becomes a truly active work. Then theres also what I call external work: contact with others, reading and answering letters, seeing and speaking to people, and finally all the activities having to do with the organization and running of the Ashram (in meditation this work becomes worldwide, but physically, materially, it is limited for the moment to the Ashram).
In the course of my observation, I also saw the position of X and people like him, who practically spend their lives doing japa, plus meditation, puja,4 ceremonies (I am talking only about sincere people, not fakers). Well, thats their way of working for the world, of serving the Divine, and it seems the best way to themperhaps even the only way but its a question of mental belief. In any case, its obvious that even a bit of not exactly puja, but some sort of ceremony that you set yourself to dohabitual gestures symbolizing and expressing a particular inner statecan also be a help and a way of offering yourself and relating to the Divine and thus serving the Divine. I feel its important looked at in this waynot from the traditional viewpoint, I cant stand that traditional viewpoint; I understand it, but it seems to me like putting a brake on true self-giving to the Divine. I am speaking of SELF-IMPOSED japa and rules (or, if someone gives you the japa, rules you accept with all your heart and adhere to). These self-imposed rules should be followed as a gesture of love, as a way of saying to the Divine, I love You. Do you see what I mean? Like arranging flowers in a certain way, burning incense, dozens of little things like that, made beautiful because of what is put into themit is a form of self-giving.
0 1962-02-13, #Agenda Vol 03, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
In that former illusion, there were noble actions, generous actions, great, heroic actions, all adding color to life and capable of giving you some interesting hours. Now that too is gone: I see it all as childishness.
I understand very well that this present state is necessary for getting out of it. For as long as something seems normal, natural, acceptable, theres no escaping it. You have one life on the side and then this [the life in the body], thats the way people with a spiritual life always lived: they had their spiritual life and let this continue on automatically, without attaching any importance to itits very easy.
0 1962-02-24, #Agenda Vol 03, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
And exhale slowly thats very difficultbeing careful to empty the top part of the lungs, because air often stagnates there. This seems to be one of the most frequent causes of coughs and colds. When I had bronchitis I learned to empty the air out completely. And I knew singing, so I was familiar with the method: you learn to hold the air and then release it slowly, slowly, so as to keep singing nonstop.
I advise you to practice it.
0 1962-02-27, #Agenda Vol 03, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Anyway, to go back to what I was saying, depending on the plane of ones vision, one can judge approximately how much time it will take to be realized. Immediate things are already realized, they are self-existent and can be seen in the subtle physical they already exist there, and the reflection (not even transcription) or projection of this image is what will take place in the material world the next day or a few hours later. In this case you see the thing accurately, in all its details, because its already there. Everything hinges on the precision and power of your vision: if your vision is objective and sincere, you will see the thing as it is; if you add personal sentiments or impressions, it gets colored. Accuracy in the subtle physical depends exclusively on the instrument, the one who sees.
But as soon as you move into a subtler realm, like the vital (and the mental even more so), there is a narrow margin of possibilities. You can see the rough outlines of what is going to take place, but in the details it can be this way or that way: it is possible for certain wills or influences to interfere and create discrepancies.
--
Take the case of someone you know well and are used to seeing materially: seeing him in the subtle physical, certain aspects become more prominent, more visible, more marked; physically they went unseen because in the material grayness they had blended with many other things. Certain character traits that never showed up physically now become so marked as to be quite visible. When you look at someone physically, you see the color of his complexion, the shape of his features, his expression. Seeing him at the same moment in the subtle physical, you suddenly notice different colors on different parts of the face, in the eyes an expression or a particular light you hadnt seen beforea strong impression of a very different overall appearance, which to our physical eyes would seem rather outlandish. But for the subtle vision its all very expressive and revealing of the persons character, or even of the influences hes under (what I am talking about is something I observed a few days ago).
So, according to the plane where you are conscious and can see, you perceive images and see events from varying distances and with varying degrees of accuracy. The only true and sure vision is the vision of the Divine Consciousness. The problem, therefore, is to become conscious of the Divine Consciousness and constantly maintain it in all lifes details.
0 1962-03-11, #Agenda Vol 03, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Do you think youll have white hair? I dont have white hair I dont dye it, you know, its natural! No, your hair is a color that never turns white.
Listen, Im already all white at the temples!
--
To those with the spiritual sense, the most dazzling vital lights always seem to have something artificial about themthey FEEL artificial and cold, hard, aggressive, deceptive. But thats the point: you yourself must be beyond all this. Not to be fooled, you mustnt fool yourself!
Actually, thats the main reason I dont like to talk about occultism. It puts people in touch with an extremely dangerous world which cant be safely entered unless one is (I cant even say a saint, because its not true; some saints enter the vital world and get right into it!) unless one is transformed, unless one has the true spiritual consciousness. On this condition alone are you perfectly safe. So where are the people with the spiritual consciousness? There are really very few of them, very few. And above all, in those who have this occult curiosity there are also all sorts of vital movements, which make it dangerous for them to enter that world. Unless, of course, they go shielded by the gurus presence; with that, you can go anywhere, its the same as going there with him. And if you do go with him, all is well; he has the knowledge and he protects you. But going there all on your own is you need the Divine Protection itself! Or the protection of the guru who represents the Divine. With the gurus protection you are safe.
But isnt it possible to have a fruitful collaboration with those beings? Should they be avoided altogether, or what?
collaboration? Not with them as they are, and not in the world as it isno.
I have told you about my dealings with the Lord of Nations on several occasionsits that kind of thing. It can hardly be called collaboration!
The great ones know (I am not speaking of the multitude of minor beings, but the others; there are millions of emanationsemanations by the truckload!but only a few great ones), they know enough to be aware of their own position in the universe and that they will come to an end. They know there is such a thing as the Supreme (although they deny it), and that they are cut off from the Supreme, and that they will come to an end. But they have taken a stand against the Work, the Action, the Progress, and are intent on destroying as much as they can.
0 1962-03-13, #Agenda Vol 03, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Because it comes from very highits not from here, not at all; it was decided on high, and a long, LONG time ago. Before you came here, I was constantly feeling. Besides, it hadnt been so long without Sri Aurobindo; when Sri Aurobindo was here I had nothing to say, and if I did speak it was almost by chance. Thats all. What had to be said was said by him. And when he left and I began to read his books (which I hadnt read before), I told myself, Well, what do you know! There was absolutely no need for me to say anything. And I had less and less desire to speak. The minute I met you, I began to get interested. Ah, I thought, collaboration! Something interesting can be done.
None of this is random chance. Its not that were taking advantage of circumstances, not at all; it was DECREED.
0 1962-05-13, #Agenda Vol 03, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
And each gust of this essence of Love was dividing and spreading out but they werent forces, it was far beyond the realm of forces. The universe as we know it no longer existed; it was a sort of bizarre illusion, bearing no relation to THAT. There was only the truth of the universe, with those great gusts of colorthey were coloredgreat gusts colored with something that is the essence of color.
It was stupendous. I lived more than two hours like that, consciously.
0 1962-05-15, #Agenda Vol 03, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Did I tell you about it? It was a sort of vision that I took for a beginning of work on the subconscient. I had come to a place where Sri Aurobindo was staying and found him closeted in his room. There was a sort of large hall, an immense hall with rooms opening onto it, and his apartment was off to one side (gesture). I asked to see him. I was told it wasnt possible and I had to wait. I was astonished. Then certain things happened in the hall concerning A. and M. (rather interesting things, but concerning them personally). And at the same time, I was waiting. When it was all over, I asked once again to go into the room. Then through the doorway I saw I saw a tall Sri Aurobindomuch taller than he actually wasstrong but rather thin, thin in a way that not the way he really wasit was rather a gauntness, very harsh, very cold; and he was somewhat darker than he used to be. I saw him there, walking up and down; and when he was told I was asking to see him, I saw him in the distance saying, No, I dont want to see her. I wont acknowledge her and I dont want anything to do with hershe has betrayed me. Something like that (I couldnt hear the actual words, but the gestures were plain enough). Well, that was the very first timenothing of the kind had ever occurred before.
And I immediately felt that it was the expression of certain peoples thoughts. During the war there was a whole clique (I know their names and all the details) who said I had influenced Sri Aurobindo, made him deviate from his nationalist path and turn towards the Allies; they considered me to have ruined his life, his consciousness, his workeverything, you understand.1
--
There was, in fact, a whole group of Ashram people (they might be called the Ashram "intelligentsia") who, influenced by Subhas Bose, were strongly in favor of the Nazis and the Japanese against the British. (It should be recalled that the British were the invaders of India, and thus many people considered Britain's enemies to be automatically India's friends.) It reached the point where Sri Aurobindo had to intervene forcefully and write: "I affirm again to you most strongly that this is the Mother's war.... The victory of one side (the Allies) would keep the path open for the evolutionary forces: the victory of the other side would drag back humanity, degrade it horribly and might lead even, at the worst, to its eventual failure as a race, as others in the past evolution failed and perished.... The Allies at least have stood for human values, though they may often act against their own best ideals (human beings always do that); Hitler stands for diabolical values or for human values exaggerated in the wrong way until they become diabolical.... That does not make the English or Americans nations of spotless angels nor the Germans a wicked and sinful race, but...." (July 29, 1942 and Sept. 3, 1943, Cent. Ed., Vol. XXVI.394 ff.) And on her side also, Mother had to publicly declare: "It has become necessary to state emphatically and clearly that all who by their thoughts and wishes are supporting and calling for the victory of the Nazis are by that very fact collaborating with the Asura against the Divine and helping to bring about the victory of the Asura.... Those, therefore, who wish for the victory of the Nazis and their associates should now understand that it is a wish for the destruction of our work and an act of treachery against Sri Aurobindo." (May 6, 1941, original English.)
See note at the end of this conversation
0 1962-05-24, #Agenda Vol 03, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
I dont think any single individual on earth (as it is now) no matter how great he may be, no matter how eternal his consciousness and origin, can all by himself change and realize. Change the world, change the creation as it is, and realize that higher Truth, the Truth that will be a new worlda truer, if not absolutely true, world. A certain number of individuals (until now they seem to have come in succession, in time, but they might also come as a collectivity, in space) would seem indispensable for this Truth to be concretized and realized.
On a practical level, I am sure of it.
--
The individual can give the initial impulse, point out the path, WALK the path himself (I mean show the path by realizing it) but he cant bring the work to fulfillment. The fulfillment of the work depends on certain collective laws that are the expression of a particular aspect of the Eternal and Infinitenaturally, its all one and the same Being! There arent different individuals and personalities, its all one and the same Being. But the same Being expressing itself in a particular way that for us translates as a group or a collectivity.
Well, thenany other questions on this?
0 1962-05-27, #Agenda Vol 03, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
From the collective viewpoint, of course, the work would be greatly inconvenienced: even if we could just manage to finish the Bulletin for August, the November Bulletin would be in real jeopardy.
And as for the Agenda, well it would simply stop, thats all, for the whole time youre away. I might also have nothing to say, I dont know. It could be that I wont have anything to say for two or three months, or even longer. I cant say. I dont know whats going to happen to me I mean happen to this whole collection (Mother indicates her body), this collection of bodily experiences and research. I havent been told anything I dont try to know and I dont know. So I will probably have nothing to say. On the whole, thats how it looks to me.
There is no definite answer in the consciousness.
0 1962-05-31, #Agenda Vol 03, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
And the dreams it gives me! Oh, theres a whole series of them, with particular styles and categories. You start down a flight of stairsno more stairs; you want to take a certain road the road closes; you want to catch someoneyou cant. All kinds of things. And although these dreams (I have a whole collection of them, in fact) recur with certain minor outward differences, they are all of the same type. Its a well-known type which I now classify as self-imposed troubles. When I get out of it and look, I see very clearly that its only this nasty habit we have of fretting over nothing! (Laughingly) Oh, whatever we want to do, immediately theres a complication, a difficulty.
Yes, these dreams arise from the subconscient; they are primarily subconscious habits. But the pain, the thorns in the garmentits so clear! (Mother laughs) And no way to get comfortable!
--
But to say its these particular Words exclusively would be ridiculous. What counts is the sincerity of the aspiration, the exactness of the expression and the power; that is, the power that comes from the mantra being accepted. This is something very interesting: the mantra has been ACCEPTED by the supreme Power as an effective tool, and so it automatically contains a certain force and power.5 But it is a purely personal phenomenon (the expression is the same, but the vibrations are personal). A mantra leading one person straight to divine realization will leave another person cold and flat.
What is your experience when you say your mantra? You once told me you felt good saying it.
0 1962-06-02, #Agenda Vol 03, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
It was delightful (it happened around 1:30 in the afternoon): sitting on the water the way you would sit on a chair! And the water was so clear, crystal clear, transparent, rippled with tiny waves; the depths were dark blue, but the surface was perfectly clear, transparent, almost colorless. Then when the big brother came, boasting that he knew how to do it too, and would take me across, the water began to get muddy, as river water always isa dirty grayish yellow.
It must be the continuation of that experience the other day. I was beginning to find the key.
--
The afternoon experience was very intriguing; I was busy working (organizing things for one of the departments, I no longer remember which) and then I said to the person I was with, Now I am going to my cousins place! When I was very young I had a cousin, the eldest son of one of my fathers brothers (he had a large family, such as you seldom see in France). This cousin became some kind of engineera civil engineer, maybe, or a mechanical engineer (he was an outstanding chemist). Anyway, this boy was very attracted to me. He went off to the war as an officer and caught some disease (I forget what) and died around 1915, at the time I returned to France. Well, in my experience yesterday afternoon, a certain family living HERE gave me exactly the same sensation I had had towards those people when I was young. And especially for this cousin (for the rest of the family it was more vague, like a background to the experience). I am going to their place, I said. They have a lovely estate here, just as they had a lovely estate in France before (they had Madame de Sevignes chateau at Sucy, near Parisa beautiful property). And it was all so concrete! It wasnt coming through the head; it wasnt a thought but a sensation. I have to go see him now, I said. And even as I was having my vision I was telling myself, You must be going crazy! Can they really be here in Pondicherry? This uncle with whom I had only rather distant relations and this cousin I never saw much of, but whom I knew to be very nice and very loyalAre they really here?! The sensation was most strange (the head wasnt functioning at all; it was a SENSATION). So off I went to see this cousin, and it was on the way to see him that I had the experience of crossing the river. And on the way back, after the discussion with the spiritual brother (whom I really told off: Get out of here! I dont need you!), after that, when I found myself back on the bank, I started collecting my consciousness again, telling myself, Look here now! Lets try to see clearly. And then I realized that the cousin who died prematurely during the war had reincarnated in someone here. How strange, I thought. And the dates coincided.
But that is a singular state: there is no mental intervention at all; you live things POSITIVELY, just as you experience them physically, in the same way that this (Mother knocks on the table next to her) is physically a table. Its that kind of perception something positive. I positively said, I am going to my cousins place, and the relationship had an absolutely positive vibrationit wasnt at all something thought or even remembered: theres no remembering anything, its simply there, alive. A strange state. I have had it on several occasions, and when I have it I am aware that this must be the state people who know what is happening and make predictions are inin this state there is no possibility of doubt. No thoughts intervenenone at all, not one. Absolutely nothing intellectual: simply certain vital-physical vibrations, and then you know. And you dont even wonder how you know; its not that kind of thingits self-evident. And since I was in that state when I saw the reincarnation of the cousin, I am perfectly sure of what I saw. And god knows (Mother laughs), when I came out of it and began to look at it all with my usual consciousness, I said to myself, My word! I would never have thought of such a thing! It was millions of miles from any thought of mine. Besides, I never used to think of that cousin; he was a fine boy but I never paid much attention to him, he had no place in my active consciousness.
--
If you sometimes remember a word or a gesture, a color or an image, hang on to it and dont move.
Some people succeed right away; for others it takes longer. But it always succeeds in the end. You just have to build a bridge, thats all.
0 1962-07-11, #Agenda Vol 03, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
No I dont know, I imagine colored waves.
Maybe. Ah, that day [April 13] the whole creation was colored waves, but not like the colors we have here, it was. Ah, that day!
For a good two hours it was absolutely. The world, the whole creation seemed like a child at play, thats how I related to it. And what play!
0 1962-07-14, #Agenda Vol 03, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Ever since Einstein's Theory of Relativity, we have known that such an experience of time's relative nature is "physically" feasible. We need only consider the example of time aboard a spaceship approaching the speed of light: time "slows down," and the same event will take less time aboard the spaceship than on earth. In this instance, speed is what makes time slow down. In Mother's experience (which is every bit as "physical"), the "intensity of the Presence" seems to be the origin of time change. In other words, consciousness is what makes time slow down. Thus we are witnessing two experiences with identical physical results, but formulated in different languages. In one, we speak of "speed," in the other of "consciousness." But what is speed, after all?... (Moreover, the implications of this "language" difference are quite colossal, for it would indeed be simpler to press on a "consciousness button" than on an accelerator that had to take us to the speed of light.) Speed is a question of distance. Distance is a question of two legs or two wings: it implies a limited phenomenon or a limited being. When we say "at the speed of light," we imagine our two legs or our two wings moving very, very fast. And all the phenomena of the universe are seen and conceived of in relation to these two legs, these two wings or this rocketship they are creations of our present-day biped biology. But for a being (a supramental being, of the future biology) containing everything within himself, who is immediately everywhere, without distance, where is "speed"? ... The only "speed of light" is biped. Speed increases and time slows down, they say. The future biology says: consciousness intensifies and time slows down or ceases to existdistances are abolished, the body doesn't age. And the world's whole physical cage collapses. "Time is a rhythm of consciousness," says Mother. We change rhythm and the physical world changes. Might this be the whole problem of transformation?
Asked later about this unfinished sentence, Mother said, "I stopped because it was an impression and not a certainty. We'll talk about it again later." Was Mother hinting at a stage when she would live in both times simultaneously?...
0 1962-07-18, #Agenda Vol 03, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
But now the body the body itself, its very own selffeels it is WITHIN things or WITHIN people or WITHIN an action. There are no more limits, none of this (Mother touches the skin of her hands as if all separation had disappeared). Take this example: someone accidentally bumps me (it does happen) with an object or a part of his body. Well, it is NEVER something external: it happens INSIDE the bodys consciousness is much larger than my body. Yesterday, the table leg bumped my foot; so there was the ordinary outward reaction (it operates automatically and in a curious way the body jumped), and then the body-consciousness now I am speaking of the body-consciousness saw that an unexpected and involuntary collision of two objects had taken place INSIDE ITSELF. And it also saw that if it made a certain movement of concentration at that particular spot, inside itself, some pain or damage would result; but if it made the other movement of (how shall I put it?) of union, of abolishing all separation (which it can do very well), well, then the results of the blow would be annulled. And thats what happened, I did it. I was simply sitting down, and I let my body cope with the whole thing (while I watched with keen interest); and I noticed it really did feel the blow inside and not outsideit wasnt that something from outside had struck it, but that there had been an unexpected, or rather an unforeseen and involuntary collision of two things inside itself. And I clearly followed how the body made a more complete movement of identification (you see, someone with the sense of separation had moved the table, so the sense of separation accompanied the blow, and then of course there was all the regret,2 and so on and so forth); well, the body simply went into its usual state where theres no sense of separation, and the effect vanished instantaneously. Had I been asked, Where were you hit, what spot?, I couldnt have told, I dont know. All I know, because of words I heard spoken, is that the table leg bumped into my foot. But where? I cant say; I couldnt have said even five minutes after the incidentit had utterly disappeared, and disappeared through a VOLUNTARY movement.
This body-consciousness has a will; it is constantly, constantly calling upon the Lords will: Lord, take possession of this, take possession of that, take. Theres no question of taking possession of the will, that was done ages ago, but: Take possession of these cells, those cells, this, that. It is the BODYS aspiration. Well, the blow wasnt caused by this will acting in the body; the blow didnt come directly from the body, but from something that had slipped in through an unconscious element; and the body simply erased, or absorbed, digested this unconsciousness and the thing vanished without a trace!
0 1962-07-25, #Agenda Vol 03, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
That is my first memoryat five years old. Its impact was more on the ethical side than the intellectual; and yet it took an intellectual form too, since. You see, apparently I was a child like any other, except that I was hard to handle. Hard in the sense that I had no interest in food, no interest in ordinary games, no liking for going to my friends houses for snacks, because eating cake wasnt the least bit interesting! And it was impossible to punish me because I really couldnt have cared less: being deprived of dessert was rather a relief for me! And then I flatly refused to learn reading, I refused to learn. And even bathing me was very hard, because I was put in the care of an English governess, and that meant cold bathsmy brother took it in stride, but I just howled! Later it was found to be bad for me (the doctor said so), but that was much later. So you get the picture.
But whenever there was unpleasantness with my relatives, with playmates or friends, I would feel all the nastiness or bad willall sorts of pretty ugly things that came (I was rather sensitive, for I instinctively nurtured an ideal of beauty and harmony, which all the circumstances of life kept denying) so whenever I felt sad, I was most careful not to say anything to my mother or father, because my father didnt give a hoot and my mother would s cold me that was always the first thing she did. And so I would go to my room and sit down in my little armchair, and there I could concentrate and try to understand in my own way. And I remember that after quite a few probably fruitless attempts I wound up telling myself (I always used to talk to myself; I dont know why or how, but I would talk to myself just as I talked to others): Look here, you feel sad because so-and-so said something really disgusting to you but why does that make you cry? Why are you so sad? Hes the one who was bad, so he should be crying. You didnt do anything bad to him. Did you tell him nasty things? Did you fight with her, or with him? No, you didnt do anything, did you; well then, you neednt feel sad. You should only be sad if youve done something bad, but. So that settled it: I would never cry. With just a slight inward movement, or something that said, Youve done no wrong, there was no sadness.
0 1962-07-31, #Agenda Vol 03, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
But the things I am seeing arent at all personal like this letter, you know, they are not small details, they are overall actions. There seems to be something unyielding, like this (gesture), and then it suddenly collapses and theres a free flow.
I cant say this gentleman knows it (he probably doesntwhat goes on in the human brain is very incoherent). But in any case, something in him is wary: Whats to tell me this book wont lead me just where I dont want to go?
0 1962-08-04, #Agenda Vol 03, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Interestingly enough, these last few days I have been making a sort of detailed study of the various kinds of vibrations, how they approach you and enter the various centers. I dont know how to explain itcertain differences between vibrations resemble differences in tastes. Theres a whole gamut, you see, all vibrations, nothing but vibrations, and the differences between them resemble differences in taste or color or intensity, perhaps differences in force as wellessentially, of course, they are differences in quality.
Ive been observing all this in a neuro-physical realm, subtle-physical, that is but its still physical and in a complete mental silence where all judgments (you know, judgments) have disappeared, along with a certain way of observing things. Thats why I cant talk about it.
These vibrations have various qualities; if they were expressed through a mental observation, it would be done through such things as taste, color, and so forth, everything Ive just mentioned1but thats not how theyre expressed. They come almost exclusively as sensations, but those sensations some, I mean some vibrations, have rounded edges. Some come horizontally (I was in fact studying everything that comes horizontally), others result from the state of consciousness (vertical gesture from top to bottom). While at the same time, others are. Yes, its like looking through a high-powered microscope: some are rounded, others pointed; some are darker, some brighter. Some are very upsetting to the body, and some even feel dangerous. On the other hand, certain ones make the body receptive to the vibration, which we might call the Lords Vibration, the supreme Vibration. You see, all this is the outcome of a discipline, a tapasya, for preparing the body to receive the Lords Vibrations (the first step is receiving, being able to receive them; afterwards you have to hold on to and then manifest them). Those vibrations are unmistakable, they are something else entirely. But other vibrations are helpful, beneficial, while still others are disruptive, contradictory.
And each one is beginning to reveal its own particular nature. There are those stemming from peoples thoughts (I sense them in my body, not in the mind: the material consequence of peoples psychological state, and even their state of health). Some things are general and last a bit longer; others are momentary, lasting only a few seconds. The first step is to study the different vibrational qualitiesyou could practically draw diagrams: if we had a machine sensitive enough to record these things, it would produce all kinds of zigs and zags.2 Certain vibrations immediately stop or change or are dissolved or repelled. Others are adopted, as it were, and transformed. The majority are simply pushed back and worked on from a distancequite a distance! I keep them at a fair distance (Mother laughs). Very few are let in. But some are let in for the sake of the experience, to see how much they upset the body. Theres also the effect of peoples permanent auras: I know a certain person is arriving by his auras effect on the body; because (laughing) each vibration has its particular effect on the bodyperfectly prosaic things, maybe, but by studying them you realize that each thing has its own law.
--
It is very interesting to note that all these perceptions we consider physical, material (taste, color, etc.), Mother attributes to the mind. What then, is true physical perception?
Like the needle of an electroencephalograph.
0 1962-08-08, #Agenda Vol 03, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
But I understand your question. You want to know if this has an effect on all identical vibratory modes in the world. In principle, yes. But the effects may not be immediately visible; in the first place, our field of observation is nothingmaterially, what do we know? Only our immediate surroundings thats nothing. In 1920, for example, I had an experience of that type, which resulted in a symbolic but terrestrial action. It was a vision (I dont remember enough details to make it interesting) where each nation was represented by a symbolic entity, and there was a certain type of horrorof terror, rather. A certain will of terror was trying to manifest in that gathering of all nations. And I was witness to the whole thing. I remember it being a very conscious and rather long and detailed vision with a more intense reality than physical things have (it was in the subtle physical). And after it was over and I had done what needed to be done (I am not saying what because I dont remember all the details, and without accuracy it loses its value), when I came out of it I could say with TOTAL conviction: Terror has been overcome in the world. Of course, its not literally true, plenty of people still feel terror, but a certain type of terror was as if UNDERMINED at the foundations. What had already manifested kept on and is gradually being exhausted, but the terror that was trying to increase and dominate the life of nations was stopped cold.
I have had other similar experienceson Durgas day, for instance, when Sri Aurobindo was still here (you know, thats the day when Durga masters an asura; she doesnt kill him, she masters him). Well, each year one particular type of thing was undermined (and my experiences were never mental: the experience would suddenly come, and AFTERWARDS I would realize it was Durgas day), and each time I used to tell Sri Aurobindo, Looktoday this (or that) thing has been cut off at the roots. Thats how it works with the adverse forcesyes, like something being uprooted from the world. Whatever has already spread out keeps going and follows its karma, but the SOURCE is dried up. Thats also what happened (it was in 1904, I believe) when the Asura of Consciousness and Darkness made his surrender and was converted; he told me, I have millions and millions of emanations, and these will keep on living, but their source has now run dry.4 How much time will it take to exhaust it all? We cant say, but the source has dried up and that is something extremely important. In 1920, that terror was trying to spread all over the world and to become really catastrophic; and then in my inner vision I could see that a whole movement had dried up at its source. This means that little by little, little by little, little by little the karma is being exhausted.
0 1962-08-14, #Agenda Vol 03, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
One of our children, V., a courageous boy, went up there all by himself. In winter its completely isolated, theres nothing nearby. It was May and still frightfully cold, it seems, snow still covered the ground. And the man was sitting there stark naked as though it were perfectly natural! He even asked the boy, Do you want to spend the night here? That was a bit too much!
Anyway, V. went there, sat down next to him, and after a while the man went into a sort of trance and began to tell V. about his life (the boys life, not his own!). So V. was interested and wanted to know more. Where do I come from? he asked. The man answered, Oh, from an ashram by the sea the sea is there. Then he began to speak (I must mention that outwardly he knew nothing about Sri Aurobindo or me or the Ashram, absolutely nothing at all), and he told V. that a great sage and the Mother were there, and that they wanted to do something on earth that had never been done before something very difficult. Then, I dont know whether he mentioned I was alone now (I have no idea), but he said, Oh, she has had to withdraw2 because the people around her dont understand and life there has become very difficult. It will be very difficult until 1964.
0 1962-08-18, #Agenda Vol 03, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
(Then Mother speaks of the collective meditation held on August 15, Sri Aurobindos ninetieth birthday.)
Mon petit, we had a meditation here on the 15th, at ten oclock.2 At a quarter to ten, I was sitting here at the table in a total silence. And then I cant say Sri Aurobindo came, for he is always here, but he manifested in a special way. Concretely, in the subtle physical, he became so tall that, sitting cross-legged as they do here, he covered the whole compoundeven extended a bit beyond it! He was literally sitting upon the compound; so to the extent that the people meditating were not closed, they were all inside him. He was sitting like that (not on their heads!), and I could feel (I was here, you see) the FRICTION of his presence in the subtle physicalan utterly physical friction! And I saw him (as you well know, I am not shut up in here [the body]), I saw him sitting there, very tall and perfectly proportioned; and then he started gently, gently descendingthis descent is what caused the frictiongently, very gently, so as not to give people a shock. Then he settled there and stayed for a little more than half an hour, a few minutes more, like that, absolutely still, but fully concentrated on all the people they were inside him.
0 1962-09-05, #Agenda Vol 03, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Thats it. And then illnesses related to colloidal disorders (blood, for example, is a colloidal fluid): when the component elements cease to combine in the normal and natural way. Both are newly recognized causes of illness. And they usually (I dont say in every case) result from what is called an inner discrepancy; that is, when the different parts of the being have not reached the same level of development, things of that nature may crop up.
With very few exceptions, these illnesses are not found to originate from germs, microbes or bacteria. They are frequently classified as mental illnesses, nervous disorders, etc., and they result from that inner discrepancy.
0 1962-09-15, #Agenda Vol 03, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
People are getting restless, they want to publish a complete collection of my talksin English. Calm down! I told them. I dont want any of this; we will publish a French edition later, when its ready.
I dont want English. I dont want English! And more and more, I dont want English. For instance, the English translation of Prayers and Meditations is out of print and they wanted to reprint it. I said no: If you want, you can reprint what Sri Aurobindo HIMSELF translated (theres not much, just a thin volume). That, yes, because Sri Aurobindo translated it. But even at that, its not the same thing as my textits Sri Aurobindos, not mine.
0 1962-09-26, #Agenda Vol 03, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
This must refer to the colloquy of Rishi Agastya and Indra (The Secret of The Veda, Cent. Ed., X. 241), commented on by Mother in the 1961 Agenda (Vol. II, p. 37).
***
0 1962-10-27, #Agenda Vol 03, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
The first zone you encounter is the zone of painting, sculpture, architecture: everything that has a material form. It is the zone of forms, colored forms that are expressed as paintings, sculptures, and architecture. They are not forms as we know them, but rather typal forms; you can see garden types, for instance, wonderfully colored and beautiful, or construction types.
Then comes the musical zone, and there you find the origin of the sounds that have inspired the various composers. Great waves of music, without sound. It seems a bit strange, but thats how it is.
--
Higher up, there is a fourth zone, a zone of colored lights, plays of colored lights. Thats the order: first form, then sound, then ideas, then colored lights. But that zone is already more distant from humanity; it is a zone of forces, a zone which appears as colored lights. No forms colored lights representing forces. And one can combine these forces so that they work in the terrestrial atmosphere and bring about certain events. Its a zone of action, independent of form, sound and thought; it is above all that. A zone of active power and might you can use for a particular purposeif you have the capacity to do so.
Thats the highest zone.
Thus we have form, expressed in painting, sculpture or architecture; sound, expressed in musical themes; and thought, expressed in books, plays, novels, or even in philosophical and other kinds of intellectual theories (thats where you can send out ideas that will affect the whole world, because they influence receptive brains in any land, and are expressed by corresponding thoughts in the appropriate language). And above this zone, free of form, sound and though, is the play of forces appearing as colored lights. And when you go there and have the power, you can combine those forces so that they eventually materialize as creations on earth (it takes some time, its rarely immediate).
But those great waves of music you hear, which you said were beyond soundsare they part of that domain of luminous vibrations?
Yes. But its the higher level of the musical zone. Each of these zones contains several levels, and the top of the musical zone is already starting to be waves, waves of vibration. But its still directly related to music, while those colored forces I am speaking of have to do with terrestrial transformations and actionsgreat actions. They are powers of action. This zone where you hear no sound eventually becomes sounds and music. It is the summit. Each zone contains several levels.
In short, when one rises to that Origin, one finds a single vibration, which can be expressed as music or thought or architectural or pictorial formsis that right?
Yes, but it goes through specific transformations en route. It passes through one zone or another, where it undergoes transformations to adapt itself to the particular mode of expression. The waves of music are one particular mode of expression of those colored wavesthey should really be called luminous waves, for they are self-luminous. Waves of colored light. Great waves of colored light.
(silence)
--
And mind you, I knew nothing of all those worlds, I hadnt the slightest knowledge; but all my experiences came that wayunexpectedly, without my seeking anything. When I looked at a painting, same thing: something would suddenly open up inside my head and I would see the origin of the painting and such colors! One can get to that world directly from the vital, without going through all the mental gradations.
***
--
Ysaye (1838-1931): celebrated Belgian violinist, colleague of Rubinstein.
See conversation of October 6: the "rain of truth."
0 1962-10-30, #Agenda Vol 03, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
I have come to understand that the Chinese are a lunar racetheir origin is the moon. They came to earth when the moon got too cold and they could no longer exist there. This is something I saw at the beginning of the century and my impression was further intensified when I went to China.2 They are a lunar race. And they gave me the feeling of people who lack a psychic being: they are cold, ice- cold. But wonderfully intellectual!
I met another Chinese a few years ago, a man with a spiritual life. He came to meet me and talked for an hour about China. It made me understand China externally as if I had been born and lived my whole life there. I saw they were people who have attained the summit of the intellect, and who have a creative powerinventors. He told me, No people in the world could understand Sri Aurobindo intellectually as well as the Chinese. And it was luminously true. The highest intellectual comprehension, really at its peak.
0 1962-11-07, #Agenda Vol 03, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Its somewhat similar to collecting ones thoughts. Its part concentration, part interiorization, and both togetherlike drawing back, but without movement.
After a while, it becomes almost automatic; I do it hundreds of times a day. Its difficult to describe, because the description makes it too concrete. But its a drawing back, an interiorizationa self-gathering. But all those words seem dense, heavy; too material, too heavy. Yet its a very concrete sensation, very concrete, which immediately brings about a kind of stabilizationeverything stops. Everything stops, to the point where even a vibration of pain is stopped, it doesnt exist any more. But when you leave this state, back it comes again. It gets cured only when you persist for some time; otherwise the two might continue to coexist.
0 1962-11-10, #Agenda Vol 03, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Some people found it interesting, mon petit! First of all, Sri Aurobindo was there it was like a large hall: a very large room with scarcely any walls, just enough so it didnt seem wide open to everything. And then there was a kind of musical instrument, like a grand piano, but much bigger and higher, playing its own music: nobody was playing it. And its own music was the music of what you have written. It was taking the form of something like luminous, colored sheets of paper, tinged with gold, with pink, which were scattering in the air and then very slowly falling onto a floor that was scarcely a floor, with an almost birdlike movement. They were falling, fallingalmost square sheets of paper falling one upon another like feathersnothing heavy about it. And then from the left a being like a god from the overmind entered the room; he was both like a Hindu deity with a tiara, and a kind of angel in a long robe (a combination of the two), and he moved so lightly, without touching the groundhe was all lightness. And with a very lovely and harmonious movement (everything was so harmonious!), he gathered up all the sheets: he took them in his arms and they stayed therethey were weightless, you see. He gathered them up, smiling all the while, with a young and very, very luminous and happy face something very lovely. Then, when he had gathered them all up, he turned towards me (I was here; you were over there, the music was there and Sri Aurobindo was there), and said as he was leaving, I am taking all this to give to them, as if he were returning to the overmental world where they were greatly interested in it! (Mother laughs.)
But it was all so lovely, so very lovely! There was a rhythm; it was all unfolding rhythmically, a rhythm of the falling sheets of paper; and a rhythm moving along very slowly, not in a straight line, and undulating.
0 1962-11-20, #Agenda Vol 03, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
And all night long (or a good part of it in any case), Indira Gandhis thought was here, clinging to me (Indira Gandhi is Nehrus daughter), and the jewelry was sent to her.3 It was handed over to Nehru, who passed it on to Indira.4 And she wrote me a letter I received yesterdaya very (Mother searches for the proper word) a very amicable letter; a letter from someone who has understood that this gift was an important elementnot on a worldwide level (!), but because it was important that people know I have made a gesture of collaboration. But it didnt end there. The letter came yesterday; generally, of course, when I see a letter coming, I see it BEFORE receiving it; but here it was SHE, she herself, thinking [of Mother], thinking, thinking, thinking over and over again. (With Nehru, its always very blurred: he doesnt have sufficient mental power for his position, he lacks the required strength of mind, so its always hazy; when you tune in to him, thats the impression you getblurred gesturenot solid.) But with her, it kept coming and coming and coming. They must be feeling or beginning to feel that something other than what they have is required.
We shall see.
I dont forget what Sri Aurobindo saiddeclared (in writing): that in 1967 the supramental Power will be behind all the earths governments. Whether its these people or those or whoever, they will be directly, maybe not consciously, but directly under the influence of the supramental forces, which will make them do what has to be done. And so, of course, the first result will be a kind of worldwide collaborationhe explicitly told me that, and he wrote it down. Thats what he had seen. But he didnt say we would get there without without catastrophe. He never said that.
Well, mon petit.
0 1962-11-27, #Agenda Vol 03, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Is it silver, is it? Its indefinable. Thats just what makes that grass so exquisite. Well, the tulle was that color. Afterwards, a long time after, when I began to observe and to not actually think, but to try to formulate it, I noticed the color was identical. Now I know why I named it Humility! I said to myself. Its like being in a domain where things are known quite naturally, you understand theres no seeking.
How lovely it was! The sense of delicate beauty in things.
--
I can see I am still (and God knows how long it will last!) in that transitional period Sri Aurobindo describes in The Yoga of Self-Perfection. A period when the true thing is getting established but the tail of the old thing trails behind, mixes in and colors things. Well, its an old habit, and it takes SUCH a long time to go away.
The habit of not understanding something unless it can be mentally explained is disastrous, for instance. This feeling we have that we dont understand something unless we can explain it thats really disastrous. That half-hours experience was something absolute, you see, not for one second was there any concern to know what was going on (naturally!); it was absolute. And only when the time was up and I had to come out of it did I start wondering, What happened? What does it mean? It wasnt even that pronounced. Its simply an old habit, what we call understanding.
--
One day, I dont remember on what occasion, I saw what had motivated the forefa thers who wrote the Vedas: it was the need for immortality; they were in quest of immortality.6 From there, I went on to Buddha and saw what had set the Buddha on his way: this kind of need for permanence, purely and simply; the vision of the impermanence of things had profoundly troubled him, and he felt the need for Permanence. His whole quest was to find the Permanent (why was he so anxious to have the Permanent?). There are a few things like that in human nature, in the deep human need. And then I saw another such need: a need for the Certitude which is security. I dont know how to explain it. Because I had the experience of it, I saw it was one of the human needs; and I understood it very intensely, for when I met Sri Aurobindo, this Certitude is what made me feel I had found the Truth I needed. And I didnt realize how DEEP this need was until he left his bodyjust then, at the moment of the transition. Then the entire physical consciousness felt its certitude and security collapse. At that moment I saw (we spoke about it with Nolini a year later and he had had exactly the same impression), I saw this was similar to Buddhas experience when he realized that everything was impermanent and so all of life collapsed in other words, Something Else HAD to be found. Well, at that moment. Id already had all my experiences, but with Sri Aurobindo, for the thirty years I lived with him (a little more than thirty years), I lived in an absolute, an absolute of securitya sense of total security, even physical, even the most material security. A sense of absolute security, because Sri Aurobindo was there. And it held me up, you know, like this (gesture of being carried): not for ONE MINUTE in those thirty years did it leave me. That was why I could do my work with a Base, really, a Base of absolutenessof eternity and absoluteness. I realized it when he left: THAT suddenly collapsed.
And then I understood that it is one of lifes needs (there are several); and its what spurs the human being to get out of his present state and find another one. These needs are (whats the word?) the seeds, the germs of evolution. They compel us to progress. The whole time Sri Aurobindo was here, as I said, individual progress was automatic: all the progress Sri Aurobindo made, I made. But I was in a state of eternity, of absoluteness, with a feeling of such security, in every circumstance. Nothing, nothing unfortunate could happen, for he was there. So when he left, all at oncea fall into a pit. And thats what projected me wholly (Mother gestures forward).
0 1962-11-30, #Agenda Vol 03, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
And it becomes such an absorbing and absolute experience (Mother seems to be enveloped in white light) the uncertainty, the instability, the fleeting, inconstant and impermanent nature of all thingseverything collapses, there is nothing to lean on, except THE SUPREME, for He is all.
One thing alone is unfailing: the absolute All.
0 1962-12-04, #Agenda Vol 03, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
This body is very conscious, it was BORN conscious, and throughout those years its consciousness went on growing, perfecting itself, proliferating, as it were; this was its concern, its joy. And with Sri Aurobindo, there was such peaceful certitude, there were no more problems, no more difficulties: the future was opening up, luminous and peaceful and certain. Nothing, nothing, no words can describe what a collapse it was for the body when Sri Aurobindo left.
Its only because Sri Aurobindos conscious will entered into itleft one body and entered the other. I was standing facing his body, you know, and I materially felt the friction as his will entered into me (his knowledge and his will): You will accomplish my Work. He said to this body: You will accomplish my Work. Its the one thing that kept me alive.
Apart from that. Theres nothing, no physical destruction I can think of, comparable to that collapse.
It took me twelve days to get out of ittwelve days during which I didnt speak a single word.
0 1962-12-12, #Agenda Vol 03, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Well, my usual answer, the only answer that has some weight with those beings, is Its not up to me. Its up to the Lord, address yourselves to Him. Then they keep quiet. They come back another time, hoping to succeed, and the response is always the same, which they find somewhat discouraging. After a while its over. But really, everything imaginable; and precisely for those who were progressing steadily: a collapse into all the old errors and stupidities. And then a sort of hate coming out of everything and everybody and hurled at me, with this inevitable conclusion: What are you doing here! Go away, youre not wanted. Nobody wants you, cant you see that! Its not up to me, its none of my business. Wanted or not, I am here for as long as the Lord keeps me here; when He no longer wants to keep me here, Hell make me go, thats allits none of my business. That calms them down, its the only thing that calms them down. But it doesnt discourage them!
Now I am just waiting for the hurricane to pass.
0 1962-12-15, #Agenda Vol 03, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Divine unity, embodied and manifested by collective humanity.
It was in both French and English. He called it Fundamental Axioms of Cosmic Philosophy. It was the work of a certain French metaphysician who was well known around the turn of the centuryhis name began with a B. He met Theon in Egypt when Theon was with Blavatski; they started a magazine with an ancient Egyptian name (I cant recall what it was), and then he told Theon (Theon must have already known French) to publish a Cosmic Review and the Cosmic Books. And this B. is the one who formulated all this gobbledygook.
--
But the reason for a loose-fitting robe is obvious: its important not to get cold during such experiences, and there shouldnt be anything hampering you. And also, its important that nothing interfere with your circulation, which diminishes greatly and must be protected.
These things are practical, but.
0 1962-12-28, #Agenda Vol 03, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
This cleansing of the middle ground is the whole story of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother I had been dredging, dredging, dredging the mire of the subconscious. The supramental light was coming down before November,2 but afterwards all the mud arose and it stopped.3 Once again Sri Aurobindo verified, not individually this time but collectively, that if one pulls down too strong a light, the violated darkness below is made to moan. It is noteworthy that each time Sri Aurobindo and the Mother had some new experience marking a progress in the transformation, this progress automatically materialized in the consciousness of the disciples, without their even knowing anything about it, as a period of increased difficulties, sometimes even revolts or illnesses, as though everything were grating and grinding. But then, one begins to understand the mechanism. If a pygmy were abruptly subjected to the simple mental light of a cultivated man, we would probably see the poor fellow traumatized and driven mad by the subterranean revolutions within him. There is still too much jungle beneath the surface. The world is still full of jungle, thats the crux of the matter in a word; our mental colonization is a minuscule crust plastered over a barely dry quaternary. And the battle seems endless; one digs and digs, said the Rishis, and the deeper one digs, the more the bottom seems to recede: I have been digging, digging. Many autumns have I been toiling night and day, the dawns aging me. Age is diminishing the glory of our bodies. Thus, thousands of years ago, lamented Lopamudra, wife of Rishi Agastya, who was also seeking transformation. But Agastya doesnt lose heart, and his reply is magnificently characteristic of the conquerors the Rishis were: Not in vain is the labor which the gods protect. Let us relish all the contesting forces, let us conquer indeed even here, let us run this battle race of a hundred leadings.
(Rig-Veda I.179)
0 1963-01-02, #Agenda Vol 04, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
I feel the work is going fairly fast inside, there are some interesting things (what shall I say?) like promises. But the [bodys] sensitivity and the possibility of imbalance have heightened, in the sense that a mere trifle, which in other circumstances would have been totally unimportant and would have just gone by smoothly, throws the body off balance the body has grown terribly sensitive. For example, a wrong reaction in someone, a tension or some reaction of a quite ordinary order, causes a sudden weariness in my body, as if it were exhausted. Then I have to collect myself and plunge back into the Source so that
These are difficult days.
0 1963-01-09, #Agenda Vol 04, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
If the inner being the true beingis the ruler, the power of the true being makes the body act automatically; but then it doesnt grow conscious of its own change, it doesnt collaborate in its change, so for the change to happen it would take maybe millennia. The true being has to be like this (gesture to the background, standing back) and the body has to do everything BY ITSELF, in other words, contain the Lord, receive the Lord, give itself to the Lord, BE the Lord. It does aspireoh, its intense, aflame thats very good. But the Lord (smiling) doesnt conform to the ordinary habit! So all the habits, the minute He just tries to take possession of one function or another, even partially (not totally), all the interrelationships, all the movements are changed instantlypanic. Panic at the particular spot. And the result: you faint, or you are just about to faint, or you have an excruciating pain, or anyway something APPARENTLY breaks down completely. So whats to be done? Wait patiently until that small number or large number of cells, that little spot of consciousness, has learned its lesson. It takes one day, two days, three days, then the chaotic, upsetting big event calms down, is explained, and those particular cells say to themselves (or begin saying to themselves), God, how dumb we are! It takes a little while, then they understand.
But there are thousands and thousands and thousands of them!
--
The yoga's collective difficulties.
During the last conversation, Mother had broken off abruptly as if about to faint.
0 1963-01-12, #Agenda Vol 04, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
And it keeps coming and coming. Many come and are not even aware of it! And I keep going and going. Consciously, most of the time, but also quite often not consciously. Heres an example: someone is very ill, someone who truly loves me (its Z, A.s wife). A. informed me she was ill. So I increased the dose (everyone is inside, I am with everyone, that goes without saying, but when something goes wrong I increase the dose). I increased the dose. I expected an improvement but it didnt happen. So I increased the dose again. The next day, I received a letter from A. saying that the night before, Z had had an interesting experience. She has asthma (asthmatics feel as if they are dying, its very painful, and she is very sensitive, very nervousshe was really unwell, so they drugged her, and so). Well then, during an acute attack of asthma, she sat up in her bed, her legs hanging down. Then her feet began to feel cold and she reached out for her slippers; she bent down, and instead of her slippers she felt something soft and alive. Astonished, she looks down and sees my feet. My feet were there with the sandals I used to wear to go outmy bare feet. So she touched my feet and said, Ohh, Mother is here! Immediately she lay down again, fell asleep and woke up cured.
And she didnt make it up: my feet WERE there. My feet, I mean something of me which took that form to be perceptible to her.
0 1963-01-14, #Agenda Vol 04, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
I know I know He wants me to learn not to take seriously the responsibility (responsibility isnt the right word), the formidable task of finding 8,000 rupees a day to meet the Ashrams expensesin other words, a colossal fortune every month.
And I very well see (because I told Him several times, You know, it would be great fun if I had plenty of money to play with), so I see that He laughs, but He doesnt answer! He teaches me to be able to laugh at this difficulty, to see the cashier send me his book in which the figures are growing astronomical ([laughing] its by 50,000, 60,000, 80,000, 90,000), while the drawer is nearly empty! And He wants me to learn to laugh at it. The day when I can really laughlaugh, enjoy myselfSINCERELY (not through effortyou can do anything you want through effort), when it makes me laugh spontaneously, I think it will change. Because otherwise its impossible. You see, we have fun with all sorts of things, theres no reason we couldnt have fun with more money than we need and do things in style! It will surely happen one day, but we shouldwe shouldnt be overwhelmed by the amount, and for that we shouldnt take money seriously.
0 1963-02-19, #Agenda Vol 04, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
It was really very interesting. Afterwards its just a memory, no longer the thing. It concerned the creation of the material world, the material universe, in the light of the conception of the Supreme in love with His emanation. But the vision was all-embracing, as if I were on the other side the side of the Supreme, not of the creation and saw the creation as a whole, with the true sense of progress, the true sense of advance, of movement, and the true way in which all that doesnt belong to the future creation will disappear in a kind of pralaya1 (it cant really disappear but it will be withdrawn from the Manifestation). And it was very interesting: all that doesnt collaborate (in the sense that it is a sufficient experience, an experience that has come to its end) was reabsorbed. It was like the true vision of what was rendered as the Last Judgment. It is something going on constantly, that mighty gust of manifestation, and there are things that have been, according to our vision of time, but that live on, that continue to exist in the future; there are things that exhaust themselves (thats in the present), and there are things that have no more purpose, that cannot keep pace with the movement (I dont know how to explain this) and enter the Non-Being the pralaya, the Non-Being, the unmanifestof course, not in their forms but in their essence; that is to say, the Supreme in them remains the Supreme but unmanifest.
But it was all a living, palpable experience which lasted for a day and a half. The entire universal movement was LIVED and sensed. Not merely seen but lived and in what light! What stupendous power! With that kind of certitude at the core of everything something very odd. Its very difficult to express. But the experience lasted so long that it became perfectly familiar. To translate it into words I might say: it is the Supremes way of seeingof feeling, of living. I was living things the way He does. And it gives a power of certitude of realization. In the sense that what we are heading for is already here; the road we look back on, the road we have traveled and the road yet to travel, it all lives simultaneously. And with such logic! An eternal, wonderful superlogic which makes it obviousness itselfeverything is obviousness itself. Struggle, effort, fear, all of that, oh, absolutely, absolutely nonexistent. And together with this, the explanation of the feeling we have of not wanting certain things any more: they leave the Manifest. You see, its like a sieve into which everything is thrown and where He to Him, everything, but everything is the same, but there is the vision of what He wants, and also of what is useless for what He wants or would prevent the fullness and totality of what He wants (contradictions of sorts, I dont know how to explain it)so with that He just goes this way (gesture of reswallowing) and it goes out of the Manifestation.
0 1963-02-23, #Agenda Vol 04, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
So colossal a difference that I didnt expect it I wasnt thinking about it nor was I expecting it. I stayed there as long as it lasted, then at a certain point someone said, Thats enough, they are getting tired. (It wasnt I who said it.) Enough, they cant take any more. So I came back inside. Thats what made me come inside. It lasted five minutes. In five minutes, they were full to bursting.
I think this body has become another person, its not the same any more. Its no longer what it used to be. Yet the memory of its earthly existence hasnt gone, it isnt another body. Yet it is another person. I am referring here only to the material consciousness (Mother touches her body). The other thing up there (gesture above) is all very easy to explain, the work was done long ago, thats not what I meanno, its here. The change is HERE. Its odd. There, petit.
--
But then, they had brought a four-year-old with them. Today was his birthday. They sent me some money for the child and asked for a card of blessings. I refused to give the card and threw the money back at themquite bluntly. I said, Tell these people that they are selfish and stupid, and I want nothing from them. And I banged on the table. Oh, oh! Everyone was petrified. (Mother laughs) The doctor was there, and Nolini, Champaklal, Amrita. Something in me was laughing a lot! Oh, they thought I was in a terrible fit: Theyll see what will happen to them! And you know, those vibrations are familiar to metheyre terrifying, mon petit. Not human. When it comes, its fearsome, people are in a cold sweat. And I watch it all like a spectator!
Fairly often, its Sri Aurobindo. But this time it was entirely impersonal. It was something that WILL NO LONGER tolerate in the world a certain kind of selfish stupidityto trample this childs finer feelings just because she isnt stupidly attached to her family (who didnt even give her a single thought all the time she was here, she didnt exist for them).
0 1963-03-19, #Agenda Vol 04, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Because at the start, there is usually that vibration with all the colors, though with blue strongly predominant (the color I have come to call the Tantric power in Matter); thats immediately with you, its a sort of normal state of concentration. Then afterwards, you seemed to recede or stretch out into a vast Immensity of very quiet silvery whitenessvery quiet and unbroken. Like a receding from outer life and a stretching out into that state. And then there comes downliterally comes downa very intense golden light, very intense, almost (what could I call it?) a colorful gold, really golden, very, very intense, and as though atomizeda powdering. The three in succession. Dont you feel that way?
I feel the second movement: a sense of expanse, it is all white and open.
0 1963-03-27, #Agenda Vol 04, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
The nations of the world legitimize that destructive madness of the arms race by saying its a way to prevent destruction through fear thats futile. As an argument, its futile, but thats the way they think. Its part of that same thirst or need for Security: nothing can be achieved except in peace, nothing can be arrived at except in peace, nothing can be realized except in peacewe need peace, individually, collectively, globally. So lets make horrifying weapons of destruction so that men will be so frightened that nothing will happenhow childish! But thats the current state of mind. It is still one of those in English they say device, a ploy (its not a ploy, its a meansbetween ploy and means) to urge the human race on towards its evolutionary goal. And for that, we must catch hold of the Divine: its a means of catching hold of the Divine. For there is nothingnothing, nothing exists from the point of view of Security, except the Supreme. If we ARE the Supreme, that is to say, the supreme Consciousness, supreme Power, supreme Existence, then there is Securityoutside of that, there is none. Because everything is in perpetual motion. What exists at one moment in time, as Sri Aurobindo says (time is an unbroken succession of moments), what exists at a given moment no longer exists the next, so theres no security. Its the same experience, seen from another angle, as that of Buddha, who said there was no permanence. And basically, the Rishis saw only from the angle of human existence, thats why they were after Immortality. It all boils down to the same thing.
(Mother remains in contemplation)
0 1963-04-06, #Agenda Vol 04, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
So looking at it from an ordinary viewpoint, its so fantastic, it means such a colossal work. Of course, its the Lord who does it, but will this hold out? (Mother touches her body) I cant say.
If He wants, certainly He will find a way for it to hold out. But the thing is rather new.
0 1963-04-20, #Agenda Vol 04, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Like a bang on the head I was completely dazed. They called a doctor. There were no medicines left in the citythere werent enough medicines for people, but as we were considered important people (!) the doctor brought two tablets. I told him (laughing), Doctor, I never take any medicines. What! he said. Its so hard to get them!Thats just the point, I replied, theyre very good for others! Then, then suddenly (I was in bed, of course, with a first-rate fever), suddenly I felt seized by trance the real trance, the kind that pushes you out of your body and I knew. I knew: Its the end; if I cant resist it, its the end. So I looked. I looked and I saw it was a being whose head had been half blown off by a bomb and who didnt know he was dead, so he was hooking on to anybody he could to suck life. And each of those beings (I saw one over me, doing his business!) was one of the countless dead. Each had a sort of atmospherea very widespread atmosphereof human decomposition, utterly pestilential, and thats what gave the illness. If it was merely that, you recovered, but if it was one of those beings with half a head or half a body, a being who had been killed so brutally that he didnt know he was dead and was trying to get hold of a body in order to continue his life (the atmosphere made thousands of people catch the illness every day, it was swarming, an infection), well, with such beings, you died. Within three days it was overeven before, within a day, sometimes. So once I saw and knew, I collected all the occult energy, all the occult power, and (Mother bangs down her fist, as if to force her way into her body) I found myself back in my bed, awake, and it was over. Not only was it over, but I stayed very quiet and began to work in the atmosphere. From that moment on, mon petit, there were no new cases! It was so extraordinary that it appeared in the Japanese papers. They didnt know how it happened, but from that day on, from that night on, not a single fresh case. And people recovered little by little.
I told the story to our Japanese friend in whose house we were living, I told him, Well, thats what this illness isa remnant of the war; and heres the way it happens. And that being was repaid for his attempt! Naturally, the fact that I repelled his influence by turning around and fighting [dissolved the formation]. But what power it takes to do that! Extraordinary.
He told the story to some friends, who in turn told it to some friends, so in the end the story became known. There was even a sort of collective thanks from the city for my intervention. But the whole thing stemmed from that: What Is this illness? Youre able to find out, arent you? (Laughter) Go and catch it!
But that feeling of being absolutely paralyzed, a prey to somethingabsolutely paralyzed, you cant You are no longer in your body, you understand, you cant act on it any more. And a sense of liberation when you are able to turn around.
0 1963-04-22, #Agenda Vol 04, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
On the material level, the conditions are as wretched as possiblein a word, complete barrenness in complete squalor. My body isnt too brilliant, but I hope it will get better. On the mental and affective level = NIL. That leaves the one Thing without which all would collapse.
I need you terribly.
0 1963-05-18, #Agenda Vol 04, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
(Mother asks for a box of paints to demonstrate practically the gradation of colors of the levels of consciousness, from the most material Nature to the Supreme. The point is to illustrate the symbol of Infinity, the figure 8, which Mother explained in the conversation of May 11: the infinite play of the Supreme reaching down to Nature and Nature rising toward the Supreme. Mother speaks in English in the presence of a disciple, who is a painter, so that he may convey her explanations to H., the disciple who is preparing illustrations for "Savitri".)
Of course, all these things are lights, so you cant reproduce them. But still, it must be a violet that is not dull and not dark (Mother starts from the most material Nature). What she has put is too red, but if its too blue, it wont be good eitheryou understand the difficulty? Then after violet there is blue, which must be truly blue, not too light, but it must be a bright blue. Not too light because there are three consecutive blues: there is the blue of the Mind, and then comes the Higher Mind, which is paler, and then the Illumined Mind, which is the color of the flag [Mothers flag], a silver blue, but naturally paler than that. And after this comes yellow, a yellow that is the yellow of the Intuitive Mind; it must not be golden, it must be the color of cadmium. Then after this yellow, which is pale, we have the Overmind with all the colors they must all be bright colors, not dark: blue, red, green, violet, purple, yellow, all of them, all the colors. And after that, we then have all the golds of the Supermind, with its three layers. And then, after that, there is one layer of golden whiteit is white, but a golden white. After this golden white, there is silver whitesilver white: how can I explain that? (H. has sent me some ridiculous pictures of a sun shining on waterit has nothing to do with that.) If you put silver, silver gray (Mother shows a silver box nearby shining brilliantly in the sun), silver gray together with white that is, it is white, but if you put the four whites together you see the difference. There is a white white, then there is a white with a touch of pink, then a silvery white and a golden white. It makes four worlds.
I have explained this [to H.] as I am explaining it to you, but H. has not seen it so she cant understand. I want to show her on paper. It is twelve different things [or twelve worlds], one after another.1
--
You saw last time how I lost my balance. When you touched my foot, there came down a not a column, it was a tornado! Of a light so white, so white! Not transparentsparkling white, white like milk. But such a powerful mass! It came so violently that I lost my balance. Thats all, I only lost my balance. And it remained there, it was thereyou saw how I stood a moment without raising my head, it was because I was looking at it. It was it was MUCH MORE SOLID THAN MATTER. Something very peculiar, it was solid! More solid, MORE MATERIAL THAN MATTER. And a power, a weight, a densityextraordinary! Like a great column, and everything became pure white. Absolutely white. Nothing but white, everywhere. It stayed on a few seconds. And the power of it threw me off balance.
I was in no condition to tell you all this at the time!
--
Mother seems to have forgotten the red of the vital, which comes between material Nature's violet and the Mind's blue. Thus we have twelve worlds: violet, red, blue (the Mind's three blues), yellow, then the Overmind's prismatic colors, which makes five lower worlds, then finally the three golds of the Supermind and the four whites of the supreme creative Joy or Ananda.
Mother means that there is no proof that the order was restored because of the Lord's intervention rather than by some other, "natural" mechanism.
0 1963-05-25, #Agenda Vol 04, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Not for a second did I think they would publish itin fact, to tell you the truth, it wouldnt make me too happy either! Its not a book for their collection. Their collection is much too trite, too superficial.
Anyhow it wouldnt have been in their collection because it has more than 300 pages and the books in their collection have only 150. But it could have been outside the collectionwell, it doesnt seem its going to happen. Id be curious to see their criticisms.
Oh, they wont understand anything anyway.
--
That universal thing might be a collective transformation. A transformation thats no longer exclusively individual the descent of the Holy Spirit into the collectivity?
I had been told that even in the college of Cardinals, things were only suggested, and each one was left to understand more or less deeply, according to his capacity. Its quite likely. But who has kept the tradition intact? We cant say.
Anyway, put like this, it makes sense.
0 1963-05-29, #Agenda Vol 04, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
It isnt role! The role is a fact, a sort of ineluctable fact, absolutely independent of the individual will and consciousness I am more and more convinced of it, fantastically so. The Work is done through a certain number of elementswhe ther they are aware of it or not, whether they collaborate or not makes little difference. It has been decided that way, it has been chosen that way and it is done that way. Whether you like it or not, whether you are aware of it or not, whether you collaborate or notvery little difference. Its more a question of personal satisfaction!
And in as much as the very cells of the body no longer feel their separateness (that is almost entirely gone, even in the sensation), then something is done (or takes place), but without any self-observation. Somewhere (gesture above), something knows, wills and acts; somewhere else, there is a certain number of things in a state of happy receptivity, and absolutely, extraordinarily passive, not interfering. And the less it observes, the better. It remains in an inner contemplation, or rather turned to the Heights (a Height that is everywhere, of course, not just above), a Height perfectly luminous, perfectly conscious, perfectly effective. And thats all that is needed.
0 1963-06-08, #Agenda Vol 04, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
It was yesterday, I think, in the night (not last night, the night before, the 6th of June, that is), for more than three hours without stop, there was no consciousness of anything any morenot a thought, not a will, not an action, not an observation, nothing. Everything was at a standstill. For instance, all that happens when you have experiences and you work in the subconscientall that, everything, everything was at a standstill. It was like the action of a Force. Without any thought or idea, only the sensation and a sort of perception (awareness is the right word) of a Force, but a stupendous Force, you know, like the Force of the earthall the combinations of the forces along with an action that came from above and worked on them. It was going through me (especially around the head down to the chest, but it was going on in the whole body, and it was spherical), it went through me and out, and out, and out in this direction, that direction, another direction, innumerable directions, and nothing but movements of Force (there was something like a perception of colors, but not in the ordinary way: like a knowledge that certain vibrations corresponded to a particular color), but it was an incalculable MASS, almost indefinite, at any rate, and simultaneous. At first I said to myself (laughing), Whats going on? Then I thought, All right, it doesnt matter, Ill just let it happen. And it went on and on and onthree hours without letup.
I didnt know I didnt know anything any more, didnt understand anything any more, had no bearings any more; there was only a Force on the move, and what Force! It was a Force that came from beyond and acted upon all the forces of the earth: on big things, on small things, on small, precise points, on enormous things, and it was going on and on and on, on this point, that point, all points together and everywhere. I suppose that if the mind had been associated with the experience, it would have gone a bit mad! It gave that impression, you see, because it was so overwhelming that And all the time, all the time in the physical center (the physical center, that is, in the corporeal base), with something in an ecstatic state; it was very interesting how that ecstasyan ecstasy that sparkled like a diamondwas there, so sweet, so sweet, so peaceful, as though it were there all the while, telling the body, Dont be afraid, (laughing) dont worry, dont be afraid, all is well. As though the supreme Power were saying all the while, Dont worry, dont worry, leave it to me, leave it to me. It lasted more than three hours.
--
There were no psychological perceptions (what I call psychological perceptions are, for instance, vibrations of love, vibrations of peace, vibrations of light, vibrations of knowledge, of power), they werent there in that form, it wasnt that. Still, all that must have been there, because there were many things, many things that were all one thing, but one thing which assumed different forms; but I didnt see the forms, I didnt see the colors. It was only a question of pure sensation. A pure vibratory sensation: only vibrations, vibrations, vibrations, on a colossal scale.
It is a new experience.
--
You see, when I had that experience of the pulsations of Love in April last year, I had the perception of the color, the psychological perception of the state I was in (how can I explain?), for instance, the quality of the vibration of Love (something that has absolutely nothing to do with earthly things). At the time, I was That, I was those vibrations, but I was fully aware of the quality of those vibrations, and remained so for monthsthis is completely different! It was nothing but an action. NOTHING but an action. And an action, you know, in which the human body is less than an ant. Much less than an ant: an imperceptible point. Yet there seemed to be ONLY this body! As if this body alone were there and it were going through that. This body was a body it was THE body! And that point that comforting point of ecstasywas very small. Very small. But it was there, quite insistent, very conscious, telling me, Dont interfere; leave it to me entirely, all is wellsee, all is well. Very small, very small. Yet it was my body: I tell you, my head still seems swollen!
Strange.
0 1963-06-12, #Agenda Vol 04, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
It was a rather acute sensation that when the world, the earth, goes from one state to another, there is a sort of transition; it is always like a ridge between two mountains (gesture of a precarious balance), and there is a very perilous moment when the slightest thing can cause a catastrophewhich means a lot of things would have to be built anew. The same phenomenon exists too on a very small scale, for individuals, in the sense that when they go from one state of consciousnessa collection of states which constitutes their individualityto a higher state, or when they introduce into their state an element that will yield a higher synthesis, there is always a dangerous period when a catastrophe is possible. And the sensation I had last night was that the earth is now going through one such period of transition, and there isthere was or there isa possibility of catastrophe.
(silence)
0 1963-06-15, #Agenda Vol 04, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
With me, its a wonderful thing (I give thanks to the Lord): I feel neither hot nor cold nor anything any more. But I can see that people suffer from heat.
I suffer when I write. When I write, I burn. I burn, my body literally burns! When I wrote the book on Sri Aurobindo, I was exhaustedit burns me, you see, I am ablaze! And then I get covered all over with salt: I dont sweat but I get covered with salt!
--
Its true, people are generally built for the place where they are to live, but in my case, I felt comfortable only here. Up to the age of thirty, my whole childhood and youth, I always felt coldalways cold. And in winter Yet I went skating, did exercises, I led a very active life but cold, terribly cold! I felt as if I lacked the sun. But when I came here: Ah, at last! (Mother takes a breath) Now I am comfortable. The first year when I came here, bringing all that accumulated cold in my body, at the height of summer, in this season, I was going about in a woolen suit! A skirt, a blouse and a cloak. People would stare at me. I didnt even notice itit was my natural dress.
When I left again, I went by boat (people didnt travel by plane at the time), and when I came to the middle of the Mediterranean, I fell sicksick from the cold, in the Mediterranean! So you see, I was built for the work here, (laughing) it was foreseen!
But couldnt we do something about that burning sensation?
0 1963-06-19, #Agenda Vol 04, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
There are activities that take place in a semidarkness, which the people of the placepeople who are here at the Ashramregard as light and where everyone attends to his affairs with his own ideas and what he considers to be his knowledge. Everything takes place in a semidarkness, a great confusion and a you know, a most oppressive sense of powerlessness. It went on for hours. Finally, I absolutely wanted I wanted to get out of that place at all costs and return to the Light (the real one) and the open. But it was literally impossible: whatever path I took to get out suddenly collapsed, or disappeared as if swallowed up in a wall or a complexity of incoherent things, or else it came to an abrupt end, plunging straight down very deep. I remember one of those places, I absolutely wanted to find a way out, and when I got there, there was a sheer gulf, and I said to myself, What am I going to do? Just then I saw a man, I dont know who he was, but he was dressed (it was symbolic) as a mountain climber, with all the equipment needed to climb down a sheer cliff, and with the help of his ice axe he fastened himself to the cliff and climbed down. Then I said, This is PRETENDING to find the way, but its not finding the way. I was there concentrating, and as I concentrated, suddenly I was able to find a path which led me up to a terrace.
I was accompanied by three or four people (but they are symbolic people). Everything was taking place in a half-night, and outside it was complete night. But when I reached the terrace, there was one of those big electric street lights, which turned on and gave a white light (like the half-light of an electric lamp in the nightwhich is nothing). The terrace was a very long one, but with a drop on every side: there was no way to get out; at one end, the way was blocked by a sort of house, and on both sides it plunged straight down into a black hole. And then that sense of powerlessness, of knowing nothingyou dont know where to go, you dont know what to do. It was And it is THE ORDINARY STATE OF HUMAN CONSCIOUSNESS the consciousness of human activity. But in my consciousness (I was shut in there, you understand), it was truly it was almost a torture, last night; it was frightful.
0 1963-06-29, #Agenda Vol 04, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
(Mother glances through a collection of Playground Talks and chances on the following question, which she answers immediately:)
Why isnt the universe a place of perfect bliss?1
--
But clay, that was something really newand lovely! Pink. Pink, a warm, golden pink. They were cutting out [of the clay] rooms, stairways, ship decks and funnels, captains cabins. Sri Aurobindo himself is as he was, but more with a harmony of form: very, very broad here (in the chest), broad and solid. And very agile: he comes and goes, sits down, gets up, always with great majesty. His color is a sort of golden bronze, a color like the coagulation of his supramental gold, of his golden supramental being; as if it were very concentrated and coagulated to fashion his appearance; and it doesnt reflect light: it seems as if lit from within (but it doesnt radiate), and it doesnt cast any shadows. But perfectly natural, it doesnt surprise you, the most natural thing in the world: thats the way he is. Ageless; his hair has the same color as his body: he has hair, but you cant say if its hair, its the same color; the eyes too: a golden look. Yet its perfectly natural, nothing surprising. He sits down just as he used to, with his leg as he used to put it [the right leg in front], and at the same time, when he gets up, he is agile: he comes and goes. Then when he went out of the house (he had told me he would have to go, he had an appointment with someone: he had promised to see two people, he had to go), he went out into a big garden, and down to the boatwhich wasnt exactly a boat, it was a flat boatand he had to go to the captains cabin (he had to see the captain about some work), but it was with that boat that he was returning to his room elsewherehe has a room elsewhere. Then after a while I thought, Ill follow him so I can see. So I followed him; as long as I saw him in front of me I followed him. And when I came to the boat, I saw it was entirely built out of pink clay! Some workmen were working thereadmirable workmen. So Sri Aurobindo went down quite naturally, down into the ship under construction, without (I dont think there were any stairs), and I followed him down. Then I saw him enter the captains room; as he had told me he had some work to do, I thought (laughing), I dont want to meddle in others business! Ill go back home (and I did well, I was already late in waking up!), Ill go back home. And I saw one of the workmen leaving (as Sri Aurobindo had come back to the ship, they stopped the work). He was leaving. I called him, but he didnt know my language or any of the languages I know; so I called him in thought and asked him to pull me up, as I was below and there was a sheer wall of slippery clay. Then he smiled and with his head he said, I certainly dont mind helping you, but it isnt necessary! You can climb up all by yourself. And indeed he held out his hand, I took it (I only touched him slightly), and climbed up all by myself without the slightest difficulty I was weightless! I didnt have to pull at his hand, he didnt pull me up. And as soon as I was up, I went back home I woke up and found myself in my bed five minutes later than my usual time.
But what struck me was the clayit means something very material, doesnt it? And pink! A pink, oh, lovely! A golden pink.
0 1963-07-03, #Agenda Vol 04, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Here, your flowers [roses]. A magnificent color.
Then I have another photo of the Pope (Mother shows Time magazine).
--
Another time, when I was younger, I was in Italy, in Venice, painting in a corner of St. Marks Cathedral (a marvelous place of great beauty), and I happened to be sitting right next to a confessional. One day, as I sat there painting, I saw the priest arrive and enter the confessional that man completely black, tall, thin, the very face of wickedness and hardness: a pitiless wickedness. He closeted himself in there. After a short while there came a rather young woman, perhaps thirty years old, gentle, very sweetnot intelligent but very sweetentirely dressed in black. She entered the box (he was already shut in and could no longer be seen), and they spoke through a grille. I should add that its far more medieval than in France, it was really it was almost theatrical. She knelt down there, I saw her long gown flowing out, and she was speaking. (I couldnt hear, she was whispering; besides, both of them spoke in Italian, although I understand Italian.) The voices were barely audible, there was no sound. Then all at once, I heard the woman sobbing (she was sobbing in spasms), and it went on till suddenlya collapse: she crumpled in a heap on the floor. Then that man opened the door, shoving aside her body with the door and he strode away without a backward glance. I was young, you know, and if I could have, I would have killed him. What he had just done was monstrous. And he was going away it was a chunk of steel that walked out.
Incidents of that sort have left me with a peculiar impression. The stories of the Inquisition had already given me a sufficient Now, of course, youve heard what I told you [the story of the Asura], and thats really my way of seeing the thing. But there was a time when I might have said, No religion has done more evil in the world than this one.
0 1963-07-13, #Agenda Vol 04, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
It was very interesting. I had to see someone before him, and I wanted enough time to prepare the atmosphere, but it didnt last too long. Then it condensed and accumulated. It made an absolutely still atmosphere, with only the internal vibration I dont know how to explain. Ive said this a few times already: there is a Force which doesnt move and consequently can be said to be absolutely still, yet has an INNER intensity of vibration far more considerable than the vibration of motion. And its a PALE golden light: it isnt white at all, its golden. But not an intense gold: a pale color. It filled everything (there were no more walls in the room), and it was condensed, so condensed, as if tight as if under pressure, you know. There was nothing left but the inner vibration.
He came in, and there was only the ripple of his coming in. It took him maybe a minute or two to adapt. I dont know what his first impression was, but he looked visibly somewhat embarrassednot ill at ease, but almost surprised, as if wondering, Whats going on? Then after not even two minutes, he made his usual movement and stayed exactly twenty-two minutes without ANYTHING stirring. Nothing stirred. The atmosphere was absolutely still, without a thought, a movement, a reaction or anything.
0 1963-07-27, #Agenda Vol 04, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
It isnt final, mind you, only a first contact: the experience recurs on another occasion and for another reason (they arent mental reasons, they are occasions), it recurs, but there is already a beginning of collaboration: the cells have LEARNED that with That, the state changed (very interestingly, they remember), so they begin to collaborate, and the Action is even more rapid. Then a third time, a few hours away, it recurs once again; but then THE CELLS THEMSELVES call and ask for the divine Action, because they remember. And then That comes in, gloriously, like something established.
Now Ive got it Ive got the knack! Its for training the cells, you understand! Its not just like a sick person who has to be cured once and for all: no, its a training of the cells, to teach them to live.
0 1963-07-31, #Agenda Vol 04, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
But this time, there was a voluntary collaboration, so maybe it will go faster.
I was unable to do my work3: the jolt was too strong. But I said I would see you because I wanted to tell you about it.
--
Because, with everybody, I feel as if I had to shout in order to be heard and its an effort, a considerable effort. There is a sort of mass, the color of brownish earth, weighing down on me, as though I were buried and had to shout. All the while I was speaking to you just now, I felt as if I were making an enormous effort to be heard.
Am I shouting or?
0 1963-08-07, #Agenda Vol 04, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Its giving me the same kind of nights again. But its odd, I dont know what it means, last night there were buildings made of a kind of red granite, and many Japanese. Japanese women sewing and making ladies dresses and fabrics; Japanese youths climbing up and down the buildings with great agility; and everybody was very nice. But it was always the same thing (gesture of a collapse or a fall into a hole): you know, a path opens up, you walk on it, and after a while, plop! it all collapses. And there was a young Japanese man who was climbing up and down the place absolutely like a monkey, with extraordinary ease: Oh, I thought, but thats what I should do! But when I approached the spot, the things he used to climb up and down vanished! Finally, after a while, I made a decision: I will go just the same, and found myself downstairs. There I met some people and all sorts of things took place. But what I found interesting was that all the buildings (there were a great many of them, countless buildings!) were made of a kind of red porphyry. It was very beautiful, Granite or porphyry, there were both. Wide stairs, big halls, large gardenseven in the gardens there were constructions.
But outwardly, difficulties are coming back, in the sense that the Chinese seem to be seized again with a zeal to conquer they are massing troops at the border.
0 1963-08-10, #Agenda Vol 04, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
But its still going on. Now, theres a great battle against all the ideas, the habits, the sensations, the possibilities, everything, concerning deathdeath (laughing), not death in the sense of the consciousness departing (that, of course, people talk about, but those things no longer exist), no: WHAT THE CELLS MUST FEEL.2 And all the possibilities are presented to me With that consciousness (the consciousness accumulated, compressed in all those cells), when the heart stops beating and its understood that, according to human ignorance, you are dead, how does the force that groups all those cells together abdicate its will to hold them all together? Naturally, I was told right away (because the problemall the problemscome from everywhere, and its purposely that I am shown the problem and made to struggle with it; its not just as an idea), I was told right away that that force, that consciousness which holds everything together in really superconscious cells (they dont have at all the ordinary type of consciousness; ordinarily, its the inner, vital being [Mother touches the heart center] thats conscious of oneness, that is, conscious of being a being), that this aggregate of cells is now an aggregate OF ITS OWN WILL, with an organized consciousness which is a sort of collective gathering of that cellular consciousness; well Obviously this is an exceptional condition, but even in the past, in those beings who were very developed outwardly, there was a beginning of willed, conscious cellular gathering, and thats certainly why in ancient Egypt, where occultism was very developed. exceptional beings such as the pharaohs, the high priests, etc., were mummified, so as to preserve the form as long as possible. Even here in India, generally they were petrified (in the Himalayas there were petrifactive springs). There was a reason.3
And I saw for Sri Aurobindo (although he hadnt yet started this systematic transformation; but still, he was constantly pulling the supramental force down into his body), even in his case, it took five days to show the first slight sign of decomposition. I would have kept his body longer, but the government always meddles in other peoples business, naturally, and they pestered me awfully, saying it was forbidden to keep a body so long and that we should So when the body began to (whats the word?) shrinkit was shrinking and contracting, that is, dehydrating then we had to do it. He had had enough time to come out, since almost everything came into my bodyalmost everything that was material came into my body.
0 1963-08-21, #Agenda Vol 04, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
For instance, these last few days I had a whole vision of X, of what he represents, the people around him, his relationship with the Ashramall that entirely changed. Every element took a new place in relation to all the others. And I have nothing to do with it, I dont try to understand, I dont try to see, nothing: the thing is simply shown to me. Like pictures that are shown to me. Each thing has its own special flavor, its own special color, its own special quality and its own special relationship with the restall the relationships are different.
Its growing very PRECISE, very minute, very sharp, not floating: very accurate to the last detail. And with a great simplicity.
0 1963-08-24, #Agenda Vol 04, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
I told you that the only process Ive known, and which recurred several times in my life, is to renounce an error. Something you believe to be truewhich probably was true for a timeon which you partly base your action, but which, in actuality, was only one opinion. You thought it was a truthful finding with all its logical consequences, and your action (part of your action) was based on it, so that everything proceeded from it automatically. Till suddenly an experience, a circumstance or an intuition warns you that your finding isnt so true as it appeared to be (!) Then there is a whole period of observation and study (sometimes too it comes as a revelation, a massive proof), and then its not just your idea or false knowledge that needs to be changed, but also all its consequences, perhaps an entire way of acting on a particular point. At that moment, you get a sort of sensation, something that feels like a sensation of renunciation; that is to say, you have to undo a whole collection of things you had built. Sometimes its quite considerable, sometimes a very small thing, but the experience is the same: the movement of a force, a dissolving power, and the resistance of all that must be dissolved, all the past habit. It is the contact of the movement of dissolution with the corresponding resistance that probably translates in the ordinary human consciousness as the sense of renunciation.
I saw that very recently; its something insignificant, the circumstances are completely unimportant in themselves (its only the study of the whole that makes it interesting). Its the only phenomenon that has recurred several times in my life and which for that reason I know well. And as the being progresses, the power of dissolution increases, becomes more and more immediate, and the resistance lessens. But I remember the time when the resistances were at their highest (more than half a century ago), and it never worked in any other way: it was always something outside menot outside my consciousness but outside my will something that resists the will. I never had the feeling I had to renounce things but I felt as if I had to exert a pressure on them to dissolve them. Whereas now, the farther I go, the more imperceptible the pressure becomes, its immediate: as soon as the Force that comes to dissolve a collection of things manifests, theres no resistance, everything gets dissolved; on the contrary, theres hardly any sense of liberation theres something that is amused every time and says, Ah, again! How many times you limit yourself. How many times you think youre constantly moving on, smoothly, without stopping, and how many times you set a little limit to your action (it isnt a big limit because its a very little thing within an immense whole, but its a limit nonetheless). And then when the Force acts to dissolve the limit, at first you feel liberated, you feel a joy; but now its not even like that any more: there is a smile. Because its not a sense of liberationyou very simply remove a stone that stands in your way.
Thats more or less what I told you last night, but I told it to you complete with illustrations! It would take pages, you understand! (Laughing) Thats why the illustrations are gone, otherwise it would fill a volume. There were all the explanations, all the details.
That idea of renunciation can occur only in an egocentric consciousness. Naturally, people (those whom I call quite unevolved) are attached to thingswhen they have something, they dont want to let go of it! That seems so childish to me! For them, if they are obliged to give it up, it hurts! Because they identify with the things they hold on to. But thats childish. The real process behind is the amount of resistance in the things that developed on a certain basis of knowledgea knowledge at a given time, no longer a knowledge at another timea partial knowledge, not fleeting but impermanent. There is a whole collection of things built on that knowledge, and they resist the Force that says, No! Its not true, (laughing) your basis is no longer true, away with it! But then, Oh, it hurts!thats what people feel as renunciation.
The difficult thing is perhaps not so much to renounce as to accept [Mother smiles] when you see life as it is now. But then if you accept, how can you live in the midst of all that while having that untroubled rapture the untroubled rapture not up there but here?1
0 1963-08-31, #Agenda Vol 04, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
You were in a sort of golden light, rather solid, and then from here (the throat) down to here (the solar plexus), there were all the Tantric colors, you know, all the shades. I dont know if you have ever seen them: the Tantrics have an atmosphere with all the colors, not mixed together but side by side. Its a kind of chart of powers, and according to the color they select and pick out, or use, it serves one purpose or another: one is for health, another for progress, another for understanding, and so forth. That chart was with you, and I saw your hand moving as if you were writing.
I see those colors, I always see them in association with those who have practiced Tantrism. X always has them with him, and with his guru,1 its even much more, very strong and very intense.
It was there in front of you, from there (the throat), that is to say the center of relationship with the world, down to here (the solar plexus).
0 1963-09-18, #Agenda Vol 04, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Because NOTHING in the consciousness budged during those changeovers [back and forth from the true to the false movement]; the consciousness is like that, turned not upward, not inward, turned simply turned to the Lord, living in His Light, which, in the physical world, becomes a golden splendor. The consciousness is turned to That. There is nothing but That, its the sole reality, the sole truth. And It vibrates like this (Mother touches her hands, her arms), It vibrates in all the cells, everywhere. I go like this (Mother makes a gesture of collecting it in the air around), as if I picked it up. It isnt ethereal, its very material; it feels like an air that is thick but vibrant, very vibrant. The consciousness is like that. And all this goes on in the body. But with the presence of that old idiot which is immediately pessimistic, catastrophic, defeatisthow defeatist, oh it sees everything as a calamity. And then that wonderful character, after imagining the worse (in the space of a second, of course), it submits it all to the Lord and tells Him, Here, Lord, here is Your work, its all Yours, do what You will with it! The silly idiot, why did it have to prepare its catastrophes! A catastrophe, invariably a catastrophe, everything is catastrophic but it offers its catastrophe to the Lord!
And the answer is invariably a smile full of such patience, oh! That patience gives me a sense of wonder every second.
0 1963-09-25, #Agenda Vol 04, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
The thing is new to me. Thats what I told you the other day: first an experience, but an experience something that takes HOLD of the entire being, the entire body, everything, everything, like this (grasping gesture) and keeps you in its hold. And it works. It works everywhere in the cells: absolutely everywhere, in the consciousness, in the sensation, in the cells. Then it settles, as if passing through a very fine sieve, and it falls back to the other sideas words. But not always arranged in sentences (its very odd): two words here, three words there (Mother seems to show patches of color here and there). Then I keep very still, I dont stirabove all I dont think, dont stirsilence. Then, little by little, the words start a dance, and when they form a reasonably coherent sentence, I write it down. But generally it isnt final. If I wait a little longer (even while doing something else), after a time it comes: a sentence that has a far more logical and striking existence. And if I wait still longer, it becomes more precise, until finally it comes with a feeling, Now this is it. Thats what happened with the English note: Now this is it. Good, so I write it down.
I never had that before. Everything had to fall silent (I mean even the most active and material outer mind), I had to get into the habit, when my experience comes, of not stirringnot stirring, nothing stirring, everything like this (gesture in suspense), waiting.
--
And now, with that new process, the papers will go on multiplying! Because it comes the way I told you [in successive bits]. But it has an advantage: the mind stays absolutely silent the mind need not do anything, its as if someone came to look for the words in a storehouse and made all the arrangements. And that someone is impersonal: an impersonal consciousness. Almost the consciousness of what wants to be expressed, the consciousness of a revelation or an instruction, or the consciousness of a will, but not of a person. That someone collects the words and puts them together, then there is a dance like a dance of electrons!
(silence)
--
But the night before, I was with Sri Aurobindo, who gave me a revelation. I was with him, he was reclining (not stretched out but on a sort of chaise longue) and I was supposed to bring him something to eat (not at all like physical food, its something else I dont know what it is its rather different in that world the subtle physical), and it was expressed to me (there were no words in my consciousness; I dont know why, no words), he told me something which I understood perfectly, not only understood but it made me very happy, a joy came into me, and I answered, Yes, exactly! It corresponds to the experience I had today and which is??? (Mother leaves her sentence hanging) You see, I was conscious while I was having all the activity, but it was expressed in words [there] that arent words [here], so I dont know what to do! And he told me in the tone you take when expressing a definitive and overwhelming experience (his tone was one of absolute power) something that was translated like this: Now, the nourishment (it wasnt nourishment but food) comes from the whole of Nature at once. (Mother utters those words like a riddle or an open sesame that has not yet opened the door) And he told me to bring it to him (that too was a translation): Yes, you will bring it (the it was that food coming from the whole Nature at onceits a seemingly silly transcription, but anyway), you will bring it in this translucent bowl. And I replied, Yes, I knew, I knew that I had to use this translucent bowl to bring you the food. But what on earth does that correspond to?? Yet it was so evident! There was such a joy! (Because as I was conscious, I thought, Well, all the same, I am still following him closely in his development, its going on as when he was here: when he wins a victory, it is materialized in me.) Thus I was perfectly conscious and I told him, Ah, I am glad! (I am faltering, of course, it wasnt that at allit was admirable.) Oh, I am glad, I knew that I had to bring you the food in this translucent bowl. And the translucent bowl was a marvel! I had it, you see, it was beautiful! It was like opaline, living glass, all luminous but with all the lights alive and moving, and what colors! Pink, mauve, silver and gold, oh, it was so very beautiful. And I brought it to him.
It impressed me very strongly. Very strongly: I was under a spell, probably because the experience was still too strong and powerful for the material brain. And I saw it immediately; at the very moment of the experience, I saw it was a transcription, and an extraordinarily poor transcription, but nothing better could be done.
--
Last night was less pleasant. There were again those things collapsing. I was below, you see, trying to go back up to my room, and every time I tried to go back up, all the means to do so disappeared or were done away with. Now Ive chased it all away because it was tiring. But one thing I do remember: I was climbing up a sort of not stairs or a ladder, it was a very queer thing, like blocks of dark red stone, and they were all crumbling and coming apart. It ended up annoying me, and I had a movement not of anger, but of self-assertive will and everything vanished. You feel its adverse formations trying to harass you, until I cant say I lose patience, but something gets angry (is it angry? Asserts itself, rather: Ah, no! Enough!) and instantly, pfft! it all goes away. But then I found myself on a road I knew very well, but there was such a crowd! A crowd, a crowd: all the schools of the world were coming there for their holidays. There were troops of kids led by matrons and teachers, myriads and myriads of them! And also children who stopped and played on the ground; but all those children knew me very well, and when I arrived, they would take their things out of the way to let me throughweeny little kids this high. Then I met a symbolic person (not a human person) whom I know very well, she was pale blue (that is to say, a being of the higher mind, a force of Nature in the higher mind), I know her very well, she is very often with me. She explained to me her difficulties and I explained to her what she should do; I told her, Ive already told you several times, its like this and like that. She stayed beside me a very long time, and she asked me, Why do I always have to leave you? I answered her, Dont worry; everything is fine now. It went on for a long time. But it was interesting, a very pleasant, very refined contact: a beautiful girl that is, a beautiful thought or a beautiful idea. A beautiful girl. And she had in her charge an innumerable amount of kids (Mother laughs), so she was somewhat worried at times, and I explained to her what she should do.
I feel a sort of tenderness towards that person.
--
But that experience [of the crumbling stairs], I know what it corresponds to, because I know the experience I had when I went to sleep: its always when I am confronted with the Problem. I could put it this way (but that diminishes it a lot), Why is the world the way it is? Then there comes to me that sort of its an INTENSE state of compassionintense, almost painful for the condition of the world and humanity. When that comes, I have those difficulties at night. And then I ask, I want to know the REAL secretnot all the things people have told (which all seem to me just like a story to to comfort children), but the REAL thing. When I go into deep rest with that tension, its always translated by those things collapsing: I try to climb and crunch! crunch! crunch! all the time, all the time everything crumbles under the weight of my ascent. Until I see that ill will trying to stop me from finding what I want to find, so I get angry and it stops instantlyis angry the word? I dont know: I refuse, I refuse the situation. Then it stops short.
And I awake saying to myself, You see, its all your fault: as long as you accept, you cannot know, you are in the dark; when you really refuse, you will know.
0 1963-10-03, #Agenda Vol 04, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
It was fringed with red, like little red sparks. The same white square. Afterwards, it was as though absorbed and replaced by a square of blue and green light the blue and green of the Tantrics: its like vividly colored emerald and sapphire, a powerful color. Translucent, luminous. And the two squares became superposed the blue first, the green on top.
But before that, when the white square fringed with red entered (it took form first, you see; it seemed to take form between us), it took form and then something eased in youdid you feel a relaxation?
0 1963-10-16, #Agenda Vol 04, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
And always that question of age In everybody, everybody, without even their noticing it, there is always in the background (for the slightest thing, at the slightest opportunity), always the idea of old age, of going downhill, of decrepitude. And it comes a thousand times a day! (Mother laughs) So here too, I say to the Lord, Listen, am I really going downhill? Then He shows me one or two things in a dazzling light. It happens to me off and onnot oftenwhen the avalanche has been considerable enough; then there is a bedazzlement of Light and Power, sometimes of such a formidable Power that you get the feeling that if you were to wield it what would happen? For instance, if I simply come into contact with a malicious ill will (thats rare), an urge or a desire to harm, I do this (Mother pinches the vibration between her fingers), I do this (but it corresponds to an inner action: its a Power that acts together with a white Light, absolutely white, you know, intolerant of anything but the perfectly white), and almost instantly, in the person in whom the movement of ill will resulted in a partial possession of the vital: an attack of nerves or (what do they call it?) a vital collapse or a nervous collapse, very tangible. So naturally, you curb all movements and you watch it all, perfectly quiet, with the eternal Smile. But its as if to show me: herehere is the potentiality (!) Only there is no Order to wield it, except now and then just to see.
(silence)
--
Things are increasingly AS THEY ARE: exact, without complications. I have noticed that with people, even the most sincere and straightforward, there is always a kind of coating, an emotive coating (even with the coldest and driest), something that belongs to the vital; an emotive coating that makes things fuzzy, uncertain and allows a game that gives them a feeling of all sorts of mysterious forces at playthings are very clear, very simple, very, oh, very simple, and that coating brings along a sort of confusion. Its not sentiment, not emotion either, its something something that LOVES uncertainty, the unknown, the unexpectednot positively chance (its not so strong), but which loves to live in that, in in fact, in Ignorance! Which loves not to know whats going to happen. Even the simplest things, the most obvious, have all that coating over them.
Look, for instance, how many people, even the most serious, love to have their fortune told: reading the hand, reading the handwriting (I am pestered with people who ask me things like that), but anyway, even regardless of any spiritual idea, that sort of interest people find in being told, See, your life line will last up to here. People love it! They love it, they love to remain in their uncertainty. They love their ignorance. They love that unknown the unknown full of mysteries. They love the prophet who comes and tell them, This is what you will do. This is what is going to happen to you. It seems so childish! Its the same as the taste for theater, its the same thing (not the playwright, but the spectator who watches the play without knowing how it will end), or again the taste for novels the taste for the unknown. But then thats very close to the taste for the marvelous.
0 1963-10-19, #Agenda Vol 04, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Yesterday (this is an example I give you, but in all three domains its similar), yesterday it was a question of money. The question of money, for more than twelve years, has been a problemgrowing increasingly acute because the expenses are increasing fantastically while the income is decreasing! (laughing) So the two things together make the problem very acute. It results in things to be paid but no money, which means that the cashier (the poor cashier, it does him a lot of good from the yogic viewpoint: he has acquired a calm that he never had before! But still he is the one who has to stand the greatest tension), the cashier spends money and I cannot reimburse him. Very well. And then its not for me to run about, look for money, arrange things, discuss with people, of course, that wouldnt be proper (!), and those who do it for me have in them a rather sizable amount of tamas, which I cannot yet shake up. Anyway, yesterday they proposed something absurd to me (I dont want to go into the details, it doesnt matter), but their proposal was absurd and put me in a totally unacceptable situation. In other words, it might have brought a legal action against me, I might have been summoned before the court, anyway, all kinds of inadmissible thingsnot that I care personally, but theyre inadmissible. When they proposed their idea to me, I looked and saw it was silly; I was very quiet, when, suddenly, there came into me a Power (I told you it happens now and then) like this (massive gesture). When it comes, you feel as though you could destroydestroy everything with it you see, its too awesome for the present state of the earth. So I answered very quietly that it was unacceptable, I said why, and I returned the paper. Then something COMPELLED me to add: If I am here, it is not because of any necessity or obligation; it is not a necessity from the past, not a karma, not any obligation, any attraction, any attachment, but only, solely and absolutely because of the Lords Grace. I am here because He keeps me here, and when He no longer keeps me here, when He considers I am not to stay any longer, I wont stay. And I added (I was speaking in English), As for me (as for me [gesture upward] that is, not this [gesture to the body]), as for Me, I consider that the world isnt ready: its way of responding inwardly and outwardly, even visibly in those around me, proves that the world isnt ready something must happen for it to be ready. Or else it will take QUITE SOME TIME for it to be prepared. Its all the same to me: whether it is ready or not makes no difference. And everything could collapse, Icouldntcareless. And with what force I said that! My arm rose, my fist banged on the tablemon petit, I thought I was going to break everything!
I was watching the scene, thinking, Why the devil am I made to do this?! These people are, apparently, quite devoted, quite surrendered and intimate enough not to be afraid. (I dont know what effect it had on them, but it must have had some effect.) As soon as it was over, I started working again, looking into affairs and so on. Afterwards, once I was alone, I wondered, Why did that come into me? And in the evening, I had the solution to the situation: its here (Mother takes an envelope on the table). I didnt even look at it (Mother opens the envelope and looks at the amount of a check).
0 1963-11-20, #Agenda Vol 04, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
There are times when one is disgusted, and thats just when one should remember this. Now, your disgust may have reasons of its own (!) But you have only to endure. You know, there is one thing, I dont know if you have savored it yet: as soon as you have a difficulty, dissatisfaction, revolt, disgustanythingfatigue, tension, discomfort, all, all that negative side (there are lots and lots and lots of such things, they take on all kinds of different colors), the immediate movementimmediateof calling the Lord and saying, Its up to You. As long as you try (instinctively you try to arrange things with your best light, your best consciousness, your best knowledge), its stupid, because that prolongs the struggle, and ultimately its not very effective. There is only one effective thing, thats to step back from whats still called me and with or without words, it doesnt matter, but above all with the flame of aspiration, this (gesture to the heart), and something perfectly, perfectly sincere: Lord, its You; and only You can do it, You alone can do it, I cant. Its excellent, you cant imagine how excellent! For instance, someone comes and deluges you with impossible problems, wants you to make instant decisions; you have to write, you have to answer, you have to sayall of itand its like truckloads of darkness and stupidity and wrong movements and all that being dumped on you; and its dumped and dumped and dumpedyou are almost stoned to death with all that. You begin to stiffen, you get tense; then, immediately (gesture of stepping back): O Lord. You stay quiet, take a little step back (gesture of offering): Its up to you.
But you cant imagine, its wonderful! Immediately there comesclear, simple, effortlessly, without seeking for itexactly what has to be done or said or written: the whole tension stops, its over. And then, if you need paper, the paper is there; if you need a fountain pen, you find just the one you need; if you need (theres no seeking: above all dont seek, dont try to seek, youll just make another mess)its there. And thats a fact of EVERY MINUTE. You have the field of experience every second. For instance, youre dealing with a servant who doesnt do things properly or as you think they should be done, or youre dealing with a stomach that doesnt work the way youd like it to and it hurts: its the same method, there is no other. You know, at times situations get so tense that you feel as if youre about to faint, the body cant stand it any more, its so tense; or else theres a pain, something wrong, things arent sorting themselves out, and theres a tension; so immediately you stop everything: Lord, You, its up to You. At first there comes a peace, as if you were entirely outside existence, and then its gone the pain goes, the dizziness disappears. And what is to happen happens automatically. And, you see, its not in meditation, not in actions of terrestrial importance: its the field of experience you have ALL the time, without interruptionwhen you know how to put it to use. And for everything: when something hurts, for instance, when things resist or grate or howl inside there, instead of your saying, Oh, how it hurts! you call the Lord in there: Come in here, and then you stay calm, not thinking of anythingyou simply stay still in your sensation. And more than a thousand times, you know, I was almost bewildered: Look! The pain is gone! You didnt even notice how it went. So people who want to lead a special life or have a special organization to have experiences, thats quite silly the greatest possible diversity of experiences is at your disposal every minute, every minute. Only you must learn not to have a mental ambition for great things. Just the other day, I was shown in such a clear way a very small thing I had done (I, its the body speaking), a very small things that had been done by the Lord in this body (thats a long sentence!), and I was shown the terrestrial consequence of that very small thingit was visible, I mean, as my hand is visible to my eyesand the terrestrial correspondence. Then I understood.
0 1963-11-23, #Agenda Vol 04, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
But were so totally enslaved to very small things the very small things of the body: its needs (or supposed needs). I see all the entreaties that come from everywhere, and it all revolves around the same thing (even those who think theyve understood that the consciousness must be generalnot collective, but terrestrial theyre slaves to the reactions of their body), it all revolves around two things: sleep-food-sleep-food-sleep (Mother draws a circle). Even with those who profess that they have no interest in those things, they still have the power to cause reactions in their consciousness: a sleepless night or poor digestion, or an upset digestive system there you are. It has the power to weigh down on their faith and to take away its capacity of action. Its a kind of attachmentan involuntary and mechanical attachmentto that need for sleep and that need for food. And I dont mean people who love to eat or lazy people who like to sleep I dont even mean that, which is all the way down, thats not it: I mean those who arent interested in food and would really like to replace sleep with something else, something more interesting, even thoseall, all, all of them.
And even this body, which has been worked on and kneaded for years Its in the subconscient of the body. And so that was the answer, it was said to the body:
0 1963-12-14, #Agenda Vol 04, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
That way, you can gauge precisely how much is left of the old habit of personal reaction, especially in the emotive part of the universal being: its the emotive part that still remains the most personal, even more so than the purely physical, material part. As soon as the emotive part comes into play, it personalizes, because it ENJOYS individual reactions; it is the part that LOVES to feel it loves, that LOVES to feel its own emotions, and because of it there remains a faint personal coloration. And when there occurs a somewhat darker or backward movement, the body is indignant and doesnt understand that its part of the whole, that the whole must go forward together and you cant separate a piece of it to perfect itit cant be done! Its impossible. Its not that it shouldnt be doneit CANNOT be done. Everything goes together.
(silence)
0 1963-12-21, #Agenda Vol 04, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Ultimately, gratitude is only a very slightly colored hue of the essential Vibration of Love.
(meditation)
0 1963-12-31, #Agenda Vol 04, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
And showed a colour that they could not keep,
Mirrors to a fantasm of reality.
0 1964-01-18, #Agenda Vol 05, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
There should be somewhere upon earth a place that no nation could claim as its own, a place where every human being of goodwill, sincere in his aspiration, could live freely as a citizen of the world, obeying one single authority, that of the supreme Truth; a place of peace, concord, harmony, where all the fighting instincts of man would be used exclusively to conquer the causes of his sufferings and miseries, to surmount his weakness and ignorance, to triumph over his limitations and incapacities; a place where the needs of the spirit and the concern for progress would take precedence over the satisfaction of desires and passions, the search for pleasures and material enjoyment. In this place, children would be able to grow and develop integrally without losing contact with their souls; education would be given not with a view to passing examinations or obtaining certificates and posts, but to enrich ones existing faculties and bring forth new ones. In this place, titles and positions would be replaced by opportunities to serve and organize; everyones bodily needs would be provided for equally, and in the general organization, intellectual, moral and spiritual superiority would be expressed not by increased pleasures and powers in life, but by greater duties and responsibilities. Beauty in all its art formspainting, sculpture, music, literaturewould be accessible to all equally, the ability to share in the joys it brings being limited solely by ones capacities and not by social or financial position. For in this ideal place, money would no longer be the sovereign lord; individual worth would have a far greater importance than that of material wealth and social position. There, work would not be for earning ones living, but the means to express oneself and develop ones capacities and possibilities, while at the same time being of service to the group as a whole, which would in turn provide for everyones subsistence and field of action. In short, it would be a place where human relationships, ordinarily based almost exclusively on competition and strife, would be replaced by relationships of emulation in trying to do ones best, of collaboration and real brotherhood.
The earth is not ready to realize such an ideal, for humanity does not yet possess either the knowledge necessary to understand and adopt it or the conscious force indispensable for its execution. This is why I call it a dream.
0 1964-01-22, #Agenda Vol 05, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
(Mother looks tired and seems to have a cold. First she quotes from memory a note she has written in English:)
The true purpose of life: to live for the Divine or to live for the Truth, or at least to live for ones soul.
--
Someone has given me a present: a head colda lavish present!
Who gave it to you?
0 1964-01-25, #Agenda Vol 05, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
No. Ill be better also (Mother still has her cold), it will give me some time to get better. Not that the ideas arent clear (!), on the contrary theres a sort of very precise and sharp vision of things, but speaking is difficult.
But what I say is hard for people to understand, I find. I gave that text from the Agenda to A.he didnt say anything. Which shows that he didnt understand anything. As for Pavitra, he clearly didnt understand anything.
0 1964-01-29, #Agenda Vol 05, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
And now its something as solid as cement (which means its material) and ab-so-lute-ly EVEN, you know, even, not one ripple of form, absolutely flat as a slab of marble, and without beginning or endlimitless, you cant see its end: its everywhere. Everywhere, and everywhere the same. Everywhere the same. A color like a sort of gray (a gray, the gray of Matter) that would contain a golden light, yet doesnt shine: it doesnt shine, it doesnt have a luminosity of its own, but it contains light. It doesnt radiate, it isnt luminous, yet its a gray with a golden light in it the gray of the most material Matter, of stone; gray, you know. But it contains that light: its not inert, not insensitive, not unconscious, yet it is MATTER.
I have never seen that before.
--
She was looking at the sky, then she started seeing stars falling down everywhere, like a rain of stars over the earth. And then the ground had turned into an even mass of ice, like at the poles: it wasnt bright, but it was like ice everywhere on the ground. And a sort of ship rose on it, with a slightly gray color, with passengers, whose color was also not bright, but slightly gray, slightly blue, as though they had escaped from old thingsas though they had escaped from some catastrophe or were coming out of some catastrophe.1
Really!
0 1964-01-31, #Agenda Vol 05, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
But it is left to men to decide if they will collaborate in this change or if it will have to be enforced upon them by the power of crushing circumstances.
Then, at the end, I put:
So, wake up and collaborate.
There seems to be a push from behind I dont know how I could explain it to you. I feel something, as if from behind a veil something were pushing and saying, Come on! Move on, now! As if everything were almost completely asleep and there were, behind, something pushing very forcefully.
0 1964-02-05, #Agenda Vol 05, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
And it wasnt an animated view, it wasnt a vision: it was a PHOTO, just like the other photos, the same color as the other photosa photo which I even studied critically as a photo for the way it was taken. It doesnt exist!
It must exist somewhere.
0 1964-02-22, #Agenda Vol 05, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Mother, some fifteen days ago, I dreamed that very thing. There was a sort of enormous drill boring into Matter; then you came, and you were very interested, as if you participated actively in it. An enormous black drill, like the ones they use to drill wells, boring into a sort of Matter with a color like yellow clay. It struck me very much. About ten or fifteen days ago. A tremendous power.
Yes, yesterday I had the feeling that I was brought into contact with something thats going on ALL THE TIME.
0 1964-03-04, #Agenda Vol 05, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
I did see something, but I dont think its very interesting, or collective either. I seemed to kind myself in an enormous plane, a very powerful one, which managed to take off (a takeoff which, besides, gave me a very pleasant sensation). It took off, but it was hedgehopping, that was dangerous. At first, the space before us was clear anyway, but we were flying very low and skimming the trees. Then, suddenly there were all kinds of buildings that stood in the way, in particular a huge tower, like a church steeple, of a very black color. I dont know how it happened, but the plane (or the force) entered itoddly enough and inside it was completely dark; there was only a sort of opening in a watt, and beyond it, a patch of blue sky. It sounds impossible, but the plane tried to go through that hose, and when we tried to, that sort of opening turned out to be covered with very thick glass that stopped us from going through. So I remember that with a pointed instrument I broke the entire window to enable us to go through. We did, but it was too small, the opening was too narrow for such an enormous plane. Afterwards, its very confused; I only remember that in a hidden place, there was a sort of huge gold ciborium, very beautifulit was hidden. But all the rest is quite confused.
Oh, but its interesting.
--
Your vision obviously its mental constructions standing in the way of the takeoff thats obvious. But it isnt an individual experience: its a collective thing.
It was very black, and it was a church like a church steeple. But the gold ciborium, what is that? It was very pretty, besides; it was beautiful, but hidden.
0 1964-03-07, #Agenda Vol 05, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
I noticed (Ive known it for some time, but it was quite concrete this time) that in my rest, as soon as I am at rest, the body is completely identified with the material substance of the earth, that is to say, the experience of the material substance of the earth becomes its ownwhich may be expressed by all sorts of things (it depends on the day, on the occasion). I had known for a long time that it was no longer the individual consciousness; it isnt the collective consciousness of mankind: its a terrestrial consciousness, meaning it also contains the material substance of the earth, including the unconscious substance. Because I have prayed a lot, concentrated a lot, aspired a lot for the transformation of the Inconscient (since it is the essential condition for the thing to happen)because of that there has been a kind of identification.
Last night it became a certainty.
0 1964-03-25, #Agenda Vol 05, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Even from that point of view, I have seen You know, the ordinary idea that the phenomenon [of transformation] must necessarily occur first in the body in which the Consciousness is expressed the most constantly seems to me quite unnecessary and secondary. On the contrary, it occurs at the same time wherever it can occur the most easily and totally, and this aggregate of cells (Mother points to her own body) isnt necessarily the most ready for this operation. It may therefore remain a very long time as it apparently is, even if its understanding and receptivity are special. I mean that this bodys awareness, its conscious perception is infinitely superior to the one all the bodies it comes into contact with can have, except for a few minutesa few minuteswhen other bodies, as if through a grace, have the Perception. While for it, its a natural and constant state; its the effective result of this Truth-Consciousness being more constantly concentrated on this collection of cells than on othersmore directly. But the substitution of one vibration for another in facts, in actions, in objects, occurs wherever the result is the most striking and effective.
I dont know if I can make myself understood, but it is something I have felt very, very clearly, and which one cannot feel as long as the physical ego is there, because the physical ego has the sense of its own importance, and that disappears entirely with the physical ego. When it disappears, one has a clear perception that the intervention or manifestation of the true Vibration doesnt depend on egos or individualities (human or national individualities, or even individualities of Nature: animals, plants and so on), it depends on a certain play of the cells and Matter in which there are aggregates particularly favorable for the transformation to occurnot transformation: the substitution, to be precise, the substitution of the Vibration of Truth for the vibration of Falsehood. And the phenomenon may be very independent of groupings and individualities (it may happen in one part here, another part there, one thing here, another thing there); and it always corresponds to a certain quality of vibration that causes a sort of swellinga receptive swelling and then, the thing can occur.
0 1964-03-28, #Agenda Vol 05, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
And the light and warmth were expressed, that intensity of Ananda, that bliss You understand, it wasnt in opposition to but like a COMPLEMENT of this vibratory knowledge, which was I cant say a coldly scientific knowledge because that introduces mental notions, but it was of such a wisdom! A knowledge so wise, so calm, so imperturbably quiet, absolutely free from any notion of good and evil, of divine, of positive and negative, absolutely independent of all of thatpurely material. And with an absolute power. Then in these same cells, which were fully conscious of this knowledge of vibrations as being the supreme means of control for their harmony, suddenly there arose in them a sort of not a flame (a flame is dark in comparison), a luminous Ananda: Love in its perfect reality.
And it was translated like this: Its so much more marvelous when we know its You!
--
And there was that experience, which of all experiences was truly the most I could say the most decisive: that was when Sri Aurobindo left his body. Because materially, for the body, it was the complete collapse of a sort of unshakable trust, a sense of absolute security, of certitude that things were going to be done just like that, harmoniously. Then his departure the blow of a sledgehammer on the head. And the entire weight of the responsibility here, on the body. Voil.
That means quite a preparationwhich is as wise as all the rest.
0 1964-04-08, #Agenda Vol 05, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Theres one thing, you know, which is so difficult (Mother has a spasm in her throat), so difficult, its that Sri Aurobindo left. Thats at the root of everything. Before, my body wasnt like this; before, nothing in me was like this: there was an absolute certitude. That, you know, it was a collapse.
It clearly came to teach something that could never had been learned before. But its always on this that the adverse forces base themselvesalways. All the adverse suggestions, all the adverse forces, all the ill will, all the disbeliefits all based on this: Yes, but HE left.
0 1964-05-02, #Agenda Vol 05, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Why do I have to write all those lines in ink when it would be so much simpler to think of you, and lo! I would be with you, I would see you. Our human life is quite bounded and stupid. In two hundred years, in Eskimo land, we will be colored penguins; you will be sky blue and I, pomegranate red. And sometimes, I will be you and you will be me, red and blue, and well no longer be able to tell each other apart, or else well become all white like snow and no one will be able to find us again, except the great Caribou who is wise and knows love. And when the snow melts, we will be eider-penguins, of course, a new flying race, emerald, which plays among the northern fir trees on the shores of Lake Rokakitutu (pronounced fiddledeedee in penguin language).
S.
0 1964-08-05, #Agenda Vol 05, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
(D., a disciple, sent Mother an eighteenth-century account by a Japanese monk of the Zen Buddhist sect describing a method called "Introspection," which enables one to overcome cold and hunger and attain physical immortality. Mother reads a few pages, then gives up.)
[Herms magazine, Spring 1963.]
0 1964-08-08, #Agenda Vol 05, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
There are some strange things. When I went to Japan, I met a man there who was a striking reproduction of my father the first moment, I wondered if I was dreaming. I think my father was already dead, but I am not sure, I dont remember exactly (my father died while I was in Japan, thats all I know). But he was the same age as my father, which means they were born together, at the same time. My father was born in Turkey, while this one was born in Japan but anyway, it WAS my father! And this man took to me with a paternal passion, it was extraordinary! He wanted to see me all the time, he showered me with gifts. And we could hardly talk to each other, as he knew very little English. But what a resemblance! As if one were the exact replica of the other: same size, same features, same color (he was exceptionally white for a Japanese, and my father wasnt white as northern people are: he was white as people from the Middle East are, just like me).
It always surprised me. You know, people often say, Oh, they look like each other, but thats not it! He was like an exact replica.
0 1964-08-11, #Agenda Vol 05, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
He has sent me his usual message: its a sort of picture with all the colors. You know that Tantrism attributes a value to each color; they make a sort of play of forces with all those colors, depending on what they want to say or express theyre lights, very brightly colored lights. Its very particular; the first time I saw that, it was connected with Tantrism. And the other day there came to me (in a slightly ironical tone) a very beautiful picture, this big (gesture: about six inches by twelve). So I knew it was coming from him and that he was happy!
***
--
You cant imagine how, as you go forward and as all that Consciousness, in fact, grows more and more alive, true and constant, how at first you feel you are a rotten bundle of insincerity, hypocrisy, lack of faith, doubt, stupidity. Because as (how can I explain?) as the balance changes between the parts of the being and as the luminous part increases, the rest grows more and more inadequate and intolerable. Then you are really utterly disgusted (there was a time when it used to hurt me, long agonot so long ago, but anyway long enough, a few years ago), and more and more there is the movement (a very spontaneous and simple movement, very complete): I cant do anything about it. Its impossible, I cant, its such a colossal work that its impossibleLord, do it for me. And when you do this with the simplicity of a child (gesture of offering), really like this, you know, really convinced that you cannot do it, Its not possible, Ill never be able to do itdo it for me, its wonderful! Oh, He does it, mon petit, youre dumbfounded afterwards: How come! There are lots of things that prrt! vanish and never come back againfinished. After a time, you wonder, How can that be?! It was there. Just like that, prrt! in a second.
But as long as there is personal effort, its oof! its like the man who rolls his barrel uphill, and down it rolls again every minute.
0 1964-08-26, #Agenda Vol 05, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
The question I am asking myself is whether the cells have an autonomous existence or whether they must remain aggregated in the way they are, obeying a collective consciousness.2 I do not mean the body consciousness, which is an entity; I mean: does the cell, as an individuality, have the will to remain in its present collectivity? Just as an individual willingly collaborates with a society, with an aggregate, does the individual cell have the will to remain in its aggregate, or is it only the central consciousness that has that will?
They speak of the consciousness of EACH cell, which has its own life code, and communicates with the other cells for a particular work by sending out messages.
What I meant was: if you take a cell, does that cell have a will to remain in its present collectivity, that is to say, the body?
They conducted an experiment and took a piece from the heart membrane. The cells they took from the body started to come together, and Then they start to move towards one another, after several hours clusters are formed and the cells in each cluster are pulsing in unison, as though they were trying to form a heart again.
--
Not at all, they are conscious of a collective work to be done. And they communicate among themselves to organize that collective work.
Yes, I understand that very well; in other words, the heart cells tend to form a heart again, the liver cells to form a liver again, and so on. But I am up against this problem: here is an aggregate of cells making up this body; do they have a will for this body to continue, or? But when a body decomposes, the cells do not remain cells: the end is dust.
--
One cannot imagineone cannot imagine what a grace it is to have someone in whose hands you can place yourself entirely! By whom you can let yourself be guided without having the need to seek. I had that, I was very, very conscious of it as long as Sri Aurobindo was there. And when he left his body, it was a dreadful collapse. One cannot imagine. Someone you can refer to with the certainty that what he says will be the truth.
Theres no path, the path has to be blazed out!
0 1964-09-16, #Agenda Vol 05, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Yes, I am thinking, for instance, of those who live in the West, who live the Western life: they are constantly swamped with work, with appointments, with telephones they dont have one minute to purify what constantly falls on them and to collect themselves. In those conditions, how can they be free men? How is it possible?
This is the other extreme.
--
That was the idea, I think, of all the apostles of renunciation: eliminate all that comes from outside or from below, so that if something from above manifests, you will be in a fit state to receive it. But from the collective point of view, its a process that may take thousands of years! From the individual point of view, its possible; but then the aspiration to receive the true impulse should be kept intactnot the aspiration to total liberation, but the aspiration to the ACTIVE identification with the Supreme, in other words, to want only what He wants, to do only what He wants, to exist only through Him, in Him.
So the method of renunciation may be tried, but its a method for someone who wants to cut himself off from others. And can there be an integrality in that case? It doesnt seem possible to me.
--
There are scores of very convincing details, but, naturally, as they are details or very personal things, I cant talk about them. But on the basis of the proof or proofs of repeated experiences, I am forced to say this: when that Power of PURE Lovea wonderful Power, beyond any expressionas soon as it begins to manifest fully, freely, a great many things seem to collapse instantly: they cant hold on. They cant hold on, theyre dissolved. Then then everything comes to a stop. And that stop, which we might believe to be a disgrace, is on the contrary an infinite Grace!
Just the ever so slightly concrete and tangible perception of the difference between the vibration in which we live normally and almost continuously and that Vibration, just the realization of that infirmity, which I call nauseousit really gives you a feeling of nauseais enough to stop everything.
0 1964-10-07, #Agenda Vol 05, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
I dont know if youve heard this, its something P. told me. She was still in Switzerland, and shortly before she came back here, she had a vision (she was in her home, simply meditating, and she had a vision), and in her vision she saw five big luminous cigars going past like this, slowly, one behind the other, in single file. When she woke up, she wondered what it was. And a few days later (maybe the next day or the day after, I dont know), she read in a newspaper the account of people in southern France (I dont remember in which part) who saw above the sea five luminous cigars go by, in single file, exactly the same color as those she had seen. But in their case, they saw it with their physical eyes. So that seems interesting.
It was clearly a phenomenon of a subtle physical order (in its origin) or material vital (in its origin), but which manifested physically, and which may very well have come from other planets that are a little more subtle than the earth.
0 1964-10-10, #Agenda Vol 05, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Whats odd, too, is that this conviction, this certitude is necessarily expressed in altogether different actions according to the person: its the SAME THING taking on different colorations in the aspiration of different consciousnesses.
For instance, I saw recently a sort of exhibition or procession of all the possible theories of humanity explaining the creation (the world, life, existence). All those conceptions came before me one after another, from the seemingly most primitive and most ignorant to the most scientific and they were all (smiling) on the same plane of incomprehension but ALL had the same RIGHT to express the true aspiration that was behind. And it was miraculous! Even the faith of the savage, even the most primitive religions and most ignorant convictions had behind them the same right to express that aspiration. It was wonderful. And then the sense of the superiority of intelligence fell away completely, instantly.
0 1964-10-14, #Agenda Vol 05, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
You seem to have quite a cold!
Yes! (Mother laughs) Its odd, I have been with people who had all sorts of things, including fever, and I didnt catch anything;, and the other day, Z came.
--
I told Z, Well, really, thats going a bit too far! And he was probably upset, because suddenly something came through him: it was like black little darts (they didnt come from him directlymaybe they came from the teachers!), little black darts that rushed at my throat. I felt it: it went ztt! I said, Oh, whats that? And I struggled; but I struggled against a sore throat, and indeed it didnt happenit turned into a cold!
In this School, they have a terrible tendency to turn everything into a system.
--
When I was there at the Playground,1 after ten minutes (that was probably because of my presence), all the little children were deeply asleep, and as it isnt cold and they were lying on mats, they would sleep there quietly till the end of the show.
True, at that time films were shown only once a week. Nowadays, you know how it is, its the competitiveness: everyone wants to bring films. So one turned to the French embassy, another turned to the British embassy, another to the American embassy, another to the Russian, German, Italian embassies. From all the embassies, theyre pouring in. And how do you make a choice? How do you decide without hurting one or the other? Before, it was agreed that films would be shown only on Saturday, so that on Sunday morning they could get up an hour later if they felt sleepy. Now, in effect, it takes place two or three times a week. But thats the fault of these people! Everyone took pride in bringing films from his embassy. How can you refuse some and accept others?
--
Anyway it gives me colds!
Yes, thats true, thats what gives colds, its dogmatism, which rigidifies, hardens, takes away life.
They are convinced that they are right and I am wrong, and its out of a sort of benevolent respect for me (Mother laughs) and of politeness that they dont tell me, Really, youre exaggerating, we were right.
--
These last few nights, an experience has been developing. There is a sort of objectification, like scenes unfolding in which I am one of the characters; but it isnt me, it is some character or other that I play in order to have the double consciousness, the ordinary consciousness and the true consciousness at the same time. There was a whole series of experiences to show simultaneously the True Thing and the sort of half-death (its his word that makes me think of this I am too dead), the half-death of the mind. In those experiences, the state of ordinary mentality is something dry (not exactly hard because its crumbly), lifeless, without vibrationdry, cold; and as a color, its always grayish. And then, there is a maximum tension, an effort to understand and remember and knowknow what you should do; when you go somewhere, know how you should go there; know what people are going to do, know Everything, you see, is a perpetual question of the mind (its subconscious in the mindsome are conscious of it, but even in those who are apparently quiet, its there constantly that tension to know). And its a sort of superficial thing, shallow, cold and dry, WITHOUT VIBRATION. At the same time, as if in gusts, the true consciousness comes, as a contrast. And it happens in almost cinematographic circumstances (there is always a story, to make it more living). For instance, last night (its one story among many, many others), the I that was conscious then (which isnt me, you understand), the I that was playing had to go somewhere: it was with other people in a certain place and had to go through the town to another place. And she knew nothing, neither the way nor the name of the place she was going to, nor the person she had to seeshe knew nothing. She knew nothing, but she knew she had to go. So then, that tension: how, how can you know? How can you know? And questioning people, asking questions, trying to explain, You know, its like this and like that, innumerable details (it lasts for hours). And now and then, a flood of lighta warm, golden, living, comfortable lightand the feeling that everything is prearranged, that all that will have to be known will be known, that the way has been prepared beforeh and that all you have to do is let yourself live! It comes like that, in gusts. But then, there is an intensity of contrast between that constant effort of the mind, which is an enormous effort of tension and concentrated will, and then and then that glory. That comfortable glory, you know, in which you let yourself go in trusting happiness: But everything is ready, everything is luminous, everything is known! All you have to do is let yourself live. All you have to do is let yourself live.
Its as if a play were performed to make it more living, more realone subject, another subject, this, that. If you enter a certain state, then another time enter the other state, you can remember the difference and its useful, but in this form of a play, with the double consciousness, the opposition becomes so real, so concrete that you come out of it wondering, How can you go on living in this aberration when you have once TOUCHEDtouched, experienced the True Thing?
--
Things come from outside, you cant always stop them from coming; its like what I told you, those little black darts (you dont keep guard, you dont spend all your time protecting yourself!). But if, at that moment, you had the true attitude It was curious enough, because it came to the throat, and it rather bothered me, I dont like it when it comes there; so I concentrated so it wouldnt be there, and it didnt come there (laughing) it turned into a cold!
Oh, they are learning their lesson all the time, all the time. Everything, all that happens is ALWAYS a lessonalways. Always, always: all the quarrels, all the difficulties, all the troubles, all the so-called illnesses, everything, all the disorders are to make you learn a lessonas soon as youve learned the lesson, its over! But then, you are so slow and heavy, you take so much time to realize that its a lesson that it drags on and on and on.
--
With this cold, I cant see anymore at all, not even to write.
But just imagine, I have some important birthday cards to write, and I was warned one month in advance! I was warned, I was told repeatedly, Write these things down. So common sense says, But theres time!Write these things down. So I wrote them down. And now, if I had to write them, it would be quite a bother!
0 1964-10-17, #Agenda Vol 05, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
You get an impression (its precisely the impression I bring back from those activities of the night), the impression of a building crackingall over. Exactly like just before the collapse: it cracks all over.
Besides, if you are completely outside your usual consciousness, your usual reactions, your immediate circle and your daily activity, if you get completely out of all that, and take a look and wonder, Whats going to happen?a black hole, you cant see anything.
--
I am not aware of what people nowadays think they know, but, for example, when the animal reign dominated the earth, before it appeared and to make it appear, were there ever any catastrophes? Of course, you can vaguely feel an earth that slowly grows colder and is first purely mineral, then plants appear little by littleyou see that very well (Ive even seen very interesting photographs), but is it the fact of growing colder that itself caused catastrophes? Earthquakes, submersions, floods?
Yes, there was a period of great foldings.
--
Now they say that they have instruments capable of measuring the fact that the continents are still moving. They even said, a few years ago, that many parts of Siberia, which used to be so cold that nothing could be done there, were beginning to be cultivated, and that, necessarily, the tropics arent so warm anymore.
But these things must be coming about very gradually, so its always possible to adapt, people can move to other places.
--
Maybe its into the past that I wander? It may be into the past, it may be into the future, it may be in the present. I have noticed that the costumes arent at all like todays or like anything we know. But when I am there, in the activity, its perfectly natural, you dont notice it: its like something you see every day, you dont notice it. Only when I come back and objectify a little do I say to myself, Well, how odd! (for myself and for others). And I am not at all as I am now, not at all. Moreover, I think I have been what is called different persons at different times. There was even a time when I looked to see if it wasnt that I was identifying with different persons, but there is no identification, I dont feel I am entering someone, nothing like that. But in appearance, I am not always the same person: sometimes I am very tall, sometimes I am small, sometimes I am young, sometimes I am not old but grownup. Very, very different. But there is always the same central consciousness, there is always (Mother collects herself) the Witness who watches on behalf of the Lord and decides on behalf of the Lord. This is the attitude: the Witness who watches that is to say, who sees everything, observes everything, and who decides, either for himself or for others (indifferently), always. That is the fixed point. On behalf of of the something thats eternaleternal, eternally true, eternally powerful and eternally knowing. That is there, through everything. Otherwise, there are different things all the time, different circumstances, different surroundings; there are ways of life that are very, very different. And also, if I wake up at the beginning of the night, its one particular type of thing; if I wake up in the middle of the night, its another type of thing; if I wake up wake up, lets be clear, it isnt coming out of sleep, its returning to the present consciousness. And every time, its different, like coming from different worlds, different times, different activities.
And its clear that one doesnt expect me to remember that doesnt matter at all. It is an ACTION. Its an action, it isnt a knowledge I am givenan action. I am working. Is it I have worked? Is it I am going to work? Is it I am working? I dont know. Probably all three.
0 1964-11-04, #Agenda Vol 05, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
It wasnt a defined form, but it was a personal form. And it came in the wake of a series of experiences in which I saw the different attitudes of different categories of people or thinkers, according to their conviction. And it came as if that form were saying to my body (it was a PHYSICAL presence), as if it were saying, really with words (it was a translation; the words are always a translation I dont know what language the Supreme speaks (!), but it is translated, it must be translated in everyones brain according to his own language), as if He were telling me, Through you (that is, through this, the body) I am charging (it was like a conquest, a battle), I am charging to conquer the physical world. Thats how it was. And the sensation was really of an all-powerful Being whose proportions were like ours, but who was everywhere at once, and really of a physical charge to chase away all the dark little demons of Ignorance, and those little demons were like black vibrations. But He had something like a form, a color and above all, there was a contacta contact, a sensation. Thats the first time.
I have never tried to see a personal form, and it always seemed to me an impossibility, as if it were childishness and a diminishing; but this came quite unexpectedly, spontaneously, stunningly: a flash. I was so astonished. The astonishment made it go away.
0 1964-11-07, #Agenda Vol 05, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
But since then it has been like that, and particularly last night when it was terribly cold [monsoon + windstorm], I was completely still in my bed, with an almost constant feeling of that something flowing downwardof the head emptying.
It continued this morning, a very bizarre impression. Yet, physically, I feel fine, I took my food, I
0 1964-11-12, #Agenda Vol 05, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
And I noticefrom letters I receive, from remarks made to me that the Action is becoming truly general all over the earth, and with SIMILAR effects (a slight coloration according to each individual, but thats nothing), similar effects. And its a whole discipline, a sadhana of the bodynot a mental one: of the body. So it is concrete.
(silence)
There is this phenomenon: as soon as the physical organism, with its crystallization and habits, is put in the presence of a new experience without being carefully forewarned (Now be careful, this is a new experience!), it is afraid. Its afraid, it panics, it worries. It depends on the person, but at the very least, in the most courageous, in the most trusting, it creates an uneasinessit begins with a slight pain or a slight uneasiness. Some are afraid immediately; then its all over: the experience stops, it has to be started all over again; others (like those English people I was talking about, or like Z) hold on and observe, wait, and then the unpleasant effects, one may say, slowly die down, stop and turn into something else, and the experience begins to take on its own value or color.
With those faintings of sorts I told you about the other day, I observed (it went on the whole day), and I saw (saw with the inner vision): it is like the travelat times as quick as a flash, at other times slow and very measuredof a force that starts from one point to reach another one. That force travels along a precise route, which isnt always the same and seems to include certain cells on its way: the starting point and the arrival point (Mother draws a curve in the air). If you arent on your guard, if you are taken by surprise, during the passage of the force (whether long or short) you feel the same sensation (you, meaning the body), the same sensation as before fainting: its the phenomenon that precedes fainting. But if you are attentive, if you stay still and look, you see that it starts from one point, reaches another point, and then its overwhat that force had to do has been done, and there is no APPARENT consequence in the rest of the body.
0 1964-11-14, #Agenda Vol 05, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
There is another thing. Recently, one day, I suddenly I am extremely sensitive to the composition of the air, from my earliest childhood: airs, if I may say so, they each had their own taste, their own color and quality, and I would recognize them to such a point that sometimes I would say, Oh, the air of (I was a child, of course), the air of this country or the air of that place has come here. It was like that. I was extremely sensitive to the quality of pure air, that is, without the elements that come from the decomposition of life and especially from the places where people are crowded together. It was like that to an extremely sharp degree: for instance, if I was moved from one place to another, I could be suddenly cured of an illness from the change of air. When I met Thon, it became conscious, an object of study, and it still goes on. Perhaps a few days ago (I cant say, time has no meaning), but not very long ago, I said, Theres something new in the air. And something very unpleasant, extremely pernicious; I felt that that something (I didnt say anything to anyone, naturally) had a peculiar, extremely subtle odor, not a physical one, and had the power to separate vital vibrations from physical vibrations that is to say, an extremely noxious element.
Immediately I set to work (it lasted for hours), and the night was spent counteracting it: I tried to find which higher vibration could counteract it, until I succeeded in clarifying the atmosphere. But the memory remained very precise. And very recently (maybe a day or two ago), they told me that the Chinese had chosen an Indian territory, in the North, to test a certain kind of atomic bomb, and that they had exploded a certain bomb there. When they told me this, the memory of my odor abruptly came back.1
0 1964-11-25, #Agenda Vol 05, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
(The following conversation is about the collective meditation of the day before, November 24, a darshan day.)
So, what about you? Whats new? Nothing new?and whats old?! (laughter)
--
Its the first time, because even when I have an experience, even the first time, I remember, when we began collective meditations and Sri Aurobindo came down and literally sat on the [Ashram] compound, it was very interesting, of course, and very compelling,2 but I was conscious of time. And this time There have been ups and downs, good experiences and bad ones, all kinds of things, but I have always been conscious of time, while yesterday I myself was astounded. I heard the gong and I had the feeling it had just started. There was even something in the body that was jubilant like a child: Its going to last half an hour, its going to be like this for half an hour (it was funny, you know) ah, the true life at last! That was the bodys feeling, and it was going to last half an hour. Bong! bong! As if it had been robbed of its joy!
Its curious.
0 1964-12-02, #Agenda Vol 05, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
For those who run away from the necessary change, it may mean several more lives. Those who have learned to bear up (who generally have enough higher intelligence to govern), those who have endurance, who have learned to bear up and not to worry about the vitals lack of collaboration, for them, it can be done relatively quickly.
Thats what generally takes the greatest time.
--
Of course, in matters of faith (I dont mean for a very precise and very clear scientific mind), but in matters of faith, there is so far no clear proof that the Lord wants to realize Himself here; except, perhaps, for two or three visionaries who had the experience. Someone asked me if there had been a supramental realization previously, that is, before historical times (because historical times are extremely limited, of course). Naturally, the question always corresponds to one of the things that are shown to me in moments of concentration. So I answered very spontaneously that there hadnt been a collective realization, but that there might have been one or several individual realizations, as examples of what would be and as a promisea promise and examples: This is what will be.
Ive had some very precise memorieslived memoriesof a human life on earth, quite primitive (I mean outside any mental civilization), a human life on earth that wasnt an evolutionary life, but the manifestation of beings from another world. I lived in that way for a timea lived memory. I still see it, I still have the image of it in my memory. It had nothing to do with civilization and mental development: it was a blossoming of force, of beauty, in a NATURAL, spontaneous life, like animal life, but with a perfection of consciousness and power that far surpasses the one we have now; and indeed with a power over all surrounding Nature, animal nature and vegetable nature and mineral nature, a DIRECT handling of Matter, which men do not havethey need intermediaries, material instruments, whereas this was direct. And there were no thoughts or reasoning: it was spontaneous (gesture indicating the direct radiating action of will on Matter). I have the lived memory of this. It must have existed on earth because it wasnt premonitory: it wasnt a vision of the future, it was a past memory. So there must have been a moment It was limited to two beings: I dont have the feeling there were many. And there was no childbirth or anything animal, absolutely not; it was a life, yes, a truly higher life in a natural setting, but with an extraordinary beauty and harmony! And I dont have the feeling it was (how can I explain?) something known; the relationships with vegetable life and animal life were spontaneous ones, absolutely harmonious, and with the sensation of an undisputed power (you didnt even feel it was possible for it not to be), undisputed, but without any idea that there were other beings on earth and that it was necessary to look after them or make a demonstrationnothing of the sort, absolutely nothing of mental life, nothing. A life just like that, like a beautiful plant or a beautiful animal, but with an inner knowledge of things, perfectly spontaneous and effortlessan effortless life, perfectly spontaneous. I dont even have the feeling that there was any question of food, not that I remember; but there was the joy of Life, the joy of Beauty: there were flowers, there was water, there were trees, there were animals, and all that was friendly, but spontaneously so. And there were no problems! No problems to be solved, nothing at allone just lived!
0 1965-02-19, #Agenda Vol 06, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
So if that consciousness that was there had been collective, if it had been possible to receive it collectively, NOTHING WOULD HAVE BEEN TOUCHED: the stones would have been thrown, but wouldnt have hit anyone. Thats how it would have been. For instance, a stone (a brickbat) was flung and hit my window; it fell on the roof there (even causing a water leak that had to be plugged), and I saw that very minute, I saw in the consciousness of the people present the exact vibration of Falsehood that had allowed the stone to hit there. And AT THE SAME TIME, simultaneously (it cant be said, but it was simultaneous), everywhere, all over the town and especially over the Ashram here, I saw all the points, the exact vibration of Falsehood in everyone or everything that made the contact possible.
The experience began a little after 7, 7:10, and it lasted till 1 in the morning.
--
And this morning (this is rather interesting), I received a letter from R. telling me, That evening I had an extraordinary experience, but now its beginning to appear like an impossibility, like something unreal. The exact moment when the experience came over me (of course, when he received the news of the attack, his first reaction was that of human fear, with the hands becoming cold and so on, but he sat down, he braced himself, he called me), and then he felt a Peace come down from above, something he had never felt before, which swept through his whole being, took hold of him entirely and lasted for I dont know, I think he said till eleven at nightit lasted a long time. He had experienced a little bit of it from time to time, but it had never been like that: it came down into him, it seized hold of him entirely. And he says, I could move about: it was THERE, it didnt budge, it was inside me. So I thought, At last someone who felt! There has been at least one who felt.
But at the time, I saw so clearly in which people the vibration responded to the vibrations of Falsehood: that sort of movement which is like a tremor in Matter. So I know the people. But I must say there is around me someone, one person who had the true physical vibration (I had known it for a long time, but now Ive had concrete proof: its P.), and no one can understand, no one can know it, but I knew it: physically, not a single response, like this (immutable gesture). So I told him to look after the defense and organize everything.
0 1965-04-07, #Agenda Vol 06, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
If I am given some prediction, its in a very symbolic form, or in a curious form: a form I could call analogous, meaning that I am shown analogous facts that occurred in the history of the earth (sometimes the history of the earth that isnt historical, thats prehistorical), and with a special coloration, a little more internal than the plain stark fact; there is along with it a vibration which is at the same time a mixture of thought, feeling and especially forcea force of action. It comes like that with a sort of power of projection into the future (Mother draws a trajectory going from the past event into the future), and in between the two, there is the curve resulting from the terrestrial progress. So, basically, it would be rather interesting provided there is nothing else to be done!
But its clearly visible: for instance, a word or a sentence or a gesture or a thought or an impulse that has its vibratory point specifically somewhere [in the past], and then its whole line of consequences (same gesture of trajectory), its whole curve of consequences. The whole thing, seen at a glance (Mother depicts a screen on which a picture is suddenly frozen). The curve: such and such a thing goes brrt! over there. But the outcome (which would give a spectacular and high-sounding value producing a considerable effect) is never given to me. No, what would make a reputation of great prophet is never given to me (thats not what I am after, but its never given). Simply (same gesture of trajectory), such and such a thing will go this way, brrt! and then all this is going to happen, here, here (Mother marks various points along the trajectory); but as for the outcomesilence.
0 1965-04-21, #Agenda Vol 06, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
But this is a personal affair, it has nothing to do with the public or collectivity, while the other point is interesting: I have a feeling it is Natures collaboration, pushing humanity in that direction in order to prepare a matter more receptive to the ideal that wants to manifest.
When I thought about the last conversation again, it seemed to me that the gap between the two creations, the animal and the supramental, is so huge that it doesnt make much difference whether the body is more supple and so on.
0 1965-05-15, #Agenda Vol 06, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Its the hot and cold shower, to make us more supple.
Very well.
0 1965-05-19, #Agenda Vol 06, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
(To Sujata:) But this is another matter: if you have a nice goodwilled doctor, very patient, very experienced in lenses and with a magnificent collection of them (!), if you go and see him and he takes some trouble, he will be able to help you. But a gentleman who, with all his so-called science, looks down on you and tells you, You have this and that and such-and-such a deformation
(Sujata:) I dont think theres any deformation, nothing, its inside rather, as if the canals werent very clean, so the sight cannot get through.
0 1965-05-29, #Agenda Vol 06, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
He has become more sober, he doesnt speak so much anymore. You know he had made a prediction about M.s wife? What was her name? (Names its something rather odd: when people have left their body, their name goes away, I can no longer remember itits cut off, there is a break; I have to stop and let a sort of material memory come back, but in my consciousness its cut off, there isnt any name anymore: the name has gone away along with the bodywhich is quite as it should be, of course.) He had told her, Oh, you will live another ten years.The next month, she left. So I think it threw some cold water on him, because obviously people attach a great importance to those things. At any rate, he shouldnt have told her, because it interrupted all my workall my work was to make her unite with her soul before she went, so that all that could be taken along in the spiritual life would be taken along. And I was working at it, but then when the other one told her she was going to live ten years, naturally she wasnt in a hurry anymore! I lost at least ten days because of that. And she left the day after the contact was madeshe found her soul, she became quiet, very quiet and the next day she was gone.
I havent lost hope that X might be progressive. If he is progressive, all will be well. Maybe in two or three years he will be a new man with a new consciousness? The stuff is good.
0 1965-06-02, #Agenda Vol 06, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
But I seemed to be told, Yes, you can. You no longer see this way, but you can see that way; you no longer see the ordinary way, but you can see (inward gesture). I have been left with enough vision to be able to move around freely, but this is clearly the preparation for a vision through the inner light rather than projected light. And it is oh, its warm, living, intense and of such precision! You see everything at the same time, not only the color and shape, but the character of the vibration: in a liquid, the character of its vibrationits marvelous. Only, it lasts a moment, its like promises that come and tell you (like when you make a promise to someone to comfort him and give him heart), It will be like this. Very well. (Mother laughs) In how many centuries, I dont know!
But when I used to use this magnifying glass, I could read very well (I stopped because of those hemorrhages, though my eyes seem to be well again), but now its absolutely no use! (Mother looks at a file with the magnifying glass) It doesnt grow any clearer, there is always the same cloudiness. Its bigger, thats all. (Mother looks again) Strange, its bigger but its the same thing, there is the same veil of unreality.
0 1965-06-14, #Agenda Vol 06, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
For snakes, for instance, its quite remarkable. Some, when they dream of snakes, have the feeling theyre going to meet with catastrophes; I myself have had all sorts of dreams with snakes: I had to go through gardens full of snakes everywhereon the ground, in the trees, everywhere and not kindly snakes! But I knew very well what it meant; during the dream itself I knew it: it depended on certain mental conditions around me and ill willmental ill will.2 But if you have mental control and power, you can go through, they cannot touch you. And other people, when they see a snake, think it is the universal consciousness. So we cant say. Thon used to say that the serpent is the symbol of evolution, and those who were with him always saw rainbow- colored serpents, with all the colors, and it was the symbol of universal evolution Basically, to tell the truth, everyone has his own symbolism And for myself, I have seen that it depended on the periods in my life, on the activities, on the degree of development. There are things I see again now in which I see another meaning, which was behind the meaning I had seen.
Its very interesting, but it belongs entirely to the domain of relativity.
0 1965-06-18 - supramental ship, #Agenda Vol 06, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Last night, for a long time, we went to all sorts of places unknown to me: towns, countrysides, forests, etc. It lasted a very long time. And once, we were there, near a forest (near a road that crossed the forest) and we were busy and talking when all of a sudden, he leaped to his feet. You know, he never wears any clothes, so to speak; when I saw him the first time in his house (his supramental house), in the subtle physical, he was without clothes; but its a kind of vibrant matter: its very material, very concrete, and it has a sort of color that isnt a color, which is a bit golden and radiantit doesnt send out rays, but it vibrates with a radiant light. And at least nine times out of ten he is that way; generally, when we are together for some work, he is that way. Last night he was that way. So then I was busy (we had arranged something and I was busy) when, suddenly, I see him leap to his feet and run a hundred-meter sprint. At first I was shocked, I said to myself, Whats this?! And with great ease, you know: he darted off, then stopped a few minutes, and then ran back. Then he stopped again, and went off a third time on a sprint: like the 100-meter race they run. But the third time, he had grown tall, with a slim body. Grown tall as if to demonstrate to me: this is the way the body will be transformed. He had grown very tall, very strong.
It was very interesting and absolutely unexpected.
--
As for Thon, he used to say that the glorified body would be made of a matter denser than physical matter, but with qualities that physical matter doesnt have. And this substance does have qualities, they say, that Matter doesnt have, like for instance elasticity. Well, a few nights ago (I dont remember when), I was in a place in which a sort of pale gray substance had been collected, which looked like diluted clay (a paste, that is). And elastic, (laughing) glutinous! It was like diluted cement, but very pale, a really lovely pearl gray, and sticky: it could be stretched like chewing gum! And then there were a number of people who had gathered there to ba the in that substance. Some were crawling in it with delight! They were smearing themselves all over with it, and it was sticky! And I myself Once you were there, you were inevitably plunged in it to some extent: it seemed to be there even in the air; you couldnt avoid it. But there was a lady who took great care of me so it wouldnt be too inconvenient: I remember that I had a sort of luminous dress, white and red (white with red decorations) in which I wrapped myself so that substance wouldnt stick to me. But I watched the whole thing, and I saw, for instance, our Purani4 wallowing in it, sliding with delight, dripping with that mud all over! And everybody was in that mud. Only, it was a mud of a very lovely pearl gray, but was it sticky! And in the morning when I woke up, I said to myself it must be the new substance in preparationits not yet fully ready but its in preparation.
There were some highly amusing details: it was arranged like the establishments, you know, in those big stylish spas. It was like that. And people came there to take baths in that substance.
--
Last night, at one point we prepared a certain number of things that were at the same time like food, medicine, and a way to transform Matter. It had different colors, it was in test tubes, and he explained it all to me. But that wasnt the first time: it has happened very often. But then, the best part of it is that when I wake up, all the precise details are immediately swept away! I seem to feel a hand that comes and takes it all awayon purpose.
But I remember, I still have the image in which he is demonstrating things with his test tubes. There was a man who looked like a scientist (a man about forty years old, between forty and fifty, young but not very young) and very thoughtful-looking. He was sitting. I dont know what his nationality was, I dont remember, but he was modern; he was modern, with modern clothes, and Sri Aurobindo showed him his test tubes with things in them and the effect on a totality of matter. I was there, looking on (I was looking with great interest), and I understood everything then. And I still see the image, but the mental knowledge, the mental translation that would have enabled me to say, Now I know, prrt! taken away. Its the same thing every time.
--
They are lunarlunar, that is, cold, icy.
No, theres no wavering between the two. The Chinese, the Chinese domination over the earth is it means the earth hardening, the earth growing cold like the moon. Oh, that would be dreadful.
Ah, good-bye, my children.
0 1965-06-23, #Agenda Vol 06, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
So in that park I had seen the Pavilion of Love (but I dont like to use that word because men have turned it into something ludicrous); I am referring to the principle of divine Love. But it has been changed: it will be the Pavilion of the Mother; but not this (Mother points to herself): the Mother, the true Mother, the principle of the Mother. (I say Mother because Sri Aurobindo used the word, otherwise I would have put something else I would have put creative principle or realizing principle or something of that sort.) And it will be a small building, not a big one, with just a meditation room downstairs, with columns and probably a circular shape (I say probably because I am leaving it for R. to decide). Upstairs, the top floor will be a room, and the roof will be a covered terrace. Do you know the old Indian Mogul miniatures with palaces in which there are terraces and small roofs supported by columns? Do you know those old miniatures? Ive had hundreds of them in my hands. But this pavilion is very, very lovely: a small pavilion like this, with a roof over a terrace, and low walls against which there will be divans where people can sit and meditate in the open air in the evening or at night. And downstairs, at the very bottom, on the ground floor, simply a meditation rooma place with nothing in it. There would probably be, at the far end, something that would be a living light (perhaps the symbol2 made of living light), a constant light. Otherwise, a very calm, very silent place.
Adjoining it would be a small dwelling (well, a dwelling that would still have three floors), but not of large dimensions, and it would be the house of H., who would act as keepershe would be the keeper of the pavilion (she wrote me a very nice letter, but she didnt understand all this, of course).
--
H. hopes so! (Mother laughs) I didnt say either yes or no to her, I told her, The Lord will decide. It depends on my health. Moving from hereno: I am here because of the Samadhi, I remain here, thats quite certain; but I can go there on a visit (its not so far away, it takes five minutes by car). Only, H. wants to be in peace, silence, far from the world, and its quite possible in her park with a road around it and someone to stop people from enteringone can be really in peace but if I am there, thats an end to it! There will be collective meditations and so on. So if I have signs (physical signs, first), then the inner comm and to go out, I will go there in a car and spend an hour in the afternoon I can do it from time to time. We still have time, because it will take years before everything is ready.
You mean the disciples will remain here.
--
In the old formation I had made, there had to be a hill and a river. A hill was necessary because Sri Aurobindos house was on top of the hill. But Sri Aurobindo was there, in the center. It was arranged according to the plan of my symbol, that is to say, a central point with Sri Aurobindo and all that concerns Sri Aurobindos life, then four large petals (which werent the same as in this drawing, they were something different), then twelve petals around (the city proper), then around that, there were the disciples residential quarters (you know my symbol: instead of [partition] lines, there are strips; well, the last circular strip formed the residential place of the disciples), and everyone had his house and his garden: a little house and a garden for everyone. And there were means of communication; I wasnt sure if it was individual transportation or collective transportation (like those small open trams in the mountains, you know) that crossed the city in all directions to bring the disciples back to the center of the city. And around all that, there was a wall with entrance gates and guards at each gate, so people entered only with permission. And there was no money: within the walls, no money; at the various entrance gates, people found banks and counters where they deposited their money and received in exchange tickets with which they could have lodging, food, this and that. But no money. And inside, absolutely nothing, no one had any money the tickets were only for visitors, who entered only with a permit. It was a fantastic organization. No money, I didnt want money!
Oh, Ive forgotten one thing in my plan: I wanted to build a workers housing estate. But it should be part of the industrial section (perhaps an extension on the edge of the industrial section).
Outside the walls, in my first formation there was on one side the industrial estate, and on the other the fields, farms, etc., that were to supply the city. But that really meant a countrynot a large one, but a country. Now its much more limited; its not my symbol anymore, there are only four zones, and no walls. And there will be money. The other formation, you know, was really an ideal attempt. But I reckoned it would take many years before we began: at the time, I expected to begin only after twenty-four years. But now, its much more modest, its a transitional experiment, and its much more realizable the other plan was I nearly had the land: it was at the time of Sir Akbar (you remember?) of Hyderabad. They sent me photographs of Hyderabad State, and there, among those photos, I found my ideal place: an isolated hill (a rather large hill), below which a big river flowed. I told him, I would like to have this place, and he arranged the whole thing (it was all arranged, they had sent me the plans, and the papers and everything declaring it to be donated to the Ashram). But they set a condition (the area was a virgin forest and uncultivated lands): they would give the place on condition, naturally, that we would cultivate it, but the products had to be used on the spot; for instance the crops, the timber had to be used on the spot, not transported away, we werent allowed to take anything out of Hyderabad State. There was even N. who was a sailor and who said he would obtain a sailing boat from England to sail up the river, collect all the products and bring them back to us hereeverything was very well seen to! Then they set that condition. I asked if it was possible to remove it, then Sir Akbar died and it was over, the whole thing fell through. Afterwards I was glad it hadnt worked out because, with Sri Aurobindo gone, I could no longer leave Pondicherry I could leave Pondicherry only with him (provided he agreed to go and live in his ideal city). At the time I told Antonin Raymond, who built Golconde, about the project, and he was enthusiastic, he told me, As soon as you start building, call me and I will come. I showed him my plan (it was on the model of my symbol, enlarged), and he was quite enthusiastic, he found it magnificent.
It fell through. But the other project, which is just a small intermediate attempt, we can try.
--
He knows his way about very well indeed: he is the one who will become the "proprietor" of Auroville after Mother's departure, taking advantage of the money collected for Auroville. He will have the Aurovilians who will not consent to this fraud sent to jail and expelled from India, while Auroville will be reduced to a state of siege and funds meant for Auroville will be used to corrupt.
"Fresh water" is eau douce in French, douce meaning "gentle" or "sweet."
0 1965-07-03, #Agenda Vol 06, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
For me its very different: things always appear old to me, they seem to belong to a faraway past. Especially these last few days. This cold, for instance (Mother has a bad cold), I clearly saw why I caught it (outwardly the reason is very simple: the person who prepares my cards has a cold and I took the cold along with his cards), but why did I really catch it? Well, it corresponded to an arrowlike movement in the consciousness of the cells, and then, naturally, a lag: all that was refusing (refusing or unableit rather gives a feeling of drowsy things that arent too eager to make progress) is lagging behind, and naturally that manifests as a disorder.
Very well.
0 1965-07-07, #Agenda Vol 06, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
(About Mother's recent cold. After listening to the English translation of her last comments on the "Aphorisms" brought to her by Nolini, Mother starts speaking in English:)
I dont know for others but for a very long time in life when there is an illness (some illness of any kind) automatically the cells forget everything, all their sadhana and everything, and it is only slowly when you get out of the illness that the cells begin to remember. And then, my ambition was (I remember that, it was long ago, many years ago), my ambition was that the cells should remember when being illwhich is absurd because it would have been better to aspire to have no illness! But for a time it was like that. The first time that the cells remembered, oh, I was very happy. But now, it is the opposite; that is, as soon as the disorder comes, the cells first first they got a little anxious: Oh, we are so bad that we are still catching illnesses that was a period; and then, afterwards there was the impression: Oh, You want to teach us a lesson, we have something to learn that was already much better: a kind of eagerness. And now there is an intense joy and a kind of power; a power that comes, a power of aspiration and a power of realization that comes with the sense: We are winning a victory, we are winning a new victory.
--
I know how this cold came in, it comes only by negligencenot exactly on ne fait pas attention [people are careless].1
For instance, the doctor had a cold, I knew it instantly; instantly I did what had to be done, and I didnt catch anything; but someone else had a cold, I wasnt on my guard, and while handling the things he handled, I caught it: I noticed it when it came init was already too late. I said, All right, then it followed its whole course. It was particularly violent, I think, because the cells were feeling, Ah! (the joy first), Ah, now were going to make some progress! Then a sort of force, of power of transformation came like that, along with the illness, and thats why the illness developed to the full. At one point it was going to exceed a certain limit and it would have become very inconvenient for the work, so I said, No, no! Take care, because I cant stop my work like that. As if to say, Enough of these bad jokes, you dont want to be ill any longer. Then a force came, something like a boxer.
It was very, very interesting.
0 1965-07-10, #Agenda Vol 06, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Well, yes, its a disorder. But disorder is everywhere! If its any consolation to you, my body too is in disorder. It isnt clearly a disorder but an almost total lack of harmonyits the constant condition of life; its the result of effort, of resistance, of enduring, and also of that tension of being in search of something you hope to reach, but which always eludes you the something that eludes you is That, its that Harmony (a Harmony which, in its perfection, is Ananda, thats obvious). And the constant state is like that. In fact, thats what causes fatigue, tension and so on. Last night, I spent the whole night looking at that, and I was wondering, Why is that so? We are constantly in that state, straining after something that eludes us. And then the senses, the whole realm of the senses seems to be in a constantly false state, and they use that state of tension to give you the feeling that this is going wrong, that is going wrong, and this and that. And if by ill luck there is a vague hint of mental collaboration (from that famous physical mind), then things go awry, they become something really unpleasant.
But its not inescapable. Its not inescapable and its not realwhat I call real is something that comes from the supreme Will directly. That is true; the rest isnt true, its the product of all the confusion (zigzag gesture downward) and of all the disorder of the human consciousness illness isnt true. I dont think that one illness in a hundred (oh, maybe in a thousand) is true. Some are the expression of a Will for something wrong to be well shaken, demolished, so that, in that chaos, something truer may take form but thats an exceptional state.
I have a very extensive field of experience. I receive a flood of letters from just about everyone, writing about their little disorder, their little illness, their little trouble, and naturally asking for all that to be set right. So that puts me in contact with the vibration (all the people here: that makes a lot), and, well, I can truly say that there isnt, oh, there isnt one case in a hundred that is the expression of the direct Willits something (gesture of a zigzag fall) which goes like this and which in the human consciousness gets into a tangle like a wire thats so twisted that you cant untangle it anymore. And because of that state, you are on the verge, yes, of a discomfort (thats almost constant), of an illness, a disorder. And it is the defeatist mental collaboration (because a special characteristic of this mind is to be defeatist), the collaboration of the defeatist mind and the false senses that make for us the life we live, which is no fun.
For two hours last night I saw that, with proof to back it up, examples. I looked, and I was almost horrified to see the extent to which senses distortand they distort (I dont know, there may be people who distort for the better, [laughing] Im not one of them! But they must be marvelous optimists), the senses distort all the vibrations and constantly turn them into disagreeable things, unpleasant ones at any rate, or even indications of danger, warnings of catastrophe. It was fairly repugnant. But I gave free rein to that whole movement in order to see clearly, and all the cellular and other organizations started moaning and groaning, as if saying, But this life is in-tol-er-a-ble, its intolerable. And I listened to that a little while to see; and here, there and everywhere, there was a general groan. And in the end (gesture of descent of the Will), in one second it all went away! It was a whole act those senses were putting on for themselves. We are ri-dic-u-lous beings, thats all (Mother laughs). That was my observation of last night.
--
I can tell you (if it helps your physical mind) that in Japan I had a sort of measles (which had its own rather deep reasons) and that the Japanese doctor (who, besides, had studied in Germany, anyway he was a doctor through and through) told me very gravely that I should take care, that I was in the early stages of this wonderful disease, that above all I should never live in a cold climate, and this and that. I was losing weight and so on. That was in Japan. Then I came here and I said that to Sri Aurobindo, who looked at me and smiled; and it was over, we didnt talk about it anymore. We didnt talk about it anymore and it wasnt there anymore! (laughing) It was all over. When I met Dr. S., years later, I asked him. Nothing at all, he said, everything is fine, there is absolutely nothing, not a trace. And I hadnt done anything, I hadnt taken any medicine or any precaution. Only, I had told Sri Aurobindo about it, who had looked at me and smiled.
Well, I am convinced thats how it is, thats all. But the physical mind doesnt believe in that. It believes that thats all very well in the higher realms, but when we are in Matter things follow a law of Matter and are material and mechanical, and there is a mechanism, and when the mechanism and so on and so forth (not with these words, but with this thought). And one has to keep forever working on that, forever saying, Oh, put a stop to all your difficulties, keep quiet!
--
I have nothing to boast about, you know! I am preaching to this body as much as to others. I should be upright, strong, solid. Why am I stooped like this? I know why, but its not a compliment. I know why, its because all this is still subject to all those suggestions from the world, all the medical thought and all that derives from it and all the suggestions from life. And habits. And all these people here So theres nothing to boast about. Only, I know (the advantage is that I know it), I know it should be otherwise. I know it and the cells also know it, and I told you, yesterday evening they were crying over it, there on my bed; they kept moaning and groaning: I was not made for this life of darkness and disorder, I was made for Light, for Strength and Love. And the answer: Ah! Take it, then! And they were moaning, Why am I compelled to be like this? And all of a sudden, instead of giving them free play: the full Presencein one second it was all gone. But the collective suggestion, the collective atmosphere is so rotten, I may say, that it acts all the time.
But you (speaking to Sujata) are one of those who can say that when I come at night, I am tall and strong. And at night, I work, I am tall, I am strong. And it goes on moaning! Its idiotic. Not only idiotic, but there is still that sort of self-pity (Mother strokes her cheek), which of all things is the most repugnant: Oh, poor little thing, how tired you are. Oh, poor little thing, how people tire you, how hard life is, how difficult things are. And then moaning and groaning like an idiot. If it were just for me, I would give them a good thrashing! But I am asked not to do it, so I dont do it. But I do feel that before the eyes of this wonderful Graceof this resplendent divine Love and this omnipotent Powerwe are deeply ridiculous, thats all.
0 1965-07-21, #Agenda Vol 06, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
I had always been under the impression of what Sri Aurobindo said: This instrument [the physical mind] is useless, it can only be got rid of.2 It was very difficult to get rid of it because it was so intimately linked to the aggregate of the physical body and its present form it was difficult; and when I tried and a deeper consciousness tried to manifest, it used to cause fainting. I mean that the union, the fusion, the identification with the Supreme Presence without that, without this physical mind, by annulling it, caused fainting. I didnt know what to do. Now that its collaborating, and collaborating consciously (and with a great power in the sensation, it seems), maybe things are going to change.
Everything that was mental I remember very clearly the state I was in when I wrote those Prayers and Meditations, especially when I wrote them here (all those I wrote here in 1914): it seems to me cold and dry yes, dry, lifeless. Its luminous, its lovely, pleasant, but its cold, lifeless. Whereas this aspiration here [in the cellular mind], oh, it has a powera power of realizationquite an extraordinary power. If this becomes organized, it will be possible to do something. There is an accumulated power there.
(silence)
0 1965-07-24, #Agenda Vol 06, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
With this sort of work to establish perfect equality, I never drive something away immediately, saying, No, thats not possible. One must be calm and collected in the face of all things. I was calm and collected, thinking, Let us see, let me wait for two days, and if he has really broken his head (laughing), Ill find out! Of course, nothing happened. And when I got your letter, I had the feeling it was the same thing, but I thought, Let us see, let us wait. I looked, and didnt see anything. Through your letter and your words I looked, but didnt see anything. And I had the feeling it was this same physical mind that made contact with a formationa malicious formation, because such is the habit of the physical mind.
Now that the work is to rectify our way of being, we realize what it is! Its really disgusting. It works constantly and is constantly defeatist. As you say, you feel a little painoh, is it going to be a cancer?
0 1965-08-04, #Agenda Vol 06, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
At any rate, it is quite certain (Sri Aurobindo wrote it somewhere, I read it again just two or three days ago), quite certain that the Lord doesnt want automatons that He has to push along. Thats not what He wants: He wants a conscious collaboration. Only, a point comes when the sense of the person truly disappears; you go on saying I, because how do you express yourself? But when you say I, you have the feeling (not the thought for the thought, it takes a long time), a sort of feeling of the higher Will manifesting here, in this spot, with these means.
It comes after years.
0 1965-08-07, #Agenda Vol 06, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
If they have some intelligence, they will publish it. If they publish it, it will be good for everyone. I havent told you this little story which resembles yours: some two years ago, The Illustrated Weekly asked questions on where India stood, and in their questionnaire they had asked for the answers to be put in as few words as possible. Very well. As for me, I answered with one word, two words, three words, because things can be put in very few words.2 They published it in a box in the middle of peoples answers, which were columns long! Mon petit, it seems it had more effect than all the rest. They said to themselves, It has forced us to think. It will be the same thing for you if you have the courage to put just what has to be put, in as few words as possible: the thing as exact as possible.
If they have the courage to publish it, it will do a lot of good, a lot.3
--
On a December morning, almost twenty years ago, on the platforms of the Gare du Nord, a youth was preparing to set off for anywhere, as long as it was as far and adventurous as possible for the time being, it was South America. And beneath the enormous clock which weighed several tons and seemed to him as weighty as Western time, this youth was repeating a curious mantra in his heart: Sri Aurobindo-Mauthausen. Only these two words remained to live and walk with. Behind, there was a world collapsed once for all under the Austrian watchtowers. Although the watchtowers might as well have been Boulevard Montparnasseit was the same thing; another searchlight would have pierced the scenery perfectly well. And there was in that word all the force of a man who had emerged from the dead. Then this name, which did not have a very precise meaning, Sri Aurobindo, but it goes without saying that open sesames have never spoken to the headthey open the door. And there was in it all the force of a man who needs one true little thing to live.
Because we can entertain our minds as long as we likeour libraries are full; we can amass all the possible explanations of the world, but we will not have achieved anything or walked a single step if we havent touched the secret spring behind the minds flourishes. For the Truth is not what makes us think, but what makes us walk on.
0 1965-09-15a, #Agenda Vol 06, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
The hurricane didnt quite have the same color (how can I explain this?) in the large place where the person without a body was, and there, in that corridor; in the first place, it was very red, as if all the leaves were red, the trees were red (there were other colors, but red was the dominant color), while in the corridor, the color was muddier. But it was so strong! So strong that it was hard to get out of it.
And when I got out of it (it was 3 in the morning), I said to myself, All right, let me look after something else now, and I made a special concentration to get out of it. And I found myself in a place I know very well, which is like a replicaa mental replicaof what I might call certain Ashram rooms (its not exactly that, but it corresponds). And there was a gentleman there I knew very well, a Frenchman, who had come to see me. He had a big desk, he was sitting at the desk, waiting for you: you were expected (thats why I am telling you the story). But I myself wanted to see him before he saw you. There was something I wanted to tell him. Then, instead of going through the usual door, I went by another way and arrived before you. I saw him (we didnt speak to each other I never speak to people), but he was very warm, very enthusiastic, very friendly and full of a sort of rather pleasant fervorignorant, but pleasant. A rather tall man, I think, dressed in an ordinary European suit. I cant describe him very well; if I saw him, I could say, Yes, thats him. And he said two words to me that were like that didnt mean anything at all, but that were like the expression of his feeling. I dont exactly recall the word, but it was nothing, it was Oh! something. So I put my message into his head and left, and as I was leaving (Mother laughs), I almost bumped into youyou were rushing in! And I told you, Dont worry, dont worry, everything is fine! And I left.
--
They say that the Americans have asked the Indians permission to evacuate their people (they have a lot of people in Lahore, there is a large American colony), they have asked for Indias permission to send a fleet of planes to take all those people out, and India has authorized it.
Wait, Ill show you (Mother gets up and goes to get a photo of General Chaudhuri.) A little over a month ago (I dont remember, it was about one week before S.M. came4) I was looking for a man, I felt the need of a man in India, and then they proposed sending me the photo of the army chief. I said yes (he happens to be a cousin of K. here). The photo isnt good, but I see what I wanted to see; I saw it perhaps a month or a month and a half ago, and I have kept it under the accumulation of Forces, here (the photo is placed on a small table not far from Mother). He is the one who is now leading the armies.
0 1965-10-13, #Agenda Vol 06, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
It lasted long enough (gesture showing a very swift alternation from one state to the other: conscious of His Presence and oblivious of His Presence), like a demonstration. And with this Smile You know, when I say, The Lord is smiling, it means something; its not that I see a face smiling, but its a a sunny vibration You know, the sun is dull and drab and cold and almost black in comparison. And then with that gone (same alternating gesture) with that here, with that gone. Which means that those who will come and manifest, who will exist when everything is changed, they will lack the sense of wonder at the opposition.
You know, you can only be filled with wonder! (How can I put it?) A sort of laughterof sunny laughterwhich is full of an intensity of love and Yes, this must be the Ananda, the true Ananda.
--
Sometimes, in the individual or collective evolution, there are phases when you have emerged from the grating, that is to say, you no longer believe in it, no longer believe in the truth and importance, the reality of those things, but you dont have the other thing yet, so in between the two its austere, dull and cold. You no longer have the excitement of one thing, and not yet the joy of the other; you are in between the two and its a little arid. But only a small, limited number of individuals have reached that stage. They are the people who say, I dont want this world. And then they go away.
But as for the other thing
0 1965-10-20, #Agenda Vol 06, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
You must shake that up, mon petit! You must. In your being you have been and still are somewhere in full Light. I told you it was a sort of close collaboration between the Light which is in Sri Aurobindo and your capacity of expression. One has no right to forget that.
I dont forget that.
0 1965-11-06, #Agenda Vol 06, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Youve been in a car at more than sixty miles an hour, havent you? It feels motionless in comparison to that Speed. It wasnt physical since my bed wasnt moving, but it was so swift, so swift that you could feel the friction of speed. And head first: it went head first. It didnt go feet first because I was lying and I didnt go feet first: I went head first, brrf I as if sucked along by something. And my eyes were open. But naturally, the body wasnt movingvisibly, at least, it wasnt moving! Oh, I remember, yes, the night before, it was the house that was moving; I was in a room that was moving with that same swiftness, and I was watching everything hurtling and hurtling past, it was fantastic! And yesterday, it wasnt the house, it was only a sort of column how can I explain? It wasnt a columna strip. I was there on that strip, but I was very tall, I took up a lot of room; there were lots of people, and they were small (Mother draws small figures), a lot, brrf!
Yes, yes, I remember, the previous night, it was the room that was moving: a square room; and there werent any walls, there were just windows, and it was rushing and rushing, what a race it was! Then everything stopped abruptly, finishednot finished, not stopped: the consciousness changes, there is a reversal of consciousness, so its over.
0 1966-01-22, #Agenda Vol 07, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
I very well imagine that its not something absolute; it was only ONE way of being, but a charming way of being! Usually, when those who dont have a sufficient intellectual preparation have an experience like this one, they think they have caught the only truth. And then, from it, they dogmatize. But I clearly saw it wasnt that: its ONE way of being, but a wonderful way of being, of course! Infinitely superior to the one we have here. And we CAN have it here: I had it. I had it quite concretely. And there is always something going wrong (a pain here or a pain there, or this or that, and then circumstances going wrong too, always difficulties) the color of it all changes. And it becomes buoyant, you know, lightlight, supple. All the hardness and rigiditygone.
And the feeling that if you choose to be that way, you can go on being that way. And its true. Its all the bad habitshabits that have been on earth for thousands of years, obviouslyits all the bad habits that stop you; but there is no reason why it couldnt be a permanent state. Because it changes everything! Everything changes! You know, I was brushing my teeth, washing my eyes, doing the most material things: their nature changed! And there was a vibration, a conscious vibration in the eye that was being washed, in the toothbrush, in All that, all of it was different. And it is clear that if you become the master of that state, you can change all circumstances around you.
0 1966-02-23, #Agenda Vol 07, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
I have seen several such cases, but that one was so clear! So clear, so precise. And without the collaboration of active thought I wasnt thinking about it at all: one night I saw them like that, Pavitra having come out of his body, and the other leaving (he was always in repose in my aura), he left my aura, they embraced, and then one entered the other.1
He was quite young, he was twenty-one. It was the first war, the war of the trenches.
0 1966-03-26, #Agenda Vol 07, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
So, if for some reason or other there is a disorganization (but I think the reason is one of teaching), one must have the capacity to go like this (Mother brings her two hands down in a gesture that immobilizes everything) and to stop all that instantly. But the capacity has been there for a long time, a long time (it hasnt always been used, but it has been there): the Power. And its the same with EVERYTHING: world events or natural or human upheavals, earthquakes and tidal waves, volcanic eruptions, floods, or else wars, revolutions, people killing each other without even knowing whyas they are doing at the moment: everywhere something pushes them on. Behind this quiver, there is a will for disorder that tries to prevent Harmony from being established. Its there in the individual, in the collectivity, and in Nature. And then, its such a painstaking, persistent teaching, which forgets nothing and is repeated every time something isnt totally understood, and is repeated in greater detail for you to better understand the working: the working in the hands, in the activity, in the Force going through [Mother] like this, in the use of vibrationsand which teaches the great Lesson: learning how to manifest the divine Force.
Its absolutely wonderful.
0 1966-03-30, #Agenda Vol 07, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
The same Consciousness as this consciousness I had in what we can call the material mental (that is, the collective consciousness of the cells), but this morning it was in the cells themselves, this Consciousness [the eternal Consciousness Mother speaks of in the conversation of March 4], the same Consciousness. And it was truly miraculous. With the impression that with THAT there [in the cells], there is nothing impossible.
It comes, it stays in spite of everything, whatever I do, even if I speak, and it goes. And when its gone its gone, I can make an effort, it doesnt come back. But so long as it is there, it is all-powerful, it dominates everything and yes, the whole world seems to change. And yet everything is the same. You remember this sentence of Sri Aurobindo: All was changed and yet everything was the same? That is exactly that.
0 1966-04-23, #Agenda Vol 07, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
It seems to be going quite well. A very widespread collective response, and from the two opposite sides: the whole Communist side is moving, and the whole financial, American side is moving. There is an effervescence.
Its sure to work, I KNOW it exists the city is already there (it has been for many, many years). Interestingly, my creation was with Sri Aurobindo in the center, then when Sri Aurobindo left, I let it all rest, I didnt budge anymore. Then it suddenly started coming again, as if to say, Now is the time, it must be done. Very well. The Muslims would say, Its fated. Its fated, its sure to exist. I dont know how much time it will take, but it seems to be going fast.
0 1966-05-14, #Agenda Vol 07, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
This eye [the left] sees extremely clearlyextremely clearlyalmost more clearly than before, but in the entire corner here, in the very corner, there is a sort of little fog, very, very small like a needle pointno, a pinhead. So that I cant read with it. With this one [the right] I can read, theres nothing, but its dimmed: there isnt half the clarity of the other. But the left is fantastically clear! Very well. So I am accustomed to reading with a magnifying glass [with the right eye], and it has become that way; but when I look at a photograph with a magnifying glass, the photo starts having three dimensions (gesture as if the photo were surging forward), so that I see the person not in colors but alive, the picture is alive. It has three dimensions and the person moves. So I look at the photo with my magnifying glassand I see the person moving!
With the left eye, oh, it has extraordinary precision, but I cant read because (and still I could read, its an idea, just an impression), there is a sort of very, very small cloud in the corner, here. Theres nothing (laughing), I have no cataract! There was a time when it was fairly widespread in that corner, and I showed it (long ago, two years ago), I showed it to the doctor, who told me it was inside: its not on the surface of the eye, its inside. He told me, It wont go. I told him, Ah, wont it!in six months it was gone, completely gone. It came back just a littleit has come back, but it will go!
0 1966-06-02, #Agenda Vol 07, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
When I lie down on my bed at night, there is an offering of all the cells, which regularly surrender as completely as they can, with an aspiration not only for union but for fusion: let there remain nothing but the Divine. Its regular, every day, every single day. And for some time, these cells or this body consciousness (but it isnt organized as a consciousness: its like a collective consciousness of the cells), it seemed to be complaining a little, to be saying, But we dont feel much. We do feel (they cant say they dont feel: they feel protected, supported), but still They are like children, they were complaining that it wasnt spectacular: It HAS to be marvelous. (Mother laughs) Ah, very well, then! So two nights ago, they were in that state when I went to bed. I didnt move from the bed till about two in the morning. At two in the morning I got up, and I suddenly noticed that all the cells, the whole body (but it really is a cellular consciousness, not a body consciousness; it isnt the consciousness of this or that person: theres no person, its the consciousness of a cellular aggregate), that consciousness felt bathed in and at the same time shot through by a MATERIAL power of a fan-tas-tic velocity bearing no relation to the velocity of light, none at all: the velocity of light is something slow and unhurried in comparison. Fantastic, fantastic! Something that must be like the movement of the centers out there (Mother gestures towards faraway galactic space). It was so awesome! I remained quite peaceful, still, I sat quite peaceful; but still, peaceful as I could be, it was so awesome, as when you are carried away by a movement and are going so fast that you cant breathe. A sort of discomfort. Not that I couldnt breathe, that wasnt the point, but the cells felt suffocated, it was so awesome. And at the same time with a sensation of power, a power that nothing, nothing whatsoever can resist in any way. So I had been pulled out of my bed (I noticed it) so that the BODY consciousness (mark the difference: it wasnt the cells consciousness, it was the bodys consciousness) would teach the cells how to surrender and tell them, There is only one way: a total surrender, then you will no longer have that sensation of suffocation. And there was a slight concentration, like a little lesson. It was very interesting: a little lesson, how it should be done, what should be done, how to abandon oneself entirely. And when I saw it had been understood, I went back to bed. And then, from that time (it was two, two: twenty) till quarter to five, I was in that Movement without a single break! And the peculiar thing was that when I got up, there was in that consciousness (which is both cellular and a bit corporeal) the sense of Ananda [divine joy] in everything the body did: getting up, walking, washing its eyes, brushing its teeth. For the first time in my life I felt the Ananda (a quite impersonal Ananda), an Ananda in those movements. And with the feeling, Ah, thats how the Lord enjoys Himself.
Its no longer in the foreground (it was in the foreground for an hour or two to make me understand), now its a bit further in the background. But, you understand, previously the body used to feel that its whole existence was based on the Will, the surrender to the supreme Will, and endurance. If it was asked, Do you find life pleasant?, it didnt dare to say no, because but it didnt find it pleasant. Life wasnt for its own pleasure and it didnt understand how it could give pleasure. There was a concentration of will in a surrender striving to be as perfectpainstakingly perfectas possible, and a sense of endurance: holding on and holding out. That was the basis of its existence. Then, when there were transitional periods which are always difficult, like, for instance, switching from one habit to another, not in the sense of changing habits but of switching from one support to another, from one impulsion to another (what I call the transfer of power), its always difficult, it occurs periodically (not regularly but periodically) and always when the body has gathered enough energy for its endurance to be more complete; then the new transition comes, and its difficult. There was that will and that endurance, and also, Let Your Will be done, and Let me serve You as You want me to, as I should serve You, let me belong to You as You want me to, and also, Let there remain nothing but You, let the sense of the person disappear (it had indeed disappeared to a considerable extent). And there was this sudden revelation: instead of that base of enduranceholding on at any costinstead of that, a sort of joy, a very peaceful but very smiling joy, very smiling, very sweet, very smiling, very charmingcharming! So innocent, something so pure and so lovely: the joy which is in all things, in everything we do, everything, absolutely everything. I was shown last night: everything, but everything, there isnt one vibration that isnt a vibration of joy.
0 1966-08-10, #Agenda Vol 07, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Its very amusing: you have here (gesture to chest level), like this, a big lotus bud bowing down (gesture turned downward), and surrounded by a sparkle of golden light, then by another row of light; there are three, four, five rows of light of different colors. Its here (same gesture), like this, bowing down.
(Mother resumes her contemplation)
--
An engineer from the cole Polytechnique in Paris.
After Satprem had left, Mother remained silent for a long time, then turned to Sujata and told her, "Strange, very strange, I've never seen a lotus bud bowing down." Then, as Sujata looked at her without understanding, Mother added, "The heart lotus is always turned upward; it's the aspiration. Here, it bows down towards the earth."
0 1966-08-24, #Agenda Vol 07, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
(The beginning and end of the following conversation could not be tape-recorded because of mechanical trouble, and only the middle remains. The conversation was about an experience of Mothers; she described the place in which Satprem usually rests at night and from which he draws the atmosphere of his present book: a place very harmonious in color and substance. Then Sujata tells Mother a dream she had a few days ago.)
When you went to this place of harmony, did you play music? Because I saw you play music for him.
--
It was about two days ago, two or three days ago. You see, I was thinking of the uncertainty and insufficiency of our meetings [because of the avalanche from the secretaries], and I wondered what to do. Because we have work to do and it must be done, but apart from that, theres no time for anything; then I was told that music could help you. But I am completely off musical practice, and so, since I can no longer play materially, I thought, I can put him in contact with musical waves. Because they are there all the time, all the timemarvels. So then, maybe thats what made me go to that place [where Satprem rests] and thats what (turning to Sujata) gave you your dream. And thats certainly what made me have that experience. I didnt particularly notice music, but its an extremely harmonious place: the atmosphere was harmonious, the colors were harmonious, the sounds were harmonious; so there must be music there.
But I remember that when I woke up, I recalled it was on your birthday that I last played.
0 1966-09-03, #Agenda Vol 07, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
(Soon afterwards, about an old Playground Talk of April 28, 1951, in which Mother speaks of awakening the body not through coercion by the vital, but through collaboration from the body itself, and of the need for physical plasticity so as to be able to undergo all kinds of change.)
Ive had several hours of this very experience: how the body is automatically attached to its precise way of doing things, and how it must receive the light in order to be ready for anything. It must be able to say spontaneously and sincerely, Your Will, Lord, nothing but Your Will. But it accepts this from no one else or nowhere else than the Lord. Otherwise, nothing doing.
0 1966-09-14, #Agenda Vol 07, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
And those birds (they were birds that werent birds, but they looked like birds), they came all luminous, luminous, with sometimes tiny darker traces here or there, but generally all luminous; their shape was very fluid. And the colors werent as we know them: it wasnt white, it wasnt pale blue, but as if the essence of white and blue, the essence of colors. I dont know how to explain it. And they came like that, then he sent them down, and when they went through his hands and flew down towards the earth (laughing) they became brown, blue, gray all possible colors! But those were opinions. Its amusing.
***
0 1966-09-21, #Agenda Vol 07, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
All this is simply to tell you that if nations collaborate in the work of Auroville, even to a very modest extent [such as this offer of money from the French government], it will do them goodit can do them a lot of good, a good that can be out of proportion to the appearance of their actions.
You speak of the imminence of a catastrophe, but still Auroville will take some time to be realized?
No! I am speaking of the countries collaboration in CREATING something. Its not when Auroville has been completed: its the nations collaboration in creating something but creating something founded on the Truth instead of a rivalry in Falsehoods creation. Its not when Auroville is readywhen Auroville is ready, it will be one town among all other towns and its only its own capacity of truth that will have power, but that remains to be seen.
No, the point is a combined interest in building something founded on the Truth. They have had a combined interest (combined without any mutual liking, of course) in creating a power of destruction built on Falsehood; well, Auroville means diverting a little of that force (the quantity is minor, but the quality is superior). Its truly a hopeits founded on a hopeof doing something that can be the beginning of a harmony.
--
But tiny details such as the one we spoke of just before [the French governments offer of a pension] are an indication: its countries collaborating in the Truth without knowing it. And its very good, it will do them good. Its good for them. It doesnt matter if they arent aware of it (smiling): they wont have the pleasure of having done it, thats all!
(silence)
0 1966-10-19, #Agenda Vol 07, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
All those who do the puja sincerely (sincerely, of course, not mechanically but with devotion) always attract an emanation or a representation, a representative form, which is present at the puja and responds: it responds to the puja. Every family that worships Kali, for instance, has its own Kali. And its true, they are little entities that arent quite independent, but have their own lives. And in Durgas case, it was very clear. So when I say it makes a big difference, its because now, in a general way, all those representations of Durga are themselves also in a movement of collaboration.
Naturally, all those entities were more or less spontaneously doing the Supremes work, but (how can I explain it?) without their having a conscious will: they did it simply and spontaneously, because they were beings of harmony, working harmoniously. But now, in Durgas case its very clearvery clear: she is like this (gesture turned upward, awaiting the Supremes Command). In her relationship with the hostile beings, in her legendary yearly battle (which is of course symbolic), she is like this (same gesture), eager to know the direction, the indication, the gesture to be made.
0 1966-10-29, #Agenda Vol 07, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Not last night but the night before, I spent a long time, almost two hours of our time here, with Sri Aurobindo. I have told you he has something that translates as an abode (its magnificent, magnificent!) in the subtle physical. Its always immense, so clear, well-defined, yet fully open. And I get a sense of (Mother takes a deep breath) phew! open, luminousalways, in every case. He is there maybe not quite as he was here (but it makes no difference to me because the change has been very progressive: I have followed Sri Aurobindo almost from day to day, step by step), and he is perhaps rather taller, with perhaps a form that has greater perfection, I dont know, but to me, his expression (Mother smiles with her eyes closed) his expression is inexpressible. I spent a very, very long time with him. In those huge rooms (they are limitless, you know, you feel you could go indefinitely from one room to another, from one place to another), he was directing It was in a part of the place with a certain number of rooms (four, five or six, I dont know), large rooms where he was directing a pottery, just imagine! But it wasnt like here. There were objects made of clay. There wasnt any process of firing, painting or any like that (it wasnt like here), but there were shapes which looked like pottery shapes, and they had a power (Mother gestures downward) to manifest. And then, there was everything: animals, plants, people, things, everything, with all possible colors. I went from one to another, looking, explaining. I had spent a long time with him, and I knew exactly why and how it was done, and afterwards I went and studied the work and observed. Then the rooms were arranged, the things were put in their place: that was as if to show the result. And things charming in their simplicity, yet they contained an extraordinary power of manifestation! But they had a deep meaning. I took an object made of a very dark reddish brown earth, and it was badly put together, that is, the shape wasnt right and I showed it to the pottery foreman (there was a pottery foreman in each room, looking after the work). I showed it to him, and told him (it was fairly big at the bottom, with a small piece at the top [Mother draws a sort of vase with a neck], anyway it wasnt well done), I explained it to him, saying, You understand, its not properly balanced. And while I was holding it in my fingersit broke. Then he said to me, Oh, I am going to mend it. I answered, If you like, but its not as it should be. Of course, we say it with our words, but there, it had a very precise MEANING. Then, there were kinds of big openings between one room and another (they werent rooms, they were huge halls), and one went on to the place where they made fish! But the fish werent fish (!), they had another meaning. And there were fish this big, made of clay, colored and gleaming, magnificent: one was blue-green, another yellowish white, but pretty, so pretty! And they were kept on the floor as if it were water: the fish were kept on the floor, right in the way. So I thought, Thats not very convenient! (Mother laughs) And said like this, it all looks like childishness, but there it had a very deep meaning, very deep.
It was very interesting.
0 1966-11-19, #Agenda Vol 07, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Its again the quality of the vibration: sans sy attendre [without expecting it] is fullerits fuller, more golden. The other, dune faon inattendue [in an unexpected way] is a bit cold and dry.
Et sans sy attendre, la Terre deviendra divine
0 1966-12-17, #Agenda Vol 07, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
So I told him Because I looked, I immediately looked at it from THAT angle. For my part, I see things very differently, never in that way. I am always surprised at the way people see things. To me, its completely different, its the Lords Vibration crystallizing. Thats all. And always, alwaysat all times. So theres no why, no howits very simple, elementary in its simplicity. But I couldnt tell him that, he wouldnt have understood. So I looked at it from his standpoint, and all of a sudden I saw; I said, Yes indeed, how did this come about? (Mother laughs) So I answered him (I dont remember the words I used, but in substance): The protection acts on the entire group when it works in a coordinated and disciplined way, but if individuals in it have an action INDEPENDENT of the group, then they fall back into their own determinism, which means that the protection acts according to their personal faith, not at all as something collective: according to their personal state and faith, the action of the protection is greater or lesser.
I saw it was clearly that. I saw how it had happened (because his question made me look at it, so I saw). There is an interesting point, its that the mental initiative in swimming across that pond was P.s and anothersso, humanly speaking, they are the ones who are responsible (but thats not true, its not like that!). But anyway, they were outside the group, it was an action that had nothing to do with the group, and they did it because they were to rejoin the group at a precise time and they were late. So it was clearly an individual outgrowth. Walking round the pond would have taken three hours while there were hardly two hours left before nightfall, and they were in a jungle, without any light or anything. That was another impossibility. So with his reason and human common sense, he said, The best is to swim across. But he hadnt foreseen (that was the reckless part) that the water would be icy.
--
It was quite reckless because here, the body isnt accustomed to cold water, and when you are in water thats too cold, you get cramps.
But P. was sufficiently protected to escape and be saved, while the other one met his end.
0 1966-12-31, #Agenda Vol 07, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
The red rose is the order of the knights of the Truth. Dont you know this? I began placing it when colonel Rpiton came here, the one who made the Africa march during the war. Every morning I would give him a red rose, and with him I instituted it. Since then, when I give any man a rose (I give them a red rose), its so he becomes a knight of the Truth.
But I dont tell him.
0 1967-01-14, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
What is this flower? (Mother takes the hibiscus) It has a strange colour.
Yes, Ive never seen it.
0 1967-01-18, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
I have seen relatively clearly that that trance depended on the ratio between two aspects (the proportion between two aspects): that of the individual transformation (that is, the transformation of this body), and that of the general, collective and impersonal work.
If a certain balance is kept, that state (of prolonged trance) may be dispensed with, but then the same work which would have been done in a few weeks or a few months (I dont know) will extend over yearsyears and years. So its a question of patiencepatience isnt lacking. But its not only a question of patience; its a question of proportion: there must be a certain balance between the two, between the pressure from outside of the external work (not external, the collective work), and the pressure on the body for its transformation. If wisdom is still there, that is, if the instrument is constantly and infallibly capable of doing exactly what is expected of it (to put it into words: the supreme Lords precise will), then the trance would not be necessary. It would only be if there is a resistance in the execution (out of ignorance).
Thats how I perceive it.
--
There are billions of elements in the body, so its a mixture of receptivity and non-receptivity. Its still mixed. And that mixture is why the appearance2 remains what it is. Well then, to make everything receptive in every element is a work, you understand, a formidable work. If it had to be done in detail, it would be impossible, but through the pressure of the Force it can be done. So then, the trance would be made necessary precisely so that its done quickly (relatively quickly). This work is BEING DONE (I am conscious of it), you understand (laughing), only it may stretch over hundreds of years! Thats what Sri Aurobindo said: a state of consciousness has to be established in which the collective life of the cells can be preserved for as long as desired; that means the Lords Will must be sufficiently active to keep the balance between all those elements for as long as necessary for all of them to change. And always, it has always been said that the most external form would be the last to change; that the whole internal, organic functioning would be changed before the external form, the appearance (its only an appearance, of course); that the appearance would be the last to change.
It seems to me to be the legacy of primordial habits the habits of Matter. This Matter, of course, comes from total unconsciousness, and throughout the ages and all the ways of being, it returns to total consciousness it goes from one extreme to the other; well, its these habits of static immobility that give this need for trance. It shouldnt be necessary. Only (how can I explain?), logically, as things are, it depends on the balance between the bodys capacity of receptivity and its external activity: its obviously far more receptive when it is immobile, because its energies are occupied with the transformation.
There is also another thing which could change the course of events: its that the vital is becoming more and more receptive and collaborative. This whole vital zone, which was the zone of revolt and deliberate opposition to the divine transformation, is becoming more and more collaborative, and with its collaboration (because this vital zone is the zone of movement, action, energy put to use), with its conscious collaboration, the methods of transformation may become different (its something I have been studying these last few days). It may change the methods. But thats a whole world to be learned.
One should become more and more not only attentive but receptive, with a precision for details which would mean that at each second one would know what had to be done and how it should be done (not outwardly: inwardly). These cells should learn to have at each second the attitude necessary for everything to unfold smoothly, in rhythm with the supreme Consciousness.
0 1967-01-21, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
That way of being is still quite indefinable; but in this search there is a constant perception (which translates itself in vision) of a multi coloured light, of all the coloursall the colours not in layers but as though (stippling gesture) a combination of dots, of all the colours. Two years ago (a little more than two years, I dont remember), when I met the Tantrics, when I came into contact with them, I started seeing that light, and I thought it was the tantric light, the tantric way of seeing the material world. But now, I see it constantly, associated with everything, and it seems to be what we might call a perception of true Matter. All possible colours are combined without being mixed together (same stippling gesture), and combined in luminous dots. Everything is as though made up of this. And it seems to be the true mode of being I am not yet sure, but in any case its a far more conscious mode of being.
I see it all the time: with eyes open, eyes closed, all the time. And one has a strange perception (for the body), a strange perception of subtlety, permeability (if I may call it that), of suppleness of form, and not exactly an elimination but a considerable lessening of the rigidity of forms (the rigidity is eliminated, but not the forms: a suppleness in the forms). And for the body itself, the first few times it felt that in some part or the other, it had the impression of being a bit lost, with the sense of something eluding it. But if one remains very quiet and waits quietly, its simply replaced by a sort of plasticity and fluidity that seems to be a new mode of the cells.
0 1967-01-31, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Its collective. Its independent of beings.
Its independent of beings and its collective, and it acts on everyone and on circumstances. Where does it come from? That has to be seen. It must be found.
Its very strange. Ive asked myself the same question because the impression is that the same thing is happening at different points of the GLOBE.
0 1967-02-04, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Mother comes in with a bad cold
There were constant obstructions there, between the nose and the throat, and I was silly enough to complain about it; I said it really wasnt reasonable and it had better go, and then drastic measures.
--
Why? Theres a purple V in front of you. A purple Vnot purple: dark mauve, the colour of the vital. A V for victory.
Has something happened?
0 1967-02-08, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
I have some interesting things to tell you. Its about this cold. An extraordinary healing power All the phases in their most acute form, with the study of the process, and each phase gone through in a few hours, or a few minutes (depending on what it was). Usually, when you have a cold, you go through one phase, then another (you know how it is), then it goes lower down, then you cough, then All that was gone through quickly, and in two days it was over. And with the whole process, but not the mentalized process, not at all: the vibratory process, showing how the Force comes, acts, and at once Oh, it was very, very interesting, because there was the part played by the inconscient, the part played by conscious reactions, the part played by the will (tremendous, an enormous part), the part played by mental suggestion (tremendous too), and the action of the supreme Vibration. The whole thing in detail, day and night, constantly; to such a point that at moments I stood still, like that, to follow the course. And it lasted (I saw you on Saturday) for Sunday, Monday, Tuesday: those three days.
Its my fault it started; as I told you, I had complained about these sinuses which were a constant nuisance, and there was also that constant inflammation of the mouth and the throat. So it had its effect. I cant say its fully over because there still remains a lot, quite a lot of the old habit, but it came with the intention of changing things.
--
Because what applies to a cold obviously applies to any disorder, doesnt it?
Its a detailed process for each case. That was one of the manifestations of a cold.
I mean, it could act on other illnesses too, couldnt it?
--
The attitude taken by the cells, the action of the will, the habit of Nature, the Interventionall that was seen minutely, phase after phase. Because these cells (in the throat) were complaining; they were the ones that said things werent changing, that they remained as they were. They clearly saw that things were kept under control, but there was no sign of transformation. And that cold came as a magnifying glass, you understand. It came and magnified everything so it would become more visible and more easily observed. And the detail of all thats going on is, oh, really marvellous: its a whole world, and they are tiny little things that generally go unobserved because we observe mentally. But like that For instance, at a certain point during those successive phases, all the signs are there that the bodys will is going to flag and that you are going either to faint or to fall sick for a while. Then comes the choice made within by the cells, which weigh up the possibilities from the standpoint of the progress of transformation: What can act? What can be the most useful in order to produce the greatest result? Is it to yield and have an apparent fall (its only apparent), and in that fall, to allow the Force to do its work without interference; or is it to follow the course of conscious transformation? And thats where this marvellous discovery of the cells came in: they really felt Nature knew better (laughing) because it was used to it. That was exquisite! Admirable.
All this must be going on in everyone, only people are unconscious. Its the consciousness of the cells which has awakened, you understand. Its so interesting! And how illnesses can be avoided, how things All this based on the experience of the UNREALITY OF APPEARANCES: a play is going on behind, which is altogether different from what we see or know.
0 1967-02-18, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
With everything, the great secret is for the consciousness to be THE Consciousness the limitless Consciousness. Then what it does is to set this (the instrument) in motion. Laterlater, when the transformation takes place, when its total and effective, there will probably be a conscious collaboration; but now its only a surrender, a self-giving, and this lends itselflends itself with enthusiasm and joylends itself for THE Consciousness to use it.
When its like that, all goes well.
0 1967-02-25, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
(Mother gives the disciple a rose the colour of fire.)
Do you think Nature will ever invent something better than this? I dont think so.
--
How will it be? Because nothing I have seen from the point of view of form, has the richness, variety, unexpectedness, beauty of colour and form that this rose has. I have seen things, I have seen supramental realizationsfrom the point of view of consciousness, they are infinitely superior, without a doubt, but from the point of view of form
They are yet to be born. Those forms are going to be born.
--
Yes, like a flower. The consciousness can change all the colours according to the moment.
Oh, that would be lovely. If one could become a lovely rose!
0 1967-03-07, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
The vast majority of human beings have a collective destiny. For them, the question does not arise.
One who has an individualized psychic being can survive even in the midst of collective catastrophes, if such is the choice of his soul.
How is the soul conscious of being and existing after death, once it is separated from its physical, vital and mental beings?
0 1967-03-15, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
The roses have opened now (Mother holds out a rose to the disciple), and isnt this one a magnificent colour! Beautiful, isnt it?
This morning I had an amusing experience with roses. There was a closed budbig, hardbig and hard, red. I took it, looked at it, then my fingers ran over the flower like that, and (gesture showing the flower opening up), one petal after another and another and yet anotherbefore my eyes. And it was completely hard and closed. I took it and said, Its a pity. I was about to put it back in water so it would open up, and I looked It was so pretty, you know, opening up, happy, as if saying to me, Oh, how happy I am!
0 1967-04-12, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
As you know, I am very busy. I didnt have time to read these papers, but I know too that Y. is rather impatient(!), and these last three or four days I had been saying to myself, I must ABSOLUTELY see that, otherwise it wont do. I MUST see that And it kept coming back. Then one morning (in the morning, at the time when I have all my experiences), while I was sitting, I suddenly felt something so heavy in my head, heavy in my chest, and odd. I had never felt that before. And all the sensations had become almost violent. So I closed my eyes, and you know, an avalanche, a cavalcade of forms, sounds, colours, even odours, which imposed themselves with a reality and intensity I had never known that before, never.
I watched, then I said to myself, But thats a good way to go mad! And I started doing what had to be done for it to stop. But it wouldnt stop! It wanted to go on. So I thought, Its obviously here for a reason. Since its imposing itself in this way, it means theres a reason for me to have this experience. I watched, studied, observed. And I saw it was a magnified faculty of sensationinordinately magnified, you understandBECAUSE the equilibrium between all the faculties of the being had been disrupted.
--
Here is Dr. Albert Hofmann's description: "Vertigo. Intermittent sensation of heaviness in the head and the body, as if it were filled with metal. Everything seemed to topple over. When I closed my eyes, I was overcome by an uninterrupted succession of fantastic images of extraordinary intensity. All sound perceptions (the sound of a car, for instance) were transformed into optical effects, each one creating a corresponding coloured hallucination, constantly changing form and colour. At times I felt I was outside my body."
***
0 1967-04-24, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
For after all it is the will in the being that gives to circumstances their value, and often an unexpected value; the hue of apparent actuality is a misleading indicator. If the will in a race or civilisation is towards death, if it clings to the lassitude of decay and the laissez-faire of the moribund or even in strength insists blindly upon the propensities that lead to destruction or if it cherishes only the powers of dead Time and puts away from it the powers of the future, if it prefers life that was to life that will be, nothing, not even abundant strength and resources and intelligence, not even many calls to live and constantly offered opportunities will save it from an inevitable disintegration or collapse. But if there comes to it a strong faith in itself and a robust will to live, if it is open to the things that shall come, willing to seize on the future and what it offers and strong to compel it where it seems adverse, it can draw from adversity and defeat a force of invincible victory and rise from apparent helplessness and decay in a mighty flame of renovation to the light of a more splendid life. This is what Indian civilisation is now rearising to do as it has always done in the eternal strength of its spirit.1
Sri Aurobindo
0 1967-04-27, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Here is the sequence of events: someone living here had a very bad cold some seven or eight days before the darshan. I said to myself, I must not catch it(in fact, Mother has a bad cold). So I did a special prayer not to catch it. But it has had consequences.
I told you about that experience (which has been growing increasingly concrete and constant) of the Vibration of Harmony (a higher harmony expressing the essential Consciousness in its aspect of love and harmony and, as it draws nearer to the manifestation, of order and organization), and of the nearly constant and general vibration of disorder, disharmony, conflictin reality, Matters resistance to this Action. The two vibrations are like this (Mother slips the fingers of her right hand between those of the left), as if they interpenetrated each other and a simple movement of consciousness sent you to one side or the other, or rather, the aspiration, the will for realization, put you into contact with the Vibration of Harmony, and the SLIGHTEST slackening made you lapse into the other. It has become constant. And then, on the 24th, right from morning there was a constant aspiration, a constant will for the triumph of the Vibration of Harmony. Then I sat down at my table as I always do, about five or ten minutes before it began. And instantly, with a puissancea puissance capable of crushing an elephantthis Vibration of Harmony came down like that, massive to the point that the body lost the sense of its existence altogether: it became That, it was conscious of nothing but That. And the first quarter of an hour literally flashed by in a second. Then, there were three people in the room; one of the three, or maybe all three, felt a malaise (nothing surprising!), and that woke me up: I saw the light (I burn a candle on my table) and I saw the time, but it wasnt me something saw. Then there was a sort of pacifying action on the place, and thengone again. And one second later, the call of the end!1
--
To me, that was unique, because its the first time it has happened to me. But it has had a result: all that still clings, within, to that old habit of disorder and disharmonywhich is the cause of, oh, everything, all mischief, all illnesses, everything that has been Yesterday afternoon, I saw there was something that needed to be eliminated, and it changed into a head cold. Its nothing.
Its nothing, and it has given me an opportunity to see that all the cells everywhere, even those that according to the old habit should be in discomfort because of the cold, are all in a blissful aspiration of transformation. And they truly and spontaneously feel that whats happening to them is for it all to move a little faster. So they are very happy.
But things should move still faster; that is, all these things such as colds and so on, should pass off very quicklycome in and go out.
There are still many bad habits that will pass.
0 1967-05-03, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
And its good it came back; its a form quite within everyones grasp, which they can understandyou arent asked extraordinary things: you are asked goodwill. When I found this again, I smiled and found it amusing, I said, Well, I could have written the same thing about cheerfulness! I could have said, Be cheerful and you will see cheerfulness everywhere.One can say many things (Mother rotates her hand slowly as if to present various facets), it always makes me think of a kaleidoscope with colour arrangements to express something else which shrinks, becomes diminished, generalized and finally within everyones grasp. But there is something: like a FORMIDABLE conflict taking place over the earth at this moment, with this wonderful divine Grace always helping, always striving for the best and exerting a pressure, Come now, be cheerful, come now, have goodwill, come now, have, yes, have that inner Harmony of contentment, of hope, of faith. Do not accept the vibrations of decomposition the vibrations that diminish, degrade and lead towards destruction.
Its everywhere, everywhere like that (gesture of pressure on the earth).
0 1967-05-10, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
(After a silence) Listen, Ill give you an example. Some two years ago, I had a vision about U.s son. She had brought him to me (he was almost one) and I had just seen him there (in the music room). He struck me as someone I knew very well, but I didnt know who. Then, that same day in the afternoon, I had a vision. A vision of ancient Egypt, that is I was someone, the high priestess or I dont know who. (Because you dont say to yourself, I am so and so! The identification is total, there is no objectivity, so I dont know.) I was inside a wonderful monument, immense, so high! But it was completely bare: there was nothing, except for one place where there were magnificent paintings. Thats where I recognized the paintings of ancient Egypt. I was coming out of my apartments and entering a sort of great hall: there was a kind of gutter to collect water (on the ground) running round the walls. And I saw the child (who was half-naked) playing in it. I was very shocked, I said, What! This is disgusting! (But the feelings, ideas and so on were all expressed in French in my consciousness.) The tutor came, I had him sent for. I s colded him. I heard soundswell, I dont know what I said, I dont remember those sounds. I heard the sounds I uttered, I knew what they meant, but the expression was in French, and I didnt retain a memory of the sounds. I spoke to him, telling him, What! You let this child play in that? And he answered me (I woke up with his answer), saying (I didnt hear the first words, but to my thought it was), Such is the will of Amenhotep. I heard Amenhotep, I remembered it. So I knew the child was Amenhotep.1
Therefore, I know I spoke; I spoke in a language, but I dont remember more. I remembered Amenhotep because I know the word Amenhotep in my active consciousness. But otherwise, the other sounds didnt stay. I dont have the memory of the sounds.
0 1967-05-27, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
I saw a series of roses, this big (about 25 cm), coming one after the othermagnificent! All kinds of colours, which certainly had a significance: they would come and present themselves, as if giving a little bow, and then go away, and then another arrivedroses this big. Because I had complained just before!2 It was just in front of you (gesture on the heart level), magnificent roses of a perfect shape, and all kinds of colours.
Basically, it (meditation) is my lazy moment. When I stay like that, it immediately becomes very pleasant, and theres always something pretty to be seen. Its my lazy moment.
0 1967-05-30, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Ive received a letter from someone (not from Israel) who writes to me that there is such a spirit of fraternity and collaboration in the country, so strong, the like of which he has never seen anywhere else.
Humanity seems to want to do very nasty things.
0 1967-06-03, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
1) Being convinced of the essential human unity and having the will to collaborate in the advent of this unity.
2) The will to collaborate in all that furthers future realizations.
Thats all, its not complicated.
--
I saw Y. on the 31st. She stayed for about an hour and told me of her hopes: she sees the possibility of a sort of world television (I dont know how that would be arranged), with a telephone, and there would be a central office with a collection of answers to all possible questionseach question answered by someone eminent or qualified. The result would be the organization of a universal educationwell, terrestrial that would really be an education for all countries, in which the knowledge and best qualities of every country in the artistic, literary and scientific fields would be gathered in a kind of transmitting centre, and all you would have to do would be to get into communication with it. So then, instead of having more or less incapable teachers to teach what they also know more or less, you would have the answer to every question, the most competent and best answer. Thus there would really be all over the earth an education that would be the best possible, from which everyone would receive only what he wants; you wouldnt have to attend classes, a number of useless classes, in order to catch the little you want to know: you would have it just by getting into communication with the centre; you would ask for such and such a number and would get your answer.
If it could be realized, it would be very good. It means that the most beautiful works of art, the most beautiful teachings, all the best of what humanity is GOING to produce, would be collected and within reach of all those who had a television. There would be the image along with the explanation, or the text or speech. A kind of imposing central building where everything would be gathered. I found it rather attractive. I told her that we would have that in Auroville (not the central office: just a receiving set). She said that instead of teachers who teach poorly what they know, there would be the best teaching on each subject. (I didnt ask her WHO would select those people that remains the somewhat delicate point.) But I found the idea very attractive. She said things are moving in that direction.
Yes, but its still a kind of encyclopedia.
0 1967-06-07, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
You see, every national entity has a right to free and independent existence, provided it doesnt interfere in the free and independent existence of all other entities. Ambitions, territorial expansionsnaturally, all colonies and all thatmust be swept out of the picture. To defend themselves, the Egyptians say the Israelis had publicly declared Israels border should be the Nile I dont know if thats true. I dont know if its true because everybody tells lies. On their side, the Egyptians publicly declared three years ago (it was a public declaration), they publicly declared that the Israeli nation had no right to exist and had to disappear.
Three days ago, Nasser declared that he wanted the destruction of Israel: wiped off the map.
0 1967-06-14, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
There was the case of Sri Aurobindo. He is dead, the doctors decidedhe was absolutely alive. Absolutely living. And even after five days, when they put him into it was because of (how should I put it?) the pressure of the outside world, and because it was impossible to preserve him. We had to consent. But I cannot say he was dead! He wasnt at all dead, it was perfectly obvious. The body was already beginning to (very little, but a little at the end of the fifth day), that is, the skin was losing its colour, but (Mother makes a glorious gesture).
For the first three days, I remained standing there, near his bed, and in an absolutelywell, to me, it was absolutely visibleall the organized consciousness that was in his body DELIBERATELY came out of it and into mine. And not only did I see it but I felt the FRICTION of its entry.
0 1967-06-24, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Because now, the body itself really collaborates as much as it canas much as it canwith an ever-increasing goodwill and power of endurance, and the self-observation is truly reduced to a minimum (there is still some, like something touching lightly now and then, but not even for a few seconds). Self-observation, oh, that means a thoroughly disgusting, repugnant and catastrophic atmosphere. Its like that, FELT like that. And its becoming increasingly impossible, I see that, its visible. But there is still the whole weight of millennia of bad habits, which we could call pessimistic, that is, anticipating decay, anticipating catastrophe, anticipating well, all those things, and, ugh! thats the most difficult thing to purify, to clarify, to remove from the atmosphere. Its so INGRAINED that its absolutely spontaneous. That is the great, great, great obstacle that sort of sense of inevitable decay.
Naturally, from the mental standpoint, the entire earth atmosphere is like that, but in the mind it hardly matters at all: one ray of light and its swept away. But its INSIDE (pointing to her body), that habit that catastrophic habitwhich is terrible, terrible to contradict. And its INDISPENSABLE that it should disappear so the other can settle in.
0 1967-06-30, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Whats that country again which started as a colony of brigands? (Laughing) Theres a country like that somewhere, which started as a colony, I forget which.1
***
--
I remember, for nearly an hour this morning, I had a demonstration in my own body of how to do it. A demonstration. But it cant be explained. And it began again just now, but instead of being me alone, it was what I might call a collective demonstration (gesture between Mother and Satprem), I mean it had to do more particularly with you.
Its like things being put in order, in a certain very subtle way which isnt easy to express.
0 1967-07-05, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Yes, the colour of like this box, if you like. Not really cream, it was a pink a mixture of pink and cream.2
Ah!
--
Its the colour of the supramental in the physical. That is how I have seen it.
So I would have a supramental covering? I would put on a supramental covering? That would be amusing!
0 1967-07-08, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Previously I used to tear them and throw them into the wastepaper basket, then I realized that they collected all those torn papers and went through a tremendous toil to put them back together!
When I really want to get rid of something, I burn it myself. Ive burned lots of things.
0 1967-07-15, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
There was another experience I had a little later (a little later, around eighteen or nineteen), in which I suddenly found myself riding a horse, dressed as a man, leading armies to a fantastic victory; and it was the glory of the sense of the presence of the Force of Victory that made me lead the entire army to victory. Afterwards, I remembered the costume I was wearing, the peoples costumes, everything, and I saw it was Murats famous victory.3 I was (how can I put it?) the victorious spirit in Murat. And ONLY THAT. So when people tell you, I was this person, that person, its all tales: they are forces, states of consciousness that manifested in certain individuals at certain moments in their lives and which, at such moments, touched Matter concretely. And all that is gathered, collected together little by little, gradually, until it produces a conscious being.
Now, this (Mothers being) is a rather special conscious being. The psychic of this life (laughing) was rather collective! Memories of Catherine the Great, memories of Elizabeth, memories of two lives at the same time (!) at the time of Francis I,4 memories innumerable memories, and quite diverse. Each one Its not that you were in such or such person for a whole life: you were the important psychic MOMENT in those existences.
I stopped taking any interest in all that when I came here it was part of the occult knowledge, not of spiritual knowledge. I stopped taking any interest in it. But now that everything is being gathered together, it comes like that, like a part of the work, because the cells, when I had those visions, participated to some extent in the sense that they had the vibration in themselves; so all those vibrations have participated in the formation of all these cells, and now they relive it all. It gives them a possibility of breadth, of diversity, of synthesis and coordination of many, many things. And the sense of having thus lived for a long, long, long time.
--
cold.
cold: intellectual and cold. cold. Its very insensitive. And the strange thing is that their sensitivity isnt the same at all, its extremely dulled.
Elvire, the eldest daughter of Mother's grandmo ther, Mira Ismalun, had married an Italian.
0 1967-07-22, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
I have seen something. In its totality, it is luminous, but not radiant; its extremely peaceful, and as if golden, but not dazzling (I dont know how to explain), like a creamy and golden light. Very, very peaceful. But in it there were patches (as they say in English) of three VERY bright colours that were grouped together, as it were, and as though organized. There was a dazzling red, ruby red; a bluish white, almost like a pearl-grey, very luminous too; and (Mother tries to remember) Its gone, I dont remember if it was. Yes, it was green, but an emerald green that was also luminousluminous and transparent. They were like defined groups, but their positions were changing (Mother makes a rotating gesture, like the lights in a kaleidoscope). They were almost like entities. And it was in your atmosphere. Like formations moving about and organizing themselves (same gesture), made up of those three colours.
The grey is the grey of spiritual light, spiritual aspiration; the red is the ruby red of the physical; and that emerald green 3
0 1967-07-29, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
And so the conclusion. Ive always heard it said (I dont know if its true) that men think in a certain way and women in another. On an external level, the difference is not visible, but the attitude the mental attitudeis perhaps different. The mental attitude on the Prakriti side is always action, always action; the mental attitude on the Purusha3 side is conception: conception, overall vision, and also observation, as though it observed what the Prakriti had done and saw how it was done. Now I understand that. Thats how it is. Naturally, no man (here on earth) is exclusively masculine and no woman is exclusively feminine, because it has all been mixed together again and again. Similarly, I dont think any one race is absolutely pure: all that is over, its been mingled together (it is another way to re-create Oneness). But there have been TENDENCIES; Its like that note about Israelites and Muslims, its just a manner of speaking; if I were told, This is what you said, I would reply, Yes, I said that, but I can also say something else and many other things! Its a way of selecting certain things and bringing them to the fore with an action in view (its always with an action in view). But for the moment, everything is like that, everywhere mixed and mingled together with a view to general unificationno one nationality is pure and separate from the others, that no longer exists. But to a certain vision, each thing has its essential role, its raison dtre, its place in universal history. Its like that very strong impression that the Chinese are lunar, that when the moon grew cold, some beings managed to come to the earth, and those beings are at the origin of the Chinese nation; but now there only remains a tracea trace which is the memory of that distinctiveness. And its everywhere the same thing: if you look at the individuals of every nation, you find in every nation that everything is there, but with the memory the memory of a specificness which has been its raison dtre in the great terrestrial unfolding.
(Mother goes into contemplation)
0 1967-08-02, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Its the sense of being nothing, nothing, absolutely nothing when you are in front of call that what you will, it doesnt matter (one may start from the idea of consciousness and go up to the Supreme Lord, it doesnt matter). But its the concrete feeling that as long as you want to remain shut in your little person, you are nothing, while if you abdicate that little person, you become everything. Thats what they dont understand. Pride is simply You have a contact with inner eternity, inner omnipotence, but you are shut in your little ego, so the ego imagines itself to be That, and then it asserts itselfsits down and refuses to budge: a colossal I. Its precisely the supreme Truth (laughing) in its deformation.
I tried to make him understand that yesterday, but not like that, I put it very nicely!
--
It should be noted that while Mother appears to be referring to her own body, these are collective difficulties in the disciples.
***
0 1967-08-12, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
You know, it came to me as a discovery. The whole religion, instead of being seen like this (gesture from below), was seen like that (gesture from above). Here is what I mean: the ordinary idea of Christianity is that the son (to use their language), the son of God came to give his message (a message of love, unity, fraternity and charity) to the earth; and the earth, that is, those who govern, who werent ready, sacrificed him, and his Father, the supreme Lord, let him be sacrificed in order that his sacrifice would have the power to save the world. That is how they see Christianity, in its most comprehensive idea the vast majority of Christians dont understand anything whatsoever, but I mean that among them there may be (perhaps, its possible), among the cardinals for instance who have studied occultism and the deeper symbols of things, some who understand a little better anyway. But according to my vision (Mother points to her note on Christianity), what happened was that in the history of the evolution of the earth, when the human race, the human species, began to question and rebel against suffering, which was a necessity to emerge more consciously from inertia (its very clear in animals, it has become very clear already: suffering was the means to make them emerge from inertia), but man, on the other hand, went beyond that stage and began to rebel against suffering, naturally also to revolt against the Power that permits and perhaps uses (perhaps uses, to his mind) this suffering as a means of domination. So that is the place of Christianity. There was already before it a fairly long earth historywe shouldnt forget that before Christianity, there was Hinduism, which accepted that everything, including destruction, suffering, death and all calamities, are part of the one Divine, the one God (its the image of the Gita, the God who swallows the world and its creatures). There is that, here in India. There was the Buddha, who on the other hand, was horrified by suffering in all its forms, decay in all its forms, and the impermanence of all things, and in trying to find a remedy, concluded that the only true remedy is the disappearance of the creation. Such was the terrestrial situation when Christianity arrived. So there had been a whole period before it, and a great number of people beginning to rebel against suffering and wanting to escape from it like that. Others deified it and thus bore it as an inescapable calamity. Then came the necessity to bring down on earth the concept of a deified, divine suffering, a divine suffering as the supreme means to make the whole human consciousness emerge from Unconsciousness and Ignorance and lead it towards its realization of divine beatitude, but notnot by refusing to collaborate with life, but IN life itself: accepting suffering (the crucifixion) in life itself as a means of transformation in order to lead human beings and the entire creation to its divine Origin.
That gives a place to all religions in the development from the Inconscient to the divine Consciousness.
0 1967-08-19, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
But with a very clear vision that a collective transformation sufficient to create a new species on earth still seems some way off without any estimate of the length of time, but not immediate.
The fact is certain.
0 1967-09-03, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
We had a Frenchwoman here, someone from Dordogne and who changed her name when she came here: we called her Nivedita. She was extremely enthusiastic, very devoted, but at the same time she had remained very Christian: she tried to keep them both going together. Here, naturally, that created inner difficulties for her, and one day, without really knowing why or how, she went to confession and everything collapsed. She was in despair, collapsed. I told her, Its better for you to go. And she went. She went back to France. As soon as she was there, she wrote other desperate letters, and then she died.
So the nearer they draw, the more difficult the problem becomes. Its better to This lady has external work to do. I havent encouraged her too much to become intimate here, because one day shell be up against the big problemyou understand, symbolically its limited to one person, but its the larger problem of Religion, as a dogma and absolute law, versus freedom, and not many can hold out.
0 1967-09-06, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
I have made discoveries these last few days. I have discovered that in past lives (I dont know which ones), my psychic was several times in a tortured body. And it comes back for (how should I put it?) a collective action in the world, on the earth, so that the possibility of the thing may disappear. Its a rather interesting work.
But I noticed it because I said to myself, But why is my attention constantly turned to that? Then I looked carefully and saw that the psychic had been in a tortured body several times, long ago at the time of the Inquisition, but also in political cases (much more recently, probably). Real tortures, you know, those inventions in which men are worse than monstersno animal is more monstrous than human consciousness like that. And it came back with the law, the principle of the thing, of the distortion of consciousness, and once I had understood, I looked at myself (I was wondering, Why? Why is my attention turned to that?), I then looked and I saw. And I started doing the needful so that it may no longer exist in the creationsome things will not exist any longer.
--
A head as big as this He was smiling, and showing us both something that was the symbolic image of these Talks. It was very interesting! His head was big like this (about fifty centimetres), wholly luminous with that supramental light which is its golden, but with red in itnot red: pink, but its inexpressible. Its almost like a flame, but not dazzling; and it gives the sense of a forcea really all-powerful force. He was there like this (gesture between Mother and Satprem), between the two of us, with his hand outstretched (it was all the same colour), and in his hand was a cube. And that cube was all those Talks. So he showed the cube, which was of a transparent light (how can I put it?) a steady transparent lightnot still, but steady. And there were kinds of veins in it: blue veins, silvery veins It was a cube, you see, a perfect cube, but it was all moving about: blue, silvery, red veins, and sometimes too, a small dark line. And he was showing it as if to say, Here is how it is. The whole thing was a cube of colourless, transparent lightpurely transparent and purely luminous; and there were kinds of currents passing through it: sometimes in one corner (but it was shifting about, not still), and it was now dark blue (not dark, but bluereally blue), now silvery, now white, and in places, from time to time, here or there (gesture to various points), there was in a corner or at an edge (laughing), a small black line!
He held it out in his hand and laughed!
0 1967-09-13, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
It is said (but I am not sure about this, because it was simply repeated to me), a prominent Catholic to whom I spoke my mind quite plainly, answered me, In the college of Cardinals, they are taught the truth and told this is not true. I said, God bless the cardinals, but their first duty should be to destroy this monstrous formation.
The most terrible thing is that she believes she is free!
0 1967-09-30, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Oh, yesterday I saw the photo of a man, a German who speaks German, but its not clear whether he was born in Germany or in America. He must be around forty or forty-five, and for many years The story goes like this: his parents, both father and mother, were thorough non-believers, and when he was born (or anyway the day after his birth), there was a horizontal column of light on his head, visible to the naked eye. Naturally, the parents were troubled. But the interesting thing is that its going on. That man (I saw the photos) held a meeting in America of four thousand people (I saw the photo, four thousand people!) and while he was talking there was that column of light, it could be seen in the photograph. It was about as thick as an arm and this long (about twenty centimetres). And he feels he is spoken to, that something like the supreme Divinity speaks to him, and that he has been told to proclaim the coming of the second Christ! Well He proclaims and gives people a kind of baptism. I saw his photo and its very strange, he has a strong, powerful face, but a nasty mouth (blade-like gesture), tight-lipped, pinched.
And recently I saw two photos of the heads of the Rosicrucian movement in Holland (or Belgium, I forget), the Rosicrucian movement in Europeexactly the same nasty, hard, inexorable mouth. Odd.
0 1967-10-04, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Its a collective suggestion, mon petit, and so strong, so strong! I told you the story: some people, when they are awake, resist and fight; intellectually, they understand; then, when they are half conscious or in sleep, it seizes them and they are terrorized. Its over the WHOLE earth, the whole earth (there are Christians everywhere), its an atmosphere that I see like a huge spider over the whole earth.
(silence)
0 1967-10-14, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
All of a sudden, yesterday afternoon towards evening (around six, or a little before), there came a sort of atmosphere of (what should I call it?) a kind of discouraged pessimism in which everything had become lacklustre, grey, dissatisfied. When you see things from above, in a certain atmosphere of totality, each thing plays its part and collaborates in a general manifestation, but there, it was like something shut in itself, with no reason to be except that it was. It had neither aim, nor motive nor reason to be, neither was it a special circumstance or a particular event: it was a kind of self-enclosed formation, a state of being which was obviously morbid, but not violent, nothing violent. Yes, in which each and everything was without reason or aim, without any satisfactionnei ther oneself nor others, nor things. And I was DELIBERATELY shut in it, in order to feel it. The consciousness wondered, Why? What does it mean? Why is it like this? And at the same time (you know that yesterday was the day of Durgas Victory for those who worship Durga), so I asked myself, Why does she choose to shut me in this state just on the day of victory? What does it mean? What does it mean? It was indeed like a factual demonstration of the perfect uselessness of that way of being, which had no reason to be, which could be turned to anything, any time, without reason and without motive. It was like the symbol of disgruntled uselessness. But it went on. I looked and looked at it, trying to find the slightest clue to the cause of that state: what, when, who, how? And the curious thing is that its very, very foreign to my nature, because even when I was in real trouble, I never wasted my time being like that. And it went on, as things go on when I have to study them, understand them, and do what needs to be done. Then, at a certain point I said to myself, Oh, perhaps this is what Durga intends to conquer this year? And at the same time I remembered (like that, far away on the fringes of the consciousness), I remembered the time when Sri Aurobindo was there; every year, on the Victory day, I would tell him, Well, this is what Durga has done this year, and he would corroborate it. I would say, This is what Durga has conquered, this is what Durga Every year, over a long time. And so that memory was there, far away in the light, as if to tell me, See, do you remember that? And I said to myself, Well, this may be what Durga wants to conquer? Then I thought, But whats to be conquered in this? Its silly! Its a silly state. (Lots of people are in that state, I know, but its absolutely silly, it has neither reason nor cause nor aim, its like something that comes in without one knowing how or why.) It went on for a good while (I dont remember exactly how long). Then, when I had seen clearly, understood clearly what it was, I asked Durga, Is this what you want to do? And it was suddenly as if a very strange thing, as if it evaporated before my eyes, pfft! It went like this (gesture of bursting), and then I tried and tried the memory of it and everything had completely vanished! In one second it had completely gone.
While it was there, it was yes, as if something without any truth in itself, something that didnt rest on any truth. A morose, dissatisfied, grumpy state, and it was grey, grey, grey, lacklustre, looking at everything from the angle of uselessness and stupidity. Then there was a sort of bursting: all of a sudden, poff! like that, and it was all over. And now its a sort of vague memory which I can hardly recapture, which no longer exists.
0 1967-10-19, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Not this year, but it says there will be a terrible battle before the second coming of Christ. I know nothing about that myself! But a lady disciple in Holland has written a letter: it seems everyone there is terror-stricken, theres panic all over the country (!) and they say its the year of the battle. And here in India (not concertedly, of course), astrologers have said that September and October are months of a terrible battle (maybe not a war, but a battle) between Truth and Falsehood. There in Holland, it seems its like in the year 1000: they gather for meditations, entreaties, collective prayers. Well. And here, its the same thing, they are panic-stricken.
But battle there is. You cant move a finger without waging a battle.
--
But the Russians have sent spacecraft to Venus, they took four months to reach, and in those spacecraft were radio-like communication systems that send news, and a device to collect the soil and analyze itall of it just machines. It reached Venus, and now they give the news every day: Here is how it is on Venus. (Mother laughs) They are rather amazing! The Americans were content with the moonyou get to the moon quite soon, in two months, I think, maybe less than that. But the Russians took four months to get to Venus and it arrived there, they got the news, it works with electrical devices.
Yes, but on the earth it doesnt work!
--
This is a time of extremes, even extremes in the downright material. Did I tell you both the other day that I had received the first flower of a plant which visibly was supramental powera flower like this (gesture), a hibiscus? And yesterday there was the first flower of another plant, also a hibiscus, this big, snow-white, with such a colour at the centre! An indefinable colour, it cant be described. Its golden pink, but so beautiful that you wonder how such colours can be physical. A flower this big (gesture, about fifteen centimetres), the first flower was yesterday. And that was VISIBLY (it expressed itself, you know) the Victory of Love, the Power of Love. Its as if all this physical Nature were, oh, like this (gesture of intense aspiration), tryingshe tries, and there is a Response. They are blessed not to have a mind.
It was beautiful. It doesnt keep, otherwise I would have kept it to show it to you. How beautiful it was! Like this (same gesture of ardent aspiration): a thirst, a thirst for the Divine, a thirst for the Divine. All those mental ratiocinations and mental complications, it all goes round and round in circles. Yes, it does bring about whats now happening: a sordid conflict, really sordid, between Falsehood and Truth.
0 1967-10-21, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
There is also that FORMIDABLE collective suggestion weighing down. That suggestion of ageing ageing, wearing out and death (death, anyway what they call death, which isnt dyingwhat does dying mean? Annulment does not exist, nothing is annulled), but anyway, giving up the form because the form refuses to be transformed (thats nearly what it is) and isnt receptive, it accepts a progressive deterioration because of the formidable weight of the collective suggestion the habit of millennia: Its always been like that, thats that. The great argument. Which isnt true, besides.
But there is such idiocy in this body. For instance, there is at each moment (each second or minute), at each moment there is the choice between the continuation of the old habit or progress towards consciousness. Its constantly like that. And through (what can I call it?) sloppiness (what is it? Its not bad will because its idiotic; its more idiotic than bad will), there is a spontaneous tendency to choose deterioration rather than the effort of progress, and its only when there is something like a slightly awakened consciousness that says, You silly fool! Youve gone through many more difficulties than the little difficulty of making an effort of progress, then that has some weightnot always.
There is a sort of passive knowledge (not that the body doesnt know how it is, it knows how it isits sloppiness), but when it knows and makes the effort, it is always, every time, expressed as lights, yes, like vibratory waves, and those of progress are the ones which have all the colours, that stippling of all the colours: a light made of a stippling of all the colours. Those are the lights that choose the immediate little effort to reject the sloppiness. But they are not important events: its something going on each minute, for everything, all the time, all the time, all the time for everything.
It must be a phase. I dont know how long that phase will last, but it must be a phase because its obviously a transitional state. And then, when there is that inner aspiration, oh! I have seen the cells, Ive seen them saying like this, Oh, will there be a possibility to be You effortlessly? Then there comes such a marvellous Response! For a few seconds its (blissful gesture), then the old routine starts up again.
0 1967-11-04, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
For a long time I used the Talks Q. had left, until the day when I realized they were totally truncated. Then I finally discovered another collection, but I have realized that that too is not the absolute original. So every time its a huge work to collect everything together again in order to reconstruct the exact original.
But who did the recording?
--- Overview of noun col
The noun col has 1 sense (no senses from tagged texts)
1. col, gap ::: (a pass between mountain peaks)
--- Synonyms/Hypernyms (Ordered by Estimated Frequency) of noun col
1 sense of col
Sense 1
col, gap
=> pass, mountain pass, notch
=> location
=> object, physical object
=> physical entity
=> entity
--- Hyponyms of noun col
1 sense of col
Sense 1
col, gap
=> water gap
=> wind gap
--- Synonyms/Hypernyms (Ordered by Estimated Frequency) of noun col
1 sense of col
Sense 1
col, gap
=> pass, mountain pass, notch
--- Coordinate Terms (sisters) of noun col
1 sense of col
Sense 1
col, gap
-> pass, mountain pass, notch
HAS INSTANCE=> Brenner Pass
=> col, gap
HAS INSTANCE=> Cumberland Gap
=> defile, gorge
HAS INSTANCE=> Donner Pass
HAS INSTANCE=> Khyber Pass
=> saddleback, saddle
--- Grep of noun col
anonymous file transfer protocol
baycol
chloramphenicol
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collotype printing
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columbiform bird
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columnar epithelial cell
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columniation
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colutea arborescens
colymbiformes
colza
colza oil
communications protocol
ethylene glycol
file transfer protocol
glycol
hypertext transfer protocol
lescol
propylene glycol
protocol
transmission control protocol
transmission control protocol/internet protocol