At
the time when this book was being brought to its close, the first attempt
at the foundation of some initial hesitating beginning of the new world-order,
which both governments and peoples had begun to envisage as a permanent
necessity if there was to be any order in the world at all, was under
debate and consideration but had not yet been given a concrete and practical
form; but this had to come and eventually a momentous beginning was
made. It took the name and appearance of what was called a League of
Nations. It was not happy in its conception, well-inspired in its formation
or destined to any considerable longevity or a supremely successful
career. But that such an organised endeavour should be launched at all
and proceed on its way for some time without an early breakdown was
in itself an event of capital importance and meant the initiation of
a new era in world history; especially, it was an initiative which,
even if it failed, could not be allowed to remain without a sequel but
had to be taken up again until a successful solution has safeguarded
the future of mankind, not only against continued disorder and lethal
peril but against destructive possibilities which could easily prepare
the collapse of civilisation and perhaps eventually something even that
could be described as the suicide of the human race. Accordingly, the
League of Nations disappeared but was replaced by the United Nations
Organisation which now stands in the forefront of the world and struggles
towards some kind of secure permanence and success in the great and
far-reaching endeavour on which depends the world's future.
This
is the capital event, the crucial and decisive outcome of the world-wide
tendencies which Nature has set in motion for her destined purpose.
In spite of the constant shortcomings of human effort and its stumbling
mentality, in spite of adverse possibilities that may baulk or delay
for a time the success of this great adventure, it is in this event
that lies the determination of what must be. All the catastrophes that
have attended this course of events and seem to arise of purpose in
order to prevent the working out of her intention have not prevented,
and even further catastrophes will not prevent, the successful emergence
and development of an enterprise which has become a necessity for the
progress and perhaps the very existence of the race. Two stupendous
and world-devastating wars have swept over the globe and have been accompanied
or followed by revolutions with far-reaching consequences which have
altered the political map of the earth and the international balance,
the once fairly stable equilibrium of five continents, and changed the
whole future. A third still more disastrous war with a prospect of the
use of weapons and other scientific means of destruction far more fatal
and of wider reach than any ever yet invented, weapons whose far-spread
use might bring down civilisation with a crash and whose effects might
tend towards something like extermination on a large scale, looms in
prospect; the constant apprehension of it weighs upon the mind of the
nations and stimulates them towards further preparations for war and
creates an atmosphere of prolonged antagonism, if not yet of conflict,
extending to what is called “cold war” even in times of peace.
But the two wars that have come and gone have not prevented the formation
of the first and second considerable efforts towards the beginning of
an attempt at union and the practical formation of a concrete body,
an organised instrument with that object: rather they have caused and
hastened this new creation. The League of Nations came into being as
a direct consequence of the first war, the U.N.O. similarly as a consequence
of the second world-wide conflict. If the third war which is regarded
by many if not by most as inevitable does come, it is likely to precipitate
as inevitably a further step and perhaps the final outcome of this great
world-endeavour. Nature uses such means, apparently opposed and dangerous
to her intended purpose, to bring about the fruition of that purpose.
As in the practice of the spiritual science and art of Yoga one has
to raise up
the psychological possibilities which are there in the nature and stand
in the way of its spiritual perfection and fulfilment so as to eliminate
them, even, it may be, the sleeping possibilities which might arise
in future to break the work that has been done, so too Nature acts with
the world-forces that meet her on her way, not only calling up those
which will assist her but raising too, so as to finish with them, those
that she knows to be the normal or even the unavoidable obstacles which
cannot but start up to impede her secret will. This one has often seen
in the history of mankind; one sees it exampled today with an enormous
force commensurable with the magnitude of the thing that has to be done.
But always these resistances turn out to have assisted by the resistance
much more than they have impeded the intention of the great Creatrix
and her Mover.
We
may then look with a legitimate optimism on what has been hitherto achieved
and on the prospects of further achievement in the future. This optimism
need not and should not blind us to undesirable features, perilous tendencies
and the possibilities of serious interruptions in the work and even
disorders in the human world that might possibly subvert the work done.
As regards the actual conditions of the moment it may even be admitted
that most men nowadays look with dissatisfaction on the defects of the
United Nations Organisation and its blunders and the malignancies that
endanger its existence and many feel a growing pessimism and regard
with doubt the possibility of its final success. This pessimism it is
unnecessary and unwise to share; for such a psychology tends to bring
about or to make possible the results which it predicts but which need
not at all ensue. At the same time, we must not ignore the danger. The
leaders of the nations, who have the will to succeed and who will be
held responsible by posterity for any avoidable failure, must be on
guard against unwise policies or fatal errors; the deficiencies that
exist in the organisation or its constitution have to be quickly remedied
or slowly and cautiously eliminated; if there are obstinate oppositions
to necessary change, they have somehow to be overcome or circumvented
without breaking the institution; progress towards its perfection, even
if it cannot be easily or swiftly made, must yet be undertaken and the
frustration of the world's hope prevented at any cost. There is no other
way for mankind than this, unless indeed a greater way is laid open
to it by the Power that guides through some delivering turn or change
in human will or human nature or some sudden evolutionary progress,
a not easily foreseeable leap, saltus, which will make another and greater
solution of our human destiny feasible.
-Sri
Aurobindo
