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The
Mother Answers on Perfection of the Body - II
Sweet
Mother, here Sri Aurobindo speaks of "the higher perfection"
and "the lower perfection"...
The
higher perfection is the spiritual perfection, integral
union with the Divine, identification with the Divine, freedom
from all the limitations of the lower world. That is spiritual
perfection, the perfection that comes from yoga—quite
independent of the body and the physical world—which,
in ancient times, meant first rejecting the body and the
physical life so as to have a relation only with the higher
world and finally with the Divine. That is the higher perfection.
And
the lower perfection is to be able to make the human being
in his present form and in his body, in his relation with
all terrestrial things, do the utmost he can. This is the
case of all great men of genius: artistic genius, literary
genius, genius in organisation, the great rulers, those
who have carried physical capacities to their maximum perfection,
human development to the limit of its possibilities; and,
for instance, all those who have complete control over their
bodies and succeed in doing miraculous things, as we saw,
for example, during the war, with the airmen: they made
their bodies do things which at first sight seemed quite
impossible, they obtained from them an endurance, a skill,
a power which were almost unthinkable. And from every point
of view: from the point of view of physical strength, of
intellectual realisation, of the physical qualities of energy
and courage, of disinterestedness, goodness, charity; all
human qualities carried to their utmost limits. That is
the lower perfection.
The
higher perfection is spiritual and super-human. The lower
perfection is human perfection carried to its maximum limits,
and this may be quite independent of all spiritual life,
all spiritual aspiration. One can be a genius without having
any spiritual aspiration. One can have all the most extraordinary
moral qualities without having any spiritual life. And even,
usually, those who have a very great power of human realisation
are satisfied—more or less satisfied—with their
condition. They feel they are self-sufficient, that they
carry in themselves the source of their realisation and
their joy, and it is usually very difficult to make them
understand and feel that they are not the creators of their
own creations, whatever they may be. Most of them, with
very rare exceptions, if they were told, "You are not
the originator of this work you are doing, it is a force
higher than you and you are only its instrument", they
would dislike it very much—and they will send you about
your business! Therefore, these two perfections are really
divergent in ordinary life. It was said in the old yoga
that the first condition for doing yoga was to be disgusted
with life. But those who have realised this human perfection
are very rarely disgusted with life, unless they have met
with personal difficulties such as the ingratitude of people
around them, the lack of understanding of their genius which
was not sufficiently appreciated—so all this disgusts
them, but otherwise, so long as they are in their period
of success and creation, they are perfectly satisfied. So,
as they are satisfied—above all, self-satisfied—they
don't need to seek anything else.
It
is not essentially true, but this is usually how things
happen, and unless there is in this genius a soul which
is perfectly conscious of itself and has come to accomplish
a specific work on earth, he may very well be born, grow
up and die without knowing that there is anything other
than this earthly life. And above all it is this, you see,
this feeling of having achieved the utmost realisation which
gives a satisfaction that keeps one from needing anything
else... If they have a soul that's fully conscious of itself
and fully conscious of its purpose in the physical world,
there could be a vague feeling that all this is pretty hollow,
that all these achievements are a little too superficial
and that something is lacking; but that comes only to those
who are predestined, and after all, in the mass of humanity,
there are not very many of them.
Only
those who are predestined can combine these two perfections
and realise something integral... This is quite rare. The
great spiritual leaders have very rarely been great realisers
in the physical world. It has happened, but it is very rare.
Only those who are conscious incarnations of the Divine
naturally carry in themselves the possibility of the two
perfections, but this is exceptional. People who had a spiritual
life, a great spiritual realisation, were able at certain
exceptional moments to have a capacity for outward realisation;
this also was exceptional, but it was intermittent and never
had the integrality, the totality, the perfection of those
who concentrated on material realisation. And this is why
those who live only in the external consciousness, for whom
the earthly material life is all that really exists, concrete
and tangible, perceptible to all, always feel that spiritual
life is something hazy, something almost mediocre from the
material point of view.
I
have met many people—"many", well, quite
a number—who wanted to demonstrate that spiritual powers
gave a great capacity for outer realisation and who tried,
in certain exceptional spiritual states or conditions, to
paint or to compose music or write poetry; well, everything
that they produced was thoroughly second-rate and could
not be compared with the works of the great geniuses who
had mastered material nature—and this of course gave
the materialists a good opening: "You see, your so-called
power is nothing at all." But this was because in their
external life they were ordinary men; for the greatest spiritual
power, if it enters material that's not educated, will produce
a result far superior to what that individual would have
been able to achieve in his ordinary state, but far inferior
to what a genius who has mastered matter can produce. It
is not enough that "the Spirit bloweth", the instrument
must also be capable of manifesting it.
I
believe that is one of the things Sri Aurobindo is going
to explain: why it is necessary to give to the physical,
external being, its full development, the capacity of controlling
matter directly; then you put at the disposal of the Spirit
an instrument capable of manifesting it, otherwise... Yes,
I knew several people who in their ordinary state could
not write three lines without making a mistake, not only
spelling mistakes but mistakes of language, that is, who
could not express one thought clearly—well, in their
moments of spiritual inspiration, they used to write very
beautiful things, but all the same these very beautiful
things were not so beautiful as the works of the greatest
writers. These things seemed remarkable in comparison with
what they could do in their ordinary state; it was true,
their present possibilities were used to the maximum, it
was something that gave a value to what otherwise would
have had none at all. But supposing you take a real genius—a
musician or artist or writer of genius—who has fully
mastered his instrument, who can use it to produce works
that express the utmost human possibility, if you add to
this a spiritual consciousness, the supramental force, then
you will have something truly divine.
And
this is precisely the key to the effort Sri Aurobindo wanted
us to make.
And
your body, if you draw from it all the possibilities it holds,
if you educate it by the normal, well-known, scientific methods,
if you make this instrument into something as perfect as possible,
then, when the supramental truth manifests in that body, it
will become immediately—without centuries of preparation—a
marvellous instrument for the expression of the Spirit.
That
is why Sri Aurobindo used to repeat and has always said:
You must work from both ends, not let go of one for the
other. And certainly, if you want to have a divine consciousness,
you must not give up spiritual aspiration; but if you want
to become an integral divine being on earth, take good care
not to let go of the other end, and make your body the best
possible instrument.
It
is a disease of the ordinary human intellect—which
comes, moreover, from separation, division—to make
a thing always either this or that. If you
choose this, you turn your back on that; if you choose that,
you turn your back on this.
It
is an impoverishment. One must know how to take up everything,
combine everything, synthesise everything. And then one has
an integral realisation.
(Turning
to the children) Do you have anything to say?
It
is much better to do than to say. Now I have given you some
encouragement.
24
April 1957
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The Mother
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