Works of Sri Aurobindo

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SUPERIOR BEINGS

 

The human race tolerates and accepts the existence of superior beings only on condition that they are at its service.

4 February 1965  

For ordinary men, the sage is a sort of music box of wisdom into which it is enough to put the penny of a question in order to receive the answer automatically.

 

For them to recognise a god, he must have a halo behind his head; for them to recognise a king, he must have a sceptre in his hand.  

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One who is no longer egoistic no longer has any personal place in this world. That is to say, in exact proportion to his impersonality, this personal world no longer has any personal relations with him. He is in relation with the world, with beings and things only as universal and non-individual forces are; like them, he acts in all, animates all, supports all, but in a general way he is completely ignored by all that he animates, supports and sets in motion.

It is not he who no longer wants the world, it is the world that no longer wants him or, rather, that no longer even notices that he exists.

 

ADVERSE FORCES 

 

Each time that we have made a decisive step in our spiritual progress, the invisible enemies of the Divine always try to take their revenge, and when they cannot injure the soul they strike the body. But all their efforts are in vain and will finally be defeated, for the Divine Grace is with us.

 

We must never give a chance to the adverse forces to do their mischief − they take advantage of the slightest unconsciousness.

 

It is jealousy, selfish dissatisfaction and hurt vanity that open the doors of the consciousness to the hostile attacks by pulling one out of the Divine’s protection.

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It is only by refusing to allow these wrong movements to take place in oneself that one can hope to get rid of the adverse influence and its disastrous effects.

 

It is a great ignorance that makes a being answer to the suggestions of the forces of darkness and destruction. With a true sense of gratitude for the Divine’s infinite mercy, one would be saved from such dangers.

 

What are these suggestions that sometimes invade me? Do they not come from outside?

 

Yes, they do come from outside, from some vital entity that is amusing itself by sending them to you to see how you will receive them. I saw the suggestion passing at the time I gave you the flower. I did not attach any importance to it because it was just foolishness − but I see that you received it.

28 April 1934 

The wrath of Mahakali manifests from time to time and acts all right, but the effect of it does not last because those who answer to the adverse force do not truly want to be cured − they are not sincere.

1 July 1935 

Mother, the attacks are innumerable, and yesterday I felt very weak.  

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If you thought less about the attacks, there would not be so many.

7 October 1935  

Constantly thinking of the hostile forces and fearing them is a very dangerous weakness.

 

As you say, it is the adverse force itself that must be conquered and destroyed, otherwise it will always find people to manifest it.

28 May 1936 

Hostile forces are tolerated in the world only because they put man’s sincerity to the test. The day that man becomes integrally sincere, they will pass away, for there will no longer be any reason for their existence.

13 March 1949  

Tonight again there is a severe attack of the hostile forces. My sleep has completely vanished. I pray to you with utmost sincerity to liberate me from the clutches of these furies. They attack my abdomen, thighs and knees. Pray to give me the promised advice, so that I may be able to get rid of them completely for ever.

 

These adverse forces are connected with sexual desire. They live on the energy wasted when the act takes place. And even a thought, a mental or vital desire is sufficient to let them come in and settle in the atmosphere.

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Thus it is in the mind itself that the purification must take place.

            My blessings.

12 September 1950  

Mother, sometimes I see a queer thing. I see a region where dead flies go. Their condition seems to be a very miserable one. They complain that I kill so many flies.

 

These visions are imaginations which probably come from old thought-forms. There is no reason to sentimentalise about flies. They are beings created by the adverse forces and they must disappear from the earth.

 

In the terrestrial organisation, the world of insects is, so to say, the direct work of hostile creators in the vital world; they are the result of adverse and often diabolical thoughts and imaginations, directed not towards man but towards the divine work. Often an insect that looks quite harmless is the messenger of a bad and malevolent will; in that case one must deal severely with it.

Love can tolerate anything − but in action, the Divine chooses and decides. Yet even in his act of destruction, there shines out pure Love, sublime Love.

14 October 1955 

When the adverse forces are dealt with in the right way, all that is ugly and false disappears to leave place only for what is true and beautiful.  

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Your ego, at the slightest thing that displeases it, is in the habit of opening the door of your being to an evil spirit of arrogant and impudent disbelief which passes its time in throwing mud and filth on all that is sacred and beautiful and especially on the aspiration of your soul and the help from the Divine’s Grace.

If this is allowed to continue, it will end in a sure catastrophe and ruin. Strong steps must be taken to put an end to this, and for that the collaboration of your soul is needed. It must wake up and join in the fight against the ego by resolutely closing the door to this evil spirit.

9 April 1958  

After all, what is freedom? To go about doing whatever you like? But do you know what is “you”? Do you know what is your own will? Do you know what comes from you and what comes from elsewhere? Well, if you had a strong will I could have allowed you to work. But it is not like that; it is only impulses that move you and they are also not your own. They come from outside and make you do all sorts of stupid things. You fall into the hands of the Rakshasas. First they make you do stupid things and then they laugh. If you have a strong will, if your will, your impulses and all else are centred around the psychic, then and then alone can you have some taste of liberty and freedom; otherwise you are a slave.

 

If you refuse to become a docile and surrendered servant of the Divine and of the Master who manifests Him, it means that you will remain a slave of your egoism, your vanity, your presumptuous ambition, and a toy in the hands of the Rakshasas who allure you with brilliant images in their attempt − not always unsuccessful − to possess you.  

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If you had understood and reacted in the right way, you would have passed the test and got rid not only of this special difficulty but probably of this hostile’s influence altogether. But you failed and got possessed. And only one thing was left to me to do, it was to flood you with the pure light, the white flame of purification to chase from inside you the intruder. It is what you took probably for a cut in our relations, a wall of separation between us; there was nothing of the kind; I was inside you, penetrating you as usual, but in the form of this supreme purity which is so foreign to all that is anti-divine or even to all ordinary human movement.

This adverse entity is not only vital, it is also mental and supports its desires by some apparently reasonable principles which become aggressively stupid by their rigidity. When this seizes you, you seem to lose all common sense and the most elementary understanding.

No wall at all − only the pure light, the white flame of purification penetrating right through, from outside inside, from inside outside.

Now I can tell you what has happened with a chance of being understood.

 

(About a sadhak’s accident)

 

Here is a sad but striking illustration of what I said.

This case is clear. For some egoistic reason he attempted to do more than he could.

If the year had been good he might have succeeded.

With an ordinary or  neutral year he would not have succeeded but without bad results for himself or for the others.

This year, because it is dangerously bad, the consequences came in full. Now all I can do is to make the best out of the situation; but it has become a big fight.

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This is what I meant when I spoke, but very few people understood what I meant by “Be careful.” I meant: “Do always the best you can and make as far as possible no spiritual mistake.” On the contrary, most of them started fearing and that in itself is already a big spiritual mistake. Instead of being more vigilant and more faithful, most of them at once opened the door to the hostile suggestions and aggravated the situation. Some went even so far as to blame me for having spoken, not understanding that if I cannot warn the people here and advise them to keep firm in the right attitude, it means that they are not true sadhaks and have no sincerity in their attitude.

In order to make myself more clear, I repeat what I wanted to say; in a year like this one when the adverse forces have decided to attack at the utmost of their capacity, it is required from all those who have decided to fight for the Divine Realisation, to avoid carefully all fear.

When I spoke at the beginning of the year I insisted on the necessity of being especially vigilant because when times are bad whatever mistake one makes brings immediately its full consequences, the action of the Grace being hampered by the intensity of the adverse attack; the faith must be more total, the vigilance more constant, the trust in the Divine more absolute.

                                                                                                                                                                  1955    

As for your opening upward − fear nothing; it all depends on your sincerity. If it is the Divine alone that you want and not some personal advantage, it is the Divine alone who will answer your call. Adverse replies are a danger only when the motive is egoistic.

With my blessings.

5 September 1964  

Last night, at three in the morning, sleepy, exasperated, I called you.  

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A few seconds later, three times, I felt a strong force paralyzing me and trying to plunge me into unconsciousness. I struggled hard against it because I felt it as an adverse force which wanted to take away my subtle body. The third time, with one eye open I saw part of the dark blue robe of a tall person who was waiting to take me away; it seemed as if an emanation of X was at his side.

How is it that after I had called you, Mother, I had this experience?

 

This is the disadvantage of placing oneself under the influence of several occult forces.

In the past, one was recommended, not without reason, to choose one spiritual master and to take great care not to see any others, to avoid a mixture of influences, which has serious disadvantages. So-called modern wisdom, which springs from ignorance, is open to all kinds of influences which are sometimes contradictory, and the result is a great confusion.

Now there is only one solution, to go beyond all human representations and approach the Supreme directly with the utmost sincerity you are capable of, and… await the result.

Blessings.

25 March 1970 

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