Riddle of this World-AUROBINDO part 2

[Guest guest]

And at once a first question arises - is this

world an unchanging succession of the same phenomena

always or is there in it an evolutionary urge, an

evolutionary fact, a ladder of ascension somewhere from an

original apparent Inconscience to a more and more

developed consciousness, from each development still

ascending, emerging on highest heights not yet within our

normal reach. If so, what is the sense, the fundamental

principle, the logical issue of that progression? Everything

seems to point to such a progression as a fact - to a

spiritual and not merely a physical evolution. Here, too,

there is a justifying line of spiritual experience in

which we discover that the Inconscient from which all

starts is apparent only, for in it there is an involved

Consciousness with endless possibilities, a consciousness not

limited but cosmic and infinite, a concealed and

self-imprisoned Divine, imprisoned in Matter but with every

potentiality held in its secret depths. Out of this apparent

Inconscience each potentiality is revealed in its turn, first

organised Matter concealing the indwelling Spirit, then

Life emerging in the plant and associated in the

animal with a growing Mind, then Mind itself evolved and

organised in Man. This evolution, this spiritual

progression - does it stop short here in the imperfect mental

being called Man? Or is the secret of it simply a

succession of rebirths whose only purpose or issue is to

labour towards the point at which it can learn its own

futility, renounce itself and take its leap into some

original unborn Existence or Non-Existence? There is at

least the possibility, there comes at a certain point

the certitude that there is a far greater

consciousness than what we call Mind, and that by ascending the

ladder still farther we can find a point at which the

hold of the material Inconscience, the vital and

mental Ignorance ceases; a principle of consciousness

becomes capable of manifestation which liberates not

partially, not imperfectly but radically and wholly this

imprisoned Divine. In this vision each stage of evolution

appears as due to the descent of a higher and higher

Power of consciousness, raising the terrestrial level,

creating a new stratum, but the highest yet remain to

descend and it is by their descent that the riddle of

terrestrial existence will receive its solution and not only

the soul but Nature herself find her deliverance.

This is the Truth which has been seen in flashes, in

more and more entirety of its terms by the line of

seers whom the Tantra would call the heroseekers and

the divine-seekers and which may now be nearing the

point of readiness for its full revelation and

experience. Then whatever be the heavy weight of strife and

suffering and darkness in the world yet if there is this as

its high result awaiting us, all that has gone before

may not be counted too great a price by the strong

and adventurous for the glory that is to come. At any

rate the shadow lifts; there is a Divine Light that

leans over the world and is not only a far-off

incommunicable Lustre.