Significance of Birthdays - The Mother

(A spoken comment of the Mother which was noted down from
memory by the sadhak and later read to the Mother.)

Mother :It is your birthday tomorrow?
Sadhak: Yes, Mother.
How old will you be?
Sadhak: Twenty-six, Mother.
I shall see you tomorrow and give you something special.
You will see, I am not speaking of anything material- that, I shall give you a card and all that -but of something... You will see, tomorrow, now go home and prepare yourself quietly so that you may be ready to receive it.
Sadhak: Yes, Mother.
You know, my child, what "Bonne Fete" signifies, that is, the birthday we wish here?..
Sadhak: Like that, I know what it means, Mother, but not the special significance You want to tell me.
Yes, it is truly a special day in one's life. It is one of those days in the year when the Supreme descends into us -or when we are face to face with the Eternal -one of those days when our soul comes in contact with the Eternal and, if we remain a little conscious, we can feel His Presence within us. If we make a little effort on this day, we accomplish the work of many lives as in a lightning flash. That is why I give so much importance to the birthday -because what one gains in one day is truly something incomparable. And it is for this that I also work to open the consciousness a little towards what is above so that one may come before the Eternal. My child, it is a very very special day, for it is the day of decision, the day one can unite with the Supreme Consciousness. For the Lord lifts us on this day to the highest region possible so that our soul which is a portion of that Eternal Flame, may be united and identified with its Origin.
This day is truly an opportunity in life. One is so open and so receptive that one can assimilate all that is given. I can do many things, that is why it is important.
It is one of those days when the Lord Himself opens the doors wide for us. It is as though He were inviting us to rekindle more powerfully the flame of aspiration. It is one of those days which He gives us. We too, by our personal effort, could attain to this, but it would be long, hard and not so easy. And this -this is a real chance in life -the day of the Grace.

The Significance of flowers

Sweet Mother, how do you give significance to a flower?

By entering into contact with it and giving a more or less precise meaning to what I feel… by entering into contact with the nature of the flower, its inner truth; then one knows what it represents.

Each flower has its special significance, hasn't it?
Not as we understand it mentally. There is a mental projection when one gives a precise meaning to a flower. It may answer, vibrate to the touch of this projection, accept the meaning, but a flower has no equivalent of the mental consciousness. In the vegetable kingdom there is a beginning of the psychic, but there is no beginning of the mental consciousness. In animals it is different; mental life begins to form and for them things have a meaning. But in flowers it is rather like the movement of a little baby - it is neither a sensation nor a feeling, but something of both; it is a spontaneous movement, a very special vibration. So, if one is in contact with it, if one feels it, one gets an impression which may be translated by a thought. That is how I have given a meaning to flowers and plants - there is a kind of identification with the vibration, a perception of the quality it represents and, little by little, through a kind of approximation (sometimes this comes suddenly, occasionally it takes time), there is a coming together of these vibrations(which are of a vital-emotional order) and the vibration of the mental thought, and if there is a sufficient harmony, one has a direct perception of what the plant may signify.
In some countries (particularly here) certain plants are used as the media for worship, offering, devotion. Certain plants are given on special occasions. And I have often seen that this identification was quite in keeping with the nature of the plant, because spontaneously, without knowing anything, I happened to give the same meaning as that given in religious ceremonies. The vibration was really there in the flower itself.... Did it come from the use that had been made of it or did it come from very far, from somewhere deep down. From a beginning of the psychic life? It would be difficult to say.

Have flowers a power in the occult world?
Yes, they have an occult power; they can even transmit a message if one knows how to charge them with it.

Can the flowers transmit other messages apart from the significances you have given?
It is not impossible but the person who sends the message must have a great power of formation.

Is the power of formation purely occult or can a mental or vital power of formation also transmit messages?
The mental power of formation can certainly transmit messages. But for these messages to be received and understood, the person to whom they are sent must himself be very receptive mentally and particularly attentive.

When we offer flowers, with what attitude should we offer them? Does it matter if we do not know the significance?
This depends completely on the person who gives the flowers and on his state of consciousness. The same answer may be given to both the questions. According to the degree of consciousness of people what they do has a deep significance.

If our flower-offering depends on our state of consciousness, does it help us to learn the significances of flowers even if it is purely mental to begin with?
Yes, surely.

MAHASARASWATI

Mahasaraswati is the [supreme] Mother's Power of Work and her spirit of perfection and order. . . . Of all the Mother's powers she is the most long-suffering with men and his thousand imperfections. Kind, smiling, close and helpful, not easily turned away or discouraged, insistent even after repeated failure, her hand sustains our every step on condition that we are single in our will and straightforward and sincere; for a double mind she will not tolerate and her revealing irony is merciless to drama and histrionics and self- deceit and pretense. A mother to our wants, a friend in our difficulties, a persistent and tranquil counsellor and mentor, chasing away with her radiant smile the clouds of gloom and fretfulness and depression, reminding always of the ever- present help, pointing to the eternal sunshine, she is firm, quiet and persevering in the deep and continuous urge that drives us towards the integrality of the higher nature.

SRI AUROBINDO

For [Mahasaraswati] everything must be done down to the last detail, and done in an absolutely perfect way. And she wants, she insists that it should be done physically, totally, materially, that it should not remain in the air, you see, like a mental or vital action, but that it should be a physical realisation in all its details, and all the details should be perfect, that nothing should be neglected.

THE MOTHER

Mahasaraswati [is] the goddess of divine skill and of the works of the Spirit, and hers is the Yoga that is skill in works, yogah karmasu kaushalam, and the utilities of divine knowledge and the self-application of the spirit to life and the happiness of its harmonies.

SRI AUROBINDO

Mahasaraswati’s Perfection in Works
It is not satisfied with makeshift.

Rondeletia odorata
Small bright orange or deep pink salverform flowers with a limb divided into six rounded lobes and a conspicuous yellow central ring; borne in cymes. A small loosely branched shrub.

Be like a flower

Be like a flower. One must try to become like a flower: open, frank, equal, generous and kind. Do you know what it means?
A flower is open to all that surrounds it: Nature, light, the rays of the sun, the wind, etc. It exerts a spontaneous influence on all that is around it. It radiates a joy and a beauty.
It is frank: it hides nothing of its beauty, and lets it flow frankly out of itself. What is within, what is in its depths, it lets it come out so that everyone can see it.
It is equal: it has no preference. Everyone can enjoy its beauty and its perfume, without rivalry. It is equal and the same for everybody. There is no difference, or anything whatsoever.
Then generous: without reserve or restriction, how it gives the mysterious beauty and the very own perfume of Nature. It sacrifices itself entirely for our pleasure, even its life it sacrifices to express this beauty and the secret of the things
gathered within itself.
And then, kind: it has such a tenderness, it is so sweet, so close to us, so loving. Its presence fills us with joy. It is always cheerful and happy.
Happy is he who can exchange his qualities with the real qualities of the flowers. Try to cultivate in yourself their refined qualities.
- 

Excerpts from Sri Aurobindo's and The Mothers Works

Sri Aurobindo's Uttarpara Speech 30 May 1909

When I was asked to speak to you at the annual meeting of your Sabha, it was my intention to say a few words about the subject chosen for today, the subject of the Hindu religion. I do not know now whether I shall fulfil that intention; for as I sat here, there came into my mind a word that I have to speak to you, a word that I have to speak to the whole of the Indian Nation. It was spoken first to myself in jail and I have come out of jail to speak it to my people.
It was more than a year ago that I came here last. When I came I was not alone; one of the mightiest prophets of Nationalism (= Bepin Pal) sat by my side. It was he who then came out of the seclusion to which God had sent him, so that in the silence and solitude of his cell he might hear the word that He had to say. It was he that you came in your hundreds to welcome. Now he is far away, separated from us by thousands of miles. Others whom I was accustomed to find working beside me are absent. The storm that swept over the country has scattered them far and wide. It is I this time who have spent one year in seclusion, and now that I come out I find all changed. One who always sat by my side and was associated in my work is a prisoner in Burma; another is in the north rotting in detention. I looked round when I came out, I looked round for those to whom I had been accustomed to look for counsel and inspiration. I did not find them. There was more than that. When I went to jail the whole country was alive with the cry of Bande Mataram, alive with the hope of a nation, the hope of millions of men who had newly risen out of degradation. When I came out of jail I listened for that cry, but there was instead a silence. A hush had fallen on the country and men seemed bewildered; for instead of God's bright heaven full of the vision of the future that had been before us, there seemed to be overhead a leaden sky from which human thunders and lightnings rained. No man seemed to know which way to move, and from all sides came the question, "What shall we do next? What is there that we can do?" I too did not know which way to move, I too did not know what was next to be done. But one thing I knew, that as it was the Almighty Power of God which had raised that cry, that hope, so it was the same Power which had sent down that silence. He who was in the shouting and the movement was also in the pause and the hush. He has sent it upon us, so that the nation might draw back for a moment and look into itself and know His will. I have not been disheartened by that silence because I had been made familiar with silence in my prison and because I knew it was in the pause and the hush that I had myself learned this lesson through the long year of my detention. When Bepin Chandra Pal came out of jail, he came with a message, and it was an inspired message. I remember the speech he made here. It was a speech not so much political as religious in its bearing and intention. He spoke of his realisation in jail, of God within us all, of the Lord within the nation, and in his subsequent speeches also he spoke of a greater than ordinary force in the movement and a greater than ordinary purpose before it. Now I also meet you again, I also come out of jail, and again it is you of Uttarpara who are the first to welcome me, not at a political meeting but at a meeting of a society for the protection of our religion. That message which Bepin Chandra Pal received in Buxar jail, God gave to me in Alipore. That knowledge He gave to me day after day during my twelve months of imprisonment and it is that which He has commanded me to speak to you now that I have come out.
I knew I would come out. The year of detention was meant only for a year of seclusion and of training. How could anyone hold me in jail longer than was necessary for God's purpose? He had given me a word to speak and a work to do, and until that word was spoken I knew that no human power could hush me, until that work was done no human power could stop God's instrument, however weak that instrument might be or however small. Now that I have come out, even in these few minutes, a word has been suggested to me which I had no wish to speak. The thing I had in my mind He has thrown from it and what I speak is under an impulse and a compulsion.
When I was arrested and hurried to the Lal Bazar hajat I was shaken in faith for a while, for I could not look into the heart of His intention. Therefore I faltered for a moment and cried out in my heart to Him, "What is this that has happened to me? I believed that I had a mission to work for the people of my country and until that work was done, I should have Thy protection. Why then am I here and on such a charge?" A day passed and a second day and a third, when a voice came to me from within, "Wait and see." Then I grew calm and waited, I was taken from Lal Bazar to Alipore and was placed for one month in a solitary cell apart from men. There I waited day and night for the voice of God within me, to know what He had to say to me, to learn what I had to do. In this seclusion the earliest realisation, the first lesson came to me. I remembered then that a month or more before my arrest, a call had come to me to put aside all activity, to go in seclusion and to look into myself, so that I might enter into closer communion with Him. I was weak and could not accept the call. My work was very dear to me and in the pride of my heart I thought that unless I was there, it would suffer or even fail and cease; therefore I would not leave it. It seemed to me that He spoke to me again and said, "The bonds you had not the strength to break, I have broken for you, because it is not my will nor was it ever my intention that that should continue. I have had another thing for you to do and it is for that I have brought you here, to teach you what you could not learn for yourself and to train you for my work." Then He placed the Gita in my hands. His strength entered into me and I was able to do the sadhana of the Gita. I was not only to understand intellectually but to realise what Sri Krishna demanded of Arjuna and what He demands of those who aspire to do His work, to be free from repulsion and desire, to do work for Him without the demand for fruit, to renounce self-will and become a passive and faithful instrument in His hands, to have an equal heart for high and low, friend and opponent, success and failure, yet not to do His work negligently. I realised what the Hindu religion meant. We speak often of the Hindu religion, of the Sanatan Dharma, but few of us really know what that religion is. Other religions are preponderatingly religions of faith and profession, but the Sanatan Dharma is life itself; it is a thing that has not so much to be believed as lived. This is the Dharma that for the salvation of humanity was cherished in the seclusion of this peninsula from of old. It is to give this religion that India is rising. She does not rise as other countries do, for self or when she is strong, to trample on the weak. She is rising to shed the eternal light entrusted to her over the world. India has always existed for humanity and not for herself and it is for humanity and not for herself that she must be great.
Therefore this was the next thing He pointed out to me,—He made me realise the central truth of the Hindu religion. He turned the hearts of my jailors to me and they spoke to the Englishman in charge of the jail, "He is suffering in his confinement; let him at least walk outside his cell for half an hour in the morning and in the evening." So it was arranged, and it was while I was walking that His strength again entered into me. I looked the jail that secluded me from men and it was no longer by its high walls that I was imprisoned; no, it was Vasudeva who surrounded me. I walked under the branches of the tree in front of my cell but it was not the tree, I knew it was Vasudeva, it was Sri Krishna whom I saw standing there and holding over me his shade. I looked at the bars of my cell, the very grating that did duty for a door and again I saw Vasudeva. It was Narayana who was guarding and standing sentry over me. Or I lay on the coarse blankets that were given me for a couch and felt the arms of Sri Krishna around me, the arms of my Friend and Lover. This was the first use of the deeper vision He gave me. I looked at the prisoners in the jail, the thieves, the murderers, the swindlers, and as I looked at them I saw Vasudeva, it was Narayana whom I found in these darkened souls and misused bodies. Amongst these thieves and dacoits there were many who put me to shame by their sympathy, their kindness, the humanity triumphant over such adverse circumstances. One I saw among them especially, who seemed to me a saint, a peasant of my nation who did not know how to read and write, an alleged dacoit sentenced to ten years' rigorous imprisonment, one of those whom we look down upon in our Pharisaical pride of class as Chhotalok. Once more He spoke to me and said, "Behold the people among whom I have sent you to do a little of my work. This is the nature of the nation I am raising up and the reason why I raise them."
When the case opened in the lower court and we were brought before the Magistrate I was followed by the same insight. He said to me, "When you were cast into jail, did not your heart fail and did you not cry out to me, where is Thy protection? Look now at the Magistrate, look now at the Prosecuting Counsel." I looked and it was not the Magistrate whom I saw, it was Vasudeva, it was Narayana who was sitting there on the bench. I looked at the Prosecuting Counsel and it was not the Counsel for the prosecution that I saw; it was Sri Krishna who sat there, it was my Lover and Friend who sat there and smiled. "Now do you fear?" He said, "I am in all men and I overrule their actions and their words. My protection is still with you and you shall not fear. This case which is brought against you, leave it in my hand. It is not for you. It was not for the trial that I brought you here but for something else. The case itself is only a means for my work and nothing more." Afterwards when the trial opened in the Sessions Court, I began to write many instructions for my Counsel as to what was false in the evidence against me and on what points the witnesses might be cross-examined. Then something happened which I had not expected. The arrangements which had been made for my defence were suddenly changed and another Counsel stood there to defend me. He came unexpectedly,—a friend of mine, but I did not know he was coming. You have all heard the name of the man who put away from him all other thoughts and abandoned all his practice, who sat up half the night day after day for months and broke his health to save me,—Srijut Chittaranjan Das. When I saw him, I was satisfied, but I still thought it necessary to write instructions. Then all that was put away from me and I had the message from within, "This is the man who will save you from the snares put around your feet. Put aside those papers. It is not you who will instruct him. I will instruct him." From that time I did not of myself speak a word to my Counsel about the case or give a single instruction, and if ever I was asked a question, I always found that my answer did not help the case. I had left it to him and he took it entirely into his hands, with what result you know. I knew all along what He meant for me, for I heard it again and again, always I listened to the voice within; "I am guiding, therefore fear not. Turn to your own work for which I have brought you to jail and when you come out, remember never to fear, never to hesitate. Remember that it is I who am doing this, not you nor any other. Therefore whatever clouds may come, whatever dangers and sufferings, whatever difficulties, whatever impossibilities, there is nothing impossible, nothing difficult. I am in the nation and its uprising and I am Vasudeva, I am Narayana, and what I will, shall be, not what others will. What I choose to bring about, no human power can stay."
Meanwhile He had brought me out of solitude and placed me among those who had been accused along with me. You have spoken much today of my self-sacrifice and devotion to my country. I have heard that kind of speech ever since I came out of jail, but I hear it with embarrassment, with something of pain. For I know my weakness, I am a prey to my own faults and backslidings. I was not blind to them before and when they all rose up against me in seclusion, I felt them utterly. I knew them that I the man was a man of weakness, a faulty and imperfect instrument, strong only when a higher strength entered into me. Then I found myself among these young men and in many of them I discovered a mighty courage, a power of self-effacement in comparison with which I was simply nothing. I saw one or two who were not only superior to me in force and character,—very many were that,—but in the promise of that intellectual ability on which I prided myself. He said to me, "This is the young generation, the new and mighty nation that is arising at my command. They are greater than yourself. What have you to fear? If you stood aside or slept, the work would still be done. If you were cast aside tomorrow, here are the young men who will take up your work and do it more mightily than you have ever done. You have only got some strength from me to speak a word to this nation which will help to raise it." This was the next thing He told me.
Then a thing happened suddenly and in a moment I was hurried away to the seclusion of a solitary cell. What happened to me during that period I am not impelled to say, but only that day after day, He showed me His wonders and made me realise the utter truth of the Hindu religion. I had many doubts before. I was brought up in England amongst foreign ideas and an atmosphere entirely foreign. About many things in Hinduism I had once been inclined to believe that they were imaginations, that there was much of dream in it, much that was delusion and Maya. But now day after day I realised in the mind, I realised in the heart, I realised in the body the truths of the Hindu religion. They became living experiences to me, and things were opened to me which no material science could explain. When I first approached Him, it was not entirely in the spirit of the Jnani. I came to Him long ago in Baroda some years before the Swadeshi began and I was drawn into the public field.
When I approached God at that time, I hardly had a living faith in Him. The agnostic was in me, the atheist was in me, the sceptic was in me and I was not absolutely sure that there was a God at all. I did not feel His presence. Yet something drew me to the truth of the Vedas, the truth of the Gita, the truth of the Hindu religion. I felt there must be a mighty truth somewhere in this Yoga, a mighty truth in this religion based on the Vedanta. So when I turned to the Yoga and resolved to practise it and find out if my idea was right, I did it in this spirit and with this prayer to Him, "If Thou art, then Thou knowest my heart. Thou knowest that I do not ask for Mukti, I do not ask for anything which others ask for. I ask only for strength to uplift this nation, I ask only to be allowed to live and work for this people whom I love and to whom I pray that I may devote my life." I strove long for the realisation of Yoga and at last to some extent I had it, but in what I most desired I was not satisfied. Then in the seclusion of the jail, of the solitary cell I asked for it again. I said, "Give me Thy Adesh. I do not know what work to do or how to do it. Give me a message." In the communion of Yoga two messages came. The first message said, "I have given you a work and it is to help to uplift this nation. Before long the time will come when you will have to go out of jail; for it is not my will that this time either you should be convicted or that you should pass the time, as others have to do, in suffering for their country. I have called you to work, and that is the Adesh for which you have asked. I give you the Adesh to go forth and do my work." The second message came and it said, "Something has been shown to you in this year of seclusion, something about which you had your doubts and it is the truth of the Hindu religion. It is this religion that I am raising up before the world, it is this that I have perfected and developed through the Rishis, saints and Avatars, and now it is going forth to do my work among the nations. I am raising up this nation to send forth my word. This is the Sanatan Dharma, this is the eternal religion which you did not really know before, but which I have now revealed to you. The agnostic and the sceptic in you have been answered, for I have given you proofs within and without you, physical and subjective, which have satisfied you. When you go forth, speak to your nation always this word, that it is for the Sanatan Dharma that they arise, it is for the world and not for themselves that they arise. I am giving them freedom for the service of the world. When therefore it is said that India shall rise, it is the Sanatan Dharma that shall be great. When it is said that India shall expand and extend herself, it is the Sanatan Dharma that shall expand and extend itself over the world. It is for the Dharma and by the Dharma that India exists. To magnify the religion means to magnify the country. I have shown you that I am everywhere and in all men and in all things, that I am in this movement and I am not only working in those who are striving for the country but I am working also in those who oppose them and stand in their path. I am working in everybody and whatever men may think or do, they can do nothing but help in my purpose. They also are doing my work, they are not my enemies but my instruments. In all your actions you are moving forward without knowing which way you move. You mean to do one thing and you do another. You aim at a result and your efforts subserve one that is different or contrary. It is Shakti that has gone forth and entered into the people. Since long ago I have been preparing this uprising and now the time has come and it is I who will lead it to its fulfilment."
This then is what I have to say to you. The name of your society is "Society for the Protection of Religion". Well, the protection of the religion, the protection and upraising before the world of the Hindu religion, that is the work before us. But what is the Hindu religion? What is this religion which we call Sanatan, eternal? It is the Hindu religion only because the Hindu nation has kept it, because in this Peninsula it grew up in the seclusion of the sea and the Himalayas, because in this sacred and ancient land it was given as a charge to the Aryan race to preserve through the ages. But it is not circumscribed by the confines of a single country, it does not belong peculiarly and for ever to a bounded part of the world. That which we call the Hindu religion is really the eternal religion, because it is the universal religion which embraces all others. If a religion is not universal, it cannot be eternal. A narrow religion, a sectarian religion, an exclusive religion can live only for a limited time and a limited purpose. This is the one religion that can triumph over materialism by including and anticipating the discoveries of science and the speculations of philosophy. It is the one religion which impresses on mankind the closeness of God to us and embraces in its compass all the possible means by which man can approach God. It is the one religion which insists every moment on the truth which all religions acknowledge that He is in all men and all things and that in Him we move and have our being. It is the one religion which enables us not only to understand and believe this truth but to realise it with every part of our being. It is the one religion which shows the world what the world is, that it is the Lila of Vasudeva. It is the one religion which shows us how we can best play our part in that Lila, its subtlest laws and its noblest rules. It is the one religion which does not separate life in any smallest detail from religion, which knows what immortality is and has utterly removed from us the reality of death.
This is the word that has been put into my mouth to speak to you today. What I intended to speak has been put away from me, and beyond what is given to me I have nothing to say. It is only the word that is put into me that I can speak to you. That word is now finished. I spoke once before with this force in me and I said then that this movement is not a political movement and that nationalism is not politics but a religion, a creed, a faith. I say it again today, but I put it in another way. I say no longer that nationalism is a creed, a religion, a faith; I say that it is the Sanatan Dharma which for us is nationalism. This Hindu nation was born with the Sanatan Dharma, with it it moves and with it it grows. When the Sanatan Dharma declines, then the nation declines, and if the Sanatan Dharma were capable of perishing, with the Sanatan Dharma it would perish.
The Sanatan Dharma, that is nationalism.
This is the message that I have to speak to you. 

One Line Sentences in Savitri

It was the hour before the Gods awake. ||1.1||
The impassive skies were neutral, empty, still. ||1.7||
All can be done if the god-touch is there. ||1.17||
The brief perpetual sign recurred above. ||1.25||
All grew a consecration and a rite. ||1.34||
The message ceased and waned the messenger. ||1.41||
There was the common light of earthly day. ||1.44||
Time’s message of brief light was not for her. ||2.4||
In vain now seemed the splendid sacrifice. ||2.9||
Only a vague earth-nature held the frame. ||2.31||
But now she stirred, her life shared the cosmic load. ||2.32||
All the fierce question of man’s hours relived. ||2.37||
Immobile in herself, she gathered force. ||2.41||
This was the day when Satyavan must die. ||2.42||
Twelve passionate months led in a day of fate. ||3.5||
The great and dolorous moment now was close. ||3.16||
There was her drama’s radiant prologue lived. ||3.25||
Well might he find in her his perfect shrine. ||3.28||
All in her pointed to a nobler kind. ||3.30||
For even her gulfs were secrecies of light. ||3.39||
In her he met his own eternity. ||3.42||
Till then no mournful line had barred this ray. ||4.1||
One dealt with her who meets the burdened great. ||4.9||
A conscious frame was here, a self-born Force. ||4.18||
A gaol is this immense material world. ||4.21||
But one stood up and lit the limitless flame. ||4.25||
In her the superhuman cast its seed. ||4.28||
To stay the wheels of Doom this greatness rose. ||4.34||
It bore the stroke of That which kills and saves. ||4.36||
A Godhead stands behind the brute machine. ||4.45||
A world’s desire compelled her mortal birth. ||5.1||
His days were a long growth to the Supreme. ||5.9||
Then is revealed in man the overt Divine. ||5.25||
A Seer was born, a shining Guest of Time. ||5.35||
His march now soared into an eagle’s flight. ||5.39||
He owned the house of undivided Time. ||6.17||
The mind leaned out to meet the hidden worlds. ||6.24||
A vast unanimity ended life’s debate. ||6.53||
His soul stood free, a witness and a king. ||6.55||
Thence stooped the eagles of Omniscience. ||7.26||
A music spoke transcending mortal speech. ||8.2||
Life kept no more a dull and meaningless shape. ||8.34||
All now suppressed in us began to emerge. ||8.44||
His acts betrayed not the interior flame. ||9.8||
This forged the greatness of his front to earth. ||9.9||
His walk through Time outstripped the human stride. ||9.14||
Lonely his days and splendid like the sun’s. ||9.15||
On a height he stood that looked towards greater heights. ||10.1||
What now we see is a shadow of what must come. ||10.3||
Out of the unknown we move to the unknown. ||11.5||
A struggling ignorance is his wisdom’s mate. ||11.35||
Thus will the masked Transcendent mount his throne. ||11.44||
Two are the ends of the mysterious plan. ||12.9||
In Time he waits for the Eternal’s hour. ||12.24||
These calm and distant Mights shall act at last. ||12.31||
His face of human thought puts on a crown. ||14.15||
Our life is a paradox with God for key. ||15.11||
But now he hears the sound of larger seas. ||17.5||
A greater world Time’s traveller must explore. ||17.12||
Always he follows in her force’s wake. ||17.23||
This knowledge first he had of time-born men. ||18.1||
All that the Gods have learned is there self-known. ||18.6||
A larger lustre lit the mighty page. ||18.15||
In the Void he saw throned the Omniscience supreme. ||18.17||
The glory he had glimpsed must be his home. ||19.2||
His soul retired from all that he had done. ||20.1||
The Silence was his sole companion left. ||20.3||
To a few is given that godlike rare release. ||20.12||
The ineffable Wideness knows him for its own. ||20.18||
A nameless Marvel fills the motionless hours. ||20.20||
Eternity’s contact broke the moulds of sense. ||21.7||
Increased and heightened were the instruments. ||21.10||
The soul and cosmos faced as equal powers. ||21.19||
All was uncovered to his sealless eye. ||22.1||
All’s miracle here and can by miracle change. ||22.15||
This is that secret Nature’s edge of might. ||22.16||
This bizarre kingdom passed into his charge. ||22.21||
A greater despot tamed her despotism. ||22.24||
A border sovereign is the occult Force. ||23.1||
All there discovered what it seeks for here. ||24.9||
There he could enter, there awhile abide. ||24.23||
A limitless movement filled a limitless peace. ||25.3||
This was the single stair to being’s goal. ||26.6||
It is within, below, without, above. ||26.8||
Our life is a holocaust of the Supreme. ||26.15||
An idol of self is our mortality. ||26.17||
His vast design accepts a puny start. ||26.21||
A Mystery’s process is the universe. ||26.26||
To live this Mystery out our souls came here. ||26.33||
His call had reached the Traveller in Time. ||27.2||
A formless Stillness called, a nameless Light. ||27.4||
All that here seems has lovelier semblance there. ||28.13||
The subtle realms from those bright sheaths are made. ||28.25||
Out of its fall our denser Matter came. ||28.32||
Thus taken was God’s plunge into the Night. ||29.1||
All here is driven by an insentient will. ||29.4||
A mighty kinship is this daring’s cause. ||30.1||
To copy on earth’s copies is his art. ||30.11||
All is enamoured of its own delight. ||31.4||
The spirit stood back effaced behind its frame. ||31.12||
So now he looked beyond for greater light. ||31.20||
His destiny lay beyond in larger Space. ||31.22||
An uneven broad ascent now lured his feet. ||32.1||
The quintessence glowed of Life’s supreme delight. ||34.4||
But here were worlds lifted half-way to heaven. ||35.1||
Heaven’s joys might have been earth’s if earth were pure. ||35.3||
The spirit’s luminousness was bodied there. ||35.15||
All was a game of meeting kinglinesses. ||35.22||
A captive Life wedded her conqueror. ||35.26||
Life throned with mind, a double majesty. ||35.30||
There freedom was sole rule and highest law. ||35.45||
Life heard the call and left her native light. ||36.16||
To feed death with her works is here life’s doom. ||36.24||
Such was the evil mystery of her change. ||36.26||
Its prayer denied, it fumbled after thought. ||39.2||
There life was born but died before it could live. ||39.5||
Nothing seemed worth the labour to become. ||39.14||
But judged not so his spirit’s wakened eye. ||40.1||
This was the first cry of the awaking world. ||40.22||
It clings around us still and clamps the god. ||40.23||
This too was needed that breath and living might be. ||40.25||
Then slowly it gathers mass, looks up at Light. ||40.27||
Under this law an ignorant world was made. ||40.29||
Half-way she stopped and found her faith no more. ||41.33||
A third creation now revealed its face. ||42.1||
A mould of body’s early mind was made. ||42.2||
That strange observing Power imposed its sight. ||42.14||
A thinking entity appeared in Space. ||42.19||
Around all floated still the nescient haze. ||42.39||
All by their influence is enacted there. ||43.14||
To all half-conscious worlds they extend their reign. ||43.16||
A slowly changing order binds our will. ||43.26||
This is our doom until our souls are free. ||43.27||
Then only ends this dream of nether life. ||43.29||
Being was an inert substance driven by Force. ||44.7||
A little the Dreamer changed his pose of stone. ||44.16||
Infant self-feeling grew and birth was born. ||44.25||
Then man was moulded from the original brute. ||44.33||
Inscrutable work the cosmic agencies. ||45.5||
This is the ephemeral creature’s daily life. ||46.1||
His little hour is spent in little things. ||46.8||
Hardly a few can climb to greater life. ||46.17||
All tunes to a low scale and conscious pitch. ||46.18||
Such is our scene in the half-light below. ||46.32||
His only sunlight was his spirit’s flame. ||48.6||
It seemed a realm of lives that had no base. ||49.17||
Yet something seemed to be achieved at last. ||50.5||
All on that ladder mounts to an unseen end. ||50.13||
Even now herself she knows not what she has done. ||50.21||
It has kinship with the demon and the god. ||50.32||
On every plane, this Greatness must create. ||50.37||
Even nescient, null, her sleep creates a world. ||50.41||
One mighty passion motives all her works. ||50.52||
Yet when he is most near, she feels him far. ||50.57||
For contradiction is her nature’s law. ||50.58||
Yet something true and inward harboured there. ||51.2||
Or their own self they make their universe. ||51.7||
There Matter is soul’s result and not its cause. ||51.27||
And yet the ultimate oneness was not there. ||51.34||
Identity was not yet nor union’s peace. ||51.36||
Ever he met key-words, ignorant of their key. ||52.8||
Its stamp on her acts is undiscoverable. ||53.2||
A pathos of lost heights is its appeal. ||53.3||
Something was seen at last that looked like truth. ||53.11||
This to Life’s music gives its anthem swell. ||53.30||
For Nature’s vision climbs beyond her acts. ||54.7||
There was no issue from that dreamlike space. ||54.17||
No silent peak is found where Time can rest. ||54.21||
This was a magic stream that reached no sea. ||54.22||
All was contrivance and unceasing stir. ||54.25||
Each final scheme leads to a sequel plan. ||54.31||
Our life is a march to a victory never won. ||54.41||
All must be done for which life and death were made. ||54.47||
But who shall say that even then is rest? ||54.48||
All seems in vain, yet endless is the game. ||54.55||
An error of the gods has made the world. ||54.58||
Or indifferent the Eternal watches Time. ||54.59||
Its dangerous commerce is our suffering’s cause. ||56.2||
But he alone discerned that screened attack. ||56.6||
Thus was a balance kept, the world could live. ||57.13||
A lie was there the truth and truth a lie. ||57.18||
Once more they moved beneath a real sun. ||57.25||
Though Hell claimed rule, the spirit still had power. ||57.26||
This now composed the fetid atmosphere. ||58.22||
All that was there was on this pattern made. ||58.24||
A race possessed inhabited those parts. ||59.1||
Soon he emerged in a dim wall-less space. ||60.2||
But from the Night another answer came. ||62.3||
For her the world runs to its agony. ||62.19||
Assuming names divine they guide and rule. ||63.10||
Night is their refuge and strategic base. ||63.12||
None can reach heaven who has not passed through hell. ||63.16||
This too the traveller of the worlds must dare. ||64.1||
Above was a chill deaf eternity. ||64.24||
Around him shone a great felicitous Day. ||65.1||
Earth-nature stood reborn, comrade of heaven. ||65.24||
Immortality captured Time and carried Life. ||65.31||
Above was an ardent white tranquillity. ||66.9||
Out of its rays our mind’s full orb was born. ||66.22||
Even a greater miracle was done. ||66.27||
In those bright realms are Mind’s first forward steps. ||67.1||
A dwarf three-bodied trinity was her serf. ||68.1||
A fiery spirit came, next of the three. ||68.15||
Thence sprang the burning vision of Desire. ||68.17||
It burns all breasts with an ambiguous fire. ||68.19||
Attempt, not victory, was the charm of life. ||68.29||
Of all these Powers the greatest was the last. ||68.35||
Nothing she knew but all things hoped to know. ||68.40||
This art, this artifice are her only stock. ||68.50||
All now is questioned, all reduced to nought. ||68.53||
An inconclusive play is Reason’s toil. ||68.56||
Open to every thought, she cannot know. ||68.58||
This now she uses as the assayer’s stone. ||68.67||
All was precise, rigid, indubitable. ||68.76||
Once more we face the blank Unknowable. ||68.79||
One day the Face must burn out through the mask. ||68.104||
There ceased the limits of the labouring Power. ||70.1||
But being and creation cease not there. ||70.2||
But mind too falls back from a nameless peak. ||70.5||
His being stretched beyond the sight of Thought. ||70.6||
Far-off he saw the joining hemispheres. ||70.36||
A triple flight led to this triple world. ||71.3||
This was the play of the bright gods of Thought. ||72.1||
Truth smiled upon the gracious golden game. ||72.8||
For Truth is wider, greater than her forms. ||72.20||
Always the Ideal beckoned from afar. ||73.1||
Once kindled never can its flamings cease. ||73.25||
All there was an intense but partial light. ||73.36||
There paused the climbing hierarchy of worlds. ||74.3||
His mind reflected this vast quietism. ||74.7||
He looked below, but all was dark and mute. ||74.36||
To be was a prison, extinction the escape. ||74.42||
A covert answer to his seeking came. ||75.1||
Air was the breath of a pure infinite. ||76.7||
Into creation’s centre he had come. ||77.7||
Here was the fashioning chamber of the worlds. ||77.11||
A light appeared still and imperishable. ||77.23||
He fell down at her feet unconscious, prone. ||77.26||
At will he lived in the unoblivious Ray. ||78.32||
Neighbour his being grew to Nature’s crests. ||78.40||
A cave of darkness guards the eternal Light. ||79.6||
Near, it retreated; far, it called him still. ||79.9||
But who that mightiness was he knew not yet. ||79.13||
A giant doubt overshadowed his advance. ||79.16||
Abandoned by the worlds of form he strove. ||79.23||
But what That was, no thought or sight could tell. ||79.34||
All person perished in its namelessness. ||79.39||
O soul, it is too early to rejoice! ||80.3||
On what dead bank on the Eternal’s road? ||80.5||
Escape brings not the victory and the crown! ||80.7||
This too is Truth at the mystic fount of Life. ||80.10||
The zero covers an immortal face. ||80.18||
In absolute silence sleeps an absolute Power. ||80.20||
For one was there supreme behind the God. ||81.8||
The Formless and the Formed were joined in her. ||81.18||
Our self shall be one self with all through her. ||81.26||
Once seen, his heart acknowledged only her. ||81.29||
Only a hunger of infinite bliss was left. ||81.30||
Thus was a seed cast into endless Time. ||82.1||
A vast surrender was his only strength. ||82.8||
His soul was freed and given to her alone. ||82.12||
A mightier task remained than all he had done. ||83.1||
A neutral helpless void oppressed the years. ||83.6||
Thus could he bear the touch immaculate. ||83.16||
A last and mightiest transformation came. ||83.17||
The last movement died and all at once grew still. ||83.30||
All here self-lost had there its divine place. ||86.10||
A marriage with eternity divinised Time. ||86.16||
This darkness hides our nobler destiny. ||87.5||
He saw a world that is from a world to be. ||87.10||
A foreign shape it seemed, a mythic shade. ||87.12||
For even there the boundless Oneness dwells. ||88.3||
Then suddenly there rose a sacred stir. ||89.1||
All was a limitless sea that heaved to the moon. ||89.6||
What thou hast won is thine, but ask no more. ||89.13||
But too immense my danger and my joy. ||89.16||
Truth born too soon might break the imperfect earth. ||89.18||
The Enigma’s knot is tied in human kind. ||89.23||
A strange antinomy is his nature’s rule. ||89.32||
He has hitched his mortal error to Truth’s star. ||89.37||
Thus has he missed creation’s absolute. ||89.45||
It must live on, describe all Time’s huge curve. ||89.51||
Assent to thy high self, create, endure. ||89.62||
My light shall be in thee, my strength thy force. ||89.65||
All things shall change in God’s transfiguring hour. ||89.69||
August and sweet sank hushed that mighty Voice. ||90.1||
Hard is the doom to which thou bindst thy sons! ||90.4||
Ever the centuries and millenniums pass. ||90.7||
Where in the greyness is thy coming’s ray? ||90.8||
Where is the thunder of thy victory’s wings? ||90.9||
Only we hear the feet of passing gods. ||90.10||
All we have done is ever still to do. ||90.12||
All breaks and all renews and is the same. ||90.13||
I know that thy creation cannot fail. ||90.19||
A power arose out of my slumber’s cell. ||90.24||
“O strong forerunner, I have heard thy cry. ||91.3||
The grandiose respite failed, the wide release. ||92.7||
The mortal stir received him in its midst. ||92.10||
Day a half darkness wore as its dull dress. ||93.12||
None saw through dank drenched wicks the dungeon sun. ||93.14||
The sunlight was a great god’s golden smile. ||93.32||
All Nature was at beauty’s festival. ||93.33||
Once more that Will put on an earthly shape. ||94.11||
At once she seemed to found a mightier race. ||94.18||
Harmoniously she impressed the earth with heaven. ||94.22||
This at a heavenlier height was shown in her. ||94.30||
For with a greater Nature she was one. ||94.38||
There wisdom sits on her eternal throne. ||95.7||
They answered to her with the simple heart. ||96.6||
Some near approached, were touched, caught fire, then failed. ||96.9||
Too great was her demand, too pure her force. ||96.10||
Puissant, apart her soul as the gods live. ||96.12||
But like a sacred symbol’s was that cult. ||97.5||
An ancient longing struck again new roots. ||98.2||
He loves the Ignorance fathering his pain. ||98.21||
A spell is laid upon his glorious strengths. ||98.22||
Only a little lifted is Mind’s screen. ||98.26||
The Voice withdrew into its hidden skies. ||98.28||
A casual passing phrase can change our life. ||98.42||
A mighty Presence still defends thy frame. ||98.45||
Venture through the deep world to find thy mate. ||98.49||
This word was seed of all the thing to be. ||98.56||
Accustomed scenes were now an ended play. ||98.59||
Delight had fled to search the spacious world. ||98.64||
The world-ways opened before Savitri. ||99.1||
All was a part of old forgotten selves. ||99.5||
Not yet was a world all occupied by care. ||99.26||
A grandiose silence wrapped the regal day. ||100.11||
The spring winds failed; the sky was set like bronze. ||100.14||
The mighty Mother lay outstretched at ease. ||101.15||
A look, a turn decides our ill-poised fate. ||102.22||
Her vision settled, caught and all was changed. ||102.25||
An unknown imperious force drew him to her. ||102.38||
Still can the vision come, the joy arrive. ||102.56||
These knew each other though in forms thus strange. ||102.58||
I know that mighty gods are friends of earth. ||103.6||
High beauty’s visitants my inmates were. ||103.34||
The child of the Void shall be reborn in God. ||103.46||
I groped for the Mystery with the lantern, Thought. ||103.56||
I could not live the truth it spoke and thought. ||103.58||
The mystery was not solved but deepened more. ||103.63||
My mind transfigures to a rapturous seer. ||103.69||
Wilt thou not make this mortal bliss thy sphere? ||103.73||
Each now was a part of the other’s unity. ||104.17||
This now remained with her, her heart’s constant scene. ||105.10||
Thou hast not spoken with the kings of pain. ||106.32||
Moon-bright thou livest in thy inner bliss. ||106.34||
If for all time doom could be left to sleep! ||106.40||
He spoke but held his knowledge back from words. ||106.41||
So casts she her felicity on men. ||106.57||
Or must fire always test the great of soul? ||106.60||
What sudden God has met, what face supreme? ||106.65||
Whom hast thou chosen kingliest among men? ||106.71||
My father, I have chosen. This is done. ||106.75||
Astonished, all sat silent for a space. ||106.76||
Death is our road to immortality. ||106.81||
He said and Narad answered not the king. ||106.90||
Safe doors cry opening near, the doomed pass on. ||106.100||
He knows not even what his lips shall speak. ||106.103||
Yet all in vain the bitter law was made. ||106.113||
Our own minds are the justicers of doom. ||106.114||
Our sympathies become our tortures. ||106.118||
Ours not the passionless lids that cannot age. ||106.122||
Hide not from us our doom, if doom is ours. ||106.125||
To know is best, however hard to bear. ||106.127||
A lightning bright and nude the sentence fell. ||106.147||
But the queen cried: “Vain then can be Heaven’s grace! ||106.148||
But I reject the grace and the mockery. ||106.150||
Plead not thy choice, for death has made it vain. ||106.155||
Those who shall part who have grown one being within? ||106.162||
Fate’s law may change, but not my spirit’s will. ||106.165||
All passes here, nothing remains the same. ||106.169||
None is for any on this transient globe. ||106.170||
Only the gods can speak what now thou speakst. ||106.180||
Thou who art human, think not like a god. ||106.181||
Leave not thy goal to follow a beautiful face. ||106.185||
Yet hope sank down like an extinguished fire. ||107.4||
Is it thy God who made this cruel law? ||107.11||
On Nature’s gifts to man a curse was laid. ||107.26||
At every step is laid for us a snare. ||107.28||
All he has achieved he drags to the precipice. ||107.34||
All is an episode in a meaningless tale. ||107.39||
Why is it all and wherefore are we here? ||107.40||
Whence rose the call for sorrow and for pain? ||107.43||
Or all came helplessly without a cause? ||107.44||
What power forced the immortal spirit to birth? ||107.45||
A great Illusion then has built the stars. ||107.50||
Or where begins and ends Illusion’s reign? ||107.53||
In one caul with joy came forth the dreadful Power. ||108.11||
Pain ploughed the first hard ground of the world-drowse. ||108.13||
The spirit is doomed to pain till man is free. ||108.23||
Men die that man may live and God be born. ||108.25||
An awful Silence watches tragic Time. ||108.26||
Now is the debt paid, wiped off the original score. ||108.34||
He has trod with bleeding brow the Saviour’s way. ||108.39||
His knowledge immortal triumphs by his death. ||108.41||
“Yes, all is God,” peals back Heaven’s deathless call. ||108.42||
He dies that the world may be new-born and live. ||108.52||
This all must conquer who would bring down God’s peace. ||108.59||
This is the inner war without escape. ||108.61||
The human mass lingers beneath the yoke. ||109.6||
A greater power must come, a larger light. ||109.9||
He has seized life’s hands, he has mastered his own heart. ||109.14||
Then shall be ended here the Law of Pain. ||109.34||
Then shall the world-redeemer’s task be done. ||109.37||
His moments centre the vast universe. ||110.17||
He sees his little self as very God. ||110.18||
Calm is self’s victory overcoming fate. ||110.30||
Bear; thou shalt find at last thy road to bliss. ||110.31||
A vast disguise conceals the Eternal’s bliss. ||111.16||
seer, is there no remedy within? ||112.2||
All here can change if the Magician choose. ||112.17||
For only so can he be Nature’s King. ||112.20||
What else shall be is written in her soul. ||112.22||
Fate is Truth working out in Ignorance. ||112.24||
Fate is a balance drawn in Destiny’s book. . ||112.26||
Man can accept his fate, he can refuse. ||112.27||
Its splendid failures sum to victory. ||112.30||
Alone she is equal to her mighty task. ||112.46||
Cry not to heaven, for she alone can save. ||112.54||
He spoke and ceased and left the earthly scene. ||113.1||
Fate followed her foreseen immutable road. ||114.1||
A glimpse or flashes came, the Presence was hid. ||115.20||
All was too little for her bottomless need. ||115.36||
The year now paused upon the brink of change. ||115.47||
So her grief’s heavy sky shut in her heart. ||115.49||
Arise, O soul, and vanquish Time and Death. ||116.6||
Is there a God whom any cry can move? ||116.8||
The Voice replied: “Is this enough, O spirit? ||116.14||
Then Savitri’s heart fell mute, it spoke no word. ||116.20||
Open God’s door, enter into his trance. ||116.23||
This is the little surface of man’s life. ||117.17||
Man in the world’s life works out the dreams of God. ||117.21||
Man’s lower nature hides these awful guests. ||117.38||
Their vast contagion grips sometimes man’s world. ||117.39||
An awful insurgence overpowers man’s soul. ||117.40||
The unborn gods hide in his house of Life. ||117.49||
His mind creates around him its universe. ||117.51||
A vast subliminal is man’s measureless part. ||117.58||
The dim subconscient is his cavern base. ||117.59||
Our dead selves come to slay our living soul. ||117.66||
This is not all we are or all our world. ||117.70||
It shall descend and make earth’s life divine. ||117.72||
Truth made the world, not a blind Nature-Force. ||117.73||
Man human follows in God’s human steps. ||118.8||
In Matter’s body find thy heaven-born soul. ||118.10||
Soul was not there but only cries of life. ||118.23||
A thronged and clamorous air environed her. ||118.24||
This state now threatened, this she pushed from her. ||118.31||
A large deliverance came, a vast calm space. ||118.33||
Enormous was its vast and passionate voice. ||118.39||
All now was still, the soil shone dry and pure. ||118.59||
Through it all she moved not, plunged not in the vain waves. ||118.60||
Her spirit’s bounds they cast in rigid lines. ||119.4||
Each found what it had sought and knew its aim. ||120.5||
Ours is the home of cosmic certainty. ||120.10||
Here is the truth, God’s harmony is here. ||120.11||
This is the end and there is no beyond.
A favourite of Heaven and Nature live. ||120.14||
Happiest who stand on faith as on a rock. ||120.21||
Here I can stay not, for I seek my soul. ||120.23||
But others, “Nay, it is her spirit she seeks. ||120.27||
Can still the path be found, opened the gate? ||120.32||
So she fared on across her silent self. ||121.1||
Only who save themselves can others save. ||121.5||
“O Savitri, from thy hidden soul we come. ||121.9||
I am in all that suffers and that cries. ||122.10||
What profit have I of my human soul? ||122.27||
I toil like the animal, like the animal die. ||122.28||
But God has taken from me the ancient force. ||122.35||
I suffer and toil and weep; I moan and hate. ||122.38||
But thine is the power to solace, not to save. ||122.41||
There shall be peace and joy for ever more. ||122.44||
On passed she in her spirit’s upward route. ||123.1||
All beautiful grew, subtle and high and strange. ||123.3||
The earth is my floor, the sky my living’s roof. ||123.38||
All was prepared through many a silent age. ||123.39||
There is no miracle I shall not achieve. ||123.43||
I have taught my kind to serve and to obey. ||123.50||
I shall know mystic truths, seize occult powers. ||123.52||
Thou hast given men strength, wisdom thou couldst not give. ||123.58||
Thy wisdom shall be vast as vast thy power. ||123.60||
The wind was still and fragrance packed the air. ||124.2||
These powers I am and at my call they come. ||124.20||
Thus slowly I lift man’s soul nearer the Light. ||124.21||
I shall save earth, if earth consents to be saved. ||124.25||
Man only sees the cosmic surfaces. ||124.30||
Yet have I loosened the cord, enlarged my room. ||124.42||
If God is at work his secrets I have found. ||124.51||
This wizard Gods may dream, not thinking men. ||124.66||
There shall be light and peace in all the worlds. ||124.73||
Onward she passed seeking the soul’s mystic cave. ||125.1||
At first she stepped into a night of God. ||125.2||
But all was formless, voiceless, infinite. ||125.12||
An eagle covered it with wide conquering wings. ||125.24||
All happy grows towards knowledge and towards bliss. ||127.23||
What more, what more, if more must still be done? ||127.29||
A calm slow sun looked down from tranquil heavens. ||128.1||
Then rushing came its vast and fearful Fount. ||128.17||
For only the blank Eternal can be true. ||128.26||
He who would save the world must share its pain. ||128.38||
If he knows not grief, how shall he find grief’s cure? ||128.39||
Banish all thought from thee and be God’s void. ||128.46||
Annul thyself that only God may be. ||128.50||
But most her gaze pursued the birth of thought. ||129.6||
God’s summits look back on the mute Abyss. ||129.24||
The high meets the low, all is a single plan. ||129.26||
All else is Nature’s craft and this too hers. ||129.32||
This men call quietude and prize as peace. ||129.43||
Then this too paused; the body seemed a stone. ||129.45||
As yet their path lay deep concealed in light. ||129.50||
But soon that commerce failed, none reached mind’s coast. ||129.54||
Its truth escaped from shape and line and hue. ||130.22||
A formless liberation came on her. ||130.33||
As yet this great impersonal speech was rare. ||131.22||
In her the Unseen, the Unknown waited his hour. ||131.28||
The cosmos flowered in her, she was its bed. ||132.28||
All she had been and done she lived again. ||133.2||
What prayer she breathed her soul and Doorga knew. ||133.5||
At last she came to the pale mother queen. ||133.7||
Release me now and let my heart have rest. ||133.11||
But Satyavan wielded a joyous axe. ||133.22||
But as he worked, his doom upon him came. ||133.24||
Something had come there conscious, vast and dire. ||133.36||
But still the human heart in her beat on. ||134.4||
This in a moment’s depths was born in her. ||134.14||
Like a vast fire it climbed the skies of night. ||134.16||
Thus were the cords of self-oblivion torn. ||134.17||
Entomb thy passion in its living grave. ||135.15||
Onward the three still moved in her soul-scene. ||136.19||
Only in human limits man lives safe. ||136.28||
Know the cold term-stones of thy hopes in life. ||136.31||
Hungry beyond, the night desired her soul. ||137.4||
He calls the heavens to help his suffering hopes. ||137.39||
Hope not to win back to thee Satyavan. ||137.50||
Choose a life’s hopes for thy deceiving prize. ||137.53||
Conscious of immortality I walk. ||137.56||
Give, if thou must, or if thou canst, refuse. ||137.63||
I am immortal in my mortality. ||137.72||
My soul can meet them with its living fire. ||137.74||
Wherever thou leadst his soul I shall pursue. ||137.79||
Their orbs were coiled before thy soul was formed. ||137.82||
I made the worlds my net, each joy a mesh. ||137.84||
Death only lasts and the inconscient Void. ||137.103||
I only am eternal and endure. ||137.104||
I, Death, am He; there is no other God. . ||137.106||
I have made a world by my inconscient Force. ||137.108||
I, Death, am the one refuge of thy soul. ||137.112||
His being is pure, unwounded, motionless, one. ||137.119||
It is delight immortally alone. ||137.123||
I am, I love, I see, I act, I will. ||137.127||
Love in me knows the truth all changings mask. ||137.130||
I know my coming was a wave from God. ||137.133||
The Inconscient is the Superconscient’s sleep. ||138.9||
Thus all could last, yet nothing ever be. ||139.23||
It is a brilliant shadow’s dreamy trail. ||140.8||
In the Alone there is no room for love. ||140.15||
The ideal never yet was real made. ||140.17||
The snake is there and the worm in the heart of the rose. ||140.35||
Vain are the cycles of thy brilliant mind. ||140.46||
One with my fathomless Nihil all forget. ||140.48||
But I forbid thy voice to slay my soul. ||140.51||
Disguised the Lover seeks and draws our souls. ||140.64||
He named himself for me, grew Satyavan. ||140.65||
Did he not dawn on me in other stars? ||140.67||
I cherish God the Fire, not God the Dream. ||140.75||
Vain is thy longing to build heaven on earth. ||140.79||
All upon Matter stands as on a rock. ||140.88||
What seemed most real once, is Nihil’s show. ||140.90||
When all unconscious was, then all was well. ||140.97||
Nay, is not all thou art and doest a dream? ||140.115||
Thy mind and life are tricks of Matter’s force. ||140.116||
How shall the will-o’-the-wisp become a star? ||140.121||
Infant and dim the eternal Mights awoke. . ||141.12||
In waking Mind, the Thinker built his house. ||141.15||
How shall the child already be the man? ||141.19||
Because he is infant, shall he never grow? ||141.20||
Because he is ignorant, shall he never learn? ||141.21||
Still wilt thou say there is no spirit, no God? ||141.24||
A glory is his dream of purple sky. ||141.31||
A march of his greatness are the wheeling stars. ||141.32||
This world is God fulfilled in outwardness. ||141.34||
All blundered and straggled towards the one Divine. ||141.44||
O Death, this is the mystery of thy reign. ||141.63||
All grew a play of Chance simulating Fate. ||141.81||
A hidden Bliss is at the root of things. ||142.3||
A mystic slow transfiguration works. ||142.20||
I guard that seal against thy rending hands. ||142.31||
Thy words are large murmurs in a mystic dream. ||142.36||
How canst thou force to wed two eternal foes? ||142.45||
How shall thy will make one the true and false? ||142.47||
The Real with the unreal cannot mate. ||142.49||
In me all take refuge, for I, Death, am God. ||142.53||
Show me thy strength and freedom from my laws. ||142.59||
Nothing I claim but Satyavan alone. ||142.68||
There was a hush as if of doubtful fates. ||142.69||
Love shall bind by thee many gathered hearts. ||142.73||
Return, O child, to thy forsaken earth. ||142.75||
But Savitri replied, “Thy gifts resist. ||142.76||
Earth cannot flower if lonely I return. ||142.77||
Death answered her, “Return and try thy soul! ! ||142.84||
The heavens accept our broken flights at last. ||142.94||
Thus with armed speech the great opponents strove. . ||142.98||
Above was the unseen balance of his fate. ||142.109||
But all were dreams crossing an empty vast. ||143.12||
There is no house for him in hurrying Time. ||144.11||
All walk by Nature bound for ever the same. ||144.13||
Where leads the march, whither the pilgrimage? ||144.16||
Who keeps the map of the route or planned each stage? ||144.17||
Or else self-moved the world walks its own way? ||144.18||
O soul, drown in his still beatitude. ||144.35||
The world is not cut off from Truth and God. ||144.43||
I have pursued him in his earthly form. ||144.53||
Then rang again a deeper cry of Death. ||145.1||
Yet was all nothing then or vainly achieved? ||145.4||
But the violent and passionate heart forbids. ||145.9||
Lo, how all shakes when the gods tread too near! ||145.17||
All moves, is in peril, anguished, torn, upheaved. ||145.18||
Be still and tardy in the slow wise world. ||145.21||
Use not thy strength like the wild Titan souls! ||145.23||
Are thy arms sweeter than the courts of God? ||145.36||
Far Heaven can wait our coming in its calm. ||145.41||
Easy the heavens were to build for God. ||145.42||
Why came it down into the mortal’s Space? ||145.46||
This is my answer to thy lures, O Death. ||145.51||
Eternal truth lives not with mortal men. ||146.14||
Then will I give thee back thy Satyavan. ||146.16||
But here are only facts and steel-bound Law. ||146.17||
Leave then thy dead, O Savitri, and live. ||146.21||
All contraries are aspects of God’s face. ||146.25||
A demi-god animal, came thinking man. ||146.43||
There man can visit but there he cannot live. ||146.49||
But who can show to thee Truth’s glorious face? ||146.68||
Our human words can only shadow her. . ||146.69||
Who then art thou hiding in human guise? ||146.76||
But where is thy strength to conquer Time and Death? ||146.78||
Hast thou God’s force to build heaven’s values here? ||146.79||
And Savitri looked on Death and answered not. ||147.1||
A mighty transformation came on her. ||147.3||
Thus changed she waited for the Word to speak. ||147.12||
Eternity looked into the eyes of Death. ||147.13||
And Darkness saw God’s living Reality. ||147.14||
Thou art my shadow and my instrument. ||147.18||
Live, Death, awhile, be still my instrument. . ||147.21||
Unshakable he stood claiming his right. ||147.26||
The two opposed each other face to face. ||147.28||
His body was eaten by light, his spirit devoured. ||147.34||
A changed earth-nature felt the breath of peace. ||148.12||
What would be suffering here, was fiery bliss. ||148.31||
The strong who stumble and sin were calm proud gods. ||148.45||
Transfigured was the formidable shape. ||149.3||
Night the dim mask had grown a wonderful face. . ||149.5||
All powers were woven in countless concords here. ||149.25||
The bliss that made the world in his body lived. ||149.26||
Two looked upon each other, Soul saw Soul. ||149.35||
The eyes that live in night shall see my form. ||150.6||
Attend that moment of celestial fate. ||150.11||
Too far thy heavens for me from suffering men. ||151.9|
Imperfect is the joy not shared by all. ||151.10||
Are there not still a million fights to wage? ||151.14||
Fashion to beauty, point us through the world. ||151.17||
There is the All-Truth and there the timeless bliss. ||152.6||
There are high glimpses, not the lasting sight. ||152.9||
I sacrifice not earth to happier worlds. ||153.3||
I claim thee for the world that thou hast made. ||153.10||
In an ineffable world she lived fulfilled. ||153.30||
The form of things had ceased within her soul. ||153.34||
Invisible that perfect godhead now. ||153.35||
The moments fell into eternity. ||153.39||
But someone yearned within a bosom unknown. ||153.40||
Thy calm, O Lord, that bears thy hands of joy. ||153.42||
My will is thine, what thou hast chosen I choose. ||154.2||
All thou hast asked I give to earth and men. ||154.3||
Now will I do in thee my marvellous works. ||154.7||
Nowhere shalt thou escape my living eyes. ||154.16||
My fiercest masks shall my attractions bring. ||154.22||
Thou shalt not shrink from any brother soul. ||154.32||
Thou shalt be attracted helplessly to all. ||154.33||
For ever love, O beautiful slave of God! ||154.41||
“Descend to life with him thy heart desires. ||155.1||
There is an infinite truth, an absolute power. ||155.16||
Then shall the Truth supreme be given to men. ||155.23||
A mightier race shall inhabit the mortal’s world. ||155.38||
Man shall desire to climb to his own heights. ||155.57||
The measure of that subtle music ceased. ||156.1||
A choir of laughing winds to meet her came. ||156.4||
All still was in a silence of the gods. ||156.13||
A key turned in a mystic lock of Time. ||156.16||
A power leaned down, a happiness found its home. ||156.18||
Over wide earth brooded the infinite bliss. ||156.19||
Out of abysmal trance her spirit woke. ||157.1||
A marvellous voice of silence breathed its thoughts. ||157.9||
Boundless she was, a form of infinity. ||157.13||
Let us go back, for eve is in the skies. ||157.47||
Lo, all these beings in this wonderful world! ||157.49||
Let us give joy to all, for joy is ours. ||157.50||
Her eyes were first to find her children’s forms. ||158.10||
What danger kept thee for the darkening woods? ||158.13||
With her enchantments she has twined me round. ||158.17||