The
Mother taking
Class in playground
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Do
not follow the way of evil. Do not cultivate indolence
of mind. Do not choose wrong views. Do not be of those
who linger in the world.
Arise.
Cast off negligence. Follow the teaching of wisdom.
The sage knows happiness in this world and the other.
Follow
the teaching of wisdom and no, hat of evil. The sage
knows happiness in this world and the other.
One
who looks upon the world as a bubble or a mirage,
Yama the King of Death cannot find him.
Come,
look upon the world as the brightly-coloured chariot
of a Raja, which attracts the foolish but where, in
truth there is nothing attractive.
one
who, having been negligent, becomes vigilant, illumines
the earth like the moon coming forth from behind the
clouds.
One
whose good actions efface the evil he who illumines
the earth like the moon coming behind the clouds.
The
world is wrapped in darkness and few are those who
find their way, who, like a bird escaping from a net,
soar up towards heaven.
The
swans take the path of sun. Those who Possess occult
powers fly through the air. The sages leave
this
world after defeating Mara and his army of evil.
No
evil is impossible to him who transgresses one law
of the Doctrine, who utters falsehood and who disdains
the higher world.
In
truth, misers do not attain to the world of the gods
and fools do not know the happiness of giving.
But the sage delights in giving and thus knows
happiness in the other world.
Rather
than ruling the earth, rather than reaching heaven,
rather than reigning over the worlds, it is better
to enter the upward current.
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There
are four pieces of advice here which I would like to retain
for our meditation. "Do not cultivate indolence of mind."
"Do not choose wrong views" - unfortunately this is something
one does all the time. And, "Arise. Cast off negligence."
The world has been; so made - at least up to now, let
us hope that it will not be so for much longer -that, spontaneously,
a' man who is not cultured, when he is brought into contact
with ideas, always chooses wrong ideas.
And a child who is not educated always chooses bad
company. It is a thing I experience constantly and concretely.
If you keep a child in a special atmosphere and if, from
a very early age, you instill in him a special atmosphere,
a special purity, he has a chance of not making a wrong
choice. But a child who is taken from the world as it is
and is placed in a society where
there are good and bad elements will go straight to
those who can spoil him, teach him wrong things, that is
to say, towards the worst company.
A man who has no intellectual culture, if you give
him some mixed ideas, just at random, to choose from, he
will always choose the stupid ones; because, as Sri Aurobindo
has told us, this
is a world of falsehood, of ignorance and an effort is needed,
an aspiration; one must come in contact with one's inmost
being - a conscious and luminous contact - if one is to
distinguish the true from the false, the good influence
from the bad. If you let yourself go, you sink into a hole.
Things are like that because what rules the world -
oh let us put it in the part tense, so that it becomes true
- what ruled the world was falsehood and ignorance..
In fact, for the moment, it is still like that; one
should have no illusions about it. But perhaps with a great
effort and great vigilance we shall be able to make it otherwise...
soon - the "perhaps" is for "soon'.
Surely it will come one day, but we want it soon, and
that is why the last two recommendations please me: "Arise.
Cast off negligence."
9
May 1958
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