Sri Aurobindo

Letters of Sri Aurobindo

Correspondence (1933-1967)

Letter ID: 59

Sri Aurobindo — Nahar, Prithwi Singh

October 10, 1936

... I should like very much to know Mother if You will please condescend to tell me in some detail if the imperialistic powers will be allowed indefinitely to continue in their old ways exploiting the weak and carrying on the plague of abject misery and suffering wherever they go. Will not these things come to an end when Your supramental Will begins its work? Please write me something Mother, I pray.

With deep devotion,

Prithwisingh

I would prefer to avoid all public controversy especially if it touches in the least on politics. Gandhi’s theories are like other mental theories built on a basis of one-sided reasoning and claiming for a limited truth (that of non-violence and of passive resistance) a universality which it cannot have. Such theories will always exist so long as the mind is the main instrument of human truth seeking. To spend energy trying to destroy such theories is of little use; if destroyed they are replaced by others equally limited and partial.

As for imperialism, that is no new thing – it is as old as the human vital; there was never a time in known human history when it was not in existence. To get rid of it means to change human nature or at least to curb it by a superior power. Our work is not to fight these things but to bring down a higher nature and a Truth-creation which will make spiritual Light and Power the chief force in terrestrial existence.

Sri Aurobindo