Sri Aurobindo
Karmayogin
Political Writings and Speeches — 1909-1910
Karmayogin: A Weekly Review
Saturday 3rd July 1909 — No.3
Opinion and Comments
The Importance of the Individual
It is not surprising that with these ideas the Bengalee should deprecate the call for continued courage and self-sacrifice which has been made by Srijut Aurobindo Ghose in his speech at Jhalakati, for to that speech the article is a controversial answer.
The cry for expediency resolves itself into an argument for individual prudence on the part of the leaders.
“It seems to us to be a fatal idea that for the progress of the nation individuals are not necessary or that particular individuals are not more necessary than other individuals.”
And the writer asks whether an organ is justified in cutting itself off for the sake of the organism, and immediately answers his own question partially by saying, yes, when the interests of the organism require it.
The metaphor is a false one; for the individual is not an organ, he is simply an atom, and atoms not only can be replaced but are daily replaced, and the replacement is necessary for the continued life of the organism.
In times of stress or revolution the replacement is more rapid, that is all.
Whatever the importance of particular individuals,— and the importance of men like Sj. Aswini Kumar Dutta or Sj. Krishna Kumar Mitra is not denied by any man in his senses and was not denied but dwelt upon by the speaker at Jhalakati,— they are not necessary, in the sense that God does not depend upon them for the execution of His purposes.
Our 
contemporary does not expressly deny God's existence or His omnipotence or His providence, and if he accepts them, he is debarred from insisting that God cannot save India without Sj. Surendranath Banerji or Sj. Aswini Kumar Dutta, that He is unable to remove them and find other instruments or that their deportation or disappearance will defer the fulfilment of His purposes to future centuries.
Later edition of this work: The Complete Works of Sri Aurobindo: Set in 37 volumes.- Volume 8.- Karmayogin: Political writings and speeches. 1909-1910.- Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Ashram, 1997.- 471 p.