Sri Aurobindo

The Hour of God

and other writings

X. Historical Impressions

Notes on Bergson [1]

Bergson — "philosophy of change".

"It symbolises the protest of the modern impatient man of action against the great Platonic tradition in philosophy of reason or intellect and static reality."

"It substitutes force for inertia, life for death and liberty for fatalism." "Physics and logic are appropriate to the study of the inverse movement, matter, which is life or elan vital pulverised and its method is intellect and logic."

"Philosophy is the study of becoming in general and its method is intuition."

"Scrap the Platonic tradition and follow Plotinus. 'Ask me not but understand in silence as I (Nature) am silent and am not wont to speak'."

"A philosophy of evolution itself evolving", "positive and empirical", "moulded on experience, determined to base itself on solid grounds, a doctrine in no sense systematic, distinguishes different problems to examine them one by one... enemy of conventionality ... antidote to the dogmatic finality of the traditional philosopher. "

A short-cut through "the turning of the mind homeward, the coincidence of the human consciousness with the living principle"

"The destiny of man will be realised because it is the nature of the elan vital to triumph over matter and environment."