Sri Aurobindo
Autobiographical Notes
and Other Writings of Historical Interest
Part Two. Letters of Historical Interest
1. Letters on Personal, Practical and Political Matters
(1890–1926)
Letters and Telegrams to Political and Professional
Associates 1906–1926
To Motilal Roy [3]1
[c. January 1913]
Dear M.
We have received from you in December Rs 60, and Rs 20,
and in this month Rs 10. According to N’s account, Rs 10 belongs to November
account, Rs 50 to December; Rs 20 we suppose to have been sent in advance on the
January account. If so, we still expect from you Rs 20, this month. I should be
glad to know if there is any prospect of your being able to increase the amount
now or shortly. Up till now we have somehow or other managed to fill in the
deficit of Rs 35 monthly; but, now that all our regular sources here are
stopped, we have to look to mere luck for going on. Of course if we were bhaktas
of the old type this would be the regular course, but as our sadhan stands upon 
karmayoga with jnana and bhakti, this inactive nirbhara can only
continue so long as it is enjoined on us as a temporary movement of the sadhana.
It cannot be permanent. I think there will have to be a change before long, but
I cannot see clearly whether the regular and sufficient arrangement which must
be instituted some time, is to come from you or from an unexpected quarter or
whether I have myself to move in the matter. It is a question of providing some
Rs 450 a year in addition to what you send,– unless, of course, God provides us
with some new source for the sharírayátrá as He did
two years ago.
All these matters, as well as the pursuance of my work
to which you allude in your last (commercial) letter, [depend]2 on the success of the struggle which is the crowning movement of my
sadhana – viz the attempt to apply knowledge and power to the events and
happenings of the world without the necessary instrumentality of physical
action. What I am attempting is to establish the normal working of the siddhis
in life ie the perception of thoughts, feelings and happenings of other beings
and in other places throughout the world without any use of information by
speech or any other data. 2d, the
communication of the ideas and feelings I select to others (individuals, groups,
nations,) by mere transmission of will-power; 3rd,
the silent compulsion on them to act according to these communicated ideas and
feelings; 4th, the determining of events,
actions and results of action throughout the world by pure silent will power.
When I wrote to you last, I had begun the general application of these powers
which God has been developing in me for the last two or three years, but, as I
told you, I was getting badly beaten. This is no longer the case, for in the 1st,
2d and even in 3rd
I am now largely successful, although the action of these powers is not yet
perfectly organized. It is only in the 4th
that I feel a serious resistance. I can produce single results with perfect
accuracy, I can produce general results with difficulty and after a more or less
prolonged struggle, but I can neither be sure of producing the final decisive
result I am aiming at nor of securing that orderly arrangement of events which 
prevents the results from being isolated and only partially
effective. In some directions I seem to succeed, in others partly to fail and
partly to succeed, while in some fields, eg, this matter of financial equipment
both for my personal life and for my work I have hitherto entirely failed. When
I shall succeed even partially in that, then I shall know that my hour of
success is at hand and that I have got rid of the past karma in myself and
others, which stands in our way and helps the forces of Kaliyuga to baffle our
efforts.
About Tantric yoga; your experiment in the smashāna was
a daring one,– but it seems to have been efficiently and skilfully carried out,
and the success is highly gratifying.3 In these kriyas there are three considerations to be held in
view, 1st, the object of the kriya. Of
course there is the general object of mukti-bhukti which Tantriks in all ages
have pursued, but to bring it about certain subjective results and conditions
are necessary in ourselves and our surroundings and each separate kriya should
be so managed as to bring about an important result of the kind. Big kriyas or
numerous kriyas are not always necessary; the main thing is that they should be
faultlessly effective like your last kriya or the small one with which you
opened your practices. That is the second consideration viz the success of the
kriya itself and that depends on the selection and proper use of the right
mantra and tantra,– mantra, the mental part, and tantra, the practical part.
These must be arranged with the greatest scrupulousness. All rashness, pride,
ostentation etc, the rajasic defects,– also, all negligence, omission, slipshod
ritual,– the tamasic defects, must be avoided. Success must not elate your
minds, nor failure discourage. 3dly,
angarakshana is as important as siddhi. There are many Tantriks in this Kaliyuga
who are eager about siddhi, careless in angarakshana. They get some siddhi, but
become the prey of the devils and bhutas they raise. Now what is the use of a
particular siddhi, if the sadhakas are destroyed? The general and real object,–
mukti and bhukti,– remains unfulfilled. Angarakshana is managed, first, by the 
selection and arrangement of the right siddhi-mantra and kriya,
secondly, by the presence behind the sadhaka of one who repeats what is called
an angarakshaka mantra destructive of the pretas and Rakshasas or prohibitive of
their attacks. The last function I have taken on myself; it is your business so
to arrange the kriya that the bhutas get no chance for 
[prabēśa] or for the seizure and destruction of the
sadhaka. I have found that my mantra has been more and more successful in
protection, but it is not yet strong enough to prevent all 
[upadraba] of a dangerous character. It will take
some more 
[ābṛtti] to increase its power. It is for this reason
that I do not yet tell you to go on swiftly in your course of practices. Still
there is no harm in quickening the pace in comparison with the past. Remember
always the supreme necessity of mauna in Tantric practices. In Vedantic and
Puranic exercises expansion is not dangerous, but the goddess of the Tantra does
not look with a favourable eye on those who from pride, ostentation or looseness
blab about the mantra or the kriya. In Tantric sadhana secrecy is necessary for
its own sake. Those who reveal mantra or kriya to the unfit, suffer almost
inevitably; even those who reveal them unnecessarily to the fit, impair somewhat
the force of their Tantric action.
Kali
P.S. Please send the rest of this month’s money at once
if you have not already sent it, and next month’s as early as you can.