infiniti science

MODERN civilization with its scientific temper,  humanistic  spirit,  and  secular  view  of  life  is uprooting the world over the customs of long centuries and creating a ferment of restlessness. The new world cannot remain a confused mass of needs and  impulses,  ambitions  and  activities,  without  any control or guidance of the spirit. The void created by abandoned superstitions  and  uprooted  beliefs calls for a spiritual filling.



The world has found itself as one body. But physical unity and economic  interdependence  are  not  by themselves sufficient to create a universal human community. For this we require a human consciousness of community, a sense of personal relationships among men. Though this human  consciousness  was  till recently limited to the members of the political States, there has been a rapid extension of it  after the War. The modes and customs of all men are now a part of the consciousness  of  all  men.  Man  has become the spectator of man. A new humanism is on the horizon. But this time it embraces the whole  of mankind.  An  intimate  mutual  knowledge  between  peoples  is  producing  an  enrichment  of  world-consciousness. We can no more escape being members of a world community than we can jump  out  of  our own skin. Yet to our dismay we find that the world is anarchical and unruly. Its mind is in confusion; its brain out of hinge. More than ever before, the world is to-day divided and afflicted by formidable evils. The cause of the present tension and disorder is the lack of adjustment between the process  of life, which is one of increasing interdependence, and the ‘ideology’ of life, the  integrating  habits of mind, loyalties, and affections embodied in our laws and institutions. Education, which has for its aim the transmission not only of skills and techniques, but of ideals and loyalties, of affections and appreciations, is busy in the new world with the old ideals of national sovereignty and economic self-sufficiency. The present organization of the world is inconsistent with the Zeitgeist shining  on  the distant horizon as well as the true spirit of religion. To say that there is only one God is to affirm that there .is only one community of mankind. The obstacles to the organization of human society in an international commonwealth are in the minds of men who have not developed the sense of the  duty  they owe to each other. We have to touch the soul of mankind. ‘For soul is Form and doth the body make.’ We must evolve ideals, habits, and sentiments which would enable us to build up a world  community,  live in a co-operative commonwealth working for the faith : ‘so long as one man is  in  prison,  I  am  not free; so long as one community is enslaved I belong to it’.



The supreme task of our generation is to give a soul to the growing wrorld-consciousncss,  to  develop ideals and institutions necessary for the creative expression of the world  soul,  to  transmit  these loyalties and impulses to future generations and train them into world citizens. To this great work of creating a new pattern of living, some of the fundamental insights of  Eastern  religions,  especially Hinduism and Buddhism, seem to be particularly relevant, and an attempt is made in these  lectures  to indicate them. No culture, no country, lives or has a  right  to  live  for  itself.  If  it  has  any contribution to make towards the enrichment of the human spirit, it  owes  that  contribution  to  the widest circle that it can reach. The  contributions  of  ancient  Greece,  of  the  Roman  Empire,  of Renaissance Italy to the progress of humanity do not concern only the inhabitants of modern Greece  or modern Italy. They are a part of the heritage of humanity. In the life of mind and  spirit  we  cannot afford to display a mood of provincialism. At any rate, a mobilization of the wisdom of the world  may have some justification at a time when so many other forms of mobilization are threatening it.



I am aware of the scale and difficulty of the problems on which I touch. I am not a trained theologian and can only speak from the point of view of a student of  philosophy  who  has  endeavoured  to  keep abreast with modern investigations into the origin and growth of the chief religions of the world, and it seems to me that in the mystic traditions of the different religions we have a remarkable unity  of spirit. Whatever religions they may profess, the mystics are spiritual kinsmen.  While  the  different religions in their historical forms bind us to limited groups and militate against the development  of loyalty to the world community, the mystics have always stood for the  fellowship  of  humanity.  They transcend the tyranny of names and the rivalry of creeds as wrell as the conflict  of  races  and  the strife of nations. As  the  religion  of  spirit,  mysticism  avoids  the  two  extremes  of  dogmatic affirmation and dogmatic denial. All signs indicate that it is  likely  to  be  the  religion  of  the future.

SR 1942