explorers of eternity - raghav dwivedi
TRANSCRIPT
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Explorers of EternityAuthored by Mr R P Dwivedi
60 x 90 (1524 x 2286 cm)Black amp White on White paper154 pages
ISBN-13 9781497470637ISBN-10 1497470633
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 1
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 2
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY (An Indian Interpretation of Eight Western Poets)
RP DWIVEDI
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 3
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 4
ldquoIndia is the cradle of the human race the birthplace of
human speech the mother of history the grandmother
of legend and the great grandmother of tradition Our
most valuable and most instructive materials in the
history of man are treasured up in India onlyrdquo
Mark Twain
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 5
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 6
ISBN 9781497470637
First Edition 2007
Reprint 2014
copy RP Dwivedi
Rs 50000
All rights reserved No part of this publication may be
reproduced stored in a retrieval system or transmitted
in any form or by any means electronic mechanical
photocopying recording or otherwise without the
prior written permission of the copyright owner
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 7
DEDICATED TO
My Father
Late Pt Devi Sahay Dwivedi
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 8
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
I wish to express my indebtedness to all my near and
dear ones and tender grateful acknowledgements to my
wife Mrs Rajeshwari Dwivedi for her implied and
inspiring encouragement and particularly to my
nephew Raghav Dwivedi without whose willing co-
operation unfailing assistance and untiring labour the
publication of this compact volume would not have
been possible
My grateful thanks are also due to Bhartiya Vidya Bhavan Mumbai and Gita Press Gorakhpur for their
kind permission to include in this volume as many as
seven articles published in their esteemed periodicals
viz lsquoBhavanrsquos Journalrsquo and lsquoKalyana-Kalpatarursquo
respectively
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 9
CONTENTS
Introduction 10
1 Indian Spiritualism in Blakersquos Poetry 27
2 Vedanta in Wordsworthrsquos Poetry 47
3 Coleridgersquos Spiritual Quest and Indian Thought 62 4 Byron A Blend of Clay and Spark 79
5 Shelley A Pilgrim of Eternity 95
6 John Keats A Minstrel of Beauty and Truth 119 7 Emersonrsquos Spiritual Quest and Indian Thought 131
8 Thoreaursquos Tryst with Indian Culture 143
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 10
INTRODUCTION
Quest for Truth has always been manrsquos eternal passion
and pursuit Since the very dawn of human civilization
he has been at pains to unravel the mystery that
shrouds life and the world around him And yet the
enigmatic phenomenon of the universe is to quote
Tennyson ldquoan arch wherethrorsquo gleams that untraveled world whose margin fades forever and foreverrdquo as man
moves to reach it but it is never too late ldquoto seek a newer worldrdquo
Manrsquos basic faith and his dauntless persistence in
attaining truth both in the physical world and spiritual
sphere sustains his endeavour and impels him to move
into lsquofresh woods and pastures newrsquo In this sense both
Science and Religion have the identical aim of
discovering Truth and thus helping man to grow
materially and spiritually to achieve fulfillment The
yearning of the poets (selected here) for exploring and
expressing Ultimate Truth or Eternity has been
highlighted
This little volume of articles written at leisure from time
to time as a creative pastime reflects a modest attempt
at tracing out the main thought-currents of the major
English Romantic Poets and two prominent American
Transcendentalists ndash RW Emerson and HD Thoreau
and co-relating them with our own philosophical
thought and rich religio-spiritual heritage
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 11
Since these articles represent my stray and occasional
thoughts they have no claim to a thorough or
comparative study or a comprehensive coverage of all
aspects of the poets The perspective chosen is confined
to some of the distinct echoes of the Vedantic thought in
the poems of selected poets but their publication in the
journals of international repute is indicative of their
acceptance and appeal and their role in blazing the
trails for a further study of their subject for research
scholars and others
The poets in this selection have taken life in its fullness
encompassing both matter and spirit ndash the visible world
and the invisible universe beyond it They have
conceived of the shadow (world) not without substance
and movement not without a moving spirit behind it
Like our own Vedic poetry the poetry of these poets is
intensely religious in the sense of their having felt the
living presence of the Divine in the beauty and glory of
the universe Again like our ancient Vedic poets their
poetry was born out of a joyous and radiant spirit
overflowing with love of life energy for action and a
vision of divinity which needed serene faith for
inspiration They were all transported into another
world by a rare spiritual exaltation for they aspired for
revelation of the inner truth of Reality in their souls
Moreover like our Vedic hymns their poems flowed like
fresh and clear streams gushing out of rocky mountains
as our ancient sages had described long ago lsquoLike joyous streams bursting from the mountain our songs have sounded to Brihaspati (preceptor of Gods)rsquo
What Emerson said of Thoreaursquos greatness could also be
applied to a great extent to most of the poets selected
here Emerson remarked ldquoHis soul was made for the
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 12
noblest society he had in short life exhausted the capabilities of this world Wherever there is knowledge wherever there is virtue wherever there is beauty he will find a homerdquo
These articles amply prove the fundamental fallacy of
Rudyard Kiplingrsquos assertion that ldquothe East is east and the West is west and the twain shall never meetrdquo but
contrary to his view the East and the West represent
complementary views of the world While the West
gives us the perfection and joy of eternal beauty in the
outer world as expressed by Keats the East gives us lsquothe
splendor and joy of the Infinite in the inner world of
Soulrsquos visionrsquo
That the physicist and the mystic reach the truth of
essential unity of all things and events by following
different paths has been beautifully described by
modern scientist Dr Frijof Capra ldquoThus the mystic and the physicist arrive at the same conclusion one starting from the inner realm the other from the outer world The harmony between their views confirms the ancient Indian wisdom that Brahman the ultimate reality without is identical to Atman the reality withinrdquo
Clear and identical traces of our Vedic thought and
scriptural ideas are found scattered all over the corpus
of their poetic works If we take up the outstanding
ideas of each poet for our consideration we find their
striking resemblance with what abounds in our spiritual
heritage Let us consider their predominant thoughts
which find a distinct echo in our Vedic and holy texts
William Blake who was the most prophetic of all
major English poets seems to have attained the rare
super-sensory or transcendental state of consciousness
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 13
which enabled him to perceive reflective communion
with God Such a transcendental perception of Divinity
in all creation and all creation in Divinity gave him a
subtle insight into the lsquovisions of eternityrsquo In other
words this contemplative vision of Infinity in the Finite
and the Finite in Infinity has been regarded as the
distinguishing mark of pure wisdom by Lord Krishna in
the Gita ndash ldquoWhen one sees Eternity in things that pass away and Infinity in finite things then one has pure (सािवक) wisdomrdquo [XVIII20] It was this intimation of
eternity that made Blake declare
ldquoTo see the world in a grain of sand
And a Heaven in a wild flower
Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand
And Eternity in an hourrdquo
Auguries of Innocence
Moreover he strongly condemned man-made divisions
of humanity into numerous castes and creeds and
preached universal brotherhood based on love
understanding and sacrifice
ldquofor man is love
And God is love Every kindness to another is a little death
In the divine image nor can man exist but by brotherhoodrdquo
Jerusalem
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 14
And again he says
ldquoWhere mercy love and pity dwell
There God is dwelling toordquo
The Divine Image
William Wordsworth was essentially a seer-poet He
was perhaps the first English poet to appreciate the
innate kinship of man with Nature and find in her a
calm and invisible spiritual presence in perfect
communion with the Cosmic Soul He recognized the
essential spiritual unity of all things and the
interpenetration of human life with that of the universe
His poetic faith was based on an indwelling spirit in
nature which interpenetrated all life and transformed
and transfigured with its radiance rocks fields trees
and the people who lived close to them He found
something that permeates and transfigures everything
He perceived this indwelling spirit and the vision of the
Infinite (God) in his poetry He concluded that Nature
being the manifestation of God is our best moral guide
and teacher
ldquoOne impulse from a vernal wood
May teach you more of man
Of moral evil and of good
Than all the sages canrdquo
In his Ode to the Intimations of Immortality which is
his spiritual autobiography he expresses his belief in
pre-existence which is also an article of faith in our
scriptural texts
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 15
ldquoOur birth is but a sleep and a forgetting
The soul that rises with us our lifersquos star
Hath had elsewhere its setting
And cometh from afarrdquo
His mystical experience of lsquothat serene and blessed moodrsquo in which we lsquoare laid asleep in body and become a living soulrsquo and his perception of lsquoa sense sublime of something more deeply interfuseda motion and a spirit that impels all thinking things all objects of all thought and rolls through all thingsrsquo reflect not only
his profound pantheism but also find close parallels in
our own religio-spiritual literature
Samuel Taylor Coleridge who was one of the seminal
minds of his generation possessed the most fertile
imagination According to William Hazlitt he lsquohad angelic wings and fed on mannarsquo for his writings are
ethereal mystical and magical Endowed with a rare
lsquomystic idealismrsquo he was besides being a great poet a
speculative philosopher also who considered life as lsquoa vision shadowy of Truthrsquo He justified the phrase ndash
lsquoRenaissance of wonderrsquo for he revived the supernatural
and invested it with indefiniteness and suggestion
which characterize his imagination He drew his
conceptions from lsquomythrsquo and embodied them with
symbols His images express his emotion spiritual state
and metaphysical experience Unlike other poets his
poetry grew from his inner organic law and made
supernatural and romantic subjects credible to human
nature by creating lsquothat willing suspension of disbeliefrsquo that constitutes his poetic faith He was the first great
British idealist of his age who preferred the intellectual
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 16
intuition to the conceptual dialectic The image and
vision of God lsquoimago deirsquo as an intellectual
contemplation (speculari) of the transcendent Absolute
(the prius) of all beings is an aspect of his speculative
mysticism
Byron however stands apart from all other poets
included herein for although his philosophy of life was
altogether different from that of his contemporaries he
was a force a portent and historical phenomenon in his
age He was endowed with a rare fire for liberty
indomitable courage sacrificing spirit and prophetic
zeal which are undoubtedly great human values His
inevitable attitude was revolt both social and personal
As an influence and portent he was the most powerful
poet in his age for he created that Byronic legend which
became a historic phenomenon of lasting fascination of
his personality Endowed with fiery energy his self-
portrait of careless arrogance or even daemonic figure
was a persona of romantic panache He was a portrait
and a symbol whom it was possible to worship or
condemn but never to neglect
PB Shelley who was lsquoone frail form ndash a phantom among men companionlessrsquo (Adonais) occupies a
unique position among Romantic poets Essentially he
was a visionary whose philosophy of enlightenment
made his poetry fanciful and ethereal He was a born
revolutionary who launched a crusade against the
organized religion and society Disgusted by the gloomy
state of the world he dreamed a world of beauty
freedom and virtue and made his poetry a trumpet of
narcissistic fantasy A solitary intellectual lsquowandering companionlessrsquo (Alastor) his poetry is the projection of
his sense of isolation He was fired by rationalist
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 17
revolutionary thought which reflects his visions of the
future Endowed with rationalist speculative intuition
his poetry symbolizes the spirit of human welfare
ldquoI wish no living thing to suffer painrdquo
Prometheus I303
The desire of Shelley reminds us of our scriptural
prayer ndash ldquoसव भवत स13खनः सव सत नरामयाःrdquo His
imagination is idealistic and vision synoptic He deals
with the heavens and light and aspired for the
regeneration of the world through love To him there is
no dualism between the material and spiritual life for
they are the aspects of same reality To him only
Eternity is real while the phenomenal world is but an
illusion or माया ndash a veil that hides true light He echoes a
Vedic truth when he says
ldquoThe One remains the many change and pass
Heavenrsquos light forever shines Earthrsquos shadows fly
Life like a dome of many-coloured glass
Stains the white radiance of Eternityrdquo
Adonais L11
He treats natural objects and forces as symbols for his
own emotional patterns In his lsquoOde to the West Windrsquo
he uses the West Wind as a spirit of destruction and
regeneration or death and rebirth He considers death
as only a prelude to renewed life and this shows his
faith in the transmigration of human soul or the cycle of
death and rebirth He declares
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 18
ldquoIf winter comes can spring be far behindrdquo
Ode to the West Wind
His entire poetry is a vivid and symbolic expression of
the wretched actuality and the radiant idea He wants to
herald a perfect world order based on love and
freedom He treats poetry as a potent instrument of
redemption and it was his deep romantic sensibility and
fanciful ecstatic Platonic love that earned him this
description of lsquopinnacled dim in the intense inanersquo He
was one of the greatest lyricists and an
lsquounacknowledged legislator of the worldrsquo of thought and
imagination
John Keats who in his own words was lsquoa fair creature of an hourrsquo was perhaps the first conscious artist whose
artistic intuition was far ahead of his time By declaring
that ldquoan artist must serve Mammonrdquo he wished to confer
on arts a special status and thus laid the foundation of
the doctrine of lsquoArt for Artrsquos sakersquo His minute delicate
and sensuous observation of the visible world of Nature
inspired his poetry which he wanted to lsquoloadrsquo with a
special excellence His delightful communion with
Nature and the sensuous ecstasies of its sight sound
smell touch and taste formed some of his best poetry
His delicacy and keenness of perception and love for
passive contemplation made him exclaim ndash ldquoO for a life of sensations rather than thoughtrdquo But in fact most of
his sensations were his thoughts for they were
embodied in sensuous pictorial form and rich symbolic
imagery
As a liberal enthusiast he felt that sharing the distress of
humanity or participation in ldquothe agony and strife of human heartsrdquo was essential not only for human growth
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 19
but also for poetic maturity This philanthropic attitude
of Keats brings him very close to our ardent Indian
prayer - ldquoसव भवत स13खनः सव सत नरामयाःrdquo ndash May all be happy may none struck with disease To find an
escape from the fret and fever of life he sought refuge in
an infinite yearning for beauty and turned to the realm
lsquoof Flora and old Panrsquo but soon realized the transience of
the world and started exploring permanence He could
find it in the spirit of beauty which is but a reflection of
eternal truth His passionate pursuit of ideal beauty
which he identified with truth has been beautifully
expressed in the following oft-quoted lines
ldquoBeauty is truth truth beauty that is all
Ye know on earth and all ye need to knowrdquo
Ode on a Grecian Urn
This fundamental unity or oneness of beauty and truth
and their interplay in the visible world are the
mainsprings of his poetic creed
The conflict between transience and permanence forms
the theme of his famous Odes and he longs for a
solution and lasting happiness in the form of Art or lsquoon the viewless wings of Poesyrsquo At the height of his
impassioned contemplation when the life of the spirit is
fused with the objects of immediate sensuous
experience he has glimpses of the permanence of
beauty which reflects Eternal Truth In one of his letters
(281) he declares ldquoI can never feel certain of any truth but from a clean perception of its beautyrdquo And at another
place when he finds mortality and immortality poles
apart he asserts the everlasting value of truth ldquoTruthrdquo
he says ldquomeans that which has lasting valuerdquo This firm
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 20
conviction of Keats seems to be a distinct echo of our
Vedantic dictum
सयमव जयत नानतम सयन पथा वततो दवयानः
यनामतय तत सयय परम नधान ldquoTruth alone triumphs not untruth By truth is laid out the Path Divine along which the seers who are free from desires and cravings ascend the supreme abode of Truthrdquo
Mundak Upanishad III16
Again the Vedic seer says that the Atman (self) is to be
realized only through truth
सयन लampसतपसा यष आमा
मडकोपनषद III15
Thus truth is the foundation of Dharma (righteousness)
for it is an essential and abiding value of human life The
eternal oneness of beauty and truth and vice versa and
their transcendental reality was Keatsrsquo poetic creed and
the realization of this basic spiritual truth raised him to
a level of sublime consciousness which is the mark of a
true seeker of truth or seer
In sum we may say that though lsquoa lily of a dayrsquo Keats
proved that a crowded hour of glory is far better than
an age without a name as has been stressed in our epic
Mahabharat where Queen Vidula exhorts her son
Sanjaya ldquoमहतम 0व1लत 2यो न त धमतम 4चरrdquo ndash ldquoIt is better to flame forth for an instant than to smoke away for agesrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 21
Though Keats died at the young age of 26 years he left
an indelible imprint on the history of English poetry for
his deep and pervasive influence could be easily seen on
Tennysonrsquos early work Moreover he was indisputably
the precursor of the Pre-Raphaelite movement In fact
he had reached near perfection in poetic craftsmanship
which will ever remain worthy of emulation for the
succeeding generations of poets
Ralph Waldo Emerson known as the lsquoSage of Concordrsquo
acted as a bridge between the East and the West His
abiding interest in the Indian scriptures and
particularly the Gita was a source of the Concord
Movement in America According to Swami
Vivekananda all the broad movements in America are
indebted to the Concord Party Mahatma Gandhi
remarked after reading Emersonrsquos Essays ldquoThe Essays to my mind contain the teaching of Indian wisdom in a Western lsquoGurursquo it is interesting to see our own sometimes differently fashionedrdquo Emerson drew freely on the
Upanishads Manusmriti Vishnu Puran and above all
the Gita and his writings reflect his indebtedness to our
holy texts
Pt Jawaharlal Nehru admired Emersonrsquos gospel of self-
reliance and righteousness in particular and regarded
him as one of the builders of America A
transcendentalist and thinker par excellence Emersonrsquos
ideas shaped not only his countrymenrsquos thinking but
had a deep and pervasive influence over many other
nations His main thoughts coloured as they are by our
own Indian religio-philosophical strands are universal
in appeal and are as relevant today as they were in his
own lifetime
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 22
In formulating his concept of Over-Soul Emerson
stressed the fundamental identity of Individual Soul
with Over-Soul He asserted ldquoWithin man is the soul of the whole ndash the wise silence the universal beauty to which every part and particle is equally related the Eternal Oneonly by the vision of that wisdom can the horoscope of ages be readrdquo He firmly believed in the
immortality of soul and the ephemerality of the world
and strongly condemned the futility of manrsquos vanity and
ego-centric attachment to the perishable objects of the
world His writings leave us lsquocalm of mind all passions spentrsquo In fact lsquohe gives men to mankind and mankind to the laws of Godrsquo
Henry David Thoreau was a great empirical
transcendentalist about whom Emerson once remarked
ldquowherever there is knowledge wherever there is virtue wherever there is beauty he will find a homerdquo His essay
on lsquoCivil Disobediencersquo which Gandhiji read twice in a
South African jail impressed him so much so that he
regarded him as his political lsquoGurursquo and his concept of
Satyagraha owes its origin to Thoreaursquos writings
Endowed with a rare meditative mind he loved lsquosweet solitudersquo and retired to the woods for discovering the
lsquohigher lawrsquo and realize his oneness with the Cosmic
Spirit He believed in the supremacy of moral laws and
his doctrine of Civil Disobedience is based on his dictate
of conscience for he considered individual conscience
more important than arbitrary state laws
Thoroughly immersed in the Indian scriptures his
thought-process and philosophy of life was
considerably moulded by our ancient religio-spiritual
heritage His deep love for our scriptural texts is evident
from his declaration of the Gita as lsquoUniversal Gospelrsquo He
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 23
wrote ldquoIn the morning I bathe my intellect in the stupendous cosmogonal philosophy of the Bhagvad GitaIt is unquestionably one of the noblest and most sacred scriptures which have come down to usthe oriental philosophy assigns their due rank respectively to action and contemplationrdquo
About the Vedas he remarked ldquoExtracts from the Vedas fall on me like the light of a higher and purer luminaryrdquo
According to him Over-Soul could be brought down to
earth not by words but by ldquoan inquisitive and contemplative accessrdquo He further states ldquoIn us are the elements of Divinity We see God around us because He dwells within usrdquo
He was a true ascetic (सयासी) for he preached and
practiced non-attachment (अनासि8त) in his life He was
an explorer of the inner world of Spirit In the seclusion
of woods he lsquocultivated the garden of his soul as a true Yogirsquo and he wanted to lsquoshoot his selfrsquo as our Mundaka Upanishad says
ldquoThe Pranava is the bow Atma the arrow the Brahman its mark It should be hit by a self-collected onerdquo
Much of what is stated in this compact volume may be
found scattered over various other critical works but
my earnest endeavour has been to bring together such
material as is of sufficient spiritual value which belongs
to all times This small comparative survey of the realm
of main ideas of some great poets confirms the splendor
of their rich romantic imagination and the unity of all
spiritual vision that makes them not only the creators of
beauty love and light but also brothers in spirit
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 24
I would feel amply rewarded if through this modest
attempt I am able to arouse keen interest in my readers
for further critical study of the subject Any suggestions
for amplification or improvement on the text are most
welcome
RP DWIVEDI
LUCKNOW
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 25
WILLIAM BLAKE
(28 November 1757 ndash 12 August 1827)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 26
WILLIAM BLAKE
English Poet Painter Engraver and Visionary
He was trained as an engraver by James Basire and
afterward attended classes at the Royal Academy Blake
married in 1782 and in 1784 he opened a print shop in
London He developed an innovative technique for
producing coloured engravings and began producing
his own illustrated books of poetrymdashincluding Songs of Innocence (1789) The Marriage of Heaven and Hell (1790) and Songs of Experience (1794)mdashwith his new
method of ldquoIlluminated Printingrdquo Jerusalem (1804[ndash
20]) an epic treating the fall and redemption of
humanity is his most richly decorated book His other
major works include Vala or The Four Zoas
(manuscript 1796ndash1807) and Milton (1804[ndash11]) A
late series of 22 watercolours inspired by the Book of
Job includes some of his best-known pictures He was
called mad because he was single-minded and
unworldly he lived on the edge of poverty and died in
neglect His books form one of the most strikingly
original and independent bodies of work in the Western
cultural tradition Ignored by the public of his day he is
now regarded as one of the earliest and greatest figures
of Romanticism
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 27
CHAPTER ONE
INDIAN SPIRITUALISM IN BLAKErsquoS VISIONS OF ETERNITY
INTRODUCTION
William Blake was by far the most prophetic of all major
English poets In a preface to his famous poem on
Milton he exclaimed lsquoWould to God that all the Lordrsquos people were Prophetsrsquo Elsewhere Blake declared lsquoA Prophet is a seer not an arbitrary dictatorrsquo According to
PH Butter an acclaimed authority on Blake ldquoa prophet sees behind the marks of woe behind the wars and other evils of his time and the attitudes that cause such things But Blake was not the kind of prophet who just present evils but one who saw the Visions of Eternity one whose senses discovered the infinite in everythingrdquo The prophet
is also a spokesman one who speaks or believes he
speaks for God or some other higher power Blake
himself claimed in one of his letters in 1803 ldquoI dare not pretend to be any other than the Secretary the Authors are in Eternityrdquo
His belief in lsquoinspirationrsquo contributed to that lsquoterrifying honestyrsquo which TS Eliot saw in him to keep him
uncompromisingly true to his vision He perceived a
close relationship of the conscious ndash lsquoIrsquo with the deeper
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 28
self through which all inspiration flows He knew that
the prophet must also be a lsquomakerrsquo lsquoa blacksmith laboring at his furnaces to shape the stubborn structure of the languagersquo He further realized that a prophet
should also be a teacher a preacher and a beacon light
to humanity
Explaining the function of the bard or poet (and his own
mission) Blake in his introduction to Songs of Experience declares
ldquoHear the voice of the bard
Who present past and future sees
Whose ears have heard
The Holy word
That walked among the ancient trees
Calling the lapsed soul
And weeping in the evening dew
That might control
The starry pole
And fallen fallen light renewrsquo
Or again elucidating the aim of writing poetry or his
lsquogreat taskrsquo Blake declares
ldquo I rest not from my great task
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 29
To open the Eternal worlds to open the immortal eyes
Of man inwards into the worlds of Thought into Eternity
Ever expanding in the bosom of God the human imaginationrsquo
Like Milton who wanted lsquoto justify the ways of God to Manrsquo or Shelley who held that lsquopoetry is the revelation of the eternal ideas which lie behind the many-coloured ever-shifting veil that we call reality in lifersquo Blake in his
exceptional prophetic zeal set out to open the Eternal
worlds to open the immortal eyes of man inwards into
the worlds of thought into Eternity He was always at
pains to renew the fallen fallen light The poetrsquos divine
task of lsquoever expanding in the bosom of Godrsquo reminds us
of the moving verse of our Rig Veda in which God as
creator of beautiful forms has been conceived of as the
greatest poet whose divine creative energy s his poetic
power which manifests itself in the manifold forms of
beauty and splendor like the Heaven the Sun the Moon
the Sky etc
यो धता भवानानामगया स कवः काया प पपltयत
ऋवद VIII415
lsquoHe who is the supporter of the world of life
Who knows the secret mysterious names of the morning beams
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 30
He poet cherishes manifold forms by His poetic power even as heavenrsquo
Rig Veda VIII415
As a divinely inspired poet Blake seems to have had
experiences of various psychic and even mystic visions
which awakened him to subtle spiritual life It seems
that he must have transcended normal sensory
perceptions and would have attained to super-sensory
status of consciousness when he declares
lsquoI see the savior over me
Spreading his beams of love and dictating the words of mild song
Awake O sleeper of the land of shadows wake
I am in you and you in me mutual in love divinersquo
Jerusalem L4-7
He seems to have attained to that rare transcendental
consciousness when he perceived perfect communion
with God who assured him
lsquoI am not a God afar off I am a brother and friend
Within your bosoms I reside and you reside in me
We are one forgiving all evil not seeking recompensersquo
Jerusalem L18-20
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 31
Here Blake on perceiving a synoptic vision of complete
identity or oneness of God with individual self seems to
have echoed the eternal ancient Holy Scriptures Here
are a few striking parallels
In our Vedas also Go is regarded and adored as our
most-trusted friend Says the Rig Veda
lsquoमा=कर न ऐना सयाच ऋषः
वBमा Cह Dमतमसया 1शवानrsquo
ऋवद X237
lsquoNever may this friendship be severed
Of thee O Deity and the sage Vimada
We know O God Thy brother-like love
With us be Thy auspicious friendshiprsquo
Rig Veda X237
The key-note of this type of worship is the
contemplation of friendly love (described in later
religious literature as - सय ndash friendliness between the
Deity and the worshipper) The following prayer is in
the same spirit
lsquoभवा नः सFन अतमः सखा वधrsquo
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ऋवद X133
lsquoBe Thou most dear to us for bliss O friend to aidrsquo
Rig Veda X133
Similarly assuring Arjuna of His perennial benediction
Lord Krishna declares in the Gita
ईHवरः सवभतानामतltठत
Kामयसवभतानमायया
ldquoArjuna God abides in the heart of all creatures
Causing them to revolve according to their Karma
By His illusive power seated as those beings are
In the vehicle of the bodyrdquo
Bhagvad Gita XVIII61
And again describing Himself as the truest friend of all
living beings Lord Krishna pronounces
ldquoI am the (disinterested) friend of all living beings and my devotee attains supreme peacerdquo
Bhagvad Gita V29
To turn to William Blake again he has an essential
belief in the closest intimacy of all living beings with
God who is the fountain-head of all life love and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 33
friendship This belief makes him affirm his faith in the
holiness of all life on earth Says he in his Annotations to Lavater
lsquoAll Life is Holyrsquo
Again he says ldquoIt is God in all that is our companion and friend for our God himself says lsquoyou are my brother my sister and my motherrsquo and Saint John said lsquowho so dwelleth in love dwelleth in God and God in himrsquo and such a one cannot judge of any but in loveGod is in lowest effects as well as in the highest causes for he is become a worm that he may nourish the weak For let it be remembered that creation is God descending according to the weakness of man for our Lord is the word of God and everything on earth is the word of God and in its essence is Godrdquo
In our own scriptures the all-pervasiveness of God (the
One) has been conceived not only in the cosmic world
but also in the world of men The very opening verse of
the Ishopanishad stresses the immanence of God in the
universe
ईशावाय इद सवM यािकNय जगया जगत
ईशोपनष I
lsquoUnderstand all this (universe) as inhabited by the Lord
Each moving thing in this moving worldrsquo
Or again says the Atharva Veda
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य समायोऽवPणोयो वदHयः
यो दवोऽवPणोमानषः
lsquoGod is that in which things converge
He is that from which things diverge
He is our own land he is of foreign land
He is divine he is humanrsquo
Atharva Veda IV168
The immanence of God is the entire universe is also
underscored by Lord Krishna when he tells Arjuna
ldquoThere is nothing besides me Arjuna Like clusters of yarn-beads formed by knots all this (universe) is threaded on merdquo
Bhagvad Gita VII7
SYNOPTIC VISION
A firm belief in the all-pervasiveness of God in the
whole universe led him to perceive every object of
Nature as a window through which we may look with a
sense of awe and wonder into the beauty truth and all-
enveloping eternity which is but a reflection of God
Blake must have had palpable intimations of Eternity
when he wrote
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 35
lsquoTo see a world in a grain of sand
And a Heaven in a wild flower
Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand
And Eternity in an hourrsquo
Auguries of Innocence
Such a super-sensuous or transcendental perception of
Divinity in all creation and all creation in Divinity gave
Blake a subtle insight into the lsquoVisions of Eternityrsquo and
made him not only a seer but also lsquoan inhabitant of
other planes another domain of beingrsquo Commenting on
Blakersquos singular other-worldliness our own seer and
prophet Sri Aurobindo says ldquoThere is no other singer of the beyond who is like him or equal him in the strangeness supernatural lucidity power and directness of vision of the beyond and the rhythmic clarity and beauty of his singingrdquo
It is this contemplative knowledge of infinity in finite
and finite in infinity that has been regarded as the
distinguishing mark of the pure wisdom which finally
leads one to transcendental revelation which has been
so beautifully expressed in our own scriptures
सवभतषभावमययमीRत
अवभ8तसािवक
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lsquoWhen one sees Eternity in things that pass away and Infinity in finite things then one has pure knowledgersquo
Bhagvad Gita XVIII20
The same truth has been emphasized again and again in
the Upanishads When man comes to know the real
truth about God nay when he succeeds in realizing the
truth about God how can he ever revile or adversely
criticize any form or aspect of God The Isha Upanishad
says
यत सवा13ण भतान आमयवानपHयत
सवभतष चामना ततो न वजगSसत
ईशोपनष VI
ldquoWhoever beholds all beings in God alone and God in all beings ie who regards all beings as his own self he no more looks down upon any creature for regarding all as his self whom will he hate and howrdquo
Lord Krishna stresses the same equanimity of vision
when he declares
ldquoThe Yogi who is united in identity with the all-pervading infinite consciousness and sees unity everywhere beholds the self present in all beings and all beings as assumed in the selfrdquo
Bhagvad Gita VI29
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Again Lord Krishna declares
यो मा पHयत सव सवM च मय पHयत
तयाह न DणHया1म स च म न DणHयत
भगवगीता VI30
ldquoHe who sees me (the universal self) present in all beings and all beings existing within me never loses sight of me and I never lose sight of himrdquo
Bhagvad Gita VI30
FAITH IN THE LAW OF ETERNITY
Since God is infinite immanent and omnipresent soul
which is an integral and inalienable part of God is also
immortal The forms or objects of the world may change
but in reality they exist forever and are eternal Like
God soul is everlasting unborn undecaying and
undying Blake says
ldquoWhatever can be created can be annihilated
Forms can not
The oak is cut down by the axe the lamb falls by the knife
But their Form Eternal exists for everrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 38
The poet also believes that all sufferings of man if borne
meekly for a noble cause have their rich recompense
sooner or later for God being all-merciful would
certainly reward his suffering children He believes that
lsquoFor a tear is an intellectual thing
And a sigh is a sword of an angel king
And the bitter groan of a martyrrsquos woe
Is an arrow from the Almightyrsquos bowrsquo
Jerusalem
He believes that God Almighty holds out a solemn
promise of reward to sufferers for a lofty cause God
declares
lsquofear not Lo I am with thee always
Only believe in me that I have power to raise from deathrsquo
Jerusalem
MEANS OF LIBERATION
As the greatest and most inventive of Romantic
mythmakers Blake at first explores the contrary states
of human innocence and experience and then speaks of
lsquothe five gatesrsquo our mortal senses which bind us down to
the earth Not so much interested in the art of the
possible as in the visions of the beyond Blake
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 39
constructed a cosmic myth to show manrsquos infinite
potential and how he might attain to final liberation
from this sinful ephemeral world characterized by a
wheel of births and deaths He weaves his myths round
the fall and salvation of man the universal man and his
ultimate waking to eternal life In his poems lsquoMiltonrsquo and
lsquoJerusalemrsquo he regards Satan as the embodiment of
error selfhood and boundless pride and points out that
the means of liberation or freedom from the worldly
bondages lie in the annihilation of selfhood or ego and
the forgiveness of sins He exclaims lsquoI in my selfhood am that Satan I am that evil onersquo and resolves that he would
go down to self-annihilation In lsquoMiltonrsquo he puts the
following words into the mouth of Milton
lsquobut laws of Eternity
Are not such Know thou I come to self-annihilation
Such are the laws of Eternity that each shall mutually
Annihilate himself for others goodrsquo
Reiterating and stressing his poetic purpose or mission
of life Blake resolves
lsquoMine is to teach men to despise death and to go on
In fearless majesty of annihilating self
I come to discover before Heaven and Hell
the self righteousness in all its hypocritical turpitude
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 40
put off
In self-annihilation all that is not God alone
To put off self and all I have ever and everrsquo
Again in a sincere invocation to God Blake prays
lsquoO saviour pour upon me thy spirit of meekness and love
Annihilate the selfhood in me be thou all my life
Guide thou my hand which trembles exceedingly
Upon the rocks of agesrsquo
SPIRITUAL HUMANISM
Inspired by his implicit faith in Godrsquos fatherhood and
menrsquos brotherhood Blake preached the concept of
universal fraternity Considering the whole world as
one large family he maintained that all divisions and
fragmentations of humanity stemmed from manrsquos
ignorance of the eternal truth of one and only one
universal family The world being the home of mankind
all human beings are inextricably interwoven together
in the same warp and woof of life How beautifully has
this cosmopolitan philosophy of manrsquos eternal identity
with his fellow beings been enunciated in the following
memorable words
lsquoWe live as one man for contracting our infinite senses
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 41
We behold multitude or expanding
We behold as one Man all the universal family
and he is in us and we in him
Live in perfect harmony in Eden the land of life
Giving receiving and forgiving each otherrsquos trespassesrsquo
Elsewhere the poet says
lsquoThere is no other God than God
Who is the intellectual fountain of Humanity
I never made friends but by spiritual gifts
By severe contentions of friendship and the burning fire of thought
He who would see the divinity must see him in his children
So he who wishes to see a vision perfect whole
Must see it in its minute particulars organizedrsquo
Preaching universal brotherhood based on love
understanding and sacrifice he again exclaims (in the
words of Jesus)
lsquoWouldst thou live one who never died
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 42
For thee or ever die for one
Who had not died for thee
And if God died not for man and giveth not himself
Eternally for man
Man could not exist for man is love and God is love
Every kindness to another is a little death in the divine image
Nor can man exist but by brotherhoodrsquo
Jerusalem
Condemning man-made divisions of mankind into
various castes and creeds he says
lsquoAnd all must love the human form
In heathen Turk or Jew
Where mercy love and pity dwell
There God is dwelling toorsquo
The Divine Image
How truly are the poetrsquos ideas relevant even today when
the hot wind of doubt and distrust is blowing all over
the world (which has been broken up into fragments by
caste and creed clime and country) can be viewed in
the context of our age-old belief in the worship of God in
the universal form (Vishwaroop) and our religious and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 43
spiritual aspirations for ensuring the maximum good of
the world To serve humanity in a spirit of humility
impelled our people to look upon the world as one
great undivided family or nest (वHवनीड़म) and all men
as our brethren ndash (वसधव कटFबकम)
The ideal of universal brotherhood and selfless service
to humanity found spontaneous utterance in the
following moving words which embody the sublime
aim of a devout manrsquos life
न वह कामय रा0य न वगम ना पनभव
कामय दःख तSतानाम Dा13ण नामातनाशन
lsquoI do not desire earthly kingdom nor heaven nor do I want rebirth I want to reduce the sorrow of people who are sunk in sufferingrsquo
Today when the horizon of humanity is darkened by
national prejudices the need for spiritual humanism
synoptic vision and universal brotherhood is being
increasingly felt by one and all Here it is worthwhile to
turn our attention to great men whose thoughts
transcend myriad artificial barriers and teach us the
ideal of dedication to the common weal
Since truth transcends all religious dogmas and
disinterested service to mankind is a form of true
worship to God our great men have always prayed
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 44
सव भवत स13खनः सव सत नरामयाः
सव भWा13ण पHयत मा किHचX दःख भाYभवत
lsquoMay all be happy may all living beings be free from diseases may we perceive goodness in all and may none be struck with misfortunersquo
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RP DWIVEDI Page 45
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
(7 April 1770 ndash 23 April 1850)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 46
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
English Poet
Orphaned at age 13 Wordsworth attended Cambridge
University but he remained rootless and virtually
penniless until 1795 when a legacy made possible a
reunion with his sister Dorothy Wordsworth He
became friends with Samuel Taylor Coleridge with
whom he wrote Lyrical Ballads (1798) the collection
often considered to have launched the English Romantic
movement Wordsworths contributions include
Tintern Abbey and many lyrics controversial for their
common everyday language About 1798 he began
writing The Prelude (1850) the epic autobiographical
poem that would absorb him intermittently for the next
40 years His second verse collection Poems in Two Volumes (1807) includes many of the rest of his finest
works including Ode Intimations of Immortality His
poetry is perhaps most original in its vision of the
organic relation between man and the natural world a
vision that culminated in the sweeping metaphor of
nature as emblematic of the mind of God The most
memorable poems of his middle and late years were
often cast in elegaic mode few match the best of his
earlier works By the time he became widely
appreciated by the critics and the public his poetry had
lost much of its force and his radical politics had yielded
to conservatism In 1843 he became Englands poet
laureate He is regarded as the central figure in the
initiation of English Romanticism
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 47
CHAPTER TWO
VEDANTA IN WORDSWORTHrsquoS POETRY
In many of his famous poems among which Ode on Intimations of immortality and Lines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey occupy pride of place
William Wordsworth one of the greatest seer-poets of
English literature presents ideas which bear striking
similarity to the rich philosophical thought that found
unimpeded flow in our Vedantic literature
In fact there are so many echoes of Vedanta in the
poetry of Wordsworth that one is apt to conclude that
the poetrsquos lsquophilosophic mindrsquo must have led him to drink
deep at the unfailing springs of Upanishadic Helicon
A poet of nature Wordsworth was essentially lsquoa seer of spiritual realities a seer of the calm spirit in naturersquo and
his poetry at its best is a fine harmony of his spiritual
insight ethical sense and profundity of thought He is a
curious amalgam of the seer the poet and the reflective
moralist who dwells philosophically and even
prophetically on Nature Man and Cosmic Soul
The epithets lsquobest philosopherrsquo lsquomighty prophetrsquo and
lsquoseer blestrsquo which Wordsworth uses for the new-born
innocent child in his famous Ode may be well applied to
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 48
the poet himself for ldquovoyaging in strange seas of
thought alonerdquo Wordsworth had found lsquofull many a gem
of purest ray serenersquo which still shed undiminished
luster on the entire fabric of English poetry
A careful study of the Ode on Intimations of immortality Lines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey Ruth Laodamia To Cuckoo and other poems reveals that Wordsworthrsquos sustained
loftiness of thought had taken him to such heights that
on him (to quote his own words)
lsquo those truths do rest which we are toiling all our lives to findrsquo
What indeed are those truths Those are the elemental
truths of life which were keenly perceived realized and
expressed by the seers and savants of the East and
particularly of our Vedantic times A careful study of
Vedanta which is the aphoristic summary of the co-
ordinated Upanishads the Brahmasutras and the
Bhagvad Gita and is in fact the culmination of Indian
religion and Philosophical thought reveals that serious
scholars of the West drew freely upon it Wordsworthrsquos
poetry bears ample testimony to this fact because
numerous echoes of Vedanta can be easily heard in his
poetry
To cite a few comparative examples the Upanishads
assert in unambiguous terms that the whole universe of
names and forms the world of being and becoming
springs from Brahman (Supreme Godhead or Absolute
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 49
Cosmic Soul) ndash the eternal existence consciousness and
bliss Since the universe is the creation and
manifestation of Brahman it is also pervaded by Him
Naturally therefore only Brahman exists all else is non-
existent or illusory The Chhandogya Upanishad
declares lsquoBrahman is verily the Allrsquo God is the subtle
essence underlying phenomenal existence the whole
nature which is Godrsquos handiwork as well as Godrsquos
garment and is filled and inspired by God who is its
inner controller and soul
The immanence of God has been corroborated by
Brihadaranyak Upanishad in two passages the first
being in the form of an answer given by Yagnavalyak to
Uddalak Aruni
lsquoHe is immanent in fire in the intermundia in air in the heavens in the Sun in the quarters in the Moon in the stars in space in darkness in light in all beings in Prana in all things and within all things whom these things do not know whose body these things are who controls all these things from within He is thy soul the inner controller the immortal He is the unseen seer the unheard hearer the unthought thinker the ununderstood understander other than Him there is no seer other than Him there is no hearer other than Him there is no thinker other than Him there is no understander everything besides Him is naughtrsquo
Brihadaranyak Upanishad II7
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 50
In another passage Brihadaranyak Upanishad tells us
that God is the All ndash ldquoboth the formed and the formless the mortal and the immortal the stationary and the moving the this and thatHe is the verity of verities the soul of souls and He is the supreme verityrdquo
Brihadaranyak Upanishad IIV15
Wordsworth like these unique revelatory utterances of
the Upanishads codifies this truth in mystical manner in
Lines Composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey when he regards the Cosmic Soul as supreme power or
all-pervading presence
lsquoWhose dwelling is the light of setting Suns
And the round ocean and the living air
And the blue sky and in the mind of man
A motion and a spirit that impels
All thinking things all objects o all thought
And rolls through all thingsrsquo
Since God is All and everything else is Naught the world
is not real it is an appearance It is not the permanent
all-abiding Absolute Reality but a fleeting show and
ephemeral entity having seemingly phenomenal reality
In other words the world is lsquoshadow not substancersquo ndash it
is just a net-work of Maya
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 51
This Vedantic doctrine finds utterance not only in
Wordsworthrsquos poems like To the Cuckoo in which he
calls the earth ldquoan unsubstantial fairy placerdquo but he
seems to have actually experienced this illusory nature
of the world in states of mystic trance that often visited
him since his boyhood
In the introduction to his Ode on Intimations of Immortality he records such an experience in clear
terms
ldquoI was unable to think of external things as having external existence and I communed with all that I saw as something not apart from but inherent in my own immaterial nature Many a times while going to school have I grasped at a wall or tree to recall myself from the abyss of idealism to the realityrdquo
Such an ecstatic state of realizing eternal truths is
referred to in Lines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey as
lsquoThat blessed mod
In which the burden of the mystery
Of all this unintelligible world
Is lightenedrsquo
And finally to quote from the same poem
lsquoWe are laid asleep
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 52
In body and become a living soul
While with an eye made quiet by the power
Of harmony and the deep power of joy
We see into the life of thingsrsquo
One of the basic postulates of our Upanishadic
philosophy has been the idea of transmigration of soul
or faith in the cycle of births deaths and rebirths The
doctrine of transmigration has been explicitly advanced
in the Upanishads and particularly in the
Kathopanishad and Brihadaranyak Upanishad
In the Kathopanishad when the father of Nachiketas
told him that he had made him over to the god of Death
Nachiketas replied that it was no uncommon fate that
was befalling him
ldquoI indeed go at the head of many to the other world but I also go in the midst of many What is the god of Death going to do to me Look at our predecessors (who have already gone) look also at those who have succeeded them Man ripens like corn and like corn he is born againrdquo
Kathopanishad IV6
The Brihadaranyak Upanishad states the same truth
ldquoAnd as a caterpillar after reaching the end of a blade of grass finds another place of support and then draws itself towards it and as a goldsmith after taking a piece
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 53
of gold gives it another newer and more beautiful shape similarly does this Self after having thrown off this body and dispelled ignorance take on another newer and more beautiful form whether it be of one of the man or demi-god or god or of Prajapati or Brahman or of any other beingsrdquo
Brihadaranyak Upanishad IVIII5
The same truth appears in the Bhagvad Gita when Lord
Krishna says to the mentally agitated Arjuna
ldquoAs a man discarding worn-out clothes takes other new ones likewise the embodied soul casting off worn-out bodies enters into others which are newrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II22
And further Lord Krishna says to Arjuna
ldquoFor in that case the death of him who is born is certain and the rebirth of him who is dead is inevitablerdquo
Bhagvad Gita II27
Wordsworth in his famous Ode on Intimations of Immortality confirms his faith in the transmigration of
soul by saying in unmistakable terms
lsquoOur birth is but a sleep and a forgetting
The soul that rises with us our lifersquos star
Hath had elsewhere its setting
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 54
And cometh from afar
Not in entire forgetfulness
And not in utter nakedness
But trailing clouds of glory do we come
From God who is our homersquo
Again when Wordsworth laments the loss of pure
innocence immeasurable bliss and ecstatic vision of
early childhood in the great Ode and exclaims in
memorable words
lsquoWhither is fled the visionary gleam
Where is it now the glory and the dreamrsquo
He attributes the loss to the worldly intellectuality and
attachments as they grow upon man As childhood
grows into youth and youth into manhood the lsquovision splendidrsquo fades the first clear intimations of immortality
are dimmed leaving behind an unillumined waste of
mere thought and moralizing
lsquoAt length the Man perceives it die away
And fade into the light of common dayrsquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
The world of materialism or attachment tames him so
much so that man lsquothe little actorrsquo thinks
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 55
lsquoAs if his whole vocation
Were endless imitationrsquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
Whatever may be the crux of his philosophy of
childhood this belief of the poet can be safely traced
back to the comprehensive doctrine of the Maya in the
Upanishads and the Bhagvad Gita The Upanishads
tell us that the world is a delusion an appearance not
reality The Taittiriya Upanishad says ldquoAll beings spring from the Supreme Being are sustained by Him and return to the same Absolute at the time of dissolution Our life on earth is therefore a sojournrdquo The Isha Upanishad tells us that ldquothe truth is veiled in this universe by a vessel of gold and it invokes the grace of God to lift up the golden lid and allow the truth to be seenrdquo
It follows that our senses cloud our vision and lead us
farther and farther away from our spiritual moorings as
we come of age Senses dupe us and turn us into
worldlings Lord Krishna says to Arjuna in the Bhagvad Gita ldquoAs the wind carries away the barge upon the waters even so of the wandering senses the one to which the mind is joined takes away his discriminationrdquo
Thus the eternal and boundless Supreme Soul is as it
were limited by the sense organs and the body The
Universal Soul shackled by the body becomes the
individual soul (Paramatma becomes Jivatma) Because
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 56
of the presence of the Soul the spark of the Divine the
senses or sense-objects or worldly attractions fail to
dupe man fully from his divine mission This
metaphysical conviction finds expression in
Wordsworthrsquos Ode He says that though
lsquoShades of the prison-house begin to close
Upon the growing boy
But he beholds the light and whence it flows
He sees it in his joyrsquo
However farther man may go away from Nature ndash the manifestation of God and the indwelling Supreme Soul which resides in his own individual soul he can not
lsquoForget the glories he hath known
And that imperial palace whence he camersquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
Since bliss (Anand) is an inevitable attribute of God and
manrsquos soul being a fragment of Supreme Soul it
experiences the presence of God in moments of
Supreme Joy
Of the innumerable expressions in the Vedantic
literature of the joy of life of joy as the all entwining
principle of life and of creative principle of life and life
too the following passage from the Taittiriya Upanishad is very pertinent here
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 57
ldquoJoy is the Brahman from joy are born all living things by joy they are nourished towards joy they move and in joy they are absorbedrdquo Joy as the foundation of life
emanates from the Upanishad philosophy
Wordsworth seems to hold identical belief when he
craves for joy and laments its loss
lsquoO Joy that in our embers
Is something that doth live
That nature yet remembers
What was so fugitiversquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
The same idea finds expression in Lines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey where Wordsworth
declares it as Naturersquos privilege lsquoto lead (us) from joy to joyrsquo
And lastly the classicus locus of the Upanishadic
philosophy is to be found in the idea of immortality of
soul In the Chhandogya and Mundak Upanishads and
above all in the Kathopanishad we find numerous
references to the immortality of the soul We are told in
a passage of Kathopanishad lsquothat while we are dwelling in this body on earth we can visualize that Atman (Soul) as in a mirror that is contrariwise left being to the right and right being to the leftrsquo In the Bhagvad Gita also
Lord Krishna tells Arjuna about the immortality of Soul
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 58
ldquoThis soul is never born nor dies it exists on coming into being for it is unborn eternal everlasting and primeval even though the body is slain the soul is notrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II20
He further says
ldquoFor this soul is incapable of being cut it is proof against fire impervious to water and undriable as well This soul is eternal omnipresent immovable constant and everlastingrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II24
Wordsworth seems to have been fully convinced of this
philosophia perennis of the Vedanta when he eulogizes
immortality by addressing the child in his Ode in the
following words
lsquoThou over whom thy immortality
Broods like the day
A Master over a slave
A presence which is not to be put byrsquo
The poet in speaking of the lsquotruths that wake to perish neverrsquo seems to be reminiscent of the Upanishadic
concept that freed from the trammels of the body the
individual soul loses itself in the All-Soul when he
declares in the rapture
lsquoOur souls have sight of that immortal sea
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 59
Which brought us hither
Can in a moment travel thitherrsquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
Tracing the expression and confirmation of many other
tenets of Vedanta in the poetry of William Wordsworth
forms an interesting literary venture and instances of
close affinity between the Vedantic doctrines and
Wordsworthrsquos ideas may be multiplied Such a
comparative study proves that eternal truths transcend
the barriers of clime or country time or space and shine
through all ages and in all lands We should draw moral
sustenance from them and live a fuller freer life
Even today the wise all over the world maintain a
remarkable identity of views and their thoughts foster
international understanding
ldquoFrom hand to hand the greeting flows
From eye to eye the signals run
From heart to heart the bright hope glows
The seekers of light are onerdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 60
ST COLERIDGE
(21 October 1772 ndash 25 July 1834)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 61
ST COLERIDGE
English Poet Critic and Philosopher
Coleridge studied at the University of Cambridge where
he became closely associated with Robert Southey In
his poetry he perfected a sensuous lyricism that was
echoed by many later poets Lyrical Ballads (1798 with
William Wordsworth) containing the famous Rime of
the Ancient Mariner and Frost at Midnight heralded
the beginning of English Romanticism Other poems in
the ldquofantasticalrdquo style of the Mariner include the
unfinished Christabel and the celebrated Pleasure
Dome of Kubla Khan While in a bad marriage and
addicted to opium he produced Dejection An Ode
(1802) in which he laments the loss of his power to
produce poetry Later partly restored by his revived
Anglican faith he wrote Biographia Literaria 2 vol
(1817) the most significant work of general literary
criticism of the Romantic period Imaginative and
complex with a unique intellect Coleridge led a restless
life full of turmoil and unfulfilled possibilities
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 62
CHAPTER THREE
COLERIDGErsquoS SPIRITUAL QUEST AND INDIAN THOUGHT
INTRODUCTION
Coleridge was by all accounts a genius par excellence
whose versatility flowed albeit impeded in diverse
channels of creativity such as metaphysics poetry
theology and literary criticism Of all the Romantic poets
he possessed the most fertile and powerful imagination
which earned for him a special place in English poetry
and philosophical thought In the words of William
Hazlitt lsquohe had angelic wings and fed on mannarsquo He had
a lsquoseminal mindrsquo which said William Wordsworth
lsquothrew out a series of grand central truthsrsquo We find in
him the poet the philosopher and the theologian rolled
in one Charles Lamb called him lsquoLogician Metaphysician Bardrsquo whose poetry and writings are
tinged with a magical and ethereal quality His thought
made a permanent landmark on the succeeding
generations of English men of letters for he explored the
mysterious working of human mind
His life presents a saga of sharp contrast between
reality and dream blissful confidence and broken
hopes the warmth of human ties and the solitude of
haunted soul He probed human thought and dilemma
with a rare prophetic insight A prodigious thinker and
sincere seeker of truth he once remarked ldquoI would compare the Human Soul to a shiprsquos crew cast on an
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 63
Unknown Islandrdquo His particular fascination for the
unknown drew him instinctively to the German
transcendental or idealistic school of philosophy
represented by Berkeley Kant Schelling and Fichte
Fired by a peculiar mystic idealism he tried to interpret
the lsquoInterruptionrsquo of the spiritual world and beheld the
unseen with an uncommon eye which looked into the
void and found it peopled with lsquopresencesrsquo To him the
universe was lsquoebullient with creative deityrsquo and was
pervaded by lsquoan organizing surgersquo of vital energies
which emanate directly from God He was indeed an
inspired idealist who laid mystical insistence upon the
immanence and transcendence of God
Endowed with a rare penetrating mind Coleridge
ransacked works of comparative religions and
mythology and arrived at the conclusion that all
religious faiths and mythical traditions agree on the
unity of God and immortality of Soul His constant
intellectual search for truth led him to visionary
interests and universal life consciousness expressed
through the phenomena of human agencies Throughout
his intellectual career he remained a visionary and
philosophical mystic who valued a discreet and proper
exercise of the intellect Since his most serious concern
had been philosophy as a continuous trial for self-
education he wrote ldquodoubts rushed in broke upon me from the fountains of the great deep and fell from the windows of heavenrdquo For him lsquoreligionrsquo as both the
cornerstone and keystone of morality must have a
moral origin and a great poet should be lsquoa profound Metaphysician seeking for truth beauty and salvationrsquo In
one of those radiant moments when the poet the
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 64
metaphysician and the theologian of hope are one he
throws light on the process how truth works out in life
ldquoTruth considered in itself and in the effects natural to it may be conceived as a gentle spring or water source warm from the genial earth and breathing up into the snow drift that is piled over and around its outlet It turns the obstacle into its own form and character and as it makes its way increases its streamand arrested in its courseit suffers delay not loss and waits only to awaken and again roll onwardsrdquo
His description of a mystic as one who wanders into an
oasis or garden lsquoat leisure in its maze of Beauty and Sweetness and thirds (sic) his way through the odorous and flowering Thickets into open Spots of Greeneryrsquo (Aids to Reflection) is reminiscent of his own mysticism and
refers to the lsquoenfolding sunny spots of greeneryrsquo in his
famous poem Kubla Khan
Profoundly impressed by the German Idealist Schelling
whose idealistic school of thought dwelt on speculation
concerning the lsquoAbsolutersquo Coleridge viewed lsquomythrsquo as
primordial expression of elemental truths including the
Divine transcendence Inspired by his Biblical studies he
regarded self-consciousness as lying at the centre of his
philosophical and theological thought In Lay Sermons
he says ldquoSelf which then only is when for itself it hath ceased to be Even so doth Religion finitely expresses the unity of the Infinite Spirit by being a total act of the Soulrdquo
For him the lsquoinner lightrsquo is identical with the indwelling
glorious God and life is but lsquoa vision shadowy of Truthrsquo Attributing the pageant of life and the beauty and
splendor of the world to the immanence of Cosmic Soul
(God) he exclaims
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 65
ldquoAh From the soul itself must issue forth
A light a glory a fair luminous cloud
Enveloping the earthrdquo
Dejection An Ode
And again he says ldquoNature is the art of GodThe true system of natural philosophy places the sole reality of things in an Absolute which is at once causa sui effectus in the absolute identity of subject and object which it calls NatureIn this sense lsquowe see all things in Godrsquo is a strict philosophical truthrdquo
Coleridge firmly believed in the essential unity of God as
Absolute which is the creative foundation of the finite
universe and which distinguishes God from creation
He in the spirit of Vedanta stresses the immanence of
God in all and all in God in his famous poem Frost at Midnight Addressing his son he says
ldquoso shalt thou see and hear
The lovely shapes and sound intelligible
Of that eternal language which thy God
Utters who from eternity doth teach
Himself in all and all things in Himselfrdquo
In order to learn this lsquolanguagersquo Coleridge himself
became a lsquovisionaryrsquo lsquoprophetrsquo or lsquoseerrsquo The idea of
Himself (God) in all and all (creation) in Himself or the
concept that there is God in all things and all things are
things are closely interlinked with God bears a striking
resemblance to our age-old Vedic thought In
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 66
consonance with Indian thought Coleridge underscores
the identity of God (Brahman) with the individual soul
(Jivatma) and regards the universe as the reflection or
manifestation of God The seer he says is one who sees
God the creator in all creation and all creation as the
embodiment of God This according to him is the lesson
that God in His eternal language lsquouttersrsquo and doth teach
from eternity
The inherent oneness and sole identity of Brahman
(God) with the universe is a basic postulate of our
Vedanta and as such Coleridgersquos emphasis on the lsquoUnity of infinite Spiritrsquo bears a close identity with the Indian
philosophy The Oneness of God and the universe has
time and again been stressed in our Vedas and other
scriptures It would be pertinent to cite a few instances
here While the Chhandogya Upanishad describes
Brahman as lsquoOne only without a secondrsquo other
Upanishadic texts contain identical statements such as
lsquoHe is Onersquo and lsquoOne Lordrsquo The opening line of
Ishopanishad declares Godrsquos oneness and His universal
presence in unequivocal terms
ldquoUnderstand all this universe as inhabited by Lord
Each moving thing in this moving worldrdquo
Ishopanishad I
And again the same Upanishad says
ldquoThe wise man who perceives all beings as not distinct from his own self at all and his own Self as the self of every being ndash he does not by virtue of that perception hate any onerdquo
Ishopanishad VI
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 67
The same truth has been expressed in the Bhagvad Gita wherein Lord Krishna tells Arjuna
ldquoHe who sees Me (the Universal Self) present in all beings and all beings existing within Me never loses sight of Me and I never lose sight of himrdquo
Bhagvad Gita VI30
Or again
ldquoHe alone truly sees who sees the Supreme Lord as imperishable and abiding equally in all perishable beings both animate and inanimaterdquo
Bhagvad Gita XIII26
And Lord Krishna says again
ldquoThere is nothing else besides Me O Arjuna
Like clusters of yarn-beads formed by knots on a thread
All this (Universe) threaded on Me (God)
As are pearls on stringsrdquo
Bhagvad Gita VII7
THE DOCTRINE OF KARMA (CAUSE amp EFFECT)
Coleridge seems to subscribe sincerely to the Indian
doctrine of Karma which is based on the law of
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 68
Causation or cause and effect In other words Karmavad
stresses poetic justice or law of life ie virtue is
rewarded and vice is punished Since one must reap the
fruits of his good and bad deeds in life it is axiomatic
truth that lsquoas one sows so shall he reaprsquo In Sanskrit
there is a verse which says ldquoOne must bear the consequences of his good and bad deedsrdquo The echoes of
this doctrine could be distinctly heard in his poetry and
particularly in his greatest poem Rime of Ancient Mariner as also Dejection An Ode where he affirms
ldquoO Lady We receive but what we give
And in our life alone doth Nature liverdquo
So strong was his belief in the doctrine of Karma that in
a letter dated 14th October 1797 to his friend Thirlwell
he tells him how fatalistic his philosophy of life is
ldquoand at other times I adopt the Brahman
creed and say ndash lsquoit is better to sit than to stand it is better to lie than to sit it is better to sleep than wake but death is the best of allrsquordquo
His Ancient Mariner serves as an exhaustive
exposition of the law of Nemesis which works surely
but rather imperceptively in human life The poem is a
myth about a dark and troubling crisis in the human
soul It is actually a tale of crime which is due to
perversity of human will Crime is against Nature
Humanity and God He touches equally on guilt and
remorse suffering and relief hate and forgiveness and
grief and joy The marinerrsquos action shows the essential
frivolity of crimes against humanity and the ordered
system of the world and he deserves punishment for his
guilt Spirits are transformed into the powers who
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 69
watch over the good and evil actions of men and requite
them with appropriate rewards and punishments Since
the mariner has committed a hideous act of wantonly
and recklessly killing the albatross which was hailed in
Godrsquos name as if it had been a Christian soul he must
bear the punishment of life-in-death The killing of the
bird marks the breaking of bond between Man and
Nature and consequently the mariner becomes
spiritually dead When he blesses the water-snakes
even unawares it is a psychic rebirth ndash a rebirth that
must happen to all men
The mariner will never be the man that he once was He
has his special past and his special doom His sense of
guilt will end only with his death The Ancient Mariner
is a myth of a guilty soul and marks the passage from
crime through punishment and possible redemption in
the world So the poem is an allegory of redemption and
regeneration It is indeed a vivid representation or
living symbolization of universal psychic experience
The abiding fascination of the poem is that it is a
fragment of a psychic life It does not state a result it
symbolizes a process
Coleridge adds a moral ndash that the mariner is ndash to teach
by his example love and reverence to all things that God
made and loveth He advocates a sound moral
philosophy of life which extends human sympathy and
love to the animal world He affirms
ldquoHe prayeth well who loveth well
Both man and bird and beast
He prayeth best who loveth best
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 70
All things both great and small
For the dear God who loveth us
He made and loveth allrdquo
Rime of Ancient Mariner
PHILOSOPHICAL MYSTICISM AND lsquoTHE VISION OF GODrsquo
Coleridgersquos longing for the lsquounnamable somethingrsquo and
his abiding interest in conveying something of the
enigmatic perception of Godhead as a religious
experience carved for him a special place in the history
of ideas as a Christian poet and philosopher In a
predominantly mythological age he took serious
interest in the Biblical studies and drew upon the
central Christian image of Paradise as a walled garden
and the vision of God as a symbolizing that
transcendent numinous reality which the soul
inchoately and consciously seeks and strives for The
medieval image of the walled garden (paradise) as the
heavenly city (locus of God) is a symbol of divine
transcendence of that which is lsquobeyond beingrsquo This rich
image (of the walled garden) as an eminently
appropriate image of Godrsquos transcendence was used as
such by Church Fathers and also by the 15th century
Christian Platonist Nicholas of Cusa whose book The Vision of God is a paradigm of speculative mysticism
which informs Coleridgersquos metaphysics and much of his
poetry Taking inspiration from Nicholas of Cusarsquos book
The Vision of God Coleridge found it in close affinity to
his own genuinely philosophical mysticism
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 71
Coleridgersquos interest in the Vision of God is in a purely
visionary mystical tradition and his most visionary
poem Kubla Khan bears ample testimony to his
insistence upon life as lsquoa vision shadowy of Truthrsquo His
conviction in the lsquoImago Deirsquo (vision of God) is an
obvious link with the hoary mystical tradition which lay
at the heart of his philosophical and mystical thought
He maintains that the mind of man is a bridge to the
vision of God but by no means its fulfillment He says
ldquoThe vision and faculty divine is the participation of humanity in the Divinerdquo He however further maintains
throughout his intellectual career the conviction in the
reflection or bending back of the soul from the sensual
to the intelligible realm For him Christianity is an lsquoawful recalling of the drowsed soul from dreams and phantom world of sensuality to actual Realityrsquo
On the idea of reawakening he says
ldquoThe moment when the Soul begins to be sufficiently self-conscious to ask concerning itself and its relations is the first moment of its intellectual arrival into the world Its being ndash enigmatic as it must seem ndash is posterior to its existencerdquo
Collected Notes
In a recent study of Coleridge Prof Douglas Headley of
Cambridge University declares ldquoHe is best described as an essentially speculative and mystical philosopher-theologian His was a theology inspired by those Church Fathers who emphasize the vision of God as an intellectual contemplation (speculari) of the transcendent Absolute the prius of all beingrdquo Since the
mystic tradition follows a supersensuous perception
the vision of God is fundamentally lsquoVisio-intuitivarsquo ndash
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 72
intuitive or intellectual vision Coleridge expresses such
a state of mind when he says
ldquoMy mind feels as if it ached to behold and know something great something One and Indivisible and it is only in the faith of this that rocks or waterfalls mountains or caverns give me the sense of sublimity or majesty But in this faith all things counterfeit Infinityrdquo
Since the sublime enlarges and inspires the Soul to
aspire for the Divine it impresses him with the
fundamental Oneness of God and a universal vision
which he hints at in his Religious Musings as under
ldquoThere is One mind One omnipresent mind
His most holy name is Love
Truth of subliming import
lsquoTis sublime in man
Our noontide majesty to know ourselves
Parts and portions of one wondrous wholerdquo
These passages recall to our mind the famous mantra
(verse) of the Yajurveda where the mystic realization
or the direct experience of the Supreme by a Vedic sage
has been beautifully described in terms of his personal
knowledge of the Divine He says
ldquoI have known this sun-coloured Mighty Being
Refulgent as the sun beyond darkness
By knowing Him alone one transcends death
There is no other way to gordquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 73
Yajurveda XXXI18
ldquoI have realized it I have known itrdquo not that I just
believe in it and all else can also realize it This is not the
expression of an opinion but the statement of an
experience Commenting on this verse Sri Aurobindo
says
ldquoThis is one of the grandest utterances in the worldrsquos spiritual literature for it marks the emanation of this Being from across the darkness into our world so that something of the sun colour may come into our dull heads and dim heartsrdquo
Coleridge seems to be in complete agreement with our
own Indian mysticism which owes its origin to the
Vedas wherein the knowledge of the Divine or the
Ultimate Reality (Brahman) has been regarded not as a
process of philosophical thought but as a direct
experience in the depth of the human soul For him the
divine vision is possible in that spiritual meditation
transformation of intellectual rapture in which all
discursive thought is fully sublimated According to him
the lsquovisio intuitivarsquo is the culmination of all knowledge ndash
sensus-ratio-intellectus and is in conjunction with the
concept of Imago Dei In order to see that which not an
object is ie God the human mind must put aside its own
discursive differentiating reflection ndash spiritus altissimus rationis ndash which guards the walls of the garden of
paradise lsquobeyondrsquo which dwells God The highest
transformation or sublimation of conscience can ensure
an intuitive vision of God and in accordance with the
maxim ndash Simile Simili ndash the mind then becomes like its
object by divesting itself of difference in order to
experience the Absolute Reality Says Coleridge
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 74
ldquoAn Immense Being does strongly fill the soul and Omnipotency Omnisciency and Infinite Goodness do enlarge and dilate the Spirit while it fixtly looks upon them They raise strong passions of Love and Admiration which melt our Nature and transform it into the mould and imagery that which we can contemplaterdquo
Notebooks
Mysticism is thus the subtle path of spiritual realization
of That Reality or Divine Presence which has been
described in our Vedic texts as (lying hidden in a cave shrouded in secrecy) God is one One beyond all
diversities In Him all contradictions and conflicts meet
and dissolve through the spiritual transformation of the
lsquoseerrsquo or lsquomysticrsquo whose soul rises above the bewildering
trammels and distortions of life and seeks unity with all
in the unity with One To such an enlightened seer life
becomes an unceasing adventure from unreality to
reality from ephemerality to eternity from the human
to the Divine One who realizes the Divine as the One
(without parallel) loving Lord finds the whole universe
united in Him Such a significantly mystical experience
finds a memorable expression in the following verse of
the Yajurveda where the sage named Vena beholds
such a divine vision
ldquoThe loving sage (Vena) beholds that Mysterious Existence
Wherein the universe comes to have One home (nest)
Therein unites and therefore issues the whole
The Lord is the warp and woof in the Created beingsrdquo
Yajurveda XXXII8
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 75
A careful analysis of the above-quoted passage reveals
all the main elements of mysticism viz
(i) Divinity is a subject of personal spiritual
experience
(ii) The ultimate conception of Divinity is a
mystery symbolically expressed as
गहानCहतम
(iii) The abstract conception of the Divine as an
Essence or Existence is symbolized by a
neuter singular तत and
(iv) The whole universe is united in love as birds
in a nest एकनीड़ or men in a home वसधव कटFबक
To sum up wise men the world over hold almost
identical views on vital matters of human life such as
the mystery of existence soul and oversoul (God) Truth
is verily One as God is one but the pathways to reach it
are very many The ancient Rig Veda proclaims एक सद वDा बहधा वदित ndash ldquoTruth is one sages call it by various namesrdquo In our own times Swami Ram Krishna
Paramhansa said यतोमत तथोपथ ndash as many religions
so many pathways And what the Spanish litteacuterateur
and thinker states as lsquouniversal truthrsquo is equally
applicable to the philosophy and poetry of Coleridge
ldquoA deep faith in life cannot but be spiritual even if only partially spiritualThe path of Truth may not be a path of parallel lines but a path that follows one circle by going to the right and climbing the circle or by going to the left and climbing the circle we are bound to meet at the top although we started in apparently
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 76
contrary directions This is bound to be in the end because Truth is onerdquo
In Charles Lambrsquos words Coleridge lsquohad been on the confines of the next world he had a hunger for Eternityrsquo The truth of this statement is abundantly
borne out by Coleridgersquos sincere effort for the
reconciliation of the ration with transcendental belief
He closes his Biographia Literaria which symbolizes
his spiritual voyage with the following words
ldquoIt is night sacred night The upraised eyes views suns of other worlds only to preserve the soul steady and collected in its pure act of inward adoration to the great I Am and to the filial word that re-affirmeth from eternity to eternity whose choral is the universerdquo
As a true metaphysician Coleridgersquos whole being
pulsated with a passionate and unceasing search for
truth Here indeed was a spiritual aspirant and seeker
who in his own words had lsquotraced the fount whence streams of nectar flowrsquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 77
LORD BYRON
(22 January 1788 ndash 19 April 1824)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 78
LORD BYRON
British Romantic Poet and Satirist
Born with a clubfoot and extremely sensitive about it
he was 10 when he unexpectedly inherited his title and
estates Educated at Cambridge he gained recognition
with English Bards and Scotch Reviewers (1809) a satire
responding to a critical review of his first published
volume Hours of Idleness (1807) At 21 he embarked on
a European grand tour Childe Harolds Pilgrimage
(1812ndash18) a poetic travelogue expressing melancholy
and disillusionment brought him fame while his
complex personality dashing good looks and many
scandalous love affairs with women and with boys
captured the imagination of Europe Settling near
Geneva he wrote the verse tale The Prisoner of Chillon
(1816) a hymn to liberty and an indictment of tyranny
and Manfred (1817) a poetic drama whose hero
reflected Byrons own guilt and frustration His greatest
poem Don Juan (1819ndash24) is an unfinished epic
picaresque satire in ottava rima Among his numerous
other works are verse tales and poetic dramas He died
of fever in Greece while aiding the struggle for
independence making him a Greek national hero
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 79
CHAPTER FOUR
BYRON A BLEND OF CLAY AND SPARK
INTRODUCTION
Byron whom Goethe regarded as lsquothe greatest genius of the centuryrsquo and whom Carlyle considered as the noblest
spirit in Europe was one of the most remarkable men
during the 19th Century which was characterized by
liberal optimism He was unquestionably a potent and
force and cause of change in the intellectual outlook and
socio-political structure of his time His colourful figure
his charismatic personality and satiric poetry captured
the imagination of the whole continent As the most
influential English poet he stands out as an important
figure in the history of ideas Representative of a new
age he was the supreme voice which the European
poets recognized for ldquohe put into poetry something that belonged to many men in his time and he was the pioneer of a new outlook and a new art He set his mark on a whole generation and his fame rang from one end of Europe to anotherrdquo
Renowned as the ldquogloomy egoistrdquo he was a sinister yet
great influence in the Romantic Movement His deepest
romantic melancholy his satiric realism and his
aspiration for political realism earned for him such a
wide acclaim that his name became a symbol for all the
great events of his day Commenting on his pervasive
influence Calvert says ndash ldquoIt is impossible not to take Byron seriously and it is disastrous to take him literallyrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 80
A REBEL EXTRAORDINAIRE
Byron was a born rebel Essentially a child of
Revolution his poetry breathes a unique spirit of
revolutionary idealism ldquoI was born for oppositionrdquo he
once remarked and added ldquobeing of no party I shall offend all partiesrdquo Describing him as an aristocratic
rebel Bertrand Russell said
ldquoThe aristocratic rebel of whom Byron was in his day the exemplar is a very different typesuch rebels have philosophy which requires some greater change than their own personal success In their conscious thought there is criticism of the government of the world which takes the form of Titanic Cosmic self-assertion or those who retain some superstition of Satanism Both are to be found in Byron The aristocratic philosophy of rebellionhas inspired a long series of revolutionary movements from the fall of Napoleon to Hitlerrsquos coup in 1933it has inspired a corresponding manner of thought and feeling among intellectuals and artistsrdquo
Byron felt the wild storm of nations akin to the storm
within his own heart and the ruin but the picture of his
own life In his unqualified individualism he takes up an
attitude of hostility towards society Even God appears
to him mirrored in the stormy face of the angry ocean
ldquoThou glorious mirror
Of the Image of Eternityrdquo
He wished to stir the oppressed to revolt and get rid of
tyrants
ldquoFor I will teach if possible the stones
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 81
To rise against earthrsquos tyranny Never let it
Be said that we will truckle into thrones
By ye ndash our childrenrsquos children I think how we
Showed that things were before the world was freerdquo
Don Juan VIIICXXXV4-8
ldquoI have simplified my policiesrdquo wrote he ldquointo a detestation of all existing governmentsrdquo His was the
most dreaded voice of all the revolutionary poets of the
world His voice was the peal of revolutionary thunder
his poetry was the message of the revolutionary forces
He stood as the greatest symbol of a violent and
dreadful revolution
CHAMPION OF LIBERTY
He was essentially a poet of liberty His greatest ideal in
life was how to fight against the forces of tyranny
restriction aggression and enslaving of workers by
puissant exploiters Liberty was an essential part of the
Byronic creed In fact his entire poetic work is
interspersed with some of the finest poetry in praise of
freedom for mankind He composed much splendid
verse for love of freedom His passion for personal
freedom covers national freedom also and the political
freedom in the form of national self-determination
particularly for Italy and Greece He remarks in his
diary of 1821 ldquoDifficulties are the hotbeds of high spirits and Freedom the mother of the new virtues incident to human naturerdquo
Identifying himself completely with the cause of Italy
and Greece he wrote ldquoI shall not fall backbut
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 82
onward It is now the time to act and what signifies ldquoSelfrdquo if a single spark of that which would be worthy of the past can be bequeathed unquenchably to the future It is not one man nor a million but the spirit of liberty which must be spreadrdquo In his Ode to Chillon Castle he characteristically exclaimed
ldquoEternal spirit of the chainless Mind
Brightest in dungeons Liberty thou art
For there thy habitation is the heart
The heart which love of Thee alone bind
And when thy sons to fetters are consignrsquod
To fetters and damp vaultsrsquo dayless gloom
And Freedomrsquos fame finds winds on every windrdquo
Love of liberty lay at the centre of his being and
determined what was best in him ndash belief in individual
liberty and his hatred of tyranny and constraints
whether exercised by individuals or societies Liberty
was an ideal a driving power a summons to make the
best of certain possibilities in him He insisted to be free
and maintained that other men must be free too
Opposition was an integral element in his basic attitude
revolt both personal and social was his forte Love of
freedom is built into the capricious structure of Childe Harold and Don Juan
HIS POLITICAL AND COSMOPOLITAN LIBERALISM
He grew in an atmosphere in which political reaction
against revolutionary ideals was victorious all over
Europe Byron was essentially a liberal by conviction
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 83
and could hardly bear the perception of liberals Though
he loved his native country yet he had a large vision for
the freedom and welfare of all nations The excitement
of political liberalism stirred on behalf of the Greeks
against the oppression of their Turkish overlords made
him a symbol of disinterested patriotism and a Greek
national hero The first two cantos of Child Harold are
tinctured with historical and typographical material as
also the appearance of the Byronic hero with his
exhortations to the degenerate Greeks and Spaniards to
remember their glorious past and arise They contain
Byronrsquos passionate feelings for Greece which was to see
the beginning as it was to see the end of his active life
His Faustian daemonic figure and his defiant
resentment of authority found an appropriate object in
the political sphere
His last journey and his death at Missolonghi in the
cause of Greek independence proves in him the moving
combination of nobility futility and romantic or heroic
panache In the words of Graham Hough lsquoBut for once Byron was on the winning side he died but his cause triumphed and he remains one of its heroes For the whole of the 19th Century he remained a portent and a symbol whom it was possible to worship or to condemn but never to neglectrsquo
A MAN OF ACTION
Action remains at the centre of his life and at last he
gladly seized the opportunity when it presented itself in
Greece Leaving poetry behind himself he took a heroic
resolution in favour of action rather than
contemplation He presents a rare example of fusion
between the active and the reflective lsquofor his was the romanticism of actionrsquo The moralist in the garb of the
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RP DWIVEDI Page 84
pre-romantic rebel hero of the Childe Harold is cast
aside in Don Juan and the moralist in the somber garb
turns dandy in which moral judgment seems to be
ineffective Quite logically he finally abandons literature
for the field of moral action At last Byron flung himself
off into the world of action The dandy finds at last that
such a death even if it is on the sickbed and not the
battlefield is the only gesture untouched by futility ldquoIt is not enough that art perpetrates life life also must complete artrdquo WB Yeats rightly says ldquoone feels that he (Byron) is a man of action made writer by accidentrdquo
Byron did not regard writing as an end in itself on the
contrary he was several times on the point of giving up
writing He had always before him the hope of some
more active life and felt a certain mistrust for the purely
literary life He asserted ldquowho would write who had anything better to do Action- action I say and not writing Least of all rhymerdquo In a letter to Murray
he wrote ldquoYou will see that I shall do something or otherthat like the cosmogony or creation of the world will puzzle the philosophers of all agesrdquo He was
fully alive to the persistent sense both of human
aspirations and the ceaseless flux of eternity and also
knew that he would not fade into oblivion Said he
ldquoBut at the last I have shunned the common shore
And leaving land far out of sight would skim
The ocean of Eternityrdquo
And again he said
ldquoFor the sword outwears its sheath
And the soul wears out the breastrdquo
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RP DWIVEDI Page 85
HIS ROMANTIC SELF-PORTRAITURE
Byron presents manrsquos mixed and imperfect nature His
personality is a queer blend of flesh and spirit
meanness and nobility clay and spark cause and effect
The lasting fascination of his personality despite his bad
temper careless arrogance the excesses the satiety
melancholy and restlessness owes much to Splendour Primier of Miltonrsquos Satan who is ldquomajestic though in ruinrdquo and the gloom and brutality of the heroes of the
novel of terror His exotic sensibility ranging passions
and sensual perversity take refuge in a sort of ldquoCosmic Satanismrdquo He draws of himself a sketch which
reproduces in a dim outline the somber portrait of his
idealized self in the famous stanzas of Lara
ldquoIn him inexplicably mixed appeared
Much to be loved and hated sought and feared
X X X X X X
A hater of his kind
X X X X X X
There was in him a vital scorn of all
As if the worst had fallen which could befall
An erring spirit
X X X X X X
And fiery passions that had poured their wrath
In hurried desolation over his path
And left the better feeling all at strife
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RP DWIVEDI Page 86
In wild reflection over his stormy liferdquo
And the Giaour (hiding his sinister path beneath a
monkrsquos gown) also portrays Byron
ldquoA noble soul and lineage high
Alas though bestowed in vain
Which Grief could change and Guilt could stainrdquo
HIS CREDO
Despite all his self-mockery and arrogant egoism he had
a star (vision) and he followed it sincerely He was not
without guiding principles and his heroic death in the
cause of Greek independence shows that he was not an
actor but a soldier a man of affairs and a master of men
Keenly aware of something special in him he wished to
realize his powers and translate them into facts He
wished to be true to himself He had a keen appreciation
of the dignity and personal liberty of man
HIS FATAL TRUTH
Even though he disagreed with the moral code of his
age he had his own values He thought that truthfulness
is a permanent virtue and duty and so did not want to
compromise with conventions nor hide behind cant
Despite many ordeals and his own corroding skepticism
he speaks seriously and directly about his convictions
and presents them with irony satire and mockery Don Juan is a racy commentary on life and manners and is a
record of a remarkable personality ndash a poet and a man
of action a dreamer and a wit a great lover and a great
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RP DWIVEDI Page 87
hater a Whig noble and a revolutionary democrat The
paradoxes of his nature are fully reflected in Don Juan which itself is a romantic epic and a realistic satire He
was full of many romantic longings but tested them by
truth and reality He remained faithful only to those
which meant so much to him that he could not live
without them
Praising Byron Nietzsche says ldquoMan may bleed to death through the truth that he recognizesrdquo Byron expressed
this in his immortal lines
ldquoSorrow is knowledge they who know the most
Must mourn the deepest over the fatal truth
The tree of knowledge is not that of linerdquo
A BELIEVER IN GOD AND IMMORTALITY OF SOUL
Full of snobbery and rebellion as he was Byron was not
altogether without lofty ideals and religious beliefs He
firmly believed in the immanence and transcendence of
God and the transience of human glory His implicit faith
in the immortality of human soul the ephemerality of
physical body and his unwavering trust in God ndash the
eternal Light of Lights is evident from his following
memorable lines
ldquobut this clay will sink
Its spark immortal envying it the light
To which it mounts as if to break the link
That keeps us from yon heaven which woos us to its brinkrdquo
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RP DWIVEDI Page 88
Childe Harold III13-14
His Childe Haroldrsquos pilgrimage is a lament for lost
empire decay of love and triumph of love over human
mortality His lsquovoyage pittoresquersquo is full of historic and
didactic meditations and his oceanic image illustrates
the truism that nothing is constant but the rhythmic
pattern of its flux In the end all things float and toss on
that Great Ocean of which man is the foam and the
historic events are billows
ldquoBetween two worlds life hovers like a starrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquothe eternal surge
Of time and tide rolls on and bears afar our bubbles
while the graves
Of Empires heave but like some passing wavesrdquo
Don Juan XVI99
He maintains throughout his major poetic works a
sense of the presence of God or the gods and often
employs supernatural machinery to substantiate his
concept
IMMORTALITY OF SOUL
He had complete faith in the immortality of soul Said
he ldquoof the immortality of the soul it appears to me that there can be little doubtit acts also so very independent of bodyHuman passions have probably disfigured the divine doctrines Man is born passionate of body but an innate thought secret
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 89
tendency to the love of God is his mainspring of mind But God helps us allMan is eternal always changing but reproducedEternity Eternalrdquo
Again on his belief in God he says ldquoI sometimes think that man may be relic of some higher materialcreation must have had an origin and a creator for a creator is a more natural imagination than a fortuitous concourse of atoms All things remount to a fountain though they may flow to an oceanrdquo He knew
the limitations and ephemerality of phenomenal
existence He exclaims
ldquoFor I wish to know
What after all are all thingsbut a showrdquo
Unable to explore the stars with scientific aid he takes
up poesy to embark across the ocean of Eternity
ldquoI wish to do much by Poesyrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoBut at least I have shunned the common
And leaving land far out of sight would skim
The Ocean of Eternityrdquo
According to him man accepts the eternal voyage but
since man is not himself unlimited the boat capsizes in
the deep
ldquoAnd swimming long in the abyss of thought
Is apt to tire
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RP DWIVEDI Page 90
For the fall entails not only ignorance and weakness but Human mortalityrdquo
Disconcerted with mankind he turns to the placid
spectacle of Nature and feels his spirit merge into its
objects
ldquoI live not in myself but I become
Portion of that around me and to me
High mountains are a feeling
When the soul can flee
And with the sky ndash the peak ndash the heaving plain
Of Ocean or the stars mingle ndash and not in vainrdquo
Childe Harold III72
This pantheistic ecstasy gives him a sense of quasi-
immortality
ldquoSpinning the clay clod bonds which round our being clingrdquo
The picturesque is translated into a kind of mystical
union with the spirit of the place even with the
universe itself
ldquoAre not the mountains waves and skies a part
Of me and my soul as I of them
(Is not) the universe a breathing part
The spirit is clogged with clayrdquo
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RP DWIVEDI Page 91
HIS PESSIMISM
The myth of Cuvierrsquos undulations of Cosmic history
reflects Byronrsquos consistent and mature pessimism His
pessimism is traceable to his own view of society
Through a metaphor he considers his age as
ldquocatastrophicrdquo ndash an ice age of the human spirit and a
declining moral grandeur His myth of Fall and
recurrence of the Ocean and ice is both comic and
historic social and literary and personal as well The
consequences of the Fall and of manrsquos imperfect nature
are seen in all major human activities Generally fallen
mankind is hounded by its lower appetites spirit
encumbered by flesh The image of Fall is linked in
Byronrsquos imagination with the rhetorical image of the
poetrsquos lsquoflightrsquo which incurs the risk of consequent
lsquosinkingrsquo or bathos And over it all hangs the perplexity
of manrsquos ignorance about his aims his nature his true
identity
ldquoFew mortals know what end they would be at
But whether glory power or love or treasure
The path is through perplexing ways and when
The goal is gained we die you know ndash and thenrdquo
HIS PROPHETIC VISION
Endowed with strong imaginative power he had
experimented in Vulcanian visions of the earth plunged
into darkness by the final extinction or the sun or lsquoa ruined starrsquo plunging on in flames through the wastes of
space This prophetic faculty is amply evident from his
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RP DWIVEDI Page 92
poem Darkness in which his imagination prefigures the
devastating effects of nuclear weapons
ldquoThe Hour arrived ndash and it became
A wandering mass of shapeless flame
A pathless Comet and a curse
The menace of the Universe
Still rolling on with innate force
Without a sphere without a course
A bright deformity on high
The monster of the upper skyrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoI had a dream which was not at all a dream
The bright sun was extinguished and the stars
Did wander darkling in the eternal space
The habitations of all things which dwell
Were burnt for beacons cities were consumedrdquo
Darkness IV42-45
In sum and in essence Byron exemplifies Shelleyrsquos
pronouncement that poets are the unacknowledged
legislators of the world More than any other Romantic
poet Byron embodies the dictum ndash lsquowhat is to give light must endure burningrsquo
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RP DWIVEDI Page 93
PB SHELLEY
(4 August 1792 ndash 8 July 1822)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 94
PB SHELLEY
English Romantic Poet
The heir to rich estates Shelley was a rebellious youth
who was expelled from Oxford in 1811 for refusing to
admit authorship of The Necessity of Atheism Later that
year he eloped with Harriet Westbrook the daughter of
a tavern owner He gradually channeled his passionate
pursuit of personal love and social justice into poetry
His first major poem Queen Mab (1813) is a utopian
political epic revealing his progressive social ideals In
1814 he eloped to France with Mary Wollstonecraft
Godwin in 1816 after Harriet drowned herself they
were married In 1818 the Shelleys moved to Italy
Away from British politics he became less intent on
social reform and more devoted to expressing his ideals
in poetry He composed the verse tragedy The Cenci (1819) and his masterpiece the lyric drama Prometheus Unbound (1820) which was published with some of his
finest shorter poems including Ode to the West Wind
and To a Skylark Epipsychidion (1821) is a Dantean
fable about the relationship of sexual desire to spiritual
love and artistic creation Adonais (1821)
commemorates the death of John Keats Shelley
drowned at age 29 while sailing in a storm off the Italian
coast leaving unfinished his last and possibly greatest
visionary poem The Triumph of Life
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RP DWIVEDI Page 95
CHAPTER FIVE
SHELLEY A PILGRIM OF ETERNITY
INTRODUCTION
Shelley who in his Adonais eulogized Keats as lsquothe Pilgrim of Eternityrsquo is himself justly entitled to this
appellation He was essentially a poet of the skies and
heavens of light and love of eternity and immortality
Since he loved to pierce through things to their spiritual
essence the material world was less important for him
than that which lies within it and beyond it Says he ldquoI seek in what I see the manifestation of something beyond the present and tangible objectsrsquo He set out to uncover
the absolute real from its visible manifestations and
interpret it through his own poetic vision In a
passionate search for reality he pursued its essence
behind the veil of naked loveliness of Nature and the
mundane human existence Defining poetry he says
lsquoPoetry is the revelation of the eternal ideas which lie behind the many-coloured ever-shifting veil that we call reality in lifersquo For him the poet is also a seer gifted with
a peculiar insight into the nature of reality for it is
through the inspired poetic imagination that he
breathes immortality into the objects of Nature Says he
lsquoBut from these create he can
Forms more real than living man
Nurslings of immortalityrsquo
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RP DWIVEDI Page 96
Prometheus Unbound
HIS LOVE OF INDIA
Shelley was an ardent admirer of India In a letter to his
friend employed in the East India Company he
expressed keenness to visit India and settle down here
He was drawn to India for its varied and picturesque
scenic beauty vast literary heritage and age-old cultural
traditions In order to have a closer acquaintance with
our great country he set his heart and mind on serious
studies in the Indian life and letters traditions and
culture
Since he was a visionary par excellence and was
endowed with a highly contemplative mind and a
remarkable prophetic zeal he evinced a deep and
abiding interest in the philosophical and spiritual
thoughts that lie enshrined in our holy texts such as the
Vedas the Upanishads the Brahmasutras and the
Bhagvad Gita It is interesting to trace the influence of
Indian spiritual thought on Shelleyrsquos poetry
VEDANTA IN SHELLEYrsquoS POETRY
The riddle of the origin of life and Nature and the
enigmatic questions such as lsquoWhat is the cause of life
and death What is the source of universe and what will
be its ultimate destinyrsquo have always engaged the
serious attention of all wise men Man has always stood
in awe and wonder at the mysteries of human existence
and the vast world around him Our seers and savants
have not only posed such questions but have also
answered them
In the opening verse of the Kena Upanishad the
disciple asks
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 97
ldquoAt whose behest does the mind think or wander after towards its objects Commanded by whom does the life-force or the breath of life go forth on its journey At whose will do we utter speech Who is that effulgent Being whose power directs the eye and the earrdquo
Similarly in the Svetasvatara Upanishad the disciples
inquire ldquoWhat is the cause of this universe What is Brahman Whence do we come By what power do we live and on what are we established Where shall we at last find rest What rules over our joys and sorrows O Seers of Brahmanrdquo
Identical ideas impelled Shelley to exclaim in his famous
elegy Adonais
ldquoWhence are we and why are we Of what scene
The actors or spectatorsrdquo
Or again he asks in The Triumph of Life
ldquoWhence comest thou And wither goest thou
How did thy course begin I said and whyrdquo
Shelley asks
ldquoHas some unknown omnipotence unfurled
The veil of life and deathrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoAnd what were thou and earth and stars and sea
If to the human mindrsquos imaginings
Silence and solitude were vacancyrdquo
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RP DWIVEDI Page 98
Mont Blanc
Shelley in his famous poem Hymn to Intellectual Beauty answers that there is an unseen (all-pervading) omnipotence (power) behind this phenomenal world of
which all objects are but shadows
ldquoThe awful shadow of some unseen Power
Floats though unseen among us ndash visiting
This various world with as inconstant wing
As summer winds that creep from flower to flowerrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoIt visits with inconstant glance
Each human heart and countenance
Like aught that for its grace may be
Dear and yet dearer for its mysteryrdquo
Again he affirms his faith in such a mysterious
Omnipotent power when he says
ldquoThe works and ways of men their death and birth
And that of him and all that his may be
All things that move and breathe with toil and sound
Are born and die revolve subside and swell
Power dwells apart in its tranquility
Remote serene and inaccessiblerdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 99
X X X X X X
ldquoThe secret strength of things
Which governs thought and to the infinite dome
Of Heaven is as a law inhabits theerdquo
Mont Blanc
Vedanta which is the aphoristic summary of the
Upanishads the Brahmasutras and the Bhagvad Gita
is in fact the culmination of Indian religious and
philosophical thought Since Shelley sincerely desired to
unravel the essential reality which is unchanging
timeless and eternal and of which the world of sense
perceptions is but a broken reflection he turned his
attention to the ancient scriptures of India
ONENESS OF BRAHMAN (GOD)
One of the basic postulates of Vedanta is the inherent
oneness or the sole identity of Brahman in the universe
The Chhandogya Upanishad describes Brahman as
एकमव अXवतीय ndash lsquoone only without a secondrsquo and the
other Upanishadic texts also contain parallel statements
such as स एकः ndash lsquoHe is Onersquo and एकोदवः ndash lsquoOne Lordrsquo
Similarly the Rig Veda declares एक सद वDा बहदा वदित ndash lsquoTruth (God)is one but the wise one call it
differentlyrsquo Obviously Brahman the Supreme is one
and only one He is verily one and the same whether we
call Him Brahman Ishwara Paramatma God Allah or
the supreme Cosmic Soul He only exists all other
objects of the world are subject to decay and death
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 100
How beautifully have similar thoughts been expressed
by Shelley when he exclaims
ldquoThe one remains the many change and pass
Heavenrsquos light forever shines Earthrsquos shadows fly
Life like a dome of many coloured glass
Stains the white radiance of Eternity
Until Death tramples it to fragmentsrdquo
Adonais L2
The concluding lines of Epipsychidion show that in a
moment of inspiration Shelley seemed to lay hold on the
ineffable spirituality and fundamental unity of
existence
ldquoOne hope within two wils one will beneath
Two overshadowing minds one life one death
One Heaven one hell one immortality
And one annihilationrdquo
Shelley etherealized Nature and believed in a single
power or one spirit permeating the whole universe He
effected a fusion of the Platonic philosophy of love with
the Wordsworthian doctrine of Pantheism
ldquoThe one spiritrsquos plastic stress
Sweeps through the dull dense worldrsquo
Compelling there all new successions
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 101
To the forms they wearrdquo
Holding that one universal spirit is the basis and
sustainer of Nature Shelley declares
ldquoThat Power
Which wields the world with never-wearied love
Sustains it from beneath and kindles it aboverdquo
In his pantheistic conception of Nature Shelley
conceived of it as being permeated vitalized and made
real by a universal spirit of love He clearly perceives
the presence of ldquothe awful shadow of the unseen power visiting the various worldrdquo
ldquoSpirit of Nature here
In this interminable wilderness
Of worlds at whose involved immensity
Even soaring fancy staggers
Here is thy fitting templerdquo
Demon of the World
TRANSMIGRATION OF SOUL
The doctrine of transmigration of soul or the cycle of
births and rebirths has been explicitly advanced in the
Upanishadic philosophy In the Kathopanishad
Brihadaranyak Upanishad and the Bhagvad Gita there are moving passages such as these
ldquoMan ripens like corn and like corn he is born againrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 102
Kathopanishad IV6
The Brihadaranyak Upanishad states
ldquoAnd as a caterpillar after reaching the end of a blade of grass finds another place of support and then draws itself towards it and as a goldsmith after taking a piece of gold gives it another newer and more beautiful shape similarly does the self after having thrown off this body and dispelled ignorance take on another newer and more beautiful formrdquo
Brihadaranyak Upanishad IV3-5
Similarly Lord Krishna tells Arjuna
ldquoAs a man discarding worn out clothes takes other new ones likewise the embodied soul casting off worn-out bodies enters into others which are newrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II22
And further Lord Krishna says to Arjuna
ldquofor in that case the death of him who is born is certain and the rebirth for him who is dead is inevitablerdquo
Bhagvad Gita II27
Shelley entertained similar ideas when he says
ldquoThe works and ways of man their death and birth
And that of him and all that his may be
All things that move and breathe with toil and sound
Are borm and die revolve subside and swellrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 103
Mont Blanc 92-95
Or again
ldquoThe splendours of the firmament of time
May be eclipsed but are extinguished not
Like stars to their appointed height they climb
And death is a low mist which cannot blot
The brightness it may veilrdquo
Adonais XLIV
Stressing the ephemerality of worldly objects Shelley
exclaims
ldquoSpirit of Beauty that does consecrate
With thine own hues all thou doth shine upon
Of human thought or formwhere art thou gonerdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoWhy aught should fail and fade that once is shown
Why fear and dream and death and birth
Cast on the daylight of this earth
Such gloomrdquo
Hymn to Intellectual Beauty 11
Lamenting the death of his friend Keats he says
ldquohe went uninterrupted
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 104
Into the gulf of death but his clear spirit
Yet reigns over earthrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoTo that high Capital where Kingly Death
Keeps his pale court in beauty and decay
He came and bought with price of purest breath
A grave among the eternalrdquo
Adonais VII
Again dwelling on the immortality of soul he declares
ldquoNaught we know dies Shall that alone which knows
Be as a sword consumed before the sheath
By sightless lightening The intense atom glows
A moment then is quenched in a most cold reposerdquo
Adonais XX
X X X X X X
ldquoGreat and mean
Meet massed in death who lends what life must borrowrdquo
Adonais XXI
X X X X X X
ldquoDust to dust but the pure spirit shall flow
Black to the burning fountain whence it came
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 105
A portion of the Eternal which must glow
Through time and change unquenchably the same
Whilst thy cold embers choke the sordid hearth shamerdquo
Adonais XXXVIII
THE DOCTRINE OF MAYA (DELUSION)
Our scriptures regard the phenomenal world as Maya
(delusion) They explain that the universe is neither
absolutely real nor absolutely non-existent and that its
phenomenal or apparent surface conceals and
safeguards the external presence of the Absolute
Shelley seems to have pondered over similar ideas
about the world of appearances
ldquoWorlds on worlds are rolling ever
From creation to decay
Like the bubbles on a river
Sparkling bursting borne away
But they are still immortal
Who through birthrsquos oriental portal
And deathrsquos dark chasm hurrying to and fro
Clothe their unceasing flight
In the brief dust and light
Gathered around their chariots as they gordquo
Three Choruses from Hallas
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 106
In his poem Invocation to Misery Shelley says
ldquoAll the wide world beside us
Show like multitudinous
Puppets passing from a scenerdquo
Again describing human life as a veil he says
ldquoLife not the painted veil which thou who live
Call life though unreal shapes be pictured there
And it but mimic all we would believe
With colours idly spreadrdquo
Prometheus Unbound
In the myth of Aurora he gives his own account of the
creation and interpretation of works of art
ldquoAnd lovely apparitions dim at first then radiant in the mind arising bright
From the embrace of beauty whence the forms
Of which these are phantoms casts on them
The gathered rays which are realityrdquo
Shelley seems to hint at the theory of Superimposition
(Vivartavada) which maintains that the universe is a
superimposition upon Brahman It states that the world
of thought and matter has a phenomenon or relative
existence and is superimposed upon Brahman the
unique Absolute Reality
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 107
Since the world is a network of delusion and
appearance not reality our life on earth is a sojourn
and its paramount aim is to have a glimpse of and
realize the eternal Truth or the Absolute Brahman
which is concealed by ignorance and delusion The
Ishopanishad tells us
ldquoThe face of Truth is hidden by a golden orb (disk) O Pushan (the Nourisher the Effulgent Being) uncover (the Face) that I the seeker or worshipper of Truth may hold Theerdquo
Ishopanishad XV
Like a sincere aspirant for the realization of eternal
Truth or the Absolute concealed under the illusory garb
of Maya (Delusion) Shelley in the words of Fairy in his
Queen Mab declares
ldquoAnd it is yet permitted me to rend
The veil of mortal frailty that the spirit
Clothed in its changeless purity may know
How soonest to accomplish the great end
For which it hath its being and may taste
That peace which in the end all life will sharerdquo
Queen Mab
In certain other passages Shelley speaks of the veil
identified with Time which obscured Eternity from the
sight of man The symbol of veil demonstrates that
which conceals truth goodness or happiness When the
veil was torn or rent asunder
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 108
ldquoHope was seen beaming through the mists of fear
Earth was no longer Hell
Love freedom health had given
Their ripeness to the manhood of its prime
And all its pulses beat
Symphonious to the planetary spheresrdquo
Again he uses the same symbol of veil when Cythna
says
ldquoFor with strong speech I tore the veil that hid
Nature and Truth and Liberty and Loverdquo
Shelley uses the same idea of superimposition coupled
with his own robust idealism
ldquoLife may change but it may fly not
Hope may vanish but can die not
Truth be veiled but it burneth
Love repulsed ndash but it returnethrdquo
STATES OF CONSCIOUSNESS
Our Upanishads identify three states of consciousness
crowned by the fourth which transcends all the other
three states They are
(i) The Waking State
(ii) The Dreaming State
(iii) The State of Deep Sleep and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 109
(iv) The State of Pure Consciousness (Turiya)
The fourth state of ecstatic consciousness which
transcends the preceding three has no connection with
the finite mind it is reached when in meditation the
ordinary self is left behind and the Atman or the true
self is fully realized The Mandukya Upanishad describes it thus
ldquoBeyond the senses beyond the understanding beyond all expression is the Fourth It is pure unitary consciousness wherein (all) awareness of the world and of multiplicity is completely obliterated It is effable peace It is the supreme good It is one without a second It is the Self Know it alonerdquo
Mandukya Upanishad VII
Turiya (तर[य) the fourth state is the supreme mystic
experience Shelley seems to have partly attained such a
state of pure ecstatic consciousness when he states
ldquoI seem as in a trance sublime and strange
To muse on my own separate fantasy
My own my human mind which passively
Now renders and receives fast influencing
Holding an unremitting interchange
With the clear universe of things aroundrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoSome say that gleams of a remoter world
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 110
Visit the soul in sleep that death is slumber
And that its shapes the busy thoughts outnumber
Of those who wake and live ndash I look on high
Has some unknown omnipotence unfurled
The veil of life and deathrdquo
Mont Blanc
Another instance of such a mystic experience appears in
his famous poem Triumph of Life on which Shelley was
working at the time of this death in 1822
ldquobefore me fled
The night behind me rose the day the deep
Was at my feet and Heaven above my head
When a strange trance over my fancy grew
Which was not slumber for the shade it spread
Was so transparent that the scene came through
As clear as when a veil of light is drawn
Over evening hill they glimmer and I knew
That I had felt the freshness of that dawnrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoAnd in that trance of wondrous thought I lay
This was the tenor of my waking dreamrdquo
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The Triumph of Life
SHELLEY AS AN ASPIRANT FOR SELF-REALIZATION
Shelley who described himself as
ldquoA splendour among shadows a bright blot
Upon the gloomy scene a spirit that strove
For Truthrdquo
seems to have reached at last that stability or
equanimity of mind which has been described in the
Upanishads and the Bhagvad Gita In a reply to Arjunrsquos
question about the definition of one who is stable of
mind or is finally established in perfect tranquility of
mind Lord Krishna says
ldquoArjun when one thoroughly dismisses all cravings of the mind controls it and is satisfied in the self (through the joy of the self) then he is called stable of mind One whose mind remains unperturbed amid sorrows whose thirst for pleasures has altogether disappeared and who is free from passion fear and anger is called stable of mindrdquo
Bhagvad Gita V56
The Katha Upanishad stresses similar ideas when it
says
ldquoBut he who possesses right discrimination whose mind is under control and is always pure he reaches that goal from which he is not born againrdquo
X X X X X X
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RP DWIVEDI Page 112
ldquoThe man who has a discriminative intellect for the driver and a controlled mind for the reins reaches the end of the journey the highest place of Vishnu (the all-pervading and unchangeable one)rdquo
Katha Upanishad
Shelley echoes identical thoughts when he says
ldquoMan who man would be
Must rule the empire of himself in it
Must be supreme establishing his throne
On vanquished will quelling the anarchy
Of hopes and fears being himself alonerdquo
Sonnet on Political Greatness
It was in such rare moments of inner consciousness or
lsquoBlessed moodrsquo that Shelley felt lsquoOne with Naturersquo or
lsquoThe Power which wields the world with never-wearied love
Sustains it from beneath and kindles it aboversquo
As a myth-maker or a mythopoeic poet he conjured
visions of a golden age by turning to the grand aspects
of Nature ndash the ether the sky the wind the Sun the
Moon the light and the clouds and employing them as
befitting agencies and vehicles of his evolutionary ideas
ldquoPoetryrdquo he wrote ldquois indeed something divine It is at once the centre and circumference of all knowledgerdquo He
conceived of the universe as alive with a living spirit
behind it He moralizes natural myths and perceives the
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 113
Absolute behind the ephemeral In an exquisite image
he exclaims
ldquoThe sanguine sunrise with his meteor eyes
And his burning plumes outspread
Leaps on the back of my sailing rack
When the morning star shines deadrdquo
As his thoughts reached the zenith of their growth
Shelley identified his individual self with the all-
pervading Cosmic Self or the Brahman of the Vedanta
and felt himself one with the indwelling spirit of the
universe Unity filled his imagination he perceived
eternal harmony in the phenomenal existence and
rejoiced his own being in the vast million-coloured
pageants of the world And finally not only Nature but
all human existence is taken up as an inalienable aspect
of the eternal Cosmic Spirit He reaches the core the
centre of all palpable universe when he declares
ldquoI am the eye with which the Universe
Behold itself and knows itself divine
All harmony of instrument and verse
All prophecy all medicine is mine
All light of art or nature to my song
Victory and praise in its own right belongrdquo
Shelley perceived the transcendental or mystic
consciousness in which one realizes the complete
identity of self with the Supreme Self and which is called
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 114
तर[य अवथा ndash where one sees nothing but One
(Brahman) hears nothing but the One knows nothing
but the One ndash there is the Infinite The same truth is
vividly explained in the Bhagvad Gita when Lord
Krishna tells Arjuna
ldquoWhen one sees Eternity in things that pass away and Infinity in finite things then one has pure knowledgerdquo
Bhagvad Gita XVIII20
Our own great seer-poet and philosopher Sri Aurobindo
Ghose described Shelley as a sovereign voice of the new
spiritual force and a native of the heights with its
luminous ethereality where he managed to dwell
prophetically in a future heaven and earth with
brilliances of a communion with a higher law another
order of existence another meaning behind Nature and
terrestrial things
Sri Aurobindo further praises him as lsquoa seer of spiritual realities who has a poetic grasp of metaphysical truths and can see the forms and hear the voices of higher elements spirits and natural godheads and has a constant feeling of a high spiritual and intellectual beauty He is at once seer poet thinker prophet and artist Light love liberty are the three godheads in whose presence his pure and radiant spirit lived but a celestial light a celestial love a celestial liberty To bring them down to earth without their losing their celestial lustre and here is his passionate endeavour but his wings constantly buoy him upward and cannot beat strongly in an earthlier atmosphere There is an air of luminous mist surrounding his intellectual presentation of his meaning which shows the truths he sees as things to which the mortal eye cannot easily pierce or the life and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 115
temperament of earth rise to realize and live yet to bring about the union of the mortal and immortal terrestrial and the celestial is always his passion Shelley is the bright archangel of this dawn and becomes greater to us as the light he foresaw and lived and he sings half-concealed in the too dense halo of his own ethereal beautyrsquo
And what Juan Mascaro states as universal truth is
equally pertinent to Shelleyrsquos poetry
ldquoA deep faith in life cannot but be spiritual The path of Truth may not be a path of parallel lines but a path that follows one circle because Truth is onerdquo
Infinite is God infinite are His aspects and infinite are
the ways to reach Him In the Atharva Veda we read
ldquoThe one light appears in diverse formsrdquo This ideal of
harmony is carried to its logical conclusion in blending
synthesizing and reconciling conflicting metaphysical
theories and opposed conceptions of spiritual
discipline We read in the pages of Bhagvad Gita
ldquoWhatever wish men bring in worship
That wish I grant them
Whatever path men travel
Is my path
No matter where they walk
It leads to merdquo
Bhagvad Gita IV11
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RP DWIVEDI Page 116
To sum up Shelleyrsquos poetry will always hold irresistible
fascination to the lovers of light and beauty for to
quote Juan Mascaro again
ldquoThe finite in man longs for the Infinite The love that moves the stars moves also the heart of man and a law of spiritual gravitation leads his soul to the soul of the universe Man sees the sun by the light of the sun and he sees the spirit by the light of his own inner spirit The radiance of eternal beauty shines over this vast universe and in moments of contemplation we can see the Eternal in things that pass away This is the message of the great spiritual seers and all poetry and art and beauty is only an infinite variation of this message The spiritual visions of man confirm and illumine each other Great poems in different languages have different values but they all are poetry and the spiritual visions of man come all from one Light In them we have Lamps of Fire that burn to the glory of Godrdquo
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RP DWIVEDI Page 117
JOHN KEATS
(31 October 1795 ndash 23 February 1821)
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RP DWIVEDI Page 118
JOHN KEATS
English Romantic Poet
The son of a livery-stable manager he had a limited
formal education He worked as a surgeons apprentice
and assistant for several years before devoting himself
entirely to poetry at age 21 His first mature work was
the sonnet On First Looking into Chapmans Homer
(1816) His long Endymion appeared in the same year
(1818) as the first symptoms of the tuberculosis that
would kill him at age 25 During a few intense months of
1819 he produced many of his greatest works several
great odes (including Ode on a Grecian Urn Ode to a
Nightingale and To Autumnrdquo) two unfinished
versions of the story of the titan Hyperion and La Belle
Dame Sans Merci Most were published in the
landmark collection Lamia Isabella The Eve of St Agnes and Other Poems (1820) Marked by vivid imagery great
sensuous appeal and a yearning for the lost glories of
the Classical world his finest works are among the
greatest of the English tradition His letters are among
the best by any English poet
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 119
CHAPTER SIX
JOHN KEATS A MINSTREL OF BEAUTY AND TRUTH
INTRODUCTION
John Keats who in his own words was lsquoa fair creature of an hourrsquo lived a brief and turbulent life Pre-eminently a
sensuous poet in whom the Romantic sensibility to
outward impressions of sight sound touch and smell
reached its climax the life of Keats was a series of
sensations felt with febrile acuteness
His ideal was passive contemplation rather than active
mental exertion ldquoO for a life of sensations rather than of thoughtrdquo he exclaimed in one of his letters and in
another ldquoit is more noble to sit like Jove than to fly like Mercuryrdquo In fact his was a life of intense sensations
acute poignancy and an infinite yearning for beauty
which he identified with truth
Richness of sensuousness characterizes all his poetry
and his power of expression is marked by a spectacular
vividness which is interspersed with beautiful epithets
heavily charged with subtle messages for the senses His
works are so full of luxuriance of sensations and acute
passions that ordinary readers do not pause to perceive
the unimpeded flow of spiritual thoughts underneath
The pursuit of the spirit of beauty dominates all his
works which have one enduring message ndash the
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 120
lastingness of beauty and its identity with supreme
truth (or God) This message ndash the oneness of beauty
with truth and the eternal existence of truth ndash has been
beautifully enshrined in his famous and oft-quoted lines
(with which he concludes his Ode on a Grecian Urn)
ldquoBeauty is truth truth beauty ndash that is all
Ye know on earth and all ye need to knowrdquo
Keats died at the age of 26 but even from his early age
he had visions of rare spiritual significance Dwelling on
the value of visions in human life and poetry he says
ldquoSince every man whose soul is not a clod
Hath vision
For poesy alone can tell her dreams
With the fine spell of words alone can save
Imagination from the sable chain
And dumb enchantmentrdquo
Since common readers tend to ignore the underlying
spiritual import of his visions and images this article
aims at bringing into play some of the poetrsquos thoughts
which bear a remarkable resemblance to the age-old
hoary spirituality of our ancient land
Stressing the fundamental truths of our Indian thought
and tracing their distinct reflection in the works of great
Western poets seems a worth-while academic pursuit
FUNDAMENTAL UNITY
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RP DWIVEDI Page 121
From the very beginning Keats could realize the
fundamental unity of Truth and Beauty and could dwell
at length on it to show how diverse paths illumined by
the glory of spirit in man ultimately lead him to the
realization of this abiding lesson of life The supreme
oneness of Truth has been beautifully enunciated by Sri
Krishna in the Bhagvad Gita
ldquoIn any way that men love Me in that same way they find My love for many are the paths of men but they all in the end come to Merdquo
Similar thoughts have found expression in the
introduction to the Upanishads by Juan Mascaro
ldquoThe path of Truth may not be a path of parallel lines but a path that follows one circle by going to the right and climbing the circle or by going to the left and climbing the circle we are bound to meet at the top although we started in apparently contrary directions This is bound to be in the end because Truth is onerdquo
And when Keats was only 22 he could give expression
to deep thoughts that have a curious similarity to the
ideas expressed in the Mundak Upanishad and the
Bhagvad Gita
ldquoNow it appears to me that almost any man may like the spider spin from his own inwards his own airy citadel the points of leaves and twigs on which the spider begins her work are few and she fills the air with a beautiful circuiting Man should be content with as few points to tip with the fine Web of his Soul and weave a tapestry empyrean-full of symbols for his spiritual eye of softness for his spiritual touch of space for his wanderings of distinctness for his luxuryrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 122
ldquoBut the minds of mortals are so different and bent on such diverse journeys that it may at first appear impossible for any common taste and fellowship to exist between two or three under these suppositions It is however quite the contrary Minds would leave each other in contrary directions traverse each other in numberless points and at last greet each other at the journeyrsquos end An old man and a child would talk together and the old man be led on his path and the child left thinkingrdquo
ldquoMan should not dispute or assert but whisper results to his neighbor and thus by every germ of spirit sucking the sap from mould ethereal every human might become great and humanity instead of being a wide heath of furze and briars with here and there a remote oak or pine would become a great democracy of forest treesrdquo
WISDOM
All men of good will are bound to meet if they follow the
wisdom of the words Shakespeare in Hamlet where if
we write SELF or self we find the doctrine of the
Upanishad
ldquoThis above all to thine own self be true
And it must follow as the night the day
Thou canst not then be false to any manrdquo
Now coming back to the theme of beauty and truth and
their ultimate identity in the universe we have to dwell
at large on the concept of beauty as enunciated by Keats
in his poetry From the very beginning Keats realized
that beauty in its true sense illumines manrsquos thoughts
and thus leads him to understand the glory of truth and
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RP DWIVEDI Page 123
the pervading spirit of their identity in whatever he
sees hears and perceives
The eternal identity or oneness of beauty with truth and
their interplay in the world are in fact unfailing
fountains of joy The permanence of beauty as a source
of joy has been beautifully elucidated by the poet in the
opening lines of his famous poem Endymion
ldquoA thing of beauty is a joy forever
Its loveliness increases it will never
Pass into nothingnessrdquo
He goes on to say
ldquoSome shape of beauty moves away the pall
From our dark spirits
An endless fountain of immortal drink
Pouring unto us from the heavenrsquos brink
Nor do we merely feel these essences
For one short hour
glories infinite
Haunt us till they become a cheering light
Unto our souls and bound to us so fast
That whether there be shine or gloom overcast
They always must be with us or we dierdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 124
When he ascribes permanence to joy born of beauty
Keats has in mind the immanence and effulgence of
beauty as a reflection of its creator God Beauty whose
lsquoloveliness increasesrsquo and which lsquowill never pass into nothingnessrsquo is an inalienable attribute of Divinity for it
is lsquoan endless fountain of immortal drinkrsquo
BEAUTY
God (as the poet seems to presuppose) is all Beautiful or
the embodiment of all Beauty and the entire world of
sights and sounds is nothing else but a glorious garment
of God So beauty does not consist only in apparent
physical appearances but is an offspring of inherent
divinity in man and nature which is dimly reflected in
their attractive exterior Such an eternal beauty in his
view presents lsquoglories infinite that haunt us till they become a cheering light unto our souls It is this beauty the glory of spirit which must be with us or we dierdquo
The poetrsquos concept of beauty with its glories infinite
bears a striking resemblance with the path of splendour
of our Vedic and epic scriptures in which our sages
perceived the Divine presence in all that is splendid and
beautiful in the universe
Our Vedic texts are full of the expressions of the sage-
poetrsquos exquisite astonishment before the visions of
glory and wonder The attitude of our Vedic seer-poets
towards beauty as a transcendental reality beyond our
sense-perceptions has been beautifully expressed in
images of beauty and glory as an abstract idea Says Rig Veda
ldquoSinless for noble power under the influence of Savita God
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 125
May we obtain all things that are beautifulrdquo
GOODNESS
Here the power of goodness is contemplated to lead to
the power of beauty Beauty in its myriad forms leads
us to spiritual consciousness of Divinity inherent in
Nature and all living beings Identical thoughts have
been expressed by Sri Krishna in Chapter X of the
Bhagvad Gita where all splendour and glory is said to
be the reflection of God whose manifestation this
universe is Says Sri Krishna to Arjuna
ldquoKnow thou that whatever is beautiful and good whatever has glory and power is only a portion of My own radiancerdquo
Bhagvad Gita X41
Seeing the effulgence of a thousand suns bursting forth
and yet it could hardly match the splendour of the
supreme Lord Arjuna exclaimed in wonder
ldquoI see the splendour of an infinite beauty which illumines the whole universe It is thee With thy crown and scepter and circle How difficult thou art to see But I see thee as fire as the Sun blinding incomprehensiblerdquo
Bhagvad Gita XI17
Besides this concept of ultimate elemental beauty
Keats goes on to underscore its fundamental and
inseparable unity with Truth which is yet another
inalienable facet of Divinity on earth
Truth being an essential attribute of God lies at the
core of all existence and it sustains the entire universe
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 126
with its manifold forms of beauty reflected in countless
objects around us When Keats declares that lsquoBeauty is truth truth beautyrsquo he seems to remind us of the age-old
spiritual consciousness that found sublime utterance in
our Vedas which are the oldest treatises on lsquophilosophia perennisrsquo the eternal philosophy In the Vedas truth has
been described as the essence of Divinity
ldquoThe deity has truth as the law of His beingrdquo
Atharva Veda VIIXXIV1
The Rig Veda calls the deities as various manifestations
of Truth Elsewhere in the Rig Veda the Deity has been
described as true and the path of religious progress is
the ingredient of Dharma Declares the Rig Veda
ldquoBy truth is the earth upheldrdquo
Rig Veda X85
An Upanishadic sage says
ldquoTruth alone triumphs not untruth By Truth the spiritual path is widened that path by which the seers who are free from all cravings and declares travel and reach the supreme abode of Truthrdquo
Mundak Upanishad IIII6
So Truth is a basic postulate of Dharma and an abiding
and ultimate value of life It is the eternal oneness of
beauty and truth and truth and beauty that inspired
Keats to stress their underlying unity and their
transcendental reality When Keats says ldquoThat is all ye know on earth and all ye need to knowrdquo he points to that
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 127
ecstatic wonder which the spiritual realization of this
eternal truth brings to a seeker or seer or a poet
SUBLIMITY
Keats seems to have reached such a sublime plane of
poetic consciousness that is so aptly suggested by our
Vedic seers who have extolled God as a poet (कव) and
His divine creative energy is indicated as the poetic
power (काय) which has assumed manifold forms of
beauty and splendour So God as the supreme creator of
beauty has been described in the Rig Veda as
ldquoHe who is supporter of the world of life
Who knows the secret mysterious names
Of the morning beams
He poet cherishes manifold forms
By His poetic powerrdquo
Rig Veda VIIIXL5
So let me hasten to the conclusion by affirming that as
lsquoa lily for a dayrsquo Keats proved that a crowded hour of
glory is far better than an age without a name he seems
to have lived up to the lofty advice of Queen Vidula to
her son King Sanjaya in the Mahabharat
महतम 0व1लत 2यो न त धमऽतम 4चर
ldquoIt is better to flame forth for an instant than smoke away for agesrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 128
Eternal truths transcend the barriers of time and space
country and clime caste and creed and shine through all
lands and in all ages Even today the enlightened souls
all over the world have a significant identity of ideas
irrespective of the countries to which they belong and
the religious faith to which they are affiliated
Such wise men awaken others from a state of
intellectual and spiritual slumber enkindle in them a
sense of understanding and fraternity It has been
rightly said by HW Longfellow
ldquoLives of great men all remind us
We can make our lives sublime
And departing leave behind us
Footprints on the sand of Timerdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 129
RW EMERSON
(25 May 1803 ndash 27 April 1882)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 130
RW EMERSON
US Poet Essayist and Lecturer
Emerson graduated from Harvard University and was
ordained a Unitarian minister in 1829 His questioning
of traditional doctrine led him to resign the ministry
three years later He formulated his philosophy in
Nature (1836) the book helped initiate New England
Transcendentalism a movement of which he soon
became the leading exponent In 1834 he moved to
Concord Mass the home of his friend Henry David
Thoreau His lectures on the proper role of the scholar
and the waning of the Christian tradition caused
considerable controversy In 1840 with Margaret
Fuller he helped launch The Dial a journal that
provided an outlet for Transcendentalist ideas He
became internationally famous with his Essays (1841
1844) including Self-Reliance Representative Men
(1850) consists of biographies of historical figures The Conduct of Life (1860) his most mature work reveals a
developed humanism and a full awareness of human
limitations His Poems (1847) and May-Day (1867)
established his reputation as a major poet
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 131
CHAPTER SEVEN
EMERSONrsquoS SPIRITUAL QUEST AND INDIAN THOUGHT
INTRODUCTION
Ralph Waldo Emerson the lsquoSage of Concordrsquo as he is
rightly called was an American seer who came into the
world at a time when East and the West were gradually
coming closer to each other in spheres more than one
trade and commerce between the two was gaining
momentum and above all the era of inter-
communication of ideas intellect and spirit was being
ushered in by exchange of books
Emerson was one of the first great Americans who
absorbed himself sufficiently in this phenomenon
ventured into the sacred literature of India and
assimilated its thought to such a remarkable degree that
he became its eminent interpreter to his countrymen in
particular and to the entire West in general
EMERSON AND THE GITA
Let us see what Swami Vivekananda said about the
source of Emersonrsquos inspiration Swamiji said
ldquoThe greatest incident of the (Mahabharata) war was the marvelous and immortal poem of the Gita the Song Celestial It is the popular scripture of India and the loftiest of all teachings I would advise those of you who have not read that book to read it If you only knew how
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 132
much it has influenced your own country (America) even If you want to know the source of Emersonrsquos inspiration it is this book the Gita He went to see Carlyle and Carlyle made him a present of the Gita and that little book is responsible for the Concord Movement All the broad movements in America in one way or other are indebted to the Concord partyrdquo
His interest in the sacred writings of India was probably
aroused at Harvard and he kept it aglow throughout his
life With his motto ldquoTomorrow to fresh fields and pastures newrdquo he set out in search of the True (Satyam)
the Good (Shivam) and the Beautiful (Sundaram)
In busy and bustling New England there came forward
to quote Theodore Parker ldquothis young David a shepherd but to be a king with his garlands and singing robes about him one note upon his new and fresh-string lyre was worth a thousand menrdquo
With unflinching faith in Truth Righteousness and
Beauty and absolute confidence in all the attributes of
infinity he drank deep at the unfailing source of Indian
philosophy and religion and gave his thoughts such a
lucid inimitable expression that his writings have
become a veritable treasure of world literature Revered
the world over held in high esteem by great Indians like
Rabindranath Tagore and Pt Jawaharlal Nehru and
admired by Gandhiji his writings abound in the beauty
of his speech the majesty of his ideas and the loftiness
of his moral sentiments
Perhaps the most fitting commentary on the relevance
of his thoughts to our country was made by Mahatma
Gandhi after reading his Essays Said Mahatma Gandhi
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 133
ldquoThe Essays to my mind contain the teaching of Indian wisdom in a Western Guru It is interesting to see our own sometimes differently fashionedrdquo
There are indeed innumerable points of similarity in
thought and experience between Emerson and the
mainstream of Indian philosophy The philosophy of
Vedanta which was one of the thought currents that
reached America in the first half of the 19th century
influenced Emerson deeply and contributed largely to
his concept of lsquoselfhoodrsquo Emerson found the Vedic
doctrines of soul congenial to his own ideas about manrsquos
relationship to the universe He therefore drew freely
upon the Hindu scriptures which contain a vivid and
well-elaborated doctrine of lsquoSelfrsquo Numerous references
in his essays and journals to the lsquoLaws of Manursquo
(Manusmriti) Vishnu Puran Bhagvad Gita and Katha Upanishad bear ample testimony to this fact
Let us examine some of the striking identities between
Emerson and the Vedanta The Upanishads tell us that
the central core of onersquos self is clearly identifiable with
the Cosmic Reality ldquoThe self within you the resplendent immortal person is the internal self of all things and is the Universal Brahmanrdquo The Chhandogya Upanishad tells
us that ldquothe self which inhabits the body is verily the Brahman and that as soon as the mortal coil is thrown over it will finally merge in Brahmanrdquo
How close was Emersonrsquos spiritual kinship with the
Vedantic doctrines is clear from the following lines
taken from his essay Plato or the Philosopher
ldquoIn all nations there are minds which incline to dwell in the conception of the Fundamental Unity the ecstasy of losing all being in one Being This tendency
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 134
finds its highest expression chiefly in the Indian scriptures in the Vedas the Bhagvad Gita and the Vishnu Puranrdquo
He further quotes Lord Krishna speaking to a sage ldquoYou are fit to apprehend that you are not distinct from meThat which I am thou art and that also in this world with its gods and heroes and mankind Men contemplate distinctions because they are stupefied with ignorance What is the great end of all you shall now learn from me It is soul-one in all bodies pervading uniform perfect pre-eminent over nature exempt from birth growth and decay Omnipresent made up of true knowledge independent unconnected with unrealities with name species and the rest in time past present and to come The knowledge that this spirit which is essentially one is in onersquos own and all other bodies is the wisdom of one who knows the unity of thingsrdquo
In formulating his own concept of the Over-soul
Emerson quotes Lord Krishna once again
ldquoWe live in succession in division in parts in particles Meantime within man is the soul of the whole the wise silence the universal beauty to which every part and particle is equally related the eternal One And this deep power in which we exist and whose beatitude is all accessible to us is not only self-sufficing and perfect in every hour but in the act of seeing and the thing seen the seer and the spectacle the subject and the object are one We see the world piece by piece as the sun the moon the animal the tree but the whole of which these are shining parts is the Soul Only by the vision of that wisdom can the horoscope of ages be readrdquo
The Over-Soul
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 135
A transcendentalist par excellence Emerson who was
influenced by German philosophers like Kant Hegel
Fichte and Schelling and their English interpreters
Coleridge and Carlyle affirmed that man could
apprehend reality by direct spiritual insight To him
intuition knew truths which ldquotranscendedrdquo those
accessible to intellect logical argument and scientific
inquiry Such a transcendentalism or attitude which
provided a metaphysical justification for the ideal of
individual freedom was found writ large in the holy
books of India
Steeped as he was in the oriental lore echoes of
Vedantic philosophy can be distinctly heard in his
writings which shine like ldquoa good deed in a naughty worldrdquo
Some of his poems resemble Vedantic literature in form
as well as in content His two famous poems Brahma
and Hamatreya are striking examples of such a close
affinity both in content and expression Ideas and
images in Brahma reflect certain passages which
Emerson had copied into his journals from the Vishnu
Puran the Bhagvad Gita and Katha Upanishad The first
stanza of Brahma which reads
ldquoIf the red slayer think he slays
Or if the slain think he is slain
They know not well the subtle ways
I keep and pass and turn againrdquo
is essentially an adaptation of these lines from the
Katha Upanishad
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 136
ldquoIf the slayer thinks I slay if the slain thinks I am slain then both of them do not know well It (the soul) does not slay nor is it slainrdquo
Katha Upanishad II19
The same lines with a little variation of course appear
in the Bhagvad Gita
ldquoThey are both ignorant he who knows that the soul to be capable of killing and he who takes it as killed for verily the soul neither kills nor is killedrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II19
The image of Brahma as a red slayer has been derived
from the Vishnu Puran where Lord Shiva the destroyer
of Creation has been depicted as Rudra (the red slayer)
but destruction envisages new creation and therefore
symbolizes the decadence of one and necessitates the
advent of the other This is why Lord Shiva is regarded
as the god not only of extermination but also of
regeneration With this concept is connected the cult of
Shaivagam ndash the ushering in of an era of general good
and prosperity when the world is created anew
The second and third stanzas of Brahma echo the
following lines of the Bhagvad Gita
ldquoI am the ritual action I am the sacrifice I am the ancestral oblation I am the sacred hymn I am the melted butter I am the fire and I am the offeringrdquo
Bhagvad Gita IX16
and also from the same source
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 137
ldquoI am immortality as well as death I am being as well as non-beingrdquo
Bhagvad Gita IX19
In the fourth stanza of Brahma there is a direct
reference to lsquothe Sacred Sevenrsquo ndash the seven highest saints
of our country namely Kashyapa Atri Bharadwaj Vishwamitra Gautam Vashishtha and Jamadagni Thus
we find that Brahma embodies an age-old Vedantic
truth
As regards his next poem Hamatreya its very title is a
variation of a disciplersquos name lsquoMaitreyarsquo to whom the
earth had recited a few verses Before we examine the
poem critically let us read a long passage from the
Vishnu Puran Book IV which Emerson had copied into
his 1845 Journal This passage which sheds ample light
on the background and theme of the poem under
reference reads
ldquoKings who with perishable frames have possessed this ever-enduring world and who blinded with deceptive notions of individual occupation have indulged the feeling that suggests lsquoThis earth is mine it is my sonrsquos it belongs to my dynastyrsquo have all passed awayearth laughs as if smiling with autumnal flowers to behold her kings unable to effect the subjugation of themselvesthese were the verses Maitreya which earth recited and by listening to which ambition fades away like snow before the windrdquo
Journals VII127-130
How futile is human vanity and how ridiculous is the
possessive instinct in man has been thoroughly exposed
by Emerson in the following lines
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RP DWIVEDI Page 138
ldquoEarth laughs in flowers to see her boastful boys
Earth-proud proud of the earth which is not theirs
Who steer the plough but cannot steer their feet
Clear of the graverdquo
Hamatreya
Man who awaits lsquothe inevitable hourrsquo forgets that all his
heraldry pomp power wealth and lsquopaths of gloryrsquo lead
him lsquobut to the graversquo and grows so proud of his material
achievements and so deeply attached to the fleeting
things of the world that he loses sight of the supreme
philosophical truth - the ephemerality of the world and
the immortality of soul Death which is lurking in the
shadows can lay his icy hands upon us any day yet due
to false pride and sense of meum and attachment we
allow ourselves to be duped by the passing show of the
world without ever thinking of salvation or final release
from the worldly bondages Says Emerson
ldquoAh the hot owner sees not Death who adds
Him to his land a lump of mould the morerdquo
Hamatreya
Here Emerson seems to have been deeply influences by
Indian scriptures and particularly Ishopanishad and
the Bhagvad Gita in which the philosophy of God-
realization through detached action has been succinctly
elaborated In these two sacred books it has been stated
that total renunciation of the sense of meum egotism
and attachment with regard to the world all worldly
objects body and all actions is a path to real love for
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 139
God All worldly objects like land wealth house clothes
all relations like parents wife children friends and all
forms of worldly enjoyment like honour fame prestige
being the creations of Maya are wholly deluding
transient and perishable whereas one God alone the
embodiment of Existence (Sat) Knowledge (Chit) and
Bliss (Anand) is all in all omnipotent omniscient and
omnipresent Therefore all sense of meum egotism and
attachment must be totally renounced for spiritual
growth and pure exclusive love for God If the seed of
egoism is sown sorrow is the fruit On the other hand
the more a man cultivates dispassion and
disinterestedness with regard to the world the more
easily he transcends the barriers of Ignorance (Avidya)
Delusion (Maya) and Aversion (Dvesha) and marches
on the path of self-realization and God-realization A
similar thought current runs through the following
memorable lines of Earth-Song which forms an integral
part of the poem
ldquoThe earth says
They called me theirs who so controlled me
Yet every one wished to stay and is gone
How am I theirs if they cannot hold me
But I hold themrdquo
Hamatreya
These lines remind us of those memorable words of
Lord Krishna in the Bhagvad Gita XII16 where a true
devotee is characterized as one who is ldquodelivered from the egorsquos thrall - the sense of I and minerdquo or the feeling of
doership in all undertakings
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 140
After reading these lines which seem to refer to the
famous Biblical phrase lsquodust thou art to dust returnethrsquo
the readers may feel called upon to cultivate a sense of
detachment and renunciation for their ambition fades
away and their lsquoavarice cooled like dust in the chill of the graversquo
All art it has been said is an attempt to distract man
from his ego Emersonrsquos Hamatreya is certainly an
illustrious example of great art Highly didactic in
content and tone this poem reminds us of that sublime
mood in which Emerson realized the futility of
egocentric attachment to earth and its fleeting objects
which are shadows rather than substances
Emersonrsquos writings leave us to quote John Milton lsquoCalm of mind all passions spentrsquo A fitting comment on the
total impact of Emersonrsquos works on us has been given
by a brilliant American man of letters Theodore Parker
who says
ldquoA good test of the comparative value of books is the state they leave you in Emerson leaves you tranquil resolved on noble manhood fearless of the consequences he gives men to mankind and mankind to the laws of Godrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 141
HD THOREAU
(12 July 1817 ndash 6 May 1862)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 142
HD THOREAU
US Thinker Essayist and Naturalist
Thoreau graduated from Harvard University and taught
school for several years before leaving his job to
become a poet of nature Back in Concord he came
under the influence of Ralph Waldo Emerson and began
to publish pieces in the Transcendentalist magazine The Dial In the years 1845ndash47 to demonstrate how
satisfying a simple life could be he lived in a hut beside
Concords Walden Pond essays recording his daily life
were assembled for his masterwork Walden (1854) His
A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers (1849)
was the only other book he published in his lifetime He
reflected on a night he spent in jail protesting the
Mexican-American War in the essay Civil
Disobedience (1849) which would later influence such
figures as Mohandas K Gandhi and Martin Luther King
Jr In later years his interest in Transcendentalism
waned and he became a dedicated abolitionist His
many nature writings and records of his wanderings in
Canada Maine and Cape Cod display the mind of a keen
naturalist After his death his collected writings were
published in 20 volumes and further writings have
continued to appear in print
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 143
CHAPTER EIGHT
THOREAUrsquoS TRYST WITH INDIAN CULTURE
INTRODUCTION
Henry David Thoreau was a great American
transcendentalist thinker His seminal mind and
original thought had an enduring impact on his own
countrymen and also on peoples beyond the bounds of
America His philosophy and life had a deep influence
on all great men of his time Mahatma Gandhi regarded
him as his Guru and his concept of Satyagraha owes its
origin to Thoreaursquos essay on Civil Disobedience which
Gandhiji chanced upon in South Africa On Thoreaursquos
greatness another great American contemporary RW
Emerson once remarked ldquoHis soul was made for the noblest society he had in short life exhausted the capabilities of this world Wherever there is knowledge wherever there is virtue wherever there is beauty he will find a homerdquo
HIS LOVE OF SOLITUDE
Endowed with a rare meditative mind Thoreau loved
lsquosweet solitudersquo for he held that what is truly alone is the
spirit A seeker after perfection he retired to the
solitude of the woods to see with the eyes of the soul ndash
ldquothe higher law in naturerdquo and realize his oneness with
the Cosmic Spirit A lover of the spirit behind the world
of appearance he once said ndash ldquoI love to be alone I never
found the companion that was so companionable as
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 144
solitude In solitude of the woods I suddenly recover my
spirits my spirituality I can go from the buttercups to
the life everlastingrdquo His love for loneliness resembles
that of our own sages and saints who shunned the din
and clamour of madding crowds and retired to the
sylvan solitude of the woods for meditation on
mysteries of life It was in the secluded and tranquil
atmosphere of the woods that the great teachers of
mankind cultivated their souls observed austerity and
wrote the holiest scriptures Aranyakas and sacred texts
Gurukul (forest academies)- the ideal nurseries of
higher learning and disciplined rigorous life were setup
here for success in life and self-realization which is a
path-way to God-realization
HIS CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE AND GANDHIJIrsquoS
SATYAGRAHA
Bapu read Thoreaursquos essay on Civil Disobedience for
the second time in jail and was so deeply impressed by
it that he called it ldquoa masterly treatise which left a deep impression on merdquo He copied the words ldquoI did not feel for a moment confined and the walls seemed a great waste of stone and mortarrdquo Gandhiji wrote to Roosevelt
in 1942 ldquoI have profited greatly by the writings of Thoreau and Emersonrdquo He told Roger Baldwin that
Thoreaursquos essay ldquocontained the essence of his political philosophy not only as Indiarsquos struggle related to the British but as to his own views of the relation of citizens to Governmentrdquo As Miller observed ldquoGandhiji received back from America what was fundamentally the philosophy of India after it had been distilled and crystallized in the mind of Thoreaurdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 145
In his Civil Disobedience which as a document of
much ethical and spiritual value is manrsquos most powerful
weapon in dealing with tyranny Thoreau examines the
relation of the individual to the state and offers a candid
exposition when he says ldquoThat Government is best which governs the leastrdquo He believed in the supremacy of
moral laws and his concept of Civil Disobedience is
based on the dictates of conscience Since the nature of
an individual is determined by his conscience there is
always a basic conflict between the laws arbitrarily
made by the Government and the objectives sanctioned
and held sacred by the individualrsquos conscience He
regarded the individual as more important than the
state So in the interests of justice and virtue men with
clean conscience most oppose unjust laws The form of
protest launched by conscientious and holy men against
government is called Civil Disobedience
Thoreau seems to have derived the concept from the
Bhagvad Gita which invests each individual with two
contradictory traits ndash the Divine Attributes and the
Diabolical Propensities Whenever diabolical tendencies
promote arbitrary administration by making unjust
laws and men of clean conscience are forced to obey
them injustice prevails and justice or righteousness is
destroyed In such a situation the Divinity incarnates
itself and sets matters right Declares Lord Krishna
ldquoWhenever righteousness (Virtue) is on the decline and injustice (Vice) is on the ascendant then I body forth myselfrdquo
Bhagvad Gita IV7
To Gandhiji also Satya (Truth) and Ahimsa (Non-
violence) are inter-related and Satyagraha or non-
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 146
violent resistance is based on the belief in the power of
spirit the power of truth the power of love by which we
can overcome evil through self-suffering and self-
sacrifice
FORMATIVE INDIAN INFLUENCES
Thoreau was thoroughly immersed in the Indian
scriptures In Emersonrsquos library he read and was deeply
influenced by the Manusmriti Bhagvad Gita Vishnu Puran Hitopadesh Rig-Veda and the Upanishads
Which the Manusmriti led him to seek the Self in
solitude the Bhagvad Gita taught him the ideal of
disinterested action non-attachment meditation and
self-realization He was so overwhelmed by the Gita that
he declared it to be the lsquoUniversal Gospelrsquo Praising its
moral grandeur and sustained sublimity of thoughts he
wrote in Walden ndash ldquoIn the morning I bathe my intellect in the stupendous cosmogonal philosophy of the Bhagvad Gita since whose composition years of the gods have elapsed and in comparison with which our modern world and its literature seems puny and trivial the best Hindu scripture (Gita) is remarkable for its pure intellectuality The reader is nowhere raised into and sustained in a higher purer and rarer region of thought than the Bhagvad Gita It is unquestionably one of the noblest and most sacred scriptures which have come down to us The oriental philosophy assigns their due rank respectively to action and contemplation or rather does full Justice to the latterrdquo
A thorough study of the Upanishads made him exclaim
joyfully ldquoWhat extracts from the Vedas I have read fall on me like the light of a higher and purer luminary which describes a loftier course through a purer stratum ndash free from particulars simple universalrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 147
At a time when the Western philosophers did not
appreciate the significance of contemplation Thoreau
emphasized that contemplation is as important as
action for the latter has to be charged by the former
otherwise action will lead to chaos disillusionment and
despair
HIS TRANSCENDENTALISM
Thoreau was an empirical transcendentalist To him
transcendentalism was a profound exploration of the
spiritual foundations of life His emphasis on intuition
or inner light for a direct relationship with God which
transcends all the conventional avenues of
communication stemmed from an intuitive capacity for
grasping the ultimate truth He was interested less in
the material world than in spiritual reality He regarded
Nature as a viable garment of the spiritual world and
the universe as the embodiment of a single Cosmic Soul
His transcendentalism relied upon the higher planes of
human circumstances its oneness with something
higher than itself While logical reasoning fails to grasp
the truth intuition transcends understanding and is a
synthesizing power to understand the organic whole
which is called the Over-soul
An individual of exceptional self-ascending and self-
reliance he believed that Over-soul is brought down to
earth by action rather than words He therefore did not
preach transcendentalism but actually lived it To him
transcendentalism is ldquoan inquisitive and contemplative access to Godrdquo He believed in the immanence of God in
nature and in man and also the identity of God with the
soul of the individual He said ldquothe creator is still behind the increate the Divinity is so fleeting that its attributes are never expressedthe idea of God is the idea of
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 148
our Spiritual nature purified and enlarged to infinity In ourselves are the elements of Divinity We see God around us because He dwells within usrdquo
This statement reminds us of a verse in the Gita
wherein Lord Krishna declares that every living heart is
His abode
ldquoArjuna God abides in the heart of all creatures causing them to revolve according to their deeds by His illusive power seated as those beings are in the vehicle of the bodyrdquo
At one place Thoreau said ldquoThe whole is whole an organic whole which is called Over-soul or Para-Brahman and the highest aim of life is to realize this truth and be one with the whole or Over-soulrdquo Thoreau seems to have
been moved by our Vedic incantation which says
ldquoThat (the invisible Absolute) is whole whole is this (the visible phenomenal universe) from the invisible whole comes forth the visible whole Though the visible whole has come out from that invisible whole yet the whole remains unalteredrdquo Thus the phenomenal and the
Absolute are inseparable All existence is in the
Absolute and whatever exists must exist in it hence all
manifestation is merely a modification of the one
Supreme Whole and neither increases nor diminishes It
Serene and thoughtful as he was he wrote in his
Journal ldquoThe fact is I am a mystic a transcendentalist and a natural philosopher to bootrdquo
HIS ASCETISM (SANNYASA)
He was a true ascetic or Sannyasi for he preached and
practiced the basic human values of Anasakti (non-
attachment) and Aparigraha (non-possession)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 149
throughout his life He abhorred acquisition of wealth
and regarded worldly possessions as the result of sheer
exploitation of the masses by a few powerful men and
agencies including the State and the Government Since
the universe belongs to God any claim to ownership or
personal possessions is against moral law and is in fact
a sin against divinity Moral laws being superior to
worldly rules his preference for a life of self-abnegation
and renunciation bears a striking similarity to our Vedic
view expressed in the very opening line of the
Ishopanishad
ldquoAll this whatever exists in the universe is inhabited by the Lord Having renounced (the unreal) enjoy (the real) with restraint Do not covet or set your eye on the possession of othersrdquo
To him all worldly attractions and allurements were but
a passing show or fleeting moments (in eternity) which
distract the seekers of truth from cultivating self-culture
and promoting inner spiritual growth
EXPLORER OF THE INNER WORLD OF SPIRIT
Thoreau was an explorer of the inner self He wanted to
pass ldquoan invisible boundaryrdquo establishment within and
around him new universal and more liberal laws and
live with higher order of beings To him every man is
the Lord of the realm beside which the earthly empire
of the Czar is but a petty state a hammock left by the
icethere are continents and seas in the moral
world yet unexplored by him He praised William
Habbingtonrsquos following lines which echoed his own
thoughts
ldquoDirect your eyes right inward and you will find
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 150
A thousand regions in your mind
Yet undiscovered Travel then and be
Expert in home home cosmographyrdquo
Simple living based on extreme reduction of wants and
self-reliance enabled him to lsquocultivate the garden of his soulrsquo In consonance with the concept of an ideal Yogi in
the Gita he wrote
ldquoThe millions are awake enough for physical labour but only one in a million is awake enough for effective intellectual exertion and only one in a hundred millions do a poetic or divine liferdquo How truly does this view echo
the memorable words of Lord Krishna
ldquoAmong thousands of men one rare soul strives for perfection and among those who strive with success one perchance knows me in truthrdquo
Condemning people who go to Africa to hunt giraffes for
pastime he exhorted them to aim at seeking their own
lsquoSelfrsquo He said ldquoIt would be a noble game to shoot onersquos selfrdquo He seems to recall the famous verse of the
Mundakopanishad which says
ldquoThe Pranava is the bow the Atman is the arrow and the Brahman is said to be its mark It should be hit by one who is self-collected and that which hits becomes like the arrow one with the mark ie Brahmanrdquo
When he ordains lsquoto shoot oneselfrsquo he like our Vedic
seers hints at penetrating the truth centre in us with
our mind propelled by the motive force generated in the
voiceless ecstasy of deepest meditation which touches
the Brahman the Ultimate Reality When the individual
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 151
soul gets fully detached from its contacts with matter or
its false identification with material envelopment it
realizes its oneness with the Supreme Brahman How
beautifully has he stressed the value of inner search in
the concluding sentence of Walden
ldquoThe light which puts out our eyes is darkness to us Only that day dawns to which we are awake There is more day to dawn The Sun is but a morning starrdquo
IMMORTALITY OF SOUL AND THE DOCTRINE OF
TRANSMIGRATION
Thoreau firmly believed in the immortality of soul and
its transmigration He had fully imbibed the philosophy
of the Gita which enunciates in unequivocal terms the
permanence of the soul and the transience of the body
Says Lord Krishna
ldquoThis soul is never born and never dies nor does it become only after being born For it is unborn eternal everlasting and ancient even though the body is slain the soul is notrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II20
ldquoAs a man shedding worn-out garments takes other new ones likewise the embodied soul casting off worn-out bodies enters into others which are newrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II22
Thoreau considered his life as a series of many more
lives to come On his return from Waldon Pond he said
ldquoI had several more lives to live and could not spare any more for that onerdquo At another place he refers to the
solitary hired manrsquos lsquosecond birth and peculiar religious
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 152
experiencersquo He evidently recalled the following words of
St John ldquoExcept a man be born again he cannot see the kingdom of Godrdquo In his Waldon he refers to a bug and
declares ldquoWho does not feel his faith in a resurrection and immortality Who knows what beautiful and winged whose egg has been buried for ages under many concentric layers of woodenness in the dead dry life in societyheard perchance of gnawing out now for years by the astonished family of man may unexpectedly come forth from amidst societyrsquos most trivial furniture to enjoy its perfect summer life at lastrdquo
CONCLUSION
Thoreau was a true Yogi or an ascetic modeling on the
Indian tradition of strict moral code of conduct for a
Sannyasi He drew abundant spiritual and moral
sustenance from the Indian scriptures and its rich
lsquoculturersquo and approximated the ideal of a perfect recluse
The concept of an ideal Yogi is similar upto a point to
the postulates of Divinity expressed thus in the Atharva Veda
ldquoThe Yogi is desireless and hence free from the impact of animal nature he is serene in the heroism of the spirit he is satisfied with the essence of things perceived spirituality and hence does not depend on sense-perception for happiness and so he is complete in himself And though the physical body is subject to decay and death he remains unworn and ever youthful in spirit and has no fear of deathrdquo
Atharva Veda XVIII44
Such an enlightenment Yogi or spiritual superman was
Thoreau whose greatness will ever inspire us and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 153
illumine our lifersquos path with light and love His life was
lsquoa chronicle of actions just and brightrsquo and his writings
were lsquowrit with beams of heavenly light on which the eyes of God not rarely lookrsquo
Proof
Printed By Createspace
Digital Proofer
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 2
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY (An Indian Interpretation of Eight Western Poets)
RP DWIVEDI
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 3
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 4
ldquoIndia is the cradle of the human race the birthplace of
human speech the mother of history the grandmother
of legend and the great grandmother of tradition Our
most valuable and most instructive materials in the
history of man are treasured up in India onlyrdquo
Mark Twain
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 5
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 6
ISBN 9781497470637
First Edition 2007
Reprint 2014
copy RP Dwivedi
Rs 50000
All rights reserved No part of this publication may be
reproduced stored in a retrieval system or transmitted
in any form or by any means electronic mechanical
photocopying recording or otherwise without the
prior written permission of the copyright owner
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 7
DEDICATED TO
My Father
Late Pt Devi Sahay Dwivedi
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 8
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
I wish to express my indebtedness to all my near and
dear ones and tender grateful acknowledgements to my
wife Mrs Rajeshwari Dwivedi for her implied and
inspiring encouragement and particularly to my
nephew Raghav Dwivedi without whose willing co-
operation unfailing assistance and untiring labour the
publication of this compact volume would not have
been possible
My grateful thanks are also due to Bhartiya Vidya Bhavan Mumbai and Gita Press Gorakhpur for their
kind permission to include in this volume as many as
seven articles published in their esteemed periodicals
viz lsquoBhavanrsquos Journalrsquo and lsquoKalyana-Kalpatarursquo
respectively
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 9
CONTENTS
Introduction 10
1 Indian Spiritualism in Blakersquos Poetry 27
2 Vedanta in Wordsworthrsquos Poetry 47
3 Coleridgersquos Spiritual Quest and Indian Thought 62 4 Byron A Blend of Clay and Spark 79
5 Shelley A Pilgrim of Eternity 95
6 John Keats A Minstrel of Beauty and Truth 119 7 Emersonrsquos Spiritual Quest and Indian Thought 131
8 Thoreaursquos Tryst with Indian Culture 143
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 10
INTRODUCTION
Quest for Truth has always been manrsquos eternal passion
and pursuit Since the very dawn of human civilization
he has been at pains to unravel the mystery that
shrouds life and the world around him And yet the
enigmatic phenomenon of the universe is to quote
Tennyson ldquoan arch wherethrorsquo gleams that untraveled world whose margin fades forever and foreverrdquo as man
moves to reach it but it is never too late ldquoto seek a newer worldrdquo
Manrsquos basic faith and his dauntless persistence in
attaining truth both in the physical world and spiritual
sphere sustains his endeavour and impels him to move
into lsquofresh woods and pastures newrsquo In this sense both
Science and Religion have the identical aim of
discovering Truth and thus helping man to grow
materially and spiritually to achieve fulfillment The
yearning of the poets (selected here) for exploring and
expressing Ultimate Truth or Eternity has been
highlighted
This little volume of articles written at leisure from time
to time as a creative pastime reflects a modest attempt
at tracing out the main thought-currents of the major
English Romantic Poets and two prominent American
Transcendentalists ndash RW Emerson and HD Thoreau
and co-relating them with our own philosophical
thought and rich religio-spiritual heritage
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 11
Since these articles represent my stray and occasional
thoughts they have no claim to a thorough or
comparative study or a comprehensive coverage of all
aspects of the poets The perspective chosen is confined
to some of the distinct echoes of the Vedantic thought in
the poems of selected poets but their publication in the
journals of international repute is indicative of their
acceptance and appeal and their role in blazing the
trails for a further study of their subject for research
scholars and others
The poets in this selection have taken life in its fullness
encompassing both matter and spirit ndash the visible world
and the invisible universe beyond it They have
conceived of the shadow (world) not without substance
and movement not without a moving spirit behind it
Like our own Vedic poetry the poetry of these poets is
intensely religious in the sense of their having felt the
living presence of the Divine in the beauty and glory of
the universe Again like our ancient Vedic poets their
poetry was born out of a joyous and radiant spirit
overflowing with love of life energy for action and a
vision of divinity which needed serene faith for
inspiration They were all transported into another
world by a rare spiritual exaltation for they aspired for
revelation of the inner truth of Reality in their souls
Moreover like our Vedic hymns their poems flowed like
fresh and clear streams gushing out of rocky mountains
as our ancient sages had described long ago lsquoLike joyous streams bursting from the mountain our songs have sounded to Brihaspati (preceptor of Gods)rsquo
What Emerson said of Thoreaursquos greatness could also be
applied to a great extent to most of the poets selected
here Emerson remarked ldquoHis soul was made for the
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 12
noblest society he had in short life exhausted the capabilities of this world Wherever there is knowledge wherever there is virtue wherever there is beauty he will find a homerdquo
These articles amply prove the fundamental fallacy of
Rudyard Kiplingrsquos assertion that ldquothe East is east and the West is west and the twain shall never meetrdquo but
contrary to his view the East and the West represent
complementary views of the world While the West
gives us the perfection and joy of eternal beauty in the
outer world as expressed by Keats the East gives us lsquothe
splendor and joy of the Infinite in the inner world of
Soulrsquos visionrsquo
That the physicist and the mystic reach the truth of
essential unity of all things and events by following
different paths has been beautifully described by
modern scientist Dr Frijof Capra ldquoThus the mystic and the physicist arrive at the same conclusion one starting from the inner realm the other from the outer world The harmony between their views confirms the ancient Indian wisdom that Brahman the ultimate reality without is identical to Atman the reality withinrdquo
Clear and identical traces of our Vedic thought and
scriptural ideas are found scattered all over the corpus
of their poetic works If we take up the outstanding
ideas of each poet for our consideration we find their
striking resemblance with what abounds in our spiritual
heritage Let us consider their predominant thoughts
which find a distinct echo in our Vedic and holy texts
William Blake who was the most prophetic of all
major English poets seems to have attained the rare
super-sensory or transcendental state of consciousness
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 13
which enabled him to perceive reflective communion
with God Such a transcendental perception of Divinity
in all creation and all creation in Divinity gave him a
subtle insight into the lsquovisions of eternityrsquo In other
words this contemplative vision of Infinity in the Finite
and the Finite in Infinity has been regarded as the
distinguishing mark of pure wisdom by Lord Krishna in
the Gita ndash ldquoWhen one sees Eternity in things that pass away and Infinity in finite things then one has pure (सािवक) wisdomrdquo [XVIII20] It was this intimation of
eternity that made Blake declare
ldquoTo see the world in a grain of sand
And a Heaven in a wild flower
Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand
And Eternity in an hourrdquo
Auguries of Innocence
Moreover he strongly condemned man-made divisions
of humanity into numerous castes and creeds and
preached universal brotherhood based on love
understanding and sacrifice
ldquofor man is love
And God is love Every kindness to another is a little death
In the divine image nor can man exist but by brotherhoodrdquo
Jerusalem
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 14
And again he says
ldquoWhere mercy love and pity dwell
There God is dwelling toordquo
The Divine Image
William Wordsworth was essentially a seer-poet He
was perhaps the first English poet to appreciate the
innate kinship of man with Nature and find in her a
calm and invisible spiritual presence in perfect
communion with the Cosmic Soul He recognized the
essential spiritual unity of all things and the
interpenetration of human life with that of the universe
His poetic faith was based on an indwelling spirit in
nature which interpenetrated all life and transformed
and transfigured with its radiance rocks fields trees
and the people who lived close to them He found
something that permeates and transfigures everything
He perceived this indwelling spirit and the vision of the
Infinite (God) in his poetry He concluded that Nature
being the manifestation of God is our best moral guide
and teacher
ldquoOne impulse from a vernal wood
May teach you more of man
Of moral evil and of good
Than all the sages canrdquo
In his Ode to the Intimations of Immortality which is
his spiritual autobiography he expresses his belief in
pre-existence which is also an article of faith in our
scriptural texts
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 15
ldquoOur birth is but a sleep and a forgetting
The soul that rises with us our lifersquos star
Hath had elsewhere its setting
And cometh from afarrdquo
His mystical experience of lsquothat serene and blessed moodrsquo in which we lsquoare laid asleep in body and become a living soulrsquo and his perception of lsquoa sense sublime of something more deeply interfuseda motion and a spirit that impels all thinking things all objects of all thought and rolls through all thingsrsquo reflect not only
his profound pantheism but also find close parallels in
our own religio-spiritual literature
Samuel Taylor Coleridge who was one of the seminal
minds of his generation possessed the most fertile
imagination According to William Hazlitt he lsquohad angelic wings and fed on mannarsquo for his writings are
ethereal mystical and magical Endowed with a rare
lsquomystic idealismrsquo he was besides being a great poet a
speculative philosopher also who considered life as lsquoa vision shadowy of Truthrsquo He justified the phrase ndash
lsquoRenaissance of wonderrsquo for he revived the supernatural
and invested it with indefiniteness and suggestion
which characterize his imagination He drew his
conceptions from lsquomythrsquo and embodied them with
symbols His images express his emotion spiritual state
and metaphysical experience Unlike other poets his
poetry grew from his inner organic law and made
supernatural and romantic subjects credible to human
nature by creating lsquothat willing suspension of disbeliefrsquo that constitutes his poetic faith He was the first great
British idealist of his age who preferred the intellectual
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 16
intuition to the conceptual dialectic The image and
vision of God lsquoimago deirsquo as an intellectual
contemplation (speculari) of the transcendent Absolute
(the prius) of all beings is an aspect of his speculative
mysticism
Byron however stands apart from all other poets
included herein for although his philosophy of life was
altogether different from that of his contemporaries he
was a force a portent and historical phenomenon in his
age He was endowed with a rare fire for liberty
indomitable courage sacrificing spirit and prophetic
zeal which are undoubtedly great human values His
inevitable attitude was revolt both social and personal
As an influence and portent he was the most powerful
poet in his age for he created that Byronic legend which
became a historic phenomenon of lasting fascination of
his personality Endowed with fiery energy his self-
portrait of careless arrogance or even daemonic figure
was a persona of romantic panache He was a portrait
and a symbol whom it was possible to worship or
condemn but never to neglect
PB Shelley who was lsquoone frail form ndash a phantom among men companionlessrsquo (Adonais) occupies a
unique position among Romantic poets Essentially he
was a visionary whose philosophy of enlightenment
made his poetry fanciful and ethereal He was a born
revolutionary who launched a crusade against the
organized religion and society Disgusted by the gloomy
state of the world he dreamed a world of beauty
freedom and virtue and made his poetry a trumpet of
narcissistic fantasy A solitary intellectual lsquowandering companionlessrsquo (Alastor) his poetry is the projection of
his sense of isolation He was fired by rationalist
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 17
revolutionary thought which reflects his visions of the
future Endowed with rationalist speculative intuition
his poetry symbolizes the spirit of human welfare
ldquoI wish no living thing to suffer painrdquo
Prometheus I303
The desire of Shelley reminds us of our scriptural
prayer ndash ldquoसव भवत स13खनः सव सत नरामयाःrdquo His
imagination is idealistic and vision synoptic He deals
with the heavens and light and aspired for the
regeneration of the world through love To him there is
no dualism between the material and spiritual life for
they are the aspects of same reality To him only
Eternity is real while the phenomenal world is but an
illusion or माया ndash a veil that hides true light He echoes a
Vedic truth when he says
ldquoThe One remains the many change and pass
Heavenrsquos light forever shines Earthrsquos shadows fly
Life like a dome of many-coloured glass
Stains the white radiance of Eternityrdquo
Adonais L11
He treats natural objects and forces as symbols for his
own emotional patterns In his lsquoOde to the West Windrsquo
he uses the West Wind as a spirit of destruction and
regeneration or death and rebirth He considers death
as only a prelude to renewed life and this shows his
faith in the transmigration of human soul or the cycle of
death and rebirth He declares
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 18
ldquoIf winter comes can spring be far behindrdquo
Ode to the West Wind
His entire poetry is a vivid and symbolic expression of
the wretched actuality and the radiant idea He wants to
herald a perfect world order based on love and
freedom He treats poetry as a potent instrument of
redemption and it was his deep romantic sensibility and
fanciful ecstatic Platonic love that earned him this
description of lsquopinnacled dim in the intense inanersquo He
was one of the greatest lyricists and an
lsquounacknowledged legislator of the worldrsquo of thought and
imagination
John Keats who in his own words was lsquoa fair creature of an hourrsquo was perhaps the first conscious artist whose
artistic intuition was far ahead of his time By declaring
that ldquoan artist must serve Mammonrdquo he wished to confer
on arts a special status and thus laid the foundation of
the doctrine of lsquoArt for Artrsquos sakersquo His minute delicate
and sensuous observation of the visible world of Nature
inspired his poetry which he wanted to lsquoloadrsquo with a
special excellence His delightful communion with
Nature and the sensuous ecstasies of its sight sound
smell touch and taste formed some of his best poetry
His delicacy and keenness of perception and love for
passive contemplation made him exclaim ndash ldquoO for a life of sensations rather than thoughtrdquo But in fact most of
his sensations were his thoughts for they were
embodied in sensuous pictorial form and rich symbolic
imagery
As a liberal enthusiast he felt that sharing the distress of
humanity or participation in ldquothe agony and strife of human heartsrdquo was essential not only for human growth
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 19
but also for poetic maturity This philanthropic attitude
of Keats brings him very close to our ardent Indian
prayer - ldquoसव भवत स13खनः सव सत नरामयाःrdquo ndash May all be happy may none struck with disease To find an
escape from the fret and fever of life he sought refuge in
an infinite yearning for beauty and turned to the realm
lsquoof Flora and old Panrsquo but soon realized the transience of
the world and started exploring permanence He could
find it in the spirit of beauty which is but a reflection of
eternal truth His passionate pursuit of ideal beauty
which he identified with truth has been beautifully
expressed in the following oft-quoted lines
ldquoBeauty is truth truth beauty that is all
Ye know on earth and all ye need to knowrdquo
Ode on a Grecian Urn
This fundamental unity or oneness of beauty and truth
and their interplay in the visible world are the
mainsprings of his poetic creed
The conflict between transience and permanence forms
the theme of his famous Odes and he longs for a
solution and lasting happiness in the form of Art or lsquoon the viewless wings of Poesyrsquo At the height of his
impassioned contemplation when the life of the spirit is
fused with the objects of immediate sensuous
experience he has glimpses of the permanence of
beauty which reflects Eternal Truth In one of his letters
(281) he declares ldquoI can never feel certain of any truth but from a clean perception of its beautyrdquo And at another
place when he finds mortality and immortality poles
apart he asserts the everlasting value of truth ldquoTruthrdquo
he says ldquomeans that which has lasting valuerdquo This firm
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 20
conviction of Keats seems to be a distinct echo of our
Vedantic dictum
सयमव जयत नानतम सयन पथा वततो दवयानः
यनामतय तत सयय परम नधान ldquoTruth alone triumphs not untruth By truth is laid out the Path Divine along which the seers who are free from desires and cravings ascend the supreme abode of Truthrdquo
Mundak Upanishad III16
Again the Vedic seer says that the Atman (self) is to be
realized only through truth
सयन लampसतपसा यष आमा
मडकोपनषद III15
Thus truth is the foundation of Dharma (righteousness)
for it is an essential and abiding value of human life The
eternal oneness of beauty and truth and vice versa and
their transcendental reality was Keatsrsquo poetic creed and
the realization of this basic spiritual truth raised him to
a level of sublime consciousness which is the mark of a
true seeker of truth or seer
In sum we may say that though lsquoa lily of a dayrsquo Keats
proved that a crowded hour of glory is far better than
an age without a name as has been stressed in our epic
Mahabharat where Queen Vidula exhorts her son
Sanjaya ldquoमहतम 0व1लत 2यो न त धमतम 4चरrdquo ndash ldquoIt is better to flame forth for an instant than to smoke away for agesrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 21
Though Keats died at the young age of 26 years he left
an indelible imprint on the history of English poetry for
his deep and pervasive influence could be easily seen on
Tennysonrsquos early work Moreover he was indisputably
the precursor of the Pre-Raphaelite movement In fact
he had reached near perfection in poetic craftsmanship
which will ever remain worthy of emulation for the
succeeding generations of poets
Ralph Waldo Emerson known as the lsquoSage of Concordrsquo
acted as a bridge between the East and the West His
abiding interest in the Indian scriptures and
particularly the Gita was a source of the Concord
Movement in America According to Swami
Vivekananda all the broad movements in America are
indebted to the Concord Party Mahatma Gandhi
remarked after reading Emersonrsquos Essays ldquoThe Essays to my mind contain the teaching of Indian wisdom in a Western lsquoGurursquo it is interesting to see our own sometimes differently fashionedrdquo Emerson drew freely on the
Upanishads Manusmriti Vishnu Puran and above all
the Gita and his writings reflect his indebtedness to our
holy texts
Pt Jawaharlal Nehru admired Emersonrsquos gospel of self-
reliance and righteousness in particular and regarded
him as one of the builders of America A
transcendentalist and thinker par excellence Emersonrsquos
ideas shaped not only his countrymenrsquos thinking but
had a deep and pervasive influence over many other
nations His main thoughts coloured as they are by our
own Indian religio-philosophical strands are universal
in appeal and are as relevant today as they were in his
own lifetime
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 22
In formulating his concept of Over-Soul Emerson
stressed the fundamental identity of Individual Soul
with Over-Soul He asserted ldquoWithin man is the soul of the whole ndash the wise silence the universal beauty to which every part and particle is equally related the Eternal Oneonly by the vision of that wisdom can the horoscope of ages be readrdquo He firmly believed in the
immortality of soul and the ephemerality of the world
and strongly condemned the futility of manrsquos vanity and
ego-centric attachment to the perishable objects of the
world His writings leave us lsquocalm of mind all passions spentrsquo In fact lsquohe gives men to mankind and mankind to the laws of Godrsquo
Henry David Thoreau was a great empirical
transcendentalist about whom Emerson once remarked
ldquowherever there is knowledge wherever there is virtue wherever there is beauty he will find a homerdquo His essay
on lsquoCivil Disobediencersquo which Gandhiji read twice in a
South African jail impressed him so much so that he
regarded him as his political lsquoGurursquo and his concept of
Satyagraha owes its origin to Thoreaursquos writings
Endowed with a rare meditative mind he loved lsquosweet solitudersquo and retired to the woods for discovering the
lsquohigher lawrsquo and realize his oneness with the Cosmic
Spirit He believed in the supremacy of moral laws and
his doctrine of Civil Disobedience is based on his dictate
of conscience for he considered individual conscience
more important than arbitrary state laws
Thoroughly immersed in the Indian scriptures his
thought-process and philosophy of life was
considerably moulded by our ancient religio-spiritual
heritage His deep love for our scriptural texts is evident
from his declaration of the Gita as lsquoUniversal Gospelrsquo He
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 23
wrote ldquoIn the morning I bathe my intellect in the stupendous cosmogonal philosophy of the Bhagvad GitaIt is unquestionably one of the noblest and most sacred scriptures which have come down to usthe oriental philosophy assigns their due rank respectively to action and contemplationrdquo
About the Vedas he remarked ldquoExtracts from the Vedas fall on me like the light of a higher and purer luminaryrdquo
According to him Over-Soul could be brought down to
earth not by words but by ldquoan inquisitive and contemplative accessrdquo He further states ldquoIn us are the elements of Divinity We see God around us because He dwells within usrdquo
He was a true ascetic (सयासी) for he preached and
practiced non-attachment (अनासि8त) in his life He was
an explorer of the inner world of Spirit In the seclusion
of woods he lsquocultivated the garden of his soul as a true Yogirsquo and he wanted to lsquoshoot his selfrsquo as our Mundaka Upanishad says
ldquoThe Pranava is the bow Atma the arrow the Brahman its mark It should be hit by a self-collected onerdquo
Much of what is stated in this compact volume may be
found scattered over various other critical works but
my earnest endeavour has been to bring together such
material as is of sufficient spiritual value which belongs
to all times This small comparative survey of the realm
of main ideas of some great poets confirms the splendor
of their rich romantic imagination and the unity of all
spiritual vision that makes them not only the creators of
beauty love and light but also brothers in spirit
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 24
I would feel amply rewarded if through this modest
attempt I am able to arouse keen interest in my readers
for further critical study of the subject Any suggestions
for amplification or improvement on the text are most
welcome
RP DWIVEDI
LUCKNOW
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 25
WILLIAM BLAKE
(28 November 1757 ndash 12 August 1827)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 26
WILLIAM BLAKE
English Poet Painter Engraver and Visionary
He was trained as an engraver by James Basire and
afterward attended classes at the Royal Academy Blake
married in 1782 and in 1784 he opened a print shop in
London He developed an innovative technique for
producing coloured engravings and began producing
his own illustrated books of poetrymdashincluding Songs of Innocence (1789) The Marriage of Heaven and Hell (1790) and Songs of Experience (1794)mdashwith his new
method of ldquoIlluminated Printingrdquo Jerusalem (1804[ndash
20]) an epic treating the fall and redemption of
humanity is his most richly decorated book His other
major works include Vala or The Four Zoas
(manuscript 1796ndash1807) and Milton (1804[ndash11]) A
late series of 22 watercolours inspired by the Book of
Job includes some of his best-known pictures He was
called mad because he was single-minded and
unworldly he lived on the edge of poverty and died in
neglect His books form one of the most strikingly
original and independent bodies of work in the Western
cultural tradition Ignored by the public of his day he is
now regarded as one of the earliest and greatest figures
of Romanticism
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 27
CHAPTER ONE
INDIAN SPIRITUALISM IN BLAKErsquoS VISIONS OF ETERNITY
INTRODUCTION
William Blake was by far the most prophetic of all major
English poets In a preface to his famous poem on
Milton he exclaimed lsquoWould to God that all the Lordrsquos people were Prophetsrsquo Elsewhere Blake declared lsquoA Prophet is a seer not an arbitrary dictatorrsquo According to
PH Butter an acclaimed authority on Blake ldquoa prophet sees behind the marks of woe behind the wars and other evils of his time and the attitudes that cause such things But Blake was not the kind of prophet who just present evils but one who saw the Visions of Eternity one whose senses discovered the infinite in everythingrdquo The prophet
is also a spokesman one who speaks or believes he
speaks for God or some other higher power Blake
himself claimed in one of his letters in 1803 ldquoI dare not pretend to be any other than the Secretary the Authors are in Eternityrdquo
His belief in lsquoinspirationrsquo contributed to that lsquoterrifying honestyrsquo which TS Eliot saw in him to keep him
uncompromisingly true to his vision He perceived a
close relationship of the conscious ndash lsquoIrsquo with the deeper
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 28
self through which all inspiration flows He knew that
the prophet must also be a lsquomakerrsquo lsquoa blacksmith laboring at his furnaces to shape the stubborn structure of the languagersquo He further realized that a prophet
should also be a teacher a preacher and a beacon light
to humanity
Explaining the function of the bard or poet (and his own
mission) Blake in his introduction to Songs of Experience declares
ldquoHear the voice of the bard
Who present past and future sees
Whose ears have heard
The Holy word
That walked among the ancient trees
Calling the lapsed soul
And weeping in the evening dew
That might control
The starry pole
And fallen fallen light renewrsquo
Or again elucidating the aim of writing poetry or his
lsquogreat taskrsquo Blake declares
ldquo I rest not from my great task
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 29
To open the Eternal worlds to open the immortal eyes
Of man inwards into the worlds of Thought into Eternity
Ever expanding in the bosom of God the human imaginationrsquo
Like Milton who wanted lsquoto justify the ways of God to Manrsquo or Shelley who held that lsquopoetry is the revelation of the eternal ideas which lie behind the many-coloured ever-shifting veil that we call reality in lifersquo Blake in his
exceptional prophetic zeal set out to open the Eternal
worlds to open the immortal eyes of man inwards into
the worlds of thought into Eternity He was always at
pains to renew the fallen fallen light The poetrsquos divine
task of lsquoever expanding in the bosom of Godrsquo reminds us
of the moving verse of our Rig Veda in which God as
creator of beautiful forms has been conceived of as the
greatest poet whose divine creative energy s his poetic
power which manifests itself in the manifold forms of
beauty and splendor like the Heaven the Sun the Moon
the Sky etc
यो धता भवानानामगया स कवः काया प पपltयत
ऋवद VIII415
lsquoHe who is the supporter of the world of life
Who knows the secret mysterious names of the morning beams
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 30
He poet cherishes manifold forms by His poetic power even as heavenrsquo
Rig Veda VIII415
As a divinely inspired poet Blake seems to have had
experiences of various psychic and even mystic visions
which awakened him to subtle spiritual life It seems
that he must have transcended normal sensory
perceptions and would have attained to super-sensory
status of consciousness when he declares
lsquoI see the savior over me
Spreading his beams of love and dictating the words of mild song
Awake O sleeper of the land of shadows wake
I am in you and you in me mutual in love divinersquo
Jerusalem L4-7
He seems to have attained to that rare transcendental
consciousness when he perceived perfect communion
with God who assured him
lsquoI am not a God afar off I am a brother and friend
Within your bosoms I reside and you reside in me
We are one forgiving all evil not seeking recompensersquo
Jerusalem L18-20
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 31
Here Blake on perceiving a synoptic vision of complete
identity or oneness of God with individual self seems to
have echoed the eternal ancient Holy Scriptures Here
are a few striking parallels
In our Vedas also Go is regarded and adored as our
most-trusted friend Says the Rig Veda
lsquoमा=कर न ऐना सयाच ऋषः
वBमा Cह Dमतमसया 1शवानrsquo
ऋवद X237
lsquoNever may this friendship be severed
Of thee O Deity and the sage Vimada
We know O God Thy brother-like love
With us be Thy auspicious friendshiprsquo
Rig Veda X237
The key-note of this type of worship is the
contemplation of friendly love (described in later
religious literature as - सय ndash friendliness between the
Deity and the worshipper) The following prayer is in
the same spirit
lsquoभवा नः सFन अतमः सखा वधrsquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 32
ऋवद X133
lsquoBe Thou most dear to us for bliss O friend to aidrsquo
Rig Veda X133
Similarly assuring Arjuna of His perennial benediction
Lord Krishna declares in the Gita
ईHवरः सवभतानामतltठत
Kामयसवभतानमायया
ldquoArjuna God abides in the heart of all creatures
Causing them to revolve according to their Karma
By His illusive power seated as those beings are
In the vehicle of the bodyrdquo
Bhagvad Gita XVIII61
And again describing Himself as the truest friend of all
living beings Lord Krishna pronounces
ldquoI am the (disinterested) friend of all living beings and my devotee attains supreme peacerdquo
Bhagvad Gita V29
To turn to William Blake again he has an essential
belief in the closest intimacy of all living beings with
God who is the fountain-head of all life love and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 33
friendship This belief makes him affirm his faith in the
holiness of all life on earth Says he in his Annotations to Lavater
lsquoAll Life is Holyrsquo
Again he says ldquoIt is God in all that is our companion and friend for our God himself says lsquoyou are my brother my sister and my motherrsquo and Saint John said lsquowho so dwelleth in love dwelleth in God and God in himrsquo and such a one cannot judge of any but in loveGod is in lowest effects as well as in the highest causes for he is become a worm that he may nourish the weak For let it be remembered that creation is God descending according to the weakness of man for our Lord is the word of God and everything on earth is the word of God and in its essence is Godrdquo
In our own scriptures the all-pervasiveness of God (the
One) has been conceived not only in the cosmic world
but also in the world of men The very opening verse of
the Ishopanishad stresses the immanence of God in the
universe
ईशावाय इद सवM यािकNय जगया जगत
ईशोपनष I
lsquoUnderstand all this (universe) as inhabited by the Lord
Each moving thing in this moving worldrsquo
Or again says the Atharva Veda
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 34
य समायोऽवPणोयो वदHयः
यो दवोऽवPणोमानषः
lsquoGod is that in which things converge
He is that from which things diverge
He is our own land he is of foreign land
He is divine he is humanrsquo
Atharva Veda IV168
The immanence of God is the entire universe is also
underscored by Lord Krishna when he tells Arjuna
ldquoThere is nothing besides me Arjuna Like clusters of yarn-beads formed by knots all this (universe) is threaded on merdquo
Bhagvad Gita VII7
SYNOPTIC VISION
A firm belief in the all-pervasiveness of God in the
whole universe led him to perceive every object of
Nature as a window through which we may look with a
sense of awe and wonder into the beauty truth and all-
enveloping eternity which is but a reflection of God
Blake must have had palpable intimations of Eternity
when he wrote
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 35
lsquoTo see a world in a grain of sand
And a Heaven in a wild flower
Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand
And Eternity in an hourrsquo
Auguries of Innocence
Such a super-sensuous or transcendental perception of
Divinity in all creation and all creation in Divinity gave
Blake a subtle insight into the lsquoVisions of Eternityrsquo and
made him not only a seer but also lsquoan inhabitant of
other planes another domain of beingrsquo Commenting on
Blakersquos singular other-worldliness our own seer and
prophet Sri Aurobindo says ldquoThere is no other singer of the beyond who is like him or equal him in the strangeness supernatural lucidity power and directness of vision of the beyond and the rhythmic clarity and beauty of his singingrdquo
It is this contemplative knowledge of infinity in finite
and finite in infinity that has been regarded as the
distinguishing mark of the pure wisdom which finally
leads one to transcendental revelation which has been
so beautifully expressed in our own scriptures
सवभतषभावमययमीRत
अवभ8तसािवक
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 36
lsquoWhen one sees Eternity in things that pass away and Infinity in finite things then one has pure knowledgersquo
Bhagvad Gita XVIII20
The same truth has been emphasized again and again in
the Upanishads When man comes to know the real
truth about God nay when he succeeds in realizing the
truth about God how can he ever revile or adversely
criticize any form or aspect of God The Isha Upanishad
says
यत सवा13ण भतान आमयवानपHयत
सवभतष चामना ततो न वजगSसत
ईशोपनष VI
ldquoWhoever beholds all beings in God alone and God in all beings ie who regards all beings as his own self he no more looks down upon any creature for regarding all as his self whom will he hate and howrdquo
Lord Krishna stresses the same equanimity of vision
when he declares
ldquoThe Yogi who is united in identity with the all-pervading infinite consciousness and sees unity everywhere beholds the self present in all beings and all beings as assumed in the selfrdquo
Bhagvad Gita VI29
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 37
Again Lord Krishna declares
यो मा पHयत सव सवM च मय पHयत
तयाह न DणHया1म स च म न DणHयत
भगवगीता VI30
ldquoHe who sees me (the universal self) present in all beings and all beings existing within me never loses sight of me and I never lose sight of himrdquo
Bhagvad Gita VI30
FAITH IN THE LAW OF ETERNITY
Since God is infinite immanent and omnipresent soul
which is an integral and inalienable part of God is also
immortal The forms or objects of the world may change
but in reality they exist forever and are eternal Like
God soul is everlasting unborn undecaying and
undying Blake says
ldquoWhatever can be created can be annihilated
Forms can not
The oak is cut down by the axe the lamb falls by the knife
But their Form Eternal exists for everrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 38
The poet also believes that all sufferings of man if borne
meekly for a noble cause have their rich recompense
sooner or later for God being all-merciful would
certainly reward his suffering children He believes that
lsquoFor a tear is an intellectual thing
And a sigh is a sword of an angel king
And the bitter groan of a martyrrsquos woe
Is an arrow from the Almightyrsquos bowrsquo
Jerusalem
He believes that God Almighty holds out a solemn
promise of reward to sufferers for a lofty cause God
declares
lsquofear not Lo I am with thee always
Only believe in me that I have power to raise from deathrsquo
Jerusalem
MEANS OF LIBERATION
As the greatest and most inventive of Romantic
mythmakers Blake at first explores the contrary states
of human innocence and experience and then speaks of
lsquothe five gatesrsquo our mortal senses which bind us down to
the earth Not so much interested in the art of the
possible as in the visions of the beyond Blake
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 39
constructed a cosmic myth to show manrsquos infinite
potential and how he might attain to final liberation
from this sinful ephemeral world characterized by a
wheel of births and deaths He weaves his myths round
the fall and salvation of man the universal man and his
ultimate waking to eternal life In his poems lsquoMiltonrsquo and
lsquoJerusalemrsquo he regards Satan as the embodiment of
error selfhood and boundless pride and points out that
the means of liberation or freedom from the worldly
bondages lie in the annihilation of selfhood or ego and
the forgiveness of sins He exclaims lsquoI in my selfhood am that Satan I am that evil onersquo and resolves that he would
go down to self-annihilation In lsquoMiltonrsquo he puts the
following words into the mouth of Milton
lsquobut laws of Eternity
Are not such Know thou I come to self-annihilation
Such are the laws of Eternity that each shall mutually
Annihilate himself for others goodrsquo
Reiterating and stressing his poetic purpose or mission
of life Blake resolves
lsquoMine is to teach men to despise death and to go on
In fearless majesty of annihilating self
I come to discover before Heaven and Hell
the self righteousness in all its hypocritical turpitude
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 40
put off
In self-annihilation all that is not God alone
To put off self and all I have ever and everrsquo
Again in a sincere invocation to God Blake prays
lsquoO saviour pour upon me thy spirit of meekness and love
Annihilate the selfhood in me be thou all my life
Guide thou my hand which trembles exceedingly
Upon the rocks of agesrsquo
SPIRITUAL HUMANISM
Inspired by his implicit faith in Godrsquos fatherhood and
menrsquos brotherhood Blake preached the concept of
universal fraternity Considering the whole world as
one large family he maintained that all divisions and
fragmentations of humanity stemmed from manrsquos
ignorance of the eternal truth of one and only one
universal family The world being the home of mankind
all human beings are inextricably interwoven together
in the same warp and woof of life How beautifully has
this cosmopolitan philosophy of manrsquos eternal identity
with his fellow beings been enunciated in the following
memorable words
lsquoWe live as one man for contracting our infinite senses
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 41
We behold multitude or expanding
We behold as one Man all the universal family
and he is in us and we in him
Live in perfect harmony in Eden the land of life
Giving receiving and forgiving each otherrsquos trespassesrsquo
Elsewhere the poet says
lsquoThere is no other God than God
Who is the intellectual fountain of Humanity
I never made friends but by spiritual gifts
By severe contentions of friendship and the burning fire of thought
He who would see the divinity must see him in his children
So he who wishes to see a vision perfect whole
Must see it in its minute particulars organizedrsquo
Preaching universal brotherhood based on love
understanding and sacrifice he again exclaims (in the
words of Jesus)
lsquoWouldst thou live one who never died
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 42
For thee or ever die for one
Who had not died for thee
And if God died not for man and giveth not himself
Eternally for man
Man could not exist for man is love and God is love
Every kindness to another is a little death in the divine image
Nor can man exist but by brotherhoodrsquo
Jerusalem
Condemning man-made divisions of mankind into
various castes and creeds he says
lsquoAnd all must love the human form
In heathen Turk or Jew
Where mercy love and pity dwell
There God is dwelling toorsquo
The Divine Image
How truly are the poetrsquos ideas relevant even today when
the hot wind of doubt and distrust is blowing all over
the world (which has been broken up into fragments by
caste and creed clime and country) can be viewed in
the context of our age-old belief in the worship of God in
the universal form (Vishwaroop) and our religious and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 43
spiritual aspirations for ensuring the maximum good of
the world To serve humanity in a spirit of humility
impelled our people to look upon the world as one
great undivided family or nest (वHवनीड़म) and all men
as our brethren ndash (वसधव कटFबकम)
The ideal of universal brotherhood and selfless service
to humanity found spontaneous utterance in the
following moving words which embody the sublime
aim of a devout manrsquos life
न वह कामय रा0य न वगम ना पनभव
कामय दःख तSतानाम Dा13ण नामातनाशन
lsquoI do not desire earthly kingdom nor heaven nor do I want rebirth I want to reduce the sorrow of people who are sunk in sufferingrsquo
Today when the horizon of humanity is darkened by
national prejudices the need for spiritual humanism
synoptic vision and universal brotherhood is being
increasingly felt by one and all Here it is worthwhile to
turn our attention to great men whose thoughts
transcend myriad artificial barriers and teach us the
ideal of dedication to the common weal
Since truth transcends all religious dogmas and
disinterested service to mankind is a form of true
worship to God our great men have always prayed
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 44
सव भवत स13खनः सव सत नरामयाः
सव भWा13ण पHयत मा किHचX दःख भाYभवत
lsquoMay all be happy may all living beings be free from diseases may we perceive goodness in all and may none be struck with misfortunersquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 45
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
(7 April 1770 ndash 23 April 1850)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 46
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
English Poet
Orphaned at age 13 Wordsworth attended Cambridge
University but he remained rootless and virtually
penniless until 1795 when a legacy made possible a
reunion with his sister Dorothy Wordsworth He
became friends with Samuel Taylor Coleridge with
whom he wrote Lyrical Ballads (1798) the collection
often considered to have launched the English Romantic
movement Wordsworths contributions include
Tintern Abbey and many lyrics controversial for their
common everyday language About 1798 he began
writing The Prelude (1850) the epic autobiographical
poem that would absorb him intermittently for the next
40 years His second verse collection Poems in Two Volumes (1807) includes many of the rest of his finest
works including Ode Intimations of Immortality His
poetry is perhaps most original in its vision of the
organic relation between man and the natural world a
vision that culminated in the sweeping metaphor of
nature as emblematic of the mind of God The most
memorable poems of his middle and late years were
often cast in elegaic mode few match the best of his
earlier works By the time he became widely
appreciated by the critics and the public his poetry had
lost much of its force and his radical politics had yielded
to conservatism In 1843 he became Englands poet
laureate He is regarded as the central figure in the
initiation of English Romanticism
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 47
CHAPTER TWO
VEDANTA IN WORDSWORTHrsquoS POETRY
In many of his famous poems among which Ode on Intimations of immortality and Lines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey occupy pride of place
William Wordsworth one of the greatest seer-poets of
English literature presents ideas which bear striking
similarity to the rich philosophical thought that found
unimpeded flow in our Vedantic literature
In fact there are so many echoes of Vedanta in the
poetry of Wordsworth that one is apt to conclude that
the poetrsquos lsquophilosophic mindrsquo must have led him to drink
deep at the unfailing springs of Upanishadic Helicon
A poet of nature Wordsworth was essentially lsquoa seer of spiritual realities a seer of the calm spirit in naturersquo and
his poetry at its best is a fine harmony of his spiritual
insight ethical sense and profundity of thought He is a
curious amalgam of the seer the poet and the reflective
moralist who dwells philosophically and even
prophetically on Nature Man and Cosmic Soul
The epithets lsquobest philosopherrsquo lsquomighty prophetrsquo and
lsquoseer blestrsquo which Wordsworth uses for the new-born
innocent child in his famous Ode may be well applied to
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 48
the poet himself for ldquovoyaging in strange seas of
thought alonerdquo Wordsworth had found lsquofull many a gem
of purest ray serenersquo which still shed undiminished
luster on the entire fabric of English poetry
A careful study of the Ode on Intimations of immortality Lines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey Ruth Laodamia To Cuckoo and other poems reveals that Wordsworthrsquos sustained
loftiness of thought had taken him to such heights that
on him (to quote his own words)
lsquo those truths do rest which we are toiling all our lives to findrsquo
What indeed are those truths Those are the elemental
truths of life which were keenly perceived realized and
expressed by the seers and savants of the East and
particularly of our Vedantic times A careful study of
Vedanta which is the aphoristic summary of the co-
ordinated Upanishads the Brahmasutras and the
Bhagvad Gita and is in fact the culmination of Indian
religion and Philosophical thought reveals that serious
scholars of the West drew freely upon it Wordsworthrsquos
poetry bears ample testimony to this fact because
numerous echoes of Vedanta can be easily heard in his
poetry
To cite a few comparative examples the Upanishads
assert in unambiguous terms that the whole universe of
names and forms the world of being and becoming
springs from Brahman (Supreme Godhead or Absolute
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 49
Cosmic Soul) ndash the eternal existence consciousness and
bliss Since the universe is the creation and
manifestation of Brahman it is also pervaded by Him
Naturally therefore only Brahman exists all else is non-
existent or illusory The Chhandogya Upanishad
declares lsquoBrahman is verily the Allrsquo God is the subtle
essence underlying phenomenal existence the whole
nature which is Godrsquos handiwork as well as Godrsquos
garment and is filled and inspired by God who is its
inner controller and soul
The immanence of God has been corroborated by
Brihadaranyak Upanishad in two passages the first
being in the form of an answer given by Yagnavalyak to
Uddalak Aruni
lsquoHe is immanent in fire in the intermundia in air in the heavens in the Sun in the quarters in the Moon in the stars in space in darkness in light in all beings in Prana in all things and within all things whom these things do not know whose body these things are who controls all these things from within He is thy soul the inner controller the immortal He is the unseen seer the unheard hearer the unthought thinker the ununderstood understander other than Him there is no seer other than Him there is no hearer other than Him there is no thinker other than Him there is no understander everything besides Him is naughtrsquo
Brihadaranyak Upanishad II7
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 50
In another passage Brihadaranyak Upanishad tells us
that God is the All ndash ldquoboth the formed and the formless the mortal and the immortal the stationary and the moving the this and thatHe is the verity of verities the soul of souls and He is the supreme verityrdquo
Brihadaranyak Upanishad IIV15
Wordsworth like these unique revelatory utterances of
the Upanishads codifies this truth in mystical manner in
Lines Composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey when he regards the Cosmic Soul as supreme power or
all-pervading presence
lsquoWhose dwelling is the light of setting Suns
And the round ocean and the living air
And the blue sky and in the mind of man
A motion and a spirit that impels
All thinking things all objects o all thought
And rolls through all thingsrsquo
Since God is All and everything else is Naught the world
is not real it is an appearance It is not the permanent
all-abiding Absolute Reality but a fleeting show and
ephemeral entity having seemingly phenomenal reality
In other words the world is lsquoshadow not substancersquo ndash it
is just a net-work of Maya
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 51
This Vedantic doctrine finds utterance not only in
Wordsworthrsquos poems like To the Cuckoo in which he
calls the earth ldquoan unsubstantial fairy placerdquo but he
seems to have actually experienced this illusory nature
of the world in states of mystic trance that often visited
him since his boyhood
In the introduction to his Ode on Intimations of Immortality he records such an experience in clear
terms
ldquoI was unable to think of external things as having external existence and I communed with all that I saw as something not apart from but inherent in my own immaterial nature Many a times while going to school have I grasped at a wall or tree to recall myself from the abyss of idealism to the realityrdquo
Such an ecstatic state of realizing eternal truths is
referred to in Lines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey as
lsquoThat blessed mod
In which the burden of the mystery
Of all this unintelligible world
Is lightenedrsquo
And finally to quote from the same poem
lsquoWe are laid asleep
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 52
In body and become a living soul
While with an eye made quiet by the power
Of harmony and the deep power of joy
We see into the life of thingsrsquo
One of the basic postulates of our Upanishadic
philosophy has been the idea of transmigration of soul
or faith in the cycle of births deaths and rebirths The
doctrine of transmigration has been explicitly advanced
in the Upanishads and particularly in the
Kathopanishad and Brihadaranyak Upanishad
In the Kathopanishad when the father of Nachiketas
told him that he had made him over to the god of Death
Nachiketas replied that it was no uncommon fate that
was befalling him
ldquoI indeed go at the head of many to the other world but I also go in the midst of many What is the god of Death going to do to me Look at our predecessors (who have already gone) look also at those who have succeeded them Man ripens like corn and like corn he is born againrdquo
Kathopanishad IV6
The Brihadaranyak Upanishad states the same truth
ldquoAnd as a caterpillar after reaching the end of a blade of grass finds another place of support and then draws itself towards it and as a goldsmith after taking a piece
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 53
of gold gives it another newer and more beautiful shape similarly does this Self after having thrown off this body and dispelled ignorance take on another newer and more beautiful form whether it be of one of the man or demi-god or god or of Prajapati or Brahman or of any other beingsrdquo
Brihadaranyak Upanishad IVIII5
The same truth appears in the Bhagvad Gita when Lord
Krishna says to the mentally agitated Arjuna
ldquoAs a man discarding worn-out clothes takes other new ones likewise the embodied soul casting off worn-out bodies enters into others which are newrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II22
And further Lord Krishna says to Arjuna
ldquoFor in that case the death of him who is born is certain and the rebirth of him who is dead is inevitablerdquo
Bhagvad Gita II27
Wordsworth in his famous Ode on Intimations of Immortality confirms his faith in the transmigration of
soul by saying in unmistakable terms
lsquoOur birth is but a sleep and a forgetting
The soul that rises with us our lifersquos star
Hath had elsewhere its setting
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 54
And cometh from afar
Not in entire forgetfulness
And not in utter nakedness
But trailing clouds of glory do we come
From God who is our homersquo
Again when Wordsworth laments the loss of pure
innocence immeasurable bliss and ecstatic vision of
early childhood in the great Ode and exclaims in
memorable words
lsquoWhither is fled the visionary gleam
Where is it now the glory and the dreamrsquo
He attributes the loss to the worldly intellectuality and
attachments as they grow upon man As childhood
grows into youth and youth into manhood the lsquovision splendidrsquo fades the first clear intimations of immortality
are dimmed leaving behind an unillumined waste of
mere thought and moralizing
lsquoAt length the Man perceives it die away
And fade into the light of common dayrsquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
The world of materialism or attachment tames him so
much so that man lsquothe little actorrsquo thinks
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 55
lsquoAs if his whole vocation
Were endless imitationrsquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
Whatever may be the crux of his philosophy of
childhood this belief of the poet can be safely traced
back to the comprehensive doctrine of the Maya in the
Upanishads and the Bhagvad Gita The Upanishads
tell us that the world is a delusion an appearance not
reality The Taittiriya Upanishad says ldquoAll beings spring from the Supreme Being are sustained by Him and return to the same Absolute at the time of dissolution Our life on earth is therefore a sojournrdquo The Isha Upanishad tells us that ldquothe truth is veiled in this universe by a vessel of gold and it invokes the grace of God to lift up the golden lid and allow the truth to be seenrdquo
It follows that our senses cloud our vision and lead us
farther and farther away from our spiritual moorings as
we come of age Senses dupe us and turn us into
worldlings Lord Krishna says to Arjuna in the Bhagvad Gita ldquoAs the wind carries away the barge upon the waters even so of the wandering senses the one to which the mind is joined takes away his discriminationrdquo
Thus the eternal and boundless Supreme Soul is as it
were limited by the sense organs and the body The
Universal Soul shackled by the body becomes the
individual soul (Paramatma becomes Jivatma) Because
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 56
of the presence of the Soul the spark of the Divine the
senses or sense-objects or worldly attractions fail to
dupe man fully from his divine mission This
metaphysical conviction finds expression in
Wordsworthrsquos Ode He says that though
lsquoShades of the prison-house begin to close
Upon the growing boy
But he beholds the light and whence it flows
He sees it in his joyrsquo
However farther man may go away from Nature ndash the manifestation of God and the indwelling Supreme Soul which resides in his own individual soul he can not
lsquoForget the glories he hath known
And that imperial palace whence he camersquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
Since bliss (Anand) is an inevitable attribute of God and
manrsquos soul being a fragment of Supreme Soul it
experiences the presence of God in moments of
Supreme Joy
Of the innumerable expressions in the Vedantic
literature of the joy of life of joy as the all entwining
principle of life and of creative principle of life and life
too the following passage from the Taittiriya Upanishad is very pertinent here
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 57
ldquoJoy is the Brahman from joy are born all living things by joy they are nourished towards joy they move and in joy they are absorbedrdquo Joy as the foundation of life
emanates from the Upanishad philosophy
Wordsworth seems to hold identical belief when he
craves for joy and laments its loss
lsquoO Joy that in our embers
Is something that doth live
That nature yet remembers
What was so fugitiversquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
The same idea finds expression in Lines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey where Wordsworth
declares it as Naturersquos privilege lsquoto lead (us) from joy to joyrsquo
And lastly the classicus locus of the Upanishadic
philosophy is to be found in the idea of immortality of
soul In the Chhandogya and Mundak Upanishads and
above all in the Kathopanishad we find numerous
references to the immortality of the soul We are told in
a passage of Kathopanishad lsquothat while we are dwelling in this body on earth we can visualize that Atman (Soul) as in a mirror that is contrariwise left being to the right and right being to the leftrsquo In the Bhagvad Gita also
Lord Krishna tells Arjuna about the immortality of Soul
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 58
ldquoThis soul is never born nor dies it exists on coming into being for it is unborn eternal everlasting and primeval even though the body is slain the soul is notrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II20
He further says
ldquoFor this soul is incapable of being cut it is proof against fire impervious to water and undriable as well This soul is eternal omnipresent immovable constant and everlastingrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II24
Wordsworth seems to have been fully convinced of this
philosophia perennis of the Vedanta when he eulogizes
immortality by addressing the child in his Ode in the
following words
lsquoThou over whom thy immortality
Broods like the day
A Master over a slave
A presence which is not to be put byrsquo
The poet in speaking of the lsquotruths that wake to perish neverrsquo seems to be reminiscent of the Upanishadic
concept that freed from the trammels of the body the
individual soul loses itself in the All-Soul when he
declares in the rapture
lsquoOur souls have sight of that immortal sea
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 59
Which brought us hither
Can in a moment travel thitherrsquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
Tracing the expression and confirmation of many other
tenets of Vedanta in the poetry of William Wordsworth
forms an interesting literary venture and instances of
close affinity between the Vedantic doctrines and
Wordsworthrsquos ideas may be multiplied Such a
comparative study proves that eternal truths transcend
the barriers of clime or country time or space and shine
through all ages and in all lands We should draw moral
sustenance from them and live a fuller freer life
Even today the wise all over the world maintain a
remarkable identity of views and their thoughts foster
international understanding
ldquoFrom hand to hand the greeting flows
From eye to eye the signals run
From heart to heart the bright hope glows
The seekers of light are onerdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 60
ST COLERIDGE
(21 October 1772 ndash 25 July 1834)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 61
ST COLERIDGE
English Poet Critic and Philosopher
Coleridge studied at the University of Cambridge where
he became closely associated with Robert Southey In
his poetry he perfected a sensuous lyricism that was
echoed by many later poets Lyrical Ballads (1798 with
William Wordsworth) containing the famous Rime of
the Ancient Mariner and Frost at Midnight heralded
the beginning of English Romanticism Other poems in
the ldquofantasticalrdquo style of the Mariner include the
unfinished Christabel and the celebrated Pleasure
Dome of Kubla Khan While in a bad marriage and
addicted to opium he produced Dejection An Ode
(1802) in which he laments the loss of his power to
produce poetry Later partly restored by his revived
Anglican faith he wrote Biographia Literaria 2 vol
(1817) the most significant work of general literary
criticism of the Romantic period Imaginative and
complex with a unique intellect Coleridge led a restless
life full of turmoil and unfulfilled possibilities
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 62
CHAPTER THREE
COLERIDGErsquoS SPIRITUAL QUEST AND INDIAN THOUGHT
INTRODUCTION
Coleridge was by all accounts a genius par excellence
whose versatility flowed albeit impeded in diverse
channels of creativity such as metaphysics poetry
theology and literary criticism Of all the Romantic poets
he possessed the most fertile and powerful imagination
which earned for him a special place in English poetry
and philosophical thought In the words of William
Hazlitt lsquohe had angelic wings and fed on mannarsquo He had
a lsquoseminal mindrsquo which said William Wordsworth
lsquothrew out a series of grand central truthsrsquo We find in
him the poet the philosopher and the theologian rolled
in one Charles Lamb called him lsquoLogician Metaphysician Bardrsquo whose poetry and writings are
tinged with a magical and ethereal quality His thought
made a permanent landmark on the succeeding
generations of English men of letters for he explored the
mysterious working of human mind
His life presents a saga of sharp contrast between
reality and dream blissful confidence and broken
hopes the warmth of human ties and the solitude of
haunted soul He probed human thought and dilemma
with a rare prophetic insight A prodigious thinker and
sincere seeker of truth he once remarked ldquoI would compare the Human Soul to a shiprsquos crew cast on an
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 63
Unknown Islandrdquo His particular fascination for the
unknown drew him instinctively to the German
transcendental or idealistic school of philosophy
represented by Berkeley Kant Schelling and Fichte
Fired by a peculiar mystic idealism he tried to interpret
the lsquoInterruptionrsquo of the spiritual world and beheld the
unseen with an uncommon eye which looked into the
void and found it peopled with lsquopresencesrsquo To him the
universe was lsquoebullient with creative deityrsquo and was
pervaded by lsquoan organizing surgersquo of vital energies
which emanate directly from God He was indeed an
inspired idealist who laid mystical insistence upon the
immanence and transcendence of God
Endowed with a rare penetrating mind Coleridge
ransacked works of comparative religions and
mythology and arrived at the conclusion that all
religious faiths and mythical traditions agree on the
unity of God and immortality of Soul His constant
intellectual search for truth led him to visionary
interests and universal life consciousness expressed
through the phenomena of human agencies Throughout
his intellectual career he remained a visionary and
philosophical mystic who valued a discreet and proper
exercise of the intellect Since his most serious concern
had been philosophy as a continuous trial for self-
education he wrote ldquodoubts rushed in broke upon me from the fountains of the great deep and fell from the windows of heavenrdquo For him lsquoreligionrsquo as both the
cornerstone and keystone of morality must have a
moral origin and a great poet should be lsquoa profound Metaphysician seeking for truth beauty and salvationrsquo In
one of those radiant moments when the poet the
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 64
metaphysician and the theologian of hope are one he
throws light on the process how truth works out in life
ldquoTruth considered in itself and in the effects natural to it may be conceived as a gentle spring or water source warm from the genial earth and breathing up into the snow drift that is piled over and around its outlet It turns the obstacle into its own form and character and as it makes its way increases its streamand arrested in its courseit suffers delay not loss and waits only to awaken and again roll onwardsrdquo
His description of a mystic as one who wanders into an
oasis or garden lsquoat leisure in its maze of Beauty and Sweetness and thirds (sic) his way through the odorous and flowering Thickets into open Spots of Greeneryrsquo (Aids to Reflection) is reminiscent of his own mysticism and
refers to the lsquoenfolding sunny spots of greeneryrsquo in his
famous poem Kubla Khan
Profoundly impressed by the German Idealist Schelling
whose idealistic school of thought dwelt on speculation
concerning the lsquoAbsolutersquo Coleridge viewed lsquomythrsquo as
primordial expression of elemental truths including the
Divine transcendence Inspired by his Biblical studies he
regarded self-consciousness as lying at the centre of his
philosophical and theological thought In Lay Sermons
he says ldquoSelf which then only is when for itself it hath ceased to be Even so doth Religion finitely expresses the unity of the Infinite Spirit by being a total act of the Soulrdquo
For him the lsquoinner lightrsquo is identical with the indwelling
glorious God and life is but lsquoa vision shadowy of Truthrsquo Attributing the pageant of life and the beauty and
splendor of the world to the immanence of Cosmic Soul
(God) he exclaims
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 65
ldquoAh From the soul itself must issue forth
A light a glory a fair luminous cloud
Enveloping the earthrdquo
Dejection An Ode
And again he says ldquoNature is the art of GodThe true system of natural philosophy places the sole reality of things in an Absolute which is at once causa sui effectus in the absolute identity of subject and object which it calls NatureIn this sense lsquowe see all things in Godrsquo is a strict philosophical truthrdquo
Coleridge firmly believed in the essential unity of God as
Absolute which is the creative foundation of the finite
universe and which distinguishes God from creation
He in the spirit of Vedanta stresses the immanence of
God in all and all in God in his famous poem Frost at Midnight Addressing his son he says
ldquoso shalt thou see and hear
The lovely shapes and sound intelligible
Of that eternal language which thy God
Utters who from eternity doth teach
Himself in all and all things in Himselfrdquo
In order to learn this lsquolanguagersquo Coleridge himself
became a lsquovisionaryrsquo lsquoprophetrsquo or lsquoseerrsquo The idea of
Himself (God) in all and all (creation) in Himself or the
concept that there is God in all things and all things are
things are closely interlinked with God bears a striking
resemblance to our age-old Vedic thought In
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 66
consonance with Indian thought Coleridge underscores
the identity of God (Brahman) with the individual soul
(Jivatma) and regards the universe as the reflection or
manifestation of God The seer he says is one who sees
God the creator in all creation and all creation as the
embodiment of God This according to him is the lesson
that God in His eternal language lsquouttersrsquo and doth teach
from eternity
The inherent oneness and sole identity of Brahman
(God) with the universe is a basic postulate of our
Vedanta and as such Coleridgersquos emphasis on the lsquoUnity of infinite Spiritrsquo bears a close identity with the Indian
philosophy The Oneness of God and the universe has
time and again been stressed in our Vedas and other
scriptures It would be pertinent to cite a few instances
here While the Chhandogya Upanishad describes
Brahman as lsquoOne only without a secondrsquo other
Upanishadic texts contain identical statements such as
lsquoHe is Onersquo and lsquoOne Lordrsquo The opening line of
Ishopanishad declares Godrsquos oneness and His universal
presence in unequivocal terms
ldquoUnderstand all this universe as inhabited by Lord
Each moving thing in this moving worldrdquo
Ishopanishad I
And again the same Upanishad says
ldquoThe wise man who perceives all beings as not distinct from his own self at all and his own Self as the self of every being ndash he does not by virtue of that perception hate any onerdquo
Ishopanishad VI
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 67
The same truth has been expressed in the Bhagvad Gita wherein Lord Krishna tells Arjuna
ldquoHe who sees Me (the Universal Self) present in all beings and all beings existing within Me never loses sight of Me and I never lose sight of himrdquo
Bhagvad Gita VI30
Or again
ldquoHe alone truly sees who sees the Supreme Lord as imperishable and abiding equally in all perishable beings both animate and inanimaterdquo
Bhagvad Gita XIII26
And Lord Krishna says again
ldquoThere is nothing else besides Me O Arjuna
Like clusters of yarn-beads formed by knots on a thread
All this (Universe) threaded on Me (God)
As are pearls on stringsrdquo
Bhagvad Gita VII7
THE DOCTRINE OF KARMA (CAUSE amp EFFECT)
Coleridge seems to subscribe sincerely to the Indian
doctrine of Karma which is based on the law of
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 68
Causation or cause and effect In other words Karmavad
stresses poetic justice or law of life ie virtue is
rewarded and vice is punished Since one must reap the
fruits of his good and bad deeds in life it is axiomatic
truth that lsquoas one sows so shall he reaprsquo In Sanskrit
there is a verse which says ldquoOne must bear the consequences of his good and bad deedsrdquo The echoes of
this doctrine could be distinctly heard in his poetry and
particularly in his greatest poem Rime of Ancient Mariner as also Dejection An Ode where he affirms
ldquoO Lady We receive but what we give
And in our life alone doth Nature liverdquo
So strong was his belief in the doctrine of Karma that in
a letter dated 14th October 1797 to his friend Thirlwell
he tells him how fatalistic his philosophy of life is
ldquoand at other times I adopt the Brahman
creed and say ndash lsquoit is better to sit than to stand it is better to lie than to sit it is better to sleep than wake but death is the best of allrsquordquo
His Ancient Mariner serves as an exhaustive
exposition of the law of Nemesis which works surely
but rather imperceptively in human life The poem is a
myth about a dark and troubling crisis in the human
soul It is actually a tale of crime which is due to
perversity of human will Crime is against Nature
Humanity and God He touches equally on guilt and
remorse suffering and relief hate and forgiveness and
grief and joy The marinerrsquos action shows the essential
frivolity of crimes against humanity and the ordered
system of the world and he deserves punishment for his
guilt Spirits are transformed into the powers who
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 69
watch over the good and evil actions of men and requite
them with appropriate rewards and punishments Since
the mariner has committed a hideous act of wantonly
and recklessly killing the albatross which was hailed in
Godrsquos name as if it had been a Christian soul he must
bear the punishment of life-in-death The killing of the
bird marks the breaking of bond between Man and
Nature and consequently the mariner becomes
spiritually dead When he blesses the water-snakes
even unawares it is a psychic rebirth ndash a rebirth that
must happen to all men
The mariner will never be the man that he once was He
has his special past and his special doom His sense of
guilt will end only with his death The Ancient Mariner
is a myth of a guilty soul and marks the passage from
crime through punishment and possible redemption in
the world So the poem is an allegory of redemption and
regeneration It is indeed a vivid representation or
living symbolization of universal psychic experience
The abiding fascination of the poem is that it is a
fragment of a psychic life It does not state a result it
symbolizes a process
Coleridge adds a moral ndash that the mariner is ndash to teach
by his example love and reverence to all things that God
made and loveth He advocates a sound moral
philosophy of life which extends human sympathy and
love to the animal world He affirms
ldquoHe prayeth well who loveth well
Both man and bird and beast
He prayeth best who loveth best
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 70
All things both great and small
For the dear God who loveth us
He made and loveth allrdquo
Rime of Ancient Mariner
PHILOSOPHICAL MYSTICISM AND lsquoTHE VISION OF GODrsquo
Coleridgersquos longing for the lsquounnamable somethingrsquo and
his abiding interest in conveying something of the
enigmatic perception of Godhead as a religious
experience carved for him a special place in the history
of ideas as a Christian poet and philosopher In a
predominantly mythological age he took serious
interest in the Biblical studies and drew upon the
central Christian image of Paradise as a walled garden
and the vision of God as a symbolizing that
transcendent numinous reality which the soul
inchoately and consciously seeks and strives for The
medieval image of the walled garden (paradise) as the
heavenly city (locus of God) is a symbol of divine
transcendence of that which is lsquobeyond beingrsquo This rich
image (of the walled garden) as an eminently
appropriate image of Godrsquos transcendence was used as
such by Church Fathers and also by the 15th century
Christian Platonist Nicholas of Cusa whose book The Vision of God is a paradigm of speculative mysticism
which informs Coleridgersquos metaphysics and much of his
poetry Taking inspiration from Nicholas of Cusarsquos book
The Vision of God Coleridge found it in close affinity to
his own genuinely philosophical mysticism
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 71
Coleridgersquos interest in the Vision of God is in a purely
visionary mystical tradition and his most visionary
poem Kubla Khan bears ample testimony to his
insistence upon life as lsquoa vision shadowy of Truthrsquo His
conviction in the lsquoImago Deirsquo (vision of God) is an
obvious link with the hoary mystical tradition which lay
at the heart of his philosophical and mystical thought
He maintains that the mind of man is a bridge to the
vision of God but by no means its fulfillment He says
ldquoThe vision and faculty divine is the participation of humanity in the Divinerdquo He however further maintains
throughout his intellectual career the conviction in the
reflection or bending back of the soul from the sensual
to the intelligible realm For him Christianity is an lsquoawful recalling of the drowsed soul from dreams and phantom world of sensuality to actual Realityrsquo
On the idea of reawakening he says
ldquoThe moment when the Soul begins to be sufficiently self-conscious to ask concerning itself and its relations is the first moment of its intellectual arrival into the world Its being ndash enigmatic as it must seem ndash is posterior to its existencerdquo
Collected Notes
In a recent study of Coleridge Prof Douglas Headley of
Cambridge University declares ldquoHe is best described as an essentially speculative and mystical philosopher-theologian His was a theology inspired by those Church Fathers who emphasize the vision of God as an intellectual contemplation (speculari) of the transcendent Absolute the prius of all beingrdquo Since the
mystic tradition follows a supersensuous perception
the vision of God is fundamentally lsquoVisio-intuitivarsquo ndash
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 72
intuitive or intellectual vision Coleridge expresses such
a state of mind when he says
ldquoMy mind feels as if it ached to behold and know something great something One and Indivisible and it is only in the faith of this that rocks or waterfalls mountains or caverns give me the sense of sublimity or majesty But in this faith all things counterfeit Infinityrdquo
Since the sublime enlarges and inspires the Soul to
aspire for the Divine it impresses him with the
fundamental Oneness of God and a universal vision
which he hints at in his Religious Musings as under
ldquoThere is One mind One omnipresent mind
His most holy name is Love
Truth of subliming import
lsquoTis sublime in man
Our noontide majesty to know ourselves
Parts and portions of one wondrous wholerdquo
These passages recall to our mind the famous mantra
(verse) of the Yajurveda where the mystic realization
or the direct experience of the Supreme by a Vedic sage
has been beautifully described in terms of his personal
knowledge of the Divine He says
ldquoI have known this sun-coloured Mighty Being
Refulgent as the sun beyond darkness
By knowing Him alone one transcends death
There is no other way to gordquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 73
Yajurveda XXXI18
ldquoI have realized it I have known itrdquo not that I just
believe in it and all else can also realize it This is not the
expression of an opinion but the statement of an
experience Commenting on this verse Sri Aurobindo
says
ldquoThis is one of the grandest utterances in the worldrsquos spiritual literature for it marks the emanation of this Being from across the darkness into our world so that something of the sun colour may come into our dull heads and dim heartsrdquo
Coleridge seems to be in complete agreement with our
own Indian mysticism which owes its origin to the
Vedas wherein the knowledge of the Divine or the
Ultimate Reality (Brahman) has been regarded not as a
process of philosophical thought but as a direct
experience in the depth of the human soul For him the
divine vision is possible in that spiritual meditation
transformation of intellectual rapture in which all
discursive thought is fully sublimated According to him
the lsquovisio intuitivarsquo is the culmination of all knowledge ndash
sensus-ratio-intellectus and is in conjunction with the
concept of Imago Dei In order to see that which not an
object is ie God the human mind must put aside its own
discursive differentiating reflection ndash spiritus altissimus rationis ndash which guards the walls of the garden of
paradise lsquobeyondrsquo which dwells God The highest
transformation or sublimation of conscience can ensure
an intuitive vision of God and in accordance with the
maxim ndash Simile Simili ndash the mind then becomes like its
object by divesting itself of difference in order to
experience the Absolute Reality Says Coleridge
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 74
ldquoAn Immense Being does strongly fill the soul and Omnipotency Omnisciency and Infinite Goodness do enlarge and dilate the Spirit while it fixtly looks upon them They raise strong passions of Love and Admiration which melt our Nature and transform it into the mould and imagery that which we can contemplaterdquo
Notebooks
Mysticism is thus the subtle path of spiritual realization
of That Reality or Divine Presence which has been
described in our Vedic texts as (lying hidden in a cave shrouded in secrecy) God is one One beyond all
diversities In Him all contradictions and conflicts meet
and dissolve through the spiritual transformation of the
lsquoseerrsquo or lsquomysticrsquo whose soul rises above the bewildering
trammels and distortions of life and seeks unity with all
in the unity with One To such an enlightened seer life
becomes an unceasing adventure from unreality to
reality from ephemerality to eternity from the human
to the Divine One who realizes the Divine as the One
(without parallel) loving Lord finds the whole universe
united in Him Such a significantly mystical experience
finds a memorable expression in the following verse of
the Yajurveda where the sage named Vena beholds
such a divine vision
ldquoThe loving sage (Vena) beholds that Mysterious Existence
Wherein the universe comes to have One home (nest)
Therein unites and therefore issues the whole
The Lord is the warp and woof in the Created beingsrdquo
Yajurveda XXXII8
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 75
A careful analysis of the above-quoted passage reveals
all the main elements of mysticism viz
(i) Divinity is a subject of personal spiritual
experience
(ii) The ultimate conception of Divinity is a
mystery symbolically expressed as
गहानCहतम
(iii) The abstract conception of the Divine as an
Essence or Existence is symbolized by a
neuter singular तत and
(iv) The whole universe is united in love as birds
in a nest एकनीड़ or men in a home वसधव कटFबक
To sum up wise men the world over hold almost
identical views on vital matters of human life such as
the mystery of existence soul and oversoul (God) Truth
is verily One as God is one but the pathways to reach it
are very many The ancient Rig Veda proclaims एक सद वDा बहधा वदित ndash ldquoTruth is one sages call it by various namesrdquo In our own times Swami Ram Krishna
Paramhansa said यतोमत तथोपथ ndash as many religions
so many pathways And what the Spanish litteacuterateur
and thinker states as lsquouniversal truthrsquo is equally
applicable to the philosophy and poetry of Coleridge
ldquoA deep faith in life cannot but be spiritual even if only partially spiritualThe path of Truth may not be a path of parallel lines but a path that follows one circle by going to the right and climbing the circle or by going to the left and climbing the circle we are bound to meet at the top although we started in apparently
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 76
contrary directions This is bound to be in the end because Truth is onerdquo
In Charles Lambrsquos words Coleridge lsquohad been on the confines of the next world he had a hunger for Eternityrsquo The truth of this statement is abundantly
borne out by Coleridgersquos sincere effort for the
reconciliation of the ration with transcendental belief
He closes his Biographia Literaria which symbolizes
his spiritual voyage with the following words
ldquoIt is night sacred night The upraised eyes views suns of other worlds only to preserve the soul steady and collected in its pure act of inward adoration to the great I Am and to the filial word that re-affirmeth from eternity to eternity whose choral is the universerdquo
As a true metaphysician Coleridgersquos whole being
pulsated with a passionate and unceasing search for
truth Here indeed was a spiritual aspirant and seeker
who in his own words had lsquotraced the fount whence streams of nectar flowrsquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 77
LORD BYRON
(22 January 1788 ndash 19 April 1824)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 78
LORD BYRON
British Romantic Poet and Satirist
Born with a clubfoot and extremely sensitive about it
he was 10 when he unexpectedly inherited his title and
estates Educated at Cambridge he gained recognition
with English Bards and Scotch Reviewers (1809) a satire
responding to a critical review of his first published
volume Hours of Idleness (1807) At 21 he embarked on
a European grand tour Childe Harolds Pilgrimage
(1812ndash18) a poetic travelogue expressing melancholy
and disillusionment brought him fame while his
complex personality dashing good looks and many
scandalous love affairs with women and with boys
captured the imagination of Europe Settling near
Geneva he wrote the verse tale The Prisoner of Chillon
(1816) a hymn to liberty and an indictment of tyranny
and Manfred (1817) a poetic drama whose hero
reflected Byrons own guilt and frustration His greatest
poem Don Juan (1819ndash24) is an unfinished epic
picaresque satire in ottava rima Among his numerous
other works are verse tales and poetic dramas He died
of fever in Greece while aiding the struggle for
independence making him a Greek national hero
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 79
CHAPTER FOUR
BYRON A BLEND OF CLAY AND SPARK
INTRODUCTION
Byron whom Goethe regarded as lsquothe greatest genius of the centuryrsquo and whom Carlyle considered as the noblest
spirit in Europe was one of the most remarkable men
during the 19th Century which was characterized by
liberal optimism He was unquestionably a potent and
force and cause of change in the intellectual outlook and
socio-political structure of his time His colourful figure
his charismatic personality and satiric poetry captured
the imagination of the whole continent As the most
influential English poet he stands out as an important
figure in the history of ideas Representative of a new
age he was the supreme voice which the European
poets recognized for ldquohe put into poetry something that belonged to many men in his time and he was the pioneer of a new outlook and a new art He set his mark on a whole generation and his fame rang from one end of Europe to anotherrdquo
Renowned as the ldquogloomy egoistrdquo he was a sinister yet
great influence in the Romantic Movement His deepest
romantic melancholy his satiric realism and his
aspiration for political realism earned for him such a
wide acclaim that his name became a symbol for all the
great events of his day Commenting on his pervasive
influence Calvert says ndash ldquoIt is impossible not to take Byron seriously and it is disastrous to take him literallyrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 80
A REBEL EXTRAORDINAIRE
Byron was a born rebel Essentially a child of
Revolution his poetry breathes a unique spirit of
revolutionary idealism ldquoI was born for oppositionrdquo he
once remarked and added ldquobeing of no party I shall offend all partiesrdquo Describing him as an aristocratic
rebel Bertrand Russell said
ldquoThe aristocratic rebel of whom Byron was in his day the exemplar is a very different typesuch rebels have philosophy which requires some greater change than their own personal success In their conscious thought there is criticism of the government of the world which takes the form of Titanic Cosmic self-assertion or those who retain some superstition of Satanism Both are to be found in Byron The aristocratic philosophy of rebellionhas inspired a long series of revolutionary movements from the fall of Napoleon to Hitlerrsquos coup in 1933it has inspired a corresponding manner of thought and feeling among intellectuals and artistsrdquo
Byron felt the wild storm of nations akin to the storm
within his own heart and the ruin but the picture of his
own life In his unqualified individualism he takes up an
attitude of hostility towards society Even God appears
to him mirrored in the stormy face of the angry ocean
ldquoThou glorious mirror
Of the Image of Eternityrdquo
He wished to stir the oppressed to revolt and get rid of
tyrants
ldquoFor I will teach if possible the stones
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 81
To rise against earthrsquos tyranny Never let it
Be said that we will truckle into thrones
By ye ndash our childrenrsquos children I think how we
Showed that things were before the world was freerdquo
Don Juan VIIICXXXV4-8
ldquoI have simplified my policiesrdquo wrote he ldquointo a detestation of all existing governmentsrdquo His was the
most dreaded voice of all the revolutionary poets of the
world His voice was the peal of revolutionary thunder
his poetry was the message of the revolutionary forces
He stood as the greatest symbol of a violent and
dreadful revolution
CHAMPION OF LIBERTY
He was essentially a poet of liberty His greatest ideal in
life was how to fight against the forces of tyranny
restriction aggression and enslaving of workers by
puissant exploiters Liberty was an essential part of the
Byronic creed In fact his entire poetic work is
interspersed with some of the finest poetry in praise of
freedom for mankind He composed much splendid
verse for love of freedom His passion for personal
freedom covers national freedom also and the political
freedom in the form of national self-determination
particularly for Italy and Greece He remarks in his
diary of 1821 ldquoDifficulties are the hotbeds of high spirits and Freedom the mother of the new virtues incident to human naturerdquo
Identifying himself completely with the cause of Italy
and Greece he wrote ldquoI shall not fall backbut
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 82
onward It is now the time to act and what signifies ldquoSelfrdquo if a single spark of that which would be worthy of the past can be bequeathed unquenchably to the future It is not one man nor a million but the spirit of liberty which must be spreadrdquo In his Ode to Chillon Castle he characteristically exclaimed
ldquoEternal spirit of the chainless Mind
Brightest in dungeons Liberty thou art
For there thy habitation is the heart
The heart which love of Thee alone bind
And when thy sons to fetters are consignrsquod
To fetters and damp vaultsrsquo dayless gloom
And Freedomrsquos fame finds winds on every windrdquo
Love of liberty lay at the centre of his being and
determined what was best in him ndash belief in individual
liberty and his hatred of tyranny and constraints
whether exercised by individuals or societies Liberty
was an ideal a driving power a summons to make the
best of certain possibilities in him He insisted to be free
and maintained that other men must be free too
Opposition was an integral element in his basic attitude
revolt both personal and social was his forte Love of
freedom is built into the capricious structure of Childe Harold and Don Juan
HIS POLITICAL AND COSMOPOLITAN LIBERALISM
He grew in an atmosphere in which political reaction
against revolutionary ideals was victorious all over
Europe Byron was essentially a liberal by conviction
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 83
and could hardly bear the perception of liberals Though
he loved his native country yet he had a large vision for
the freedom and welfare of all nations The excitement
of political liberalism stirred on behalf of the Greeks
against the oppression of their Turkish overlords made
him a symbol of disinterested patriotism and a Greek
national hero The first two cantos of Child Harold are
tinctured with historical and typographical material as
also the appearance of the Byronic hero with his
exhortations to the degenerate Greeks and Spaniards to
remember their glorious past and arise They contain
Byronrsquos passionate feelings for Greece which was to see
the beginning as it was to see the end of his active life
His Faustian daemonic figure and his defiant
resentment of authority found an appropriate object in
the political sphere
His last journey and his death at Missolonghi in the
cause of Greek independence proves in him the moving
combination of nobility futility and romantic or heroic
panache In the words of Graham Hough lsquoBut for once Byron was on the winning side he died but his cause triumphed and he remains one of its heroes For the whole of the 19th Century he remained a portent and a symbol whom it was possible to worship or to condemn but never to neglectrsquo
A MAN OF ACTION
Action remains at the centre of his life and at last he
gladly seized the opportunity when it presented itself in
Greece Leaving poetry behind himself he took a heroic
resolution in favour of action rather than
contemplation He presents a rare example of fusion
between the active and the reflective lsquofor his was the romanticism of actionrsquo The moralist in the garb of the
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 84
pre-romantic rebel hero of the Childe Harold is cast
aside in Don Juan and the moralist in the somber garb
turns dandy in which moral judgment seems to be
ineffective Quite logically he finally abandons literature
for the field of moral action At last Byron flung himself
off into the world of action The dandy finds at last that
such a death even if it is on the sickbed and not the
battlefield is the only gesture untouched by futility ldquoIt is not enough that art perpetrates life life also must complete artrdquo WB Yeats rightly says ldquoone feels that he (Byron) is a man of action made writer by accidentrdquo
Byron did not regard writing as an end in itself on the
contrary he was several times on the point of giving up
writing He had always before him the hope of some
more active life and felt a certain mistrust for the purely
literary life He asserted ldquowho would write who had anything better to do Action- action I say and not writing Least of all rhymerdquo In a letter to Murray
he wrote ldquoYou will see that I shall do something or otherthat like the cosmogony or creation of the world will puzzle the philosophers of all agesrdquo He was
fully alive to the persistent sense both of human
aspirations and the ceaseless flux of eternity and also
knew that he would not fade into oblivion Said he
ldquoBut at the last I have shunned the common shore
And leaving land far out of sight would skim
The ocean of Eternityrdquo
And again he said
ldquoFor the sword outwears its sheath
And the soul wears out the breastrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 85
HIS ROMANTIC SELF-PORTRAITURE
Byron presents manrsquos mixed and imperfect nature His
personality is a queer blend of flesh and spirit
meanness and nobility clay and spark cause and effect
The lasting fascination of his personality despite his bad
temper careless arrogance the excesses the satiety
melancholy and restlessness owes much to Splendour Primier of Miltonrsquos Satan who is ldquomajestic though in ruinrdquo and the gloom and brutality of the heroes of the
novel of terror His exotic sensibility ranging passions
and sensual perversity take refuge in a sort of ldquoCosmic Satanismrdquo He draws of himself a sketch which
reproduces in a dim outline the somber portrait of his
idealized self in the famous stanzas of Lara
ldquoIn him inexplicably mixed appeared
Much to be loved and hated sought and feared
X X X X X X
A hater of his kind
X X X X X X
There was in him a vital scorn of all
As if the worst had fallen which could befall
An erring spirit
X X X X X X
And fiery passions that had poured their wrath
In hurried desolation over his path
And left the better feeling all at strife
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 86
In wild reflection over his stormy liferdquo
And the Giaour (hiding his sinister path beneath a
monkrsquos gown) also portrays Byron
ldquoA noble soul and lineage high
Alas though bestowed in vain
Which Grief could change and Guilt could stainrdquo
HIS CREDO
Despite all his self-mockery and arrogant egoism he had
a star (vision) and he followed it sincerely He was not
without guiding principles and his heroic death in the
cause of Greek independence shows that he was not an
actor but a soldier a man of affairs and a master of men
Keenly aware of something special in him he wished to
realize his powers and translate them into facts He
wished to be true to himself He had a keen appreciation
of the dignity and personal liberty of man
HIS FATAL TRUTH
Even though he disagreed with the moral code of his
age he had his own values He thought that truthfulness
is a permanent virtue and duty and so did not want to
compromise with conventions nor hide behind cant
Despite many ordeals and his own corroding skepticism
he speaks seriously and directly about his convictions
and presents them with irony satire and mockery Don Juan is a racy commentary on life and manners and is a
record of a remarkable personality ndash a poet and a man
of action a dreamer and a wit a great lover and a great
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 87
hater a Whig noble and a revolutionary democrat The
paradoxes of his nature are fully reflected in Don Juan which itself is a romantic epic and a realistic satire He
was full of many romantic longings but tested them by
truth and reality He remained faithful only to those
which meant so much to him that he could not live
without them
Praising Byron Nietzsche says ldquoMan may bleed to death through the truth that he recognizesrdquo Byron expressed
this in his immortal lines
ldquoSorrow is knowledge they who know the most
Must mourn the deepest over the fatal truth
The tree of knowledge is not that of linerdquo
A BELIEVER IN GOD AND IMMORTALITY OF SOUL
Full of snobbery and rebellion as he was Byron was not
altogether without lofty ideals and religious beliefs He
firmly believed in the immanence and transcendence of
God and the transience of human glory His implicit faith
in the immortality of human soul the ephemerality of
physical body and his unwavering trust in God ndash the
eternal Light of Lights is evident from his following
memorable lines
ldquobut this clay will sink
Its spark immortal envying it the light
To which it mounts as if to break the link
That keeps us from yon heaven which woos us to its brinkrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 88
Childe Harold III13-14
His Childe Haroldrsquos pilgrimage is a lament for lost
empire decay of love and triumph of love over human
mortality His lsquovoyage pittoresquersquo is full of historic and
didactic meditations and his oceanic image illustrates
the truism that nothing is constant but the rhythmic
pattern of its flux In the end all things float and toss on
that Great Ocean of which man is the foam and the
historic events are billows
ldquoBetween two worlds life hovers like a starrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquothe eternal surge
Of time and tide rolls on and bears afar our bubbles
while the graves
Of Empires heave but like some passing wavesrdquo
Don Juan XVI99
He maintains throughout his major poetic works a
sense of the presence of God or the gods and often
employs supernatural machinery to substantiate his
concept
IMMORTALITY OF SOUL
He had complete faith in the immortality of soul Said
he ldquoof the immortality of the soul it appears to me that there can be little doubtit acts also so very independent of bodyHuman passions have probably disfigured the divine doctrines Man is born passionate of body but an innate thought secret
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 89
tendency to the love of God is his mainspring of mind But God helps us allMan is eternal always changing but reproducedEternity Eternalrdquo
Again on his belief in God he says ldquoI sometimes think that man may be relic of some higher materialcreation must have had an origin and a creator for a creator is a more natural imagination than a fortuitous concourse of atoms All things remount to a fountain though they may flow to an oceanrdquo He knew
the limitations and ephemerality of phenomenal
existence He exclaims
ldquoFor I wish to know
What after all are all thingsbut a showrdquo
Unable to explore the stars with scientific aid he takes
up poesy to embark across the ocean of Eternity
ldquoI wish to do much by Poesyrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoBut at least I have shunned the common
And leaving land far out of sight would skim
The Ocean of Eternityrdquo
According to him man accepts the eternal voyage but
since man is not himself unlimited the boat capsizes in
the deep
ldquoAnd swimming long in the abyss of thought
Is apt to tire
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 90
For the fall entails not only ignorance and weakness but Human mortalityrdquo
Disconcerted with mankind he turns to the placid
spectacle of Nature and feels his spirit merge into its
objects
ldquoI live not in myself but I become
Portion of that around me and to me
High mountains are a feeling
When the soul can flee
And with the sky ndash the peak ndash the heaving plain
Of Ocean or the stars mingle ndash and not in vainrdquo
Childe Harold III72
This pantheistic ecstasy gives him a sense of quasi-
immortality
ldquoSpinning the clay clod bonds which round our being clingrdquo
The picturesque is translated into a kind of mystical
union with the spirit of the place even with the
universe itself
ldquoAre not the mountains waves and skies a part
Of me and my soul as I of them
(Is not) the universe a breathing part
The spirit is clogged with clayrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 91
HIS PESSIMISM
The myth of Cuvierrsquos undulations of Cosmic history
reflects Byronrsquos consistent and mature pessimism His
pessimism is traceable to his own view of society
Through a metaphor he considers his age as
ldquocatastrophicrdquo ndash an ice age of the human spirit and a
declining moral grandeur His myth of Fall and
recurrence of the Ocean and ice is both comic and
historic social and literary and personal as well The
consequences of the Fall and of manrsquos imperfect nature
are seen in all major human activities Generally fallen
mankind is hounded by its lower appetites spirit
encumbered by flesh The image of Fall is linked in
Byronrsquos imagination with the rhetorical image of the
poetrsquos lsquoflightrsquo which incurs the risk of consequent
lsquosinkingrsquo or bathos And over it all hangs the perplexity
of manrsquos ignorance about his aims his nature his true
identity
ldquoFew mortals know what end they would be at
But whether glory power or love or treasure
The path is through perplexing ways and when
The goal is gained we die you know ndash and thenrdquo
HIS PROPHETIC VISION
Endowed with strong imaginative power he had
experimented in Vulcanian visions of the earth plunged
into darkness by the final extinction or the sun or lsquoa ruined starrsquo plunging on in flames through the wastes of
space This prophetic faculty is amply evident from his
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 92
poem Darkness in which his imagination prefigures the
devastating effects of nuclear weapons
ldquoThe Hour arrived ndash and it became
A wandering mass of shapeless flame
A pathless Comet and a curse
The menace of the Universe
Still rolling on with innate force
Without a sphere without a course
A bright deformity on high
The monster of the upper skyrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoI had a dream which was not at all a dream
The bright sun was extinguished and the stars
Did wander darkling in the eternal space
The habitations of all things which dwell
Were burnt for beacons cities were consumedrdquo
Darkness IV42-45
In sum and in essence Byron exemplifies Shelleyrsquos
pronouncement that poets are the unacknowledged
legislators of the world More than any other Romantic
poet Byron embodies the dictum ndash lsquowhat is to give light must endure burningrsquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 93
PB SHELLEY
(4 August 1792 ndash 8 July 1822)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 94
PB SHELLEY
English Romantic Poet
The heir to rich estates Shelley was a rebellious youth
who was expelled from Oxford in 1811 for refusing to
admit authorship of The Necessity of Atheism Later that
year he eloped with Harriet Westbrook the daughter of
a tavern owner He gradually channeled his passionate
pursuit of personal love and social justice into poetry
His first major poem Queen Mab (1813) is a utopian
political epic revealing his progressive social ideals In
1814 he eloped to France with Mary Wollstonecraft
Godwin in 1816 after Harriet drowned herself they
were married In 1818 the Shelleys moved to Italy
Away from British politics he became less intent on
social reform and more devoted to expressing his ideals
in poetry He composed the verse tragedy The Cenci (1819) and his masterpiece the lyric drama Prometheus Unbound (1820) which was published with some of his
finest shorter poems including Ode to the West Wind
and To a Skylark Epipsychidion (1821) is a Dantean
fable about the relationship of sexual desire to spiritual
love and artistic creation Adonais (1821)
commemorates the death of John Keats Shelley
drowned at age 29 while sailing in a storm off the Italian
coast leaving unfinished his last and possibly greatest
visionary poem The Triumph of Life
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 95
CHAPTER FIVE
SHELLEY A PILGRIM OF ETERNITY
INTRODUCTION
Shelley who in his Adonais eulogized Keats as lsquothe Pilgrim of Eternityrsquo is himself justly entitled to this
appellation He was essentially a poet of the skies and
heavens of light and love of eternity and immortality
Since he loved to pierce through things to their spiritual
essence the material world was less important for him
than that which lies within it and beyond it Says he ldquoI seek in what I see the manifestation of something beyond the present and tangible objectsrsquo He set out to uncover
the absolute real from its visible manifestations and
interpret it through his own poetic vision In a
passionate search for reality he pursued its essence
behind the veil of naked loveliness of Nature and the
mundane human existence Defining poetry he says
lsquoPoetry is the revelation of the eternal ideas which lie behind the many-coloured ever-shifting veil that we call reality in lifersquo For him the poet is also a seer gifted with
a peculiar insight into the nature of reality for it is
through the inspired poetic imagination that he
breathes immortality into the objects of Nature Says he
lsquoBut from these create he can
Forms more real than living man
Nurslings of immortalityrsquo
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RP DWIVEDI Page 96
Prometheus Unbound
HIS LOVE OF INDIA
Shelley was an ardent admirer of India In a letter to his
friend employed in the East India Company he
expressed keenness to visit India and settle down here
He was drawn to India for its varied and picturesque
scenic beauty vast literary heritage and age-old cultural
traditions In order to have a closer acquaintance with
our great country he set his heart and mind on serious
studies in the Indian life and letters traditions and
culture
Since he was a visionary par excellence and was
endowed with a highly contemplative mind and a
remarkable prophetic zeal he evinced a deep and
abiding interest in the philosophical and spiritual
thoughts that lie enshrined in our holy texts such as the
Vedas the Upanishads the Brahmasutras and the
Bhagvad Gita It is interesting to trace the influence of
Indian spiritual thought on Shelleyrsquos poetry
VEDANTA IN SHELLEYrsquoS POETRY
The riddle of the origin of life and Nature and the
enigmatic questions such as lsquoWhat is the cause of life
and death What is the source of universe and what will
be its ultimate destinyrsquo have always engaged the
serious attention of all wise men Man has always stood
in awe and wonder at the mysteries of human existence
and the vast world around him Our seers and savants
have not only posed such questions but have also
answered them
In the opening verse of the Kena Upanishad the
disciple asks
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RP DWIVEDI Page 97
ldquoAt whose behest does the mind think or wander after towards its objects Commanded by whom does the life-force or the breath of life go forth on its journey At whose will do we utter speech Who is that effulgent Being whose power directs the eye and the earrdquo
Similarly in the Svetasvatara Upanishad the disciples
inquire ldquoWhat is the cause of this universe What is Brahman Whence do we come By what power do we live and on what are we established Where shall we at last find rest What rules over our joys and sorrows O Seers of Brahmanrdquo
Identical ideas impelled Shelley to exclaim in his famous
elegy Adonais
ldquoWhence are we and why are we Of what scene
The actors or spectatorsrdquo
Or again he asks in The Triumph of Life
ldquoWhence comest thou And wither goest thou
How did thy course begin I said and whyrdquo
Shelley asks
ldquoHas some unknown omnipotence unfurled
The veil of life and deathrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoAnd what were thou and earth and stars and sea
If to the human mindrsquos imaginings
Silence and solitude were vacancyrdquo
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RP DWIVEDI Page 98
Mont Blanc
Shelley in his famous poem Hymn to Intellectual Beauty answers that there is an unseen (all-pervading) omnipotence (power) behind this phenomenal world of
which all objects are but shadows
ldquoThe awful shadow of some unseen Power
Floats though unseen among us ndash visiting
This various world with as inconstant wing
As summer winds that creep from flower to flowerrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoIt visits with inconstant glance
Each human heart and countenance
Like aught that for its grace may be
Dear and yet dearer for its mysteryrdquo
Again he affirms his faith in such a mysterious
Omnipotent power when he says
ldquoThe works and ways of men their death and birth
And that of him and all that his may be
All things that move and breathe with toil and sound
Are born and die revolve subside and swell
Power dwells apart in its tranquility
Remote serene and inaccessiblerdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 99
X X X X X X
ldquoThe secret strength of things
Which governs thought and to the infinite dome
Of Heaven is as a law inhabits theerdquo
Mont Blanc
Vedanta which is the aphoristic summary of the
Upanishads the Brahmasutras and the Bhagvad Gita
is in fact the culmination of Indian religious and
philosophical thought Since Shelley sincerely desired to
unravel the essential reality which is unchanging
timeless and eternal and of which the world of sense
perceptions is but a broken reflection he turned his
attention to the ancient scriptures of India
ONENESS OF BRAHMAN (GOD)
One of the basic postulates of Vedanta is the inherent
oneness or the sole identity of Brahman in the universe
The Chhandogya Upanishad describes Brahman as
एकमव अXवतीय ndash lsquoone only without a secondrsquo and the
other Upanishadic texts also contain parallel statements
such as स एकः ndash lsquoHe is Onersquo and एकोदवः ndash lsquoOne Lordrsquo
Similarly the Rig Veda declares एक सद वDा बहदा वदित ndash lsquoTruth (God)is one but the wise one call it
differentlyrsquo Obviously Brahman the Supreme is one
and only one He is verily one and the same whether we
call Him Brahman Ishwara Paramatma God Allah or
the supreme Cosmic Soul He only exists all other
objects of the world are subject to decay and death
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
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How beautifully have similar thoughts been expressed
by Shelley when he exclaims
ldquoThe one remains the many change and pass
Heavenrsquos light forever shines Earthrsquos shadows fly
Life like a dome of many coloured glass
Stains the white radiance of Eternity
Until Death tramples it to fragmentsrdquo
Adonais L2
The concluding lines of Epipsychidion show that in a
moment of inspiration Shelley seemed to lay hold on the
ineffable spirituality and fundamental unity of
existence
ldquoOne hope within two wils one will beneath
Two overshadowing minds one life one death
One Heaven one hell one immortality
And one annihilationrdquo
Shelley etherealized Nature and believed in a single
power or one spirit permeating the whole universe He
effected a fusion of the Platonic philosophy of love with
the Wordsworthian doctrine of Pantheism
ldquoThe one spiritrsquos plastic stress
Sweeps through the dull dense worldrsquo
Compelling there all new successions
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 101
To the forms they wearrdquo
Holding that one universal spirit is the basis and
sustainer of Nature Shelley declares
ldquoThat Power
Which wields the world with never-wearied love
Sustains it from beneath and kindles it aboverdquo
In his pantheistic conception of Nature Shelley
conceived of it as being permeated vitalized and made
real by a universal spirit of love He clearly perceives
the presence of ldquothe awful shadow of the unseen power visiting the various worldrdquo
ldquoSpirit of Nature here
In this interminable wilderness
Of worlds at whose involved immensity
Even soaring fancy staggers
Here is thy fitting templerdquo
Demon of the World
TRANSMIGRATION OF SOUL
The doctrine of transmigration of soul or the cycle of
births and rebirths has been explicitly advanced in the
Upanishadic philosophy In the Kathopanishad
Brihadaranyak Upanishad and the Bhagvad Gita there are moving passages such as these
ldquoMan ripens like corn and like corn he is born againrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 102
Kathopanishad IV6
The Brihadaranyak Upanishad states
ldquoAnd as a caterpillar after reaching the end of a blade of grass finds another place of support and then draws itself towards it and as a goldsmith after taking a piece of gold gives it another newer and more beautiful shape similarly does the self after having thrown off this body and dispelled ignorance take on another newer and more beautiful formrdquo
Brihadaranyak Upanishad IV3-5
Similarly Lord Krishna tells Arjuna
ldquoAs a man discarding worn out clothes takes other new ones likewise the embodied soul casting off worn-out bodies enters into others which are newrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II22
And further Lord Krishna says to Arjuna
ldquofor in that case the death of him who is born is certain and the rebirth for him who is dead is inevitablerdquo
Bhagvad Gita II27
Shelley entertained similar ideas when he says
ldquoThe works and ways of man their death and birth
And that of him and all that his may be
All things that move and breathe with toil and sound
Are borm and die revolve subside and swellrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 103
Mont Blanc 92-95
Or again
ldquoThe splendours of the firmament of time
May be eclipsed but are extinguished not
Like stars to their appointed height they climb
And death is a low mist which cannot blot
The brightness it may veilrdquo
Adonais XLIV
Stressing the ephemerality of worldly objects Shelley
exclaims
ldquoSpirit of Beauty that does consecrate
With thine own hues all thou doth shine upon
Of human thought or formwhere art thou gonerdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoWhy aught should fail and fade that once is shown
Why fear and dream and death and birth
Cast on the daylight of this earth
Such gloomrdquo
Hymn to Intellectual Beauty 11
Lamenting the death of his friend Keats he says
ldquohe went uninterrupted
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 104
Into the gulf of death but his clear spirit
Yet reigns over earthrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoTo that high Capital where Kingly Death
Keeps his pale court in beauty and decay
He came and bought with price of purest breath
A grave among the eternalrdquo
Adonais VII
Again dwelling on the immortality of soul he declares
ldquoNaught we know dies Shall that alone which knows
Be as a sword consumed before the sheath
By sightless lightening The intense atom glows
A moment then is quenched in a most cold reposerdquo
Adonais XX
X X X X X X
ldquoGreat and mean
Meet massed in death who lends what life must borrowrdquo
Adonais XXI
X X X X X X
ldquoDust to dust but the pure spirit shall flow
Black to the burning fountain whence it came
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 105
A portion of the Eternal which must glow
Through time and change unquenchably the same
Whilst thy cold embers choke the sordid hearth shamerdquo
Adonais XXXVIII
THE DOCTRINE OF MAYA (DELUSION)
Our scriptures regard the phenomenal world as Maya
(delusion) They explain that the universe is neither
absolutely real nor absolutely non-existent and that its
phenomenal or apparent surface conceals and
safeguards the external presence of the Absolute
Shelley seems to have pondered over similar ideas
about the world of appearances
ldquoWorlds on worlds are rolling ever
From creation to decay
Like the bubbles on a river
Sparkling bursting borne away
But they are still immortal
Who through birthrsquos oriental portal
And deathrsquos dark chasm hurrying to and fro
Clothe their unceasing flight
In the brief dust and light
Gathered around their chariots as they gordquo
Three Choruses from Hallas
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
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In his poem Invocation to Misery Shelley says
ldquoAll the wide world beside us
Show like multitudinous
Puppets passing from a scenerdquo
Again describing human life as a veil he says
ldquoLife not the painted veil which thou who live
Call life though unreal shapes be pictured there
And it but mimic all we would believe
With colours idly spreadrdquo
Prometheus Unbound
In the myth of Aurora he gives his own account of the
creation and interpretation of works of art
ldquoAnd lovely apparitions dim at first then radiant in the mind arising bright
From the embrace of beauty whence the forms
Of which these are phantoms casts on them
The gathered rays which are realityrdquo
Shelley seems to hint at the theory of Superimposition
(Vivartavada) which maintains that the universe is a
superimposition upon Brahman It states that the world
of thought and matter has a phenomenon or relative
existence and is superimposed upon Brahman the
unique Absolute Reality
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 107
Since the world is a network of delusion and
appearance not reality our life on earth is a sojourn
and its paramount aim is to have a glimpse of and
realize the eternal Truth or the Absolute Brahman
which is concealed by ignorance and delusion The
Ishopanishad tells us
ldquoThe face of Truth is hidden by a golden orb (disk) O Pushan (the Nourisher the Effulgent Being) uncover (the Face) that I the seeker or worshipper of Truth may hold Theerdquo
Ishopanishad XV
Like a sincere aspirant for the realization of eternal
Truth or the Absolute concealed under the illusory garb
of Maya (Delusion) Shelley in the words of Fairy in his
Queen Mab declares
ldquoAnd it is yet permitted me to rend
The veil of mortal frailty that the spirit
Clothed in its changeless purity may know
How soonest to accomplish the great end
For which it hath its being and may taste
That peace which in the end all life will sharerdquo
Queen Mab
In certain other passages Shelley speaks of the veil
identified with Time which obscured Eternity from the
sight of man The symbol of veil demonstrates that
which conceals truth goodness or happiness When the
veil was torn or rent asunder
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 108
ldquoHope was seen beaming through the mists of fear
Earth was no longer Hell
Love freedom health had given
Their ripeness to the manhood of its prime
And all its pulses beat
Symphonious to the planetary spheresrdquo
Again he uses the same symbol of veil when Cythna
says
ldquoFor with strong speech I tore the veil that hid
Nature and Truth and Liberty and Loverdquo
Shelley uses the same idea of superimposition coupled
with his own robust idealism
ldquoLife may change but it may fly not
Hope may vanish but can die not
Truth be veiled but it burneth
Love repulsed ndash but it returnethrdquo
STATES OF CONSCIOUSNESS
Our Upanishads identify three states of consciousness
crowned by the fourth which transcends all the other
three states They are
(i) The Waking State
(ii) The Dreaming State
(iii) The State of Deep Sleep and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 109
(iv) The State of Pure Consciousness (Turiya)
The fourth state of ecstatic consciousness which
transcends the preceding three has no connection with
the finite mind it is reached when in meditation the
ordinary self is left behind and the Atman or the true
self is fully realized The Mandukya Upanishad describes it thus
ldquoBeyond the senses beyond the understanding beyond all expression is the Fourth It is pure unitary consciousness wherein (all) awareness of the world and of multiplicity is completely obliterated It is effable peace It is the supreme good It is one without a second It is the Self Know it alonerdquo
Mandukya Upanishad VII
Turiya (तर[य) the fourth state is the supreme mystic
experience Shelley seems to have partly attained such a
state of pure ecstatic consciousness when he states
ldquoI seem as in a trance sublime and strange
To muse on my own separate fantasy
My own my human mind which passively
Now renders and receives fast influencing
Holding an unremitting interchange
With the clear universe of things aroundrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoSome say that gleams of a remoter world
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 110
Visit the soul in sleep that death is slumber
And that its shapes the busy thoughts outnumber
Of those who wake and live ndash I look on high
Has some unknown omnipotence unfurled
The veil of life and deathrdquo
Mont Blanc
Another instance of such a mystic experience appears in
his famous poem Triumph of Life on which Shelley was
working at the time of this death in 1822
ldquobefore me fled
The night behind me rose the day the deep
Was at my feet and Heaven above my head
When a strange trance over my fancy grew
Which was not slumber for the shade it spread
Was so transparent that the scene came through
As clear as when a veil of light is drawn
Over evening hill they glimmer and I knew
That I had felt the freshness of that dawnrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoAnd in that trance of wondrous thought I lay
This was the tenor of my waking dreamrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 111
The Triumph of Life
SHELLEY AS AN ASPIRANT FOR SELF-REALIZATION
Shelley who described himself as
ldquoA splendour among shadows a bright blot
Upon the gloomy scene a spirit that strove
For Truthrdquo
seems to have reached at last that stability or
equanimity of mind which has been described in the
Upanishads and the Bhagvad Gita In a reply to Arjunrsquos
question about the definition of one who is stable of
mind or is finally established in perfect tranquility of
mind Lord Krishna says
ldquoArjun when one thoroughly dismisses all cravings of the mind controls it and is satisfied in the self (through the joy of the self) then he is called stable of mind One whose mind remains unperturbed amid sorrows whose thirst for pleasures has altogether disappeared and who is free from passion fear and anger is called stable of mindrdquo
Bhagvad Gita V56
The Katha Upanishad stresses similar ideas when it
says
ldquoBut he who possesses right discrimination whose mind is under control and is always pure he reaches that goal from which he is not born againrdquo
X X X X X X
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 112
ldquoThe man who has a discriminative intellect for the driver and a controlled mind for the reins reaches the end of the journey the highest place of Vishnu (the all-pervading and unchangeable one)rdquo
Katha Upanishad
Shelley echoes identical thoughts when he says
ldquoMan who man would be
Must rule the empire of himself in it
Must be supreme establishing his throne
On vanquished will quelling the anarchy
Of hopes and fears being himself alonerdquo
Sonnet on Political Greatness
It was in such rare moments of inner consciousness or
lsquoBlessed moodrsquo that Shelley felt lsquoOne with Naturersquo or
lsquoThe Power which wields the world with never-wearied love
Sustains it from beneath and kindles it aboversquo
As a myth-maker or a mythopoeic poet he conjured
visions of a golden age by turning to the grand aspects
of Nature ndash the ether the sky the wind the Sun the
Moon the light and the clouds and employing them as
befitting agencies and vehicles of his evolutionary ideas
ldquoPoetryrdquo he wrote ldquois indeed something divine It is at once the centre and circumference of all knowledgerdquo He
conceived of the universe as alive with a living spirit
behind it He moralizes natural myths and perceives the
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 113
Absolute behind the ephemeral In an exquisite image
he exclaims
ldquoThe sanguine sunrise with his meteor eyes
And his burning plumes outspread
Leaps on the back of my sailing rack
When the morning star shines deadrdquo
As his thoughts reached the zenith of their growth
Shelley identified his individual self with the all-
pervading Cosmic Self or the Brahman of the Vedanta
and felt himself one with the indwelling spirit of the
universe Unity filled his imagination he perceived
eternal harmony in the phenomenal existence and
rejoiced his own being in the vast million-coloured
pageants of the world And finally not only Nature but
all human existence is taken up as an inalienable aspect
of the eternal Cosmic Spirit He reaches the core the
centre of all palpable universe when he declares
ldquoI am the eye with which the Universe
Behold itself and knows itself divine
All harmony of instrument and verse
All prophecy all medicine is mine
All light of art or nature to my song
Victory and praise in its own right belongrdquo
Shelley perceived the transcendental or mystic
consciousness in which one realizes the complete
identity of self with the Supreme Self and which is called
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 114
तर[य अवथा ndash where one sees nothing but One
(Brahman) hears nothing but the One knows nothing
but the One ndash there is the Infinite The same truth is
vividly explained in the Bhagvad Gita when Lord
Krishna tells Arjuna
ldquoWhen one sees Eternity in things that pass away and Infinity in finite things then one has pure knowledgerdquo
Bhagvad Gita XVIII20
Our own great seer-poet and philosopher Sri Aurobindo
Ghose described Shelley as a sovereign voice of the new
spiritual force and a native of the heights with its
luminous ethereality where he managed to dwell
prophetically in a future heaven and earth with
brilliances of a communion with a higher law another
order of existence another meaning behind Nature and
terrestrial things
Sri Aurobindo further praises him as lsquoa seer of spiritual realities who has a poetic grasp of metaphysical truths and can see the forms and hear the voices of higher elements spirits and natural godheads and has a constant feeling of a high spiritual and intellectual beauty He is at once seer poet thinker prophet and artist Light love liberty are the three godheads in whose presence his pure and radiant spirit lived but a celestial light a celestial love a celestial liberty To bring them down to earth without their losing their celestial lustre and here is his passionate endeavour but his wings constantly buoy him upward and cannot beat strongly in an earthlier atmosphere There is an air of luminous mist surrounding his intellectual presentation of his meaning which shows the truths he sees as things to which the mortal eye cannot easily pierce or the life and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 115
temperament of earth rise to realize and live yet to bring about the union of the mortal and immortal terrestrial and the celestial is always his passion Shelley is the bright archangel of this dawn and becomes greater to us as the light he foresaw and lived and he sings half-concealed in the too dense halo of his own ethereal beautyrsquo
And what Juan Mascaro states as universal truth is
equally pertinent to Shelleyrsquos poetry
ldquoA deep faith in life cannot but be spiritual The path of Truth may not be a path of parallel lines but a path that follows one circle because Truth is onerdquo
Infinite is God infinite are His aspects and infinite are
the ways to reach Him In the Atharva Veda we read
ldquoThe one light appears in diverse formsrdquo This ideal of
harmony is carried to its logical conclusion in blending
synthesizing and reconciling conflicting metaphysical
theories and opposed conceptions of spiritual
discipline We read in the pages of Bhagvad Gita
ldquoWhatever wish men bring in worship
That wish I grant them
Whatever path men travel
Is my path
No matter where they walk
It leads to merdquo
Bhagvad Gita IV11
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 116
To sum up Shelleyrsquos poetry will always hold irresistible
fascination to the lovers of light and beauty for to
quote Juan Mascaro again
ldquoThe finite in man longs for the Infinite The love that moves the stars moves also the heart of man and a law of spiritual gravitation leads his soul to the soul of the universe Man sees the sun by the light of the sun and he sees the spirit by the light of his own inner spirit The radiance of eternal beauty shines over this vast universe and in moments of contemplation we can see the Eternal in things that pass away This is the message of the great spiritual seers and all poetry and art and beauty is only an infinite variation of this message The spiritual visions of man confirm and illumine each other Great poems in different languages have different values but they all are poetry and the spiritual visions of man come all from one Light In them we have Lamps of Fire that burn to the glory of Godrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 117
JOHN KEATS
(31 October 1795 ndash 23 February 1821)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 118
JOHN KEATS
English Romantic Poet
The son of a livery-stable manager he had a limited
formal education He worked as a surgeons apprentice
and assistant for several years before devoting himself
entirely to poetry at age 21 His first mature work was
the sonnet On First Looking into Chapmans Homer
(1816) His long Endymion appeared in the same year
(1818) as the first symptoms of the tuberculosis that
would kill him at age 25 During a few intense months of
1819 he produced many of his greatest works several
great odes (including Ode on a Grecian Urn Ode to a
Nightingale and To Autumnrdquo) two unfinished
versions of the story of the titan Hyperion and La Belle
Dame Sans Merci Most were published in the
landmark collection Lamia Isabella The Eve of St Agnes and Other Poems (1820) Marked by vivid imagery great
sensuous appeal and a yearning for the lost glories of
the Classical world his finest works are among the
greatest of the English tradition His letters are among
the best by any English poet
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 119
CHAPTER SIX
JOHN KEATS A MINSTREL OF BEAUTY AND TRUTH
INTRODUCTION
John Keats who in his own words was lsquoa fair creature of an hourrsquo lived a brief and turbulent life Pre-eminently a
sensuous poet in whom the Romantic sensibility to
outward impressions of sight sound touch and smell
reached its climax the life of Keats was a series of
sensations felt with febrile acuteness
His ideal was passive contemplation rather than active
mental exertion ldquoO for a life of sensations rather than of thoughtrdquo he exclaimed in one of his letters and in
another ldquoit is more noble to sit like Jove than to fly like Mercuryrdquo In fact his was a life of intense sensations
acute poignancy and an infinite yearning for beauty
which he identified with truth
Richness of sensuousness characterizes all his poetry
and his power of expression is marked by a spectacular
vividness which is interspersed with beautiful epithets
heavily charged with subtle messages for the senses His
works are so full of luxuriance of sensations and acute
passions that ordinary readers do not pause to perceive
the unimpeded flow of spiritual thoughts underneath
The pursuit of the spirit of beauty dominates all his
works which have one enduring message ndash the
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RP DWIVEDI Page 120
lastingness of beauty and its identity with supreme
truth (or God) This message ndash the oneness of beauty
with truth and the eternal existence of truth ndash has been
beautifully enshrined in his famous and oft-quoted lines
(with which he concludes his Ode on a Grecian Urn)
ldquoBeauty is truth truth beauty ndash that is all
Ye know on earth and all ye need to knowrdquo
Keats died at the age of 26 but even from his early age
he had visions of rare spiritual significance Dwelling on
the value of visions in human life and poetry he says
ldquoSince every man whose soul is not a clod
Hath vision
For poesy alone can tell her dreams
With the fine spell of words alone can save
Imagination from the sable chain
And dumb enchantmentrdquo
Since common readers tend to ignore the underlying
spiritual import of his visions and images this article
aims at bringing into play some of the poetrsquos thoughts
which bear a remarkable resemblance to the age-old
hoary spirituality of our ancient land
Stressing the fundamental truths of our Indian thought
and tracing their distinct reflection in the works of great
Western poets seems a worth-while academic pursuit
FUNDAMENTAL UNITY
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From the very beginning Keats could realize the
fundamental unity of Truth and Beauty and could dwell
at length on it to show how diverse paths illumined by
the glory of spirit in man ultimately lead him to the
realization of this abiding lesson of life The supreme
oneness of Truth has been beautifully enunciated by Sri
Krishna in the Bhagvad Gita
ldquoIn any way that men love Me in that same way they find My love for many are the paths of men but they all in the end come to Merdquo
Similar thoughts have found expression in the
introduction to the Upanishads by Juan Mascaro
ldquoThe path of Truth may not be a path of parallel lines but a path that follows one circle by going to the right and climbing the circle or by going to the left and climbing the circle we are bound to meet at the top although we started in apparently contrary directions This is bound to be in the end because Truth is onerdquo
And when Keats was only 22 he could give expression
to deep thoughts that have a curious similarity to the
ideas expressed in the Mundak Upanishad and the
Bhagvad Gita
ldquoNow it appears to me that almost any man may like the spider spin from his own inwards his own airy citadel the points of leaves and twigs on which the spider begins her work are few and she fills the air with a beautiful circuiting Man should be content with as few points to tip with the fine Web of his Soul and weave a tapestry empyrean-full of symbols for his spiritual eye of softness for his spiritual touch of space for his wanderings of distinctness for his luxuryrdquo
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RP DWIVEDI Page 122
ldquoBut the minds of mortals are so different and bent on such diverse journeys that it may at first appear impossible for any common taste and fellowship to exist between two or three under these suppositions It is however quite the contrary Minds would leave each other in contrary directions traverse each other in numberless points and at last greet each other at the journeyrsquos end An old man and a child would talk together and the old man be led on his path and the child left thinkingrdquo
ldquoMan should not dispute or assert but whisper results to his neighbor and thus by every germ of spirit sucking the sap from mould ethereal every human might become great and humanity instead of being a wide heath of furze and briars with here and there a remote oak or pine would become a great democracy of forest treesrdquo
WISDOM
All men of good will are bound to meet if they follow the
wisdom of the words Shakespeare in Hamlet where if
we write SELF or self we find the doctrine of the
Upanishad
ldquoThis above all to thine own self be true
And it must follow as the night the day
Thou canst not then be false to any manrdquo
Now coming back to the theme of beauty and truth and
their ultimate identity in the universe we have to dwell
at large on the concept of beauty as enunciated by Keats
in his poetry From the very beginning Keats realized
that beauty in its true sense illumines manrsquos thoughts
and thus leads him to understand the glory of truth and
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RP DWIVEDI Page 123
the pervading spirit of their identity in whatever he
sees hears and perceives
The eternal identity or oneness of beauty with truth and
their interplay in the world are in fact unfailing
fountains of joy The permanence of beauty as a source
of joy has been beautifully elucidated by the poet in the
opening lines of his famous poem Endymion
ldquoA thing of beauty is a joy forever
Its loveliness increases it will never
Pass into nothingnessrdquo
He goes on to say
ldquoSome shape of beauty moves away the pall
From our dark spirits
An endless fountain of immortal drink
Pouring unto us from the heavenrsquos brink
Nor do we merely feel these essences
For one short hour
glories infinite
Haunt us till they become a cheering light
Unto our souls and bound to us so fast
That whether there be shine or gloom overcast
They always must be with us or we dierdquo
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When he ascribes permanence to joy born of beauty
Keats has in mind the immanence and effulgence of
beauty as a reflection of its creator God Beauty whose
lsquoloveliness increasesrsquo and which lsquowill never pass into nothingnessrsquo is an inalienable attribute of Divinity for it
is lsquoan endless fountain of immortal drinkrsquo
BEAUTY
God (as the poet seems to presuppose) is all Beautiful or
the embodiment of all Beauty and the entire world of
sights and sounds is nothing else but a glorious garment
of God So beauty does not consist only in apparent
physical appearances but is an offspring of inherent
divinity in man and nature which is dimly reflected in
their attractive exterior Such an eternal beauty in his
view presents lsquoglories infinite that haunt us till they become a cheering light unto our souls It is this beauty the glory of spirit which must be with us or we dierdquo
The poetrsquos concept of beauty with its glories infinite
bears a striking resemblance with the path of splendour
of our Vedic and epic scriptures in which our sages
perceived the Divine presence in all that is splendid and
beautiful in the universe
Our Vedic texts are full of the expressions of the sage-
poetrsquos exquisite astonishment before the visions of
glory and wonder The attitude of our Vedic seer-poets
towards beauty as a transcendental reality beyond our
sense-perceptions has been beautifully expressed in
images of beauty and glory as an abstract idea Says Rig Veda
ldquoSinless for noble power under the influence of Savita God
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RP DWIVEDI Page 125
May we obtain all things that are beautifulrdquo
GOODNESS
Here the power of goodness is contemplated to lead to
the power of beauty Beauty in its myriad forms leads
us to spiritual consciousness of Divinity inherent in
Nature and all living beings Identical thoughts have
been expressed by Sri Krishna in Chapter X of the
Bhagvad Gita where all splendour and glory is said to
be the reflection of God whose manifestation this
universe is Says Sri Krishna to Arjuna
ldquoKnow thou that whatever is beautiful and good whatever has glory and power is only a portion of My own radiancerdquo
Bhagvad Gita X41
Seeing the effulgence of a thousand suns bursting forth
and yet it could hardly match the splendour of the
supreme Lord Arjuna exclaimed in wonder
ldquoI see the splendour of an infinite beauty which illumines the whole universe It is thee With thy crown and scepter and circle How difficult thou art to see But I see thee as fire as the Sun blinding incomprehensiblerdquo
Bhagvad Gita XI17
Besides this concept of ultimate elemental beauty
Keats goes on to underscore its fundamental and
inseparable unity with Truth which is yet another
inalienable facet of Divinity on earth
Truth being an essential attribute of God lies at the
core of all existence and it sustains the entire universe
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RP DWIVEDI Page 126
with its manifold forms of beauty reflected in countless
objects around us When Keats declares that lsquoBeauty is truth truth beautyrsquo he seems to remind us of the age-old
spiritual consciousness that found sublime utterance in
our Vedas which are the oldest treatises on lsquophilosophia perennisrsquo the eternal philosophy In the Vedas truth has
been described as the essence of Divinity
ldquoThe deity has truth as the law of His beingrdquo
Atharva Veda VIIXXIV1
The Rig Veda calls the deities as various manifestations
of Truth Elsewhere in the Rig Veda the Deity has been
described as true and the path of religious progress is
the ingredient of Dharma Declares the Rig Veda
ldquoBy truth is the earth upheldrdquo
Rig Veda X85
An Upanishadic sage says
ldquoTruth alone triumphs not untruth By Truth the spiritual path is widened that path by which the seers who are free from all cravings and declares travel and reach the supreme abode of Truthrdquo
Mundak Upanishad IIII6
So Truth is a basic postulate of Dharma and an abiding
and ultimate value of life It is the eternal oneness of
beauty and truth and truth and beauty that inspired
Keats to stress their underlying unity and their
transcendental reality When Keats says ldquoThat is all ye know on earth and all ye need to knowrdquo he points to that
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 127
ecstatic wonder which the spiritual realization of this
eternal truth brings to a seeker or seer or a poet
SUBLIMITY
Keats seems to have reached such a sublime plane of
poetic consciousness that is so aptly suggested by our
Vedic seers who have extolled God as a poet (कव) and
His divine creative energy is indicated as the poetic
power (काय) which has assumed manifold forms of
beauty and splendour So God as the supreme creator of
beauty has been described in the Rig Veda as
ldquoHe who is supporter of the world of life
Who knows the secret mysterious names
Of the morning beams
He poet cherishes manifold forms
By His poetic powerrdquo
Rig Veda VIIIXL5
So let me hasten to the conclusion by affirming that as
lsquoa lily for a dayrsquo Keats proved that a crowded hour of
glory is far better than an age without a name he seems
to have lived up to the lofty advice of Queen Vidula to
her son King Sanjaya in the Mahabharat
महतम 0व1लत 2यो न त धमऽतम 4चर
ldquoIt is better to flame forth for an instant than smoke away for agesrdquo
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Eternal truths transcend the barriers of time and space
country and clime caste and creed and shine through all
lands and in all ages Even today the enlightened souls
all over the world have a significant identity of ideas
irrespective of the countries to which they belong and
the religious faith to which they are affiliated
Such wise men awaken others from a state of
intellectual and spiritual slumber enkindle in them a
sense of understanding and fraternity It has been
rightly said by HW Longfellow
ldquoLives of great men all remind us
We can make our lives sublime
And departing leave behind us
Footprints on the sand of Timerdquo
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RP DWIVEDI Page 129
RW EMERSON
(25 May 1803 ndash 27 April 1882)
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RP DWIVEDI Page 130
RW EMERSON
US Poet Essayist and Lecturer
Emerson graduated from Harvard University and was
ordained a Unitarian minister in 1829 His questioning
of traditional doctrine led him to resign the ministry
three years later He formulated his philosophy in
Nature (1836) the book helped initiate New England
Transcendentalism a movement of which he soon
became the leading exponent In 1834 he moved to
Concord Mass the home of his friend Henry David
Thoreau His lectures on the proper role of the scholar
and the waning of the Christian tradition caused
considerable controversy In 1840 with Margaret
Fuller he helped launch The Dial a journal that
provided an outlet for Transcendentalist ideas He
became internationally famous with his Essays (1841
1844) including Self-Reliance Representative Men
(1850) consists of biographies of historical figures The Conduct of Life (1860) his most mature work reveals a
developed humanism and a full awareness of human
limitations His Poems (1847) and May-Day (1867)
established his reputation as a major poet
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RP DWIVEDI Page 131
CHAPTER SEVEN
EMERSONrsquoS SPIRITUAL QUEST AND INDIAN THOUGHT
INTRODUCTION
Ralph Waldo Emerson the lsquoSage of Concordrsquo as he is
rightly called was an American seer who came into the
world at a time when East and the West were gradually
coming closer to each other in spheres more than one
trade and commerce between the two was gaining
momentum and above all the era of inter-
communication of ideas intellect and spirit was being
ushered in by exchange of books
Emerson was one of the first great Americans who
absorbed himself sufficiently in this phenomenon
ventured into the sacred literature of India and
assimilated its thought to such a remarkable degree that
he became its eminent interpreter to his countrymen in
particular and to the entire West in general
EMERSON AND THE GITA
Let us see what Swami Vivekananda said about the
source of Emersonrsquos inspiration Swamiji said
ldquoThe greatest incident of the (Mahabharata) war was the marvelous and immortal poem of the Gita the Song Celestial It is the popular scripture of India and the loftiest of all teachings I would advise those of you who have not read that book to read it If you only knew how
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 132
much it has influenced your own country (America) even If you want to know the source of Emersonrsquos inspiration it is this book the Gita He went to see Carlyle and Carlyle made him a present of the Gita and that little book is responsible for the Concord Movement All the broad movements in America in one way or other are indebted to the Concord partyrdquo
His interest in the sacred writings of India was probably
aroused at Harvard and he kept it aglow throughout his
life With his motto ldquoTomorrow to fresh fields and pastures newrdquo he set out in search of the True (Satyam)
the Good (Shivam) and the Beautiful (Sundaram)
In busy and bustling New England there came forward
to quote Theodore Parker ldquothis young David a shepherd but to be a king with his garlands and singing robes about him one note upon his new and fresh-string lyre was worth a thousand menrdquo
With unflinching faith in Truth Righteousness and
Beauty and absolute confidence in all the attributes of
infinity he drank deep at the unfailing source of Indian
philosophy and religion and gave his thoughts such a
lucid inimitable expression that his writings have
become a veritable treasure of world literature Revered
the world over held in high esteem by great Indians like
Rabindranath Tagore and Pt Jawaharlal Nehru and
admired by Gandhiji his writings abound in the beauty
of his speech the majesty of his ideas and the loftiness
of his moral sentiments
Perhaps the most fitting commentary on the relevance
of his thoughts to our country was made by Mahatma
Gandhi after reading his Essays Said Mahatma Gandhi
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 133
ldquoThe Essays to my mind contain the teaching of Indian wisdom in a Western Guru It is interesting to see our own sometimes differently fashionedrdquo
There are indeed innumerable points of similarity in
thought and experience between Emerson and the
mainstream of Indian philosophy The philosophy of
Vedanta which was one of the thought currents that
reached America in the first half of the 19th century
influenced Emerson deeply and contributed largely to
his concept of lsquoselfhoodrsquo Emerson found the Vedic
doctrines of soul congenial to his own ideas about manrsquos
relationship to the universe He therefore drew freely
upon the Hindu scriptures which contain a vivid and
well-elaborated doctrine of lsquoSelfrsquo Numerous references
in his essays and journals to the lsquoLaws of Manursquo
(Manusmriti) Vishnu Puran Bhagvad Gita and Katha Upanishad bear ample testimony to this fact
Let us examine some of the striking identities between
Emerson and the Vedanta The Upanishads tell us that
the central core of onersquos self is clearly identifiable with
the Cosmic Reality ldquoThe self within you the resplendent immortal person is the internal self of all things and is the Universal Brahmanrdquo The Chhandogya Upanishad tells
us that ldquothe self which inhabits the body is verily the Brahman and that as soon as the mortal coil is thrown over it will finally merge in Brahmanrdquo
How close was Emersonrsquos spiritual kinship with the
Vedantic doctrines is clear from the following lines
taken from his essay Plato or the Philosopher
ldquoIn all nations there are minds which incline to dwell in the conception of the Fundamental Unity the ecstasy of losing all being in one Being This tendency
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 134
finds its highest expression chiefly in the Indian scriptures in the Vedas the Bhagvad Gita and the Vishnu Puranrdquo
He further quotes Lord Krishna speaking to a sage ldquoYou are fit to apprehend that you are not distinct from meThat which I am thou art and that also in this world with its gods and heroes and mankind Men contemplate distinctions because they are stupefied with ignorance What is the great end of all you shall now learn from me It is soul-one in all bodies pervading uniform perfect pre-eminent over nature exempt from birth growth and decay Omnipresent made up of true knowledge independent unconnected with unrealities with name species and the rest in time past present and to come The knowledge that this spirit which is essentially one is in onersquos own and all other bodies is the wisdom of one who knows the unity of thingsrdquo
In formulating his own concept of the Over-soul
Emerson quotes Lord Krishna once again
ldquoWe live in succession in division in parts in particles Meantime within man is the soul of the whole the wise silence the universal beauty to which every part and particle is equally related the eternal One And this deep power in which we exist and whose beatitude is all accessible to us is not only self-sufficing and perfect in every hour but in the act of seeing and the thing seen the seer and the spectacle the subject and the object are one We see the world piece by piece as the sun the moon the animal the tree but the whole of which these are shining parts is the Soul Only by the vision of that wisdom can the horoscope of ages be readrdquo
The Over-Soul
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RP DWIVEDI Page 135
A transcendentalist par excellence Emerson who was
influenced by German philosophers like Kant Hegel
Fichte and Schelling and their English interpreters
Coleridge and Carlyle affirmed that man could
apprehend reality by direct spiritual insight To him
intuition knew truths which ldquotranscendedrdquo those
accessible to intellect logical argument and scientific
inquiry Such a transcendentalism or attitude which
provided a metaphysical justification for the ideal of
individual freedom was found writ large in the holy
books of India
Steeped as he was in the oriental lore echoes of
Vedantic philosophy can be distinctly heard in his
writings which shine like ldquoa good deed in a naughty worldrdquo
Some of his poems resemble Vedantic literature in form
as well as in content His two famous poems Brahma
and Hamatreya are striking examples of such a close
affinity both in content and expression Ideas and
images in Brahma reflect certain passages which
Emerson had copied into his journals from the Vishnu
Puran the Bhagvad Gita and Katha Upanishad The first
stanza of Brahma which reads
ldquoIf the red slayer think he slays
Or if the slain think he is slain
They know not well the subtle ways
I keep and pass and turn againrdquo
is essentially an adaptation of these lines from the
Katha Upanishad
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ldquoIf the slayer thinks I slay if the slain thinks I am slain then both of them do not know well It (the soul) does not slay nor is it slainrdquo
Katha Upanishad II19
The same lines with a little variation of course appear
in the Bhagvad Gita
ldquoThey are both ignorant he who knows that the soul to be capable of killing and he who takes it as killed for verily the soul neither kills nor is killedrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II19
The image of Brahma as a red slayer has been derived
from the Vishnu Puran where Lord Shiva the destroyer
of Creation has been depicted as Rudra (the red slayer)
but destruction envisages new creation and therefore
symbolizes the decadence of one and necessitates the
advent of the other This is why Lord Shiva is regarded
as the god not only of extermination but also of
regeneration With this concept is connected the cult of
Shaivagam ndash the ushering in of an era of general good
and prosperity when the world is created anew
The second and third stanzas of Brahma echo the
following lines of the Bhagvad Gita
ldquoI am the ritual action I am the sacrifice I am the ancestral oblation I am the sacred hymn I am the melted butter I am the fire and I am the offeringrdquo
Bhagvad Gita IX16
and also from the same source
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RP DWIVEDI Page 137
ldquoI am immortality as well as death I am being as well as non-beingrdquo
Bhagvad Gita IX19
In the fourth stanza of Brahma there is a direct
reference to lsquothe Sacred Sevenrsquo ndash the seven highest saints
of our country namely Kashyapa Atri Bharadwaj Vishwamitra Gautam Vashishtha and Jamadagni Thus
we find that Brahma embodies an age-old Vedantic
truth
As regards his next poem Hamatreya its very title is a
variation of a disciplersquos name lsquoMaitreyarsquo to whom the
earth had recited a few verses Before we examine the
poem critically let us read a long passage from the
Vishnu Puran Book IV which Emerson had copied into
his 1845 Journal This passage which sheds ample light
on the background and theme of the poem under
reference reads
ldquoKings who with perishable frames have possessed this ever-enduring world and who blinded with deceptive notions of individual occupation have indulged the feeling that suggests lsquoThis earth is mine it is my sonrsquos it belongs to my dynastyrsquo have all passed awayearth laughs as if smiling with autumnal flowers to behold her kings unable to effect the subjugation of themselvesthese were the verses Maitreya which earth recited and by listening to which ambition fades away like snow before the windrdquo
Journals VII127-130
How futile is human vanity and how ridiculous is the
possessive instinct in man has been thoroughly exposed
by Emerson in the following lines
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RP DWIVEDI Page 138
ldquoEarth laughs in flowers to see her boastful boys
Earth-proud proud of the earth which is not theirs
Who steer the plough but cannot steer their feet
Clear of the graverdquo
Hamatreya
Man who awaits lsquothe inevitable hourrsquo forgets that all his
heraldry pomp power wealth and lsquopaths of gloryrsquo lead
him lsquobut to the graversquo and grows so proud of his material
achievements and so deeply attached to the fleeting
things of the world that he loses sight of the supreme
philosophical truth - the ephemerality of the world and
the immortality of soul Death which is lurking in the
shadows can lay his icy hands upon us any day yet due
to false pride and sense of meum and attachment we
allow ourselves to be duped by the passing show of the
world without ever thinking of salvation or final release
from the worldly bondages Says Emerson
ldquoAh the hot owner sees not Death who adds
Him to his land a lump of mould the morerdquo
Hamatreya
Here Emerson seems to have been deeply influences by
Indian scriptures and particularly Ishopanishad and
the Bhagvad Gita in which the philosophy of God-
realization through detached action has been succinctly
elaborated In these two sacred books it has been stated
that total renunciation of the sense of meum egotism
and attachment with regard to the world all worldly
objects body and all actions is a path to real love for
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 139
God All worldly objects like land wealth house clothes
all relations like parents wife children friends and all
forms of worldly enjoyment like honour fame prestige
being the creations of Maya are wholly deluding
transient and perishable whereas one God alone the
embodiment of Existence (Sat) Knowledge (Chit) and
Bliss (Anand) is all in all omnipotent omniscient and
omnipresent Therefore all sense of meum egotism and
attachment must be totally renounced for spiritual
growth and pure exclusive love for God If the seed of
egoism is sown sorrow is the fruit On the other hand
the more a man cultivates dispassion and
disinterestedness with regard to the world the more
easily he transcends the barriers of Ignorance (Avidya)
Delusion (Maya) and Aversion (Dvesha) and marches
on the path of self-realization and God-realization A
similar thought current runs through the following
memorable lines of Earth-Song which forms an integral
part of the poem
ldquoThe earth says
They called me theirs who so controlled me
Yet every one wished to stay and is gone
How am I theirs if they cannot hold me
But I hold themrdquo
Hamatreya
These lines remind us of those memorable words of
Lord Krishna in the Bhagvad Gita XII16 where a true
devotee is characterized as one who is ldquodelivered from the egorsquos thrall - the sense of I and minerdquo or the feeling of
doership in all undertakings
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 140
After reading these lines which seem to refer to the
famous Biblical phrase lsquodust thou art to dust returnethrsquo
the readers may feel called upon to cultivate a sense of
detachment and renunciation for their ambition fades
away and their lsquoavarice cooled like dust in the chill of the graversquo
All art it has been said is an attempt to distract man
from his ego Emersonrsquos Hamatreya is certainly an
illustrious example of great art Highly didactic in
content and tone this poem reminds us of that sublime
mood in which Emerson realized the futility of
egocentric attachment to earth and its fleeting objects
which are shadows rather than substances
Emersonrsquos writings leave us to quote John Milton lsquoCalm of mind all passions spentrsquo A fitting comment on the
total impact of Emersonrsquos works on us has been given
by a brilliant American man of letters Theodore Parker
who says
ldquoA good test of the comparative value of books is the state they leave you in Emerson leaves you tranquil resolved on noble manhood fearless of the consequences he gives men to mankind and mankind to the laws of Godrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 141
HD THOREAU
(12 July 1817 ndash 6 May 1862)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 142
HD THOREAU
US Thinker Essayist and Naturalist
Thoreau graduated from Harvard University and taught
school for several years before leaving his job to
become a poet of nature Back in Concord he came
under the influence of Ralph Waldo Emerson and began
to publish pieces in the Transcendentalist magazine The Dial In the years 1845ndash47 to demonstrate how
satisfying a simple life could be he lived in a hut beside
Concords Walden Pond essays recording his daily life
were assembled for his masterwork Walden (1854) His
A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers (1849)
was the only other book he published in his lifetime He
reflected on a night he spent in jail protesting the
Mexican-American War in the essay Civil
Disobedience (1849) which would later influence such
figures as Mohandas K Gandhi and Martin Luther King
Jr In later years his interest in Transcendentalism
waned and he became a dedicated abolitionist His
many nature writings and records of his wanderings in
Canada Maine and Cape Cod display the mind of a keen
naturalist After his death his collected writings were
published in 20 volumes and further writings have
continued to appear in print
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 143
CHAPTER EIGHT
THOREAUrsquoS TRYST WITH INDIAN CULTURE
INTRODUCTION
Henry David Thoreau was a great American
transcendentalist thinker His seminal mind and
original thought had an enduring impact on his own
countrymen and also on peoples beyond the bounds of
America His philosophy and life had a deep influence
on all great men of his time Mahatma Gandhi regarded
him as his Guru and his concept of Satyagraha owes its
origin to Thoreaursquos essay on Civil Disobedience which
Gandhiji chanced upon in South Africa On Thoreaursquos
greatness another great American contemporary RW
Emerson once remarked ldquoHis soul was made for the noblest society he had in short life exhausted the capabilities of this world Wherever there is knowledge wherever there is virtue wherever there is beauty he will find a homerdquo
HIS LOVE OF SOLITUDE
Endowed with a rare meditative mind Thoreau loved
lsquosweet solitudersquo for he held that what is truly alone is the
spirit A seeker after perfection he retired to the
solitude of the woods to see with the eyes of the soul ndash
ldquothe higher law in naturerdquo and realize his oneness with
the Cosmic Spirit A lover of the spirit behind the world
of appearance he once said ndash ldquoI love to be alone I never
found the companion that was so companionable as
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 144
solitude In solitude of the woods I suddenly recover my
spirits my spirituality I can go from the buttercups to
the life everlastingrdquo His love for loneliness resembles
that of our own sages and saints who shunned the din
and clamour of madding crowds and retired to the
sylvan solitude of the woods for meditation on
mysteries of life It was in the secluded and tranquil
atmosphere of the woods that the great teachers of
mankind cultivated their souls observed austerity and
wrote the holiest scriptures Aranyakas and sacred texts
Gurukul (forest academies)- the ideal nurseries of
higher learning and disciplined rigorous life were setup
here for success in life and self-realization which is a
path-way to God-realization
HIS CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE AND GANDHIJIrsquoS
SATYAGRAHA
Bapu read Thoreaursquos essay on Civil Disobedience for
the second time in jail and was so deeply impressed by
it that he called it ldquoa masterly treatise which left a deep impression on merdquo He copied the words ldquoI did not feel for a moment confined and the walls seemed a great waste of stone and mortarrdquo Gandhiji wrote to Roosevelt
in 1942 ldquoI have profited greatly by the writings of Thoreau and Emersonrdquo He told Roger Baldwin that
Thoreaursquos essay ldquocontained the essence of his political philosophy not only as Indiarsquos struggle related to the British but as to his own views of the relation of citizens to Governmentrdquo As Miller observed ldquoGandhiji received back from America what was fundamentally the philosophy of India after it had been distilled and crystallized in the mind of Thoreaurdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 145
In his Civil Disobedience which as a document of
much ethical and spiritual value is manrsquos most powerful
weapon in dealing with tyranny Thoreau examines the
relation of the individual to the state and offers a candid
exposition when he says ldquoThat Government is best which governs the leastrdquo He believed in the supremacy of
moral laws and his concept of Civil Disobedience is
based on the dictates of conscience Since the nature of
an individual is determined by his conscience there is
always a basic conflict between the laws arbitrarily
made by the Government and the objectives sanctioned
and held sacred by the individualrsquos conscience He
regarded the individual as more important than the
state So in the interests of justice and virtue men with
clean conscience most oppose unjust laws The form of
protest launched by conscientious and holy men against
government is called Civil Disobedience
Thoreau seems to have derived the concept from the
Bhagvad Gita which invests each individual with two
contradictory traits ndash the Divine Attributes and the
Diabolical Propensities Whenever diabolical tendencies
promote arbitrary administration by making unjust
laws and men of clean conscience are forced to obey
them injustice prevails and justice or righteousness is
destroyed In such a situation the Divinity incarnates
itself and sets matters right Declares Lord Krishna
ldquoWhenever righteousness (Virtue) is on the decline and injustice (Vice) is on the ascendant then I body forth myselfrdquo
Bhagvad Gita IV7
To Gandhiji also Satya (Truth) and Ahimsa (Non-
violence) are inter-related and Satyagraha or non-
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 146
violent resistance is based on the belief in the power of
spirit the power of truth the power of love by which we
can overcome evil through self-suffering and self-
sacrifice
FORMATIVE INDIAN INFLUENCES
Thoreau was thoroughly immersed in the Indian
scriptures In Emersonrsquos library he read and was deeply
influenced by the Manusmriti Bhagvad Gita Vishnu Puran Hitopadesh Rig-Veda and the Upanishads
Which the Manusmriti led him to seek the Self in
solitude the Bhagvad Gita taught him the ideal of
disinterested action non-attachment meditation and
self-realization He was so overwhelmed by the Gita that
he declared it to be the lsquoUniversal Gospelrsquo Praising its
moral grandeur and sustained sublimity of thoughts he
wrote in Walden ndash ldquoIn the morning I bathe my intellect in the stupendous cosmogonal philosophy of the Bhagvad Gita since whose composition years of the gods have elapsed and in comparison with which our modern world and its literature seems puny and trivial the best Hindu scripture (Gita) is remarkable for its pure intellectuality The reader is nowhere raised into and sustained in a higher purer and rarer region of thought than the Bhagvad Gita It is unquestionably one of the noblest and most sacred scriptures which have come down to us The oriental philosophy assigns their due rank respectively to action and contemplation or rather does full Justice to the latterrdquo
A thorough study of the Upanishads made him exclaim
joyfully ldquoWhat extracts from the Vedas I have read fall on me like the light of a higher and purer luminary which describes a loftier course through a purer stratum ndash free from particulars simple universalrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 147
At a time when the Western philosophers did not
appreciate the significance of contemplation Thoreau
emphasized that contemplation is as important as
action for the latter has to be charged by the former
otherwise action will lead to chaos disillusionment and
despair
HIS TRANSCENDENTALISM
Thoreau was an empirical transcendentalist To him
transcendentalism was a profound exploration of the
spiritual foundations of life His emphasis on intuition
or inner light for a direct relationship with God which
transcends all the conventional avenues of
communication stemmed from an intuitive capacity for
grasping the ultimate truth He was interested less in
the material world than in spiritual reality He regarded
Nature as a viable garment of the spiritual world and
the universe as the embodiment of a single Cosmic Soul
His transcendentalism relied upon the higher planes of
human circumstances its oneness with something
higher than itself While logical reasoning fails to grasp
the truth intuition transcends understanding and is a
synthesizing power to understand the organic whole
which is called the Over-soul
An individual of exceptional self-ascending and self-
reliance he believed that Over-soul is brought down to
earth by action rather than words He therefore did not
preach transcendentalism but actually lived it To him
transcendentalism is ldquoan inquisitive and contemplative access to Godrdquo He believed in the immanence of God in
nature and in man and also the identity of God with the
soul of the individual He said ldquothe creator is still behind the increate the Divinity is so fleeting that its attributes are never expressedthe idea of God is the idea of
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 148
our Spiritual nature purified and enlarged to infinity In ourselves are the elements of Divinity We see God around us because He dwells within usrdquo
This statement reminds us of a verse in the Gita
wherein Lord Krishna declares that every living heart is
His abode
ldquoArjuna God abides in the heart of all creatures causing them to revolve according to their deeds by His illusive power seated as those beings are in the vehicle of the bodyrdquo
At one place Thoreau said ldquoThe whole is whole an organic whole which is called Over-soul or Para-Brahman and the highest aim of life is to realize this truth and be one with the whole or Over-soulrdquo Thoreau seems to have
been moved by our Vedic incantation which says
ldquoThat (the invisible Absolute) is whole whole is this (the visible phenomenal universe) from the invisible whole comes forth the visible whole Though the visible whole has come out from that invisible whole yet the whole remains unalteredrdquo Thus the phenomenal and the
Absolute are inseparable All existence is in the
Absolute and whatever exists must exist in it hence all
manifestation is merely a modification of the one
Supreme Whole and neither increases nor diminishes It
Serene and thoughtful as he was he wrote in his
Journal ldquoThe fact is I am a mystic a transcendentalist and a natural philosopher to bootrdquo
HIS ASCETISM (SANNYASA)
He was a true ascetic or Sannyasi for he preached and
practiced the basic human values of Anasakti (non-
attachment) and Aparigraha (non-possession)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 149
throughout his life He abhorred acquisition of wealth
and regarded worldly possessions as the result of sheer
exploitation of the masses by a few powerful men and
agencies including the State and the Government Since
the universe belongs to God any claim to ownership or
personal possessions is against moral law and is in fact
a sin against divinity Moral laws being superior to
worldly rules his preference for a life of self-abnegation
and renunciation bears a striking similarity to our Vedic
view expressed in the very opening line of the
Ishopanishad
ldquoAll this whatever exists in the universe is inhabited by the Lord Having renounced (the unreal) enjoy (the real) with restraint Do not covet or set your eye on the possession of othersrdquo
To him all worldly attractions and allurements were but
a passing show or fleeting moments (in eternity) which
distract the seekers of truth from cultivating self-culture
and promoting inner spiritual growth
EXPLORER OF THE INNER WORLD OF SPIRIT
Thoreau was an explorer of the inner self He wanted to
pass ldquoan invisible boundaryrdquo establishment within and
around him new universal and more liberal laws and
live with higher order of beings To him every man is
the Lord of the realm beside which the earthly empire
of the Czar is but a petty state a hammock left by the
icethere are continents and seas in the moral
world yet unexplored by him He praised William
Habbingtonrsquos following lines which echoed his own
thoughts
ldquoDirect your eyes right inward and you will find
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 150
A thousand regions in your mind
Yet undiscovered Travel then and be
Expert in home home cosmographyrdquo
Simple living based on extreme reduction of wants and
self-reliance enabled him to lsquocultivate the garden of his soulrsquo In consonance with the concept of an ideal Yogi in
the Gita he wrote
ldquoThe millions are awake enough for physical labour but only one in a million is awake enough for effective intellectual exertion and only one in a hundred millions do a poetic or divine liferdquo How truly does this view echo
the memorable words of Lord Krishna
ldquoAmong thousands of men one rare soul strives for perfection and among those who strive with success one perchance knows me in truthrdquo
Condemning people who go to Africa to hunt giraffes for
pastime he exhorted them to aim at seeking their own
lsquoSelfrsquo He said ldquoIt would be a noble game to shoot onersquos selfrdquo He seems to recall the famous verse of the
Mundakopanishad which says
ldquoThe Pranava is the bow the Atman is the arrow and the Brahman is said to be its mark It should be hit by one who is self-collected and that which hits becomes like the arrow one with the mark ie Brahmanrdquo
When he ordains lsquoto shoot oneselfrsquo he like our Vedic
seers hints at penetrating the truth centre in us with
our mind propelled by the motive force generated in the
voiceless ecstasy of deepest meditation which touches
the Brahman the Ultimate Reality When the individual
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 151
soul gets fully detached from its contacts with matter or
its false identification with material envelopment it
realizes its oneness with the Supreme Brahman How
beautifully has he stressed the value of inner search in
the concluding sentence of Walden
ldquoThe light which puts out our eyes is darkness to us Only that day dawns to which we are awake There is more day to dawn The Sun is but a morning starrdquo
IMMORTALITY OF SOUL AND THE DOCTRINE OF
TRANSMIGRATION
Thoreau firmly believed in the immortality of soul and
its transmigration He had fully imbibed the philosophy
of the Gita which enunciates in unequivocal terms the
permanence of the soul and the transience of the body
Says Lord Krishna
ldquoThis soul is never born and never dies nor does it become only after being born For it is unborn eternal everlasting and ancient even though the body is slain the soul is notrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II20
ldquoAs a man shedding worn-out garments takes other new ones likewise the embodied soul casting off worn-out bodies enters into others which are newrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II22
Thoreau considered his life as a series of many more
lives to come On his return from Waldon Pond he said
ldquoI had several more lives to live and could not spare any more for that onerdquo At another place he refers to the
solitary hired manrsquos lsquosecond birth and peculiar religious
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 152
experiencersquo He evidently recalled the following words of
St John ldquoExcept a man be born again he cannot see the kingdom of Godrdquo In his Waldon he refers to a bug and
declares ldquoWho does not feel his faith in a resurrection and immortality Who knows what beautiful and winged whose egg has been buried for ages under many concentric layers of woodenness in the dead dry life in societyheard perchance of gnawing out now for years by the astonished family of man may unexpectedly come forth from amidst societyrsquos most trivial furniture to enjoy its perfect summer life at lastrdquo
CONCLUSION
Thoreau was a true Yogi or an ascetic modeling on the
Indian tradition of strict moral code of conduct for a
Sannyasi He drew abundant spiritual and moral
sustenance from the Indian scriptures and its rich
lsquoculturersquo and approximated the ideal of a perfect recluse
The concept of an ideal Yogi is similar upto a point to
the postulates of Divinity expressed thus in the Atharva Veda
ldquoThe Yogi is desireless and hence free from the impact of animal nature he is serene in the heroism of the spirit he is satisfied with the essence of things perceived spirituality and hence does not depend on sense-perception for happiness and so he is complete in himself And though the physical body is subject to decay and death he remains unworn and ever youthful in spirit and has no fear of deathrdquo
Atharva Veda XVIII44
Such an enlightenment Yogi or spiritual superman was
Thoreau whose greatness will ever inspire us and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 153
illumine our lifersquos path with light and love His life was
lsquoa chronicle of actions just and brightrsquo and his writings
were lsquowrit with beams of heavenly light on which the eyes of God not rarely lookrsquo
Proof
Printed By Createspace
Digital Proofer
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 4
ldquoIndia is the cradle of the human race the birthplace of
human speech the mother of history the grandmother
of legend and the great grandmother of tradition Our
most valuable and most instructive materials in the
history of man are treasured up in India onlyrdquo
Mark Twain
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 5
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 6
ISBN 9781497470637
First Edition 2007
Reprint 2014
copy RP Dwivedi
Rs 50000
All rights reserved No part of this publication may be
reproduced stored in a retrieval system or transmitted
in any form or by any means electronic mechanical
photocopying recording or otherwise without the
prior written permission of the copyright owner
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 7
DEDICATED TO
My Father
Late Pt Devi Sahay Dwivedi
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 8
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
I wish to express my indebtedness to all my near and
dear ones and tender grateful acknowledgements to my
wife Mrs Rajeshwari Dwivedi for her implied and
inspiring encouragement and particularly to my
nephew Raghav Dwivedi without whose willing co-
operation unfailing assistance and untiring labour the
publication of this compact volume would not have
been possible
My grateful thanks are also due to Bhartiya Vidya Bhavan Mumbai and Gita Press Gorakhpur for their
kind permission to include in this volume as many as
seven articles published in their esteemed periodicals
viz lsquoBhavanrsquos Journalrsquo and lsquoKalyana-Kalpatarursquo
respectively
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 9
CONTENTS
Introduction 10
1 Indian Spiritualism in Blakersquos Poetry 27
2 Vedanta in Wordsworthrsquos Poetry 47
3 Coleridgersquos Spiritual Quest and Indian Thought 62 4 Byron A Blend of Clay and Spark 79
5 Shelley A Pilgrim of Eternity 95
6 John Keats A Minstrel of Beauty and Truth 119 7 Emersonrsquos Spiritual Quest and Indian Thought 131
8 Thoreaursquos Tryst with Indian Culture 143
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 10
INTRODUCTION
Quest for Truth has always been manrsquos eternal passion
and pursuit Since the very dawn of human civilization
he has been at pains to unravel the mystery that
shrouds life and the world around him And yet the
enigmatic phenomenon of the universe is to quote
Tennyson ldquoan arch wherethrorsquo gleams that untraveled world whose margin fades forever and foreverrdquo as man
moves to reach it but it is never too late ldquoto seek a newer worldrdquo
Manrsquos basic faith and his dauntless persistence in
attaining truth both in the physical world and spiritual
sphere sustains his endeavour and impels him to move
into lsquofresh woods and pastures newrsquo In this sense both
Science and Religion have the identical aim of
discovering Truth and thus helping man to grow
materially and spiritually to achieve fulfillment The
yearning of the poets (selected here) for exploring and
expressing Ultimate Truth or Eternity has been
highlighted
This little volume of articles written at leisure from time
to time as a creative pastime reflects a modest attempt
at tracing out the main thought-currents of the major
English Romantic Poets and two prominent American
Transcendentalists ndash RW Emerson and HD Thoreau
and co-relating them with our own philosophical
thought and rich religio-spiritual heritage
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 11
Since these articles represent my stray and occasional
thoughts they have no claim to a thorough or
comparative study or a comprehensive coverage of all
aspects of the poets The perspective chosen is confined
to some of the distinct echoes of the Vedantic thought in
the poems of selected poets but their publication in the
journals of international repute is indicative of their
acceptance and appeal and their role in blazing the
trails for a further study of their subject for research
scholars and others
The poets in this selection have taken life in its fullness
encompassing both matter and spirit ndash the visible world
and the invisible universe beyond it They have
conceived of the shadow (world) not without substance
and movement not without a moving spirit behind it
Like our own Vedic poetry the poetry of these poets is
intensely religious in the sense of their having felt the
living presence of the Divine in the beauty and glory of
the universe Again like our ancient Vedic poets their
poetry was born out of a joyous and radiant spirit
overflowing with love of life energy for action and a
vision of divinity which needed serene faith for
inspiration They were all transported into another
world by a rare spiritual exaltation for they aspired for
revelation of the inner truth of Reality in their souls
Moreover like our Vedic hymns their poems flowed like
fresh and clear streams gushing out of rocky mountains
as our ancient sages had described long ago lsquoLike joyous streams bursting from the mountain our songs have sounded to Brihaspati (preceptor of Gods)rsquo
What Emerson said of Thoreaursquos greatness could also be
applied to a great extent to most of the poets selected
here Emerson remarked ldquoHis soul was made for the
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 12
noblest society he had in short life exhausted the capabilities of this world Wherever there is knowledge wherever there is virtue wherever there is beauty he will find a homerdquo
These articles amply prove the fundamental fallacy of
Rudyard Kiplingrsquos assertion that ldquothe East is east and the West is west and the twain shall never meetrdquo but
contrary to his view the East and the West represent
complementary views of the world While the West
gives us the perfection and joy of eternal beauty in the
outer world as expressed by Keats the East gives us lsquothe
splendor and joy of the Infinite in the inner world of
Soulrsquos visionrsquo
That the physicist and the mystic reach the truth of
essential unity of all things and events by following
different paths has been beautifully described by
modern scientist Dr Frijof Capra ldquoThus the mystic and the physicist arrive at the same conclusion one starting from the inner realm the other from the outer world The harmony between their views confirms the ancient Indian wisdom that Brahman the ultimate reality without is identical to Atman the reality withinrdquo
Clear and identical traces of our Vedic thought and
scriptural ideas are found scattered all over the corpus
of their poetic works If we take up the outstanding
ideas of each poet for our consideration we find their
striking resemblance with what abounds in our spiritual
heritage Let us consider their predominant thoughts
which find a distinct echo in our Vedic and holy texts
William Blake who was the most prophetic of all
major English poets seems to have attained the rare
super-sensory or transcendental state of consciousness
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 13
which enabled him to perceive reflective communion
with God Such a transcendental perception of Divinity
in all creation and all creation in Divinity gave him a
subtle insight into the lsquovisions of eternityrsquo In other
words this contemplative vision of Infinity in the Finite
and the Finite in Infinity has been regarded as the
distinguishing mark of pure wisdom by Lord Krishna in
the Gita ndash ldquoWhen one sees Eternity in things that pass away and Infinity in finite things then one has pure (सािवक) wisdomrdquo [XVIII20] It was this intimation of
eternity that made Blake declare
ldquoTo see the world in a grain of sand
And a Heaven in a wild flower
Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand
And Eternity in an hourrdquo
Auguries of Innocence
Moreover he strongly condemned man-made divisions
of humanity into numerous castes and creeds and
preached universal brotherhood based on love
understanding and sacrifice
ldquofor man is love
And God is love Every kindness to another is a little death
In the divine image nor can man exist but by brotherhoodrdquo
Jerusalem
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 14
And again he says
ldquoWhere mercy love and pity dwell
There God is dwelling toordquo
The Divine Image
William Wordsworth was essentially a seer-poet He
was perhaps the first English poet to appreciate the
innate kinship of man with Nature and find in her a
calm and invisible spiritual presence in perfect
communion with the Cosmic Soul He recognized the
essential spiritual unity of all things and the
interpenetration of human life with that of the universe
His poetic faith was based on an indwelling spirit in
nature which interpenetrated all life and transformed
and transfigured with its radiance rocks fields trees
and the people who lived close to them He found
something that permeates and transfigures everything
He perceived this indwelling spirit and the vision of the
Infinite (God) in his poetry He concluded that Nature
being the manifestation of God is our best moral guide
and teacher
ldquoOne impulse from a vernal wood
May teach you more of man
Of moral evil and of good
Than all the sages canrdquo
In his Ode to the Intimations of Immortality which is
his spiritual autobiography he expresses his belief in
pre-existence which is also an article of faith in our
scriptural texts
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 15
ldquoOur birth is but a sleep and a forgetting
The soul that rises with us our lifersquos star
Hath had elsewhere its setting
And cometh from afarrdquo
His mystical experience of lsquothat serene and blessed moodrsquo in which we lsquoare laid asleep in body and become a living soulrsquo and his perception of lsquoa sense sublime of something more deeply interfuseda motion and a spirit that impels all thinking things all objects of all thought and rolls through all thingsrsquo reflect not only
his profound pantheism but also find close parallels in
our own religio-spiritual literature
Samuel Taylor Coleridge who was one of the seminal
minds of his generation possessed the most fertile
imagination According to William Hazlitt he lsquohad angelic wings and fed on mannarsquo for his writings are
ethereal mystical and magical Endowed with a rare
lsquomystic idealismrsquo he was besides being a great poet a
speculative philosopher also who considered life as lsquoa vision shadowy of Truthrsquo He justified the phrase ndash
lsquoRenaissance of wonderrsquo for he revived the supernatural
and invested it with indefiniteness and suggestion
which characterize his imagination He drew his
conceptions from lsquomythrsquo and embodied them with
symbols His images express his emotion spiritual state
and metaphysical experience Unlike other poets his
poetry grew from his inner organic law and made
supernatural and romantic subjects credible to human
nature by creating lsquothat willing suspension of disbeliefrsquo that constitutes his poetic faith He was the first great
British idealist of his age who preferred the intellectual
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 16
intuition to the conceptual dialectic The image and
vision of God lsquoimago deirsquo as an intellectual
contemplation (speculari) of the transcendent Absolute
(the prius) of all beings is an aspect of his speculative
mysticism
Byron however stands apart from all other poets
included herein for although his philosophy of life was
altogether different from that of his contemporaries he
was a force a portent and historical phenomenon in his
age He was endowed with a rare fire for liberty
indomitable courage sacrificing spirit and prophetic
zeal which are undoubtedly great human values His
inevitable attitude was revolt both social and personal
As an influence and portent he was the most powerful
poet in his age for he created that Byronic legend which
became a historic phenomenon of lasting fascination of
his personality Endowed with fiery energy his self-
portrait of careless arrogance or even daemonic figure
was a persona of romantic panache He was a portrait
and a symbol whom it was possible to worship or
condemn but never to neglect
PB Shelley who was lsquoone frail form ndash a phantom among men companionlessrsquo (Adonais) occupies a
unique position among Romantic poets Essentially he
was a visionary whose philosophy of enlightenment
made his poetry fanciful and ethereal He was a born
revolutionary who launched a crusade against the
organized religion and society Disgusted by the gloomy
state of the world he dreamed a world of beauty
freedom and virtue and made his poetry a trumpet of
narcissistic fantasy A solitary intellectual lsquowandering companionlessrsquo (Alastor) his poetry is the projection of
his sense of isolation He was fired by rationalist
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 17
revolutionary thought which reflects his visions of the
future Endowed with rationalist speculative intuition
his poetry symbolizes the spirit of human welfare
ldquoI wish no living thing to suffer painrdquo
Prometheus I303
The desire of Shelley reminds us of our scriptural
prayer ndash ldquoसव भवत स13खनः सव सत नरामयाःrdquo His
imagination is idealistic and vision synoptic He deals
with the heavens and light and aspired for the
regeneration of the world through love To him there is
no dualism between the material and spiritual life for
they are the aspects of same reality To him only
Eternity is real while the phenomenal world is but an
illusion or माया ndash a veil that hides true light He echoes a
Vedic truth when he says
ldquoThe One remains the many change and pass
Heavenrsquos light forever shines Earthrsquos shadows fly
Life like a dome of many-coloured glass
Stains the white radiance of Eternityrdquo
Adonais L11
He treats natural objects and forces as symbols for his
own emotional patterns In his lsquoOde to the West Windrsquo
he uses the West Wind as a spirit of destruction and
regeneration or death and rebirth He considers death
as only a prelude to renewed life and this shows his
faith in the transmigration of human soul or the cycle of
death and rebirth He declares
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 18
ldquoIf winter comes can spring be far behindrdquo
Ode to the West Wind
His entire poetry is a vivid and symbolic expression of
the wretched actuality and the radiant idea He wants to
herald a perfect world order based on love and
freedom He treats poetry as a potent instrument of
redemption and it was his deep romantic sensibility and
fanciful ecstatic Platonic love that earned him this
description of lsquopinnacled dim in the intense inanersquo He
was one of the greatest lyricists and an
lsquounacknowledged legislator of the worldrsquo of thought and
imagination
John Keats who in his own words was lsquoa fair creature of an hourrsquo was perhaps the first conscious artist whose
artistic intuition was far ahead of his time By declaring
that ldquoan artist must serve Mammonrdquo he wished to confer
on arts a special status and thus laid the foundation of
the doctrine of lsquoArt for Artrsquos sakersquo His minute delicate
and sensuous observation of the visible world of Nature
inspired his poetry which he wanted to lsquoloadrsquo with a
special excellence His delightful communion with
Nature and the sensuous ecstasies of its sight sound
smell touch and taste formed some of his best poetry
His delicacy and keenness of perception and love for
passive contemplation made him exclaim ndash ldquoO for a life of sensations rather than thoughtrdquo But in fact most of
his sensations were his thoughts for they were
embodied in sensuous pictorial form and rich symbolic
imagery
As a liberal enthusiast he felt that sharing the distress of
humanity or participation in ldquothe agony and strife of human heartsrdquo was essential not only for human growth
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 19
but also for poetic maturity This philanthropic attitude
of Keats brings him very close to our ardent Indian
prayer - ldquoसव भवत स13खनः सव सत नरामयाःrdquo ndash May all be happy may none struck with disease To find an
escape from the fret and fever of life he sought refuge in
an infinite yearning for beauty and turned to the realm
lsquoof Flora and old Panrsquo but soon realized the transience of
the world and started exploring permanence He could
find it in the spirit of beauty which is but a reflection of
eternal truth His passionate pursuit of ideal beauty
which he identified with truth has been beautifully
expressed in the following oft-quoted lines
ldquoBeauty is truth truth beauty that is all
Ye know on earth and all ye need to knowrdquo
Ode on a Grecian Urn
This fundamental unity or oneness of beauty and truth
and their interplay in the visible world are the
mainsprings of his poetic creed
The conflict between transience and permanence forms
the theme of his famous Odes and he longs for a
solution and lasting happiness in the form of Art or lsquoon the viewless wings of Poesyrsquo At the height of his
impassioned contemplation when the life of the spirit is
fused with the objects of immediate sensuous
experience he has glimpses of the permanence of
beauty which reflects Eternal Truth In one of his letters
(281) he declares ldquoI can never feel certain of any truth but from a clean perception of its beautyrdquo And at another
place when he finds mortality and immortality poles
apart he asserts the everlasting value of truth ldquoTruthrdquo
he says ldquomeans that which has lasting valuerdquo This firm
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 20
conviction of Keats seems to be a distinct echo of our
Vedantic dictum
सयमव जयत नानतम सयन पथा वततो दवयानः
यनामतय तत सयय परम नधान ldquoTruth alone triumphs not untruth By truth is laid out the Path Divine along which the seers who are free from desires and cravings ascend the supreme abode of Truthrdquo
Mundak Upanishad III16
Again the Vedic seer says that the Atman (self) is to be
realized only through truth
सयन लampसतपसा यष आमा
मडकोपनषद III15
Thus truth is the foundation of Dharma (righteousness)
for it is an essential and abiding value of human life The
eternal oneness of beauty and truth and vice versa and
their transcendental reality was Keatsrsquo poetic creed and
the realization of this basic spiritual truth raised him to
a level of sublime consciousness which is the mark of a
true seeker of truth or seer
In sum we may say that though lsquoa lily of a dayrsquo Keats
proved that a crowded hour of glory is far better than
an age without a name as has been stressed in our epic
Mahabharat where Queen Vidula exhorts her son
Sanjaya ldquoमहतम 0व1लत 2यो न त धमतम 4चरrdquo ndash ldquoIt is better to flame forth for an instant than to smoke away for agesrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 21
Though Keats died at the young age of 26 years he left
an indelible imprint on the history of English poetry for
his deep and pervasive influence could be easily seen on
Tennysonrsquos early work Moreover he was indisputably
the precursor of the Pre-Raphaelite movement In fact
he had reached near perfection in poetic craftsmanship
which will ever remain worthy of emulation for the
succeeding generations of poets
Ralph Waldo Emerson known as the lsquoSage of Concordrsquo
acted as a bridge between the East and the West His
abiding interest in the Indian scriptures and
particularly the Gita was a source of the Concord
Movement in America According to Swami
Vivekananda all the broad movements in America are
indebted to the Concord Party Mahatma Gandhi
remarked after reading Emersonrsquos Essays ldquoThe Essays to my mind contain the teaching of Indian wisdom in a Western lsquoGurursquo it is interesting to see our own sometimes differently fashionedrdquo Emerson drew freely on the
Upanishads Manusmriti Vishnu Puran and above all
the Gita and his writings reflect his indebtedness to our
holy texts
Pt Jawaharlal Nehru admired Emersonrsquos gospel of self-
reliance and righteousness in particular and regarded
him as one of the builders of America A
transcendentalist and thinker par excellence Emersonrsquos
ideas shaped not only his countrymenrsquos thinking but
had a deep and pervasive influence over many other
nations His main thoughts coloured as they are by our
own Indian religio-philosophical strands are universal
in appeal and are as relevant today as they were in his
own lifetime
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 22
In formulating his concept of Over-Soul Emerson
stressed the fundamental identity of Individual Soul
with Over-Soul He asserted ldquoWithin man is the soul of the whole ndash the wise silence the universal beauty to which every part and particle is equally related the Eternal Oneonly by the vision of that wisdom can the horoscope of ages be readrdquo He firmly believed in the
immortality of soul and the ephemerality of the world
and strongly condemned the futility of manrsquos vanity and
ego-centric attachment to the perishable objects of the
world His writings leave us lsquocalm of mind all passions spentrsquo In fact lsquohe gives men to mankind and mankind to the laws of Godrsquo
Henry David Thoreau was a great empirical
transcendentalist about whom Emerson once remarked
ldquowherever there is knowledge wherever there is virtue wherever there is beauty he will find a homerdquo His essay
on lsquoCivil Disobediencersquo which Gandhiji read twice in a
South African jail impressed him so much so that he
regarded him as his political lsquoGurursquo and his concept of
Satyagraha owes its origin to Thoreaursquos writings
Endowed with a rare meditative mind he loved lsquosweet solitudersquo and retired to the woods for discovering the
lsquohigher lawrsquo and realize his oneness with the Cosmic
Spirit He believed in the supremacy of moral laws and
his doctrine of Civil Disobedience is based on his dictate
of conscience for he considered individual conscience
more important than arbitrary state laws
Thoroughly immersed in the Indian scriptures his
thought-process and philosophy of life was
considerably moulded by our ancient religio-spiritual
heritage His deep love for our scriptural texts is evident
from his declaration of the Gita as lsquoUniversal Gospelrsquo He
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 23
wrote ldquoIn the morning I bathe my intellect in the stupendous cosmogonal philosophy of the Bhagvad GitaIt is unquestionably one of the noblest and most sacred scriptures which have come down to usthe oriental philosophy assigns their due rank respectively to action and contemplationrdquo
About the Vedas he remarked ldquoExtracts from the Vedas fall on me like the light of a higher and purer luminaryrdquo
According to him Over-Soul could be brought down to
earth not by words but by ldquoan inquisitive and contemplative accessrdquo He further states ldquoIn us are the elements of Divinity We see God around us because He dwells within usrdquo
He was a true ascetic (सयासी) for he preached and
practiced non-attachment (अनासि8त) in his life He was
an explorer of the inner world of Spirit In the seclusion
of woods he lsquocultivated the garden of his soul as a true Yogirsquo and he wanted to lsquoshoot his selfrsquo as our Mundaka Upanishad says
ldquoThe Pranava is the bow Atma the arrow the Brahman its mark It should be hit by a self-collected onerdquo
Much of what is stated in this compact volume may be
found scattered over various other critical works but
my earnest endeavour has been to bring together such
material as is of sufficient spiritual value which belongs
to all times This small comparative survey of the realm
of main ideas of some great poets confirms the splendor
of their rich romantic imagination and the unity of all
spiritual vision that makes them not only the creators of
beauty love and light but also brothers in spirit
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 24
I would feel amply rewarded if through this modest
attempt I am able to arouse keen interest in my readers
for further critical study of the subject Any suggestions
for amplification or improvement on the text are most
welcome
RP DWIVEDI
LUCKNOW
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 25
WILLIAM BLAKE
(28 November 1757 ndash 12 August 1827)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 26
WILLIAM BLAKE
English Poet Painter Engraver and Visionary
He was trained as an engraver by James Basire and
afterward attended classes at the Royal Academy Blake
married in 1782 and in 1784 he opened a print shop in
London He developed an innovative technique for
producing coloured engravings and began producing
his own illustrated books of poetrymdashincluding Songs of Innocence (1789) The Marriage of Heaven and Hell (1790) and Songs of Experience (1794)mdashwith his new
method of ldquoIlluminated Printingrdquo Jerusalem (1804[ndash
20]) an epic treating the fall and redemption of
humanity is his most richly decorated book His other
major works include Vala or The Four Zoas
(manuscript 1796ndash1807) and Milton (1804[ndash11]) A
late series of 22 watercolours inspired by the Book of
Job includes some of his best-known pictures He was
called mad because he was single-minded and
unworldly he lived on the edge of poverty and died in
neglect His books form one of the most strikingly
original and independent bodies of work in the Western
cultural tradition Ignored by the public of his day he is
now regarded as one of the earliest and greatest figures
of Romanticism
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 27
CHAPTER ONE
INDIAN SPIRITUALISM IN BLAKErsquoS VISIONS OF ETERNITY
INTRODUCTION
William Blake was by far the most prophetic of all major
English poets In a preface to his famous poem on
Milton he exclaimed lsquoWould to God that all the Lordrsquos people were Prophetsrsquo Elsewhere Blake declared lsquoA Prophet is a seer not an arbitrary dictatorrsquo According to
PH Butter an acclaimed authority on Blake ldquoa prophet sees behind the marks of woe behind the wars and other evils of his time and the attitudes that cause such things But Blake was not the kind of prophet who just present evils but one who saw the Visions of Eternity one whose senses discovered the infinite in everythingrdquo The prophet
is also a spokesman one who speaks or believes he
speaks for God or some other higher power Blake
himself claimed in one of his letters in 1803 ldquoI dare not pretend to be any other than the Secretary the Authors are in Eternityrdquo
His belief in lsquoinspirationrsquo contributed to that lsquoterrifying honestyrsquo which TS Eliot saw in him to keep him
uncompromisingly true to his vision He perceived a
close relationship of the conscious ndash lsquoIrsquo with the deeper
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 28
self through which all inspiration flows He knew that
the prophet must also be a lsquomakerrsquo lsquoa blacksmith laboring at his furnaces to shape the stubborn structure of the languagersquo He further realized that a prophet
should also be a teacher a preacher and a beacon light
to humanity
Explaining the function of the bard or poet (and his own
mission) Blake in his introduction to Songs of Experience declares
ldquoHear the voice of the bard
Who present past and future sees
Whose ears have heard
The Holy word
That walked among the ancient trees
Calling the lapsed soul
And weeping in the evening dew
That might control
The starry pole
And fallen fallen light renewrsquo
Or again elucidating the aim of writing poetry or his
lsquogreat taskrsquo Blake declares
ldquo I rest not from my great task
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 29
To open the Eternal worlds to open the immortal eyes
Of man inwards into the worlds of Thought into Eternity
Ever expanding in the bosom of God the human imaginationrsquo
Like Milton who wanted lsquoto justify the ways of God to Manrsquo or Shelley who held that lsquopoetry is the revelation of the eternal ideas which lie behind the many-coloured ever-shifting veil that we call reality in lifersquo Blake in his
exceptional prophetic zeal set out to open the Eternal
worlds to open the immortal eyes of man inwards into
the worlds of thought into Eternity He was always at
pains to renew the fallen fallen light The poetrsquos divine
task of lsquoever expanding in the bosom of Godrsquo reminds us
of the moving verse of our Rig Veda in which God as
creator of beautiful forms has been conceived of as the
greatest poet whose divine creative energy s his poetic
power which manifests itself in the manifold forms of
beauty and splendor like the Heaven the Sun the Moon
the Sky etc
यो धता भवानानामगया स कवः काया प पपltयत
ऋवद VIII415
lsquoHe who is the supporter of the world of life
Who knows the secret mysterious names of the morning beams
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 30
He poet cherishes manifold forms by His poetic power even as heavenrsquo
Rig Veda VIII415
As a divinely inspired poet Blake seems to have had
experiences of various psychic and even mystic visions
which awakened him to subtle spiritual life It seems
that he must have transcended normal sensory
perceptions and would have attained to super-sensory
status of consciousness when he declares
lsquoI see the savior over me
Spreading his beams of love and dictating the words of mild song
Awake O sleeper of the land of shadows wake
I am in you and you in me mutual in love divinersquo
Jerusalem L4-7
He seems to have attained to that rare transcendental
consciousness when he perceived perfect communion
with God who assured him
lsquoI am not a God afar off I am a brother and friend
Within your bosoms I reside and you reside in me
We are one forgiving all evil not seeking recompensersquo
Jerusalem L18-20
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 31
Here Blake on perceiving a synoptic vision of complete
identity or oneness of God with individual self seems to
have echoed the eternal ancient Holy Scriptures Here
are a few striking parallels
In our Vedas also Go is regarded and adored as our
most-trusted friend Says the Rig Veda
lsquoमा=कर न ऐना सयाच ऋषः
वBमा Cह Dमतमसया 1शवानrsquo
ऋवद X237
lsquoNever may this friendship be severed
Of thee O Deity and the sage Vimada
We know O God Thy brother-like love
With us be Thy auspicious friendshiprsquo
Rig Veda X237
The key-note of this type of worship is the
contemplation of friendly love (described in later
religious literature as - सय ndash friendliness between the
Deity and the worshipper) The following prayer is in
the same spirit
lsquoभवा नः सFन अतमः सखा वधrsquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 32
ऋवद X133
lsquoBe Thou most dear to us for bliss O friend to aidrsquo
Rig Veda X133
Similarly assuring Arjuna of His perennial benediction
Lord Krishna declares in the Gita
ईHवरः सवभतानामतltठत
Kामयसवभतानमायया
ldquoArjuna God abides in the heart of all creatures
Causing them to revolve according to their Karma
By His illusive power seated as those beings are
In the vehicle of the bodyrdquo
Bhagvad Gita XVIII61
And again describing Himself as the truest friend of all
living beings Lord Krishna pronounces
ldquoI am the (disinterested) friend of all living beings and my devotee attains supreme peacerdquo
Bhagvad Gita V29
To turn to William Blake again he has an essential
belief in the closest intimacy of all living beings with
God who is the fountain-head of all life love and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 33
friendship This belief makes him affirm his faith in the
holiness of all life on earth Says he in his Annotations to Lavater
lsquoAll Life is Holyrsquo
Again he says ldquoIt is God in all that is our companion and friend for our God himself says lsquoyou are my brother my sister and my motherrsquo and Saint John said lsquowho so dwelleth in love dwelleth in God and God in himrsquo and such a one cannot judge of any but in loveGod is in lowest effects as well as in the highest causes for he is become a worm that he may nourish the weak For let it be remembered that creation is God descending according to the weakness of man for our Lord is the word of God and everything on earth is the word of God and in its essence is Godrdquo
In our own scriptures the all-pervasiveness of God (the
One) has been conceived not only in the cosmic world
but also in the world of men The very opening verse of
the Ishopanishad stresses the immanence of God in the
universe
ईशावाय इद सवM यािकNय जगया जगत
ईशोपनष I
lsquoUnderstand all this (universe) as inhabited by the Lord
Each moving thing in this moving worldrsquo
Or again says the Atharva Veda
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 34
य समायोऽवPणोयो वदHयः
यो दवोऽवPणोमानषः
lsquoGod is that in which things converge
He is that from which things diverge
He is our own land he is of foreign land
He is divine he is humanrsquo
Atharva Veda IV168
The immanence of God is the entire universe is also
underscored by Lord Krishna when he tells Arjuna
ldquoThere is nothing besides me Arjuna Like clusters of yarn-beads formed by knots all this (universe) is threaded on merdquo
Bhagvad Gita VII7
SYNOPTIC VISION
A firm belief in the all-pervasiveness of God in the
whole universe led him to perceive every object of
Nature as a window through which we may look with a
sense of awe and wonder into the beauty truth and all-
enveloping eternity which is but a reflection of God
Blake must have had palpable intimations of Eternity
when he wrote
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 35
lsquoTo see a world in a grain of sand
And a Heaven in a wild flower
Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand
And Eternity in an hourrsquo
Auguries of Innocence
Such a super-sensuous or transcendental perception of
Divinity in all creation and all creation in Divinity gave
Blake a subtle insight into the lsquoVisions of Eternityrsquo and
made him not only a seer but also lsquoan inhabitant of
other planes another domain of beingrsquo Commenting on
Blakersquos singular other-worldliness our own seer and
prophet Sri Aurobindo says ldquoThere is no other singer of the beyond who is like him or equal him in the strangeness supernatural lucidity power and directness of vision of the beyond and the rhythmic clarity and beauty of his singingrdquo
It is this contemplative knowledge of infinity in finite
and finite in infinity that has been regarded as the
distinguishing mark of the pure wisdom which finally
leads one to transcendental revelation which has been
so beautifully expressed in our own scriptures
सवभतषभावमययमीRत
अवभ8तसािवक
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 36
lsquoWhen one sees Eternity in things that pass away and Infinity in finite things then one has pure knowledgersquo
Bhagvad Gita XVIII20
The same truth has been emphasized again and again in
the Upanishads When man comes to know the real
truth about God nay when he succeeds in realizing the
truth about God how can he ever revile or adversely
criticize any form or aspect of God The Isha Upanishad
says
यत सवा13ण भतान आमयवानपHयत
सवभतष चामना ततो न वजगSसत
ईशोपनष VI
ldquoWhoever beholds all beings in God alone and God in all beings ie who regards all beings as his own self he no more looks down upon any creature for regarding all as his self whom will he hate and howrdquo
Lord Krishna stresses the same equanimity of vision
when he declares
ldquoThe Yogi who is united in identity with the all-pervading infinite consciousness and sees unity everywhere beholds the self present in all beings and all beings as assumed in the selfrdquo
Bhagvad Gita VI29
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 37
Again Lord Krishna declares
यो मा पHयत सव सवM च मय पHयत
तयाह न DणHया1म स च म न DणHयत
भगवगीता VI30
ldquoHe who sees me (the universal self) present in all beings and all beings existing within me never loses sight of me and I never lose sight of himrdquo
Bhagvad Gita VI30
FAITH IN THE LAW OF ETERNITY
Since God is infinite immanent and omnipresent soul
which is an integral and inalienable part of God is also
immortal The forms or objects of the world may change
but in reality they exist forever and are eternal Like
God soul is everlasting unborn undecaying and
undying Blake says
ldquoWhatever can be created can be annihilated
Forms can not
The oak is cut down by the axe the lamb falls by the knife
But their Form Eternal exists for everrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 38
The poet also believes that all sufferings of man if borne
meekly for a noble cause have their rich recompense
sooner or later for God being all-merciful would
certainly reward his suffering children He believes that
lsquoFor a tear is an intellectual thing
And a sigh is a sword of an angel king
And the bitter groan of a martyrrsquos woe
Is an arrow from the Almightyrsquos bowrsquo
Jerusalem
He believes that God Almighty holds out a solemn
promise of reward to sufferers for a lofty cause God
declares
lsquofear not Lo I am with thee always
Only believe in me that I have power to raise from deathrsquo
Jerusalem
MEANS OF LIBERATION
As the greatest and most inventive of Romantic
mythmakers Blake at first explores the contrary states
of human innocence and experience and then speaks of
lsquothe five gatesrsquo our mortal senses which bind us down to
the earth Not so much interested in the art of the
possible as in the visions of the beyond Blake
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 39
constructed a cosmic myth to show manrsquos infinite
potential and how he might attain to final liberation
from this sinful ephemeral world characterized by a
wheel of births and deaths He weaves his myths round
the fall and salvation of man the universal man and his
ultimate waking to eternal life In his poems lsquoMiltonrsquo and
lsquoJerusalemrsquo he regards Satan as the embodiment of
error selfhood and boundless pride and points out that
the means of liberation or freedom from the worldly
bondages lie in the annihilation of selfhood or ego and
the forgiveness of sins He exclaims lsquoI in my selfhood am that Satan I am that evil onersquo and resolves that he would
go down to self-annihilation In lsquoMiltonrsquo he puts the
following words into the mouth of Milton
lsquobut laws of Eternity
Are not such Know thou I come to self-annihilation
Such are the laws of Eternity that each shall mutually
Annihilate himself for others goodrsquo
Reiterating and stressing his poetic purpose or mission
of life Blake resolves
lsquoMine is to teach men to despise death and to go on
In fearless majesty of annihilating self
I come to discover before Heaven and Hell
the self righteousness in all its hypocritical turpitude
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 40
put off
In self-annihilation all that is not God alone
To put off self and all I have ever and everrsquo
Again in a sincere invocation to God Blake prays
lsquoO saviour pour upon me thy spirit of meekness and love
Annihilate the selfhood in me be thou all my life
Guide thou my hand which trembles exceedingly
Upon the rocks of agesrsquo
SPIRITUAL HUMANISM
Inspired by his implicit faith in Godrsquos fatherhood and
menrsquos brotherhood Blake preached the concept of
universal fraternity Considering the whole world as
one large family he maintained that all divisions and
fragmentations of humanity stemmed from manrsquos
ignorance of the eternal truth of one and only one
universal family The world being the home of mankind
all human beings are inextricably interwoven together
in the same warp and woof of life How beautifully has
this cosmopolitan philosophy of manrsquos eternal identity
with his fellow beings been enunciated in the following
memorable words
lsquoWe live as one man for contracting our infinite senses
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 41
We behold multitude or expanding
We behold as one Man all the universal family
and he is in us and we in him
Live in perfect harmony in Eden the land of life
Giving receiving and forgiving each otherrsquos trespassesrsquo
Elsewhere the poet says
lsquoThere is no other God than God
Who is the intellectual fountain of Humanity
I never made friends but by spiritual gifts
By severe contentions of friendship and the burning fire of thought
He who would see the divinity must see him in his children
So he who wishes to see a vision perfect whole
Must see it in its minute particulars organizedrsquo
Preaching universal brotherhood based on love
understanding and sacrifice he again exclaims (in the
words of Jesus)
lsquoWouldst thou live one who never died
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 42
For thee or ever die for one
Who had not died for thee
And if God died not for man and giveth not himself
Eternally for man
Man could not exist for man is love and God is love
Every kindness to another is a little death in the divine image
Nor can man exist but by brotherhoodrsquo
Jerusalem
Condemning man-made divisions of mankind into
various castes and creeds he says
lsquoAnd all must love the human form
In heathen Turk or Jew
Where mercy love and pity dwell
There God is dwelling toorsquo
The Divine Image
How truly are the poetrsquos ideas relevant even today when
the hot wind of doubt and distrust is blowing all over
the world (which has been broken up into fragments by
caste and creed clime and country) can be viewed in
the context of our age-old belief in the worship of God in
the universal form (Vishwaroop) and our religious and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 43
spiritual aspirations for ensuring the maximum good of
the world To serve humanity in a spirit of humility
impelled our people to look upon the world as one
great undivided family or nest (वHवनीड़म) and all men
as our brethren ndash (वसधव कटFबकम)
The ideal of universal brotherhood and selfless service
to humanity found spontaneous utterance in the
following moving words which embody the sublime
aim of a devout manrsquos life
न वह कामय रा0य न वगम ना पनभव
कामय दःख तSतानाम Dा13ण नामातनाशन
lsquoI do not desire earthly kingdom nor heaven nor do I want rebirth I want to reduce the sorrow of people who are sunk in sufferingrsquo
Today when the horizon of humanity is darkened by
national prejudices the need for spiritual humanism
synoptic vision and universal brotherhood is being
increasingly felt by one and all Here it is worthwhile to
turn our attention to great men whose thoughts
transcend myriad artificial barriers and teach us the
ideal of dedication to the common weal
Since truth transcends all religious dogmas and
disinterested service to mankind is a form of true
worship to God our great men have always prayed
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 44
सव भवत स13खनः सव सत नरामयाः
सव भWा13ण पHयत मा किHचX दःख भाYभवत
lsquoMay all be happy may all living beings be free from diseases may we perceive goodness in all and may none be struck with misfortunersquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 45
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
(7 April 1770 ndash 23 April 1850)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 46
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
English Poet
Orphaned at age 13 Wordsworth attended Cambridge
University but he remained rootless and virtually
penniless until 1795 when a legacy made possible a
reunion with his sister Dorothy Wordsworth He
became friends with Samuel Taylor Coleridge with
whom he wrote Lyrical Ballads (1798) the collection
often considered to have launched the English Romantic
movement Wordsworths contributions include
Tintern Abbey and many lyrics controversial for their
common everyday language About 1798 he began
writing The Prelude (1850) the epic autobiographical
poem that would absorb him intermittently for the next
40 years His second verse collection Poems in Two Volumes (1807) includes many of the rest of his finest
works including Ode Intimations of Immortality His
poetry is perhaps most original in its vision of the
organic relation between man and the natural world a
vision that culminated in the sweeping metaphor of
nature as emblematic of the mind of God The most
memorable poems of his middle and late years were
often cast in elegaic mode few match the best of his
earlier works By the time he became widely
appreciated by the critics and the public his poetry had
lost much of its force and his radical politics had yielded
to conservatism In 1843 he became Englands poet
laureate He is regarded as the central figure in the
initiation of English Romanticism
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 47
CHAPTER TWO
VEDANTA IN WORDSWORTHrsquoS POETRY
In many of his famous poems among which Ode on Intimations of immortality and Lines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey occupy pride of place
William Wordsworth one of the greatest seer-poets of
English literature presents ideas which bear striking
similarity to the rich philosophical thought that found
unimpeded flow in our Vedantic literature
In fact there are so many echoes of Vedanta in the
poetry of Wordsworth that one is apt to conclude that
the poetrsquos lsquophilosophic mindrsquo must have led him to drink
deep at the unfailing springs of Upanishadic Helicon
A poet of nature Wordsworth was essentially lsquoa seer of spiritual realities a seer of the calm spirit in naturersquo and
his poetry at its best is a fine harmony of his spiritual
insight ethical sense and profundity of thought He is a
curious amalgam of the seer the poet and the reflective
moralist who dwells philosophically and even
prophetically on Nature Man and Cosmic Soul
The epithets lsquobest philosopherrsquo lsquomighty prophetrsquo and
lsquoseer blestrsquo which Wordsworth uses for the new-born
innocent child in his famous Ode may be well applied to
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 48
the poet himself for ldquovoyaging in strange seas of
thought alonerdquo Wordsworth had found lsquofull many a gem
of purest ray serenersquo which still shed undiminished
luster on the entire fabric of English poetry
A careful study of the Ode on Intimations of immortality Lines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey Ruth Laodamia To Cuckoo and other poems reveals that Wordsworthrsquos sustained
loftiness of thought had taken him to such heights that
on him (to quote his own words)
lsquo those truths do rest which we are toiling all our lives to findrsquo
What indeed are those truths Those are the elemental
truths of life which were keenly perceived realized and
expressed by the seers and savants of the East and
particularly of our Vedantic times A careful study of
Vedanta which is the aphoristic summary of the co-
ordinated Upanishads the Brahmasutras and the
Bhagvad Gita and is in fact the culmination of Indian
religion and Philosophical thought reveals that serious
scholars of the West drew freely upon it Wordsworthrsquos
poetry bears ample testimony to this fact because
numerous echoes of Vedanta can be easily heard in his
poetry
To cite a few comparative examples the Upanishads
assert in unambiguous terms that the whole universe of
names and forms the world of being and becoming
springs from Brahman (Supreme Godhead or Absolute
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 49
Cosmic Soul) ndash the eternal existence consciousness and
bliss Since the universe is the creation and
manifestation of Brahman it is also pervaded by Him
Naturally therefore only Brahman exists all else is non-
existent or illusory The Chhandogya Upanishad
declares lsquoBrahman is verily the Allrsquo God is the subtle
essence underlying phenomenal existence the whole
nature which is Godrsquos handiwork as well as Godrsquos
garment and is filled and inspired by God who is its
inner controller and soul
The immanence of God has been corroborated by
Brihadaranyak Upanishad in two passages the first
being in the form of an answer given by Yagnavalyak to
Uddalak Aruni
lsquoHe is immanent in fire in the intermundia in air in the heavens in the Sun in the quarters in the Moon in the stars in space in darkness in light in all beings in Prana in all things and within all things whom these things do not know whose body these things are who controls all these things from within He is thy soul the inner controller the immortal He is the unseen seer the unheard hearer the unthought thinker the ununderstood understander other than Him there is no seer other than Him there is no hearer other than Him there is no thinker other than Him there is no understander everything besides Him is naughtrsquo
Brihadaranyak Upanishad II7
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RP DWIVEDI Page 50
In another passage Brihadaranyak Upanishad tells us
that God is the All ndash ldquoboth the formed and the formless the mortal and the immortal the stationary and the moving the this and thatHe is the verity of verities the soul of souls and He is the supreme verityrdquo
Brihadaranyak Upanishad IIV15
Wordsworth like these unique revelatory utterances of
the Upanishads codifies this truth in mystical manner in
Lines Composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey when he regards the Cosmic Soul as supreme power or
all-pervading presence
lsquoWhose dwelling is the light of setting Suns
And the round ocean and the living air
And the blue sky and in the mind of man
A motion and a spirit that impels
All thinking things all objects o all thought
And rolls through all thingsrsquo
Since God is All and everything else is Naught the world
is not real it is an appearance It is not the permanent
all-abiding Absolute Reality but a fleeting show and
ephemeral entity having seemingly phenomenal reality
In other words the world is lsquoshadow not substancersquo ndash it
is just a net-work of Maya
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 51
This Vedantic doctrine finds utterance not only in
Wordsworthrsquos poems like To the Cuckoo in which he
calls the earth ldquoan unsubstantial fairy placerdquo but he
seems to have actually experienced this illusory nature
of the world in states of mystic trance that often visited
him since his boyhood
In the introduction to his Ode on Intimations of Immortality he records such an experience in clear
terms
ldquoI was unable to think of external things as having external existence and I communed with all that I saw as something not apart from but inherent in my own immaterial nature Many a times while going to school have I grasped at a wall or tree to recall myself from the abyss of idealism to the realityrdquo
Such an ecstatic state of realizing eternal truths is
referred to in Lines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey as
lsquoThat blessed mod
In which the burden of the mystery
Of all this unintelligible world
Is lightenedrsquo
And finally to quote from the same poem
lsquoWe are laid asleep
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 52
In body and become a living soul
While with an eye made quiet by the power
Of harmony and the deep power of joy
We see into the life of thingsrsquo
One of the basic postulates of our Upanishadic
philosophy has been the idea of transmigration of soul
or faith in the cycle of births deaths and rebirths The
doctrine of transmigration has been explicitly advanced
in the Upanishads and particularly in the
Kathopanishad and Brihadaranyak Upanishad
In the Kathopanishad when the father of Nachiketas
told him that he had made him over to the god of Death
Nachiketas replied that it was no uncommon fate that
was befalling him
ldquoI indeed go at the head of many to the other world but I also go in the midst of many What is the god of Death going to do to me Look at our predecessors (who have already gone) look also at those who have succeeded them Man ripens like corn and like corn he is born againrdquo
Kathopanishad IV6
The Brihadaranyak Upanishad states the same truth
ldquoAnd as a caterpillar after reaching the end of a blade of grass finds another place of support and then draws itself towards it and as a goldsmith after taking a piece
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 53
of gold gives it another newer and more beautiful shape similarly does this Self after having thrown off this body and dispelled ignorance take on another newer and more beautiful form whether it be of one of the man or demi-god or god or of Prajapati or Brahman or of any other beingsrdquo
Brihadaranyak Upanishad IVIII5
The same truth appears in the Bhagvad Gita when Lord
Krishna says to the mentally agitated Arjuna
ldquoAs a man discarding worn-out clothes takes other new ones likewise the embodied soul casting off worn-out bodies enters into others which are newrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II22
And further Lord Krishna says to Arjuna
ldquoFor in that case the death of him who is born is certain and the rebirth of him who is dead is inevitablerdquo
Bhagvad Gita II27
Wordsworth in his famous Ode on Intimations of Immortality confirms his faith in the transmigration of
soul by saying in unmistakable terms
lsquoOur birth is but a sleep and a forgetting
The soul that rises with us our lifersquos star
Hath had elsewhere its setting
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 54
And cometh from afar
Not in entire forgetfulness
And not in utter nakedness
But trailing clouds of glory do we come
From God who is our homersquo
Again when Wordsworth laments the loss of pure
innocence immeasurable bliss and ecstatic vision of
early childhood in the great Ode and exclaims in
memorable words
lsquoWhither is fled the visionary gleam
Where is it now the glory and the dreamrsquo
He attributes the loss to the worldly intellectuality and
attachments as they grow upon man As childhood
grows into youth and youth into manhood the lsquovision splendidrsquo fades the first clear intimations of immortality
are dimmed leaving behind an unillumined waste of
mere thought and moralizing
lsquoAt length the Man perceives it die away
And fade into the light of common dayrsquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
The world of materialism or attachment tames him so
much so that man lsquothe little actorrsquo thinks
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 55
lsquoAs if his whole vocation
Were endless imitationrsquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
Whatever may be the crux of his philosophy of
childhood this belief of the poet can be safely traced
back to the comprehensive doctrine of the Maya in the
Upanishads and the Bhagvad Gita The Upanishads
tell us that the world is a delusion an appearance not
reality The Taittiriya Upanishad says ldquoAll beings spring from the Supreme Being are sustained by Him and return to the same Absolute at the time of dissolution Our life on earth is therefore a sojournrdquo The Isha Upanishad tells us that ldquothe truth is veiled in this universe by a vessel of gold and it invokes the grace of God to lift up the golden lid and allow the truth to be seenrdquo
It follows that our senses cloud our vision and lead us
farther and farther away from our spiritual moorings as
we come of age Senses dupe us and turn us into
worldlings Lord Krishna says to Arjuna in the Bhagvad Gita ldquoAs the wind carries away the barge upon the waters even so of the wandering senses the one to which the mind is joined takes away his discriminationrdquo
Thus the eternal and boundless Supreme Soul is as it
were limited by the sense organs and the body The
Universal Soul shackled by the body becomes the
individual soul (Paramatma becomes Jivatma) Because
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 56
of the presence of the Soul the spark of the Divine the
senses or sense-objects or worldly attractions fail to
dupe man fully from his divine mission This
metaphysical conviction finds expression in
Wordsworthrsquos Ode He says that though
lsquoShades of the prison-house begin to close
Upon the growing boy
But he beholds the light and whence it flows
He sees it in his joyrsquo
However farther man may go away from Nature ndash the manifestation of God and the indwelling Supreme Soul which resides in his own individual soul he can not
lsquoForget the glories he hath known
And that imperial palace whence he camersquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
Since bliss (Anand) is an inevitable attribute of God and
manrsquos soul being a fragment of Supreme Soul it
experiences the presence of God in moments of
Supreme Joy
Of the innumerable expressions in the Vedantic
literature of the joy of life of joy as the all entwining
principle of life and of creative principle of life and life
too the following passage from the Taittiriya Upanishad is very pertinent here
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 57
ldquoJoy is the Brahman from joy are born all living things by joy they are nourished towards joy they move and in joy they are absorbedrdquo Joy as the foundation of life
emanates from the Upanishad philosophy
Wordsworth seems to hold identical belief when he
craves for joy and laments its loss
lsquoO Joy that in our embers
Is something that doth live
That nature yet remembers
What was so fugitiversquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
The same idea finds expression in Lines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey where Wordsworth
declares it as Naturersquos privilege lsquoto lead (us) from joy to joyrsquo
And lastly the classicus locus of the Upanishadic
philosophy is to be found in the idea of immortality of
soul In the Chhandogya and Mundak Upanishads and
above all in the Kathopanishad we find numerous
references to the immortality of the soul We are told in
a passage of Kathopanishad lsquothat while we are dwelling in this body on earth we can visualize that Atman (Soul) as in a mirror that is contrariwise left being to the right and right being to the leftrsquo In the Bhagvad Gita also
Lord Krishna tells Arjuna about the immortality of Soul
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 58
ldquoThis soul is never born nor dies it exists on coming into being for it is unborn eternal everlasting and primeval even though the body is slain the soul is notrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II20
He further says
ldquoFor this soul is incapable of being cut it is proof against fire impervious to water and undriable as well This soul is eternal omnipresent immovable constant and everlastingrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II24
Wordsworth seems to have been fully convinced of this
philosophia perennis of the Vedanta when he eulogizes
immortality by addressing the child in his Ode in the
following words
lsquoThou over whom thy immortality
Broods like the day
A Master over a slave
A presence which is not to be put byrsquo
The poet in speaking of the lsquotruths that wake to perish neverrsquo seems to be reminiscent of the Upanishadic
concept that freed from the trammels of the body the
individual soul loses itself in the All-Soul when he
declares in the rapture
lsquoOur souls have sight of that immortal sea
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 59
Which brought us hither
Can in a moment travel thitherrsquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
Tracing the expression and confirmation of many other
tenets of Vedanta in the poetry of William Wordsworth
forms an interesting literary venture and instances of
close affinity between the Vedantic doctrines and
Wordsworthrsquos ideas may be multiplied Such a
comparative study proves that eternal truths transcend
the barriers of clime or country time or space and shine
through all ages and in all lands We should draw moral
sustenance from them and live a fuller freer life
Even today the wise all over the world maintain a
remarkable identity of views and their thoughts foster
international understanding
ldquoFrom hand to hand the greeting flows
From eye to eye the signals run
From heart to heart the bright hope glows
The seekers of light are onerdquo
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RP DWIVEDI Page 60
ST COLERIDGE
(21 October 1772 ndash 25 July 1834)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 61
ST COLERIDGE
English Poet Critic and Philosopher
Coleridge studied at the University of Cambridge where
he became closely associated with Robert Southey In
his poetry he perfected a sensuous lyricism that was
echoed by many later poets Lyrical Ballads (1798 with
William Wordsworth) containing the famous Rime of
the Ancient Mariner and Frost at Midnight heralded
the beginning of English Romanticism Other poems in
the ldquofantasticalrdquo style of the Mariner include the
unfinished Christabel and the celebrated Pleasure
Dome of Kubla Khan While in a bad marriage and
addicted to opium he produced Dejection An Ode
(1802) in which he laments the loss of his power to
produce poetry Later partly restored by his revived
Anglican faith he wrote Biographia Literaria 2 vol
(1817) the most significant work of general literary
criticism of the Romantic period Imaginative and
complex with a unique intellect Coleridge led a restless
life full of turmoil and unfulfilled possibilities
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 62
CHAPTER THREE
COLERIDGErsquoS SPIRITUAL QUEST AND INDIAN THOUGHT
INTRODUCTION
Coleridge was by all accounts a genius par excellence
whose versatility flowed albeit impeded in diverse
channels of creativity such as metaphysics poetry
theology and literary criticism Of all the Romantic poets
he possessed the most fertile and powerful imagination
which earned for him a special place in English poetry
and philosophical thought In the words of William
Hazlitt lsquohe had angelic wings and fed on mannarsquo He had
a lsquoseminal mindrsquo which said William Wordsworth
lsquothrew out a series of grand central truthsrsquo We find in
him the poet the philosopher and the theologian rolled
in one Charles Lamb called him lsquoLogician Metaphysician Bardrsquo whose poetry and writings are
tinged with a magical and ethereal quality His thought
made a permanent landmark on the succeeding
generations of English men of letters for he explored the
mysterious working of human mind
His life presents a saga of sharp contrast between
reality and dream blissful confidence and broken
hopes the warmth of human ties and the solitude of
haunted soul He probed human thought and dilemma
with a rare prophetic insight A prodigious thinker and
sincere seeker of truth he once remarked ldquoI would compare the Human Soul to a shiprsquos crew cast on an
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 63
Unknown Islandrdquo His particular fascination for the
unknown drew him instinctively to the German
transcendental or idealistic school of philosophy
represented by Berkeley Kant Schelling and Fichte
Fired by a peculiar mystic idealism he tried to interpret
the lsquoInterruptionrsquo of the spiritual world and beheld the
unseen with an uncommon eye which looked into the
void and found it peopled with lsquopresencesrsquo To him the
universe was lsquoebullient with creative deityrsquo and was
pervaded by lsquoan organizing surgersquo of vital energies
which emanate directly from God He was indeed an
inspired idealist who laid mystical insistence upon the
immanence and transcendence of God
Endowed with a rare penetrating mind Coleridge
ransacked works of comparative religions and
mythology and arrived at the conclusion that all
religious faiths and mythical traditions agree on the
unity of God and immortality of Soul His constant
intellectual search for truth led him to visionary
interests and universal life consciousness expressed
through the phenomena of human agencies Throughout
his intellectual career he remained a visionary and
philosophical mystic who valued a discreet and proper
exercise of the intellect Since his most serious concern
had been philosophy as a continuous trial for self-
education he wrote ldquodoubts rushed in broke upon me from the fountains of the great deep and fell from the windows of heavenrdquo For him lsquoreligionrsquo as both the
cornerstone and keystone of morality must have a
moral origin and a great poet should be lsquoa profound Metaphysician seeking for truth beauty and salvationrsquo In
one of those radiant moments when the poet the
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 64
metaphysician and the theologian of hope are one he
throws light on the process how truth works out in life
ldquoTruth considered in itself and in the effects natural to it may be conceived as a gentle spring or water source warm from the genial earth and breathing up into the snow drift that is piled over and around its outlet It turns the obstacle into its own form and character and as it makes its way increases its streamand arrested in its courseit suffers delay not loss and waits only to awaken and again roll onwardsrdquo
His description of a mystic as one who wanders into an
oasis or garden lsquoat leisure in its maze of Beauty and Sweetness and thirds (sic) his way through the odorous and flowering Thickets into open Spots of Greeneryrsquo (Aids to Reflection) is reminiscent of his own mysticism and
refers to the lsquoenfolding sunny spots of greeneryrsquo in his
famous poem Kubla Khan
Profoundly impressed by the German Idealist Schelling
whose idealistic school of thought dwelt on speculation
concerning the lsquoAbsolutersquo Coleridge viewed lsquomythrsquo as
primordial expression of elemental truths including the
Divine transcendence Inspired by his Biblical studies he
regarded self-consciousness as lying at the centre of his
philosophical and theological thought In Lay Sermons
he says ldquoSelf which then only is when for itself it hath ceased to be Even so doth Religion finitely expresses the unity of the Infinite Spirit by being a total act of the Soulrdquo
For him the lsquoinner lightrsquo is identical with the indwelling
glorious God and life is but lsquoa vision shadowy of Truthrsquo Attributing the pageant of life and the beauty and
splendor of the world to the immanence of Cosmic Soul
(God) he exclaims
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 65
ldquoAh From the soul itself must issue forth
A light a glory a fair luminous cloud
Enveloping the earthrdquo
Dejection An Ode
And again he says ldquoNature is the art of GodThe true system of natural philosophy places the sole reality of things in an Absolute which is at once causa sui effectus in the absolute identity of subject and object which it calls NatureIn this sense lsquowe see all things in Godrsquo is a strict philosophical truthrdquo
Coleridge firmly believed in the essential unity of God as
Absolute which is the creative foundation of the finite
universe and which distinguishes God from creation
He in the spirit of Vedanta stresses the immanence of
God in all and all in God in his famous poem Frost at Midnight Addressing his son he says
ldquoso shalt thou see and hear
The lovely shapes and sound intelligible
Of that eternal language which thy God
Utters who from eternity doth teach
Himself in all and all things in Himselfrdquo
In order to learn this lsquolanguagersquo Coleridge himself
became a lsquovisionaryrsquo lsquoprophetrsquo or lsquoseerrsquo The idea of
Himself (God) in all and all (creation) in Himself or the
concept that there is God in all things and all things are
things are closely interlinked with God bears a striking
resemblance to our age-old Vedic thought In
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 66
consonance with Indian thought Coleridge underscores
the identity of God (Brahman) with the individual soul
(Jivatma) and regards the universe as the reflection or
manifestation of God The seer he says is one who sees
God the creator in all creation and all creation as the
embodiment of God This according to him is the lesson
that God in His eternal language lsquouttersrsquo and doth teach
from eternity
The inherent oneness and sole identity of Brahman
(God) with the universe is a basic postulate of our
Vedanta and as such Coleridgersquos emphasis on the lsquoUnity of infinite Spiritrsquo bears a close identity with the Indian
philosophy The Oneness of God and the universe has
time and again been stressed in our Vedas and other
scriptures It would be pertinent to cite a few instances
here While the Chhandogya Upanishad describes
Brahman as lsquoOne only without a secondrsquo other
Upanishadic texts contain identical statements such as
lsquoHe is Onersquo and lsquoOne Lordrsquo The opening line of
Ishopanishad declares Godrsquos oneness and His universal
presence in unequivocal terms
ldquoUnderstand all this universe as inhabited by Lord
Each moving thing in this moving worldrdquo
Ishopanishad I
And again the same Upanishad says
ldquoThe wise man who perceives all beings as not distinct from his own self at all and his own Self as the self of every being ndash he does not by virtue of that perception hate any onerdquo
Ishopanishad VI
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 67
The same truth has been expressed in the Bhagvad Gita wherein Lord Krishna tells Arjuna
ldquoHe who sees Me (the Universal Self) present in all beings and all beings existing within Me never loses sight of Me and I never lose sight of himrdquo
Bhagvad Gita VI30
Or again
ldquoHe alone truly sees who sees the Supreme Lord as imperishable and abiding equally in all perishable beings both animate and inanimaterdquo
Bhagvad Gita XIII26
And Lord Krishna says again
ldquoThere is nothing else besides Me O Arjuna
Like clusters of yarn-beads formed by knots on a thread
All this (Universe) threaded on Me (God)
As are pearls on stringsrdquo
Bhagvad Gita VII7
THE DOCTRINE OF KARMA (CAUSE amp EFFECT)
Coleridge seems to subscribe sincerely to the Indian
doctrine of Karma which is based on the law of
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 68
Causation or cause and effect In other words Karmavad
stresses poetic justice or law of life ie virtue is
rewarded and vice is punished Since one must reap the
fruits of his good and bad deeds in life it is axiomatic
truth that lsquoas one sows so shall he reaprsquo In Sanskrit
there is a verse which says ldquoOne must bear the consequences of his good and bad deedsrdquo The echoes of
this doctrine could be distinctly heard in his poetry and
particularly in his greatest poem Rime of Ancient Mariner as also Dejection An Ode where he affirms
ldquoO Lady We receive but what we give
And in our life alone doth Nature liverdquo
So strong was his belief in the doctrine of Karma that in
a letter dated 14th October 1797 to his friend Thirlwell
he tells him how fatalistic his philosophy of life is
ldquoand at other times I adopt the Brahman
creed and say ndash lsquoit is better to sit than to stand it is better to lie than to sit it is better to sleep than wake but death is the best of allrsquordquo
His Ancient Mariner serves as an exhaustive
exposition of the law of Nemesis which works surely
but rather imperceptively in human life The poem is a
myth about a dark and troubling crisis in the human
soul It is actually a tale of crime which is due to
perversity of human will Crime is against Nature
Humanity and God He touches equally on guilt and
remorse suffering and relief hate and forgiveness and
grief and joy The marinerrsquos action shows the essential
frivolity of crimes against humanity and the ordered
system of the world and he deserves punishment for his
guilt Spirits are transformed into the powers who
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 69
watch over the good and evil actions of men and requite
them with appropriate rewards and punishments Since
the mariner has committed a hideous act of wantonly
and recklessly killing the albatross which was hailed in
Godrsquos name as if it had been a Christian soul he must
bear the punishment of life-in-death The killing of the
bird marks the breaking of bond between Man and
Nature and consequently the mariner becomes
spiritually dead When he blesses the water-snakes
even unawares it is a psychic rebirth ndash a rebirth that
must happen to all men
The mariner will never be the man that he once was He
has his special past and his special doom His sense of
guilt will end only with his death The Ancient Mariner
is a myth of a guilty soul and marks the passage from
crime through punishment and possible redemption in
the world So the poem is an allegory of redemption and
regeneration It is indeed a vivid representation or
living symbolization of universal psychic experience
The abiding fascination of the poem is that it is a
fragment of a psychic life It does not state a result it
symbolizes a process
Coleridge adds a moral ndash that the mariner is ndash to teach
by his example love and reverence to all things that God
made and loveth He advocates a sound moral
philosophy of life which extends human sympathy and
love to the animal world He affirms
ldquoHe prayeth well who loveth well
Both man and bird and beast
He prayeth best who loveth best
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 70
All things both great and small
For the dear God who loveth us
He made and loveth allrdquo
Rime of Ancient Mariner
PHILOSOPHICAL MYSTICISM AND lsquoTHE VISION OF GODrsquo
Coleridgersquos longing for the lsquounnamable somethingrsquo and
his abiding interest in conveying something of the
enigmatic perception of Godhead as a religious
experience carved for him a special place in the history
of ideas as a Christian poet and philosopher In a
predominantly mythological age he took serious
interest in the Biblical studies and drew upon the
central Christian image of Paradise as a walled garden
and the vision of God as a symbolizing that
transcendent numinous reality which the soul
inchoately and consciously seeks and strives for The
medieval image of the walled garden (paradise) as the
heavenly city (locus of God) is a symbol of divine
transcendence of that which is lsquobeyond beingrsquo This rich
image (of the walled garden) as an eminently
appropriate image of Godrsquos transcendence was used as
such by Church Fathers and also by the 15th century
Christian Platonist Nicholas of Cusa whose book The Vision of God is a paradigm of speculative mysticism
which informs Coleridgersquos metaphysics and much of his
poetry Taking inspiration from Nicholas of Cusarsquos book
The Vision of God Coleridge found it in close affinity to
his own genuinely philosophical mysticism
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 71
Coleridgersquos interest in the Vision of God is in a purely
visionary mystical tradition and his most visionary
poem Kubla Khan bears ample testimony to his
insistence upon life as lsquoa vision shadowy of Truthrsquo His
conviction in the lsquoImago Deirsquo (vision of God) is an
obvious link with the hoary mystical tradition which lay
at the heart of his philosophical and mystical thought
He maintains that the mind of man is a bridge to the
vision of God but by no means its fulfillment He says
ldquoThe vision and faculty divine is the participation of humanity in the Divinerdquo He however further maintains
throughout his intellectual career the conviction in the
reflection or bending back of the soul from the sensual
to the intelligible realm For him Christianity is an lsquoawful recalling of the drowsed soul from dreams and phantom world of sensuality to actual Realityrsquo
On the idea of reawakening he says
ldquoThe moment when the Soul begins to be sufficiently self-conscious to ask concerning itself and its relations is the first moment of its intellectual arrival into the world Its being ndash enigmatic as it must seem ndash is posterior to its existencerdquo
Collected Notes
In a recent study of Coleridge Prof Douglas Headley of
Cambridge University declares ldquoHe is best described as an essentially speculative and mystical philosopher-theologian His was a theology inspired by those Church Fathers who emphasize the vision of God as an intellectual contemplation (speculari) of the transcendent Absolute the prius of all beingrdquo Since the
mystic tradition follows a supersensuous perception
the vision of God is fundamentally lsquoVisio-intuitivarsquo ndash
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 72
intuitive or intellectual vision Coleridge expresses such
a state of mind when he says
ldquoMy mind feels as if it ached to behold and know something great something One and Indivisible and it is only in the faith of this that rocks or waterfalls mountains or caverns give me the sense of sublimity or majesty But in this faith all things counterfeit Infinityrdquo
Since the sublime enlarges and inspires the Soul to
aspire for the Divine it impresses him with the
fundamental Oneness of God and a universal vision
which he hints at in his Religious Musings as under
ldquoThere is One mind One omnipresent mind
His most holy name is Love
Truth of subliming import
lsquoTis sublime in man
Our noontide majesty to know ourselves
Parts and portions of one wondrous wholerdquo
These passages recall to our mind the famous mantra
(verse) of the Yajurveda where the mystic realization
or the direct experience of the Supreme by a Vedic sage
has been beautifully described in terms of his personal
knowledge of the Divine He says
ldquoI have known this sun-coloured Mighty Being
Refulgent as the sun beyond darkness
By knowing Him alone one transcends death
There is no other way to gordquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 73
Yajurveda XXXI18
ldquoI have realized it I have known itrdquo not that I just
believe in it and all else can also realize it This is not the
expression of an opinion but the statement of an
experience Commenting on this verse Sri Aurobindo
says
ldquoThis is one of the grandest utterances in the worldrsquos spiritual literature for it marks the emanation of this Being from across the darkness into our world so that something of the sun colour may come into our dull heads and dim heartsrdquo
Coleridge seems to be in complete agreement with our
own Indian mysticism which owes its origin to the
Vedas wherein the knowledge of the Divine or the
Ultimate Reality (Brahman) has been regarded not as a
process of philosophical thought but as a direct
experience in the depth of the human soul For him the
divine vision is possible in that spiritual meditation
transformation of intellectual rapture in which all
discursive thought is fully sublimated According to him
the lsquovisio intuitivarsquo is the culmination of all knowledge ndash
sensus-ratio-intellectus and is in conjunction with the
concept of Imago Dei In order to see that which not an
object is ie God the human mind must put aside its own
discursive differentiating reflection ndash spiritus altissimus rationis ndash which guards the walls of the garden of
paradise lsquobeyondrsquo which dwells God The highest
transformation or sublimation of conscience can ensure
an intuitive vision of God and in accordance with the
maxim ndash Simile Simili ndash the mind then becomes like its
object by divesting itself of difference in order to
experience the Absolute Reality Says Coleridge
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 74
ldquoAn Immense Being does strongly fill the soul and Omnipotency Omnisciency and Infinite Goodness do enlarge and dilate the Spirit while it fixtly looks upon them They raise strong passions of Love and Admiration which melt our Nature and transform it into the mould and imagery that which we can contemplaterdquo
Notebooks
Mysticism is thus the subtle path of spiritual realization
of That Reality or Divine Presence which has been
described in our Vedic texts as (lying hidden in a cave shrouded in secrecy) God is one One beyond all
diversities In Him all contradictions and conflicts meet
and dissolve through the spiritual transformation of the
lsquoseerrsquo or lsquomysticrsquo whose soul rises above the bewildering
trammels and distortions of life and seeks unity with all
in the unity with One To such an enlightened seer life
becomes an unceasing adventure from unreality to
reality from ephemerality to eternity from the human
to the Divine One who realizes the Divine as the One
(without parallel) loving Lord finds the whole universe
united in Him Such a significantly mystical experience
finds a memorable expression in the following verse of
the Yajurveda where the sage named Vena beholds
such a divine vision
ldquoThe loving sage (Vena) beholds that Mysterious Existence
Wherein the universe comes to have One home (nest)
Therein unites and therefore issues the whole
The Lord is the warp and woof in the Created beingsrdquo
Yajurveda XXXII8
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 75
A careful analysis of the above-quoted passage reveals
all the main elements of mysticism viz
(i) Divinity is a subject of personal spiritual
experience
(ii) The ultimate conception of Divinity is a
mystery symbolically expressed as
गहानCहतम
(iii) The abstract conception of the Divine as an
Essence or Existence is symbolized by a
neuter singular तत and
(iv) The whole universe is united in love as birds
in a nest एकनीड़ or men in a home वसधव कटFबक
To sum up wise men the world over hold almost
identical views on vital matters of human life such as
the mystery of existence soul and oversoul (God) Truth
is verily One as God is one but the pathways to reach it
are very many The ancient Rig Veda proclaims एक सद वDा बहधा वदित ndash ldquoTruth is one sages call it by various namesrdquo In our own times Swami Ram Krishna
Paramhansa said यतोमत तथोपथ ndash as many religions
so many pathways And what the Spanish litteacuterateur
and thinker states as lsquouniversal truthrsquo is equally
applicable to the philosophy and poetry of Coleridge
ldquoA deep faith in life cannot but be spiritual even if only partially spiritualThe path of Truth may not be a path of parallel lines but a path that follows one circle by going to the right and climbing the circle or by going to the left and climbing the circle we are bound to meet at the top although we started in apparently
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 76
contrary directions This is bound to be in the end because Truth is onerdquo
In Charles Lambrsquos words Coleridge lsquohad been on the confines of the next world he had a hunger for Eternityrsquo The truth of this statement is abundantly
borne out by Coleridgersquos sincere effort for the
reconciliation of the ration with transcendental belief
He closes his Biographia Literaria which symbolizes
his spiritual voyage with the following words
ldquoIt is night sacred night The upraised eyes views suns of other worlds only to preserve the soul steady and collected in its pure act of inward adoration to the great I Am and to the filial word that re-affirmeth from eternity to eternity whose choral is the universerdquo
As a true metaphysician Coleridgersquos whole being
pulsated with a passionate and unceasing search for
truth Here indeed was a spiritual aspirant and seeker
who in his own words had lsquotraced the fount whence streams of nectar flowrsquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 77
LORD BYRON
(22 January 1788 ndash 19 April 1824)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 78
LORD BYRON
British Romantic Poet and Satirist
Born with a clubfoot and extremely sensitive about it
he was 10 when he unexpectedly inherited his title and
estates Educated at Cambridge he gained recognition
with English Bards and Scotch Reviewers (1809) a satire
responding to a critical review of his first published
volume Hours of Idleness (1807) At 21 he embarked on
a European grand tour Childe Harolds Pilgrimage
(1812ndash18) a poetic travelogue expressing melancholy
and disillusionment brought him fame while his
complex personality dashing good looks and many
scandalous love affairs with women and with boys
captured the imagination of Europe Settling near
Geneva he wrote the verse tale The Prisoner of Chillon
(1816) a hymn to liberty and an indictment of tyranny
and Manfred (1817) a poetic drama whose hero
reflected Byrons own guilt and frustration His greatest
poem Don Juan (1819ndash24) is an unfinished epic
picaresque satire in ottava rima Among his numerous
other works are verse tales and poetic dramas He died
of fever in Greece while aiding the struggle for
independence making him a Greek national hero
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RP DWIVEDI Page 79
CHAPTER FOUR
BYRON A BLEND OF CLAY AND SPARK
INTRODUCTION
Byron whom Goethe regarded as lsquothe greatest genius of the centuryrsquo and whom Carlyle considered as the noblest
spirit in Europe was one of the most remarkable men
during the 19th Century which was characterized by
liberal optimism He was unquestionably a potent and
force and cause of change in the intellectual outlook and
socio-political structure of his time His colourful figure
his charismatic personality and satiric poetry captured
the imagination of the whole continent As the most
influential English poet he stands out as an important
figure in the history of ideas Representative of a new
age he was the supreme voice which the European
poets recognized for ldquohe put into poetry something that belonged to many men in his time and he was the pioneer of a new outlook and a new art He set his mark on a whole generation and his fame rang from one end of Europe to anotherrdquo
Renowned as the ldquogloomy egoistrdquo he was a sinister yet
great influence in the Romantic Movement His deepest
romantic melancholy his satiric realism and his
aspiration for political realism earned for him such a
wide acclaim that his name became a symbol for all the
great events of his day Commenting on his pervasive
influence Calvert says ndash ldquoIt is impossible not to take Byron seriously and it is disastrous to take him literallyrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 80
A REBEL EXTRAORDINAIRE
Byron was a born rebel Essentially a child of
Revolution his poetry breathes a unique spirit of
revolutionary idealism ldquoI was born for oppositionrdquo he
once remarked and added ldquobeing of no party I shall offend all partiesrdquo Describing him as an aristocratic
rebel Bertrand Russell said
ldquoThe aristocratic rebel of whom Byron was in his day the exemplar is a very different typesuch rebels have philosophy which requires some greater change than their own personal success In their conscious thought there is criticism of the government of the world which takes the form of Titanic Cosmic self-assertion or those who retain some superstition of Satanism Both are to be found in Byron The aristocratic philosophy of rebellionhas inspired a long series of revolutionary movements from the fall of Napoleon to Hitlerrsquos coup in 1933it has inspired a corresponding manner of thought and feeling among intellectuals and artistsrdquo
Byron felt the wild storm of nations akin to the storm
within his own heart and the ruin but the picture of his
own life In his unqualified individualism he takes up an
attitude of hostility towards society Even God appears
to him mirrored in the stormy face of the angry ocean
ldquoThou glorious mirror
Of the Image of Eternityrdquo
He wished to stir the oppressed to revolt and get rid of
tyrants
ldquoFor I will teach if possible the stones
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 81
To rise against earthrsquos tyranny Never let it
Be said that we will truckle into thrones
By ye ndash our childrenrsquos children I think how we
Showed that things were before the world was freerdquo
Don Juan VIIICXXXV4-8
ldquoI have simplified my policiesrdquo wrote he ldquointo a detestation of all existing governmentsrdquo His was the
most dreaded voice of all the revolutionary poets of the
world His voice was the peal of revolutionary thunder
his poetry was the message of the revolutionary forces
He stood as the greatest symbol of a violent and
dreadful revolution
CHAMPION OF LIBERTY
He was essentially a poet of liberty His greatest ideal in
life was how to fight against the forces of tyranny
restriction aggression and enslaving of workers by
puissant exploiters Liberty was an essential part of the
Byronic creed In fact his entire poetic work is
interspersed with some of the finest poetry in praise of
freedom for mankind He composed much splendid
verse for love of freedom His passion for personal
freedom covers national freedom also and the political
freedom in the form of national self-determination
particularly for Italy and Greece He remarks in his
diary of 1821 ldquoDifficulties are the hotbeds of high spirits and Freedom the mother of the new virtues incident to human naturerdquo
Identifying himself completely with the cause of Italy
and Greece he wrote ldquoI shall not fall backbut
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 82
onward It is now the time to act and what signifies ldquoSelfrdquo if a single spark of that which would be worthy of the past can be bequeathed unquenchably to the future It is not one man nor a million but the spirit of liberty which must be spreadrdquo In his Ode to Chillon Castle he characteristically exclaimed
ldquoEternal spirit of the chainless Mind
Brightest in dungeons Liberty thou art
For there thy habitation is the heart
The heart which love of Thee alone bind
And when thy sons to fetters are consignrsquod
To fetters and damp vaultsrsquo dayless gloom
And Freedomrsquos fame finds winds on every windrdquo
Love of liberty lay at the centre of his being and
determined what was best in him ndash belief in individual
liberty and his hatred of tyranny and constraints
whether exercised by individuals or societies Liberty
was an ideal a driving power a summons to make the
best of certain possibilities in him He insisted to be free
and maintained that other men must be free too
Opposition was an integral element in his basic attitude
revolt both personal and social was his forte Love of
freedom is built into the capricious structure of Childe Harold and Don Juan
HIS POLITICAL AND COSMOPOLITAN LIBERALISM
He grew in an atmosphere in which political reaction
against revolutionary ideals was victorious all over
Europe Byron was essentially a liberal by conviction
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 83
and could hardly bear the perception of liberals Though
he loved his native country yet he had a large vision for
the freedom and welfare of all nations The excitement
of political liberalism stirred on behalf of the Greeks
against the oppression of their Turkish overlords made
him a symbol of disinterested patriotism and a Greek
national hero The first two cantos of Child Harold are
tinctured with historical and typographical material as
also the appearance of the Byronic hero with his
exhortations to the degenerate Greeks and Spaniards to
remember their glorious past and arise They contain
Byronrsquos passionate feelings for Greece which was to see
the beginning as it was to see the end of his active life
His Faustian daemonic figure and his defiant
resentment of authority found an appropriate object in
the political sphere
His last journey and his death at Missolonghi in the
cause of Greek independence proves in him the moving
combination of nobility futility and romantic or heroic
panache In the words of Graham Hough lsquoBut for once Byron was on the winning side he died but his cause triumphed and he remains one of its heroes For the whole of the 19th Century he remained a portent and a symbol whom it was possible to worship or to condemn but never to neglectrsquo
A MAN OF ACTION
Action remains at the centre of his life and at last he
gladly seized the opportunity when it presented itself in
Greece Leaving poetry behind himself he took a heroic
resolution in favour of action rather than
contemplation He presents a rare example of fusion
between the active and the reflective lsquofor his was the romanticism of actionrsquo The moralist in the garb of the
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 84
pre-romantic rebel hero of the Childe Harold is cast
aside in Don Juan and the moralist in the somber garb
turns dandy in which moral judgment seems to be
ineffective Quite logically he finally abandons literature
for the field of moral action At last Byron flung himself
off into the world of action The dandy finds at last that
such a death even if it is on the sickbed and not the
battlefield is the only gesture untouched by futility ldquoIt is not enough that art perpetrates life life also must complete artrdquo WB Yeats rightly says ldquoone feels that he (Byron) is a man of action made writer by accidentrdquo
Byron did not regard writing as an end in itself on the
contrary he was several times on the point of giving up
writing He had always before him the hope of some
more active life and felt a certain mistrust for the purely
literary life He asserted ldquowho would write who had anything better to do Action- action I say and not writing Least of all rhymerdquo In a letter to Murray
he wrote ldquoYou will see that I shall do something or otherthat like the cosmogony or creation of the world will puzzle the philosophers of all agesrdquo He was
fully alive to the persistent sense both of human
aspirations and the ceaseless flux of eternity and also
knew that he would not fade into oblivion Said he
ldquoBut at the last I have shunned the common shore
And leaving land far out of sight would skim
The ocean of Eternityrdquo
And again he said
ldquoFor the sword outwears its sheath
And the soul wears out the breastrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 85
HIS ROMANTIC SELF-PORTRAITURE
Byron presents manrsquos mixed and imperfect nature His
personality is a queer blend of flesh and spirit
meanness and nobility clay and spark cause and effect
The lasting fascination of his personality despite his bad
temper careless arrogance the excesses the satiety
melancholy and restlessness owes much to Splendour Primier of Miltonrsquos Satan who is ldquomajestic though in ruinrdquo and the gloom and brutality of the heroes of the
novel of terror His exotic sensibility ranging passions
and sensual perversity take refuge in a sort of ldquoCosmic Satanismrdquo He draws of himself a sketch which
reproduces in a dim outline the somber portrait of his
idealized self in the famous stanzas of Lara
ldquoIn him inexplicably mixed appeared
Much to be loved and hated sought and feared
X X X X X X
A hater of his kind
X X X X X X
There was in him a vital scorn of all
As if the worst had fallen which could befall
An erring spirit
X X X X X X
And fiery passions that had poured their wrath
In hurried desolation over his path
And left the better feeling all at strife
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 86
In wild reflection over his stormy liferdquo
And the Giaour (hiding his sinister path beneath a
monkrsquos gown) also portrays Byron
ldquoA noble soul and lineage high
Alas though bestowed in vain
Which Grief could change and Guilt could stainrdquo
HIS CREDO
Despite all his self-mockery and arrogant egoism he had
a star (vision) and he followed it sincerely He was not
without guiding principles and his heroic death in the
cause of Greek independence shows that he was not an
actor but a soldier a man of affairs and a master of men
Keenly aware of something special in him he wished to
realize his powers and translate them into facts He
wished to be true to himself He had a keen appreciation
of the dignity and personal liberty of man
HIS FATAL TRUTH
Even though he disagreed with the moral code of his
age he had his own values He thought that truthfulness
is a permanent virtue and duty and so did not want to
compromise with conventions nor hide behind cant
Despite many ordeals and his own corroding skepticism
he speaks seriously and directly about his convictions
and presents them with irony satire and mockery Don Juan is a racy commentary on life and manners and is a
record of a remarkable personality ndash a poet and a man
of action a dreamer and a wit a great lover and a great
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 87
hater a Whig noble and a revolutionary democrat The
paradoxes of his nature are fully reflected in Don Juan which itself is a romantic epic and a realistic satire He
was full of many romantic longings but tested them by
truth and reality He remained faithful only to those
which meant so much to him that he could not live
without them
Praising Byron Nietzsche says ldquoMan may bleed to death through the truth that he recognizesrdquo Byron expressed
this in his immortal lines
ldquoSorrow is knowledge they who know the most
Must mourn the deepest over the fatal truth
The tree of knowledge is not that of linerdquo
A BELIEVER IN GOD AND IMMORTALITY OF SOUL
Full of snobbery and rebellion as he was Byron was not
altogether without lofty ideals and religious beliefs He
firmly believed in the immanence and transcendence of
God and the transience of human glory His implicit faith
in the immortality of human soul the ephemerality of
physical body and his unwavering trust in God ndash the
eternal Light of Lights is evident from his following
memorable lines
ldquobut this clay will sink
Its spark immortal envying it the light
To which it mounts as if to break the link
That keeps us from yon heaven which woos us to its brinkrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 88
Childe Harold III13-14
His Childe Haroldrsquos pilgrimage is a lament for lost
empire decay of love and triumph of love over human
mortality His lsquovoyage pittoresquersquo is full of historic and
didactic meditations and his oceanic image illustrates
the truism that nothing is constant but the rhythmic
pattern of its flux In the end all things float and toss on
that Great Ocean of which man is the foam and the
historic events are billows
ldquoBetween two worlds life hovers like a starrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquothe eternal surge
Of time and tide rolls on and bears afar our bubbles
while the graves
Of Empires heave but like some passing wavesrdquo
Don Juan XVI99
He maintains throughout his major poetic works a
sense of the presence of God or the gods and often
employs supernatural machinery to substantiate his
concept
IMMORTALITY OF SOUL
He had complete faith in the immortality of soul Said
he ldquoof the immortality of the soul it appears to me that there can be little doubtit acts also so very independent of bodyHuman passions have probably disfigured the divine doctrines Man is born passionate of body but an innate thought secret
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 89
tendency to the love of God is his mainspring of mind But God helps us allMan is eternal always changing but reproducedEternity Eternalrdquo
Again on his belief in God he says ldquoI sometimes think that man may be relic of some higher materialcreation must have had an origin and a creator for a creator is a more natural imagination than a fortuitous concourse of atoms All things remount to a fountain though they may flow to an oceanrdquo He knew
the limitations and ephemerality of phenomenal
existence He exclaims
ldquoFor I wish to know
What after all are all thingsbut a showrdquo
Unable to explore the stars with scientific aid he takes
up poesy to embark across the ocean of Eternity
ldquoI wish to do much by Poesyrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoBut at least I have shunned the common
And leaving land far out of sight would skim
The Ocean of Eternityrdquo
According to him man accepts the eternal voyage but
since man is not himself unlimited the boat capsizes in
the deep
ldquoAnd swimming long in the abyss of thought
Is apt to tire
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 90
For the fall entails not only ignorance and weakness but Human mortalityrdquo
Disconcerted with mankind he turns to the placid
spectacle of Nature and feels his spirit merge into its
objects
ldquoI live not in myself but I become
Portion of that around me and to me
High mountains are a feeling
When the soul can flee
And with the sky ndash the peak ndash the heaving plain
Of Ocean or the stars mingle ndash and not in vainrdquo
Childe Harold III72
This pantheistic ecstasy gives him a sense of quasi-
immortality
ldquoSpinning the clay clod bonds which round our being clingrdquo
The picturesque is translated into a kind of mystical
union with the spirit of the place even with the
universe itself
ldquoAre not the mountains waves and skies a part
Of me and my soul as I of them
(Is not) the universe a breathing part
The spirit is clogged with clayrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 91
HIS PESSIMISM
The myth of Cuvierrsquos undulations of Cosmic history
reflects Byronrsquos consistent and mature pessimism His
pessimism is traceable to his own view of society
Through a metaphor he considers his age as
ldquocatastrophicrdquo ndash an ice age of the human spirit and a
declining moral grandeur His myth of Fall and
recurrence of the Ocean and ice is both comic and
historic social and literary and personal as well The
consequences of the Fall and of manrsquos imperfect nature
are seen in all major human activities Generally fallen
mankind is hounded by its lower appetites spirit
encumbered by flesh The image of Fall is linked in
Byronrsquos imagination with the rhetorical image of the
poetrsquos lsquoflightrsquo which incurs the risk of consequent
lsquosinkingrsquo or bathos And over it all hangs the perplexity
of manrsquos ignorance about his aims his nature his true
identity
ldquoFew mortals know what end they would be at
But whether glory power or love or treasure
The path is through perplexing ways and when
The goal is gained we die you know ndash and thenrdquo
HIS PROPHETIC VISION
Endowed with strong imaginative power he had
experimented in Vulcanian visions of the earth plunged
into darkness by the final extinction or the sun or lsquoa ruined starrsquo plunging on in flames through the wastes of
space This prophetic faculty is amply evident from his
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 92
poem Darkness in which his imagination prefigures the
devastating effects of nuclear weapons
ldquoThe Hour arrived ndash and it became
A wandering mass of shapeless flame
A pathless Comet and a curse
The menace of the Universe
Still rolling on with innate force
Without a sphere without a course
A bright deformity on high
The monster of the upper skyrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoI had a dream which was not at all a dream
The bright sun was extinguished and the stars
Did wander darkling in the eternal space
The habitations of all things which dwell
Were burnt for beacons cities were consumedrdquo
Darkness IV42-45
In sum and in essence Byron exemplifies Shelleyrsquos
pronouncement that poets are the unacknowledged
legislators of the world More than any other Romantic
poet Byron embodies the dictum ndash lsquowhat is to give light must endure burningrsquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 93
PB SHELLEY
(4 August 1792 ndash 8 July 1822)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 94
PB SHELLEY
English Romantic Poet
The heir to rich estates Shelley was a rebellious youth
who was expelled from Oxford in 1811 for refusing to
admit authorship of The Necessity of Atheism Later that
year he eloped with Harriet Westbrook the daughter of
a tavern owner He gradually channeled his passionate
pursuit of personal love and social justice into poetry
His first major poem Queen Mab (1813) is a utopian
political epic revealing his progressive social ideals In
1814 he eloped to France with Mary Wollstonecraft
Godwin in 1816 after Harriet drowned herself they
were married In 1818 the Shelleys moved to Italy
Away from British politics he became less intent on
social reform and more devoted to expressing his ideals
in poetry He composed the verse tragedy The Cenci (1819) and his masterpiece the lyric drama Prometheus Unbound (1820) which was published with some of his
finest shorter poems including Ode to the West Wind
and To a Skylark Epipsychidion (1821) is a Dantean
fable about the relationship of sexual desire to spiritual
love and artistic creation Adonais (1821)
commemorates the death of John Keats Shelley
drowned at age 29 while sailing in a storm off the Italian
coast leaving unfinished his last and possibly greatest
visionary poem The Triumph of Life
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 95
CHAPTER FIVE
SHELLEY A PILGRIM OF ETERNITY
INTRODUCTION
Shelley who in his Adonais eulogized Keats as lsquothe Pilgrim of Eternityrsquo is himself justly entitled to this
appellation He was essentially a poet of the skies and
heavens of light and love of eternity and immortality
Since he loved to pierce through things to their spiritual
essence the material world was less important for him
than that which lies within it and beyond it Says he ldquoI seek in what I see the manifestation of something beyond the present and tangible objectsrsquo He set out to uncover
the absolute real from its visible manifestations and
interpret it through his own poetic vision In a
passionate search for reality he pursued its essence
behind the veil of naked loveliness of Nature and the
mundane human existence Defining poetry he says
lsquoPoetry is the revelation of the eternal ideas which lie behind the many-coloured ever-shifting veil that we call reality in lifersquo For him the poet is also a seer gifted with
a peculiar insight into the nature of reality for it is
through the inspired poetic imagination that he
breathes immortality into the objects of Nature Says he
lsquoBut from these create he can
Forms more real than living man
Nurslings of immortalityrsquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 96
Prometheus Unbound
HIS LOVE OF INDIA
Shelley was an ardent admirer of India In a letter to his
friend employed in the East India Company he
expressed keenness to visit India and settle down here
He was drawn to India for its varied and picturesque
scenic beauty vast literary heritage and age-old cultural
traditions In order to have a closer acquaintance with
our great country he set his heart and mind on serious
studies in the Indian life and letters traditions and
culture
Since he was a visionary par excellence and was
endowed with a highly contemplative mind and a
remarkable prophetic zeal he evinced a deep and
abiding interest in the philosophical and spiritual
thoughts that lie enshrined in our holy texts such as the
Vedas the Upanishads the Brahmasutras and the
Bhagvad Gita It is interesting to trace the influence of
Indian spiritual thought on Shelleyrsquos poetry
VEDANTA IN SHELLEYrsquoS POETRY
The riddle of the origin of life and Nature and the
enigmatic questions such as lsquoWhat is the cause of life
and death What is the source of universe and what will
be its ultimate destinyrsquo have always engaged the
serious attention of all wise men Man has always stood
in awe and wonder at the mysteries of human existence
and the vast world around him Our seers and savants
have not only posed such questions but have also
answered them
In the opening verse of the Kena Upanishad the
disciple asks
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 97
ldquoAt whose behest does the mind think or wander after towards its objects Commanded by whom does the life-force or the breath of life go forth on its journey At whose will do we utter speech Who is that effulgent Being whose power directs the eye and the earrdquo
Similarly in the Svetasvatara Upanishad the disciples
inquire ldquoWhat is the cause of this universe What is Brahman Whence do we come By what power do we live and on what are we established Where shall we at last find rest What rules over our joys and sorrows O Seers of Brahmanrdquo
Identical ideas impelled Shelley to exclaim in his famous
elegy Adonais
ldquoWhence are we and why are we Of what scene
The actors or spectatorsrdquo
Or again he asks in The Triumph of Life
ldquoWhence comest thou And wither goest thou
How did thy course begin I said and whyrdquo
Shelley asks
ldquoHas some unknown omnipotence unfurled
The veil of life and deathrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoAnd what were thou and earth and stars and sea
If to the human mindrsquos imaginings
Silence and solitude were vacancyrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 98
Mont Blanc
Shelley in his famous poem Hymn to Intellectual Beauty answers that there is an unseen (all-pervading) omnipotence (power) behind this phenomenal world of
which all objects are but shadows
ldquoThe awful shadow of some unseen Power
Floats though unseen among us ndash visiting
This various world with as inconstant wing
As summer winds that creep from flower to flowerrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoIt visits with inconstant glance
Each human heart and countenance
Like aught that for its grace may be
Dear and yet dearer for its mysteryrdquo
Again he affirms his faith in such a mysterious
Omnipotent power when he says
ldquoThe works and ways of men their death and birth
And that of him and all that his may be
All things that move and breathe with toil and sound
Are born and die revolve subside and swell
Power dwells apart in its tranquility
Remote serene and inaccessiblerdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 99
X X X X X X
ldquoThe secret strength of things
Which governs thought and to the infinite dome
Of Heaven is as a law inhabits theerdquo
Mont Blanc
Vedanta which is the aphoristic summary of the
Upanishads the Brahmasutras and the Bhagvad Gita
is in fact the culmination of Indian religious and
philosophical thought Since Shelley sincerely desired to
unravel the essential reality which is unchanging
timeless and eternal and of which the world of sense
perceptions is but a broken reflection he turned his
attention to the ancient scriptures of India
ONENESS OF BRAHMAN (GOD)
One of the basic postulates of Vedanta is the inherent
oneness or the sole identity of Brahman in the universe
The Chhandogya Upanishad describes Brahman as
एकमव अXवतीय ndash lsquoone only without a secondrsquo and the
other Upanishadic texts also contain parallel statements
such as स एकः ndash lsquoHe is Onersquo and एकोदवः ndash lsquoOne Lordrsquo
Similarly the Rig Veda declares एक सद वDा बहदा वदित ndash lsquoTruth (God)is one but the wise one call it
differentlyrsquo Obviously Brahman the Supreme is one
and only one He is verily one and the same whether we
call Him Brahman Ishwara Paramatma God Allah or
the supreme Cosmic Soul He only exists all other
objects of the world are subject to decay and death
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
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How beautifully have similar thoughts been expressed
by Shelley when he exclaims
ldquoThe one remains the many change and pass
Heavenrsquos light forever shines Earthrsquos shadows fly
Life like a dome of many coloured glass
Stains the white radiance of Eternity
Until Death tramples it to fragmentsrdquo
Adonais L2
The concluding lines of Epipsychidion show that in a
moment of inspiration Shelley seemed to lay hold on the
ineffable spirituality and fundamental unity of
existence
ldquoOne hope within two wils one will beneath
Two overshadowing minds one life one death
One Heaven one hell one immortality
And one annihilationrdquo
Shelley etherealized Nature and believed in a single
power or one spirit permeating the whole universe He
effected a fusion of the Platonic philosophy of love with
the Wordsworthian doctrine of Pantheism
ldquoThe one spiritrsquos plastic stress
Sweeps through the dull dense worldrsquo
Compelling there all new successions
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 101
To the forms they wearrdquo
Holding that one universal spirit is the basis and
sustainer of Nature Shelley declares
ldquoThat Power
Which wields the world with never-wearied love
Sustains it from beneath and kindles it aboverdquo
In his pantheistic conception of Nature Shelley
conceived of it as being permeated vitalized and made
real by a universal spirit of love He clearly perceives
the presence of ldquothe awful shadow of the unseen power visiting the various worldrdquo
ldquoSpirit of Nature here
In this interminable wilderness
Of worlds at whose involved immensity
Even soaring fancy staggers
Here is thy fitting templerdquo
Demon of the World
TRANSMIGRATION OF SOUL
The doctrine of transmigration of soul or the cycle of
births and rebirths has been explicitly advanced in the
Upanishadic philosophy In the Kathopanishad
Brihadaranyak Upanishad and the Bhagvad Gita there are moving passages such as these
ldquoMan ripens like corn and like corn he is born againrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 102
Kathopanishad IV6
The Brihadaranyak Upanishad states
ldquoAnd as a caterpillar after reaching the end of a blade of grass finds another place of support and then draws itself towards it and as a goldsmith after taking a piece of gold gives it another newer and more beautiful shape similarly does the self after having thrown off this body and dispelled ignorance take on another newer and more beautiful formrdquo
Brihadaranyak Upanishad IV3-5
Similarly Lord Krishna tells Arjuna
ldquoAs a man discarding worn out clothes takes other new ones likewise the embodied soul casting off worn-out bodies enters into others which are newrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II22
And further Lord Krishna says to Arjuna
ldquofor in that case the death of him who is born is certain and the rebirth for him who is dead is inevitablerdquo
Bhagvad Gita II27
Shelley entertained similar ideas when he says
ldquoThe works and ways of man their death and birth
And that of him and all that his may be
All things that move and breathe with toil and sound
Are borm and die revolve subside and swellrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 103
Mont Blanc 92-95
Or again
ldquoThe splendours of the firmament of time
May be eclipsed but are extinguished not
Like stars to their appointed height they climb
And death is a low mist which cannot blot
The brightness it may veilrdquo
Adonais XLIV
Stressing the ephemerality of worldly objects Shelley
exclaims
ldquoSpirit of Beauty that does consecrate
With thine own hues all thou doth shine upon
Of human thought or formwhere art thou gonerdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoWhy aught should fail and fade that once is shown
Why fear and dream and death and birth
Cast on the daylight of this earth
Such gloomrdquo
Hymn to Intellectual Beauty 11
Lamenting the death of his friend Keats he says
ldquohe went uninterrupted
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 104
Into the gulf of death but his clear spirit
Yet reigns over earthrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoTo that high Capital where Kingly Death
Keeps his pale court in beauty and decay
He came and bought with price of purest breath
A grave among the eternalrdquo
Adonais VII
Again dwelling on the immortality of soul he declares
ldquoNaught we know dies Shall that alone which knows
Be as a sword consumed before the sheath
By sightless lightening The intense atom glows
A moment then is quenched in a most cold reposerdquo
Adonais XX
X X X X X X
ldquoGreat and mean
Meet massed in death who lends what life must borrowrdquo
Adonais XXI
X X X X X X
ldquoDust to dust but the pure spirit shall flow
Black to the burning fountain whence it came
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 105
A portion of the Eternal which must glow
Through time and change unquenchably the same
Whilst thy cold embers choke the sordid hearth shamerdquo
Adonais XXXVIII
THE DOCTRINE OF MAYA (DELUSION)
Our scriptures regard the phenomenal world as Maya
(delusion) They explain that the universe is neither
absolutely real nor absolutely non-existent and that its
phenomenal or apparent surface conceals and
safeguards the external presence of the Absolute
Shelley seems to have pondered over similar ideas
about the world of appearances
ldquoWorlds on worlds are rolling ever
From creation to decay
Like the bubbles on a river
Sparkling bursting borne away
But they are still immortal
Who through birthrsquos oriental portal
And deathrsquos dark chasm hurrying to and fro
Clothe their unceasing flight
In the brief dust and light
Gathered around their chariots as they gordquo
Three Choruses from Hallas
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
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In his poem Invocation to Misery Shelley says
ldquoAll the wide world beside us
Show like multitudinous
Puppets passing from a scenerdquo
Again describing human life as a veil he says
ldquoLife not the painted veil which thou who live
Call life though unreal shapes be pictured there
And it but mimic all we would believe
With colours idly spreadrdquo
Prometheus Unbound
In the myth of Aurora he gives his own account of the
creation and interpretation of works of art
ldquoAnd lovely apparitions dim at first then radiant in the mind arising bright
From the embrace of beauty whence the forms
Of which these are phantoms casts on them
The gathered rays which are realityrdquo
Shelley seems to hint at the theory of Superimposition
(Vivartavada) which maintains that the universe is a
superimposition upon Brahman It states that the world
of thought and matter has a phenomenon or relative
existence and is superimposed upon Brahman the
unique Absolute Reality
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 107
Since the world is a network of delusion and
appearance not reality our life on earth is a sojourn
and its paramount aim is to have a glimpse of and
realize the eternal Truth or the Absolute Brahman
which is concealed by ignorance and delusion The
Ishopanishad tells us
ldquoThe face of Truth is hidden by a golden orb (disk) O Pushan (the Nourisher the Effulgent Being) uncover (the Face) that I the seeker or worshipper of Truth may hold Theerdquo
Ishopanishad XV
Like a sincere aspirant for the realization of eternal
Truth or the Absolute concealed under the illusory garb
of Maya (Delusion) Shelley in the words of Fairy in his
Queen Mab declares
ldquoAnd it is yet permitted me to rend
The veil of mortal frailty that the spirit
Clothed in its changeless purity may know
How soonest to accomplish the great end
For which it hath its being and may taste
That peace which in the end all life will sharerdquo
Queen Mab
In certain other passages Shelley speaks of the veil
identified with Time which obscured Eternity from the
sight of man The symbol of veil demonstrates that
which conceals truth goodness or happiness When the
veil was torn or rent asunder
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 108
ldquoHope was seen beaming through the mists of fear
Earth was no longer Hell
Love freedom health had given
Their ripeness to the manhood of its prime
And all its pulses beat
Symphonious to the planetary spheresrdquo
Again he uses the same symbol of veil when Cythna
says
ldquoFor with strong speech I tore the veil that hid
Nature and Truth and Liberty and Loverdquo
Shelley uses the same idea of superimposition coupled
with his own robust idealism
ldquoLife may change but it may fly not
Hope may vanish but can die not
Truth be veiled but it burneth
Love repulsed ndash but it returnethrdquo
STATES OF CONSCIOUSNESS
Our Upanishads identify three states of consciousness
crowned by the fourth which transcends all the other
three states They are
(i) The Waking State
(ii) The Dreaming State
(iii) The State of Deep Sleep and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 109
(iv) The State of Pure Consciousness (Turiya)
The fourth state of ecstatic consciousness which
transcends the preceding three has no connection with
the finite mind it is reached when in meditation the
ordinary self is left behind and the Atman or the true
self is fully realized The Mandukya Upanishad describes it thus
ldquoBeyond the senses beyond the understanding beyond all expression is the Fourth It is pure unitary consciousness wherein (all) awareness of the world and of multiplicity is completely obliterated It is effable peace It is the supreme good It is one without a second It is the Self Know it alonerdquo
Mandukya Upanishad VII
Turiya (तर[य) the fourth state is the supreme mystic
experience Shelley seems to have partly attained such a
state of pure ecstatic consciousness when he states
ldquoI seem as in a trance sublime and strange
To muse on my own separate fantasy
My own my human mind which passively
Now renders and receives fast influencing
Holding an unremitting interchange
With the clear universe of things aroundrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoSome say that gleams of a remoter world
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 110
Visit the soul in sleep that death is slumber
And that its shapes the busy thoughts outnumber
Of those who wake and live ndash I look on high
Has some unknown omnipotence unfurled
The veil of life and deathrdquo
Mont Blanc
Another instance of such a mystic experience appears in
his famous poem Triumph of Life on which Shelley was
working at the time of this death in 1822
ldquobefore me fled
The night behind me rose the day the deep
Was at my feet and Heaven above my head
When a strange trance over my fancy grew
Which was not slumber for the shade it spread
Was so transparent that the scene came through
As clear as when a veil of light is drawn
Over evening hill they glimmer and I knew
That I had felt the freshness of that dawnrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoAnd in that trance of wondrous thought I lay
This was the tenor of my waking dreamrdquo
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The Triumph of Life
SHELLEY AS AN ASPIRANT FOR SELF-REALIZATION
Shelley who described himself as
ldquoA splendour among shadows a bright blot
Upon the gloomy scene a spirit that strove
For Truthrdquo
seems to have reached at last that stability or
equanimity of mind which has been described in the
Upanishads and the Bhagvad Gita In a reply to Arjunrsquos
question about the definition of one who is stable of
mind or is finally established in perfect tranquility of
mind Lord Krishna says
ldquoArjun when one thoroughly dismisses all cravings of the mind controls it and is satisfied in the self (through the joy of the self) then he is called stable of mind One whose mind remains unperturbed amid sorrows whose thirst for pleasures has altogether disappeared and who is free from passion fear and anger is called stable of mindrdquo
Bhagvad Gita V56
The Katha Upanishad stresses similar ideas when it
says
ldquoBut he who possesses right discrimination whose mind is under control and is always pure he reaches that goal from which he is not born againrdquo
X X X X X X
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 112
ldquoThe man who has a discriminative intellect for the driver and a controlled mind for the reins reaches the end of the journey the highest place of Vishnu (the all-pervading and unchangeable one)rdquo
Katha Upanishad
Shelley echoes identical thoughts when he says
ldquoMan who man would be
Must rule the empire of himself in it
Must be supreme establishing his throne
On vanquished will quelling the anarchy
Of hopes and fears being himself alonerdquo
Sonnet on Political Greatness
It was in such rare moments of inner consciousness or
lsquoBlessed moodrsquo that Shelley felt lsquoOne with Naturersquo or
lsquoThe Power which wields the world with never-wearied love
Sustains it from beneath and kindles it aboversquo
As a myth-maker or a mythopoeic poet he conjured
visions of a golden age by turning to the grand aspects
of Nature ndash the ether the sky the wind the Sun the
Moon the light and the clouds and employing them as
befitting agencies and vehicles of his evolutionary ideas
ldquoPoetryrdquo he wrote ldquois indeed something divine It is at once the centre and circumference of all knowledgerdquo He
conceived of the universe as alive with a living spirit
behind it He moralizes natural myths and perceives the
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 113
Absolute behind the ephemeral In an exquisite image
he exclaims
ldquoThe sanguine sunrise with his meteor eyes
And his burning plumes outspread
Leaps on the back of my sailing rack
When the morning star shines deadrdquo
As his thoughts reached the zenith of their growth
Shelley identified his individual self with the all-
pervading Cosmic Self or the Brahman of the Vedanta
and felt himself one with the indwelling spirit of the
universe Unity filled his imagination he perceived
eternal harmony in the phenomenal existence and
rejoiced his own being in the vast million-coloured
pageants of the world And finally not only Nature but
all human existence is taken up as an inalienable aspect
of the eternal Cosmic Spirit He reaches the core the
centre of all palpable universe when he declares
ldquoI am the eye with which the Universe
Behold itself and knows itself divine
All harmony of instrument and verse
All prophecy all medicine is mine
All light of art or nature to my song
Victory and praise in its own right belongrdquo
Shelley perceived the transcendental or mystic
consciousness in which one realizes the complete
identity of self with the Supreme Self and which is called
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 114
तर[य अवथा ndash where one sees nothing but One
(Brahman) hears nothing but the One knows nothing
but the One ndash there is the Infinite The same truth is
vividly explained in the Bhagvad Gita when Lord
Krishna tells Arjuna
ldquoWhen one sees Eternity in things that pass away and Infinity in finite things then one has pure knowledgerdquo
Bhagvad Gita XVIII20
Our own great seer-poet and philosopher Sri Aurobindo
Ghose described Shelley as a sovereign voice of the new
spiritual force and a native of the heights with its
luminous ethereality where he managed to dwell
prophetically in a future heaven and earth with
brilliances of a communion with a higher law another
order of existence another meaning behind Nature and
terrestrial things
Sri Aurobindo further praises him as lsquoa seer of spiritual realities who has a poetic grasp of metaphysical truths and can see the forms and hear the voices of higher elements spirits and natural godheads and has a constant feeling of a high spiritual and intellectual beauty He is at once seer poet thinker prophet and artist Light love liberty are the three godheads in whose presence his pure and radiant spirit lived but a celestial light a celestial love a celestial liberty To bring them down to earth without their losing their celestial lustre and here is his passionate endeavour but his wings constantly buoy him upward and cannot beat strongly in an earthlier atmosphere There is an air of luminous mist surrounding his intellectual presentation of his meaning which shows the truths he sees as things to which the mortal eye cannot easily pierce or the life and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 115
temperament of earth rise to realize and live yet to bring about the union of the mortal and immortal terrestrial and the celestial is always his passion Shelley is the bright archangel of this dawn and becomes greater to us as the light he foresaw and lived and he sings half-concealed in the too dense halo of his own ethereal beautyrsquo
And what Juan Mascaro states as universal truth is
equally pertinent to Shelleyrsquos poetry
ldquoA deep faith in life cannot but be spiritual The path of Truth may not be a path of parallel lines but a path that follows one circle because Truth is onerdquo
Infinite is God infinite are His aspects and infinite are
the ways to reach Him In the Atharva Veda we read
ldquoThe one light appears in diverse formsrdquo This ideal of
harmony is carried to its logical conclusion in blending
synthesizing and reconciling conflicting metaphysical
theories and opposed conceptions of spiritual
discipline We read in the pages of Bhagvad Gita
ldquoWhatever wish men bring in worship
That wish I grant them
Whatever path men travel
Is my path
No matter where they walk
It leads to merdquo
Bhagvad Gita IV11
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 116
To sum up Shelleyrsquos poetry will always hold irresistible
fascination to the lovers of light and beauty for to
quote Juan Mascaro again
ldquoThe finite in man longs for the Infinite The love that moves the stars moves also the heart of man and a law of spiritual gravitation leads his soul to the soul of the universe Man sees the sun by the light of the sun and he sees the spirit by the light of his own inner spirit The radiance of eternal beauty shines over this vast universe and in moments of contemplation we can see the Eternal in things that pass away This is the message of the great spiritual seers and all poetry and art and beauty is only an infinite variation of this message The spiritual visions of man confirm and illumine each other Great poems in different languages have different values but they all are poetry and the spiritual visions of man come all from one Light In them we have Lamps of Fire that burn to the glory of Godrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
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JOHN KEATS
(31 October 1795 ndash 23 February 1821)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 118
JOHN KEATS
English Romantic Poet
The son of a livery-stable manager he had a limited
formal education He worked as a surgeons apprentice
and assistant for several years before devoting himself
entirely to poetry at age 21 His first mature work was
the sonnet On First Looking into Chapmans Homer
(1816) His long Endymion appeared in the same year
(1818) as the first symptoms of the tuberculosis that
would kill him at age 25 During a few intense months of
1819 he produced many of his greatest works several
great odes (including Ode on a Grecian Urn Ode to a
Nightingale and To Autumnrdquo) two unfinished
versions of the story of the titan Hyperion and La Belle
Dame Sans Merci Most were published in the
landmark collection Lamia Isabella The Eve of St Agnes and Other Poems (1820) Marked by vivid imagery great
sensuous appeal and a yearning for the lost glories of
the Classical world his finest works are among the
greatest of the English tradition His letters are among
the best by any English poet
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 119
CHAPTER SIX
JOHN KEATS A MINSTREL OF BEAUTY AND TRUTH
INTRODUCTION
John Keats who in his own words was lsquoa fair creature of an hourrsquo lived a brief and turbulent life Pre-eminently a
sensuous poet in whom the Romantic sensibility to
outward impressions of sight sound touch and smell
reached its climax the life of Keats was a series of
sensations felt with febrile acuteness
His ideal was passive contemplation rather than active
mental exertion ldquoO for a life of sensations rather than of thoughtrdquo he exclaimed in one of his letters and in
another ldquoit is more noble to sit like Jove than to fly like Mercuryrdquo In fact his was a life of intense sensations
acute poignancy and an infinite yearning for beauty
which he identified with truth
Richness of sensuousness characterizes all his poetry
and his power of expression is marked by a spectacular
vividness which is interspersed with beautiful epithets
heavily charged with subtle messages for the senses His
works are so full of luxuriance of sensations and acute
passions that ordinary readers do not pause to perceive
the unimpeded flow of spiritual thoughts underneath
The pursuit of the spirit of beauty dominates all his
works which have one enduring message ndash the
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 120
lastingness of beauty and its identity with supreme
truth (or God) This message ndash the oneness of beauty
with truth and the eternal existence of truth ndash has been
beautifully enshrined in his famous and oft-quoted lines
(with which he concludes his Ode on a Grecian Urn)
ldquoBeauty is truth truth beauty ndash that is all
Ye know on earth and all ye need to knowrdquo
Keats died at the age of 26 but even from his early age
he had visions of rare spiritual significance Dwelling on
the value of visions in human life and poetry he says
ldquoSince every man whose soul is not a clod
Hath vision
For poesy alone can tell her dreams
With the fine spell of words alone can save
Imagination from the sable chain
And dumb enchantmentrdquo
Since common readers tend to ignore the underlying
spiritual import of his visions and images this article
aims at bringing into play some of the poetrsquos thoughts
which bear a remarkable resemblance to the age-old
hoary spirituality of our ancient land
Stressing the fundamental truths of our Indian thought
and tracing their distinct reflection in the works of great
Western poets seems a worth-while academic pursuit
FUNDAMENTAL UNITY
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 121
From the very beginning Keats could realize the
fundamental unity of Truth and Beauty and could dwell
at length on it to show how diverse paths illumined by
the glory of spirit in man ultimately lead him to the
realization of this abiding lesson of life The supreme
oneness of Truth has been beautifully enunciated by Sri
Krishna in the Bhagvad Gita
ldquoIn any way that men love Me in that same way they find My love for many are the paths of men but they all in the end come to Merdquo
Similar thoughts have found expression in the
introduction to the Upanishads by Juan Mascaro
ldquoThe path of Truth may not be a path of parallel lines but a path that follows one circle by going to the right and climbing the circle or by going to the left and climbing the circle we are bound to meet at the top although we started in apparently contrary directions This is bound to be in the end because Truth is onerdquo
And when Keats was only 22 he could give expression
to deep thoughts that have a curious similarity to the
ideas expressed in the Mundak Upanishad and the
Bhagvad Gita
ldquoNow it appears to me that almost any man may like the spider spin from his own inwards his own airy citadel the points of leaves and twigs on which the spider begins her work are few and she fills the air with a beautiful circuiting Man should be content with as few points to tip with the fine Web of his Soul and weave a tapestry empyrean-full of symbols for his spiritual eye of softness for his spiritual touch of space for his wanderings of distinctness for his luxuryrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 122
ldquoBut the minds of mortals are so different and bent on such diverse journeys that it may at first appear impossible for any common taste and fellowship to exist between two or three under these suppositions It is however quite the contrary Minds would leave each other in contrary directions traverse each other in numberless points and at last greet each other at the journeyrsquos end An old man and a child would talk together and the old man be led on his path and the child left thinkingrdquo
ldquoMan should not dispute or assert but whisper results to his neighbor and thus by every germ of spirit sucking the sap from mould ethereal every human might become great and humanity instead of being a wide heath of furze and briars with here and there a remote oak or pine would become a great democracy of forest treesrdquo
WISDOM
All men of good will are bound to meet if they follow the
wisdom of the words Shakespeare in Hamlet where if
we write SELF or self we find the doctrine of the
Upanishad
ldquoThis above all to thine own self be true
And it must follow as the night the day
Thou canst not then be false to any manrdquo
Now coming back to the theme of beauty and truth and
their ultimate identity in the universe we have to dwell
at large on the concept of beauty as enunciated by Keats
in his poetry From the very beginning Keats realized
that beauty in its true sense illumines manrsquos thoughts
and thus leads him to understand the glory of truth and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 123
the pervading spirit of their identity in whatever he
sees hears and perceives
The eternal identity or oneness of beauty with truth and
their interplay in the world are in fact unfailing
fountains of joy The permanence of beauty as a source
of joy has been beautifully elucidated by the poet in the
opening lines of his famous poem Endymion
ldquoA thing of beauty is a joy forever
Its loveliness increases it will never
Pass into nothingnessrdquo
He goes on to say
ldquoSome shape of beauty moves away the pall
From our dark spirits
An endless fountain of immortal drink
Pouring unto us from the heavenrsquos brink
Nor do we merely feel these essences
For one short hour
glories infinite
Haunt us till they become a cheering light
Unto our souls and bound to us so fast
That whether there be shine or gloom overcast
They always must be with us or we dierdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 124
When he ascribes permanence to joy born of beauty
Keats has in mind the immanence and effulgence of
beauty as a reflection of its creator God Beauty whose
lsquoloveliness increasesrsquo and which lsquowill never pass into nothingnessrsquo is an inalienable attribute of Divinity for it
is lsquoan endless fountain of immortal drinkrsquo
BEAUTY
God (as the poet seems to presuppose) is all Beautiful or
the embodiment of all Beauty and the entire world of
sights and sounds is nothing else but a glorious garment
of God So beauty does not consist only in apparent
physical appearances but is an offspring of inherent
divinity in man and nature which is dimly reflected in
their attractive exterior Such an eternal beauty in his
view presents lsquoglories infinite that haunt us till they become a cheering light unto our souls It is this beauty the glory of spirit which must be with us or we dierdquo
The poetrsquos concept of beauty with its glories infinite
bears a striking resemblance with the path of splendour
of our Vedic and epic scriptures in which our sages
perceived the Divine presence in all that is splendid and
beautiful in the universe
Our Vedic texts are full of the expressions of the sage-
poetrsquos exquisite astonishment before the visions of
glory and wonder The attitude of our Vedic seer-poets
towards beauty as a transcendental reality beyond our
sense-perceptions has been beautifully expressed in
images of beauty and glory as an abstract idea Says Rig Veda
ldquoSinless for noble power under the influence of Savita God
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 125
May we obtain all things that are beautifulrdquo
GOODNESS
Here the power of goodness is contemplated to lead to
the power of beauty Beauty in its myriad forms leads
us to spiritual consciousness of Divinity inherent in
Nature and all living beings Identical thoughts have
been expressed by Sri Krishna in Chapter X of the
Bhagvad Gita where all splendour and glory is said to
be the reflection of God whose manifestation this
universe is Says Sri Krishna to Arjuna
ldquoKnow thou that whatever is beautiful and good whatever has glory and power is only a portion of My own radiancerdquo
Bhagvad Gita X41
Seeing the effulgence of a thousand suns bursting forth
and yet it could hardly match the splendour of the
supreme Lord Arjuna exclaimed in wonder
ldquoI see the splendour of an infinite beauty which illumines the whole universe It is thee With thy crown and scepter and circle How difficult thou art to see But I see thee as fire as the Sun blinding incomprehensiblerdquo
Bhagvad Gita XI17
Besides this concept of ultimate elemental beauty
Keats goes on to underscore its fundamental and
inseparable unity with Truth which is yet another
inalienable facet of Divinity on earth
Truth being an essential attribute of God lies at the
core of all existence and it sustains the entire universe
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 126
with its manifold forms of beauty reflected in countless
objects around us When Keats declares that lsquoBeauty is truth truth beautyrsquo he seems to remind us of the age-old
spiritual consciousness that found sublime utterance in
our Vedas which are the oldest treatises on lsquophilosophia perennisrsquo the eternal philosophy In the Vedas truth has
been described as the essence of Divinity
ldquoThe deity has truth as the law of His beingrdquo
Atharva Veda VIIXXIV1
The Rig Veda calls the deities as various manifestations
of Truth Elsewhere in the Rig Veda the Deity has been
described as true and the path of religious progress is
the ingredient of Dharma Declares the Rig Veda
ldquoBy truth is the earth upheldrdquo
Rig Veda X85
An Upanishadic sage says
ldquoTruth alone triumphs not untruth By Truth the spiritual path is widened that path by which the seers who are free from all cravings and declares travel and reach the supreme abode of Truthrdquo
Mundak Upanishad IIII6
So Truth is a basic postulate of Dharma and an abiding
and ultimate value of life It is the eternal oneness of
beauty and truth and truth and beauty that inspired
Keats to stress their underlying unity and their
transcendental reality When Keats says ldquoThat is all ye know on earth and all ye need to knowrdquo he points to that
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 127
ecstatic wonder which the spiritual realization of this
eternal truth brings to a seeker or seer or a poet
SUBLIMITY
Keats seems to have reached such a sublime plane of
poetic consciousness that is so aptly suggested by our
Vedic seers who have extolled God as a poet (कव) and
His divine creative energy is indicated as the poetic
power (काय) which has assumed manifold forms of
beauty and splendour So God as the supreme creator of
beauty has been described in the Rig Veda as
ldquoHe who is supporter of the world of life
Who knows the secret mysterious names
Of the morning beams
He poet cherishes manifold forms
By His poetic powerrdquo
Rig Veda VIIIXL5
So let me hasten to the conclusion by affirming that as
lsquoa lily for a dayrsquo Keats proved that a crowded hour of
glory is far better than an age without a name he seems
to have lived up to the lofty advice of Queen Vidula to
her son King Sanjaya in the Mahabharat
महतम 0व1लत 2यो न त धमऽतम 4चर
ldquoIt is better to flame forth for an instant than smoke away for agesrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 128
Eternal truths transcend the barriers of time and space
country and clime caste and creed and shine through all
lands and in all ages Even today the enlightened souls
all over the world have a significant identity of ideas
irrespective of the countries to which they belong and
the religious faith to which they are affiliated
Such wise men awaken others from a state of
intellectual and spiritual slumber enkindle in them a
sense of understanding and fraternity It has been
rightly said by HW Longfellow
ldquoLives of great men all remind us
We can make our lives sublime
And departing leave behind us
Footprints on the sand of Timerdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 129
RW EMERSON
(25 May 1803 ndash 27 April 1882)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 130
RW EMERSON
US Poet Essayist and Lecturer
Emerson graduated from Harvard University and was
ordained a Unitarian minister in 1829 His questioning
of traditional doctrine led him to resign the ministry
three years later He formulated his philosophy in
Nature (1836) the book helped initiate New England
Transcendentalism a movement of which he soon
became the leading exponent In 1834 he moved to
Concord Mass the home of his friend Henry David
Thoreau His lectures on the proper role of the scholar
and the waning of the Christian tradition caused
considerable controversy In 1840 with Margaret
Fuller he helped launch The Dial a journal that
provided an outlet for Transcendentalist ideas He
became internationally famous with his Essays (1841
1844) including Self-Reliance Representative Men
(1850) consists of biographies of historical figures The Conduct of Life (1860) his most mature work reveals a
developed humanism and a full awareness of human
limitations His Poems (1847) and May-Day (1867)
established his reputation as a major poet
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 131
CHAPTER SEVEN
EMERSONrsquoS SPIRITUAL QUEST AND INDIAN THOUGHT
INTRODUCTION
Ralph Waldo Emerson the lsquoSage of Concordrsquo as he is
rightly called was an American seer who came into the
world at a time when East and the West were gradually
coming closer to each other in spheres more than one
trade and commerce between the two was gaining
momentum and above all the era of inter-
communication of ideas intellect and spirit was being
ushered in by exchange of books
Emerson was one of the first great Americans who
absorbed himself sufficiently in this phenomenon
ventured into the sacred literature of India and
assimilated its thought to such a remarkable degree that
he became its eminent interpreter to his countrymen in
particular and to the entire West in general
EMERSON AND THE GITA
Let us see what Swami Vivekananda said about the
source of Emersonrsquos inspiration Swamiji said
ldquoThe greatest incident of the (Mahabharata) war was the marvelous and immortal poem of the Gita the Song Celestial It is the popular scripture of India and the loftiest of all teachings I would advise those of you who have not read that book to read it If you only knew how
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 132
much it has influenced your own country (America) even If you want to know the source of Emersonrsquos inspiration it is this book the Gita He went to see Carlyle and Carlyle made him a present of the Gita and that little book is responsible for the Concord Movement All the broad movements in America in one way or other are indebted to the Concord partyrdquo
His interest in the sacred writings of India was probably
aroused at Harvard and he kept it aglow throughout his
life With his motto ldquoTomorrow to fresh fields and pastures newrdquo he set out in search of the True (Satyam)
the Good (Shivam) and the Beautiful (Sundaram)
In busy and bustling New England there came forward
to quote Theodore Parker ldquothis young David a shepherd but to be a king with his garlands and singing robes about him one note upon his new and fresh-string lyre was worth a thousand menrdquo
With unflinching faith in Truth Righteousness and
Beauty and absolute confidence in all the attributes of
infinity he drank deep at the unfailing source of Indian
philosophy and religion and gave his thoughts such a
lucid inimitable expression that his writings have
become a veritable treasure of world literature Revered
the world over held in high esteem by great Indians like
Rabindranath Tagore and Pt Jawaharlal Nehru and
admired by Gandhiji his writings abound in the beauty
of his speech the majesty of his ideas and the loftiness
of his moral sentiments
Perhaps the most fitting commentary on the relevance
of his thoughts to our country was made by Mahatma
Gandhi after reading his Essays Said Mahatma Gandhi
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 133
ldquoThe Essays to my mind contain the teaching of Indian wisdom in a Western Guru It is interesting to see our own sometimes differently fashionedrdquo
There are indeed innumerable points of similarity in
thought and experience between Emerson and the
mainstream of Indian philosophy The philosophy of
Vedanta which was one of the thought currents that
reached America in the first half of the 19th century
influenced Emerson deeply and contributed largely to
his concept of lsquoselfhoodrsquo Emerson found the Vedic
doctrines of soul congenial to his own ideas about manrsquos
relationship to the universe He therefore drew freely
upon the Hindu scriptures which contain a vivid and
well-elaborated doctrine of lsquoSelfrsquo Numerous references
in his essays and journals to the lsquoLaws of Manursquo
(Manusmriti) Vishnu Puran Bhagvad Gita and Katha Upanishad bear ample testimony to this fact
Let us examine some of the striking identities between
Emerson and the Vedanta The Upanishads tell us that
the central core of onersquos self is clearly identifiable with
the Cosmic Reality ldquoThe self within you the resplendent immortal person is the internal self of all things and is the Universal Brahmanrdquo The Chhandogya Upanishad tells
us that ldquothe self which inhabits the body is verily the Brahman and that as soon as the mortal coil is thrown over it will finally merge in Brahmanrdquo
How close was Emersonrsquos spiritual kinship with the
Vedantic doctrines is clear from the following lines
taken from his essay Plato or the Philosopher
ldquoIn all nations there are minds which incline to dwell in the conception of the Fundamental Unity the ecstasy of losing all being in one Being This tendency
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 134
finds its highest expression chiefly in the Indian scriptures in the Vedas the Bhagvad Gita and the Vishnu Puranrdquo
He further quotes Lord Krishna speaking to a sage ldquoYou are fit to apprehend that you are not distinct from meThat which I am thou art and that also in this world with its gods and heroes and mankind Men contemplate distinctions because they are stupefied with ignorance What is the great end of all you shall now learn from me It is soul-one in all bodies pervading uniform perfect pre-eminent over nature exempt from birth growth and decay Omnipresent made up of true knowledge independent unconnected with unrealities with name species and the rest in time past present and to come The knowledge that this spirit which is essentially one is in onersquos own and all other bodies is the wisdom of one who knows the unity of thingsrdquo
In formulating his own concept of the Over-soul
Emerson quotes Lord Krishna once again
ldquoWe live in succession in division in parts in particles Meantime within man is the soul of the whole the wise silence the universal beauty to which every part and particle is equally related the eternal One And this deep power in which we exist and whose beatitude is all accessible to us is not only self-sufficing and perfect in every hour but in the act of seeing and the thing seen the seer and the spectacle the subject and the object are one We see the world piece by piece as the sun the moon the animal the tree but the whole of which these are shining parts is the Soul Only by the vision of that wisdom can the horoscope of ages be readrdquo
The Over-Soul
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 135
A transcendentalist par excellence Emerson who was
influenced by German philosophers like Kant Hegel
Fichte and Schelling and their English interpreters
Coleridge and Carlyle affirmed that man could
apprehend reality by direct spiritual insight To him
intuition knew truths which ldquotranscendedrdquo those
accessible to intellect logical argument and scientific
inquiry Such a transcendentalism or attitude which
provided a metaphysical justification for the ideal of
individual freedom was found writ large in the holy
books of India
Steeped as he was in the oriental lore echoes of
Vedantic philosophy can be distinctly heard in his
writings which shine like ldquoa good deed in a naughty worldrdquo
Some of his poems resemble Vedantic literature in form
as well as in content His two famous poems Brahma
and Hamatreya are striking examples of such a close
affinity both in content and expression Ideas and
images in Brahma reflect certain passages which
Emerson had copied into his journals from the Vishnu
Puran the Bhagvad Gita and Katha Upanishad The first
stanza of Brahma which reads
ldquoIf the red slayer think he slays
Or if the slain think he is slain
They know not well the subtle ways
I keep and pass and turn againrdquo
is essentially an adaptation of these lines from the
Katha Upanishad
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 136
ldquoIf the slayer thinks I slay if the slain thinks I am slain then both of them do not know well It (the soul) does not slay nor is it slainrdquo
Katha Upanishad II19
The same lines with a little variation of course appear
in the Bhagvad Gita
ldquoThey are both ignorant he who knows that the soul to be capable of killing and he who takes it as killed for verily the soul neither kills nor is killedrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II19
The image of Brahma as a red slayer has been derived
from the Vishnu Puran where Lord Shiva the destroyer
of Creation has been depicted as Rudra (the red slayer)
but destruction envisages new creation and therefore
symbolizes the decadence of one and necessitates the
advent of the other This is why Lord Shiva is regarded
as the god not only of extermination but also of
regeneration With this concept is connected the cult of
Shaivagam ndash the ushering in of an era of general good
and prosperity when the world is created anew
The second and third stanzas of Brahma echo the
following lines of the Bhagvad Gita
ldquoI am the ritual action I am the sacrifice I am the ancestral oblation I am the sacred hymn I am the melted butter I am the fire and I am the offeringrdquo
Bhagvad Gita IX16
and also from the same source
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 137
ldquoI am immortality as well as death I am being as well as non-beingrdquo
Bhagvad Gita IX19
In the fourth stanza of Brahma there is a direct
reference to lsquothe Sacred Sevenrsquo ndash the seven highest saints
of our country namely Kashyapa Atri Bharadwaj Vishwamitra Gautam Vashishtha and Jamadagni Thus
we find that Brahma embodies an age-old Vedantic
truth
As regards his next poem Hamatreya its very title is a
variation of a disciplersquos name lsquoMaitreyarsquo to whom the
earth had recited a few verses Before we examine the
poem critically let us read a long passage from the
Vishnu Puran Book IV which Emerson had copied into
his 1845 Journal This passage which sheds ample light
on the background and theme of the poem under
reference reads
ldquoKings who with perishable frames have possessed this ever-enduring world and who blinded with deceptive notions of individual occupation have indulged the feeling that suggests lsquoThis earth is mine it is my sonrsquos it belongs to my dynastyrsquo have all passed awayearth laughs as if smiling with autumnal flowers to behold her kings unable to effect the subjugation of themselvesthese were the verses Maitreya which earth recited and by listening to which ambition fades away like snow before the windrdquo
Journals VII127-130
How futile is human vanity and how ridiculous is the
possessive instinct in man has been thoroughly exposed
by Emerson in the following lines
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 138
ldquoEarth laughs in flowers to see her boastful boys
Earth-proud proud of the earth which is not theirs
Who steer the plough but cannot steer their feet
Clear of the graverdquo
Hamatreya
Man who awaits lsquothe inevitable hourrsquo forgets that all his
heraldry pomp power wealth and lsquopaths of gloryrsquo lead
him lsquobut to the graversquo and grows so proud of his material
achievements and so deeply attached to the fleeting
things of the world that he loses sight of the supreme
philosophical truth - the ephemerality of the world and
the immortality of soul Death which is lurking in the
shadows can lay his icy hands upon us any day yet due
to false pride and sense of meum and attachment we
allow ourselves to be duped by the passing show of the
world without ever thinking of salvation or final release
from the worldly bondages Says Emerson
ldquoAh the hot owner sees not Death who adds
Him to his land a lump of mould the morerdquo
Hamatreya
Here Emerson seems to have been deeply influences by
Indian scriptures and particularly Ishopanishad and
the Bhagvad Gita in which the philosophy of God-
realization through detached action has been succinctly
elaborated In these two sacred books it has been stated
that total renunciation of the sense of meum egotism
and attachment with regard to the world all worldly
objects body and all actions is a path to real love for
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 139
God All worldly objects like land wealth house clothes
all relations like parents wife children friends and all
forms of worldly enjoyment like honour fame prestige
being the creations of Maya are wholly deluding
transient and perishable whereas one God alone the
embodiment of Existence (Sat) Knowledge (Chit) and
Bliss (Anand) is all in all omnipotent omniscient and
omnipresent Therefore all sense of meum egotism and
attachment must be totally renounced for spiritual
growth and pure exclusive love for God If the seed of
egoism is sown sorrow is the fruit On the other hand
the more a man cultivates dispassion and
disinterestedness with regard to the world the more
easily he transcends the barriers of Ignorance (Avidya)
Delusion (Maya) and Aversion (Dvesha) and marches
on the path of self-realization and God-realization A
similar thought current runs through the following
memorable lines of Earth-Song which forms an integral
part of the poem
ldquoThe earth says
They called me theirs who so controlled me
Yet every one wished to stay and is gone
How am I theirs if they cannot hold me
But I hold themrdquo
Hamatreya
These lines remind us of those memorable words of
Lord Krishna in the Bhagvad Gita XII16 where a true
devotee is characterized as one who is ldquodelivered from the egorsquos thrall - the sense of I and minerdquo or the feeling of
doership in all undertakings
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 140
After reading these lines which seem to refer to the
famous Biblical phrase lsquodust thou art to dust returnethrsquo
the readers may feel called upon to cultivate a sense of
detachment and renunciation for their ambition fades
away and their lsquoavarice cooled like dust in the chill of the graversquo
All art it has been said is an attempt to distract man
from his ego Emersonrsquos Hamatreya is certainly an
illustrious example of great art Highly didactic in
content and tone this poem reminds us of that sublime
mood in which Emerson realized the futility of
egocentric attachment to earth and its fleeting objects
which are shadows rather than substances
Emersonrsquos writings leave us to quote John Milton lsquoCalm of mind all passions spentrsquo A fitting comment on the
total impact of Emersonrsquos works on us has been given
by a brilliant American man of letters Theodore Parker
who says
ldquoA good test of the comparative value of books is the state they leave you in Emerson leaves you tranquil resolved on noble manhood fearless of the consequences he gives men to mankind and mankind to the laws of Godrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 141
HD THOREAU
(12 July 1817 ndash 6 May 1862)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 142
HD THOREAU
US Thinker Essayist and Naturalist
Thoreau graduated from Harvard University and taught
school for several years before leaving his job to
become a poet of nature Back in Concord he came
under the influence of Ralph Waldo Emerson and began
to publish pieces in the Transcendentalist magazine The Dial In the years 1845ndash47 to demonstrate how
satisfying a simple life could be he lived in a hut beside
Concords Walden Pond essays recording his daily life
were assembled for his masterwork Walden (1854) His
A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers (1849)
was the only other book he published in his lifetime He
reflected on a night he spent in jail protesting the
Mexican-American War in the essay Civil
Disobedience (1849) which would later influence such
figures as Mohandas K Gandhi and Martin Luther King
Jr In later years his interest in Transcendentalism
waned and he became a dedicated abolitionist His
many nature writings and records of his wanderings in
Canada Maine and Cape Cod display the mind of a keen
naturalist After his death his collected writings were
published in 20 volumes and further writings have
continued to appear in print
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 143
CHAPTER EIGHT
THOREAUrsquoS TRYST WITH INDIAN CULTURE
INTRODUCTION
Henry David Thoreau was a great American
transcendentalist thinker His seminal mind and
original thought had an enduring impact on his own
countrymen and also on peoples beyond the bounds of
America His philosophy and life had a deep influence
on all great men of his time Mahatma Gandhi regarded
him as his Guru and his concept of Satyagraha owes its
origin to Thoreaursquos essay on Civil Disobedience which
Gandhiji chanced upon in South Africa On Thoreaursquos
greatness another great American contemporary RW
Emerson once remarked ldquoHis soul was made for the noblest society he had in short life exhausted the capabilities of this world Wherever there is knowledge wherever there is virtue wherever there is beauty he will find a homerdquo
HIS LOVE OF SOLITUDE
Endowed with a rare meditative mind Thoreau loved
lsquosweet solitudersquo for he held that what is truly alone is the
spirit A seeker after perfection he retired to the
solitude of the woods to see with the eyes of the soul ndash
ldquothe higher law in naturerdquo and realize his oneness with
the Cosmic Spirit A lover of the spirit behind the world
of appearance he once said ndash ldquoI love to be alone I never
found the companion that was so companionable as
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 144
solitude In solitude of the woods I suddenly recover my
spirits my spirituality I can go from the buttercups to
the life everlastingrdquo His love for loneliness resembles
that of our own sages and saints who shunned the din
and clamour of madding crowds and retired to the
sylvan solitude of the woods for meditation on
mysteries of life It was in the secluded and tranquil
atmosphere of the woods that the great teachers of
mankind cultivated their souls observed austerity and
wrote the holiest scriptures Aranyakas and sacred texts
Gurukul (forest academies)- the ideal nurseries of
higher learning and disciplined rigorous life were setup
here for success in life and self-realization which is a
path-way to God-realization
HIS CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE AND GANDHIJIrsquoS
SATYAGRAHA
Bapu read Thoreaursquos essay on Civil Disobedience for
the second time in jail and was so deeply impressed by
it that he called it ldquoa masterly treatise which left a deep impression on merdquo He copied the words ldquoI did not feel for a moment confined and the walls seemed a great waste of stone and mortarrdquo Gandhiji wrote to Roosevelt
in 1942 ldquoI have profited greatly by the writings of Thoreau and Emersonrdquo He told Roger Baldwin that
Thoreaursquos essay ldquocontained the essence of his political philosophy not only as Indiarsquos struggle related to the British but as to his own views of the relation of citizens to Governmentrdquo As Miller observed ldquoGandhiji received back from America what was fundamentally the philosophy of India after it had been distilled and crystallized in the mind of Thoreaurdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 145
In his Civil Disobedience which as a document of
much ethical and spiritual value is manrsquos most powerful
weapon in dealing with tyranny Thoreau examines the
relation of the individual to the state and offers a candid
exposition when he says ldquoThat Government is best which governs the leastrdquo He believed in the supremacy of
moral laws and his concept of Civil Disobedience is
based on the dictates of conscience Since the nature of
an individual is determined by his conscience there is
always a basic conflict between the laws arbitrarily
made by the Government and the objectives sanctioned
and held sacred by the individualrsquos conscience He
regarded the individual as more important than the
state So in the interests of justice and virtue men with
clean conscience most oppose unjust laws The form of
protest launched by conscientious and holy men against
government is called Civil Disobedience
Thoreau seems to have derived the concept from the
Bhagvad Gita which invests each individual with two
contradictory traits ndash the Divine Attributes and the
Diabolical Propensities Whenever diabolical tendencies
promote arbitrary administration by making unjust
laws and men of clean conscience are forced to obey
them injustice prevails and justice or righteousness is
destroyed In such a situation the Divinity incarnates
itself and sets matters right Declares Lord Krishna
ldquoWhenever righteousness (Virtue) is on the decline and injustice (Vice) is on the ascendant then I body forth myselfrdquo
Bhagvad Gita IV7
To Gandhiji also Satya (Truth) and Ahimsa (Non-
violence) are inter-related and Satyagraha or non-
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 146
violent resistance is based on the belief in the power of
spirit the power of truth the power of love by which we
can overcome evil through self-suffering and self-
sacrifice
FORMATIVE INDIAN INFLUENCES
Thoreau was thoroughly immersed in the Indian
scriptures In Emersonrsquos library he read and was deeply
influenced by the Manusmriti Bhagvad Gita Vishnu Puran Hitopadesh Rig-Veda and the Upanishads
Which the Manusmriti led him to seek the Self in
solitude the Bhagvad Gita taught him the ideal of
disinterested action non-attachment meditation and
self-realization He was so overwhelmed by the Gita that
he declared it to be the lsquoUniversal Gospelrsquo Praising its
moral grandeur and sustained sublimity of thoughts he
wrote in Walden ndash ldquoIn the morning I bathe my intellect in the stupendous cosmogonal philosophy of the Bhagvad Gita since whose composition years of the gods have elapsed and in comparison with which our modern world and its literature seems puny and trivial the best Hindu scripture (Gita) is remarkable for its pure intellectuality The reader is nowhere raised into and sustained in a higher purer and rarer region of thought than the Bhagvad Gita It is unquestionably one of the noblest and most sacred scriptures which have come down to us The oriental philosophy assigns their due rank respectively to action and contemplation or rather does full Justice to the latterrdquo
A thorough study of the Upanishads made him exclaim
joyfully ldquoWhat extracts from the Vedas I have read fall on me like the light of a higher and purer luminary which describes a loftier course through a purer stratum ndash free from particulars simple universalrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 147
At a time when the Western philosophers did not
appreciate the significance of contemplation Thoreau
emphasized that contemplation is as important as
action for the latter has to be charged by the former
otherwise action will lead to chaos disillusionment and
despair
HIS TRANSCENDENTALISM
Thoreau was an empirical transcendentalist To him
transcendentalism was a profound exploration of the
spiritual foundations of life His emphasis on intuition
or inner light for a direct relationship with God which
transcends all the conventional avenues of
communication stemmed from an intuitive capacity for
grasping the ultimate truth He was interested less in
the material world than in spiritual reality He regarded
Nature as a viable garment of the spiritual world and
the universe as the embodiment of a single Cosmic Soul
His transcendentalism relied upon the higher planes of
human circumstances its oneness with something
higher than itself While logical reasoning fails to grasp
the truth intuition transcends understanding and is a
synthesizing power to understand the organic whole
which is called the Over-soul
An individual of exceptional self-ascending and self-
reliance he believed that Over-soul is brought down to
earth by action rather than words He therefore did not
preach transcendentalism but actually lived it To him
transcendentalism is ldquoan inquisitive and contemplative access to Godrdquo He believed in the immanence of God in
nature and in man and also the identity of God with the
soul of the individual He said ldquothe creator is still behind the increate the Divinity is so fleeting that its attributes are never expressedthe idea of God is the idea of
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 148
our Spiritual nature purified and enlarged to infinity In ourselves are the elements of Divinity We see God around us because He dwells within usrdquo
This statement reminds us of a verse in the Gita
wherein Lord Krishna declares that every living heart is
His abode
ldquoArjuna God abides in the heart of all creatures causing them to revolve according to their deeds by His illusive power seated as those beings are in the vehicle of the bodyrdquo
At one place Thoreau said ldquoThe whole is whole an organic whole which is called Over-soul or Para-Brahman and the highest aim of life is to realize this truth and be one with the whole or Over-soulrdquo Thoreau seems to have
been moved by our Vedic incantation which says
ldquoThat (the invisible Absolute) is whole whole is this (the visible phenomenal universe) from the invisible whole comes forth the visible whole Though the visible whole has come out from that invisible whole yet the whole remains unalteredrdquo Thus the phenomenal and the
Absolute are inseparable All existence is in the
Absolute and whatever exists must exist in it hence all
manifestation is merely a modification of the one
Supreme Whole and neither increases nor diminishes It
Serene and thoughtful as he was he wrote in his
Journal ldquoThe fact is I am a mystic a transcendentalist and a natural philosopher to bootrdquo
HIS ASCETISM (SANNYASA)
He was a true ascetic or Sannyasi for he preached and
practiced the basic human values of Anasakti (non-
attachment) and Aparigraha (non-possession)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 149
throughout his life He abhorred acquisition of wealth
and regarded worldly possessions as the result of sheer
exploitation of the masses by a few powerful men and
agencies including the State and the Government Since
the universe belongs to God any claim to ownership or
personal possessions is against moral law and is in fact
a sin against divinity Moral laws being superior to
worldly rules his preference for a life of self-abnegation
and renunciation bears a striking similarity to our Vedic
view expressed in the very opening line of the
Ishopanishad
ldquoAll this whatever exists in the universe is inhabited by the Lord Having renounced (the unreal) enjoy (the real) with restraint Do not covet or set your eye on the possession of othersrdquo
To him all worldly attractions and allurements were but
a passing show or fleeting moments (in eternity) which
distract the seekers of truth from cultivating self-culture
and promoting inner spiritual growth
EXPLORER OF THE INNER WORLD OF SPIRIT
Thoreau was an explorer of the inner self He wanted to
pass ldquoan invisible boundaryrdquo establishment within and
around him new universal and more liberal laws and
live with higher order of beings To him every man is
the Lord of the realm beside which the earthly empire
of the Czar is but a petty state a hammock left by the
icethere are continents and seas in the moral
world yet unexplored by him He praised William
Habbingtonrsquos following lines which echoed his own
thoughts
ldquoDirect your eyes right inward and you will find
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 150
A thousand regions in your mind
Yet undiscovered Travel then and be
Expert in home home cosmographyrdquo
Simple living based on extreme reduction of wants and
self-reliance enabled him to lsquocultivate the garden of his soulrsquo In consonance with the concept of an ideal Yogi in
the Gita he wrote
ldquoThe millions are awake enough for physical labour but only one in a million is awake enough for effective intellectual exertion and only one in a hundred millions do a poetic or divine liferdquo How truly does this view echo
the memorable words of Lord Krishna
ldquoAmong thousands of men one rare soul strives for perfection and among those who strive with success one perchance knows me in truthrdquo
Condemning people who go to Africa to hunt giraffes for
pastime he exhorted them to aim at seeking their own
lsquoSelfrsquo He said ldquoIt would be a noble game to shoot onersquos selfrdquo He seems to recall the famous verse of the
Mundakopanishad which says
ldquoThe Pranava is the bow the Atman is the arrow and the Brahman is said to be its mark It should be hit by one who is self-collected and that which hits becomes like the arrow one with the mark ie Brahmanrdquo
When he ordains lsquoto shoot oneselfrsquo he like our Vedic
seers hints at penetrating the truth centre in us with
our mind propelled by the motive force generated in the
voiceless ecstasy of deepest meditation which touches
the Brahman the Ultimate Reality When the individual
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 151
soul gets fully detached from its contacts with matter or
its false identification with material envelopment it
realizes its oneness with the Supreme Brahman How
beautifully has he stressed the value of inner search in
the concluding sentence of Walden
ldquoThe light which puts out our eyes is darkness to us Only that day dawns to which we are awake There is more day to dawn The Sun is but a morning starrdquo
IMMORTALITY OF SOUL AND THE DOCTRINE OF
TRANSMIGRATION
Thoreau firmly believed in the immortality of soul and
its transmigration He had fully imbibed the philosophy
of the Gita which enunciates in unequivocal terms the
permanence of the soul and the transience of the body
Says Lord Krishna
ldquoThis soul is never born and never dies nor does it become only after being born For it is unborn eternal everlasting and ancient even though the body is slain the soul is notrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II20
ldquoAs a man shedding worn-out garments takes other new ones likewise the embodied soul casting off worn-out bodies enters into others which are newrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II22
Thoreau considered his life as a series of many more
lives to come On his return from Waldon Pond he said
ldquoI had several more lives to live and could not spare any more for that onerdquo At another place he refers to the
solitary hired manrsquos lsquosecond birth and peculiar religious
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 152
experiencersquo He evidently recalled the following words of
St John ldquoExcept a man be born again he cannot see the kingdom of Godrdquo In his Waldon he refers to a bug and
declares ldquoWho does not feel his faith in a resurrection and immortality Who knows what beautiful and winged whose egg has been buried for ages under many concentric layers of woodenness in the dead dry life in societyheard perchance of gnawing out now for years by the astonished family of man may unexpectedly come forth from amidst societyrsquos most trivial furniture to enjoy its perfect summer life at lastrdquo
CONCLUSION
Thoreau was a true Yogi or an ascetic modeling on the
Indian tradition of strict moral code of conduct for a
Sannyasi He drew abundant spiritual and moral
sustenance from the Indian scriptures and its rich
lsquoculturersquo and approximated the ideal of a perfect recluse
The concept of an ideal Yogi is similar upto a point to
the postulates of Divinity expressed thus in the Atharva Veda
ldquoThe Yogi is desireless and hence free from the impact of animal nature he is serene in the heroism of the spirit he is satisfied with the essence of things perceived spirituality and hence does not depend on sense-perception for happiness and so he is complete in himself And though the physical body is subject to decay and death he remains unworn and ever youthful in spirit and has no fear of deathrdquo
Atharva Veda XVIII44
Such an enlightenment Yogi or spiritual superman was
Thoreau whose greatness will ever inspire us and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 153
illumine our lifersquos path with light and love His life was
lsquoa chronicle of actions just and brightrsquo and his writings
were lsquowrit with beams of heavenly light on which the eyes of God not rarely lookrsquo
Proof
Printed By Createspace
Digital Proofer
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 6
ISBN 9781497470637
First Edition 2007
Reprint 2014
copy RP Dwivedi
Rs 50000
All rights reserved No part of this publication may be
reproduced stored in a retrieval system or transmitted
in any form or by any means electronic mechanical
photocopying recording or otherwise without the
prior written permission of the copyright owner
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 7
DEDICATED TO
My Father
Late Pt Devi Sahay Dwivedi
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 8
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
I wish to express my indebtedness to all my near and
dear ones and tender grateful acknowledgements to my
wife Mrs Rajeshwari Dwivedi for her implied and
inspiring encouragement and particularly to my
nephew Raghav Dwivedi without whose willing co-
operation unfailing assistance and untiring labour the
publication of this compact volume would not have
been possible
My grateful thanks are also due to Bhartiya Vidya Bhavan Mumbai and Gita Press Gorakhpur for their
kind permission to include in this volume as many as
seven articles published in their esteemed periodicals
viz lsquoBhavanrsquos Journalrsquo and lsquoKalyana-Kalpatarursquo
respectively
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 9
CONTENTS
Introduction 10
1 Indian Spiritualism in Blakersquos Poetry 27
2 Vedanta in Wordsworthrsquos Poetry 47
3 Coleridgersquos Spiritual Quest and Indian Thought 62 4 Byron A Blend of Clay and Spark 79
5 Shelley A Pilgrim of Eternity 95
6 John Keats A Minstrel of Beauty and Truth 119 7 Emersonrsquos Spiritual Quest and Indian Thought 131
8 Thoreaursquos Tryst with Indian Culture 143
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 10
INTRODUCTION
Quest for Truth has always been manrsquos eternal passion
and pursuit Since the very dawn of human civilization
he has been at pains to unravel the mystery that
shrouds life and the world around him And yet the
enigmatic phenomenon of the universe is to quote
Tennyson ldquoan arch wherethrorsquo gleams that untraveled world whose margin fades forever and foreverrdquo as man
moves to reach it but it is never too late ldquoto seek a newer worldrdquo
Manrsquos basic faith and his dauntless persistence in
attaining truth both in the physical world and spiritual
sphere sustains his endeavour and impels him to move
into lsquofresh woods and pastures newrsquo In this sense both
Science and Religion have the identical aim of
discovering Truth and thus helping man to grow
materially and spiritually to achieve fulfillment The
yearning of the poets (selected here) for exploring and
expressing Ultimate Truth or Eternity has been
highlighted
This little volume of articles written at leisure from time
to time as a creative pastime reflects a modest attempt
at tracing out the main thought-currents of the major
English Romantic Poets and two prominent American
Transcendentalists ndash RW Emerson and HD Thoreau
and co-relating them with our own philosophical
thought and rich religio-spiritual heritage
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 11
Since these articles represent my stray and occasional
thoughts they have no claim to a thorough or
comparative study or a comprehensive coverage of all
aspects of the poets The perspective chosen is confined
to some of the distinct echoes of the Vedantic thought in
the poems of selected poets but their publication in the
journals of international repute is indicative of their
acceptance and appeal and their role in blazing the
trails for a further study of their subject for research
scholars and others
The poets in this selection have taken life in its fullness
encompassing both matter and spirit ndash the visible world
and the invisible universe beyond it They have
conceived of the shadow (world) not without substance
and movement not without a moving spirit behind it
Like our own Vedic poetry the poetry of these poets is
intensely religious in the sense of their having felt the
living presence of the Divine in the beauty and glory of
the universe Again like our ancient Vedic poets their
poetry was born out of a joyous and radiant spirit
overflowing with love of life energy for action and a
vision of divinity which needed serene faith for
inspiration They were all transported into another
world by a rare spiritual exaltation for they aspired for
revelation of the inner truth of Reality in their souls
Moreover like our Vedic hymns their poems flowed like
fresh and clear streams gushing out of rocky mountains
as our ancient sages had described long ago lsquoLike joyous streams bursting from the mountain our songs have sounded to Brihaspati (preceptor of Gods)rsquo
What Emerson said of Thoreaursquos greatness could also be
applied to a great extent to most of the poets selected
here Emerson remarked ldquoHis soul was made for the
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 12
noblest society he had in short life exhausted the capabilities of this world Wherever there is knowledge wherever there is virtue wherever there is beauty he will find a homerdquo
These articles amply prove the fundamental fallacy of
Rudyard Kiplingrsquos assertion that ldquothe East is east and the West is west and the twain shall never meetrdquo but
contrary to his view the East and the West represent
complementary views of the world While the West
gives us the perfection and joy of eternal beauty in the
outer world as expressed by Keats the East gives us lsquothe
splendor and joy of the Infinite in the inner world of
Soulrsquos visionrsquo
That the physicist and the mystic reach the truth of
essential unity of all things and events by following
different paths has been beautifully described by
modern scientist Dr Frijof Capra ldquoThus the mystic and the physicist arrive at the same conclusion one starting from the inner realm the other from the outer world The harmony between their views confirms the ancient Indian wisdom that Brahman the ultimate reality without is identical to Atman the reality withinrdquo
Clear and identical traces of our Vedic thought and
scriptural ideas are found scattered all over the corpus
of their poetic works If we take up the outstanding
ideas of each poet for our consideration we find their
striking resemblance with what abounds in our spiritual
heritage Let us consider their predominant thoughts
which find a distinct echo in our Vedic and holy texts
William Blake who was the most prophetic of all
major English poets seems to have attained the rare
super-sensory or transcendental state of consciousness
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 13
which enabled him to perceive reflective communion
with God Such a transcendental perception of Divinity
in all creation and all creation in Divinity gave him a
subtle insight into the lsquovisions of eternityrsquo In other
words this contemplative vision of Infinity in the Finite
and the Finite in Infinity has been regarded as the
distinguishing mark of pure wisdom by Lord Krishna in
the Gita ndash ldquoWhen one sees Eternity in things that pass away and Infinity in finite things then one has pure (सािवक) wisdomrdquo [XVIII20] It was this intimation of
eternity that made Blake declare
ldquoTo see the world in a grain of sand
And a Heaven in a wild flower
Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand
And Eternity in an hourrdquo
Auguries of Innocence
Moreover he strongly condemned man-made divisions
of humanity into numerous castes and creeds and
preached universal brotherhood based on love
understanding and sacrifice
ldquofor man is love
And God is love Every kindness to another is a little death
In the divine image nor can man exist but by brotherhoodrdquo
Jerusalem
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 14
And again he says
ldquoWhere mercy love and pity dwell
There God is dwelling toordquo
The Divine Image
William Wordsworth was essentially a seer-poet He
was perhaps the first English poet to appreciate the
innate kinship of man with Nature and find in her a
calm and invisible spiritual presence in perfect
communion with the Cosmic Soul He recognized the
essential spiritual unity of all things and the
interpenetration of human life with that of the universe
His poetic faith was based on an indwelling spirit in
nature which interpenetrated all life and transformed
and transfigured with its radiance rocks fields trees
and the people who lived close to them He found
something that permeates and transfigures everything
He perceived this indwelling spirit and the vision of the
Infinite (God) in his poetry He concluded that Nature
being the manifestation of God is our best moral guide
and teacher
ldquoOne impulse from a vernal wood
May teach you more of man
Of moral evil and of good
Than all the sages canrdquo
In his Ode to the Intimations of Immortality which is
his spiritual autobiography he expresses his belief in
pre-existence which is also an article of faith in our
scriptural texts
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 15
ldquoOur birth is but a sleep and a forgetting
The soul that rises with us our lifersquos star
Hath had elsewhere its setting
And cometh from afarrdquo
His mystical experience of lsquothat serene and blessed moodrsquo in which we lsquoare laid asleep in body and become a living soulrsquo and his perception of lsquoa sense sublime of something more deeply interfuseda motion and a spirit that impels all thinking things all objects of all thought and rolls through all thingsrsquo reflect not only
his profound pantheism but also find close parallels in
our own religio-spiritual literature
Samuel Taylor Coleridge who was one of the seminal
minds of his generation possessed the most fertile
imagination According to William Hazlitt he lsquohad angelic wings and fed on mannarsquo for his writings are
ethereal mystical and magical Endowed with a rare
lsquomystic idealismrsquo he was besides being a great poet a
speculative philosopher also who considered life as lsquoa vision shadowy of Truthrsquo He justified the phrase ndash
lsquoRenaissance of wonderrsquo for he revived the supernatural
and invested it with indefiniteness and suggestion
which characterize his imagination He drew his
conceptions from lsquomythrsquo and embodied them with
symbols His images express his emotion spiritual state
and metaphysical experience Unlike other poets his
poetry grew from his inner organic law and made
supernatural and romantic subjects credible to human
nature by creating lsquothat willing suspension of disbeliefrsquo that constitutes his poetic faith He was the first great
British idealist of his age who preferred the intellectual
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 16
intuition to the conceptual dialectic The image and
vision of God lsquoimago deirsquo as an intellectual
contemplation (speculari) of the transcendent Absolute
(the prius) of all beings is an aspect of his speculative
mysticism
Byron however stands apart from all other poets
included herein for although his philosophy of life was
altogether different from that of his contemporaries he
was a force a portent and historical phenomenon in his
age He was endowed with a rare fire for liberty
indomitable courage sacrificing spirit and prophetic
zeal which are undoubtedly great human values His
inevitable attitude was revolt both social and personal
As an influence and portent he was the most powerful
poet in his age for he created that Byronic legend which
became a historic phenomenon of lasting fascination of
his personality Endowed with fiery energy his self-
portrait of careless arrogance or even daemonic figure
was a persona of romantic panache He was a portrait
and a symbol whom it was possible to worship or
condemn but never to neglect
PB Shelley who was lsquoone frail form ndash a phantom among men companionlessrsquo (Adonais) occupies a
unique position among Romantic poets Essentially he
was a visionary whose philosophy of enlightenment
made his poetry fanciful and ethereal He was a born
revolutionary who launched a crusade against the
organized religion and society Disgusted by the gloomy
state of the world he dreamed a world of beauty
freedom and virtue and made his poetry a trumpet of
narcissistic fantasy A solitary intellectual lsquowandering companionlessrsquo (Alastor) his poetry is the projection of
his sense of isolation He was fired by rationalist
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 17
revolutionary thought which reflects his visions of the
future Endowed with rationalist speculative intuition
his poetry symbolizes the spirit of human welfare
ldquoI wish no living thing to suffer painrdquo
Prometheus I303
The desire of Shelley reminds us of our scriptural
prayer ndash ldquoसव भवत स13खनः सव सत नरामयाःrdquo His
imagination is idealistic and vision synoptic He deals
with the heavens and light and aspired for the
regeneration of the world through love To him there is
no dualism between the material and spiritual life for
they are the aspects of same reality To him only
Eternity is real while the phenomenal world is but an
illusion or माया ndash a veil that hides true light He echoes a
Vedic truth when he says
ldquoThe One remains the many change and pass
Heavenrsquos light forever shines Earthrsquos shadows fly
Life like a dome of many-coloured glass
Stains the white radiance of Eternityrdquo
Adonais L11
He treats natural objects and forces as symbols for his
own emotional patterns In his lsquoOde to the West Windrsquo
he uses the West Wind as a spirit of destruction and
regeneration or death and rebirth He considers death
as only a prelude to renewed life and this shows his
faith in the transmigration of human soul or the cycle of
death and rebirth He declares
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 18
ldquoIf winter comes can spring be far behindrdquo
Ode to the West Wind
His entire poetry is a vivid and symbolic expression of
the wretched actuality and the radiant idea He wants to
herald a perfect world order based on love and
freedom He treats poetry as a potent instrument of
redemption and it was his deep romantic sensibility and
fanciful ecstatic Platonic love that earned him this
description of lsquopinnacled dim in the intense inanersquo He
was one of the greatest lyricists and an
lsquounacknowledged legislator of the worldrsquo of thought and
imagination
John Keats who in his own words was lsquoa fair creature of an hourrsquo was perhaps the first conscious artist whose
artistic intuition was far ahead of his time By declaring
that ldquoan artist must serve Mammonrdquo he wished to confer
on arts a special status and thus laid the foundation of
the doctrine of lsquoArt for Artrsquos sakersquo His minute delicate
and sensuous observation of the visible world of Nature
inspired his poetry which he wanted to lsquoloadrsquo with a
special excellence His delightful communion with
Nature and the sensuous ecstasies of its sight sound
smell touch and taste formed some of his best poetry
His delicacy and keenness of perception and love for
passive contemplation made him exclaim ndash ldquoO for a life of sensations rather than thoughtrdquo But in fact most of
his sensations were his thoughts for they were
embodied in sensuous pictorial form and rich symbolic
imagery
As a liberal enthusiast he felt that sharing the distress of
humanity or participation in ldquothe agony and strife of human heartsrdquo was essential not only for human growth
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 19
but also for poetic maturity This philanthropic attitude
of Keats brings him very close to our ardent Indian
prayer - ldquoसव भवत स13खनः सव सत नरामयाःrdquo ndash May all be happy may none struck with disease To find an
escape from the fret and fever of life he sought refuge in
an infinite yearning for beauty and turned to the realm
lsquoof Flora and old Panrsquo but soon realized the transience of
the world and started exploring permanence He could
find it in the spirit of beauty which is but a reflection of
eternal truth His passionate pursuit of ideal beauty
which he identified with truth has been beautifully
expressed in the following oft-quoted lines
ldquoBeauty is truth truth beauty that is all
Ye know on earth and all ye need to knowrdquo
Ode on a Grecian Urn
This fundamental unity or oneness of beauty and truth
and their interplay in the visible world are the
mainsprings of his poetic creed
The conflict between transience and permanence forms
the theme of his famous Odes and he longs for a
solution and lasting happiness in the form of Art or lsquoon the viewless wings of Poesyrsquo At the height of his
impassioned contemplation when the life of the spirit is
fused with the objects of immediate sensuous
experience he has glimpses of the permanence of
beauty which reflects Eternal Truth In one of his letters
(281) he declares ldquoI can never feel certain of any truth but from a clean perception of its beautyrdquo And at another
place when he finds mortality and immortality poles
apart he asserts the everlasting value of truth ldquoTruthrdquo
he says ldquomeans that which has lasting valuerdquo This firm
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 20
conviction of Keats seems to be a distinct echo of our
Vedantic dictum
सयमव जयत नानतम सयन पथा वततो दवयानः
यनामतय तत सयय परम नधान ldquoTruth alone triumphs not untruth By truth is laid out the Path Divine along which the seers who are free from desires and cravings ascend the supreme abode of Truthrdquo
Mundak Upanishad III16
Again the Vedic seer says that the Atman (self) is to be
realized only through truth
सयन लampसतपसा यष आमा
मडकोपनषद III15
Thus truth is the foundation of Dharma (righteousness)
for it is an essential and abiding value of human life The
eternal oneness of beauty and truth and vice versa and
their transcendental reality was Keatsrsquo poetic creed and
the realization of this basic spiritual truth raised him to
a level of sublime consciousness which is the mark of a
true seeker of truth or seer
In sum we may say that though lsquoa lily of a dayrsquo Keats
proved that a crowded hour of glory is far better than
an age without a name as has been stressed in our epic
Mahabharat where Queen Vidula exhorts her son
Sanjaya ldquoमहतम 0व1लत 2यो न त धमतम 4चरrdquo ndash ldquoIt is better to flame forth for an instant than to smoke away for agesrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 21
Though Keats died at the young age of 26 years he left
an indelible imprint on the history of English poetry for
his deep and pervasive influence could be easily seen on
Tennysonrsquos early work Moreover he was indisputably
the precursor of the Pre-Raphaelite movement In fact
he had reached near perfection in poetic craftsmanship
which will ever remain worthy of emulation for the
succeeding generations of poets
Ralph Waldo Emerson known as the lsquoSage of Concordrsquo
acted as a bridge between the East and the West His
abiding interest in the Indian scriptures and
particularly the Gita was a source of the Concord
Movement in America According to Swami
Vivekananda all the broad movements in America are
indebted to the Concord Party Mahatma Gandhi
remarked after reading Emersonrsquos Essays ldquoThe Essays to my mind contain the teaching of Indian wisdom in a Western lsquoGurursquo it is interesting to see our own sometimes differently fashionedrdquo Emerson drew freely on the
Upanishads Manusmriti Vishnu Puran and above all
the Gita and his writings reflect his indebtedness to our
holy texts
Pt Jawaharlal Nehru admired Emersonrsquos gospel of self-
reliance and righteousness in particular and regarded
him as one of the builders of America A
transcendentalist and thinker par excellence Emersonrsquos
ideas shaped not only his countrymenrsquos thinking but
had a deep and pervasive influence over many other
nations His main thoughts coloured as they are by our
own Indian religio-philosophical strands are universal
in appeal and are as relevant today as they were in his
own lifetime
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 22
In formulating his concept of Over-Soul Emerson
stressed the fundamental identity of Individual Soul
with Over-Soul He asserted ldquoWithin man is the soul of the whole ndash the wise silence the universal beauty to which every part and particle is equally related the Eternal Oneonly by the vision of that wisdom can the horoscope of ages be readrdquo He firmly believed in the
immortality of soul and the ephemerality of the world
and strongly condemned the futility of manrsquos vanity and
ego-centric attachment to the perishable objects of the
world His writings leave us lsquocalm of mind all passions spentrsquo In fact lsquohe gives men to mankind and mankind to the laws of Godrsquo
Henry David Thoreau was a great empirical
transcendentalist about whom Emerson once remarked
ldquowherever there is knowledge wherever there is virtue wherever there is beauty he will find a homerdquo His essay
on lsquoCivil Disobediencersquo which Gandhiji read twice in a
South African jail impressed him so much so that he
regarded him as his political lsquoGurursquo and his concept of
Satyagraha owes its origin to Thoreaursquos writings
Endowed with a rare meditative mind he loved lsquosweet solitudersquo and retired to the woods for discovering the
lsquohigher lawrsquo and realize his oneness with the Cosmic
Spirit He believed in the supremacy of moral laws and
his doctrine of Civil Disobedience is based on his dictate
of conscience for he considered individual conscience
more important than arbitrary state laws
Thoroughly immersed in the Indian scriptures his
thought-process and philosophy of life was
considerably moulded by our ancient religio-spiritual
heritage His deep love for our scriptural texts is evident
from his declaration of the Gita as lsquoUniversal Gospelrsquo He
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 23
wrote ldquoIn the morning I bathe my intellect in the stupendous cosmogonal philosophy of the Bhagvad GitaIt is unquestionably one of the noblest and most sacred scriptures which have come down to usthe oriental philosophy assigns their due rank respectively to action and contemplationrdquo
About the Vedas he remarked ldquoExtracts from the Vedas fall on me like the light of a higher and purer luminaryrdquo
According to him Over-Soul could be brought down to
earth not by words but by ldquoan inquisitive and contemplative accessrdquo He further states ldquoIn us are the elements of Divinity We see God around us because He dwells within usrdquo
He was a true ascetic (सयासी) for he preached and
practiced non-attachment (अनासि8त) in his life He was
an explorer of the inner world of Spirit In the seclusion
of woods he lsquocultivated the garden of his soul as a true Yogirsquo and he wanted to lsquoshoot his selfrsquo as our Mundaka Upanishad says
ldquoThe Pranava is the bow Atma the arrow the Brahman its mark It should be hit by a self-collected onerdquo
Much of what is stated in this compact volume may be
found scattered over various other critical works but
my earnest endeavour has been to bring together such
material as is of sufficient spiritual value which belongs
to all times This small comparative survey of the realm
of main ideas of some great poets confirms the splendor
of their rich romantic imagination and the unity of all
spiritual vision that makes them not only the creators of
beauty love and light but also brothers in spirit
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 24
I would feel amply rewarded if through this modest
attempt I am able to arouse keen interest in my readers
for further critical study of the subject Any suggestions
for amplification or improvement on the text are most
welcome
RP DWIVEDI
LUCKNOW
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 25
WILLIAM BLAKE
(28 November 1757 ndash 12 August 1827)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 26
WILLIAM BLAKE
English Poet Painter Engraver and Visionary
He was trained as an engraver by James Basire and
afterward attended classes at the Royal Academy Blake
married in 1782 and in 1784 he opened a print shop in
London He developed an innovative technique for
producing coloured engravings and began producing
his own illustrated books of poetrymdashincluding Songs of Innocence (1789) The Marriage of Heaven and Hell (1790) and Songs of Experience (1794)mdashwith his new
method of ldquoIlluminated Printingrdquo Jerusalem (1804[ndash
20]) an epic treating the fall and redemption of
humanity is his most richly decorated book His other
major works include Vala or The Four Zoas
(manuscript 1796ndash1807) and Milton (1804[ndash11]) A
late series of 22 watercolours inspired by the Book of
Job includes some of his best-known pictures He was
called mad because he was single-minded and
unworldly he lived on the edge of poverty and died in
neglect His books form one of the most strikingly
original and independent bodies of work in the Western
cultural tradition Ignored by the public of his day he is
now regarded as one of the earliest and greatest figures
of Romanticism
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 27
CHAPTER ONE
INDIAN SPIRITUALISM IN BLAKErsquoS VISIONS OF ETERNITY
INTRODUCTION
William Blake was by far the most prophetic of all major
English poets In a preface to his famous poem on
Milton he exclaimed lsquoWould to God that all the Lordrsquos people were Prophetsrsquo Elsewhere Blake declared lsquoA Prophet is a seer not an arbitrary dictatorrsquo According to
PH Butter an acclaimed authority on Blake ldquoa prophet sees behind the marks of woe behind the wars and other evils of his time and the attitudes that cause such things But Blake was not the kind of prophet who just present evils but one who saw the Visions of Eternity one whose senses discovered the infinite in everythingrdquo The prophet
is also a spokesman one who speaks or believes he
speaks for God or some other higher power Blake
himself claimed in one of his letters in 1803 ldquoI dare not pretend to be any other than the Secretary the Authors are in Eternityrdquo
His belief in lsquoinspirationrsquo contributed to that lsquoterrifying honestyrsquo which TS Eliot saw in him to keep him
uncompromisingly true to his vision He perceived a
close relationship of the conscious ndash lsquoIrsquo with the deeper
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 28
self through which all inspiration flows He knew that
the prophet must also be a lsquomakerrsquo lsquoa blacksmith laboring at his furnaces to shape the stubborn structure of the languagersquo He further realized that a prophet
should also be a teacher a preacher and a beacon light
to humanity
Explaining the function of the bard or poet (and his own
mission) Blake in his introduction to Songs of Experience declares
ldquoHear the voice of the bard
Who present past and future sees
Whose ears have heard
The Holy word
That walked among the ancient trees
Calling the lapsed soul
And weeping in the evening dew
That might control
The starry pole
And fallen fallen light renewrsquo
Or again elucidating the aim of writing poetry or his
lsquogreat taskrsquo Blake declares
ldquo I rest not from my great task
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 29
To open the Eternal worlds to open the immortal eyes
Of man inwards into the worlds of Thought into Eternity
Ever expanding in the bosom of God the human imaginationrsquo
Like Milton who wanted lsquoto justify the ways of God to Manrsquo or Shelley who held that lsquopoetry is the revelation of the eternal ideas which lie behind the many-coloured ever-shifting veil that we call reality in lifersquo Blake in his
exceptional prophetic zeal set out to open the Eternal
worlds to open the immortal eyes of man inwards into
the worlds of thought into Eternity He was always at
pains to renew the fallen fallen light The poetrsquos divine
task of lsquoever expanding in the bosom of Godrsquo reminds us
of the moving verse of our Rig Veda in which God as
creator of beautiful forms has been conceived of as the
greatest poet whose divine creative energy s his poetic
power which manifests itself in the manifold forms of
beauty and splendor like the Heaven the Sun the Moon
the Sky etc
यो धता भवानानामगया स कवः काया प पपltयत
ऋवद VIII415
lsquoHe who is the supporter of the world of life
Who knows the secret mysterious names of the morning beams
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RP DWIVEDI Page 30
He poet cherishes manifold forms by His poetic power even as heavenrsquo
Rig Veda VIII415
As a divinely inspired poet Blake seems to have had
experiences of various psychic and even mystic visions
which awakened him to subtle spiritual life It seems
that he must have transcended normal sensory
perceptions and would have attained to super-sensory
status of consciousness when he declares
lsquoI see the savior over me
Spreading his beams of love and dictating the words of mild song
Awake O sleeper of the land of shadows wake
I am in you and you in me mutual in love divinersquo
Jerusalem L4-7
He seems to have attained to that rare transcendental
consciousness when he perceived perfect communion
with God who assured him
lsquoI am not a God afar off I am a brother and friend
Within your bosoms I reside and you reside in me
We are one forgiving all evil not seeking recompensersquo
Jerusalem L18-20
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 31
Here Blake on perceiving a synoptic vision of complete
identity or oneness of God with individual self seems to
have echoed the eternal ancient Holy Scriptures Here
are a few striking parallels
In our Vedas also Go is regarded and adored as our
most-trusted friend Says the Rig Veda
lsquoमा=कर न ऐना सयाच ऋषः
वBमा Cह Dमतमसया 1शवानrsquo
ऋवद X237
lsquoNever may this friendship be severed
Of thee O Deity and the sage Vimada
We know O God Thy brother-like love
With us be Thy auspicious friendshiprsquo
Rig Veda X237
The key-note of this type of worship is the
contemplation of friendly love (described in later
religious literature as - सय ndash friendliness between the
Deity and the worshipper) The following prayer is in
the same spirit
lsquoभवा नः सFन अतमः सखा वधrsquo
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RP DWIVEDI Page 32
ऋवद X133
lsquoBe Thou most dear to us for bliss O friend to aidrsquo
Rig Veda X133
Similarly assuring Arjuna of His perennial benediction
Lord Krishna declares in the Gita
ईHवरः सवभतानामतltठत
Kामयसवभतानमायया
ldquoArjuna God abides in the heart of all creatures
Causing them to revolve according to their Karma
By His illusive power seated as those beings are
In the vehicle of the bodyrdquo
Bhagvad Gita XVIII61
And again describing Himself as the truest friend of all
living beings Lord Krishna pronounces
ldquoI am the (disinterested) friend of all living beings and my devotee attains supreme peacerdquo
Bhagvad Gita V29
To turn to William Blake again he has an essential
belief in the closest intimacy of all living beings with
God who is the fountain-head of all life love and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 33
friendship This belief makes him affirm his faith in the
holiness of all life on earth Says he in his Annotations to Lavater
lsquoAll Life is Holyrsquo
Again he says ldquoIt is God in all that is our companion and friend for our God himself says lsquoyou are my brother my sister and my motherrsquo and Saint John said lsquowho so dwelleth in love dwelleth in God and God in himrsquo and such a one cannot judge of any but in loveGod is in lowest effects as well as in the highest causes for he is become a worm that he may nourish the weak For let it be remembered that creation is God descending according to the weakness of man for our Lord is the word of God and everything on earth is the word of God and in its essence is Godrdquo
In our own scriptures the all-pervasiveness of God (the
One) has been conceived not only in the cosmic world
but also in the world of men The very opening verse of
the Ishopanishad stresses the immanence of God in the
universe
ईशावाय इद सवM यािकNय जगया जगत
ईशोपनष I
lsquoUnderstand all this (universe) as inhabited by the Lord
Each moving thing in this moving worldrsquo
Or again says the Atharva Veda
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 34
य समायोऽवPणोयो वदHयः
यो दवोऽवPणोमानषः
lsquoGod is that in which things converge
He is that from which things diverge
He is our own land he is of foreign land
He is divine he is humanrsquo
Atharva Veda IV168
The immanence of God is the entire universe is also
underscored by Lord Krishna when he tells Arjuna
ldquoThere is nothing besides me Arjuna Like clusters of yarn-beads formed by knots all this (universe) is threaded on merdquo
Bhagvad Gita VII7
SYNOPTIC VISION
A firm belief in the all-pervasiveness of God in the
whole universe led him to perceive every object of
Nature as a window through which we may look with a
sense of awe and wonder into the beauty truth and all-
enveloping eternity which is but a reflection of God
Blake must have had palpable intimations of Eternity
when he wrote
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 35
lsquoTo see a world in a grain of sand
And a Heaven in a wild flower
Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand
And Eternity in an hourrsquo
Auguries of Innocence
Such a super-sensuous or transcendental perception of
Divinity in all creation and all creation in Divinity gave
Blake a subtle insight into the lsquoVisions of Eternityrsquo and
made him not only a seer but also lsquoan inhabitant of
other planes another domain of beingrsquo Commenting on
Blakersquos singular other-worldliness our own seer and
prophet Sri Aurobindo says ldquoThere is no other singer of the beyond who is like him or equal him in the strangeness supernatural lucidity power and directness of vision of the beyond and the rhythmic clarity and beauty of his singingrdquo
It is this contemplative knowledge of infinity in finite
and finite in infinity that has been regarded as the
distinguishing mark of the pure wisdom which finally
leads one to transcendental revelation which has been
so beautifully expressed in our own scriptures
सवभतषभावमययमीRत
अवभ8तसािवक
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 36
lsquoWhen one sees Eternity in things that pass away and Infinity in finite things then one has pure knowledgersquo
Bhagvad Gita XVIII20
The same truth has been emphasized again and again in
the Upanishads When man comes to know the real
truth about God nay when he succeeds in realizing the
truth about God how can he ever revile or adversely
criticize any form or aspect of God The Isha Upanishad
says
यत सवा13ण भतान आमयवानपHयत
सवभतष चामना ततो न वजगSसत
ईशोपनष VI
ldquoWhoever beholds all beings in God alone and God in all beings ie who regards all beings as his own self he no more looks down upon any creature for regarding all as his self whom will he hate and howrdquo
Lord Krishna stresses the same equanimity of vision
when he declares
ldquoThe Yogi who is united in identity with the all-pervading infinite consciousness and sees unity everywhere beholds the self present in all beings and all beings as assumed in the selfrdquo
Bhagvad Gita VI29
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 37
Again Lord Krishna declares
यो मा पHयत सव सवM च मय पHयत
तयाह न DणHया1म स च म न DणHयत
भगवगीता VI30
ldquoHe who sees me (the universal self) present in all beings and all beings existing within me never loses sight of me and I never lose sight of himrdquo
Bhagvad Gita VI30
FAITH IN THE LAW OF ETERNITY
Since God is infinite immanent and omnipresent soul
which is an integral and inalienable part of God is also
immortal The forms or objects of the world may change
but in reality they exist forever and are eternal Like
God soul is everlasting unborn undecaying and
undying Blake says
ldquoWhatever can be created can be annihilated
Forms can not
The oak is cut down by the axe the lamb falls by the knife
But their Form Eternal exists for everrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 38
The poet also believes that all sufferings of man if borne
meekly for a noble cause have their rich recompense
sooner or later for God being all-merciful would
certainly reward his suffering children He believes that
lsquoFor a tear is an intellectual thing
And a sigh is a sword of an angel king
And the bitter groan of a martyrrsquos woe
Is an arrow from the Almightyrsquos bowrsquo
Jerusalem
He believes that God Almighty holds out a solemn
promise of reward to sufferers for a lofty cause God
declares
lsquofear not Lo I am with thee always
Only believe in me that I have power to raise from deathrsquo
Jerusalem
MEANS OF LIBERATION
As the greatest and most inventive of Romantic
mythmakers Blake at first explores the contrary states
of human innocence and experience and then speaks of
lsquothe five gatesrsquo our mortal senses which bind us down to
the earth Not so much interested in the art of the
possible as in the visions of the beyond Blake
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 39
constructed a cosmic myth to show manrsquos infinite
potential and how he might attain to final liberation
from this sinful ephemeral world characterized by a
wheel of births and deaths He weaves his myths round
the fall and salvation of man the universal man and his
ultimate waking to eternal life In his poems lsquoMiltonrsquo and
lsquoJerusalemrsquo he regards Satan as the embodiment of
error selfhood and boundless pride and points out that
the means of liberation or freedom from the worldly
bondages lie in the annihilation of selfhood or ego and
the forgiveness of sins He exclaims lsquoI in my selfhood am that Satan I am that evil onersquo and resolves that he would
go down to self-annihilation In lsquoMiltonrsquo he puts the
following words into the mouth of Milton
lsquobut laws of Eternity
Are not such Know thou I come to self-annihilation
Such are the laws of Eternity that each shall mutually
Annihilate himself for others goodrsquo
Reiterating and stressing his poetic purpose or mission
of life Blake resolves
lsquoMine is to teach men to despise death and to go on
In fearless majesty of annihilating self
I come to discover before Heaven and Hell
the self righteousness in all its hypocritical turpitude
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 40
put off
In self-annihilation all that is not God alone
To put off self and all I have ever and everrsquo
Again in a sincere invocation to God Blake prays
lsquoO saviour pour upon me thy spirit of meekness and love
Annihilate the selfhood in me be thou all my life
Guide thou my hand which trembles exceedingly
Upon the rocks of agesrsquo
SPIRITUAL HUMANISM
Inspired by his implicit faith in Godrsquos fatherhood and
menrsquos brotherhood Blake preached the concept of
universal fraternity Considering the whole world as
one large family he maintained that all divisions and
fragmentations of humanity stemmed from manrsquos
ignorance of the eternal truth of one and only one
universal family The world being the home of mankind
all human beings are inextricably interwoven together
in the same warp and woof of life How beautifully has
this cosmopolitan philosophy of manrsquos eternal identity
with his fellow beings been enunciated in the following
memorable words
lsquoWe live as one man for contracting our infinite senses
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 41
We behold multitude or expanding
We behold as one Man all the universal family
and he is in us and we in him
Live in perfect harmony in Eden the land of life
Giving receiving and forgiving each otherrsquos trespassesrsquo
Elsewhere the poet says
lsquoThere is no other God than God
Who is the intellectual fountain of Humanity
I never made friends but by spiritual gifts
By severe contentions of friendship and the burning fire of thought
He who would see the divinity must see him in his children
So he who wishes to see a vision perfect whole
Must see it in its minute particulars organizedrsquo
Preaching universal brotherhood based on love
understanding and sacrifice he again exclaims (in the
words of Jesus)
lsquoWouldst thou live one who never died
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 42
For thee or ever die for one
Who had not died for thee
And if God died not for man and giveth not himself
Eternally for man
Man could not exist for man is love and God is love
Every kindness to another is a little death in the divine image
Nor can man exist but by brotherhoodrsquo
Jerusalem
Condemning man-made divisions of mankind into
various castes and creeds he says
lsquoAnd all must love the human form
In heathen Turk or Jew
Where mercy love and pity dwell
There God is dwelling toorsquo
The Divine Image
How truly are the poetrsquos ideas relevant even today when
the hot wind of doubt and distrust is blowing all over
the world (which has been broken up into fragments by
caste and creed clime and country) can be viewed in
the context of our age-old belief in the worship of God in
the universal form (Vishwaroop) and our religious and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 43
spiritual aspirations for ensuring the maximum good of
the world To serve humanity in a spirit of humility
impelled our people to look upon the world as one
great undivided family or nest (वHवनीड़म) and all men
as our brethren ndash (वसधव कटFबकम)
The ideal of universal brotherhood and selfless service
to humanity found spontaneous utterance in the
following moving words which embody the sublime
aim of a devout manrsquos life
न वह कामय रा0य न वगम ना पनभव
कामय दःख तSतानाम Dा13ण नामातनाशन
lsquoI do not desire earthly kingdom nor heaven nor do I want rebirth I want to reduce the sorrow of people who are sunk in sufferingrsquo
Today when the horizon of humanity is darkened by
national prejudices the need for spiritual humanism
synoptic vision and universal brotherhood is being
increasingly felt by one and all Here it is worthwhile to
turn our attention to great men whose thoughts
transcend myriad artificial barriers and teach us the
ideal of dedication to the common weal
Since truth transcends all religious dogmas and
disinterested service to mankind is a form of true
worship to God our great men have always prayed
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 44
सव भवत स13खनः सव सत नरामयाः
सव भWा13ण पHयत मा किHचX दःख भाYभवत
lsquoMay all be happy may all living beings be free from diseases may we perceive goodness in all and may none be struck with misfortunersquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 45
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
(7 April 1770 ndash 23 April 1850)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 46
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
English Poet
Orphaned at age 13 Wordsworth attended Cambridge
University but he remained rootless and virtually
penniless until 1795 when a legacy made possible a
reunion with his sister Dorothy Wordsworth He
became friends with Samuel Taylor Coleridge with
whom he wrote Lyrical Ballads (1798) the collection
often considered to have launched the English Romantic
movement Wordsworths contributions include
Tintern Abbey and many lyrics controversial for their
common everyday language About 1798 he began
writing The Prelude (1850) the epic autobiographical
poem that would absorb him intermittently for the next
40 years His second verse collection Poems in Two Volumes (1807) includes many of the rest of his finest
works including Ode Intimations of Immortality His
poetry is perhaps most original in its vision of the
organic relation between man and the natural world a
vision that culminated in the sweeping metaphor of
nature as emblematic of the mind of God The most
memorable poems of his middle and late years were
often cast in elegaic mode few match the best of his
earlier works By the time he became widely
appreciated by the critics and the public his poetry had
lost much of its force and his radical politics had yielded
to conservatism In 1843 he became Englands poet
laureate He is regarded as the central figure in the
initiation of English Romanticism
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 47
CHAPTER TWO
VEDANTA IN WORDSWORTHrsquoS POETRY
In many of his famous poems among which Ode on Intimations of immortality and Lines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey occupy pride of place
William Wordsworth one of the greatest seer-poets of
English literature presents ideas which bear striking
similarity to the rich philosophical thought that found
unimpeded flow in our Vedantic literature
In fact there are so many echoes of Vedanta in the
poetry of Wordsworth that one is apt to conclude that
the poetrsquos lsquophilosophic mindrsquo must have led him to drink
deep at the unfailing springs of Upanishadic Helicon
A poet of nature Wordsworth was essentially lsquoa seer of spiritual realities a seer of the calm spirit in naturersquo and
his poetry at its best is a fine harmony of his spiritual
insight ethical sense and profundity of thought He is a
curious amalgam of the seer the poet and the reflective
moralist who dwells philosophically and even
prophetically on Nature Man and Cosmic Soul
The epithets lsquobest philosopherrsquo lsquomighty prophetrsquo and
lsquoseer blestrsquo which Wordsworth uses for the new-born
innocent child in his famous Ode may be well applied to
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 48
the poet himself for ldquovoyaging in strange seas of
thought alonerdquo Wordsworth had found lsquofull many a gem
of purest ray serenersquo which still shed undiminished
luster on the entire fabric of English poetry
A careful study of the Ode on Intimations of immortality Lines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey Ruth Laodamia To Cuckoo and other poems reveals that Wordsworthrsquos sustained
loftiness of thought had taken him to such heights that
on him (to quote his own words)
lsquo those truths do rest which we are toiling all our lives to findrsquo
What indeed are those truths Those are the elemental
truths of life which were keenly perceived realized and
expressed by the seers and savants of the East and
particularly of our Vedantic times A careful study of
Vedanta which is the aphoristic summary of the co-
ordinated Upanishads the Brahmasutras and the
Bhagvad Gita and is in fact the culmination of Indian
religion and Philosophical thought reveals that serious
scholars of the West drew freely upon it Wordsworthrsquos
poetry bears ample testimony to this fact because
numerous echoes of Vedanta can be easily heard in his
poetry
To cite a few comparative examples the Upanishads
assert in unambiguous terms that the whole universe of
names and forms the world of being and becoming
springs from Brahman (Supreme Godhead or Absolute
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 49
Cosmic Soul) ndash the eternal existence consciousness and
bliss Since the universe is the creation and
manifestation of Brahman it is also pervaded by Him
Naturally therefore only Brahman exists all else is non-
existent or illusory The Chhandogya Upanishad
declares lsquoBrahman is verily the Allrsquo God is the subtle
essence underlying phenomenal existence the whole
nature which is Godrsquos handiwork as well as Godrsquos
garment and is filled and inspired by God who is its
inner controller and soul
The immanence of God has been corroborated by
Brihadaranyak Upanishad in two passages the first
being in the form of an answer given by Yagnavalyak to
Uddalak Aruni
lsquoHe is immanent in fire in the intermundia in air in the heavens in the Sun in the quarters in the Moon in the stars in space in darkness in light in all beings in Prana in all things and within all things whom these things do not know whose body these things are who controls all these things from within He is thy soul the inner controller the immortal He is the unseen seer the unheard hearer the unthought thinker the ununderstood understander other than Him there is no seer other than Him there is no hearer other than Him there is no thinker other than Him there is no understander everything besides Him is naughtrsquo
Brihadaranyak Upanishad II7
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 50
In another passage Brihadaranyak Upanishad tells us
that God is the All ndash ldquoboth the formed and the formless the mortal and the immortal the stationary and the moving the this and thatHe is the verity of verities the soul of souls and He is the supreme verityrdquo
Brihadaranyak Upanishad IIV15
Wordsworth like these unique revelatory utterances of
the Upanishads codifies this truth in mystical manner in
Lines Composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey when he regards the Cosmic Soul as supreme power or
all-pervading presence
lsquoWhose dwelling is the light of setting Suns
And the round ocean and the living air
And the blue sky and in the mind of man
A motion and a spirit that impels
All thinking things all objects o all thought
And rolls through all thingsrsquo
Since God is All and everything else is Naught the world
is not real it is an appearance It is not the permanent
all-abiding Absolute Reality but a fleeting show and
ephemeral entity having seemingly phenomenal reality
In other words the world is lsquoshadow not substancersquo ndash it
is just a net-work of Maya
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 51
This Vedantic doctrine finds utterance not only in
Wordsworthrsquos poems like To the Cuckoo in which he
calls the earth ldquoan unsubstantial fairy placerdquo but he
seems to have actually experienced this illusory nature
of the world in states of mystic trance that often visited
him since his boyhood
In the introduction to his Ode on Intimations of Immortality he records such an experience in clear
terms
ldquoI was unable to think of external things as having external existence and I communed with all that I saw as something not apart from but inherent in my own immaterial nature Many a times while going to school have I grasped at a wall or tree to recall myself from the abyss of idealism to the realityrdquo
Such an ecstatic state of realizing eternal truths is
referred to in Lines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey as
lsquoThat blessed mod
In which the burden of the mystery
Of all this unintelligible world
Is lightenedrsquo
And finally to quote from the same poem
lsquoWe are laid asleep
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 52
In body and become a living soul
While with an eye made quiet by the power
Of harmony and the deep power of joy
We see into the life of thingsrsquo
One of the basic postulates of our Upanishadic
philosophy has been the idea of transmigration of soul
or faith in the cycle of births deaths and rebirths The
doctrine of transmigration has been explicitly advanced
in the Upanishads and particularly in the
Kathopanishad and Brihadaranyak Upanishad
In the Kathopanishad when the father of Nachiketas
told him that he had made him over to the god of Death
Nachiketas replied that it was no uncommon fate that
was befalling him
ldquoI indeed go at the head of many to the other world but I also go in the midst of many What is the god of Death going to do to me Look at our predecessors (who have already gone) look also at those who have succeeded them Man ripens like corn and like corn he is born againrdquo
Kathopanishad IV6
The Brihadaranyak Upanishad states the same truth
ldquoAnd as a caterpillar after reaching the end of a blade of grass finds another place of support and then draws itself towards it and as a goldsmith after taking a piece
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 53
of gold gives it another newer and more beautiful shape similarly does this Self after having thrown off this body and dispelled ignorance take on another newer and more beautiful form whether it be of one of the man or demi-god or god or of Prajapati or Brahman or of any other beingsrdquo
Brihadaranyak Upanishad IVIII5
The same truth appears in the Bhagvad Gita when Lord
Krishna says to the mentally agitated Arjuna
ldquoAs a man discarding worn-out clothes takes other new ones likewise the embodied soul casting off worn-out bodies enters into others which are newrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II22
And further Lord Krishna says to Arjuna
ldquoFor in that case the death of him who is born is certain and the rebirth of him who is dead is inevitablerdquo
Bhagvad Gita II27
Wordsworth in his famous Ode on Intimations of Immortality confirms his faith in the transmigration of
soul by saying in unmistakable terms
lsquoOur birth is but a sleep and a forgetting
The soul that rises with us our lifersquos star
Hath had elsewhere its setting
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 54
And cometh from afar
Not in entire forgetfulness
And not in utter nakedness
But trailing clouds of glory do we come
From God who is our homersquo
Again when Wordsworth laments the loss of pure
innocence immeasurable bliss and ecstatic vision of
early childhood in the great Ode and exclaims in
memorable words
lsquoWhither is fled the visionary gleam
Where is it now the glory and the dreamrsquo
He attributes the loss to the worldly intellectuality and
attachments as they grow upon man As childhood
grows into youth and youth into manhood the lsquovision splendidrsquo fades the first clear intimations of immortality
are dimmed leaving behind an unillumined waste of
mere thought and moralizing
lsquoAt length the Man perceives it die away
And fade into the light of common dayrsquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
The world of materialism or attachment tames him so
much so that man lsquothe little actorrsquo thinks
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 55
lsquoAs if his whole vocation
Were endless imitationrsquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
Whatever may be the crux of his philosophy of
childhood this belief of the poet can be safely traced
back to the comprehensive doctrine of the Maya in the
Upanishads and the Bhagvad Gita The Upanishads
tell us that the world is a delusion an appearance not
reality The Taittiriya Upanishad says ldquoAll beings spring from the Supreme Being are sustained by Him and return to the same Absolute at the time of dissolution Our life on earth is therefore a sojournrdquo The Isha Upanishad tells us that ldquothe truth is veiled in this universe by a vessel of gold and it invokes the grace of God to lift up the golden lid and allow the truth to be seenrdquo
It follows that our senses cloud our vision and lead us
farther and farther away from our spiritual moorings as
we come of age Senses dupe us and turn us into
worldlings Lord Krishna says to Arjuna in the Bhagvad Gita ldquoAs the wind carries away the barge upon the waters even so of the wandering senses the one to which the mind is joined takes away his discriminationrdquo
Thus the eternal and boundless Supreme Soul is as it
were limited by the sense organs and the body The
Universal Soul shackled by the body becomes the
individual soul (Paramatma becomes Jivatma) Because
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 56
of the presence of the Soul the spark of the Divine the
senses or sense-objects or worldly attractions fail to
dupe man fully from his divine mission This
metaphysical conviction finds expression in
Wordsworthrsquos Ode He says that though
lsquoShades of the prison-house begin to close
Upon the growing boy
But he beholds the light and whence it flows
He sees it in his joyrsquo
However farther man may go away from Nature ndash the manifestation of God and the indwelling Supreme Soul which resides in his own individual soul he can not
lsquoForget the glories he hath known
And that imperial palace whence he camersquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
Since bliss (Anand) is an inevitable attribute of God and
manrsquos soul being a fragment of Supreme Soul it
experiences the presence of God in moments of
Supreme Joy
Of the innumerable expressions in the Vedantic
literature of the joy of life of joy as the all entwining
principle of life and of creative principle of life and life
too the following passage from the Taittiriya Upanishad is very pertinent here
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 57
ldquoJoy is the Brahman from joy are born all living things by joy they are nourished towards joy they move and in joy they are absorbedrdquo Joy as the foundation of life
emanates from the Upanishad philosophy
Wordsworth seems to hold identical belief when he
craves for joy and laments its loss
lsquoO Joy that in our embers
Is something that doth live
That nature yet remembers
What was so fugitiversquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
The same idea finds expression in Lines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey where Wordsworth
declares it as Naturersquos privilege lsquoto lead (us) from joy to joyrsquo
And lastly the classicus locus of the Upanishadic
philosophy is to be found in the idea of immortality of
soul In the Chhandogya and Mundak Upanishads and
above all in the Kathopanishad we find numerous
references to the immortality of the soul We are told in
a passage of Kathopanishad lsquothat while we are dwelling in this body on earth we can visualize that Atman (Soul) as in a mirror that is contrariwise left being to the right and right being to the leftrsquo In the Bhagvad Gita also
Lord Krishna tells Arjuna about the immortality of Soul
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 58
ldquoThis soul is never born nor dies it exists on coming into being for it is unborn eternal everlasting and primeval even though the body is slain the soul is notrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II20
He further says
ldquoFor this soul is incapable of being cut it is proof against fire impervious to water and undriable as well This soul is eternal omnipresent immovable constant and everlastingrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II24
Wordsworth seems to have been fully convinced of this
philosophia perennis of the Vedanta when he eulogizes
immortality by addressing the child in his Ode in the
following words
lsquoThou over whom thy immortality
Broods like the day
A Master over a slave
A presence which is not to be put byrsquo
The poet in speaking of the lsquotruths that wake to perish neverrsquo seems to be reminiscent of the Upanishadic
concept that freed from the trammels of the body the
individual soul loses itself in the All-Soul when he
declares in the rapture
lsquoOur souls have sight of that immortal sea
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 59
Which brought us hither
Can in a moment travel thitherrsquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
Tracing the expression and confirmation of many other
tenets of Vedanta in the poetry of William Wordsworth
forms an interesting literary venture and instances of
close affinity between the Vedantic doctrines and
Wordsworthrsquos ideas may be multiplied Such a
comparative study proves that eternal truths transcend
the barriers of clime or country time or space and shine
through all ages and in all lands We should draw moral
sustenance from them and live a fuller freer life
Even today the wise all over the world maintain a
remarkable identity of views and their thoughts foster
international understanding
ldquoFrom hand to hand the greeting flows
From eye to eye the signals run
From heart to heart the bright hope glows
The seekers of light are onerdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 60
ST COLERIDGE
(21 October 1772 ndash 25 July 1834)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 61
ST COLERIDGE
English Poet Critic and Philosopher
Coleridge studied at the University of Cambridge where
he became closely associated with Robert Southey In
his poetry he perfected a sensuous lyricism that was
echoed by many later poets Lyrical Ballads (1798 with
William Wordsworth) containing the famous Rime of
the Ancient Mariner and Frost at Midnight heralded
the beginning of English Romanticism Other poems in
the ldquofantasticalrdquo style of the Mariner include the
unfinished Christabel and the celebrated Pleasure
Dome of Kubla Khan While in a bad marriage and
addicted to opium he produced Dejection An Ode
(1802) in which he laments the loss of his power to
produce poetry Later partly restored by his revived
Anglican faith he wrote Biographia Literaria 2 vol
(1817) the most significant work of general literary
criticism of the Romantic period Imaginative and
complex with a unique intellect Coleridge led a restless
life full of turmoil and unfulfilled possibilities
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 62
CHAPTER THREE
COLERIDGErsquoS SPIRITUAL QUEST AND INDIAN THOUGHT
INTRODUCTION
Coleridge was by all accounts a genius par excellence
whose versatility flowed albeit impeded in diverse
channels of creativity such as metaphysics poetry
theology and literary criticism Of all the Romantic poets
he possessed the most fertile and powerful imagination
which earned for him a special place in English poetry
and philosophical thought In the words of William
Hazlitt lsquohe had angelic wings and fed on mannarsquo He had
a lsquoseminal mindrsquo which said William Wordsworth
lsquothrew out a series of grand central truthsrsquo We find in
him the poet the philosopher and the theologian rolled
in one Charles Lamb called him lsquoLogician Metaphysician Bardrsquo whose poetry and writings are
tinged with a magical and ethereal quality His thought
made a permanent landmark on the succeeding
generations of English men of letters for he explored the
mysterious working of human mind
His life presents a saga of sharp contrast between
reality and dream blissful confidence and broken
hopes the warmth of human ties and the solitude of
haunted soul He probed human thought and dilemma
with a rare prophetic insight A prodigious thinker and
sincere seeker of truth he once remarked ldquoI would compare the Human Soul to a shiprsquos crew cast on an
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 63
Unknown Islandrdquo His particular fascination for the
unknown drew him instinctively to the German
transcendental or idealistic school of philosophy
represented by Berkeley Kant Schelling and Fichte
Fired by a peculiar mystic idealism he tried to interpret
the lsquoInterruptionrsquo of the spiritual world and beheld the
unseen with an uncommon eye which looked into the
void and found it peopled with lsquopresencesrsquo To him the
universe was lsquoebullient with creative deityrsquo and was
pervaded by lsquoan organizing surgersquo of vital energies
which emanate directly from God He was indeed an
inspired idealist who laid mystical insistence upon the
immanence and transcendence of God
Endowed with a rare penetrating mind Coleridge
ransacked works of comparative religions and
mythology and arrived at the conclusion that all
religious faiths and mythical traditions agree on the
unity of God and immortality of Soul His constant
intellectual search for truth led him to visionary
interests and universal life consciousness expressed
through the phenomena of human agencies Throughout
his intellectual career he remained a visionary and
philosophical mystic who valued a discreet and proper
exercise of the intellect Since his most serious concern
had been philosophy as a continuous trial for self-
education he wrote ldquodoubts rushed in broke upon me from the fountains of the great deep and fell from the windows of heavenrdquo For him lsquoreligionrsquo as both the
cornerstone and keystone of morality must have a
moral origin and a great poet should be lsquoa profound Metaphysician seeking for truth beauty and salvationrsquo In
one of those radiant moments when the poet the
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 64
metaphysician and the theologian of hope are one he
throws light on the process how truth works out in life
ldquoTruth considered in itself and in the effects natural to it may be conceived as a gentle spring or water source warm from the genial earth and breathing up into the snow drift that is piled over and around its outlet It turns the obstacle into its own form and character and as it makes its way increases its streamand arrested in its courseit suffers delay not loss and waits only to awaken and again roll onwardsrdquo
His description of a mystic as one who wanders into an
oasis or garden lsquoat leisure in its maze of Beauty and Sweetness and thirds (sic) his way through the odorous and flowering Thickets into open Spots of Greeneryrsquo (Aids to Reflection) is reminiscent of his own mysticism and
refers to the lsquoenfolding sunny spots of greeneryrsquo in his
famous poem Kubla Khan
Profoundly impressed by the German Idealist Schelling
whose idealistic school of thought dwelt on speculation
concerning the lsquoAbsolutersquo Coleridge viewed lsquomythrsquo as
primordial expression of elemental truths including the
Divine transcendence Inspired by his Biblical studies he
regarded self-consciousness as lying at the centre of his
philosophical and theological thought In Lay Sermons
he says ldquoSelf which then only is when for itself it hath ceased to be Even so doth Religion finitely expresses the unity of the Infinite Spirit by being a total act of the Soulrdquo
For him the lsquoinner lightrsquo is identical with the indwelling
glorious God and life is but lsquoa vision shadowy of Truthrsquo Attributing the pageant of life and the beauty and
splendor of the world to the immanence of Cosmic Soul
(God) he exclaims
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 65
ldquoAh From the soul itself must issue forth
A light a glory a fair luminous cloud
Enveloping the earthrdquo
Dejection An Ode
And again he says ldquoNature is the art of GodThe true system of natural philosophy places the sole reality of things in an Absolute which is at once causa sui effectus in the absolute identity of subject and object which it calls NatureIn this sense lsquowe see all things in Godrsquo is a strict philosophical truthrdquo
Coleridge firmly believed in the essential unity of God as
Absolute which is the creative foundation of the finite
universe and which distinguishes God from creation
He in the spirit of Vedanta stresses the immanence of
God in all and all in God in his famous poem Frost at Midnight Addressing his son he says
ldquoso shalt thou see and hear
The lovely shapes and sound intelligible
Of that eternal language which thy God
Utters who from eternity doth teach
Himself in all and all things in Himselfrdquo
In order to learn this lsquolanguagersquo Coleridge himself
became a lsquovisionaryrsquo lsquoprophetrsquo or lsquoseerrsquo The idea of
Himself (God) in all and all (creation) in Himself or the
concept that there is God in all things and all things are
things are closely interlinked with God bears a striking
resemblance to our age-old Vedic thought In
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 66
consonance with Indian thought Coleridge underscores
the identity of God (Brahman) with the individual soul
(Jivatma) and regards the universe as the reflection or
manifestation of God The seer he says is one who sees
God the creator in all creation and all creation as the
embodiment of God This according to him is the lesson
that God in His eternal language lsquouttersrsquo and doth teach
from eternity
The inherent oneness and sole identity of Brahman
(God) with the universe is a basic postulate of our
Vedanta and as such Coleridgersquos emphasis on the lsquoUnity of infinite Spiritrsquo bears a close identity with the Indian
philosophy The Oneness of God and the universe has
time and again been stressed in our Vedas and other
scriptures It would be pertinent to cite a few instances
here While the Chhandogya Upanishad describes
Brahman as lsquoOne only without a secondrsquo other
Upanishadic texts contain identical statements such as
lsquoHe is Onersquo and lsquoOne Lordrsquo The opening line of
Ishopanishad declares Godrsquos oneness and His universal
presence in unequivocal terms
ldquoUnderstand all this universe as inhabited by Lord
Each moving thing in this moving worldrdquo
Ishopanishad I
And again the same Upanishad says
ldquoThe wise man who perceives all beings as not distinct from his own self at all and his own Self as the self of every being ndash he does not by virtue of that perception hate any onerdquo
Ishopanishad VI
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 67
The same truth has been expressed in the Bhagvad Gita wherein Lord Krishna tells Arjuna
ldquoHe who sees Me (the Universal Self) present in all beings and all beings existing within Me never loses sight of Me and I never lose sight of himrdquo
Bhagvad Gita VI30
Or again
ldquoHe alone truly sees who sees the Supreme Lord as imperishable and abiding equally in all perishable beings both animate and inanimaterdquo
Bhagvad Gita XIII26
And Lord Krishna says again
ldquoThere is nothing else besides Me O Arjuna
Like clusters of yarn-beads formed by knots on a thread
All this (Universe) threaded on Me (God)
As are pearls on stringsrdquo
Bhagvad Gita VII7
THE DOCTRINE OF KARMA (CAUSE amp EFFECT)
Coleridge seems to subscribe sincerely to the Indian
doctrine of Karma which is based on the law of
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 68
Causation or cause and effect In other words Karmavad
stresses poetic justice or law of life ie virtue is
rewarded and vice is punished Since one must reap the
fruits of his good and bad deeds in life it is axiomatic
truth that lsquoas one sows so shall he reaprsquo In Sanskrit
there is a verse which says ldquoOne must bear the consequences of his good and bad deedsrdquo The echoes of
this doctrine could be distinctly heard in his poetry and
particularly in his greatest poem Rime of Ancient Mariner as also Dejection An Ode where he affirms
ldquoO Lady We receive but what we give
And in our life alone doth Nature liverdquo
So strong was his belief in the doctrine of Karma that in
a letter dated 14th October 1797 to his friend Thirlwell
he tells him how fatalistic his philosophy of life is
ldquoand at other times I adopt the Brahman
creed and say ndash lsquoit is better to sit than to stand it is better to lie than to sit it is better to sleep than wake but death is the best of allrsquordquo
His Ancient Mariner serves as an exhaustive
exposition of the law of Nemesis which works surely
but rather imperceptively in human life The poem is a
myth about a dark and troubling crisis in the human
soul It is actually a tale of crime which is due to
perversity of human will Crime is against Nature
Humanity and God He touches equally on guilt and
remorse suffering and relief hate and forgiveness and
grief and joy The marinerrsquos action shows the essential
frivolity of crimes against humanity and the ordered
system of the world and he deserves punishment for his
guilt Spirits are transformed into the powers who
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 69
watch over the good and evil actions of men and requite
them with appropriate rewards and punishments Since
the mariner has committed a hideous act of wantonly
and recklessly killing the albatross which was hailed in
Godrsquos name as if it had been a Christian soul he must
bear the punishment of life-in-death The killing of the
bird marks the breaking of bond between Man and
Nature and consequently the mariner becomes
spiritually dead When he blesses the water-snakes
even unawares it is a psychic rebirth ndash a rebirth that
must happen to all men
The mariner will never be the man that he once was He
has his special past and his special doom His sense of
guilt will end only with his death The Ancient Mariner
is a myth of a guilty soul and marks the passage from
crime through punishment and possible redemption in
the world So the poem is an allegory of redemption and
regeneration It is indeed a vivid representation or
living symbolization of universal psychic experience
The abiding fascination of the poem is that it is a
fragment of a psychic life It does not state a result it
symbolizes a process
Coleridge adds a moral ndash that the mariner is ndash to teach
by his example love and reverence to all things that God
made and loveth He advocates a sound moral
philosophy of life which extends human sympathy and
love to the animal world He affirms
ldquoHe prayeth well who loveth well
Both man and bird and beast
He prayeth best who loveth best
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 70
All things both great and small
For the dear God who loveth us
He made and loveth allrdquo
Rime of Ancient Mariner
PHILOSOPHICAL MYSTICISM AND lsquoTHE VISION OF GODrsquo
Coleridgersquos longing for the lsquounnamable somethingrsquo and
his abiding interest in conveying something of the
enigmatic perception of Godhead as a religious
experience carved for him a special place in the history
of ideas as a Christian poet and philosopher In a
predominantly mythological age he took serious
interest in the Biblical studies and drew upon the
central Christian image of Paradise as a walled garden
and the vision of God as a symbolizing that
transcendent numinous reality which the soul
inchoately and consciously seeks and strives for The
medieval image of the walled garden (paradise) as the
heavenly city (locus of God) is a symbol of divine
transcendence of that which is lsquobeyond beingrsquo This rich
image (of the walled garden) as an eminently
appropriate image of Godrsquos transcendence was used as
such by Church Fathers and also by the 15th century
Christian Platonist Nicholas of Cusa whose book The Vision of God is a paradigm of speculative mysticism
which informs Coleridgersquos metaphysics and much of his
poetry Taking inspiration from Nicholas of Cusarsquos book
The Vision of God Coleridge found it in close affinity to
his own genuinely philosophical mysticism
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 71
Coleridgersquos interest in the Vision of God is in a purely
visionary mystical tradition and his most visionary
poem Kubla Khan bears ample testimony to his
insistence upon life as lsquoa vision shadowy of Truthrsquo His
conviction in the lsquoImago Deirsquo (vision of God) is an
obvious link with the hoary mystical tradition which lay
at the heart of his philosophical and mystical thought
He maintains that the mind of man is a bridge to the
vision of God but by no means its fulfillment He says
ldquoThe vision and faculty divine is the participation of humanity in the Divinerdquo He however further maintains
throughout his intellectual career the conviction in the
reflection or bending back of the soul from the sensual
to the intelligible realm For him Christianity is an lsquoawful recalling of the drowsed soul from dreams and phantom world of sensuality to actual Realityrsquo
On the idea of reawakening he says
ldquoThe moment when the Soul begins to be sufficiently self-conscious to ask concerning itself and its relations is the first moment of its intellectual arrival into the world Its being ndash enigmatic as it must seem ndash is posterior to its existencerdquo
Collected Notes
In a recent study of Coleridge Prof Douglas Headley of
Cambridge University declares ldquoHe is best described as an essentially speculative and mystical philosopher-theologian His was a theology inspired by those Church Fathers who emphasize the vision of God as an intellectual contemplation (speculari) of the transcendent Absolute the prius of all beingrdquo Since the
mystic tradition follows a supersensuous perception
the vision of God is fundamentally lsquoVisio-intuitivarsquo ndash
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 72
intuitive or intellectual vision Coleridge expresses such
a state of mind when he says
ldquoMy mind feels as if it ached to behold and know something great something One and Indivisible and it is only in the faith of this that rocks or waterfalls mountains or caverns give me the sense of sublimity or majesty But in this faith all things counterfeit Infinityrdquo
Since the sublime enlarges and inspires the Soul to
aspire for the Divine it impresses him with the
fundamental Oneness of God and a universal vision
which he hints at in his Religious Musings as under
ldquoThere is One mind One omnipresent mind
His most holy name is Love
Truth of subliming import
lsquoTis sublime in man
Our noontide majesty to know ourselves
Parts and portions of one wondrous wholerdquo
These passages recall to our mind the famous mantra
(verse) of the Yajurveda where the mystic realization
or the direct experience of the Supreme by a Vedic sage
has been beautifully described in terms of his personal
knowledge of the Divine He says
ldquoI have known this sun-coloured Mighty Being
Refulgent as the sun beyond darkness
By knowing Him alone one transcends death
There is no other way to gordquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 73
Yajurveda XXXI18
ldquoI have realized it I have known itrdquo not that I just
believe in it and all else can also realize it This is not the
expression of an opinion but the statement of an
experience Commenting on this verse Sri Aurobindo
says
ldquoThis is one of the grandest utterances in the worldrsquos spiritual literature for it marks the emanation of this Being from across the darkness into our world so that something of the sun colour may come into our dull heads and dim heartsrdquo
Coleridge seems to be in complete agreement with our
own Indian mysticism which owes its origin to the
Vedas wherein the knowledge of the Divine or the
Ultimate Reality (Brahman) has been regarded not as a
process of philosophical thought but as a direct
experience in the depth of the human soul For him the
divine vision is possible in that spiritual meditation
transformation of intellectual rapture in which all
discursive thought is fully sublimated According to him
the lsquovisio intuitivarsquo is the culmination of all knowledge ndash
sensus-ratio-intellectus and is in conjunction with the
concept of Imago Dei In order to see that which not an
object is ie God the human mind must put aside its own
discursive differentiating reflection ndash spiritus altissimus rationis ndash which guards the walls of the garden of
paradise lsquobeyondrsquo which dwells God The highest
transformation or sublimation of conscience can ensure
an intuitive vision of God and in accordance with the
maxim ndash Simile Simili ndash the mind then becomes like its
object by divesting itself of difference in order to
experience the Absolute Reality Says Coleridge
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 74
ldquoAn Immense Being does strongly fill the soul and Omnipotency Omnisciency and Infinite Goodness do enlarge and dilate the Spirit while it fixtly looks upon them They raise strong passions of Love and Admiration which melt our Nature and transform it into the mould and imagery that which we can contemplaterdquo
Notebooks
Mysticism is thus the subtle path of spiritual realization
of That Reality or Divine Presence which has been
described in our Vedic texts as (lying hidden in a cave shrouded in secrecy) God is one One beyond all
diversities In Him all contradictions and conflicts meet
and dissolve through the spiritual transformation of the
lsquoseerrsquo or lsquomysticrsquo whose soul rises above the bewildering
trammels and distortions of life and seeks unity with all
in the unity with One To such an enlightened seer life
becomes an unceasing adventure from unreality to
reality from ephemerality to eternity from the human
to the Divine One who realizes the Divine as the One
(without parallel) loving Lord finds the whole universe
united in Him Such a significantly mystical experience
finds a memorable expression in the following verse of
the Yajurveda where the sage named Vena beholds
such a divine vision
ldquoThe loving sage (Vena) beholds that Mysterious Existence
Wherein the universe comes to have One home (nest)
Therein unites and therefore issues the whole
The Lord is the warp and woof in the Created beingsrdquo
Yajurveda XXXII8
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 75
A careful analysis of the above-quoted passage reveals
all the main elements of mysticism viz
(i) Divinity is a subject of personal spiritual
experience
(ii) The ultimate conception of Divinity is a
mystery symbolically expressed as
गहानCहतम
(iii) The abstract conception of the Divine as an
Essence or Existence is symbolized by a
neuter singular तत and
(iv) The whole universe is united in love as birds
in a nest एकनीड़ or men in a home वसधव कटFबक
To sum up wise men the world over hold almost
identical views on vital matters of human life such as
the mystery of existence soul and oversoul (God) Truth
is verily One as God is one but the pathways to reach it
are very many The ancient Rig Veda proclaims एक सद वDा बहधा वदित ndash ldquoTruth is one sages call it by various namesrdquo In our own times Swami Ram Krishna
Paramhansa said यतोमत तथोपथ ndash as many religions
so many pathways And what the Spanish litteacuterateur
and thinker states as lsquouniversal truthrsquo is equally
applicable to the philosophy and poetry of Coleridge
ldquoA deep faith in life cannot but be spiritual even if only partially spiritualThe path of Truth may not be a path of parallel lines but a path that follows one circle by going to the right and climbing the circle or by going to the left and climbing the circle we are bound to meet at the top although we started in apparently
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 76
contrary directions This is bound to be in the end because Truth is onerdquo
In Charles Lambrsquos words Coleridge lsquohad been on the confines of the next world he had a hunger for Eternityrsquo The truth of this statement is abundantly
borne out by Coleridgersquos sincere effort for the
reconciliation of the ration with transcendental belief
He closes his Biographia Literaria which symbolizes
his spiritual voyage with the following words
ldquoIt is night sacred night The upraised eyes views suns of other worlds only to preserve the soul steady and collected in its pure act of inward adoration to the great I Am and to the filial word that re-affirmeth from eternity to eternity whose choral is the universerdquo
As a true metaphysician Coleridgersquos whole being
pulsated with a passionate and unceasing search for
truth Here indeed was a spiritual aspirant and seeker
who in his own words had lsquotraced the fount whence streams of nectar flowrsquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 77
LORD BYRON
(22 January 1788 ndash 19 April 1824)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 78
LORD BYRON
British Romantic Poet and Satirist
Born with a clubfoot and extremely sensitive about it
he was 10 when he unexpectedly inherited his title and
estates Educated at Cambridge he gained recognition
with English Bards and Scotch Reviewers (1809) a satire
responding to a critical review of his first published
volume Hours of Idleness (1807) At 21 he embarked on
a European grand tour Childe Harolds Pilgrimage
(1812ndash18) a poetic travelogue expressing melancholy
and disillusionment brought him fame while his
complex personality dashing good looks and many
scandalous love affairs with women and with boys
captured the imagination of Europe Settling near
Geneva he wrote the verse tale The Prisoner of Chillon
(1816) a hymn to liberty and an indictment of tyranny
and Manfred (1817) a poetic drama whose hero
reflected Byrons own guilt and frustration His greatest
poem Don Juan (1819ndash24) is an unfinished epic
picaresque satire in ottava rima Among his numerous
other works are verse tales and poetic dramas He died
of fever in Greece while aiding the struggle for
independence making him a Greek national hero
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 79
CHAPTER FOUR
BYRON A BLEND OF CLAY AND SPARK
INTRODUCTION
Byron whom Goethe regarded as lsquothe greatest genius of the centuryrsquo and whom Carlyle considered as the noblest
spirit in Europe was one of the most remarkable men
during the 19th Century which was characterized by
liberal optimism He was unquestionably a potent and
force and cause of change in the intellectual outlook and
socio-political structure of his time His colourful figure
his charismatic personality and satiric poetry captured
the imagination of the whole continent As the most
influential English poet he stands out as an important
figure in the history of ideas Representative of a new
age he was the supreme voice which the European
poets recognized for ldquohe put into poetry something that belonged to many men in his time and he was the pioneer of a new outlook and a new art He set his mark on a whole generation and his fame rang from one end of Europe to anotherrdquo
Renowned as the ldquogloomy egoistrdquo he was a sinister yet
great influence in the Romantic Movement His deepest
romantic melancholy his satiric realism and his
aspiration for political realism earned for him such a
wide acclaim that his name became a symbol for all the
great events of his day Commenting on his pervasive
influence Calvert says ndash ldquoIt is impossible not to take Byron seriously and it is disastrous to take him literallyrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 80
A REBEL EXTRAORDINAIRE
Byron was a born rebel Essentially a child of
Revolution his poetry breathes a unique spirit of
revolutionary idealism ldquoI was born for oppositionrdquo he
once remarked and added ldquobeing of no party I shall offend all partiesrdquo Describing him as an aristocratic
rebel Bertrand Russell said
ldquoThe aristocratic rebel of whom Byron was in his day the exemplar is a very different typesuch rebels have philosophy which requires some greater change than their own personal success In their conscious thought there is criticism of the government of the world which takes the form of Titanic Cosmic self-assertion or those who retain some superstition of Satanism Both are to be found in Byron The aristocratic philosophy of rebellionhas inspired a long series of revolutionary movements from the fall of Napoleon to Hitlerrsquos coup in 1933it has inspired a corresponding manner of thought and feeling among intellectuals and artistsrdquo
Byron felt the wild storm of nations akin to the storm
within his own heart and the ruin but the picture of his
own life In his unqualified individualism he takes up an
attitude of hostility towards society Even God appears
to him mirrored in the stormy face of the angry ocean
ldquoThou glorious mirror
Of the Image of Eternityrdquo
He wished to stir the oppressed to revolt and get rid of
tyrants
ldquoFor I will teach if possible the stones
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 81
To rise against earthrsquos tyranny Never let it
Be said that we will truckle into thrones
By ye ndash our childrenrsquos children I think how we
Showed that things were before the world was freerdquo
Don Juan VIIICXXXV4-8
ldquoI have simplified my policiesrdquo wrote he ldquointo a detestation of all existing governmentsrdquo His was the
most dreaded voice of all the revolutionary poets of the
world His voice was the peal of revolutionary thunder
his poetry was the message of the revolutionary forces
He stood as the greatest symbol of a violent and
dreadful revolution
CHAMPION OF LIBERTY
He was essentially a poet of liberty His greatest ideal in
life was how to fight against the forces of tyranny
restriction aggression and enslaving of workers by
puissant exploiters Liberty was an essential part of the
Byronic creed In fact his entire poetic work is
interspersed with some of the finest poetry in praise of
freedom for mankind He composed much splendid
verse for love of freedom His passion for personal
freedom covers national freedom also and the political
freedom in the form of national self-determination
particularly for Italy and Greece He remarks in his
diary of 1821 ldquoDifficulties are the hotbeds of high spirits and Freedom the mother of the new virtues incident to human naturerdquo
Identifying himself completely with the cause of Italy
and Greece he wrote ldquoI shall not fall backbut
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 82
onward It is now the time to act and what signifies ldquoSelfrdquo if a single spark of that which would be worthy of the past can be bequeathed unquenchably to the future It is not one man nor a million but the spirit of liberty which must be spreadrdquo In his Ode to Chillon Castle he characteristically exclaimed
ldquoEternal spirit of the chainless Mind
Brightest in dungeons Liberty thou art
For there thy habitation is the heart
The heart which love of Thee alone bind
And when thy sons to fetters are consignrsquod
To fetters and damp vaultsrsquo dayless gloom
And Freedomrsquos fame finds winds on every windrdquo
Love of liberty lay at the centre of his being and
determined what was best in him ndash belief in individual
liberty and his hatred of tyranny and constraints
whether exercised by individuals or societies Liberty
was an ideal a driving power a summons to make the
best of certain possibilities in him He insisted to be free
and maintained that other men must be free too
Opposition was an integral element in his basic attitude
revolt both personal and social was his forte Love of
freedom is built into the capricious structure of Childe Harold and Don Juan
HIS POLITICAL AND COSMOPOLITAN LIBERALISM
He grew in an atmosphere in which political reaction
against revolutionary ideals was victorious all over
Europe Byron was essentially a liberal by conviction
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RP DWIVEDI Page 83
and could hardly bear the perception of liberals Though
he loved his native country yet he had a large vision for
the freedom and welfare of all nations The excitement
of political liberalism stirred on behalf of the Greeks
against the oppression of their Turkish overlords made
him a symbol of disinterested patriotism and a Greek
national hero The first two cantos of Child Harold are
tinctured with historical and typographical material as
also the appearance of the Byronic hero with his
exhortations to the degenerate Greeks and Spaniards to
remember their glorious past and arise They contain
Byronrsquos passionate feelings for Greece which was to see
the beginning as it was to see the end of his active life
His Faustian daemonic figure and his defiant
resentment of authority found an appropriate object in
the political sphere
His last journey and his death at Missolonghi in the
cause of Greek independence proves in him the moving
combination of nobility futility and romantic or heroic
panache In the words of Graham Hough lsquoBut for once Byron was on the winning side he died but his cause triumphed and he remains one of its heroes For the whole of the 19th Century he remained a portent and a symbol whom it was possible to worship or to condemn but never to neglectrsquo
A MAN OF ACTION
Action remains at the centre of his life and at last he
gladly seized the opportunity when it presented itself in
Greece Leaving poetry behind himself he took a heroic
resolution in favour of action rather than
contemplation He presents a rare example of fusion
between the active and the reflective lsquofor his was the romanticism of actionrsquo The moralist in the garb of the
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 84
pre-romantic rebel hero of the Childe Harold is cast
aside in Don Juan and the moralist in the somber garb
turns dandy in which moral judgment seems to be
ineffective Quite logically he finally abandons literature
for the field of moral action At last Byron flung himself
off into the world of action The dandy finds at last that
such a death even if it is on the sickbed and not the
battlefield is the only gesture untouched by futility ldquoIt is not enough that art perpetrates life life also must complete artrdquo WB Yeats rightly says ldquoone feels that he (Byron) is a man of action made writer by accidentrdquo
Byron did not regard writing as an end in itself on the
contrary he was several times on the point of giving up
writing He had always before him the hope of some
more active life and felt a certain mistrust for the purely
literary life He asserted ldquowho would write who had anything better to do Action- action I say and not writing Least of all rhymerdquo In a letter to Murray
he wrote ldquoYou will see that I shall do something or otherthat like the cosmogony or creation of the world will puzzle the philosophers of all agesrdquo He was
fully alive to the persistent sense both of human
aspirations and the ceaseless flux of eternity and also
knew that he would not fade into oblivion Said he
ldquoBut at the last I have shunned the common shore
And leaving land far out of sight would skim
The ocean of Eternityrdquo
And again he said
ldquoFor the sword outwears its sheath
And the soul wears out the breastrdquo
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RP DWIVEDI Page 85
HIS ROMANTIC SELF-PORTRAITURE
Byron presents manrsquos mixed and imperfect nature His
personality is a queer blend of flesh and spirit
meanness and nobility clay and spark cause and effect
The lasting fascination of his personality despite his bad
temper careless arrogance the excesses the satiety
melancholy and restlessness owes much to Splendour Primier of Miltonrsquos Satan who is ldquomajestic though in ruinrdquo and the gloom and brutality of the heroes of the
novel of terror His exotic sensibility ranging passions
and sensual perversity take refuge in a sort of ldquoCosmic Satanismrdquo He draws of himself a sketch which
reproduces in a dim outline the somber portrait of his
idealized self in the famous stanzas of Lara
ldquoIn him inexplicably mixed appeared
Much to be loved and hated sought and feared
X X X X X X
A hater of his kind
X X X X X X
There was in him a vital scorn of all
As if the worst had fallen which could befall
An erring spirit
X X X X X X
And fiery passions that had poured their wrath
In hurried desolation over his path
And left the better feeling all at strife
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RP DWIVEDI Page 86
In wild reflection over his stormy liferdquo
And the Giaour (hiding his sinister path beneath a
monkrsquos gown) also portrays Byron
ldquoA noble soul and lineage high
Alas though bestowed in vain
Which Grief could change and Guilt could stainrdquo
HIS CREDO
Despite all his self-mockery and arrogant egoism he had
a star (vision) and he followed it sincerely He was not
without guiding principles and his heroic death in the
cause of Greek independence shows that he was not an
actor but a soldier a man of affairs and a master of men
Keenly aware of something special in him he wished to
realize his powers and translate them into facts He
wished to be true to himself He had a keen appreciation
of the dignity and personal liberty of man
HIS FATAL TRUTH
Even though he disagreed with the moral code of his
age he had his own values He thought that truthfulness
is a permanent virtue and duty and so did not want to
compromise with conventions nor hide behind cant
Despite many ordeals and his own corroding skepticism
he speaks seriously and directly about his convictions
and presents them with irony satire and mockery Don Juan is a racy commentary on life and manners and is a
record of a remarkable personality ndash a poet and a man
of action a dreamer and a wit a great lover and a great
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RP DWIVEDI Page 87
hater a Whig noble and a revolutionary democrat The
paradoxes of his nature are fully reflected in Don Juan which itself is a romantic epic and a realistic satire He
was full of many romantic longings but tested them by
truth and reality He remained faithful only to those
which meant so much to him that he could not live
without them
Praising Byron Nietzsche says ldquoMan may bleed to death through the truth that he recognizesrdquo Byron expressed
this in his immortal lines
ldquoSorrow is knowledge they who know the most
Must mourn the deepest over the fatal truth
The tree of knowledge is not that of linerdquo
A BELIEVER IN GOD AND IMMORTALITY OF SOUL
Full of snobbery and rebellion as he was Byron was not
altogether without lofty ideals and religious beliefs He
firmly believed in the immanence and transcendence of
God and the transience of human glory His implicit faith
in the immortality of human soul the ephemerality of
physical body and his unwavering trust in God ndash the
eternal Light of Lights is evident from his following
memorable lines
ldquobut this clay will sink
Its spark immortal envying it the light
To which it mounts as if to break the link
That keeps us from yon heaven which woos us to its brinkrdquo
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RP DWIVEDI Page 88
Childe Harold III13-14
His Childe Haroldrsquos pilgrimage is a lament for lost
empire decay of love and triumph of love over human
mortality His lsquovoyage pittoresquersquo is full of historic and
didactic meditations and his oceanic image illustrates
the truism that nothing is constant but the rhythmic
pattern of its flux In the end all things float and toss on
that Great Ocean of which man is the foam and the
historic events are billows
ldquoBetween two worlds life hovers like a starrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquothe eternal surge
Of time and tide rolls on and bears afar our bubbles
while the graves
Of Empires heave but like some passing wavesrdquo
Don Juan XVI99
He maintains throughout his major poetic works a
sense of the presence of God or the gods and often
employs supernatural machinery to substantiate his
concept
IMMORTALITY OF SOUL
He had complete faith in the immortality of soul Said
he ldquoof the immortality of the soul it appears to me that there can be little doubtit acts also so very independent of bodyHuman passions have probably disfigured the divine doctrines Man is born passionate of body but an innate thought secret
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 89
tendency to the love of God is his mainspring of mind But God helps us allMan is eternal always changing but reproducedEternity Eternalrdquo
Again on his belief in God he says ldquoI sometimes think that man may be relic of some higher materialcreation must have had an origin and a creator for a creator is a more natural imagination than a fortuitous concourse of atoms All things remount to a fountain though they may flow to an oceanrdquo He knew
the limitations and ephemerality of phenomenal
existence He exclaims
ldquoFor I wish to know
What after all are all thingsbut a showrdquo
Unable to explore the stars with scientific aid he takes
up poesy to embark across the ocean of Eternity
ldquoI wish to do much by Poesyrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoBut at least I have shunned the common
And leaving land far out of sight would skim
The Ocean of Eternityrdquo
According to him man accepts the eternal voyage but
since man is not himself unlimited the boat capsizes in
the deep
ldquoAnd swimming long in the abyss of thought
Is apt to tire
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 90
For the fall entails not only ignorance and weakness but Human mortalityrdquo
Disconcerted with mankind he turns to the placid
spectacle of Nature and feels his spirit merge into its
objects
ldquoI live not in myself but I become
Portion of that around me and to me
High mountains are a feeling
When the soul can flee
And with the sky ndash the peak ndash the heaving plain
Of Ocean or the stars mingle ndash and not in vainrdquo
Childe Harold III72
This pantheistic ecstasy gives him a sense of quasi-
immortality
ldquoSpinning the clay clod bonds which round our being clingrdquo
The picturesque is translated into a kind of mystical
union with the spirit of the place even with the
universe itself
ldquoAre not the mountains waves and skies a part
Of me and my soul as I of them
(Is not) the universe a breathing part
The spirit is clogged with clayrdquo
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RP DWIVEDI Page 91
HIS PESSIMISM
The myth of Cuvierrsquos undulations of Cosmic history
reflects Byronrsquos consistent and mature pessimism His
pessimism is traceable to his own view of society
Through a metaphor he considers his age as
ldquocatastrophicrdquo ndash an ice age of the human spirit and a
declining moral grandeur His myth of Fall and
recurrence of the Ocean and ice is both comic and
historic social and literary and personal as well The
consequences of the Fall and of manrsquos imperfect nature
are seen in all major human activities Generally fallen
mankind is hounded by its lower appetites spirit
encumbered by flesh The image of Fall is linked in
Byronrsquos imagination with the rhetorical image of the
poetrsquos lsquoflightrsquo which incurs the risk of consequent
lsquosinkingrsquo or bathos And over it all hangs the perplexity
of manrsquos ignorance about his aims his nature his true
identity
ldquoFew mortals know what end they would be at
But whether glory power or love or treasure
The path is through perplexing ways and when
The goal is gained we die you know ndash and thenrdquo
HIS PROPHETIC VISION
Endowed with strong imaginative power he had
experimented in Vulcanian visions of the earth plunged
into darkness by the final extinction or the sun or lsquoa ruined starrsquo plunging on in flames through the wastes of
space This prophetic faculty is amply evident from his
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 92
poem Darkness in which his imagination prefigures the
devastating effects of nuclear weapons
ldquoThe Hour arrived ndash and it became
A wandering mass of shapeless flame
A pathless Comet and a curse
The menace of the Universe
Still rolling on with innate force
Without a sphere without a course
A bright deformity on high
The monster of the upper skyrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoI had a dream which was not at all a dream
The bright sun was extinguished and the stars
Did wander darkling in the eternal space
The habitations of all things which dwell
Were burnt for beacons cities were consumedrdquo
Darkness IV42-45
In sum and in essence Byron exemplifies Shelleyrsquos
pronouncement that poets are the unacknowledged
legislators of the world More than any other Romantic
poet Byron embodies the dictum ndash lsquowhat is to give light must endure burningrsquo
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RP DWIVEDI Page 93
PB SHELLEY
(4 August 1792 ndash 8 July 1822)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 94
PB SHELLEY
English Romantic Poet
The heir to rich estates Shelley was a rebellious youth
who was expelled from Oxford in 1811 for refusing to
admit authorship of The Necessity of Atheism Later that
year he eloped with Harriet Westbrook the daughter of
a tavern owner He gradually channeled his passionate
pursuit of personal love and social justice into poetry
His first major poem Queen Mab (1813) is a utopian
political epic revealing his progressive social ideals In
1814 he eloped to France with Mary Wollstonecraft
Godwin in 1816 after Harriet drowned herself they
were married In 1818 the Shelleys moved to Italy
Away from British politics he became less intent on
social reform and more devoted to expressing his ideals
in poetry He composed the verse tragedy The Cenci (1819) and his masterpiece the lyric drama Prometheus Unbound (1820) which was published with some of his
finest shorter poems including Ode to the West Wind
and To a Skylark Epipsychidion (1821) is a Dantean
fable about the relationship of sexual desire to spiritual
love and artistic creation Adonais (1821)
commemorates the death of John Keats Shelley
drowned at age 29 while sailing in a storm off the Italian
coast leaving unfinished his last and possibly greatest
visionary poem The Triumph of Life
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 95
CHAPTER FIVE
SHELLEY A PILGRIM OF ETERNITY
INTRODUCTION
Shelley who in his Adonais eulogized Keats as lsquothe Pilgrim of Eternityrsquo is himself justly entitled to this
appellation He was essentially a poet of the skies and
heavens of light and love of eternity and immortality
Since he loved to pierce through things to their spiritual
essence the material world was less important for him
than that which lies within it and beyond it Says he ldquoI seek in what I see the manifestation of something beyond the present and tangible objectsrsquo He set out to uncover
the absolute real from its visible manifestations and
interpret it through his own poetic vision In a
passionate search for reality he pursued its essence
behind the veil of naked loveliness of Nature and the
mundane human existence Defining poetry he says
lsquoPoetry is the revelation of the eternal ideas which lie behind the many-coloured ever-shifting veil that we call reality in lifersquo For him the poet is also a seer gifted with
a peculiar insight into the nature of reality for it is
through the inspired poetic imagination that he
breathes immortality into the objects of Nature Says he
lsquoBut from these create he can
Forms more real than living man
Nurslings of immortalityrsquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 96
Prometheus Unbound
HIS LOVE OF INDIA
Shelley was an ardent admirer of India In a letter to his
friend employed in the East India Company he
expressed keenness to visit India and settle down here
He was drawn to India for its varied and picturesque
scenic beauty vast literary heritage and age-old cultural
traditions In order to have a closer acquaintance with
our great country he set his heart and mind on serious
studies in the Indian life and letters traditions and
culture
Since he was a visionary par excellence and was
endowed with a highly contemplative mind and a
remarkable prophetic zeal he evinced a deep and
abiding interest in the philosophical and spiritual
thoughts that lie enshrined in our holy texts such as the
Vedas the Upanishads the Brahmasutras and the
Bhagvad Gita It is interesting to trace the influence of
Indian spiritual thought on Shelleyrsquos poetry
VEDANTA IN SHELLEYrsquoS POETRY
The riddle of the origin of life and Nature and the
enigmatic questions such as lsquoWhat is the cause of life
and death What is the source of universe and what will
be its ultimate destinyrsquo have always engaged the
serious attention of all wise men Man has always stood
in awe and wonder at the mysteries of human existence
and the vast world around him Our seers and savants
have not only posed such questions but have also
answered them
In the opening verse of the Kena Upanishad the
disciple asks
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 97
ldquoAt whose behest does the mind think or wander after towards its objects Commanded by whom does the life-force or the breath of life go forth on its journey At whose will do we utter speech Who is that effulgent Being whose power directs the eye and the earrdquo
Similarly in the Svetasvatara Upanishad the disciples
inquire ldquoWhat is the cause of this universe What is Brahman Whence do we come By what power do we live and on what are we established Where shall we at last find rest What rules over our joys and sorrows O Seers of Brahmanrdquo
Identical ideas impelled Shelley to exclaim in his famous
elegy Adonais
ldquoWhence are we and why are we Of what scene
The actors or spectatorsrdquo
Or again he asks in The Triumph of Life
ldquoWhence comest thou And wither goest thou
How did thy course begin I said and whyrdquo
Shelley asks
ldquoHas some unknown omnipotence unfurled
The veil of life and deathrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoAnd what were thou and earth and stars and sea
If to the human mindrsquos imaginings
Silence and solitude were vacancyrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 98
Mont Blanc
Shelley in his famous poem Hymn to Intellectual Beauty answers that there is an unseen (all-pervading) omnipotence (power) behind this phenomenal world of
which all objects are but shadows
ldquoThe awful shadow of some unseen Power
Floats though unseen among us ndash visiting
This various world with as inconstant wing
As summer winds that creep from flower to flowerrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoIt visits with inconstant glance
Each human heart and countenance
Like aught that for its grace may be
Dear and yet dearer for its mysteryrdquo
Again he affirms his faith in such a mysterious
Omnipotent power when he says
ldquoThe works and ways of men their death and birth
And that of him and all that his may be
All things that move and breathe with toil and sound
Are born and die revolve subside and swell
Power dwells apart in its tranquility
Remote serene and inaccessiblerdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 99
X X X X X X
ldquoThe secret strength of things
Which governs thought and to the infinite dome
Of Heaven is as a law inhabits theerdquo
Mont Blanc
Vedanta which is the aphoristic summary of the
Upanishads the Brahmasutras and the Bhagvad Gita
is in fact the culmination of Indian religious and
philosophical thought Since Shelley sincerely desired to
unravel the essential reality which is unchanging
timeless and eternal and of which the world of sense
perceptions is but a broken reflection he turned his
attention to the ancient scriptures of India
ONENESS OF BRAHMAN (GOD)
One of the basic postulates of Vedanta is the inherent
oneness or the sole identity of Brahman in the universe
The Chhandogya Upanishad describes Brahman as
एकमव अXवतीय ndash lsquoone only without a secondrsquo and the
other Upanishadic texts also contain parallel statements
such as स एकः ndash lsquoHe is Onersquo and एकोदवः ndash lsquoOne Lordrsquo
Similarly the Rig Veda declares एक सद वDा बहदा वदित ndash lsquoTruth (God)is one but the wise one call it
differentlyrsquo Obviously Brahman the Supreme is one
and only one He is verily one and the same whether we
call Him Brahman Ishwara Paramatma God Allah or
the supreme Cosmic Soul He only exists all other
objects of the world are subject to decay and death
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 100
How beautifully have similar thoughts been expressed
by Shelley when he exclaims
ldquoThe one remains the many change and pass
Heavenrsquos light forever shines Earthrsquos shadows fly
Life like a dome of many coloured glass
Stains the white radiance of Eternity
Until Death tramples it to fragmentsrdquo
Adonais L2
The concluding lines of Epipsychidion show that in a
moment of inspiration Shelley seemed to lay hold on the
ineffable spirituality and fundamental unity of
existence
ldquoOne hope within two wils one will beneath
Two overshadowing minds one life one death
One Heaven one hell one immortality
And one annihilationrdquo
Shelley etherealized Nature and believed in a single
power or one spirit permeating the whole universe He
effected a fusion of the Platonic philosophy of love with
the Wordsworthian doctrine of Pantheism
ldquoThe one spiritrsquos plastic stress
Sweeps through the dull dense worldrsquo
Compelling there all new successions
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 101
To the forms they wearrdquo
Holding that one universal spirit is the basis and
sustainer of Nature Shelley declares
ldquoThat Power
Which wields the world with never-wearied love
Sustains it from beneath and kindles it aboverdquo
In his pantheistic conception of Nature Shelley
conceived of it as being permeated vitalized and made
real by a universal spirit of love He clearly perceives
the presence of ldquothe awful shadow of the unseen power visiting the various worldrdquo
ldquoSpirit of Nature here
In this interminable wilderness
Of worlds at whose involved immensity
Even soaring fancy staggers
Here is thy fitting templerdquo
Demon of the World
TRANSMIGRATION OF SOUL
The doctrine of transmigration of soul or the cycle of
births and rebirths has been explicitly advanced in the
Upanishadic philosophy In the Kathopanishad
Brihadaranyak Upanishad and the Bhagvad Gita there are moving passages such as these
ldquoMan ripens like corn and like corn he is born againrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 102
Kathopanishad IV6
The Brihadaranyak Upanishad states
ldquoAnd as a caterpillar after reaching the end of a blade of grass finds another place of support and then draws itself towards it and as a goldsmith after taking a piece of gold gives it another newer and more beautiful shape similarly does the self after having thrown off this body and dispelled ignorance take on another newer and more beautiful formrdquo
Brihadaranyak Upanishad IV3-5
Similarly Lord Krishna tells Arjuna
ldquoAs a man discarding worn out clothes takes other new ones likewise the embodied soul casting off worn-out bodies enters into others which are newrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II22
And further Lord Krishna says to Arjuna
ldquofor in that case the death of him who is born is certain and the rebirth for him who is dead is inevitablerdquo
Bhagvad Gita II27
Shelley entertained similar ideas when he says
ldquoThe works and ways of man their death and birth
And that of him and all that his may be
All things that move and breathe with toil and sound
Are borm and die revolve subside and swellrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 103
Mont Blanc 92-95
Or again
ldquoThe splendours of the firmament of time
May be eclipsed but are extinguished not
Like stars to their appointed height they climb
And death is a low mist which cannot blot
The brightness it may veilrdquo
Adonais XLIV
Stressing the ephemerality of worldly objects Shelley
exclaims
ldquoSpirit of Beauty that does consecrate
With thine own hues all thou doth shine upon
Of human thought or formwhere art thou gonerdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoWhy aught should fail and fade that once is shown
Why fear and dream and death and birth
Cast on the daylight of this earth
Such gloomrdquo
Hymn to Intellectual Beauty 11
Lamenting the death of his friend Keats he says
ldquohe went uninterrupted
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 104
Into the gulf of death but his clear spirit
Yet reigns over earthrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoTo that high Capital where Kingly Death
Keeps his pale court in beauty and decay
He came and bought with price of purest breath
A grave among the eternalrdquo
Adonais VII
Again dwelling on the immortality of soul he declares
ldquoNaught we know dies Shall that alone which knows
Be as a sword consumed before the sheath
By sightless lightening The intense atom glows
A moment then is quenched in a most cold reposerdquo
Adonais XX
X X X X X X
ldquoGreat and mean
Meet massed in death who lends what life must borrowrdquo
Adonais XXI
X X X X X X
ldquoDust to dust but the pure spirit shall flow
Black to the burning fountain whence it came
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 105
A portion of the Eternal which must glow
Through time and change unquenchably the same
Whilst thy cold embers choke the sordid hearth shamerdquo
Adonais XXXVIII
THE DOCTRINE OF MAYA (DELUSION)
Our scriptures regard the phenomenal world as Maya
(delusion) They explain that the universe is neither
absolutely real nor absolutely non-existent and that its
phenomenal or apparent surface conceals and
safeguards the external presence of the Absolute
Shelley seems to have pondered over similar ideas
about the world of appearances
ldquoWorlds on worlds are rolling ever
From creation to decay
Like the bubbles on a river
Sparkling bursting borne away
But they are still immortal
Who through birthrsquos oriental portal
And deathrsquos dark chasm hurrying to and fro
Clothe their unceasing flight
In the brief dust and light
Gathered around their chariots as they gordquo
Three Choruses from Hallas
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 106
In his poem Invocation to Misery Shelley says
ldquoAll the wide world beside us
Show like multitudinous
Puppets passing from a scenerdquo
Again describing human life as a veil he says
ldquoLife not the painted veil which thou who live
Call life though unreal shapes be pictured there
And it but mimic all we would believe
With colours idly spreadrdquo
Prometheus Unbound
In the myth of Aurora he gives his own account of the
creation and interpretation of works of art
ldquoAnd lovely apparitions dim at first then radiant in the mind arising bright
From the embrace of beauty whence the forms
Of which these are phantoms casts on them
The gathered rays which are realityrdquo
Shelley seems to hint at the theory of Superimposition
(Vivartavada) which maintains that the universe is a
superimposition upon Brahman It states that the world
of thought and matter has a phenomenon or relative
existence and is superimposed upon Brahman the
unique Absolute Reality
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 107
Since the world is a network of delusion and
appearance not reality our life on earth is a sojourn
and its paramount aim is to have a glimpse of and
realize the eternal Truth or the Absolute Brahman
which is concealed by ignorance and delusion The
Ishopanishad tells us
ldquoThe face of Truth is hidden by a golden orb (disk) O Pushan (the Nourisher the Effulgent Being) uncover (the Face) that I the seeker or worshipper of Truth may hold Theerdquo
Ishopanishad XV
Like a sincere aspirant for the realization of eternal
Truth or the Absolute concealed under the illusory garb
of Maya (Delusion) Shelley in the words of Fairy in his
Queen Mab declares
ldquoAnd it is yet permitted me to rend
The veil of mortal frailty that the spirit
Clothed in its changeless purity may know
How soonest to accomplish the great end
For which it hath its being and may taste
That peace which in the end all life will sharerdquo
Queen Mab
In certain other passages Shelley speaks of the veil
identified with Time which obscured Eternity from the
sight of man The symbol of veil demonstrates that
which conceals truth goodness or happiness When the
veil was torn or rent asunder
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RP DWIVEDI Page 108
ldquoHope was seen beaming through the mists of fear
Earth was no longer Hell
Love freedom health had given
Their ripeness to the manhood of its prime
And all its pulses beat
Symphonious to the planetary spheresrdquo
Again he uses the same symbol of veil when Cythna
says
ldquoFor with strong speech I tore the veil that hid
Nature and Truth and Liberty and Loverdquo
Shelley uses the same idea of superimposition coupled
with his own robust idealism
ldquoLife may change but it may fly not
Hope may vanish but can die not
Truth be veiled but it burneth
Love repulsed ndash but it returnethrdquo
STATES OF CONSCIOUSNESS
Our Upanishads identify three states of consciousness
crowned by the fourth which transcends all the other
three states They are
(i) The Waking State
(ii) The Dreaming State
(iii) The State of Deep Sleep and
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RP DWIVEDI Page 109
(iv) The State of Pure Consciousness (Turiya)
The fourth state of ecstatic consciousness which
transcends the preceding three has no connection with
the finite mind it is reached when in meditation the
ordinary self is left behind and the Atman or the true
self is fully realized The Mandukya Upanishad describes it thus
ldquoBeyond the senses beyond the understanding beyond all expression is the Fourth It is pure unitary consciousness wherein (all) awareness of the world and of multiplicity is completely obliterated It is effable peace It is the supreme good It is one without a second It is the Self Know it alonerdquo
Mandukya Upanishad VII
Turiya (तर[य) the fourth state is the supreme mystic
experience Shelley seems to have partly attained such a
state of pure ecstatic consciousness when he states
ldquoI seem as in a trance sublime and strange
To muse on my own separate fantasy
My own my human mind which passively
Now renders and receives fast influencing
Holding an unremitting interchange
With the clear universe of things aroundrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoSome say that gleams of a remoter world
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RP DWIVEDI Page 110
Visit the soul in sleep that death is slumber
And that its shapes the busy thoughts outnumber
Of those who wake and live ndash I look on high
Has some unknown omnipotence unfurled
The veil of life and deathrdquo
Mont Blanc
Another instance of such a mystic experience appears in
his famous poem Triumph of Life on which Shelley was
working at the time of this death in 1822
ldquobefore me fled
The night behind me rose the day the deep
Was at my feet and Heaven above my head
When a strange trance over my fancy grew
Which was not slumber for the shade it spread
Was so transparent that the scene came through
As clear as when a veil of light is drawn
Over evening hill they glimmer and I knew
That I had felt the freshness of that dawnrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoAnd in that trance of wondrous thought I lay
This was the tenor of my waking dreamrdquo
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The Triumph of Life
SHELLEY AS AN ASPIRANT FOR SELF-REALIZATION
Shelley who described himself as
ldquoA splendour among shadows a bright blot
Upon the gloomy scene a spirit that strove
For Truthrdquo
seems to have reached at last that stability or
equanimity of mind which has been described in the
Upanishads and the Bhagvad Gita In a reply to Arjunrsquos
question about the definition of one who is stable of
mind or is finally established in perfect tranquility of
mind Lord Krishna says
ldquoArjun when one thoroughly dismisses all cravings of the mind controls it and is satisfied in the self (through the joy of the self) then he is called stable of mind One whose mind remains unperturbed amid sorrows whose thirst for pleasures has altogether disappeared and who is free from passion fear and anger is called stable of mindrdquo
Bhagvad Gita V56
The Katha Upanishad stresses similar ideas when it
says
ldquoBut he who possesses right discrimination whose mind is under control and is always pure he reaches that goal from which he is not born againrdquo
X X X X X X
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RP DWIVEDI Page 112
ldquoThe man who has a discriminative intellect for the driver and a controlled mind for the reins reaches the end of the journey the highest place of Vishnu (the all-pervading and unchangeable one)rdquo
Katha Upanishad
Shelley echoes identical thoughts when he says
ldquoMan who man would be
Must rule the empire of himself in it
Must be supreme establishing his throne
On vanquished will quelling the anarchy
Of hopes and fears being himself alonerdquo
Sonnet on Political Greatness
It was in such rare moments of inner consciousness or
lsquoBlessed moodrsquo that Shelley felt lsquoOne with Naturersquo or
lsquoThe Power which wields the world with never-wearied love
Sustains it from beneath and kindles it aboversquo
As a myth-maker or a mythopoeic poet he conjured
visions of a golden age by turning to the grand aspects
of Nature ndash the ether the sky the wind the Sun the
Moon the light and the clouds and employing them as
befitting agencies and vehicles of his evolutionary ideas
ldquoPoetryrdquo he wrote ldquois indeed something divine It is at once the centre and circumference of all knowledgerdquo He
conceived of the universe as alive with a living spirit
behind it He moralizes natural myths and perceives the
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 113
Absolute behind the ephemeral In an exquisite image
he exclaims
ldquoThe sanguine sunrise with his meteor eyes
And his burning plumes outspread
Leaps on the back of my sailing rack
When the morning star shines deadrdquo
As his thoughts reached the zenith of their growth
Shelley identified his individual self with the all-
pervading Cosmic Self or the Brahman of the Vedanta
and felt himself one with the indwelling spirit of the
universe Unity filled his imagination he perceived
eternal harmony in the phenomenal existence and
rejoiced his own being in the vast million-coloured
pageants of the world And finally not only Nature but
all human existence is taken up as an inalienable aspect
of the eternal Cosmic Spirit He reaches the core the
centre of all palpable universe when he declares
ldquoI am the eye with which the Universe
Behold itself and knows itself divine
All harmony of instrument and verse
All prophecy all medicine is mine
All light of art or nature to my song
Victory and praise in its own right belongrdquo
Shelley perceived the transcendental or mystic
consciousness in which one realizes the complete
identity of self with the Supreme Self and which is called
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RP DWIVEDI Page 114
तर[य अवथा ndash where one sees nothing but One
(Brahman) hears nothing but the One knows nothing
but the One ndash there is the Infinite The same truth is
vividly explained in the Bhagvad Gita when Lord
Krishna tells Arjuna
ldquoWhen one sees Eternity in things that pass away and Infinity in finite things then one has pure knowledgerdquo
Bhagvad Gita XVIII20
Our own great seer-poet and philosopher Sri Aurobindo
Ghose described Shelley as a sovereign voice of the new
spiritual force and a native of the heights with its
luminous ethereality where he managed to dwell
prophetically in a future heaven and earth with
brilliances of a communion with a higher law another
order of existence another meaning behind Nature and
terrestrial things
Sri Aurobindo further praises him as lsquoa seer of spiritual realities who has a poetic grasp of metaphysical truths and can see the forms and hear the voices of higher elements spirits and natural godheads and has a constant feeling of a high spiritual and intellectual beauty He is at once seer poet thinker prophet and artist Light love liberty are the three godheads in whose presence his pure and radiant spirit lived but a celestial light a celestial love a celestial liberty To bring them down to earth without their losing their celestial lustre and here is his passionate endeavour but his wings constantly buoy him upward and cannot beat strongly in an earthlier atmosphere There is an air of luminous mist surrounding his intellectual presentation of his meaning which shows the truths he sees as things to which the mortal eye cannot easily pierce or the life and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 115
temperament of earth rise to realize and live yet to bring about the union of the mortal and immortal terrestrial and the celestial is always his passion Shelley is the bright archangel of this dawn and becomes greater to us as the light he foresaw and lived and he sings half-concealed in the too dense halo of his own ethereal beautyrsquo
And what Juan Mascaro states as universal truth is
equally pertinent to Shelleyrsquos poetry
ldquoA deep faith in life cannot but be spiritual The path of Truth may not be a path of parallel lines but a path that follows one circle because Truth is onerdquo
Infinite is God infinite are His aspects and infinite are
the ways to reach Him In the Atharva Veda we read
ldquoThe one light appears in diverse formsrdquo This ideal of
harmony is carried to its logical conclusion in blending
synthesizing and reconciling conflicting metaphysical
theories and opposed conceptions of spiritual
discipline We read in the pages of Bhagvad Gita
ldquoWhatever wish men bring in worship
That wish I grant them
Whatever path men travel
Is my path
No matter where they walk
It leads to merdquo
Bhagvad Gita IV11
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RP DWIVEDI Page 116
To sum up Shelleyrsquos poetry will always hold irresistible
fascination to the lovers of light and beauty for to
quote Juan Mascaro again
ldquoThe finite in man longs for the Infinite The love that moves the stars moves also the heart of man and a law of spiritual gravitation leads his soul to the soul of the universe Man sees the sun by the light of the sun and he sees the spirit by the light of his own inner spirit The radiance of eternal beauty shines over this vast universe and in moments of contemplation we can see the Eternal in things that pass away This is the message of the great spiritual seers and all poetry and art and beauty is only an infinite variation of this message The spiritual visions of man confirm and illumine each other Great poems in different languages have different values but they all are poetry and the spiritual visions of man come all from one Light In them we have Lamps of Fire that burn to the glory of Godrdquo
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RP DWIVEDI Page 117
JOHN KEATS
(31 October 1795 ndash 23 February 1821)
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RP DWIVEDI Page 118
JOHN KEATS
English Romantic Poet
The son of a livery-stable manager he had a limited
formal education He worked as a surgeons apprentice
and assistant for several years before devoting himself
entirely to poetry at age 21 His first mature work was
the sonnet On First Looking into Chapmans Homer
(1816) His long Endymion appeared in the same year
(1818) as the first symptoms of the tuberculosis that
would kill him at age 25 During a few intense months of
1819 he produced many of his greatest works several
great odes (including Ode on a Grecian Urn Ode to a
Nightingale and To Autumnrdquo) two unfinished
versions of the story of the titan Hyperion and La Belle
Dame Sans Merci Most were published in the
landmark collection Lamia Isabella The Eve of St Agnes and Other Poems (1820) Marked by vivid imagery great
sensuous appeal and a yearning for the lost glories of
the Classical world his finest works are among the
greatest of the English tradition His letters are among
the best by any English poet
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RP DWIVEDI Page 119
CHAPTER SIX
JOHN KEATS A MINSTREL OF BEAUTY AND TRUTH
INTRODUCTION
John Keats who in his own words was lsquoa fair creature of an hourrsquo lived a brief and turbulent life Pre-eminently a
sensuous poet in whom the Romantic sensibility to
outward impressions of sight sound touch and smell
reached its climax the life of Keats was a series of
sensations felt with febrile acuteness
His ideal was passive contemplation rather than active
mental exertion ldquoO for a life of sensations rather than of thoughtrdquo he exclaimed in one of his letters and in
another ldquoit is more noble to sit like Jove than to fly like Mercuryrdquo In fact his was a life of intense sensations
acute poignancy and an infinite yearning for beauty
which he identified with truth
Richness of sensuousness characterizes all his poetry
and his power of expression is marked by a spectacular
vividness which is interspersed with beautiful epithets
heavily charged with subtle messages for the senses His
works are so full of luxuriance of sensations and acute
passions that ordinary readers do not pause to perceive
the unimpeded flow of spiritual thoughts underneath
The pursuit of the spirit of beauty dominates all his
works which have one enduring message ndash the
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 120
lastingness of beauty and its identity with supreme
truth (or God) This message ndash the oneness of beauty
with truth and the eternal existence of truth ndash has been
beautifully enshrined in his famous and oft-quoted lines
(with which he concludes his Ode on a Grecian Urn)
ldquoBeauty is truth truth beauty ndash that is all
Ye know on earth and all ye need to knowrdquo
Keats died at the age of 26 but even from his early age
he had visions of rare spiritual significance Dwelling on
the value of visions in human life and poetry he says
ldquoSince every man whose soul is not a clod
Hath vision
For poesy alone can tell her dreams
With the fine spell of words alone can save
Imagination from the sable chain
And dumb enchantmentrdquo
Since common readers tend to ignore the underlying
spiritual import of his visions and images this article
aims at bringing into play some of the poetrsquos thoughts
which bear a remarkable resemblance to the age-old
hoary spirituality of our ancient land
Stressing the fundamental truths of our Indian thought
and tracing their distinct reflection in the works of great
Western poets seems a worth-while academic pursuit
FUNDAMENTAL UNITY
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RP DWIVEDI Page 121
From the very beginning Keats could realize the
fundamental unity of Truth and Beauty and could dwell
at length on it to show how diverse paths illumined by
the glory of spirit in man ultimately lead him to the
realization of this abiding lesson of life The supreme
oneness of Truth has been beautifully enunciated by Sri
Krishna in the Bhagvad Gita
ldquoIn any way that men love Me in that same way they find My love for many are the paths of men but they all in the end come to Merdquo
Similar thoughts have found expression in the
introduction to the Upanishads by Juan Mascaro
ldquoThe path of Truth may not be a path of parallel lines but a path that follows one circle by going to the right and climbing the circle or by going to the left and climbing the circle we are bound to meet at the top although we started in apparently contrary directions This is bound to be in the end because Truth is onerdquo
And when Keats was only 22 he could give expression
to deep thoughts that have a curious similarity to the
ideas expressed in the Mundak Upanishad and the
Bhagvad Gita
ldquoNow it appears to me that almost any man may like the spider spin from his own inwards his own airy citadel the points of leaves and twigs on which the spider begins her work are few and she fills the air with a beautiful circuiting Man should be content with as few points to tip with the fine Web of his Soul and weave a tapestry empyrean-full of symbols for his spiritual eye of softness for his spiritual touch of space for his wanderings of distinctness for his luxuryrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 122
ldquoBut the minds of mortals are so different and bent on such diverse journeys that it may at first appear impossible for any common taste and fellowship to exist between two or three under these suppositions It is however quite the contrary Minds would leave each other in contrary directions traverse each other in numberless points and at last greet each other at the journeyrsquos end An old man and a child would talk together and the old man be led on his path and the child left thinkingrdquo
ldquoMan should not dispute or assert but whisper results to his neighbor and thus by every germ of spirit sucking the sap from mould ethereal every human might become great and humanity instead of being a wide heath of furze and briars with here and there a remote oak or pine would become a great democracy of forest treesrdquo
WISDOM
All men of good will are bound to meet if they follow the
wisdom of the words Shakespeare in Hamlet where if
we write SELF or self we find the doctrine of the
Upanishad
ldquoThis above all to thine own self be true
And it must follow as the night the day
Thou canst not then be false to any manrdquo
Now coming back to the theme of beauty and truth and
their ultimate identity in the universe we have to dwell
at large on the concept of beauty as enunciated by Keats
in his poetry From the very beginning Keats realized
that beauty in its true sense illumines manrsquos thoughts
and thus leads him to understand the glory of truth and
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RP DWIVEDI Page 123
the pervading spirit of their identity in whatever he
sees hears and perceives
The eternal identity or oneness of beauty with truth and
their interplay in the world are in fact unfailing
fountains of joy The permanence of beauty as a source
of joy has been beautifully elucidated by the poet in the
opening lines of his famous poem Endymion
ldquoA thing of beauty is a joy forever
Its loveliness increases it will never
Pass into nothingnessrdquo
He goes on to say
ldquoSome shape of beauty moves away the pall
From our dark spirits
An endless fountain of immortal drink
Pouring unto us from the heavenrsquos brink
Nor do we merely feel these essences
For one short hour
glories infinite
Haunt us till they become a cheering light
Unto our souls and bound to us so fast
That whether there be shine or gloom overcast
They always must be with us or we dierdquo
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RP DWIVEDI Page 124
When he ascribes permanence to joy born of beauty
Keats has in mind the immanence and effulgence of
beauty as a reflection of its creator God Beauty whose
lsquoloveliness increasesrsquo and which lsquowill never pass into nothingnessrsquo is an inalienable attribute of Divinity for it
is lsquoan endless fountain of immortal drinkrsquo
BEAUTY
God (as the poet seems to presuppose) is all Beautiful or
the embodiment of all Beauty and the entire world of
sights and sounds is nothing else but a glorious garment
of God So beauty does not consist only in apparent
physical appearances but is an offspring of inherent
divinity in man and nature which is dimly reflected in
their attractive exterior Such an eternal beauty in his
view presents lsquoglories infinite that haunt us till they become a cheering light unto our souls It is this beauty the glory of spirit which must be with us or we dierdquo
The poetrsquos concept of beauty with its glories infinite
bears a striking resemblance with the path of splendour
of our Vedic and epic scriptures in which our sages
perceived the Divine presence in all that is splendid and
beautiful in the universe
Our Vedic texts are full of the expressions of the sage-
poetrsquos exquisite astonishment before the visions of
glory and wonder The attitude of our Vedic seer-poets
towards beauty as a transcendental reality beyond our
sense-perceptions has been beautifully expressed in
images of beauty and glory as an abstract idea Says Rig Veda
ldquoSinless for noble power under the influence of Savita God
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 125
May we obtain all things that are beautifulrdquo
GOODNESS
Here the power of goodness is contemplated to lead to
the power of beauty Beauty in its myriad forms leads
us to spiritual consciousness of Divinity inherent in
Nature and all living beings Identical thoughts have
been expressed by Sri Krishna in Chapter X of the
Bhagvad Gita where all splendour and glory is said to
be the reflection of God whose manifestation this
universe is Says Sri Krishna to Arjuna
ldquoKnow thou that whatever is beautiful and good whatever has glory and power is only a portion of My own radiancerdquo
Bhagvad Gita X41
Seeing the effulgence of a thousand suns bursting forth
and yet it could hardly match the splendour of the
supreme Lord Arjuna exclaimed in wonder
ldquoI see the splendour of an infinite beauty which illumines the whole universe It is thee With thy crown and scepter and circle How difficult thou art to see But I see thee as fire as the Sun blinding incomprehensiblerdquo
Bhagvad Gita XI17
Besides this concept of ultimate elemental beauty
Keats goes on to underscore its fundamental and
inseparable unity with Truth which is yet another
inalienable facet of Divinity on earth
Truth being an essential attribute of God lies at the
core of all existence and it sustains the entire universe
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 126
with its manifold forms of beauty reflected in countless
objects around us When Keats declares that lsquoBeauty is truth truth beautyrsquo he seems to remind us of the age-old
spiritual consciousness that found sublime utterance in
our Vedas which are the oldest treatises on lsquophilosophia perennisrsquo the eternal philosophy In the Vedas truth has
been described as the essence of Divinity
ldquoThe deity has truth as the law of His beingrdquo
Atharva Veda VIIXXIV1
The Rig Veda calls the deities as various manifestations
of Truth Elsewhere in the Rig Veda the Deity has been
described as true and the path of religious progress is
the ingredient of Dharma Declares the Rig Veda
ldquoBy truth is the earth upheldrdquo
Rig Veda X85
An Upanishadic sage says
ldquoTruth alone triumphs not untruth By Truth the spiritual path is widened that path by which the seers who are free from all cravings and declares travel and reach the supreme abode of Truthrdquo
Mundak Upanishad IIII6
So Truth is a basic postulate of Dharma and an abiding
and ultimate value of life It is the eternal oneness of
beauty and truth and truth and beauty that inspired
Keats to stress their underlying unity and their
transcendental reality When Keats says ldquoThat is all ye know on earth and all ye need to knowrdquo he points to that
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 127
ecstatic wonder which the spiritual realization of this
eternal truth brings to a seeker or seer or a poet
SUBLIMITY
Keats seems to have reached such a sublime plane of
poetic consciousness that is so aptly suggested by our
Vedic seers who have extolled God as a poet (कव) and
His divine creative energy is indicated as the poetic
power (काय) which has assumed manifold forms of
beauty and splendour So God as the supreme creator of
beauty has been described in the Rig Veda as
ldquoHe who is supporter of the world of life
Who knows the secret mysterious names
Of the morning beams
He poet cherishes manifold forms
By His poetic powerrdquo
Rig Veda VIIIXL5
So let me hasten to the conclusion by affirming that as
lsquoa lily for a dayrsquo Keats proved that a crowded hour of
glory is far better than an age without a name he seems
to have lived up to the lofty advice of Queen Vidula to
her son King Sanjaya in the Mahabharat
महतम 0व1लत 2यो न त धमऽतम 4चर
ldquoIt is better to flame forth for an instant than smoke away for agesrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 128
Eternal truths transcend the barriers of time and space
country and clime caste and creed and shine through all
lands and in all ages Even today the enlightened souls
all over the world have a significant identity of ideas
irrespective of the countries to which they belong and
the religious faith to which they are affiliated
Such wise men awaken others from a state of
intellectual and spiritual slumber enkindle in them a
sense of understanding and fraternity It has been
rightly said by HW Longfellow
ldquoLives of great men all remind us
We can make our lives sublime
And departing leave behind us
Footprints on the sand of Timerdquo
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RP DWIVEDI Page 129
RW EMERSON
(25 May 1803 ndash 27 April 1882)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 130
RW EMERSON
US Poet Essayist and Lecturer
Emerson graduated from Harvard University and was
ordained a Unitarian minister in 1829 His questioning
of traditional doctrine led him to resign the ministry
three years later He formulated his philosophy in
Nature (1836) the book helped initiate New England
Transcendentalism a movement of which he soon
became the leading exponent In 1834 he moved to
Concord Mass the home of his friend Henry David
Thoreau His lectures on the proper role of the scholar
and the waning of the Christian tradition caused
considerable controversy In 1840 with Margaret
Fuller he helped launch The Dial a journal that
provided an outlet for Transcendentalist ideas He
became internationally famous with his Essays (1841
1844) including Self-Reliance Representative Men
(1850) consists of biographies of historical figures The Conduct of Life (1860) his most mature work reveals a
developed humanism and a full awareness of human
limitations His Poems (1847) and May-Day (1867)
established his reputation as a major poet
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 131
CHAPTER SEVEN
EMERSONrsquoS SPIRITUAL QUEST AND INDIAN THOUGHT
INTRODUCTION
Ralph Waldo Emerson the lsquoSage of Concordrsquo as he is
rightly called was an American seer who came into the
world at a time when East and the West were gradually
coming closer to each other in spheres more than one
trade and commerce between the two was gaining
momentum and above all the era of inter-
communication of ideas intellect and spirit was being
ushered in by exchange of books
Emerson was one of the first great Americans who
absorbed himself sufficiently in this phenomenon
ventured into the sacred literature of India and
assimilated its thought to such a remarkable degree that
he became its eminent interpreter to his countrymen in
particular and to the entire West in general
EMERSON AND THE GITA
Let us see what Swami Vivekananda said about the
source of Emersonrsquos inspiration Swamiji said
ldquoThe greatest incident of the (Mahabharata) war was the marvelous and immortal poem of the Gita the Song Celestial It is the popular scripture of India and the loftiest of all teachings I would advise those of you who have not read that book to read it If you only knew how
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 132
much it has influenced your own country (America) even If you want to know the source of Emersonrsquos inspiration it is this book the Gita He went to see Carlyle and Carlyle made him a present of the Gita and that little book is responsible for the Concord Movement All the broad movements in America in one way or other are indebted to the Concord partyrdquo
His interest in the sacred writings of India was probably
aroused at Harvard and he kept it aglow throughout his
life With his motto ldquoTomorrow to fresh fields and pastures newrdquo he set out in search of the True (Satyam)
the Good (Shivam) and the Beautiful (Sundaram)
In busy and bustling New England there came forward
to quote Theodore Parker ldquothis young David a shepherd but to be a king with his garlands and singing robes about him one note upon his new and fresh-string lyre was worth a thousand menrdquo
With unflinching faith in Truth Righteousness and
Beauty and absolute confidence in all the attributes of
infinity he drank deep at the unfailing source of Indian
philosophy and religion and gave his thoughts such a
lucid inimitable expression that his writings have
become a veritable treasure of world literature Revered
the world over held in high esteem by great Indians like
Rabindranath Tagore and Pt Jawaharlal Nehru and
admired by Gandhiji his writings abound in the beauty
of his speech the majesty of his ideas and the loftiness
of his moral sentiments
Perhaps the most fitting commentary on the relevance
of his thoughts to our country was made by Mahatma
Gandhi after reading his Essays Said Mahatma Gandhi
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 133
ldquoThe Essays to my mind contain the teaching of Indian wisdom in a Western Guru It is interesting to see our own sometimes differently fashionedrdquo
There are indeed innumerable points of similarity in
thought and experience between Emerson and the
mainstream of Indian philosophy The philosophy of
Vedanta which was one of the thought currents that
reached America in the first half of the 19th century
influenced Emerson deeply and contributed largely to
his concept of lsquoselfhoodrsquo Emerson found the Vedic
doctrines of soul congenial to his own ideas about manrsquos
relationship to the universe He therefore drew freely
upon the Hindu scriptures which contain a vivid and
well-elaborated doctrine of lsquoSelfrsquo Numerous references
in his essays and journals to the lsquoLaws of Manursquo
(Manusmriti) Vishnu Puran Bhagvad Gita and Katha Upanishad bear ample testimony to this fact
Let us examine some of the striking identities between
Emerson and the Vedanta The Upanishads tell us that
the central core of onersquos self is clearly identifiable with
the Cosmic Reality ldquoThe self within you the resplendent immortal person is the internal self of all things and is the Universal Brahmanrdquo The Chhandogya Upanishad tells
us that ldquothe self which inhabits the body is verily the Brahman and that as soon as the mortal coil is thrown over it will finally merge in Brahmanrdquo
How close was Emersonrsquos spiritual kinship with the
Vedantic doctrines is clear from the following lines
taken from his essay Plato or the Philosopher
ldquoIn all nations there are minds which incline to dwell in the conception of the Fundamental Unity the ecstasy of losing all being in one Being This tendency
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 134
finds its highest expression chiefly in the Indian scriptures in the Vedas the Bhagvad Gita and the Vishnu Puranrdquo
He further quotes Lord Krishna speaking to a sage ldquoYou are fit to apprehend that you are not distinct from meThat which I am thou art and that also in this world with its gods and heroes and mankind Men contemplate distinctions because they are stupefied with ignorance What is the great end of all you shall now learn from me It is soul-one in all bodies pervading uniform perfect pre-eminent over nature exempt from birth growth and decay Omnipresent made up of true knowledge independent unconnected with unrealities with name species and the rest in time past present and to come The knowledge that this spirit which is essentially one is in onersquos own and all other bodies is the wisdom of one who knows the unity of thingsrdquo
In formulating his own concept of the Over-soul
Emerson quotes Lord Krishna once again
ldquoWe live in succession in division in parts in particles Meantime within man is the soul of the whole the wise silence the universal beauty to which every part and particle is equally related the eternal One And this deep power in which we exist and whose beatitude is all accessible to us is not only self-sufficing and perfect in every hour but in the act of seeing and the thing seen the seer and the spectacle the subject and the object are one We see the world piece by piece as the sun the moon the animal the tree but the whole of which these are shining parts is the Soul Only by the vision of that wisdom can the horoscope of ages be readrdquo
The Over-Soul
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 135
A transcendentalist par excellence Emerson who was
influenced by German philosophers like Kant Hegel
Fichte and Schelling and their English interpreters
Coleridge and Carlyle affirmed that man could
apprehend reality by direct spiritual insight To him
intuition knew truths which ldquotranscendedrdquo those
accessible to intellect logical argument and scientific
inquiry Such a transcendentalism or attitude which
provided a metaphysical justification for the ideal of
individual freedom was found writ large in the holy
books of India
Steeped as he was in the oriental lore echoes of
Vedantic philosophy can be distinctly heard in his
writings which shine like ldquoa good deed in a naughty worldrdquo
Some of his poems resemble Vedantic literature in form
as well as in content His two famous poems Brahma
and Hamatreya are striking examples of such a close
affinity both in content and expression Ideas and
images in Brahma reflect certain passages which
Emerson had copied into his journals from the Vishnu
Puran the Bhagvad Gita and Katha Upanishad The first
stanza of Brahma which reads
ldquoIf the red slayer think he slays
Or if the slain think he is slain
They know not well the subtle ways
I keep and pass and turn againrdquo
is essentially an adaptation of these lines from the
Katha Upanishad
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 136
ldquoIf the slayer thinks I slay if the slain thinks I am slain then both of them do not know well It (the soul) does not slay nor is it slainrdquo
Katha Upanishad II19
The same lines with a little variation of course appear
in the Bhagvad Gita
ldquoThey are both ignorant he who knows that the soul to be capable of killing and he who takes it as killed for verily the soul neither kills nor is killedrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II19
The image of Brahma as a red slayer has been derived
from the Vishnu Puran where Lord Shiva the destroyer
of Creation has been depicted as Rudra (the red slayer)
but destruction envisages new creation and therefore
symbolizes the decadence of one and necessitates the
advent of the other This is why Lord Shiva is regarded
as the god not only of extermination but also of
regeneration With this concept is connected the cult of
Shaivagam ndash the ushering in of an era of general good
and prosperity when the world is created anew
The second and third stanzas of Brahma echo the
following lines of the Bhagvad Gita
ldquoI am the ritual action I am the sacrifice I am the ancestral oblation I am the sacred hymn I am the melted butter I am the fire and I am the offeringrdquo
Bhagvad Gita IX16
and also from the same source
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 137
ldquoI am immortality as well as death I am being as well as non-beingrdquo
Bhagvad Gita IX19
In the fourth stanza of Brahma there is a direct
reference to lsquothe Sacred Sevenrsquo ndash the seven highest saints
of our country namely Kashyapa Atri Bharadwaj Vishwamitra Gautam Vashishtha and Jamadagni Thus
we find that Brahma embodies an age-old Vedantic
truth
As regards his next poem Hamatreya its very title is a
variation of a disciplersquos name lsquoMaitreyarsquo to whom the
earth had recited a few verses Before we examine the
poem critically let us read a long passage from the
Vishnu Puran Book IV which Emerson had copied into
his 1845 Journal This passage which sheds ample light
on the background and theme of the poem under
reference reads
ldquoKings who with perishable frames have possessed this ever-enduring world and who blinded with deceptive notions of individual occupation have indulged the feeling that suggests lsquoThis earth is mine it is my sonrsquos it belongs to my dynastyrsquo have all passed awayearth laughs as if smiling with autumnal flowers to behold her kings unable to effect the subjugation of themselvesthese were the verses Maitreya which earth recited and by listening to which ambition fades away like snow before the windrdquo
Journals VII127-130
How futile is human vanity and how ridiculous is the
possessive instinct in man has been thoroughly exposed
by Emerson in the following lines
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 138
ldquoEarth laughs in flowers to see her boastful boys
Earth-proud proud of the earth which is not theirs
Who steer the plough but cannot steer their feet
Clear of the graverdquo
Hamatreya
Man who awaits lsquothe inevitable hourrsquo forgets that all his
heraldry pomp power wealth and lsquopaths of gloryrsquo lead
him lsquobut to the graversquo and grows so proud of his material
achievements and so deeply attached to the fleeting
things of the world that he loses sight of the supreme
philosophical truth - the ephemerality of the world and
the immortality of soul Death which is lurking in the
shadows can lay his icy hands upon us any day yet due
to false pride and sense of meum and attachment we
allow ourselves to be duped by the passing show of the
world without ever thinking of salvation or final release
from the worldly bondages Says Emerson
ldquoAh the hot owner sees not Death who adds
Him to his land a lump of mould the morerdquo
Hamatreya
Here Emerson seems to have been deeply influences by
Indian scriptures and particularly Ishopanishad and
the Bhagvad Gita in which the philosophy of God-
realization through detached action has been succinctly
elaborated In these two sacred books it has been stated
that total renunciation of the sense of meum egotism
and attachment with regard to the world all worldly
objects body and all actions is a path to real love for
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 139
God All worldly objects like land wealth house clothes
all relations like parents wife children friends and all
forms of worldly enjoyment like honour fame prestige
being the creations of Maya are wholly deluding
transient and perishable whereas one God alone the
embodiment of Existence (Sat) Knowledge (Chit) and
Bliss (Anand) is all in all omnipotent omniscient and
omnipresent Therefore all sense of meum egotism and
attachment must be totally renounced for spiritual
growth and pure exclusive love for God If the seed of
egoism is sown sorrow is the fruit On the other hand
the more a man cultivates dispassion and
disinterestedness with regard to the world the more
easily he transcends the barriers of Ignorance (Avidya)
Delusion (Maya) and Aversion (Dvesha) and marches
on the path of self-realization and God-realization A
similar thought current runs through the following
memorable lines of Earth-Song which forms an integral
part of the poem
ldquoThe earth says
They called me theirs who so controlled me
Yet every one wished to stay and is gone
How am I theirs if they cannot hold me
But I hold themrdquo
Hamatreya
These lines remind us of those memorable words of
Lord Krishna in the Bhagvad Gita XII16 where a true
devotee is characterized as one who is ldquodelivered from the egorsquos thrall - the sense of I and minerdquo or the feeling of
doership in all undertakings
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 140
After reading these lines which seem to refer to the
famous Biblical phrase lsquodust thou art to dust returnethrsquo
the readers may feel called upon to cultivate a sense of
detachment and renunciation for their ambition fades
away and their lsquoavarice cooled like dust in the chill of the graversquo
All art it has been said is an attempt to distract man
from his ego Emersonrsquos Hamatreya is certainly an
illustrious example of great art Highly didactic in
content and tone this poem reminds us of that sublime
mood in which Emerson realized the futility of
egocentric attachment to earth and its fleeting objects
which are shadows rather than substances
Emersonrsquos writings leave us to quote John Milton lsquoCalm of mind all passions spentrsquo A fitting comment on the
total impact of Emersonrsquos works on us has been given
by a brilliant American man of letters Theodore Parker
who says
ldquoA good test of the comparative value of books is the state they leave you in Emerson leaves you tranquil resolved on noble manhood fearless of the consequences he gives men to mankind and mankind to the laws of Godrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 141
HD THOREAU
(12 July 1817 ndash 6 May 1862)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 142
HD THOREAU
US Thinker Essayist and Naturalist
Thoreau graduated from Harvard University and taught
school for several years before leaving his job to
become a poet of nature Back in Concord he came
under the influence of Ralph Waldo Emerson and began
to publish pieces in the Transcendentalist magazine The Dial In the years 1845ndash47 to demonstrate how
satisfying a simple life could be he lived in a hut beside
Concords Walden Pond essays recording his daily life
were assembled for his masterwork Walden (1854) His
A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers (1849)
was the only other book he published in his lifetime He
reflected on a night he spent in jail protesting the
Mexican-American War in the essay Civil
Disobedience (1849) which would later influence such
figures as Mohandas K Gandhi and Martin Luther King
Jr In later years his interest in Transcendentalism
waned and he became a dedicated abolitionist His
many nature writings and records of his wanderings in
Canada Maine and Cape Cod display the mind of a keen
naturalist After his death his collected writings were
published in 20 volumes and further writings have
continued to appear in print
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 143
CHAPTER EIGHT
THOREAUrsquoS TRYST WITH INDIAN CULTURE
INTRODUCTION
Henry David Thoreau was a great American
transcendentalist thinker His seminal mind and
original thought had an enduring impact on his own
countrymen and also on peoples beyond the bounds of
America His philosophy and life had a deep influence
on all great men of his time Mahatma Gandhi regarded
him as his Guru and his concept of Satyagraha owes its
origin to Thoreaursquos essay on Civil Disobedience which
Gandhiji chanced upon in South Africa On Thoreaursquos
greatness another great American contemporary RW
Emerson once remarked ldquoHis soul was made for the noblest society he had in short life exhausted the capabilities of this world Wherever there is knowledge wherever there is virtue wherever there is beauty he will find a homerdquo
HIS LOVE OF SOLITUDE
Endowed with a rare meditative mind Thoreau loved
lsquosweet solitudersquo for he held that what is truly alone is the
spirit A seeker after perfection he retired to the
solitude of the woods to see with the eyes of the soul ndash
ldquothe higher law in naturerdquo and realize his oneness with
the Cosmic Spirit A lover of the spirit behind the world
of appearance he once said ndash ldquoI love to be alone I never
found the companion that was so companionable as
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 144
solitude In solitude of the woods I suddenly recover my
spirits my spirituality I can go from the buttercups to
the life everlastingrdquo His love for loneliness resembles
that of our own sages and saints who shunned the din
and clamour of madding crowds and retired to the
sylvan solitude of the woods for meditation on
mysteries of life It was in the secluded and tranquil
atmosphere of the woods that the great teachers of
mankind cultivated their souls observed austerity and
wrote the holiest scriptures Aranyakas and sacred texts
Gurukul (forest academies)- the ideal nurseries of
higher learning and disciplined rigorous life were setup
here for success in life and self-realization which is a
path-way to God-realization
HIS CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE AND GANDHIJIrsquoS
SATYAGRAHA
Bapu read Thoreaursquos essay on Civil Disobedience for
the second time in jail and was so deeply impressed by
it that he called it ldquoa masterly treatise which left a deep impression on merdquo He copied the words ldquoI did not feel for a moment confined and the walls seemed a great waste of stone and mortarrdquo Gandhiji wrote to Roosevelt
in 1942 ldquoI have profited greatly by the writings of Thoreau and Emersonrdquo He told Roger Baldwin that
Thoreaursquos essay ldquocontained the essence of his political philosophy not only as Indiarsquos struggle related to the British but as to his own views of the relation of citizens to Governmentrdquo As Miller observed ldquoGandhiji received back from America what was fundamentally the philosophy of India after it had been distilled and crystallized in the mind of Thoreaurdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 145
In his Civil Disobedience which as a document of
much ethical and spiritual value is manrsquos most powerful
weapon in dealing with tyranny Thoreau examines the
relation of the individual to the state and offers a candid
exposition when he says ldquoThat Government is best which governs the leastrdquo He believed in the supremacy of
moral laws and his concept of Civil Disobedience is
based on the dictates of conscience Since the nature of
an individual is determined by his conscience there is
always a basic conflict between the laws arbitrarily
made by the Government and the objectives sanctioned
and held sacred by the individualrsquos conscience He
regarded the individual as more important than the
state So in the interests of justice and virtue men with
clean conscience most oppose unjust laws The form of
protest launched by conscientious and holy men against
government is called Civil Disobedience
Thoreau seems to have derived the concept from the
Bhagvad Gita which invests each individual with two
contradictory traits ndash the Divine Attributes and the
Diabolical Propensities Whenever diabolical tendencies
promote arbitrary administration by making unjust
laws and men of clean conscience are forced to obey
them injustice prevails and justice or righteousness is
destroyed In such a situation the Divinity incarnates
itself and sets matters right Declares Lord Krishna
ldquoWhenever righteousness (Virtue) is on the decline and injustice (Vice) is on the ascendant then I body forth myselfrdquo
Bhagvad Gita IV7
To Gandhiji also Satya (Truth) and Ahimsa (Non-
violence) are inter-related and Satyagraha or non-
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 146
violent resistance is based on the belief in the power of
spirit the power of truth the power of love by which we
can overcome evil through self-suffering and self-
sacrifice
FORMATIVE INDIAN INFLUENCES
Thoreau was thoroughly immersed in the Indian
scriptures In Emersonrsquos library he read and was deeply
influenced by the Manusmriti Bhagvad Gita Vishnu Puran Hitopadesh Rig-Veda and the Upanishads
Which the Manusmriti led him to seek the Self in
solitude the Bhagvad Gita taught him the ideal of
disinterested action non-attachment meditation and
self-realization He was so overwhelmed by the Gita that
he declared it to be the lsquoUniversal Gospelrsquo Praising its
moral grandeur and sustained sublimity of thoughts he
wrote in Walden ndash ldquoIn the morning I bathe my intellect in the stupendous cosmogonal philosophy of the Bhagvad Gita since whose composition years of the gods have elapsed and in comparison with which our modern world and its literature seems puny and trivial the best Hindu scripture (Gita) is remarkable for its pure intellectuality The reader is nowhere raised into and sustained in a higher purer and rarer region of thought than the Bhagvad Gita It is unquestionably one of the noblest and most sacred scriptures which have come down to us The oriental philosophy assigns their due rank respectively to action and contemplation or rather does full Justice to the latterrdquo
A thorough study of the Upanishads made him exclaim
joyfully ldquoWhat extracts from the Vedas I have read fall on me like the light of a higher and purer luminary which describes a loftier course through a purer stratum ndash free from particulars simple universalrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 147
At a time when the Western philosophers did not
appreciate the significance of contemplation Thoreau
emphasized that contemplation is as important as
action for the latter has to be charged by the former
otherwise action will lead to chaos disillusionment and
despair
HIS TRANSCENDENTALISM
Thoreau was an empirical transcendentalist To him
transcendentalism was a profound exploration of the
spiritual foundations of life His emphasis on intuition
or inner light for a direct relationship with God which
transcends all the conventional avenues of
communication stemmed from an intuitive capacity for
grasping the ultimate truth He was interested less in
the material world than in spiritual reality He regarded
Nature as a viable garment of the spiritual world and
the universe as the embodiment of a single Cosmic Soul
His transcendentalism relied upon the higher planes of
human circumstances its oneness with something
higher than itself While logical reasoning fails to grasp
the truth intuition transcends understanding and is a
synthesizing power to understand the organic whole
which is called the Over-soul
An individual of exceptional self-ascending and self-
reliance he believed that Over-soul is brought down to
earth by action rather than words He therefore did not
preach transcendentalism but actually lived it To him
transcendentalism is ldquoan inquisitive and contemplative access to Godrdquo He believed in the immanence of God in
nature and in man and also the identity of God with the
soul of the individual He said ldquothe creator is still behind the increate the Divinity is so fleeting that its attributes are never expressedthe idea of God is the idea of
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 148
our Spiritual nature purified and enlarged to infinity In ourselves are the elements of Divinity We see God around us because He dwells within usrdquo
This statement reminds us of a verse in the Gita
wherein Lord Krishna declares that every living heart is
His abode
ldquoArjuna God abides in the heart of all creatures causing them to revolve according to their deeds by His illusive power seated as those beings are in the vehicle of the bodyrdquo
At one place Thoreau said ldquoThe whole is whole an organic whole which is called Over-soul or Para-Brahman and the highest aim of life is to realize this truth and be one with the whole or Over-soulrdquo Thoreau seems to have
been moved by our Vedic incantation which says
ldquoThat (the invisible Absolute) is whole whole is this (the visible phenomenal universe) from the invisible whole comes forth the visible whole Though the visible whole has come out from that invisible whole yet the whole remains unalteredrdquo Thus the phenomenal and the
Absolute are inseparable All existence is in the
Absolute and whatever exists must exist in it hence all
manifestation is merely a modification of the one
Supreme Whole and neither increases nor diminishes It
Serene and thoughtful as he was he wrote in his
Journal ldquoThe fact is I am a mystic a transcendentalist and a natural philosopher to bootrdquo
HIS ASCETISM (SANNYASA)
He was a true ascetic or Sannyasi for he preached and
practiced the basic human values of Anasakti (non-
attachment) and Aparigraha (non-possession)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 149
throughout his life He abhorred acquisition of wealth
and regarded worldly possessions as the result of sheer
exploitation of the masses by a few powerful men and
agencies including the State and the Government Since
the universe belongs to God any claim to ownership or
personal possessions is against moral law and is in fact
a sin against divinity Moral laws being superior to
worldly rules his preference for a life of self-abnegation
and renunciation bears a striking similarity to our Vedic
view expressed in the very opening line of the
Ishopanishad
ldquoAll this whatever exists in the universe is inhabited by the Lord Having renounced (the unreal) enjoy (the real) with restraint Do not covet or set your eye on the possession of othersrdquo
To him all worldly attractions and allurements were but
a passing show or fleeting moments (in eternity) which
distract the seekers of truth from cultivating self-culture
and promoting inner spiritual growth
EXPLORER OF THE INNER WORLD OF SPIRIT
Thoreau was an explorer of the inner self He wanted to
pass ldquoan invisible boundaryrdquo establishment within and
around him new universal and more liberal laws and
live with higher order of beings To him every man is
the Lord of the realm beside which the earthly empire
of the Czar is but a petty state a hammock left by the
icethere are continents and seas in the moral
world yet unexplored by him He praised William
Habbingtonrsquos following lines which echoed his own
thoughts
ldquoDirect your eyes right inward and you will find
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 150
A thousand regions in your mind
Yet undiscovered Travel then and be
Expert in home home cosmographyrdquo
Simple living based on extreme reduction of wants and
self-reliance enabled him to lsquocultivate the garden of his soulrsquo In consonance with the concept of an ideal Yogi in
the Gita he wrote
ldquoThe millions are awake enough for physical labour but only one in a million is awake enough for effective intellectual exertion and only one in a hundred millions do a poetic or divine liferdquo How truly does this view echo
the memorable words of Lord Krishna
ldquoAmong thousands of men one rare soul strives for perfection and among those who strive with success one perchance knows me in truthrdquo
Condemning people who go to Africa to hunt giraffes for
pastime he exhorted them to aim at seeking their own
lsquoSelfrsquo He said ldquoIt would be a noble game to shoot onersquos selfrdquo He seems to recall the famous verse of the
Mundakopanishad which says
ldquoThe Pranava is the bow the Atman is the arrow and the Brahman is said to be its mark It should be hit by one who is self-collected and that which hits becomes like the arrow one with the mark ie Brahmanrdquo
When he ordains lsquoto shoot oneselfrsquo he like our Vedic
seers hints at penetrating the truth centre in us with
our mind propelled by the motive force generated in the
voiceless ecstasy of deepest meditation which touches
the Brahman the Ultimate Reality When the individual
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 151
soul gets fully detached from its contacts with matter or
its false identification with material envelopment it
realizes its oneness with the Supreme Brahman How
beautifully has he stressed the value of inner search in
the concluding sentence of Walden
ldquoThe light which puts out our eyes is darkness to us Only that day dawns to which we are awake There is more day to dawn The Sun is but a morning starrdquo
IMMORTALITY OF SOUL AND THE DOCTRINE OF
TRANSMIGRATION
Thoreau firmly believed in the immortality of soul and
its transmigration He had fully imbibed the philosophy
of the Gita which enunciates in unequivocal terms the
permanence of the soul and the transience of the body
Says Lord Krishna
ldquoThis soul is never born and never dies nor does it become only after being born For it is unborn eternal everlasting and ancient even though the body is slain the soul is notrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II20
ldquoAs a man shedding worn-out garments takes other new ones likewise the embodied soul casting off worn-out bodies enters into others which are newrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II22
Thoreau considered his life as a series of many more
lives to come On his return from Waldon Pond he said
ldquoI had several more lives to live and could not spare any more for that onerdquo At another place he refers to the
solitary hired manrsquos lsquosecond birth and peculiar religious
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 152
experiencersquo He evidently recalled the following words of
St John ldquoExcept a man be born again he cannot see the kingdom of Godrdquo In his Waldon he refers to a bug and
declares ldquoWho does not feel his faith in a resurrection and immortality Who knows what beautiful and winged whose egg has been buried for ages under many concentric layers of woodenness in the dead dry life in societyheard perchance of gnawing out now for years by the astonished family of man may unexpectedly come forth from amidst societyrsquos most trivial furniture to enjoy its perfect summer life at lastrdquo
CONCLUSION
Thoreau was a true Yogi or an ascetic modeling on the
Indian tradition of strict moral code of conduct for a
Sannyasi He drew abundant spiritual and moral
sustenance from the Indian scriptures and its rich
lsquoculturersquo and approximated the ideal of a perfect recluse
The concept of an ideal Yogi is similar upto a point to
the postulates of Divinity expressed thus in the Atharva Veda
ldquoThe Yogi is desireless and hence free from the impact of animal nature he is serene in the heroism of the spirit he is satisfied with the essence of things perceived spirituality and hence does not depend on sense-perception for happiness and so he is complete in himself And though the physical body is subject to decay and death he remains unworn and ever youthful in spirit and has no fear of deathrdquo
Atharva Veda XVIII44
Such an enlightenment Yogi or spiritual superman was
Thoreau whose greatness will ever inspire us and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 153
illumine our lifersquos path with light and love His life was
lsquoa chronicle of actions just and brightrsquo and his writings
were lsquowrit with beams of heavenly light on which the eyes of God not rarely lookrsquo
Proof
Printed By Createspace
Digital Proofer
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 8
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
I wish to express my indebtedness to all my near and
dear ones and tender grateful acknowledgements to my
wife Mrs Rajeshwari Dwivedi for her implied and
inspiring encouragement and particularly to my
nephew Raghav Dwivedi without whose willing co-
operation unfailing assistance and untiring labour the
publication of this compact volume would not have
been possible
My grateful thanks are also due to Bhartiya Vidya Bhavan Mumbai and Gita Press Gorakhpur for their
kind permission to include in this volume as many as
seven articles published in their esteemed periodicals
viz lsquoBhavanrsquos Journalrsquo and lsquoKalyana-Kalpatarursquo
respectively
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 9
CONTENTS
Introduction 10
1 Indian Spiritualism in Blakersquos Poetry 27
2 Vedanta in Wordsworthrsquos Poetry 47
3 Coleridgersquos Spiritual Quest and Indian Thought 62 4 Byron A Blend of Clay and Spark 79
5 Shelley A Pilgrim of Eternity 95
6 John Keats A Minstrel of Beauty and Truth 119 7 Emersonrsquos Spiritual Quest and Indian Thought 131
8 Thoreaursquos Tryst with Indian Culture 143
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 10
INTRODUCTION
Quest for Truth has always been manrsquos eternal passion
and pursuit Since the very dawn of human civilization
he has been at pains to unravel the mystery that
shrouds life and the world around him And yet the
enigmatic phenomenon of the universe is to quote
Tennyson ldquoan arch wherethrorsquo gleams that untraveled world whose margin fades forever and foreverrdquo as man
moves to reach it but it is never too late ldquoto seek a newer worldrdquo
Manrsquos basic faith and his dauntless persistence in
attaining truth both in the physical world and spiritual
sphere sustains his endeavour and impels him to move
into lsquofresh woods and pastures newrsquo In this sense both
Science and Religion have the identical aim of
discovering Truth and thus helping man to grow
materially and spiritually to achieve fulfillment The
yearning of the poets (selected here) for exploring and
expressing Ultimate Truth or Eternity has been
highlighted
This little volume of articles written at leisure from time
to time as a creative pastime reflects a modest attempt
at tracing out the main thought-currents of the major
English Romantic Poets and two prominent American
Transcendentalists ndash RW Emerson and HD Thoreau
and co-relating them with our own philosophical
thought and rich religio-spiritual heritage
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 11
Since these articles represent my stray and occasional
thoughts they have no claim to a thorough or
comparative study or a comprehensive coverage of all
aspects of the poets The perspective chosen is confined
to some of the distinct echoes of the Vedantic thought in
the poems of selected poets but their publication in the
journals of international repute is indicative of their
acceptance and appeal and their role in blazing the
trails for a further study of their subject for research
scholars and others
The poets in this selection have taken life in its fullness
encompassing both matter and spirit ndash the visible world
and the invisible universe beyond it They have
conceived of the shadow (world) not without substance
and movement not without a moving spirit behind it
Like our own Vedic poetry the poetry of these poets is
intensely religious in the sense of their having felt the
living presence of the Divine in the beauty and glory of
the universe Again like our ancient Vedic poets their
poetry was born out of a joyous and radiant spirit
overflowing with love of life energy for action and a
vision of divinity which needed serene faith for
inspiration They were all transported into another
world by a rare spiritual exaltation for they aspired for
revelation of the inner truth of Reality in their souls
Moreover like our Vedic hymns their poems flowed like
fresh and clear streams gushing out of rocky mountains
as our ancient sages had described long ago lsquoLike joyous streams bursting from the mountain our songs have sounded to Brihaspati (preceptor of Gods)rsquo
What Emerson said of Thoreaursquos greatness could also be
applied to a great extent to most of the poets selected
here Emerson remarked ldquoHis soul was made for the
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 12
noblest society he had in short life exhausted the capabilities of this world Wherever there is knowledge wherever there is virtue wherever there is beauty he will find a homerdquo
These articles amply prove the fundamental fallacy of
Rudyard Kiplingrsquos assertion that ldquothe East is east and the West is west and the twain shall never meetrdquo but
contrary to his view the East and the West represent
complementary views of the world While the West
gives us the perfection and joy of eternal beauty in the
outer world as expressed by Keats the East gives us lsquothe
splendor and joy of the Infinite in the inner world of
Soulrsquos visionrsquo
That the physicist and the mystic reach the truth of
essential unity of all things and events by following
different paths has been beautifully described by
modern scientist Dr Frijof Capra ldquoThus the mystic and the physicist arrive at the same conclusion one starting from the inner realm the other from the outer world The harmony between their views confirms the ancient Indian wisdom that Brahman the ultimate reality without is identical to Atman the reality withinrdquo
Clear and identical traces of our Vedic thought and
scriptural ideas are found scattered all over the corpus
of their poetic works If we take up the outstanding
ideas of each poet for our consideration we find their
striking resemblance with what abounds in our spiritual
heritage Let us consider their predominant thoughts
which find a distinct echo in our Vedic and holy texts
William Blake who was the most prophetic of all
major English poets seems to have attained the rare
super-sensory or transcendental state of consciousness
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 13
which enabled him to perceive reflective communion
with God Such a transcendental perception of Divinity
in all creation and all creation in Divinity gave him a
subtle insight into the lsquovisions of eternityrsquo In other
words this contemplative vision of Infinity in the Finite
and the Finite in Infinity has been regarded as the
distinguishing mark of pure wisdom by Lord Krishna in
the Gita ndash ldquoWhen one sees Eternity in things that pass away and Infinity in finite things then one has pure (सािवक) wisdomrdquo [XVIII20] It was this intimation of
eternity that made Blake declare
ldquoTo see the world in a grain of sand
And a Heaven in a wild flower
Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand
And Eternity in an hourrdquo
Auguries of Innocence
Moreover he strongly condemned man-made divisions
of humanity into numerous castes and creeds and
preached universal brotherhood based on love
understanding and sacrifice
ldquofor man is love
And God is love Every kindness to another is a little death
In the divine image nor can man exist but by brotherhoodrdquo
Jerusalem
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 14
And again he says
ldquoWhere mercy love and pity dwell
There God is dwelling toordquo
The Divine Image
William Wordsworth was essentially a seer-poet He
was perhaps the first English poet to appreciate the
innate kinship of man with Nature and find in her a
calm and invisible spiritual presence in perfect
communion with the Cosmic Soul He recognized the
essential spiritual unity of all things and the
interpenetration of human life with that of the universe
His poetic faith was based on an indwelling spirit in
nature which interpenetrated all life and transformed
and transfigured with its radiance rocks fields trees
and the people who lived close to them He found
something that permeates and transfigures everything
He perceived this indwelling spirit and the vision of the
Infinite (God) in his poetry He concluded that Nature
being the manifestation of God is our best moral guide
and teacher
ldquoOne impulse from a vernal wood
May teach you more of man
Of moral evil and of good
Than all the sages canrdquo
In his Ode to the Intimations of Immortality which is
his spiritual autobiography he expresses his belief in
pre-existence which is also an article of faith in our
scriptural texts
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 15
ldquoOur birth is but a sleep and a forgetting
The soul that rises with us our lifersquos star
Hath had elsewhere its setting
And cometh from afarrdquo
His mystical experience of lsquothat serene and blessed moodrsquo in which we lsquoare laid asleep in body and become a living soulrsquo and his perception of lsquoa sense sublime of something more deeply interfuseda motion and a spirit that impels all thinking things all objects of all thought and rolls through all thingsrsquo reflect not only
his profound pantheism but also find close parallels in
our own religio-spiritual literature
Samuel Taylor Coleridge who was one of the seminal
minds of his generation possessed the most fertile
imagination According to William Hazlitt he lsquohad angelic wings and fed on mannarsquo for his writings are
ethereal mystical and magical Endowed with a rare
lsquomystic idealismrsquo he was besides being a great poet a
speculative philosopher also who considered life as lsquoa vision shadowy of Truthrsquo He justified the phrase ndash
lsquoRenaissance of wonderrsquo for he revived the supernatural
and invested it with indefiniteness and suggestion
which characterize his imagination He drew his
conceptions from lsquomythrsquo and embodied them with
symbols His images express his emotion spiritual state
and metaphysical experience Unlike other poets his
poetry grew from his inner organic law and made
supernatural and romantic subjects credible to human
nature by creating lsquothat willing suspension of disbeliefrsquo that constitutes his poetic faith He was the first great
British idealist of his age who preferred the intellectual
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 16
intuition to the conceptual dialectic The image and
vision of God lsquoimago deirsquo as an intellectual
contemplation (speculari) of the transcendent Absolute
(the prius) of all beings is an aspect of his speculative
mysticism
Byron however stands apart from all other poets
included herein for although his philosophy of life was
altogether different from that of his contemporaries he
was a force a portent and historical phenomenon in his
age He was endowed with a rare fire for liberty
indomitable courage sacrificing spirit and prophetic
zeal which are undoubtedly great human values His
inevitable attitude was revolt both social and personal
As an influence and portent he was the most powerful
poet in his age for he created that Byronic legend which
became a historic phenomenon of lasting fascination of
his personality Endowed with fiery energy his self-
portrait of careless arrogance or even daemonic figure
was a persona of romantic panache He was a portrait
and a symbol whom it was possible to worship or
condemn but never to neglect
PB Shelley who was lsquoone frail form ndash a phantom among men companionlessrsquo (Adonais) occupies a
unique position among Romantic poets Essentially he
was a visionary whose philosophy of enlightenment
made his poetry fanciful and ethereal He was a born
revolutionary who launched a crusade against the
organized religion and society Disgusted by the gloomy
state of the world he dreamed a world of beauty
freedom and virtue and made his poetry a trumpet of
narcissistic fantasy A solitary intellectual lsquowandering companionlessrsquo (Alastor) his poetry is the projection of
his sense of isolation He was fired by rationalist
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 17
revolutionary thought which reflects his visions of the
future Endowed with rationalist speculative intuition
his poetry symbolizes the spirit of human welfare
ldquoI wish no living thing to suffer painrdquo
Prometheus I303
The desire of Shelley reminds us of our scriptural
prayer ndash ldquoसव भवत स13खनः सव सत नरामयाःrdquo His
imagination is idealistic and vision synoptic He deals
with the heavens and light and aspired for the
regeneration of the world through love To him there is
no dualism between the material and spiritual life for
they are the aspects of same reality To him only
Eternity is real while the phenomenal world is but an
illusion or माया ndash a veil that hides true light He echoes a
Vedic truth when he says
ldquoThe One remains the many change and pass
Heavenrsquos light forever shines Earthrsquos shadows fly
Life like a dome of many-coloured glass
Stains the white radiance of Eternityrdquo
Adonais L11
He treats natural objects and forces as symbols for his
own emotional patterns In his lsquoOde to the West Windrsquo
he uses the West Wind as a spirit of destruction and
regeneration or death and rebirth He considers death
as only a prelude to renewed life and this shows his
faith in the transmigration of human soul or the cycle of
death and rebirth He declares
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 18
ldquoIf winter comes can spring be far behindrdquo
Ode to the West Wind
His entire poetry is a vivid and symbolic expression of
the wretched actuality and the radiant idea He wants to
herald a perfect world order based on love and
freedom He treats poetry as a potent instrument of
redemption and it was his deep romantic sensibility and
fanciful ecstatic Platonic love that earned him this
description of lsquopinnacled dim in the intense inanersquo He
was one of the greatest lyricists and an
lsquounacknowledged legislator of the worldrsquo of thought and
imagination
John Keats who in his own words was lsquoa fair creature of an hourrsquo was perhaps the first conscious artist whose
artistic intuition was far ahead of his time By declaring
that ldquoan artist must serve Mammonrdquo he wished to confer
on arts a special status and thus laid the foundation of
the doctrine of lsquoArt for Artrsquos sakersquo His minute delicate
and sensuous observation of the visible world of Nature
inspired his poetry which he wanted to lsquoloadrsquo with a
special excellence His delightful communion with
Nature and the sensuous ecstasies of its sight sound
smell touch and taste formed some of his best poetry
His delicacy and keenness of perception and love for
passive contemplation made him exclaim ndash ldquoO for a life of sensations rather than thoughtrdquo But in fact most of
his sensations were his thoughts for they were
embodied in sensuous pictorial form and rich symbolic
imagery
As a liberal enthusiast he felt that sharing the distress of
humanity or participation in ldquothe agony and strife of human heartsrdquo was essential not only for human growth
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 19
but also for poetic maturity This philanthropic attitude
of Keats brings him very close to our ardent Indian
prayer - ldquoसव भवत स13खनः सव सत नरामयाःrdquo ndash May all be happy may none struck with disease To find an
escape from the fret and fever of life he sought refuge in
an infinite yearning for beauty and turned to the realm
lsquoof Flora and old Panrsquo but soon realized the transience of
the world and started exploring permanence He could
find it in the spirit of beauty which is but a reflection of
eternal truth His passionate pursuit of ideal beauty
which he identified with truth has been beautifully
expressed in the following oft-quoted lines
ldquoBeauty is truth truth beauty that is all
Ye know on earth and all ye need to knowrdquo
Ode on a Grecian Urn
This fundamental unity or oneness of beauty and truth
and their interplay in the visible world are the
mainsprings of his poetic creed
The conflict between transience and permanence forms
the theme of his famous Odes and he longs for a
solution and lasting happiness in the form of Art or lsquoon the viewless wings of Poesyrsquo At the height of his
impassioned contemplation when the life of the spirit is
fused with the objects of immediate sensuous
experience he has glimpses of the permanence of
beauty which reflects Eternal Truth In one of his letters
(281) he declares ldquoI can never feel certain of any truth but from a clean perception of its beautyrdquo And at another
place when he finds mortality and immortality poles
apart he asserts the everlasting value of truth ldquoTruthrdquo
he says ldquomeans that which has lasting valuerdquo This firm
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 20
conviction of Keats seems to be a distinct echo of our
Vedantic dictum
सयमव जयत नानतम सयन पथा वततो दवयानः
यनामतय तत सयय परम नधान ldquoTruth alone triumphs not untruth By truth is laid out the Path Divine along which the seers who are free from desires and cravings ascend the supreme abode of Truthrdquo
Mundak Upanishad III16
Again the Vedic seer says that the Atman (self) is to be
realized only through truth
सयन लampसतपसा यष आमा
मडकोपनषद III15
Thus truth is the foundation of Dharma (righteousness)
for it is an essential and abiding value of human life The
eternal oneness of beauty and truth and vice versa and
their transcendental reality was Keatsrsquo poetic creed and
the realization of this basic spiritual truth raised him to
a level of sublime consciousness which is the mark of a
true seeker of truth or seer
In sum we may say that though lsquoa lily of a dayrsquo Keats
proved that a crowded hour of glory is far better than
an age without a name as has been stressed in our epic
Mahabharat where Queen Vidula exhorts her son
Sanjaya ldquoमहतम 0व1लत 2यो न त धमतम 4चरrdquo ndash ldquoIt is better to flame forth for an instant than to smoke away for agesrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 21
Though Keats died at the young age of 26 years he left
an indelible imprint on the history of English poetry for
his deep and pervasive influence could be easily seen on
Tennysonrsquos early work Moreover he was indisputably
the precursor of the Pre-Raphaelite movement In fact
he had reached near perfection in poetic craftsmanship
which will ever remain worthy of emulation for the
succeeding generations of poets
Ralph Waldo Emerson known as the lsquoSage of Concordrsquo
acted as a bridge between the East and the West His
abiding interest in the Indian scriptures and
particularly the Gita was a source of the Concord
Movement in America According to Swami
Vivekananda all the broad movements in America are
indebted to the Concord Party Mahatma Gandhi
remarked after reading Emersonrsquos Essays ldquoThe Essays to my mind contain the teaching of Indian wisdom in a Western lsquoGurursquo it is interesting to see our own sometimes differently fashionedrdquo Emerson drew freely on the
Upanishads Manusmriti Vishnu Puran and above all
the Gita and his writings reflect his indebtedness to our
holy texts
Pt Jawaharlal Nehru admired Emersonrsquos gospel of self-
reliance and righteousness in particular and regarded
him as one of the builders of America A
transcendentalist and thinker par excellence Emersonrsquos
ideas shaped not only his countrymenrsquos thinking but
had a deep and pervasive influence over many other
nations His main thoughts coloured as they are by our
own Indian religio-philosophical strands are universal
in appeal and are as relevant today as they were in his
own lifetime
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 22
In formulating his concept of Over-Soul Emerson
stressed the fundamental identity of Individual Soul
with Over-Soul He asserted ldquoWithin man is the soul of the whole ndash the wise silence the universal beauty to which every part and particle is equally related the Eternal Oneonly by the vision of that wisdom can the horoscope of ages be readrdquo He firmly believed in the
immortality of soul and the ephemerality of the world
and strongly condemned the futility of manrsquos vanity and
ego-centric attachment to the perishable objects of the
world His writings leave us lsquocalm of mind all passions spentrsquo In fact lsquohe gives men to mankind and mankind to the laws of Godrsquo
Henry David Thoreau was a great empirical
transcendentalist about whom Emerson once remarked
ldquowherever there is knowledge wherever there is virtue wherever there is beauty he will find a homerdquo His essay
on lsquoCivil Disobediencersquo which Gandhiji read twice in a
South African jail impressed him so much so that he
regarded him as his political lsquoGurursquo and his concept of
Satyagraha owes its origin to Thoreaursquos writings
Endowed with a rare meditative mind he loved lsquosweet solitudersquo and retired to the woods for discovering the
lsquohigher lawrsquo and realize his oneness with the Cosmic
Spirit He believed in the supremacy of moral laws and
his doctrine of Civil Disobedience is based on his dictate
of conscience for he considered individual conscience
more important than arbitrary state laws
Thoroughly immersed in the Indian scriptures his
thought-process and philosophy of life was
considerably moulded by our ancient religio-spiritual
heritage His deep love for our scriptural texts is evident
from his declaration of the Gita as lsquoUniversal Gospelrsquo He
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 23
wrote ldquoIn the morning I bathe my intellect in the stupendous cosmogonal philosophy of the Bhagvad GitaIt is unquestionably one of the noblest and most sacred scriptures which have come down to usthe oriental philosophy assigns their due rank respectively to action and contemplationrdquo
About the Vedas he remarked ldquoExtracts from the Vedas fall on me like the light of a higher and purer luminaryrdquo
According to him Over-Soul could be brought down to
earth not by words but by ldquoan inquisitive and contemplative accessrdquo He further states ldquoIn us are the elements of Divinity We see God around us because He dwells within usrdquo
He was a true ascetic (सयासी) for he preached and
practiced non-attachment (अनासि8त) in his life He was
an explorer of the inner world of Spirit In the seclusion
of woods he lsquocultivated the garden of his soul as a true Yogirsquo and he wanted to lsquoshoot his selfrsquo as our Mundaka Upanishad says
ldquoThe Pranava is the bow Atma the arrow the Brahman its mark It should be hit by a self-collected onerdquo
Much of what is stated in this compact volume may be
found scattered over various other critical works but
my earnest endeavour has been to bring together such
material as is of sufficient spiritual value which belongs
to all times This small comparative survey of the realm
of main ideas of some great poets confirms the splendor
of their rich romantic imagination and the unity of all
spiritual vision that makes them not only the creators of
beauty love and light but also brothers in spirit
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 24
I would feel amply rewarded if through this modest
attempt I am able to arouse keen interest in my readers
for further critical study of the subject Any suggestions
for amplification or improvement on the text are most
welcome
RP DWIVEDI
LUCKNOW
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 25
WILLIAM BLAKE
(28 November 1757 ndash 12 August 1827)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 26
WILLIAM BLAKE
English Poet Painter Engraver and Visionary
He was trained as an engraver by James Basire and
afterward attended classes at the Royal Academy Blake
married in 1782 and in 1784 he opened a print shop in
London He developed an innovative technique for
producing coloured engravings and began producing
his own illustrated books of poetrymdashincluding Songs of Innocence (1789) The Marriage of Heaven and Hell (1790) and Songs of Experience (1794)mdashwith his new
method of ldquoIlluminated Printingrdquo Jerusalem (1804[ndash
20]) an epic treating the fall and redemption of
humanity is his most richly decorated book His other
major works include Vala or The Four Zoas
(manuscript 1796ndash1807) and Milton (1804[ndash11]) A
late series of 22 watercolours inspired by the Book of
Job includes some of his best-known pictures He was
called mad because he was single-minded and
unworldly he lived on the edge of poverty and died in
neglect His books form one of the most strikingly
original and independent bodies of work in the Western
cultural tradition Ignored by the public of his day he is
now regarded as one of the earliest and greatest figures
of Romanticism
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 27
CHAPTER ONE
INDIAN SPIRITUALISM IN BLAKErsquoS VISIONS OF ETERNITY
INTRODUCTION
William Blake was by far the most prophetic of all major
English poets In a preface to his famous poem on
Milton he exclaimed lsquoWould to God that all the Lordrsquos people were Prophetsrsquo Elsewhere Blake declared lsquoA Prophet is a seer not an arbitrary dictatorrsquo According to
PH Butter an acclaimed authority on Blake ldquoa prophet sees behind the marks of woe behind the wars and other evils of his time and the attitudes that cause such things But Blake was not the kind of prophet who just present evils but one who saw the Visions of Eternity one whose senses discovered the infinite in everythingrdquo The prophet
is also a spokesman one who speaks or believes he
speaks for God or some other higher power Blake
himself claimed in one of his letters in 1803 ldquoI dare not pretend to be any other than the Secretary the Authors are in Eternityrdquo
His belief in lsquoinspirationrsquo contributed to that lsquoterrifying honestyrsquo which TS Eliot saw in him to keep him
uncompromisingly true to his vision He perceived a
close relationship of the conscious ndash lsquoIrsquo with the deeper
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 28
self through which all inspiration flows He knew that
the prophet must also be a lsquomakerrsquo lsquoa blacksmith laboring at his furnaces to shape the stubborn structure of the languagersquo He further realized that a prophet
should also be a teacher a preacher and a beacon light
to humanity
Explaining the function of the bard or poet (and his own
mission) Blake in his introduction to Songs of Experience declares
ldquoHear the voice of the bard
Who present past and future sees
Whose ears have heard
The Holy word
That walked among the ancient trees
Calling the lapsed soul
And weeping in the evening dew
That might control
The starry pole
And fallen fallen light renewrsquo
Or again elucidating the aim of writing poetry or his
lsquogreat taskrsquo Blake declares
ldquo I rest not from my great task
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 29
To open the Eternal worlds to open the immortal eyes
Of man inwards into the worlds of Thought into Eternity
Ever expanding in the bosom of God the human imaginationrsquo
Like Milton who wanted lsquoto justify the ways of God to Manrsquo or Shelley who held that lsquopoetry is the revelation of the eternal ideas which lie behind the many-coloured ever-shifting veil that we call reality in lifersquo Blake in his
exceptional prophetic zeal set out to open the Eternal
worlds to open the immortal eyes of man inwards into
the worlds of thought into Eternity He was always at
pains to renew the fallen fallen light The poetrsquos divine
task of lsquoever expanding in the bosom of Godrsquo reminds us
of the moving verse of our Rig Veda in which God as
creator of beautiful forms has been conceived of as the
greatest poet whose divine creative energy s his poetic
power which manifests itself in the manifold forms of
beauty and splendor like the Heaven the Sun the Moon
the Sky etc
यो धता भवानानामगया स कवः काया प पपltयत
ऋवद VIII415
lsquoHe who is the supporter of the world of life
Who knows the secret mysterious names of the morning beams
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 30
He poet cherishes manifold forms by His poetic power even as heavenrsquo
Rig Veda VIII415
As a divinely inspired poet Blake seems to have had
experiences of various psychic and even mystic visions
which awakened him to subtle spiritual life It seems
that he must have transcended normal sensory
perceptions and would have attained to super-sensory
status of consciousness when he declares
lsquoI see the savior over me
Spreading his beams of love and dictating the words of mild song
Awake O sleeper of the land of shadows wake
I am in you and you in me mutual in love divinersquo
Jerusalem L4-7
He seems to have attained to that rare transcendental
consciousness when he perceived perfect communion
with God who assured him
lsquoI am not a God afar off I am a brother and friend
Within your bosoms I reside and you reside in me
We are one forgiving all evil not seeking recompensersquo
Jerusalem L18-20
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 31
Here Blake on perceiving a synoptic vision of complete
identity or oneness of God with individual self seems to
have echoed the eternal ancient Holy Scriptures Here
are a few striking parallels
In our Vedas also Go is regarded and adored as our
most-trusted friend Says the Rig Veda
lsquoमा=कर न ऐना सयाच ऋषः
वBमा Cह Dमतमसया 1शवानrsquo
ऋवद X237
lsquoNever may this friendship be severed
Of thee O Deity and the sage Vimada
We know O God Thy brother-like love
With us be Thy auspicious friendshiprsquo
Rig Veda X237
The key-note of this type of worship is the
contemplation of friendly love (described in later
religious literature as - सय ndash friendliness between the
Deity and the worshipper) The following prayer is in
the same spirit
lsquoभवा नः सFन अतमः सखा वधrsquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 32
ऋवद X133
lsquoBe Thou most dear to us for bliss O friend to aidrsquo
Rig Veda X133
Similarly assuring Arjuna of His perennial benediction
Lord Krishna declares in the Gita
ईHवरः सवभतानामतltठत
Kामयसवभतानमायया
ldquoArjuna God abides in the heart of all creatures
Causing them to revolve according to their Karma
By His illusive power seated as those beings are
In the vehicle of the bodyrdquo
Bhagvad Gita XVIII61
And again describing Himself as the truest friend of all
living beings Lord Krishna pronounces
ldquoI am the (disinterested) friend of all living beings and my devotee attains supreme peacerdquo
Bhagvad Gita V29
To turn to William Blake again he has an essential
belief in the closest intimacy of all living beings with
God who is the fountain-head of all life love and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 33
friendship This belief makes him affirm his faith in the
holiness of all life on earth Says he in his Annotations to Lavater
lsquoAll Life is Holyrsquo
Again he says ldquoIt is God in all that is our companion and friend for our God himself says lsquoyou are my brother my sister and my motherrsquo and Saint John said lsquowho so dwelleth in love dwelleth in God and God in himrsquo and such a one cannot judge of any but in loveGod is in lowest effects as well as in the highest causes for he is become a worm that he may nourish the weak For let it be remembered that creation is God descending according to the weakness of man for our Lord is the word of God and everything on earth is the word of God and in its essence is Godrdquo
In our own scriptures the all-pervasiveness of God (the
One) has been conceived not only in the cosmic world
but also in the world of men The very opening verse of
the Ishopanishad stresses the immanence of God in the
universe
ईशावाय इद सवM यािकNय जगया जगत
ईशोपनष I
lsquoUnderstand all this (universe) as inhabited by the Lord
Each moving thing in this moving worldrsquo
Or again says the Atharva Veda
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 34
य समायोऽवPणोयो वदHयः
यो दवोऽवPणोमानषः
lsquoGod is that in which things converge
He is that from which things diverge
He is our own land he is of foreign land
He is divine he is humanrsquo
Atharva Veda IV168
The immanence of God is the entire universe is also
underscored by Lord Krishna when he tells Arjuna
ldquoThere is nothing besides me Arjuna Like clusters of yarn-beads formed by knots all this (universe) is threaded on merdquo
Bhagvad Gita VII7
SYNOPTIC VISION
A firm belief in the all-pervasiveness of God in the
whole universe led him to perceive every object of
Nature as a window through which we may look with a
sense of awe and wonder into the beauty truth and all-
enveloping eternity which is but a reflection of God
Blake must have had palpable intimations of Eternity
when he wrote
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 35
lsquoTo see a world in a grain of sand
And a Heaven in a wild flower
Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand
And Eternity in an hourrsquo
Auguries of Innocence
Such a super-sensuous or transcendental perception of
Divinity in all creation and all creation in Divinity gave
Blake a subtle insight into the lsquoVisions of Eternityrsquo and
made him not only a seer but also lsquoan inhabitant of
other planes another domain of beingrsquo Commenting on
Blakersquos singular other-worldliness our own seer and
prophet Sri Aurobindo says ldquoThere is no other singer of the beyond who is like him or equal him in the strangeness supernatural lucidity power and directness of vision of the beyond and the rhythmic clarity and beauty of his singingrdquo
It is this contemplative knowledge of infinity in finite
and finite in infinity that has been regarded as the
distinguishing mark of the pure wisdom which finally
leads one to transcendental revelation which has been
so beautifully expressed in our own scriptures
सवभतषभावमययमीRत
अवभ8तसािवक
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 36
lsquoWhen one sees Eternity in things that pass away and Infinity in finite things then one has pure knowledgersquo
Bhagvad Gita XVIII20
The same truth has been emphasized again and again in
the Upanishads When man comes to know the real
truth about God nay when he succeeds in realizing the
truth about God how can he ever revile or adversely
criticize any form or aspect of God The Isha Upanishad
says
यत सवा13ण भतान आमयवानपHयत
सवभतष चामना ततो न वजगSसत
ईशोपनष VI
ldquoWhoever beholds all beings in God alone and God in all beings ie who regards all beings as his own self he no more looks down upon any creature for regarding all as his self whom will he hate and howrdquo
Lord Krishna stresses the same equanimity of vision
when he declares
ldquoThe Yogi who is united in identity with the all-pervading infinite consciousness and sees unity everywhere beholds the self present in all beings and all beings as assumed in the selfrdquo
Bhagvad Gita VI29
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Again Lord Krishna declares
यो मा पHयत सव सवM च मय पHयत
तयाह न DणHया1म स च म न DणHयत
भगवगीता VI30
ldquoHe who sees me (the universal self) present in all beings and all beings existing within me never loses sight of me and I never lose sight of himrdquo
Bhagvad Gita VI30
FAITH IN THE LAW OF ETERNITY
Since God is infinite immanent and omnipresent soul
which is an integral and inalienable part of God is also
immortal The forms or objects of the world may change
but in reality they exist forever and are eternal Like
God soul is everlasting unborn undecaying and
undying Blake says
ldquoWhatever can be created can be annihilated
Forms can not
The oak is cut down by the axe the lamb falls by the knife
But their Form Eternal exists for everrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 38
The poet also believes that all sufferings of man if borne
meekly for a noble cause have their rich recompense
sooner or later for God being all-merciful would
certainly reward his suffering children He believes that
lsquoFor a tear is an intellectual thing
And a sigh is a sword of an angel king
And the bitter groan of a martyrrsquos woe
Is an arrow from the Almightyrsquos bowrsquo
Jerusalem
He believes that God Almighty holds out a solemn
promise of reward to sufferers for a lofty cause God
declares
lsquofear not Lo I am with thee always
Only believe in me that I have power to raise from deathrsquo
Jerusalem
MEANS OF LIBERATION
As the greatest and most inventive of Romantic
mythmakers Blake at first explores the contrary states
of human innocence and experience and then speaks of
lsquothe five gatesrsquo our mortal senses which bind us down to
the earth Not so much interested in the art of the
possible as in the visions of the beyond Blake
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 39
constructed a cosmic myth to show manrsquos infinite
potential and how he might attain to final liberation
from this sinful ephemeral world characterized by a
wheel of births and deaths He weaves his myths round
the fall and salvation of man the universal man and his
ultimate waking to eternal life In his poems lsquoMiltonrsquo and
lsquoJerusalemrsquo he regards Satan as the embodiment of
error selfhood and boundless pride and points out that
the means of liberation or freedom from the worldly
bondages lie in the annihilation of selfhood or ego and
the forgiveness of sins He exclaims lsquoI in my selfhood am that Satan I am that evil onersquo and resolves that he would
go down to self-annihilation In lsquoMiltonrsquo he puts the
following words into the mouth of Milton
lsquobut laws of Eternity
Are not such Know thou I come to self-annihilation
Such are the laws of Eternity that each shall mutually
Annihilate himself for others goodrsquo
Reiterating and stressing his poetic purpose or mission
of life Blake resolves
lsquoMine is to teach men to despise death and to go on
In fearless majesty of annihilating self
I come to discover before Heaven and Hell
the self righteousness in all its hypocritical turpitude
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 40
put off
In self-annihilation all that is not God alone
To put off self and all I have ever and everrsquo
Again in a sincere invocation to God Blake prays
lsquoO saviour pour upon me thy spirit of meekness and love
Annihilate the selfhood in me be thou all my life
Guide thou my hand which trembles exceedingly
Upon the rocks of agesrsquo
SPIRITUAL HUMANISM
Inspired by his implicit faith in Godrsquos fatherhood and
menrsquos brotherhood Blake preached the concept of
universal fraternity Considering the whole world as
one large family he maintained that all divisions and
fragmentations of humanity stemmed from manrsquos
ignorance of the eternal truth of one and only one
universal family The world being the home of mankind
all human beings are inextricably interwoven together
in the same warp and woof of life How beautifully has
this cosmopolitan philosophy of manrsquos eternal identity
with his fellow beings been enunciated in the following
memorable words
lsquoWe live as one man for contracting our infinite senses
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 41
We behold multitude or expanding
We behold as one Man all the universal family
and he is in us and we in him
Live in perfect harmony in Eden the land of life
Giving receiving and forgiving each otherrsquos trespassesrsquo
Elsewhere the poet says
lsquoThere is no other God than God
Who is the intellectual fountain of Humanity
I never made friends but by spiritual gifts
By severe contentions of friendship and the burning fire of thought
He who would see the divinity must see him in his children
So he who wishes to see a vision perfect whole
Must see it in its minute particulars organizedrsquo
Preaching universal brotherhood based on love
understanding and sacrifice he again exclaims (in the
words of Jesus)
lsquoWouldst thou live one who never died
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 42
For thee or ever die for one
Who had not died for thee
And if God died not for man and giveth not himself
Eternally for man
Man could not exist for man is love and God is love
Every kindness to another is a little death in the divine image
Nor can man exist but by brotherhoodrsquo
Jerusalem
Condemning man-made divisions of mankind into
various castes and creeds he says
lsquoAnd all must love the human form
In heathen Turk or Jew
Where mercy love and pity dwell
There God is dwelling toorsquo
The Divine Image
How truly are the poetrsquos ideas relevant even today when
the hot wind of doubt and distrust is blowing all over
the world (which has been broken up into fragments by
caste and creed clime and country) can be viewed in
the context of our age-old belief in the worship of God in
the universal form (Vishwaroop) and our religious and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 43
spiritual aspirations for ensuring the maximum good of
the world To serve humanity in a spirit of humility
impelled our people to look upon the world as one
great undivided family or nest (वHवनीड़म) and all men
as our brethren ndash (वसधव कटFबकम)
The ideal of universal brotherhood and selfless service
to humanity found spontaneous utterance in the
following moving words which embody the sublime
aim of a devout manrsquos life
न वह कामय रा0य न वगम ना पनभव
कामय दःख तSतानाम Dा13ण नामातनाशन
lsquoI do not desire earthly kingdom nor heaven nor do I want rebirth I want to reduce the sorrow of people who are sunk in sufferingrsquo
Today when the horizon of humanity is darkened by
national prejudices the need for spiritual humanism
synoptic vision and universal brotherhood is being
increasingly felt by one and all Here it is worthwhile to
turn our attention to great men whose thoughts
transcend myriad artificial barriers and teach us the
ideal of dedication to the common weal
Since truth transcends all religious dogmas and
disinterested service to mankind is a form of true
worship to God our great men have always prayed
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 44
सव भवत स13खनः सव सत नरामयाः
सव भWा13ण पHयत मा किHचX दःख भाYभवत
lsquoMay all be happy may all living beings be free from diseases may we perceive goodness in all and may none be struck with misfortunersquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 45
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
(7 April 1770 ndash 23 April 1850)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 46
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
English Poet
Orphaned at age 13 Wordsworth attended Cambridge
University but he remained rootless and virtually
penniless until 1795 when a legacy made possible a
reunion with his sister Dorothy Wordsworth He
became friends with Samuel Taylor Coleridge with
whom he wrote Lyrical Ballads (1798) the collection
often considered to have launched the English Romantic
movement Wordsworths contributions include
Tintern Abbey and many lyrics controversial for their
common everyday language About 1798 he began
writing The Prelude (1850) the epic autobiographical
poem that would absorb him intermittently for the next
40 years His second verse collection Poems in Two Volumes (1807) includes many of the rest of his finest
works including Ode Intimations of Immortality His
poetry is perhaps most original in its vision of the
organic relation between man and the natural world a
vision that culminated in the sweeping metaphor of
nature as emblematic of the mind of God The most
memorable poems of his middle and late years were
often cast in elegaic mode few match the best of his
earlier works By the time he became widely
appreciated by the critics and the public his poetry had
lost much of its force and his radical politics had yielded
to conservatism In 1843 he became Englands poet
laureate He is regarded as the central figure in the
initiation of English Romanticism
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 47
CHAPTER TWO
VEDANTA IN WORDSWORTHrsquoS POETRY
In many of his famous poems among which Ode on Intimations of immortality and Lines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey occupy pride of place
William Wordsworth one of the greatest seer-poets of
English literature presents ideas which bear striking
similarity to the rich philosophical thought that found
unimpeded flow in our Vedantic literature
In fact there are so many echoes of Vedanta in the
poetry of Wordsworth that one is apt to conclude that
the poetrsquos lsquophilosophic mindrsquo must have led him to drink
deep at the unfailing springs of Upanishadic Helicon
A poet of nature Wordsworth was essentially lsquoa seer of spiritual realities a seer of the calm spirit in naturersquo and
his poetry at its best is a fine harmony of his spiritual
insight ethical sense and profundity of thought He is a
curious amalgam of the seer the poet and the reflective
moralist who dwells philosophically and even
prophetically on Nature Man and Cosmic Soul
The epithets lsquobest philosopherrsquo lsquomighty prophetrsquo and
lsquoseer blestrsquo which Wordsworth uses for the new-born
innocent child in his famous Ode may be well applied to
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 48
the poet himself for ldquovoyaging in strange seas of
thought alonerdquo Wordsworth had found lsquofull many a gem
of purest ray serenersquo which still shed undiminished
luster on the entire fabric of English poetry
A careful study of the Ode on Intimations of immortality Lines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey Ruth Laodamia To Cuckoo and other poems reveals that Wordsworthrsquos sustained
loftiness of thought had taken him to such heights that
on him (to quote his own words)
lsquo those truths do rest which we are toiling all our lives to findrsquo
What indeed are those truths Those are the elemental
truths of life which were keenly perceived realized and
expressed by the seers and savants of the East and
particularly of our Vedantic times A careful study of
Vedanta which is the aphoristic summary of the co-
ordinated Upanishads the Brahmasutras and the
Bhagvad Gita and is in fact the culmination of Indian
religion and Philosophical thought reveals that serious
scholars of the West drew freely upon it Wordsworthrsquos
poetry bears ample testimony to this fact because
numerous echoes of Vedanta can be easily heard in his
poetry
To cite a few comparative examples the Upanishads
assert in unambiguous terms that the whole universe of
names and forms the world of being and becoming
springs from Brahman (Supreme Godhead or Absolute
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 49
Cosmic Soul) ndash the eternal existence consciousness and
bliss Since the universe is the creation and
manifestation of Brahman it is also pervaded by Him
Naturally therefore only Brahman exists all else is non-
existent or illusory The Chhandogya Upanishad
declares lsquoBrahman is verily the Allrsquo God is the subtle
essence underlying phenomenal existence the whole
nature which is Godrsquos handiwork as well as Godrsquos
garment and is filled and inspired by God who is its
inner controller and soul
The immanence of God has been corroborated by
Brihadaranyak Upanishad in two passages the first
being in the form of an answer given by Yagnavalyak to
Uddalak Aruni
lsquoHe is immanent in fire in the intermundia in air in the heavens in the Sun in the quarters in the Moon in the stars in space in darkness in light in all beings in Prana in all things and within all things whom these things do not know whose body these things are who controls all these things from within He is thy soul the inner controller the immortal He is the unseen seer the unheard hearer the unthought thinker the ununderstood understander other than Him there is no seer other than Him there is no hearer other than Him there is no thinker other than Him there is no understander everything besides Him is naughtrsquo
Brihadaranyak Upanishad II7
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 50
In another passage Brihadaranyak Upanishad tells us
that God is the All ndash ldquoboth the formed and the formless the mortal and the immortal the stationary and the moving the this and thatHe is the verity of verities the soul of souls and He is the supreme verityrdquo
Brihadaranyak Upanishad IIV15
Wordsworth like these unique revelatory utterances of
the Upanishads codifies this truth in mystical manner in
Lines Composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey when he regards the Cosmic Soul as supreme power or
all-pervading presence
lsquoWhose dwelling is the light of setting Suns
And the round ocean and the living air
And the blue sky and in the mind of man
A motion and a spirit that impels
All thinking things all objects o all thought
And rolls through all thingsrsquo
Since God is All and everything else is Naught the world
is not real it is an appearance It is not the permanent
all-abiding Absolute Reality but a fleeting show and
ephemeral entity having seemingly phenomenal reality
In other words the world is lsquoshadow not substancersquo ndash it
is just a net-work of Maya
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 51
This Vedantic doctrine finds utterance not only in
Wordsworthrsquos poems like To the Cuckoo in which he
calls the earth ldquoan unsubstantial fairy placerdquo but he
seems to have actually experienced this illusory nature
of the world in states of mystic trance that often visited
him since his boyhood
In the introduction to his Ode on Intimations of Immortality he records such an experience in clear
terms
ldquoI was unable to think of external things as having external existence and I communed with all that I saw as something not apart from but inherent in my own immaterial nature Many a times while going to school have I grasped at a wall or tree to recall myself from the abyss of idealism to the realityrdquo
Such an ecstatic state of realizing eternal truths is
referred to in Lines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey as
lsquoThat blessed mod
In which the burden of the mystery
Of all this unintelligible world
Is lightenedrsquo
And finally to quote from the same poem
lsquoWe are laid asleep
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 52
In body and become a living soul
While with an eye made quiet by the power
Of harmony and the deep power of joy
We see into the life of thingsrsquo
One of the basic postulates of our Upanishadic
philosophy has been the idea of transmigration of soul
or faith in the cycle of births deaths and rebirths The
doctrine of transmigration has been explicitly advanced
in the Upanishads and particularly in the
Kathopanishad and Brihadaranyak Upanishad
In the Kathopanishad when the father of Nachiketas
told him that he had made him over to the god of Death
Nachiketas replied that it was no uncommon fate that
was befalling him
ldquoI indeed go at the head of many to the other world but I also go in the midst of many What is the god of Death going to do to me Look at our predecessors (who have already gone) look also at those who have succeeded them Man ripens like corn and like corn he is born againrdquo
Kathopanishad IV6
The Brihadaranyak Upanishad states the same truth
ldquoAnd as a caterpillar after reaching the end of a blade of grass finds another place of support and then draws itself towards it and as a goldsmith after taking a piece
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 53
of gold gives it another newer and more beautiful shape similarly does this Self after having thrown off this body and dispelled ignorance take on another newer and more beautiful form whether it be of one of the man or demi-god or god or of Prajapati or Brahman or of any other beingsrdquo
Brihadaranyak Upanishad IVIII5
The same truth appears in the Bhagvad Gita when Lord
Krishna says to the mentally agitated Arjuna
ldquoAs a man discarding worn-out clothes takes other new ones likewise the embodied soul casting off worn-out bodies enters into others which are newrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II22
And further Lord Krishna says to Arjuna
ldquoFor in that case the death of him who is born is certain and the rebirth of him who is dead is inevitablerdquo
Bhagvad Gita II27
Wordsworth in his famous Ode on Intimations of Immortality confirms his faith in the transmigration of
soul by saying in unmistakable terms
lsquoOur birth is but a sleep and a forgetting
The soul that rises with us our lifersquos star
Hath had elsewhere its setting
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 54
And cometh from afar
Not in entire forgetfulness
And not in utter nakedness
But trailing clouds of glory do we come
From God who is our homersquo
Again when Wordsworth laments the loss of pure
innocence immeasurable bliss and ecstatic vision of
early childhood in the great Ode and exclaims in
memorable words
lsquoWhither is fled the visionary gleam
Where is it now the glory and the dreamrsquo
He attributes the loss to the worldly intellectuality and
attachments as they grow upon man As childhood
grows into youth and youth into manhood the lsquovision splendidrsquo fades the first clear intimations of immortality
are dimmed leaving behind an unillumined waste of
mere thought and moralizing
lsquoAt length the Man perceives it die away
And fade into the light of common dayrsquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
The world of materialism or attachment tames him so
much so that man lsquothe little actorrsquo thinks
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 55
lsquoAs if his whole vocation
Were endless imitationrsquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
Whatever may be the crux of his philosophy of
childhood this belief of the poet can be safely traced
back to the comprehensive doctrine of the Maya in the
Upanishads and the Bhagvad Gita The Upanishads
tell us that the world is a delusion an appearance not
reality The Taittiriya Upanishad says ldquoAll beings spring from the Supreme Being are sustained by Him and return to the same Absolute at the time of dissolution Our life on earth is therefore a sojournrdquo The Isha Upanishad tells us that ldquothe truth is veiled in this universe by a vessel of gold and it invokes the grace of God to lift up the golden lid and allow the truth to be seenrdquo
It follows that our senses cloud our vision and lead us
farther and farther away from our spiritual moorings as
we come of age Senses dupe us and turn us into
worldlings Lord Krishna says to Arjuna in the Bhagvad Gita ldquoAs the wind carries away the barge upon the waters even so of the wandering senses the one to which the mind is joined takes away his discriminationrdquo
Thus the eternal and boundless Supreme Soul is as it
were limited by the sense organs and the body The
Universal Soul shackled by the body becomes the
individual soul (Paramatma becomes Jivatma) Because
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 56
of the presence of the Soul the spark of the Divine the
senses or sense-objects or worldly attractions fail to
dupe man fully from his divine mission This
metaphysical conviction finds expression in
Wordsworthrsquos Ode He says that though
lsquoShades of the prison-house begin to close
Upon the growing boy
But he beholds the light and whence it flows
He sees it in his joyrsquo
However farther man may go away from Nature ndash the manifestation of God and the indwelling Supreme Soul which resides in his own individual soul he can not
lsquoForget the glories he hath known
And that imperial palace whence he camersquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
Since bliss (Anand) is an inevitable attribute of God and
manrsquos soul being a fragment of Supreme Soul it
experiences the presence of God in moments of
Supreme Joy
Of the innumerable expressions in the Vedantic
literature of the joy of life of joy as the all entwining
principle of life and of creative principle of life and life
too the following passage from the Taittiriya Upanishad is very pertinent here
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 57
ldquoJoy is the Brahman from joy are born all living things by joy they are nourished towards joy they move and in joy they are absorbedrdquo Joy as the foundation of life
emanates from the Upanishad philosophy
Wordsworth seems to hold identical belief when he
craves for joy and laments its loss
lsquoO Joy that in our embers
Is something that doth live
That nature yet remembers
What was so fugitiversquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
The same idea finds expression in Lines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey where Wordsworth
declares it as Naturersquos privilege lsquoto lead (us) from joy to joyrsquo
And lastly the classicus locus of the Upanishadic
philosophy is to be found in the idea of immortality of
soul In the Chhandogya and Mundak Upanishads and
above all in the Kathopanishad we find numerous
references to the immortality of the soul We are told in
a passage of Kathopanishad lsquothat while we are dwelling in this body on earth we can visualize that Atman (Soul) as in a mirror that is contrariwise left being to the right and right being to the leftrsquo In the Bhagvad Gita also
Lord Krishna tells Arjuna about the immortality of Soul
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 58
ldquoThis soul is never born nor dies it exists on coming into being for it is unborn eternal everlasting and primeval even though the body is slain the soul is notrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II20
He further says
ldquoFor this soul is incapable of being cut it is proof against fire impervious to water and undriable as well This soul is eternal omnipresent immovable constant and everlastingrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II24
Wordsworth seems to have been fully convinced of this
philosophia perennis of the Vedanta when he eulogizes
immortality by addressing the child in his Ode in the
following words
lsquoThou over whom thy immortality
Broods like the day
A Master over a slave
A presence which is not to be put byrsquo
The poet in speaking of the lsquotruths that wake to perish neverrsquo seems to be reminiscent of the Upanishadic
concept that freed from the trammels of the body the
individual soul loses itself in the All-Soul when he
declares in the rapture
lsquoOur souls have sight of that immortal sea
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 59
Which brought us hither
Can in a moment travel thitherrsquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
Tracing the expression and confirmation of many other
tenets of Vedanta in the poetry of William Wordsworth
forms an interesting literary venture and instances of
close affinity between the Vedantic doctrines and
Wordsworthrsquos ideas may be multiplied Such a
comparative study proves that eternal truths transcend
the barriers of clime or country time or space and shine
through all ages and in all lands We should draw moral
sustenance from them and live a fuller freer life
Even today the wise all over the world maintain a
remarkable identity of views and their thoughts foster
international understanding
ldquoFrom hand to hand the greeting flows
From eye to eye the signals run
From heart to heart the bright hope glows
The seekers of light are onerdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 60
ST COLERIDGE
(21 October 1772 ndash 25 July 1834)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 61
ST COLERIDGE
English Poet Critic and Philosopher
Coleridge studied at the University of Cambridge where
he became closely associated with Robert Southey In
his poetry he perfected a sensuous lyricism that was
echoed by many later poets Lyrical Ballads (1798 with
William Wordsworth) containing the famous Rime of
the Ancient Mariner and Frost at Midnight heralded
the beginning of English Romanticism Other poems in
the ldquofantasticalrdquo style of the Mariner include the
unfinished Christabel and the celebrated Pleasure
Dome of Kubla Khan While in a bad marriage and
addicted to opium he produced Dejection An Ode
(1802) in which he laments the loss of his power to
produce poetry Later partly restored by his revived
Anglican faith he wrote Biographia Literaria 2 vol
(1817) the most significant work of general literary
criticism of the Romantic period Imaginative and
complex with a unique intellect Coleridge led a restless
life full of turmoil and unfulfilled possibilities
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 62
CHAPTER THREE
COLERIDGErsquoS SPIRITUAL QUEST AND INDIAN THOUGHT
INTRODUCTION
Coleridge was by all accounts a genius par excellence
whose versatility flowed albeit impeded in diverse
channels of creativity such as metaphysics poetry
theology and literary criticism Of all the Romantic poets
he possessed the most fertile and powerful imagination
which earned for him a special place in English poetry
and philosophical thought In the words of William
Hazlitt lsquohe had angelic wings and fed on mannarsquo He had
a lsquoseminal mindrsquo which said William Wordsworth
lsquothrew out a series of grand central truthsrsquo We find in
him the poet the philosopher and the theologian rolled
in one Charles Lamb called him lsquoLogician Metaphysician Bardrsquo whose poetry and writings are
tinged with a magical and ethereal quality His thought
made a permanent landmark on the succeeding
generations of English men of letters for he explored the
mysterious working of human mind
His life presents a saga of sharp contrast between
reality and dream blissful confidence and broken
hopes the warmth of human ties and the solitude of
haunted soul He probed human thought and dilemma
with a rare prophetic insight A prodigious thinker and
sincere seeker of truth he once remarked ldquoI would compare the Human Soul to a shiprsquos crew cast on an
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 63
Unknown Islandrdquo His particular fascination for the
unknown drew him instinctively to the German
transcendental or idealistic school of philosophy
represented by Berkeley Kant Schelling and Fichte
Fired by a peculiar mystic idealism he tried to interpret
the lsquoInterruptionrsquo of the spiritual world and beheld the
unseen with an uncommon eye which looked into the
void and found it peopled with lsquopresencesrsquo To him the
universe was lsquoebullient with creative deityrsquo and was
pervaded by lsquoan organizing surgersquo of vital energies
which emanate directly from God He was indeed an
inspired idealist who laid mystical insistence upon the
immanence and transcendence of God
Endowed with a rare penetrating mind Coleridge
ransacked works of comparative religions and
mythology and arrived at the conclusion that all
religious faiths and mythical traditions agree on the
unity of God and immortality of Soul His constant
intellectual search for truth led him to visionary
interests and universal life consciousness expressed
through the phenomena of human agencies Throughout
his intellectual career he remained a visionary and
philosophical mystic who valued a discreet and proper
exercise of the intellect Since his most serious concern
had been philosophy as a continuous trial for self-
education he wrote ldquodoubts rushed in broke upon me from the fountains of the great deep and fell from the windows of heavenrdquo For him lsquoreligionrsquo as both the
cornerstone and keystone of morality must have a
moral origin and a great poet should be lsquoa profound Metaphysician seeking for truth beauty and salvationrsquo In
one of those radiant moments when the poet the
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 64
metaphysician and the theologian of hope are one he
throws light on the process how truth works out in life
ldquoTruth considered in itself and in the effects natural to it may be conceived as a gentle spring or water source warm from the genial earth and breathing up into the snow drift that is piled over and around its outlet It turns the obstacle into its own form and character and as it makes its way increases its streamand arrested in its courseit suffers delay not loss and waits only to awaken and again roll onwardsrdquo
His description of a mystic as one who wanders into an
oasis or garden lsquoat leisure in its maze of Beauty and Sweetness and thirds (sic) his way through the odorous and flowering Thickets into open Spots of Greeneryrsquo (Aids to Reflection) is reminiscent of his own mysticism and
refers to the lsquoenfolding sunny spots of greeneryrsquo in his
famous poem Kubla Khan
Profoundly impressed by the German Idealist Schelling
whose idealistic school of thought dwelt on speculation
concerning the lsquoAbsolutersquo Coleridge viewed lsquomythrsquo as
primordial expression of elemental truths including the
Divine transcendence Inspired by his Biblical studies he
regarded self-consciousness as lying at the centre of his
philosophical and theological thought In Lay Sermons
he says ldquoSelf which then only is when for itself it hath ceased to be Even so doth Religion finitely expresses the unity of the Infinite Spirit by being a total act of the Soulrdquo
For him the lsquoinner lightrsquo is identical with the indwelling
glorious God and life is but lsquoa vision shadowy of Truthrsquo Attributing the pageant of life and the beauty and
splendor of the world to the immanence of Cosmic Soul
(God) he exclaims
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 65
ldquoAh From the soul itself must issue forth
A light a glory a fair luminous cloud
Enveloping the earthrdquo
Dejection An Ode
And again he says ldquoNature is the art of GodThe true system of natural philosophy places the sole reality of things in an Absolute which is at once causa sui effectus in the absolute identity of subject and object which it calls NatureIn this sense lsquowe see all things in Godrsquo is a strict philosophical truthrdquo
Coleridge firmly believed in the essential unity of God as
Absolute which is the creative foundation of the finite
universe and which distinguishes God from creation
He in the spirit of Vedanta stresses the immanence of
God in all and all in God in his famous poem Frost at Midnight Addressing his son he says
ldquoso shalt thou see and hear
The lovely shapes and sound intelligible
Of that eternal language which thy God
Utters who from eternity doth teach
Himself in all and all things in Himselfrdquo
In order to learn this lsquolanguagersquo Coleridge himself
became a lsquovisionaryrsquo lsquoprophetrsquo or lsquoseerrsquo The idea of
Himself (God) in all and all (creation) in Himself or the
concept that there is God in all things and all things are
things are closely interlinked with God bears a striking
resemblance to our age-old Vedic thought In
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 66
consonance with Indian thought Coleridge underscores
the identity of God (Brahman) with the individual soul
(Jivatma) and regards the universe as the reflection or
manifestation of God The seer he says is one who sees
God the creator in all creation and all creation as the
embodiment of God This according to him is the lesson
that God in His eternal language lsquouttersrsquo and doth teach
from eternity
The inherent oneness and sole identity of Brahman
(God) with the universe is a basic postulate of our
Vedanta and as such Coleridgersquos emphasis on the lsquoUnity of infinite Spiritrsquo bears a close identity with the Indian
philosophy The Oneness of God and the universe has
time and again been stressed in our Vedas and other
scriptures It would be pertinent to cite a few instances
here While the Chhandogya Upanishad describes
Brahman as lsquoOne only without a secondrsquo other
Upanishadic texts contain identical statements such as
lsquoHe is Onersquo and lsquoOne Lordrsquo The opening line of
Ishopanishad declares Godrsquos oneness and His universal
presence in unequivocal terms
ldquoUnderstand all this universe as inhabited by Lord
Each moving thing in this moving worldrdquo
Ishopanishad I
And again the same Upanishad says
ldquoThe wise man who perceives all beings as not distinct from his own self at all and his own Self as the self of every being ndash he does not by virtue of that perception hate any onerdquo
Ishopanishad VI
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 67
The same truth has been expressed in the Bhagvad Gita wherein Lord Krishna tells Arjuna
ldquoHe who sees Me (the Universal Self) present in all beings and all beings existing within Me never loses sight of Me and I never lose sight of himrdquo
Bhagvad Gita VI30
Or again
ldquoHe alone truly sees who sees the Supreme Lord as imperishable and abiding equally in all perishable beings both animate and inanimaterdquo
Bhagvad Gita XIII26
And Lord Krishna says again
ldquoThere is nothing else besides Me O Arjuna
Like clusters of yarn-beads formed by knots on a thread
All this (Universe) threaded on Me (God)
As are pearls on stringsrdquo
Bhagvad Gita VII7
THE DOCTRINE OF KARMA (CAUSE amp EFFECT)
Coleridge seems to subscribe sincerely to the Indian
doctrine of Karma which is based on the law of
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 68
Causation or cause and effect In other words Karmavad
stresses poetic justice or law of life ie virtue is
rewarded and vice is punished Since one must reap the
fruits of his good and bad deeds in life it is axiomatic
truth that lsquoas one sows so shall he reaprsquo In Sanskrit
there is a verse which says ldquoOne must bear the consequences of his good and bad deedsrdquo The echoes of
this doctrine could be distinctly heard in his poetry and
particularly in his greatest poem Rime of Ancient Mariner as also Dejection An Ode where he affirms
ldquoO Lady We receive but what we give
And in our life alone doth Nature liverdquo
So strong was his belief in the doctrine of Karma that in
a letter dated 14th October 1797 to his friend Thirlwell
he tells him how fatalistic his philosophy of life is
ldquoand at other times I adopt the Brahman
creed and say ndash lsquoit is better to sit than to stand it is better to lie than to sit it is better to sleep than wake but death is the best of allrsquordquo
His Ancient Mariner serves as an exhaustive
exposition of the law of Nemesis which works surely
but rather imperceptively in human life The poem is a
myth about a dark and troubling crisis in the human
soul It is actually a tale of crime which is due to
perversity of human will Crime is against Nature
Humanity and God He touches equally on guilt and
remorse suffering and relief hate and forgiveness and
grief and joy The marinerrsquos action shows the essential
frivolity of crimes against humanity and the ordered
system of the world and he deserves punishment for his
guilt Spirits are transformed into the powers who
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 69
watch over the good and evil actions of men and requite
them with appropriate rewards and punishments Since
the mariner has committed a hideous act of wantonly
and recklessly killing the albatross which was hailed in
Godrsquos name as if it had been a Christian soul he must
bear the punishment of life-in-death The killing of the
bird marks the breaking of bond between Man and
Nature and consequently the mariner becomes
spiritually dead When he blesses the water-snakes
even unawares it is a psychic rebirth ndash a rebirth that
must happen to all men
The mariner will never be the man that he once was He
has his special past and his special doom His sense of
guilt will end only with his death The Ancient Mariner
is a myth of a guilty soul and marks the passage from
crime through punishment and possible redemption in
the world So the poem is an allegory of redemption and
regeneration It is indeed a vivid representation or
living symbolization of universal psychic experience
The abiding fascination of the poem is that it is a
fragment of a psychic life It does not state a result it
symbolizes a process
Coleridge adds a moral ndash that the mariner is ndash to teach
by his example love and reverence to all things that God
made and loveth He advocates a sound moral
philosophy of life which extends human sympathy and
love to the animal world He affirms
ldquoHe prayeth well who loveth well
Both man and bird and beast
He prayeth best who loveth best
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 70
All things both great and small
For the dear God who loveth us
He made and loveth allrdquo
Rime of Ancient Mariner
PHILOSOPHICAL MYSTICISM AND lsquoTHE VISION OF GODrsquo
Coleridgersquos longing for the lsquounnamable somethingrsquo and
his abiding interest in conveying something of the
enigmatic perception of Godhead as a religious
experience carved for him a special place in the history
of ideas as a Christian poet and philosopher In a
predominantly mythological age he took serious
interest in the Biblical studies and drew upon the
central Christian image of Paradise as a walled garden
and the vision of God as a symbolizing that
transcendent numinous reality which the soul
inchoately and consciously seeks and strives for The
medieval image of the walled garden (paradise) as the
heavenly city (locus of God) is a symbol of divine
transcendence of that which is lsquobeyond beingrsquo This rich
image (of the walled garden) as an eminently
appropriate image of Godrsquos transcendence was used as
such by Church Fathers and also by the 15th century
Christian Platonist Nicholas of Cusa whose book The Vision of God is a paradigm of speculative mysticism
which informs Coleridgersquos metaphysics and much of his
poetry Taking inspiration from Nicholas of Cusarsquos book
The Vision of God Coleridge found it in close affinity to
his own genuinely philosophical mysticism
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 71
Coleridgersquos interest in the Vision of God is in a purely
visionary mystical tradition and his most visionary
poem Kubla Khan bears ample testimony to his
insistence upon life as lsquoa vision shadowy of Truthrsquo His
conviction in the lsquoImago Deirsquo (vision of God) is an
obvious link with the hoary mystical tradition which lay
at the heart of his philosophical and mystical thought
He maintains that the mind of man is a bridge to the
vision of God but by no means its fulfillment He says
ldquoThe vision and faculty divine is the participation of humanity in the Divinerdquo He however further maintains
throughout his intellectual career the conviction in the
reflection or bending back of the soul from the sensual
to the intelligible realm For him Christianity is an lsquoawful recalling of the drowsed soul from dreams and phantom world of sensuality to actual Realityrsquo
On the idea of reawakening he says
ldquoThe moment when the Soul begins to be sufficiently self-conscious to ask concerning itself and its relations is the first moment of its intellectual arrival into the world Its being ndash enigmatic as it must seem ndash is posterior to its existencerdquo
Collected Notes
In a recent study of Coleridge Prof Douglas Headley of
Cambridge University declares ldquoHe is best described as an essentially speculative and mystical philosopher-theologian His was a theology inspired by those Church Fathers who emphasize the vision of God as an intellectual contemplation (speculari) of the transcendent Absolute the prius of all beingrdquo Since the
mystic tradition follows a supersensuous perception
the vision of God is fundamentally lsquoVisio-intuitivarsquo ndash
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 72
intuitive or intellectual vision Coleridge expresses such
a state of mind when he says
ldquoMy mind feels as if it ached to behold and know something great something One and Indivisible and it is only in the faith of this that rocks or waterfalls mountains or caverns give me the sense of sublimity or majesty But in this faith all things counterfeit Infinityrdquo
Since the sublime enlarges and inspires the Soul to
aspire for the Divine it impresses him with the
fundamental Oneness of God and a universal vision
which he hints at in his Religious Musings as under
ldquoThere is One mind One omnipresent mind
His most holy name is Love
Truth of subliming import
lsquoTis sublime in man
Our noontide majesty to know ourselves
Parts and portions of one wondrous wholerdquo
These passages recall to our mind the famous mantra
(verse) of the Yajurveda where the mystic realization
or the direct experience of the Supreme by a Vedic sage
has been beautifully described in terms of his personal
knowledge of the Divine He says
ldquoI have known this sun-coloured Mighty Being
Refulgent as the sun beyond darkness
By knowing Him alone one transcends death
There is no other way to gordquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 73
Yajurveda XXXI18
ldquoI have realized it I have known itrdquo not that I just
believe in it and all else can also realize it This is not the
expression of an opinion but the statement of an
experience Commenting on this verse Sri Aurobindo
says
ldquoThis is one of the grandest utterances in the worldrsquos spiritual literature for it marks the emanation of this Being from across the darkness into our world so that something of the sun colour may come into our dull heads and dim heartsrdquo
Coleridge seems to be in complete agreement with our
own Indian mysticism which owes its origin to the
Vedas wherein the knowledge of the Divine or the
Ultimate Reality (Brahman) has been regarded not as a
process of philosophical thought but as a direct
experience in the depth of the human soul For him the
divine vision is possible in that spiritual meditation
transformation of intellectual rapture in which all
discursive thought is fully sublimated According to him
the lsquovisio intuitivarsquo is the culmination of all knowledge ndash
sensus-ratio-intellectus and is in conjunction with the
concept of Imago Dei In order to see that which not an
object is ie God the human mind must put aside its own
discursive differentiating reflection ndash spiritus altissimus rationis ndash which guards the walls of the garden of
paradise lsquobeyondrsquo which dwells God The highest
transformation or sublimation of conscience can ensure
an intuitive vision of God and in accordance with the
maxim ndash Simile Simili ndash the mind then becomes like its
object by divesting itself of difference in order to
experience the Absolute Reality Says Coleridge
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 74
ldquoAn Immense Being does strongly fill the soul and Omnipotency Omnisciency and Infinite Goodness do enlarge and dilate the Spirit while it fixtly looks upon them They raise strong passions of Love and Admiration which melt our Nature and transform it into the mould and imagery that which we can contemplaterdquo
Notebooks
Mysticism is thus the subtle path of spiritual realization
of That Reality or Divine Presence which has been
described in our Vedic texts as (lying hidden in a cave shrouded in secrecy) God is one One beyond all
diversities In Him all contradictions and conflicts meet
and dissolve through the spiritual transformation of the
lsquoseerrsquo or lsquomysticrsquo whose soul rises above the bewildering
trammels and distortions of life and seeks unity with all
in the unity with One To such an enlightened seer life
becomes an unceasing adventure from unreality to
reality from ephemerality to eternity from the human
to the Divine One who realizes the Divine as the One
(without parallel) loving Lord finds the whole universe
united in Him Such a significantly mystical experience
finds a memorable expression in the following verse of
the Yajurveda where the sage named Vena beholds
such a divine vision
ldquoThe loving sage (Vena) beholds that Mysterious Existence
Wherein the universe comes to have One home (nest)
Therein unites and therefore issues the whole
The Lord is the warp and woof in the Created beingsrdquo
Yajurveda XXXII8
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 75
A careful analysis of the above-quoted passage reveals
all the main elements of mysticism viz
(i) Divinity is a subject of personal spiritual
experience
(ii) The ultimate conception of Divinity is a
mystery symbolically expressed as
गहानCहतम
(iii) The abstract conception of the Divine as an
Essence or Existence is symbolized by a
neuter singular तत and
(iv) The whole universe is united in love as birds
in a nest एकनीड़ or men in a home वसधव कटFबक
To sum up wise men the world over hold almost
identical views on vital matters of human life such as
the mystery of existence soul and oversoul (God) Truth
is verily One as God is one but the pathways to reach it
are very many The ancient Rig Veda proclaims एक सद वDा बहधा वदित ndash ldquoTruth is one sages call it by various namesrdquo In our own times Swami Ram Krishna
Paramhansa said यतोमत तथोपथ ndash as many religions
so many pathways And what the Spanish litteacuterateur
and thinker states as lsquouniversal truthrsquo is equally
applicable to the philosophy and poetry of Coleridge
ldquoA deep faith in life cannot but be spiritual even if only partially spiritualThe path of Truth may not be a path of parallel lines but a path that follows one circle by going to the right and climbing the circle or by going to the left and climbing the circle we are bound to meet at the top although we started in apparently
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 76
contrary directions This is bound to be in the end because Truth is onerdquo
In Charles Lambrsquos words Coleridge lsquohad been on the confines of the next world he had a hunger for Eternityrsquo The truth of this statement is abundantly
borne out by Coleridgersquos sincere effort for the
reconciliation of the ration with transcendental belief
He closes his Biographia Literaria which symbolizes
his spiritual voyage with the following words
ldquoIt is night sacred night The upraised eyes views suns of other worlds only to preserve the soul steady and collected in its pure act of inward adoration to the great I Am and to the filial word that re-affirmeth from eternity to eternity whose choral is the universerdquo
As a true metaphysician Coleridgersquos whole being
pulsated with a passionate and unceasing search for
truth Here indeed was a spiritual aspirant and seeker
who in his own words had lsquotraced the fount whence streams of nectar flowrsquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 77
LORD BYRON
(22 January 1788 ndash 19 April 1824)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 78
LORD BYRON
British Romantic Poet and Satirist
Born with a clubfoot and extremely sensitive about it
he was 10 when he unexpectedly inherited his title and
estates Educated at Cambridge he gained recognition
with English Bards and Scotch Reviewers (1809) a satire
responding to a critical review of his first published
volume Hours of Idleness (1807) At 21 he embarked on
a European grand tour Childe Harolds Pilgrimage
(1812ndash18) a poetic travelogue expressing melancholy
and disillusionment brought him fame while his
complex personality dashing good looks and many
scandalous love affairs with women and with boys
captured the imagination of Europe Settling near
Geneva he wrote the verse tale The Prisoner of Chillon
(1816) a hymn to liberty and an indictment of tyranny
and Manfred (1817) a poetic drama whose hero
reflected Byrons own guilt and frustration His greatest
poem Don Juan (1819ndash24) is an unfinished epic
picaresque satire in ottava rima Among his numerous
other works are verse tales and poetic dramas He died
of fever in Greece while aiding the struggle for
independence making him a Greek national hero
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 79
CHAPTER FOUR
BYRON A BLEND OF CLAY AND SPARK
INTRODUCTION
Byron whom Goethe regarded as lsquothe greatest genius of the centuryrsquo and whom Carlyle considered as the noblest
spirit in Europe was one of the most remarkable men
during the 19th Century which was characterized by
liberal optimism He was unquestionably a potent and
force and cause of change in the intellectual outlook and
socio-political structure of his time His colourful figure
his charismatic personality and satiric poetry captured
the imagination of the whole continent As the most
influential English poet he stands out as an important
figure in the history of ideas Representative of a new
age he was the supreme voice which the European
poets recognized for ldquohe put into poetry something that belonged to many men in his time and he was the pioneer of a new outlook and a new art He set his mark on a whole generation and his fame rang from one end of Europe to anotherrdquo
Renowned as the ldquogloomy egoistrdquo he was a sinister yet
great influence in the Romantic Movement His deepest
romantic melancholy his satiric realism and his
aspiration for political realism earned for him such a
wide acclaim that his name became a symbol for all the
great events of his day Commenting on his pervasive
influence Calvert says ndash ldquoIt is impossible not to take Byron seriously and it is disastrous to take him literallyrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 80
A REBEL EXTRAORDINAIRE
Byron was a born rebel Essentially a child of
Revolution his poetry breathes a unique spirit of
revolutionary idealism ldquoI was born for oppositionrdquo he
once remarked and added ldquobeing of no party I shall offend all partiesrdquo Describing him as an aristocratic
rebel Bertrand Russell said
ldquoThe aristocratic rebel of whom Byron was in his day the exemplar is a very different typesuch rebels have philosophy which requires some greater change than their own personal success In their conscious thought there is criticism of the government of the world which takes the form of Titanic Cosmic self-assertion or those who retain some superstition of Satanism Both are to be found in Byron The aristocratic philosophy of rebellionhas inspired a long series of revolutionary movements from the fall of Napoleon to Hitlerrsquos coup in 1933it has inspired a corresponding manner of thought and feeling among intellectuals and artistsrdquo
Byron felt the wild storm of nations akin to the storm
within his own heart and the ruin but the picture of his
own life In his unqualified individualism he takes up an
attitude of hostility towards society Even God appears
to him mirrored in the stormy face of the angry ocean
ldquoThou glorious mirror
Of the Image of Eternityrdquo
He wished to stir the oppressed to revolt and get rid of
tyrants
ldquoFor I will teach if possible the stones
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 81
To rise against earthrsquos tyranny Never let it
Be said that we will truckle into thrones
By ye ndash our childrenrsquos children I think how we
Showed that things were before the world was freerdquo
Don Juan VIIICXXXV4-8
ldquoI have simplified my policiesrdquo wrote he ldquointo a detestation of all existing governmentsrdquo His was the
most dreaded voice of all the revolutionary poets of the
world His voice was the peal of revolutionary thunder
his poetry was the message of the revolutionary forces
He stood as the greatest symbol of a violent and
dreadful revolution
CHAMPION OF LIBERTY
He was essentially a poet of liberty His greatest ideal in
life was how to fight against the forces of tyranny
restriction aggression and enslaving of workers by
puissant exploiters Liberty was an essential part of the
Byronic creed In fact his entire poetic work is
interspersed with some of the finest poetry in praise of
freedom for mankind He composed much splendid
verse for love of freedom His passion for personal
freedom covers national freedom also and the political
freedom in the form of national self-determination
particularly for Italy and Greece He remarks in his
diary of 1821 ldquoDifficulties are the hotbeds of high spirits and Freedom the mother of the new virtues incident to human naturerdquo
Identifying himself completely with the cause of Italy
and Greece he wrote ldquoI shall not fall backbut
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 82
onward It is now the time to act and what signifies ldquoSelfrdquo if a single spark of that which would be worthy of the past can be bequeathed unquenchably to the future It is not one man nor a million but the spirit of liberty which must be spreadrdquo In his Ode to Chillon Castle he characteristically exclaimed
ldquoEternal spirit of the chainless Mind
Brightest in dungeons Liberty thou art
For there thy habitation is the heart
The heart which love of Thee alone bind
And when thy sons to fetters are consignrsquod
To fetters and damp vaultsrsquo dayless gloom
And Freedomrsquos fame finds winds on every windrdquo
Love of liberty lay at the centre of his being and
determined what was best in him ndash belief in individual
liberty and his hatred of tyranny and constraints
whether exercised by individuals or societies Liberty
was an ideal a driving power a summons to make the
best of certain possibilities in him He insisted to be free
and maintained that other men must be free too
Opposition was an integral element in his basic attitude
revolt both personal and social was his forte Love of
freedom is built into the capricious structure of Childe Harold and Don Juan
HIS POLITICAL AND COSMOPOLITAN LIBERALISM
He grew in an atmosphere in which political reaction
against revolutionary ideals was victorious all over
Europe Byron was essentially a liberal by conviction
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 83
and could hardly bear the perception of liberals Though
he loved his native country yet he had a large vision for
the freedom and welfare of all nations The excitement
of political liberalism stirred on behalf of the Greeks
against the oppression of their Turkish overlords made
him a symbol of disinterested patriotism and a Greek
national hero The first two cantos of Child Harold are
tinctured with historical and typographical material as
also the appearance of the Byronic hero with his
exhortations to the degenerate Greeks and Spaniards to
remember their glorious past and arise They contain
Byronrsquos passionate feelings for Greece which was to see
the beginning as it was to see the end of his active life
His Faustian daemonic figure and his defiant
resentment of authority found an appropriate object in
the political sphere
His last journey and his death at Missolonghi in the
cause of Greek independence proves in him the moving
combination of nobility futility and romantic or heroic
panache In the words of Graham Hough lsquoBut for once Byron was on the winning side he died but his cause triumphed and he remains one of its heroes For the whole of the 19th Century he remained a portent and a symbol whom it was possible to worship or to condemn but never to neglectrsquo
A MAN OF ACTION
Action remains at the centre of his life and at last he
gladly seized the opportunity when it presented itself in
Greece Leaving poetry behind himself he took a heroic
resolution in favour of action rather than
contemplation He presents a rare example of fusion
between the active and the reflective lsquofor his was the romanticism of actionrsquo The moralist in the garb of the
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 84
pre-romantic rebel hero of the Childe Harold is cast
aside in Don Juan and the moralist in the somber garb
turns dandy in which moral judgment seems to be
ineffective Quite logically he finally abandons literature
for the field of moral action At last Byron flung himself
off into the world of action The dandy finds at last that
such a death even if it is on the sickbed and not the
battlefield is the only gesture untouched by futility ldquoIt is not enough that art perpetrates life life also must complete artrdquo WB Yeats rightly says ldquoone feels that he (Byron) is a man of action made writer by accidentrdquo
Byron did not regard writing as an end in itself on the
contrary he was several times on the point of giving up
writing He had always before him the hope of some
more active life and felt a certain mistrust for the purely
literary life He asserted ldquowho would write who had anything better to do Action- action I say and not writing Least of all rhymerdquo In a letter to Murray
he wrote ldquoYou will see that I shall do something or otherthat like the cosmogony or creation of the world will puzzle the philosophers of all agesrdquo He was
fully alive to the persistent sense both of human
aspirations and the ceaseless flux of eternity and also
knew that he would not fade into oblivion Said he
ldquoBut at the last I have shunned the common shore
And leaving land far out of sight would skim
The ocean of Eternityrdquo
And again he said
ldquoFor the sword outwears its sheath
And the soul wears out the breastrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 85
HIS ROMANTIC SELF-PORTRAITURE
Byron presents manrsquos mixed and imperfect nature His
personality is a queer blend of flesh and spirit
meanness and nobility clay and spark cause and effect
The lasting fascination of his personality despite his bad
temper careless arrogance the excesses the satiety
melancholy and restlessness owes much to Splendour Primier of Miltonrsquos Satan who is ldquomajestic though in ruinrdquo and the gloom and brutality of the heroes of the
novel of terror His exotic sensibility ranging passions
and sensual perversity take refuge in a sort of ldquoCosmic Satanismrdquo He draws of himself a sketch which
reproduces in a dim outline the somber portrait of his
idealized self in the famous stanzas of Lara
ldquoIn him inexplicably mixed appeared
Much to be loved and hated sought and feared
X X X X X X
A hater of his kind
X X X X X X
There was in him a vital scorn of all
As if the worst had fallen which could befall
An erring spirit
X X X X X X
And fiery passions that had poured their wrath
In hurried desolation over his path
And left the better feeling all at strife
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 86
In wild reflection over his stormy liferdquo
And the Giaour (hiding his sinister path beneath a
monkrsquos gown) also portrays Byron
ldquoA noble soul and lineage high
Alas though bestowed in vain
Which Grief could change and Guilt could stainrdquo
HIS CREDO
Despite all his self-mockery and arrogant egoism he had
a star (vision) and he followed it sincerely He was not
without guiding principles and his heroic death in the
cause of Greek independence shows that he was not an
actor but a soldier a man of affairs and a master of men
Keenly aware of something special in him he wished to
realize his powers and translate them into facts He
wished to be true to himself He had a keen appreciation
of the dignity and personal liberty of man
HIS FATAL TRUTH
Even though he disagreed with the moral code of his
age he had his own values He thought that truthfulness
is a permanent virtue and duty and so did not want to
compromise with conventions nor hide behind cant
Despite many ordeals and his own corroding skepticism
he speaks seriously and directly about his convictions
and presents them with irony satire and mockery Don Juan is a racy commentary on life and manners and is a
record of a remarkable personality ndash a poet and a man
of action a dreamer and a wit a great lover and a great
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 87
hater a Whig noble and a revolutionary democrat The
paradoxes of his nature are fully reflected in Don Juan which itself is a romantic epic and a realistic satire He
was full of many romantic longings but tested them by
truth and reality He remained faithful only to those
which meant so much to him that he could not live
without them
Praising Byron Nietzsche says ldquoMan may bleed to death through the truth that he recognizesrdquo Byron expressed
this in his immortal lines
ldquoSorrow is knowledge they who know the most
Must mourn the deepest over the fatal truth
The tree of knowledge is not that of linerdquo
A BELIEVER IN GOD AND IMMORTALITY OF SOUL
Full of snobbery and rebellion as he was Byron was not
altogether without lofty ideals and religious beliefs He
firmly believed in the immanence and transcendence of
God and the transience of human glory His implicit faith
in the immortality of human soul the ephemerality of
physical body and his unwavering trust in God ndash the
eternal Light of Lights is evident from his following
memorable lines
ldquobut this clay will sink
Its spark immortal envying it the light
To which it mounts as if to break the link
That keeps us from yon heaven which woos us to its brinkrdquo
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RP DWIVEDI Page 88
Childe Harold III13-14
His Childe Haroldrsquos pilgrimage is a lament for lost
empire decay of love and triumph of love over human
mortality His lsquovoyage pittoresquersquo is full of historic and
didactic meditations and his oceanic image illustrates
the truism that nothing is constant but the rhythmic
pattern of its flux In the end all things float and toss on
that Great Ocean of which man is the foam and the
historic events are billows
ldquoBetween two worlds life hovers like a starrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquothe eternal surge
Of time and tide rolls on and bears afar our bubbles
while the graves
Of Empires heave but like some passing wavesrdquo
Don Juan XVI99
He maintains throughout his major poetic works a
sense of the presence of God or the gods and often
employs supernatural machinery to substantiate his
concept
IMMORTALITY OF SOUL
He had complete faith in the immortality of soul Said
he ldquoof the immortality of the soul it appears to me that there can be little doubtit acts also so very independent of bodyHuman passions have probably disfigured the divine doctrines Man is born passionate of body but an innate thought secret
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 89
tendency to the love of God is his mainspring of mind But God helps us allMan is eternal always changing but reproducedEternity Eternalrdquo
Again on his belief in God he says ldquoI sometimes think that man may be relic of some higher materialcreation must have had an origin and a creator for a creator is a more natural imagination than a fortuitous concourse of atoms All things remount to a fountain though they may flow to an oceanrdquo He knew
the limitations and ephemerality of phenomenal
existence He exclaims
ldquoFor I wish to know
What after all are all thingsbut a showrdquo
Unable to explore the stars with scientific aid he takes
up poesy to embark across the ocean of Eternity
ldquoI wish to do much by Poesyrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoBut at least I have shunned the common
And leaving land far out of sight would skim
The Ocean of Eternityrdquo
According to him man accepts the eternal voyage but
since man is not himself unlimited the boat capsizes in
the deep
ldquoAnd swimming long in the abyss of thought
Is apt to tire
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RP DWIVEDI Page 90
For the fall entails not only ignorance and weakness but Human mortalityrdquo
Disconcerted with mankind he turns to the placid
spectacle of Nature and feels his spirit merge into its
objects
ldquoI live not in myself but I become
Portion of that around me and to me
High mountains are a feeling
When the soul can flee
And with the sky ndash the peak ndash the heaving plain
Of Ocean or the stars mingle ndash and not in vainrdquo
Childe Harold III72
This pantheistic ecstasy gives him a sense of quasi-
immortality
ldquoSpinning the clay clod bonds which round our being clingrdquo
The picturesque is translated into a kind of mystical
union with the spirit of the place even with the
universe itself
ldquoAre not the mountains waves and skies a part
Of me and my soul as I of them
(Is not) the universe a breathing part
The spirit is clogged with clayrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 91
HIS PESSIMISM
The myth of Cuvierrsquos undulations of Cosmic history
reflects Byronrsquos consistent and mature pessimism His
pessimism is traceable to his own view of society
Through a metaphor he considers his age as
ldquocatastrophicrdquo ndash an ice age of the human spirit and a
declining moral grandeur His myth of Fall and
recurrence of the Ocean and ice is both comic and
historic social and literary and personal as well The
consequences of the Fall and of manrsquos imperfect nature
are seen in all major human activities Generally fallen
mankind is hounded by its lower appetites spirit
encumbered by flesh The image of Fall is linked in
Byronrsquos imagination with the rhetorical image of the
poetrsquos lsquoflightrsquo which incurs the risk of consequent
lsquosinkingrsquo or bathos And over it all hangs the perplexity
of manrsquos ignorance about his aims his nature his true
identity
ldquoFew mortals know what end they would be at
But whether glory power or love or treasure
The path is through perplexing ways and when
The goal is gained we die you know ndash and thenrdquo
HIS PROPHETIC VISION
Endowed with strong imaginative power he had
experimented in Vulcanian visions of the earth plunged
into darkness by the final extinction or the sun or lsquoa ruined starrsquo plunging on in flames through the wastes of
space This prophetic faculty is amply evident from his
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 92
poem Darkness in which his imagination prefigures the
devastating effects of nuclear weapons
ldquoThe Hour arrived ndash and it became
A wandering mass of shapeless flame
A pathless Comet and a curse
The menace of the Universe
Still rolling on with innate force
Without a sphere without a course
A bright deformity on high
The monster of the upper skyrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoI had a dream which was not at all a dream
The bright sun was extinguished and the stars
Did wander darkling in the eternal space
The habitations of all things which dwell
Were burnt for beacons cities were consumedrdquo
Darkness IV42-45
In sum and in essence Byron exemplifies Shelleyrsquos
pronouncement that poets are the unacknowledged
legislators of the world More than any other Romantic
poet Byron embodies the dictum ndash lsquowhat is to give light must endure burningrsquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 93
PB SHELLEY
(4 August 1792 ndash 8 July 1822)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 94
PB SHELLEY
English Romantic Poet
The heir to rich estates Shelley was a rebellious youth
who was expelled from Oxford in 1811 for refusing to
admit authorship of The Necessity of Atheism Later that
year he eloped with Harriet Westbrook the daughter of
a tavern owner He gradually channeled his passionate
pursuit of personal love and social justice into poetry
His first major poem Queen Mab (1813) is a utopian
political epic revealing his progressive social ideals In
1814 he eloped to France with Mary Wollstonecraft
Godwin in 1816 after Harriet drowned herself they
were married In 1818 the Shelleys moved to Italy
Away from British politics he became less intent on
social reform and more devoted to expressing his ideals
in poetry He composed the verse tragedy The Cenci (1819) and his masterpiece the lyric drama Prometheus Unbound (1820) which was published with some of his
finest shorter poems including Ode to the West Wind
and To a Skylark Epipsychidion (1821) is a Dantean
fable about the relationship of sexual desire to spiritual
love and artistic creation Adonais (1821)
commemorates the death of John Keats Shelley
drowned at age 29 while sailing in a storm off the Italian
coast leaving unfinished his last and possibly greatest
visionary poem The Triumph of Life
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 95
CHAPTER FIVE
SHELLEY A PILGRIM OF ETERNITY
INTRODUCTION
Shelley who in his Adonais eulogized Keats as lsquothe Pilgrim of Eternityrsquo is himself justly entitled to this
appellation He was essentially a poet of the skies and
heavens of light and love of eternity and immortality
Since he loved to pierce through things to their spiritual
essence the material world was less important for him
than that which lies within it and beyond it Says he ldquoI seek in what I see the manifestation of something beyond the present and tangible objectsrsquo He set out to uncover
the absolute real from its visible manifestations and
interpret it through his own poetic vision In a
passionate search for reality he pursued its essence
behind the veil of naked loveliness of Nature and the
mundane human existence Defining poetry he says
lsquoPoetry is the revelation of the eternal ideas which lie behind the many-coloured ever-shifting veil that we call reality in lifersquo For him the poet is also a seer gifted with
a peculiar insight into the nature of reality for it is
through the inspired poetic imagination that he
breathes immortality into the objects of Nature Says he
lsquoBut from these create he can
Forms more real than living man
Nurslings of immortalityrsquo
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RP DWIVEDI Page 96
Prometheus Unbound
HIS LOVE OF INDIA
Shelley was an ardent admirer of India In a letter to his
friend employed in the East India Company he
expressed keenness to visit India and settle down here
He was drawn to India for its varied and picturesque
scenic beauty vast literary heritage and age-old cultural
traditions In order to have a closer acquaintance with
our great country he set his heart and mind on serious
studies in the Indian life and letters traditions and
culture
Since he was a visionary par excellence and was
endowed with a highly contemplative mind and a
remarkable prophetic zeal he evinced a deep and
abiding interest in the philosophical and spiritual
thoughts that lie enshrined in our holy texts such as the
Vedas the Upanishads the Brahmasutras and the
Bhagvad Gita It is interesting to trace the influence of
Indian spiritual thought on Shelleyrsquos poetry
VEDANTA IN SHELLEYrsquoS POETRY
The riddle of the origin of life and Nature and the
enigmatic questions such as lsquoWhat is the cause of life
and death What is the source of universe and what will
be its ultimate destinyrsquo have always engaged the
serious attention of all wise men Man has always stood
in awe and wonder at the mysteries of human existence
and the vast world around him Our seers and savants
have not only posed such questions but have also
answered them
In the opening verse of the Kena Upanishad the
disciple asks
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 97
ldquoAt whose behest does the mind think or wander after towards its objects Commanded by whom does the life-force or the breath of life go forth on its journey At whose will do we utter speech Who is that effulgent Being whose power directs the eye and the earrdquo
Similarly in the Svetasvatara Upanishad the disciples
inquire ldquoWhat is the cause of this universe What is Brahman Whence do we come By what power do we live and on what are we established Where shall we at last find rest What rules over our joys and sorrows O Seers of Brahmanrdquo
Identical ideas impelled Shelley to exclaim in his famous
elegy Adonais
ldquoWhence are we and why are we Of what scene
The actors or spectatorsrdquo
Or again he asks in The Triumph of Life
ldquoWhence comest thou And wither goest thou
How did thy course begin I said and whyrdquo
Shelley asks
ldquoHas some unknown omnipotence unfurled
The veil of life and deathrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoAnd what were thou and earth and stars and sea
If to the human mindrsquos imaginings
Silence and solitude were vacancyrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 98
Mont Blanc
Shelley in his famous poem Hymn to Intellectual Beauty answers that there is an unseen (all-pervading) omnipotence (power) behind this phenomenal world of
which all objects are but shadows
ldquoThe awful shadow of some unseen Power
Floats though unseen among us ndash visiting
This various world with as inconstant wing
As summer winds that creep from flower to flowerrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoIt visits with inconstant glance
Each human heart and countenance
Like aught that for its grace may be
Dear and yet dearer for its mysteryrdquo
Again he affirms his faith in such a mysterious
Omnipotent power when he says
ldquoThe works and ways of men their death and birth
And that of him and all that his may be
All things that move and breathe with toil and sound
Are born and die revolve subside and swell
Power dwells apart in its tranquility
Remote serene and inaccessiblerdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 99
X X X X X X
ldquoThe secret strength of things
Which governs thought and to the infinite dome
Of Heaven is as a law inhabits theerdquo
Mont Blanc
Vedanta which is the aphoristic summary of the
Upanishads the Brahmasutras and the Bhagvad Gita
is in fact the culmination of Indian religious and
philosophical thought Since Shelley sincerely desired to
unravel the essential reality which is unchanging
timeless and eternal and of which the world of sense
perceptions is but a broken reflection he turned his
attention to the ancient scriptures of India
ONENESS OF BRAHMAN (GOD)
One of the basic postulates of Vedanta is the inherent
oneness or the sole identity of Brahman in the universe
The Chhandogya Upanishad describes Brahman as
एकमव अXवतीय ndash lsquoone only without a secondrsquo and the
other Upanishadic texts also contain parallel statements
such as स एकः ndash lsquoHe is Onersquo and एकोदवः ndash lsquoOne Lordrsquo
Similarly the Rig Veda declares एक सद वDा बहदा वदित ndash lsquoTruth (God)is one but the wise one call it
differentlyrsquo Obviously Brahman the Supreme is one
and only one He is verily one and the same whether we
call Him Brahman Ishwara Paramatma God Allah or
the supreme Cosmic Soul He only exists all other
objects of the world are subject to decay and death
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 100
How beautifully have similar thoughts been expressed
by Shelley when he exclaims
ldquoThe one remains the many change and pass
Heavenrsquos light forever shines Earthrsquos shadows fly
Life like a dome of many coloured glass
Stains the white radiance of Eternity
Until Death tramples it to fragmentsrdquo
Adonais L2
The concluding lines of Epipsychidion show that in a
moment of inspiration Shelley seemed to lay hold on the
ineffable spirituality and fundamental unity of
existence
ldquoOne hope within two wils one will beneath
Two overshadowing minds one life one death
One Heaven one hell one immortality
And one annihilationrdquo
Shelley etherealized Nature and believed in a single
power or one spirit permeating the whole universe He
effected a fusion of the Platonic philosophy of love with
the Wordsworthian doctrine of Pantheism
ldquoThe one spiritrsquos plastic stress
Sweeps through the dull dense worldrsquo
Compelling there all new successions
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 101
To the forms they wearrdquo
Holding that one universal spirit is the basis and
sustainer of Nature Shelley declares
ldquoThat Power
Which wields the world with never-wearied love
Sustains it from beneath and kindles it aboverdquo
In his pantheistic conception of Nature Shelley
conceived of it as being permeated vitalized and made
real by a universal spirit of love He clearly perceives
the presence of ldquothe awful shadow of the unseen power visiting the various worldrdquo
ldquoSpirit of Nature here
In this interminable wilderness
Of worlds at whose involved immensity
Even soaring fancy staggers
Here is thy fitting templerdquo
Demon of the World
TRANSMIGRATION OF SOUL
The doctrine of transmigration of soul or the cycle of
births and rebirths has been explicitly advanced in the
Upanishadic philosophy In the Kathopanishad
Brihadaranyak Upanishad and the Bhagvad Gita there are moving passages such as these
ldquoMan ripens like corn and like corn he is born againrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 102
Kathopanishad IV6
The Brihadaranyak Upanishad states
ldquoAnd as a caterpillar after reaching the end of a blade of grass finds another place of support and then draws itself towards it and as a goldsmith after taking a piece of gold gives it another newer and more beautiful shape similarly does the self after having thrown off this body and dispelled ignorance take on another newer and more beautiful formrdquo
Brihadaranyak Upanishad IV3-5
Similarly Lord Krishna tells Arjuna
ldquoAs a man discarding worn out clothes takes other new ones likewise the embodied soul casting off worn-out bodies enters into others which are newrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II22
And further Lord Krishna says to Arjuna
ldquofor in that case the death of him who is born is certain and the rebirth for him who is dead is inevitablerdquo
Bhagvad Gita II27
Shelley entertained similar ideas when he says
ldquoThe works and ways of man their death and birth
And that of him and all that his may be
All things that move and breathe with toil and sound
Are borm and die revolve subside and swellrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 103
Mont Blanc 92-95
Or again
ldquoThe splendours of the firmament of time
May be eclipsed but are extinguished not
Like stars to their appointed height they climb
And death is a low mist which cannot blot
The brightness it may veilrdquo
Adonais XLIV
Stressing the ephemerality of worldly objects Shelley
exclaims
ldquoSpirit of Beauty that does consecrate
With thine own hues all thou doth shine upon
Of human thought or formwhere art thou gonerdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoWhy aught should fail and fade that once is shown
Why fear and dream and death and birth
Cast on the daylight of this earth
Such gloomrdquo
Hymn to Intellectual Beauty 11
Lamenting the death of his friend Keats he says
ldquohe went uninterrupted
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 104
Into the gulf of death but his clear spirit
Yet reigns over earthrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoTo that high Capital where Kingly Death
Keeps his pale court in beauty and decay
He came and bought with price of purest breath
A grave among the eternalrdquo
Adonais VII
Again dwelling on the immortality of soul he declares
ldquoNaught we know dies Shall that alone which knows
Be as a sword consumed before the sheath
By sightless lightening The intense atom glows
A moment then is quenched in a most cold reposerdquo
Adonais XX
X X X X X X
ldquoGreat and mean
Meet massed in death who lends what life must borrowrdquo
Adonais XXI
X X X X X X
ldquoDust to dust but the pure spirit shall flow
Black to the burning fountain whence it came
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 105
A portion of the Eternal which must glow
Through time and change unquenchably the same
Whilst thy cold embers choke the sordid hearth shamerdquo
Adonais XXXVIII
THE DOCTRINE OF MAYA (DELUSION)
Our scriptures regard the phenomenal world as Maya
(delusion) They explain that the universe is neither
absolutely real nor absolutely non-existent and that its
phenomenal or apparent surface conceals and
safeguards the external presence of the Absolute
Shelley seems to have pondered over similar ideas
about the world of appearances
ldquoWorlds on worlds are rolling ever
From creation to decay
Like the bubbles on a river
Sparkling bursting borne away
But they are still immortal
Who through birthrsquos oriental portal
And deathrsquos dark chasm hurrying to and fro
Clothe their unceasing flight
In the brief dust and light
Gathered around their chariots as they gordquo
Three Choruses from Hallas
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 106
In his poem Invocation to Misery Shelley says
ldquoAll the wide world beside us
Show like multitudinous
Puppets passing from a scenerdquo
Again describing human life as a veil he says
ldquoLife not the painted veil which thou who live
Call life though unreal shapes be pictured there
And it but mimic all we would believe
With colours idly spreadrdquo
Prometheus Unbound
In the myth of Aurora he gives his own account of the
creation and interpretation of works of art
ldquoAnd lovely apparitions dim at first then radiant in the mind arising bright
From the embrace of beauty whence the forms
Of which these are phantoms casts on them
The gathered rays which are realityrdquo
Shelley seems to hint at the theory of Superimposition
(Vivartavada) which maintains that the universe is a
superimposition upon Brahman It states that the world
of thought and matter has a phenomenon or relative
existence and is superimposed upon Brahman the
unique Absolute Reality
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 107
Since the world is a network of delusion and
appearance not reality our life on earth is a sojourn
and its paramount aim is to have a glimpse of and
realize the eternal Truth or the Absolute Brahman
which is concealed by ignorance and delusion The
Ishopanishad tells us
ldquoThe face of Truth is hidden by a golden orb (disk) O Pushan (the Nourisher the Effulgent Being) uncover (the Face) that I the seeker or worshipper of Truth may hold Theerdquo
Ishopanishad XV
Like a sincere aspirant for the realization of eternal
Truth or the Absolute concealed under the illusory garb
of Maya (Delusion) Shelley in the words of Fairy in his
Queen Mab declares
ldquoAnd it is yet permitted me to rend
The veil of mortal frailty that the spirit
Clothed in its changeless purity may know
How soonest to accomplish the great end
For which it hath its being and may taste
That peace which in the end all life will sharerdquo
Queen Mab
In certain other passages Shelley speaks of the veil
identified with Time which obscured Eternity from the
sight of man The symbol of veil demonstrates that
which conceals truth goodness or happiness When the
veil was torn or rent asunder
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 108
ldquoHope was seen beaming through the mists of fear
Earth was no longer Hell
Love freedom health had given
Their ripeness to the manhood of its prime
And all its pulses beat
Symphonious to the planetary spheresrdquo
Again he uses the same symbol of veil when Cythna
says
ldquoFor with strong speech I tore the veil that hid
Nature and Truth and Liberty and Loverdquo
Shelley uses the same idea of superimposition coupled
with his own robust idealism
ldquoLife may change but it may fly not
Hope may vanish but can die not
Truth be veiled but it burneth
Love repulsed ndash but it returnethrdquo
STATES OF CONSCIOUSNESS
Our Upanishads identify three states of consciousness
crowned by the fourth which transcends all the other
three states They are
(i) The Waking State
(ii) The Dreaming State
(iii) The State of Deep Sleep and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 109
(iv) The State of Pure Consciousness (Turiya)
The fourth state of ecstatic consciousness which
transcends the preceding three has no connection with
the finite mind it is reached when in meditation the
ordinary self is left behind and the Atman or the true
self is fully realized The Mandukya Upanishad describes it thus
ldquoBeyond the senses beyond the understanding beyond all expression is the Fourth It is pure unitary consciousness wherein (all) awareness of the world and of multiplicity is completely obliterated It is effable peace It is the supreme good It is one without a second It is the Self Know it alonerdquo
Mandukya Upanishad VII
Turiya (तर[य) the fourth state is the supreme mystic
experience Shelley seems to have partly attained such a
state of pure ecstatic consciousness when he states
ldquoI seem as in a trance sublime and strange
To muse on my own separate fantasy
My own my human mind which passively
Now renders and receives fast influencing
Holding an unremitting interchange
With the clear universe of things aroundrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoSome say that gleams of a remoter world
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 110
Visit the soul in sleep that death is slumber
And that its shapes the busy thoughts outnumber
Of those who wake and live ndash I look on high
Has some unknown omnipotence unfurled
The veil of life and deathrdquo
Mont Blanc
Another instance of such a mystic experience appears in
his famous poem Triumph of Life on which Shelley was
working at the time of this death in 1822
ldquobefore me fled
The night behind me rose the day the deep
Was at my feet and Heaven above my head
When a strange trance over my fancy grew
Which was not slumber for the shade it spread
Was so transparent that the scene came through
As clear as when a veil of light is drawn
Over evening hill they glimmer and I knew
That I had felt the freshness of that dawnrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoAnd in that trance of wondrous thought I lay
This was the tenor of my waking dreamrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 111
The Triumph of Life
SHELLEY AS AN ASPIRANT FOR SELF-REALIZATION
Shelley who described himself as
ldquoA splendour among shadows a bright blot
Upon the gloomy scene a spirit that strove
For Truthrdquo
seems to have reached at last that stability or
equanimity of mind which has been described in the
Upanishads and the Bhagvad Gita In a reply to Arjunrsquos
question about the definition of one who is stable of
mind or is finally established in perfect tranquility of
mind Lord Krishna says
ldquoArjun when one thoroughly dismisses all cravings of the mind controls it and is satisfied in the self (through the joy of the self) then he is called stable of mind One whose mind remains unperturbed amid sorrows whose thirst for pleasures has altogether disappeared and who is free from passion fear and anger is called stable of mindrdquo
Bhagvad Gita V56
The Katha Upanishad stresses similar ideas when it
says
ldquoBut he who possesses right discrimination whose mind is under control and is always pure he reaches that goal from which he is not born againrdquo
X X X X X X
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 112
ldquoThe man who has a discriminative intellect for the driver and a controlled mind for the reins reaches the end of the journey the highest place of Vishnu (the all-pervading and unchangeable one)rdquo
Katha Upanishad
Shelley echoes identical thoughts when he says
ldquoMan who man would be
Must rule the empire of himself in it
Must be supreme establishing his throne
On vanquished will quelling the anarchy
Of hopes and fears being himself alonerdquo
Sonnet on Political Greatness
It was in such rare moments of inner consciousness or
lsquoBlessed moodrsquo that Shelley felt lsquoOne with Naturersquo or
lsquoThe Power which wields the world with never-wearied love
Sustains it from beneath and kindles it aboversquo
As a myth-maker or a mythopoeic poet he conjured
visions of a golden age by turning to the grand aspects
of Nature ndash the ether the sky the wind the Sun the
Moon the light and the clouds and employing them as
befitting agencies and vehicles of his evolutionary ideas
ldquoPoetryrdquo he wrote ldquois indeed something divine It is at once the centre and circumference of all knowledgerdquo He
conceived of the universe as alive with a living spirit
behind it He moralizes natural myths and perceives the
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 113
Absolute behind the ephemeral In an exquisite image
he exclaims
ldquoThe sanguine sunrise with his meteor eyes
And his burning plumes outspread
Leaps on the back of my sailing rack
When the morning star shines deadrdquo
As his thoughts reached the zenith of their growth
Shelley identified his individual self with the all-
pervading Cosmic Self or the Brahman of the Vedanta
and felt himself one with the indwelling spirit of the
universe Unity filled his imagination he perceived
eternal harmony in the phenomenal existence and
rejoiced his own being in the vast million-coloured
pageants of the world And finally not only Nature but
all human existence is taken up as an inalienable aspect
of the eternal Cosmic Spirit He reaches the core the
centre of all palpable universe when he declares
ldquoI am the eye with which the Universe
Behold itself and knows itself divine
All harmony of instrument and verse
All prophecy all medicine is mine
All light of art or nature to my song
Victory and praise in its own right belongrdquo
Shelley perceived the transcendental or mystic
consciousness in which one realizes the complete
identity of self with the Supreme Self and which is called
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 114
तर[य अवथा ndash where one sees nothing but One
(Brahman) hears nothing but the One knows nothing
but the One ndash there is the Infinite The same truth is
vividly explained in the Bhagvad Gita when Lord
Krishna tells Arjuna
ldquoWhen one sees Eternity in things that pass away and Infinity in finite things then one has pure knowledgerdquo
Bhagvad Gita XVIII20
Our own great seer-poet and philosopher Sri Aurobindo
Ghose described Shelley as a sovereign voice of the new
spiritual force and a native of the heights with its
luminous ethereality where he managed to dwell
prophetically in a future heaven and earth with
brilliances of a communion with a higher law another
order of existence another meaning behind Nature and
terrestrial things
Sri Aurobindo further praises him as lsquoa seer of spiritual realities who has a poetic grasp of metaphysical truths and can see the forms and hear the voices of higher elements spirits and natural godheads and has a constant feeling of a high spiritual and intellectual beauty He is at once seer poet thinker prophet and artist Light love liberty are the three godheads in whose presence his pure and radiant spirit lived but a celestial light a celestial love a celestial liberty To bring them down to earth without their losing their celestial lustre and here is his passionate endeavour but his wings constantly buoy him upward and cannot beat strongly in an earthlier atmosphere There is an air of luminous mist surrounding his intellectual presentation of his meaning which shows the truths he sees as things to which the mortal eye cannot easily pierce or the life and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 115
temperament of earth rise to realize and live yet to bring about the union of the mortal and immortal terrestrial and the celestial is always his passion Shelley is the bright archangel of this dawn and becomes greater to us as the light he foresaw and lived and he sings half-concealed in the too dense halo of his own ethereal beautyrsquo
And what Juan Mascaro states as universal truth is
equally pertinent to Shelleyrsquos poetry
ldquoA deep faith in life cannot but be spiritual The path of Truth may not be a path of parallel lines but a path that follows one circle because Truth is onerdquo
Infinite is God infinite are His aspects and infinite are
the ways to reach Him In the Atharva Veda we read
ldquoThe one light appears in diverse formsrdquo This ideal of
harmony is carried to its logical conclusion in blending
synthesizing and reconciling conflicting metaphysical
theories and opposed conceptions of spiritual
discipline We read in the pages of Bhagvad Gita
ldquoWhatever wish men bring in worship
That wish I grant them
Whatever path men travel
Is my path
No matter where they walk
It leads to merdquo
Bhagvad Gita IV11
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RP DWIVEDI Page 116
To sum up Shelleyrsquos poetry will always hold irresistible
fascination to the lovers of light and beauty for to
quote Juan Mascaro again
ldquoThe finite in man longs for the Infinite The love that moves the stars moves also the heart of man and a law of spiritual gravitation leads his soul to the soul of the universe Man sees the sun by the light of the sun and he sees the spirit by the light of his own inner spirit The radiance of eternal beauty shines over this vast universe and in moments of contemplation we can see the Eternal in things that pass away This is the message of the great spiritual seers and all poetry and art and beauty is only an infinite variation of this message The spiritual visions of man confirm and illumine each other Great poems in different languages have different values but they all are poetry and the spiritual visions of man come all from one Light In them we have Lamps of Fire that burn to the glory of Godrdquo
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RP DWIVEDI Page 117
JOHN KEATS
(31 October 1795 ndash 23 February 1821)
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RP DWIVEDI Page 118
JOHN KEATS
English Romantic Poet
The son of a livery-stable manager he had a limited
formal education He worked as a surgeons apprentice
and assistant for several years before devoting himself
entirely to poetry at age 21 His first mature work was
the sonnet On First Looking into Chapmans Homer
(1816) His long Endymion appeared in the same year
(1818) as the first symptoms of the tuberculosis that
would kill him at age 25 During a few intense months of
1819 he produced many of his greatest works several
great odes (including Ode on a Grecian Urn Ode to a
Nightingale and To Autumnrdquo) two unfinished
versions of the story of the titan Hyperion and La Belle
Dame Sans Merci Most were published in the
landmark collection Lamia Isabella The Eve of St Agnes and Other Poems (1820) Marked by vivid imagery great
sensuous appeal and a yearning for the lost glories of
the Classical world his finest works are among the
greatest of the English tradition His letters are among
the best by any English poet
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RP DWIVEDI Page 119
CHAPTER SIX
JOHN KEATS A MINSTREL OF BEAUTY AND TRUTH
INTRODUCTION
John Keats who in his own words was lsquoa fair creature of an hourrsquo lived a brief and turbulent life Pre-eminently a
sensuous poet in whom the Romantic sensibility to
outward impressions of sight sound touch and smell
reached its climax the life of Keats was a series of
sensations felt with febrile acuteness
His ideal was passive contemplation rather than active
mental exertion ldquoO for a life of sensations rather than of thoughtrdquo he exclaimed in one of his letters and in
another ldquoit is more noble to sit like Jove than to fly like Mercuryrdquo In fact his was a life of intense sensations
acute poignancy and an infinite yearning for beauty
which he identified with truth
Richness of sensuousness characterizes all his poetry
and his power of expression is marked by a spectacular
vividness which is interspersed with beautiful epithets
heavily charged with subtle messages for the senses His
works are so full of luxuriance of sensations and acute
passions that ordinary readers do not pause to perceive
the unimpeded flow of spiritual thoughts underneath
The pursuit of the spirit of beauty dominates all his
works which have one enduring message ndash the
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RP DWIVEDI Page 120
lastingness of beauty and its identity with supreme
truth (or God) This message ndash the oneness of beauty
with truth and the eternal existence of truth ndash has been
beautifully enshrined in his famous and oft-quoted lines
(with which he concludes his Ode on a Grecian Urn)
ldquoBeauty is truth truth beauty ndash that is all
Ye know on earth and all ye need to knowrdquo
Keats died at the age of 26 but even from his early age
he had visions of rare spiritual significance Dwelling on
the value of visions in human life and poetry he says
ldquoSince every man whose soul is not a clod
Hath vision
For poesy alone can tell her dreams
With the fine spell of words alone can save
Imagination from the sable chain
And dumb enchantmentrdquo
Since common readers tend to ignore the underlying
spiritual import of his visions and images this article
aims at bringing into play some of the poetrsquos thoughts
which bear a remarkable resemblance to the age-old
hoary spirituality of our ancient land
Stressing the fundamental truths of our Indian thought
and tracing their distinct reflection in the works of great
Western poets seems a worth-while academic pursuit
FUNDAMENTAL UNITY
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RP DWIVEDI Page 121
From the very beginning Keats could realize the
fundamental unity of Truth and Beauty and could dwell
at length on it to show how diverse paths illumined by
the glory of spirit in man ultimately lead him to the
realization of this abiding lesson of life The supreme
oneness of Truth has been beautifully enunciated by Sri
Krishna in the Bhagvad Gita
ldquoIn any way that men love Me in that same way they find My love for many are the paths of men but they all in the end come to Merdquo
Similar thoughts have found expression in the
introduction to the Upanishads by Juan Mascaro
ldquoThe path of Truth may not be a path of parallel lines but a path that follows one circle by going to the right and climbing the circle or by going to the left and climbing the circle we are bound to meet at the top although we started in apparently contrary directions This is bound to be in the end because Truth is onerdquo
And when Keats was only 22 he could give expression
to deep thoughts that have a curious similarity to the
ideas expressed in the Mundak Upanishad and the
Bhagvad Gita
ldquoNow it appears to me that almost any man may like the spider spin from his own inwards his own airy citadel the points of leaves and twigs on which the spider begins her work are few and she fills the air with a beautiful circuiting Man should be content with as few points to tip with the fine Web of his Soul and weave a tapestry empyrean-full of symbols for his spiritual eye of softness for his spiritual touch of space for his wanderings of distinctness for his luxuryrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 122
ldquoBut the minds of mortals are so different and bent on such diverse journeys that it may at first appear impossible for any common taste and fellowship to exist between two or three under these suppositions It is however quite the contrary Minds would leave each other in contrary directions traverse each other in numberless points and at last greet each other at the journeyrsquos end An old man and a child would talk together and the old man be led on his path and the child left thinkingrdquo
ldquoMan should not dispute or assert but whisper results to his neighbor and thus by every germ of spirit sucking the sap from mould ethereal every human might become great and humanity instead of being a wide heath of furze and briars with here and there a remote oak or pine would become a great democracy of forest treesrdquo
WISDOM
All men of good will are bound to meet if they follow the
wisdom of the words Shakespeare in Hamlet where if
we write SELF or self we find the doctrine of the
Upanishad
ldquoThis above all to thine own self be true
And it must follow as the night the day
Thou canst not then be false to any manrdquo
Now coming back to the theme of beauty and truth and
their ultimate identity in the universe we have to dwell
at large on the concept of beauty as enunciated by Keats
in his poetry From the very beginning Keats realized
that beauty in its true sense illumines manrsquos thoughts
and thus leads him to understand the glory of truth and
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RP DWIVEDI Page 123
the pervading spirit of their identity in whatever he
sees hears and perceives
The eternal identity or oneness of beauty with truth and
their interplay in the world are in fact unfailing
fountains of joy The permanence of beauty as a source
of joy has been beautifully elucidated by the poet in the
opening lines of his famous poem Endymion
ldquoA thing of beauty is a joy forever
Its loveliness increases it will never
Pass into nothingnessrdquo
He goes on to say
ldquoSome shape of beauty moves away the pall
From our dark spirits
An endless fountain of immortal drink
Pouring unto us from the heavenrsquos brink
Nor do we merely feel these essences
For one short hour
glories infinite
Haunt us till they become a cheering light
Unto our souls and bound to us so fast
That whether there be shine or gloom overcast
They always must be with us or we dierdquo
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RP DWIVEDI Page 124
When he ascribes permanence to joy born of beauty
Keats has in mind the immanence and effulgence of
beauty as a reflection of its creator God Beauty whose
lsquoloveliness increasesrsquo and which lsquowill never pass into nothingnessrsquo is an inalienable attribute of Divinity for it
is lsquoan endless fountain of immortal drinkrsquo
BEAUTY
God (as the poet seems to presuppose) is all Beautiful or
the embodiment of all Beauty and the entire world of
sights and sounds is nothing else but a glorious garment
of God So beauty does not consist only in apparent
physical appearances but is an offspring of inherent
divinity in man and nature which is dimly reflected in
their attractive exterior Such an eternal beauty in his
view presents lsquoglories infinite that haunt us till they become a cheering light unto our souls It is this beauty the glory of spirit which must be with us or we dierdquo
The poetrsquos concept of beauty with its glories infinite
bears a striking resemblance with the path of splendour
of our Vedic and epic scriptures in which our sages
perceived the Divine presence in all that is splendid and
beautiful in the universe
Our Vedic texts are full of the expressions of the sage-
poetrsquos exquisite astonishment before the visions of
glory and wonder The attitude of our Vedic seer-poets
towards beauty as a transcendental reality beyond our
sense-perceptions has been beautifully expressed in
images of beauty and glory as an abstract idea Says Rig Veda
ldquoSinless for noble power under the influence of Savita God
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 125
May we obtain all things that are beautifulrdquo
GOODNESS
Here the power of goodness is contemplated to lead to
the power of beauty Beauty in its myriad forms leads
us to spiritual consciousness of Divinity inherent in
Nature and all living beings Identical thoughts have
been expressed by Sri Krishna in Chapter X of the
Bhagvad Gita where all splendour and glory is said to
be the reflection of God whose manifestation this
universe is Says Sri Krishna to Arjuna
ldquoKnow thou that whatever is beautiful and good whatever has glory and power is only a portion of My own radiancerdquo
Bhagvad Gita X41
Seeing the effulgence of a thousand suns bursting forth
and yet it could hardly match the splendour of the
supreme Lord Arjuna exclaimed in wonder
ldquoI see the splendour of an infinite beauty which illumines the whole universe It is thee With thy crown and scepter and circle How difficult thou art to see But I see thee as fire as the Sun blinding incomprehensiblerdquo
Bhagvad Gita XI17
Besides this concept of ultimate elemental beauty
Keats goes on to underscore its fundamental and
inseparable unity with Truth which is yet another
inalienable facet of Divinity on earth
Truth being an essential attribute of God lies at the
core of all existence and it sustains the entire universe
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 126
with its manifold forms of beauty reflected in countless
objects around us When Keats declares that lsquoBeauty is truth truth beautyrsquo he seems to remind us of the age-old
spiritual consciousness that found sublime utterance in
our Vedas which are the oldest treatises on lsquophilosophia perennisrsquo the eternal philosophy In the Vedas truth has
been described as the essence of Divinity
ldquoThe deity has truth as the law of His beingrdquo
Atharva Veda VIIXXIV1
The Rig Veda calls the deities as various manifestations
of Truth Elsewhere in the Rig Veda the Deity has been
described as true and the path of religious progress is
the ingredient of Dharma Declares the Rig Veda
ldquoBy truth is the earth upheldrdquo
Rig Veda X85
An Upanishadic sage says
ldquoTruth alone triumphs not untruth By Truth the spiritual path is widened that path by which the seers who are free from all cravings and declares travel and reach the supreme abode of Truthrdquo
Mundak Upanishad IIII6
So Truth is a basic postulate of Dharma and an abiding
and ultimate value of life It is the eternal oneness of
beauty and truth and truth and beauty that inspired
Keats to stress their underlying unity and their
transcendental reality When Keats says ldquoThat is all ye know on earth and all ye need to knowrdquo he points to that
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 127
ecstatic wonder which the spiritual realization of this
eternal truth brings to a seeker or seer or a poet
SUBLIMITY
Keats seems to have reached such a sublime plane of
poetic consciousness that is so aptly suggested by our
Vedic seers who have extolled God as a poet (कव) and
His divine creative energy is indicated as the poetic
power (काय) which has assumed manifold forms of
beauty and splendour So God as the supreme creator of
beauty has been described in the Rig Veda as
ldquoHe who is supporter of the world of life
Who knows the secret mysterious names
Of the morning beams
He poet cherishes manifold forms
By His poetic powerrdquo
Rig Veda VIIIXL5
So let me hasten to the conclusion by affirming that as
lsquoa lily for a dayrsquo Keats proved that a crowded hour of
glory is far better than an age without a name he seems
to have lived up to the lofty advice of Queen Vidula to
her son King Sanjaya in the Mahabharat
महतम 0व1लत 2यो न त धमऽतम 4चर
ldquoIt is better to flame forth for an instant than smoke away for agesrdquo
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RP DWIVEDI Page 128
Eternal truths transcend the barriers of time and space
country and clime caste and creed and shine through all
lands and in all ages Even today the enlightened souls
all over the world have a significant identity of ideas
irrespective of the countries to which they belong and
the religious faith to which they are affiliated
Such wise men awaken others from a state of
intellectual and spiritual slumber enkindle in them a
sense of understanding and fraternity It has been
rightly said by HW Longfellow
ldquoLives of great men all remind us
We can make our lives sublime
And departing leave behind us
Footprints on the sand of Timerdquo
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RP DWIVEDI Page 129
RW EMERSON
(25 May 1803 ndash 27 April 1882)
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RP DWIVEDI Page 130
RW EMERSON
US Poet Essayist and Lecturer
Emerson graduated from Harvard University and was
ordained a Unitarian minister in 1829 His questioning
of traditional doctrine led him to resign the ministry
three years later He formulated his philosophy in
Nature (1836) the book helped initiate New England
Transcendentalism a movement of which he soon
became the leading exponent In 1834 he moved to
Concord Mass the home of his friend Henry David
Thoreau His lectures on the proper role of the scholar
and the waning of the Christian tradition caused
considerable controversy In 1840 with Margaret
Fuller he helped launch The Dial a journal that
provided an outlet for Transcendentalist ideas He
became internationally famous with his Essays (1841
1844) including Self-Reliance Representative Men
(1850) consists of biographies of historical figures The Conduct of Life (1860) his most mature work reveals a
developed humanism and a full awareness of human
limitations His Poems (1847) and May-Day (1867)
established his reputation as a major poet
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 131
CHAPTER SEVEN
EMERSONrsquoS SPIRITUAL QUEST AND INDIAN THOUGHT
INTRODUCTION
Ralph Waldo Emerson the lsquoSage of Concordrsquo as he is
rightly called was an American seer who came into the
world at a time when East and the West were gradually
coming closer to each other in spheres more than one
trade and commerce between the two was gaining
momentum and above all the era of inter-
communication of ideas intellect and spirit was being
ushered in by exchange of books
Emerson was one of the first great Americans who
absorbed himself sufficiently in this phenomenon
ventured into the sacred literature of India and
assimilated its thought to such a remarkable degree that
he became its eminent interpreter to his countrymen in
particular and to the entire West in general
EMERSON AND THE GITA
Let us see what Swami Vivekananda said about the
source of Emersonrsquos inspiration Swamiji said
ldquoThe greatest incident of the (Mahabharata) war was the marvelous and immortal poem of the Gita the Song Celestial It is the popular scripture of India and the loftiest of all teachings I would advise those of you who have not read that book to read it If you only knew how
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 132
much it has influenced your own country (America) even If you want to know the source of Emersonrsquos inspiration it is this book the Gita He went to see Carlyle and Carlyle made him a present of the Gita and that little book is responsible for the Concord Movement All the broad movements in America in one way or other are indebted to the Concord partyrdquo
His interest in the sacred writings of India was probably
aroused at Harvard and he kept it aglow throughout his
life With his motto ldquoTomorrow to fresh fields and pastures newrdquo he set out in search of the True (Satyam)
the Good (Shivam) and the Beautiful (Sundaram)
In busy and bustling New England there came forward
to quote Theodore Parker ldquothis young David a shepherd but to be a king with his garlands and singing robes about him one note upon his new and fresh-string lyre was worth a thousand menrdquo
With unflinching faith in Truth Righteousness and
Beauty and absolute confidence in all the attributes of
infinity he drank deep at the unfailing source of Indian
philosophy and religion and gave his thoughts such a
lucid inimitable expression that his writings have
become a veritable treasure of world literature Revered
the world over held in high esteem by great Indians like
Rabindranath Tagore and Pt Jawaharlal Nehru and
admired by Gandhiji his writings abound in the beauty
of his speech the majesty of his ideas and the loftiness
of his moral sentiments
Perhaps the most fitting commentary on the relevance
of his thoughts to our country was made by Mahatma
Gandhi after reading his Essays Said Mahatma Gandhi
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 133
ldquoThe Essays to my mind contain the teaching of Indian wisdom in a Western Guru It is interesting to see our own sometimes differently fashionedrdquo
There are indeed innumerable points of similarity in
thought and experience between Emerson and the
mainstream of Indian philosophy The philosophy of
Vedanta which was one of the thought currents that
reached America in the first half of the 19th century
influenced Emerson deeply and contributed largely to
his concept of lsquoselfhoodrsquo Emerson found the Vedic
doctrines of soul congenial to his own ideas about manrsquos
relationship to the universe He therefore drew freely
upon the Hindu scriptures which contain a vivid and
well-elaborated doctrine of lsquoSelfrsquo Numerous references
in his essays and journals to the lsquoLaws of Manursquo
(Manusmriti) Vishnu Puran Bhagvad Gita and Katha Upanishad bear ample testimony to this fact
Let us examine some of the striking identities between
Emerson and the Vedanta The Upanishads tell us that
the central core of onersquos self is clearly identifiable with
the Cosmic Reality ldquoThe self within you the resplendent immortal person is the internal self of all things and is the Universal Brahmanrdquo The Chhandogya Upanishad tells
us that ldquothe self which inhabits the body is verily the Brahman and that as soon as the mortal coil is thrown over it will finally merge in Brahmanrdquo
How close was Emersonrsquos spiritual kinship with the
Vedantic doctrines is clear from the following lines
taken from his essay Plato or the Philosopher
ldquoIn all nations there are minds which incline to dwell in the conception of the Fundamental Unity the ecstasy of losing all being in one Being This tendency
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 134
finds its highest expression chiefly in the Indian scriptures in the Vedas the Bhagvad Gita and the Vishnu Puranrdquo
He further quotes Lord Krishna speaking to a sage ldquoYou are fit to apprehend that you are not distinct from meThat which I am thou art and that also in this world with its gods and heroes and mankind Men contemplate distinctions because they are stupefied with ignorance What is the great end of all you shall now learn from me It is soul-one in all bodies pervading uniform perfect pre-eminent over nature exempt from birth growth and decay Omnipresent made up of true knowledge independent unconnected with unrealities with name species and the rest in time past present and to come The knowledge that this spirit which is essentially one is in onersquos own and all other bodies is the wisdom of one who knows the unity of thingsrdquo
In formulating his own concept of the Over-soul
Emerson quotes Lord Krishna once again
ldquoWe live in succession in division in parts in particles Meantime within man is the soul of the whole the wise silence the universal beauty to which every part and particle is equally related the eternal One And this deep power in which we exist and whose beatitude is all accessible to us is not only self-sufficing and perfect in every hour but in the act of seeing and the thing seen the seer and the spectacle the subject and the object are one We see the world piece by piece as the sun the moon the animal the tree but the whole of which these are shining parts is the Soul Only by the vision of that wisdom can the horoscope of ages be readrdquo
The Over-Soul
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 135
A transcendentalist par excellence Emerson who was
influenced by German philosophers like Kant Hegel
Fichte and Schelling and their English interpreters
Coleridge and Carlyle affirmed that man could
apprehend reality by direct spiritual insight To him
intuition knew truths which ldquotranscendedrdquo those
accessible to intellect logical argument and scientific
inquiry Such a transcendentalism or attitude which
provided a metaphysical justification for the ideal of
individual freedom was found writ large in the holy
books of India
Steeped as he was in the oriental lore echoes of
Vedantic philosophy can be distinctly heard in his
writings which shine like ldquoa good deed in a naughty worldrdquo
Some of his poems resemble Vedantic literature in form
as well as in content His two famous poems Brahma
and Hamatreya are striking examples of such a close
affinity both in content and expression Ideas and
images in Brahma reflect certain passages which
Emerson had copied into his journals from the Vishnu
Puran the Bhagvad Gita and Katha Upanishad The first
stanza of Brahma which reads
ldquoIf the red slayer think he slays
Or if the slain think he is slain
They know not well the subtle ways
I keep and pass and turn againrdquo
is essentially an adaptation of these lines from the
Katha Upanishad
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 136
ldquoIf the slayer thinks I slay if the slain thinks I am slain then both of them do not know well It (the soul) does not slay nor is it slainrdquo
Katha Upanishad II19
The same lines with a little variation of course appear
in the Bhagvad Gita
ldquoThey are both ignorant he who knows that the soul to be capable of killing and he who takes it as killed for verily the soul neither kills nor is killedrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II19
The image of Brahma as a red slayer has been derived
from the Vishnu Puran where Lord Shiva the destroyer
of Creation has been depicted as Rudra (the red slayer)
but destruction envisages new creation and therefore
symbolizes the decadence of one and necessitates the
advent of the other This is why Lord Shiva is regarded
as the god not only of extermination but also of
regeneration With this concept is connected the cult of
Shaivagam ndash the ushering in of an era of general good
and prosperity when the world is created anew
The second and third stanzas of Brahma echo the
following lines of the Bhagvad Gita
ldquoI am the ritual action I am the sacrifice I am the ancestral oblation I am the sacred hymn I am the melted butter I am the fire and I am the offeringrdquo
Bhagvad Gita IX16
and also from the same source
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 137
ldquoI am immortality as well as death I am being as well as non-beingrdquo
Bhagvad Gita IX19
In the fourth stanza of Brahma there is a direct
reference to lsquothe Sacred Sevenrsquo ndash the seven highest saints
of our country namely Kashyapa Atri Bharadwaj Vishwamitra Gautam Vashishtha and Jamadagni Thus
we find that Brahma embodies an age-old Vedantic
truth
As regards his next poem Hamatreya its very title is a
variation of a disciplersquos name lsquoMaitreyarsquo to whom the
earth had recited a few verses Before we examine the
poem critically let us read a long passage from the
Vishnu Puran Book IV which Emerson had copied into
his 1845 Journal This passage which sheds ample light
on the background and theme of the poem under
reference reads
ldquoKings who with perishable frames have possessed this ever-enduring world and who blinded with deceptive notions of individual occupation have indulged the feeling that suggests lsquoThis earth is mine it is my sonrsquos it belongs to my dynastyrsquo have all passed awayearth laughs as if smiling with autumnal flowers to behold her kings unable to effect the subjugation of themselvesthese were the verses Maitreya which earth recited and by listening to which ambition fades away like snow before the windrdquo
Journals VII127-130
How futile is human vanity and how ridiculous is the
possessive instinct in man has been thoroughly exposed
by Emerson in the following lines
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 138
ldquoEarth laughs in flowers to see her boastful boys
Earth-proud proud of the earth which is not theirs
Who steer the plough but cannot steer their feet
Clear of the graverdquo
Hamatreya
Man who awaits lsquothe inevitable hourrsquo forgets that all his
heraldry pomp power wealth and lsquopaths of gloryrsquo lead
him lsquobut to the graversquo and grows so proud of his material
achievements and so deeply attached to the fleeting
things of the world that he loses sight of the supreme
philosophical truth - the ephemerality of the world and
the immortality of soul Death which is lurking in the
shadows can lay his icy hands upon us any day yet due
to false pride and sense of meum and attachment we
allow ourselves to be duped by the passing show of the
world without ever thinking of salvation or final release
from the worldly bondages Says Emerson
ldquoAh the hot owner sees not Death who adds
Him to his land a lump of mould the morerdquo
Hamatreya
Here Emerson seems to have been deeply influences by
Indian scriptures and particularly Ishopanishad and
the Bhagvad Gita in which the philosophy of God-
realization through detached action has been succinctly
elaborated In these two sacred books it has been stated
that total renunciation of the sense of meum egotism
and attachment with regard to the world all worldly
objects body and all actions is a path to real love for
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 139
God All worldly objects like land wealth house clothes
all relations like parents wife children friends and all
forms of worldly enjoyment like honour fame prestige
being the creations of Maya are wholly deluding
transient and perishable whereas one God alone the
embodiment of Existence (Sat) Knowledge (Chit) and
Bliss (Anand) is all in all omnipotent omniscient and
omnipresent Therefore all sense of meum egotism and
attachment must be totally renounced for spiritual
growth and pure exclusive love for God If the seed of
egoism is sown sorrow is the fruit On the other hand
the more a man cultivates dispassion and
disinterestedness with regard to the world the more
easily he transcends the barriers of Ignorance (Avidya)
Delusion (Maya) and Aversion (Dvesha) and marches
on the path of self-realization and God-realization A
similar thought current runs through the following
memorable lines of Earth-Song which forms an integral
part of the poem
ldquoThe earth says
They called me theirs who so controlled me
Yet every one wished to stay and is gone
How am I theirs if they cannot hold me
But I hold themrdquo
Hamatreya
These lines remind us of those memorable words of
Lord Krishna in the Bhagvad Gita XII16 where a true
devotee is characterized as one who is ldquodelivered from the egorsquos thrall - the sense of I and minerdquo or the feeling of
doership in all undertakings
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 140
After reading these lines which seem to refer to the
famous Biblical phrase lsquodust thou art to dust returnethrsquo
the readers may feel called upon to cultivate a sense of
detachment and renunciation for their ambition fades
away and their lsquoavarice cooled like dust in the chill of the graversquo
All art it has been said is an attempt to distract man
from his ego Emersonrsquos Hamatreya is certainly an
illustrious example of great art Highly didactic in
content and tone this poem reminds us of that sublime
mood in which Emerson realized the futility of
egocentric attachment to earth and its fleeting objects
which are shadows rather than substances
Emersonrsquos writings leave us to quote John Milton lsquoCalm of mind all passions spentrsquo A fitting comment on the
total impact of Emersonrsquos works on us has been given
by a brilliant American man of letters Theodore Parker
who says
ldquoA good test of the comparative value of books is the state they leave you in Emerson leaves you tranquil resolved on noble manhood fearless of the consequences he gives men to mankind and mankind to the laws of Godrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 141
HD THOREAU
(12 July 1817 ndash 6 May 1862)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 142
HD THOREAU
US Thinker Essayist and Naturalist
Thoreau graduated from Harvard University and taught
school for several years before leaving his job to
become a poet of nature Back in Concord he came
under the influence of Ralph Waldo Emerson and began
to publish pieces in the Transcendentalist magazine The Dial In the years 1845ndash47 to demonstrate how
satisfying a simple life could be he lived in a hut beside
Concords Walden Pond essays recording his daily life
were assembled for his masterwork Walden (1854) His
A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers (1849)
was the only other book he published in his lifetime He
reflected on a night he spent in jail protesting the
Mexican-American War in the essay Civil
Disobedience (1849) which would later influence such
figures as Mohandas K Gandhi and Martin Luther King
Jr In later years his interest in Transcendentalism
waned and he became a dedicated abolitionist His
many nature writings and records of his wanderings in
Canada Maine and Cape Cod display the mind of a keen
naturalist After his death his collected writings were
published in 20 volumes and further writings have
continued to appear in print
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RP DWIVEDI Page 143
CHAPTER EIGHT
THOREAUrsquoS TRYST WITH INDIAN CULTURE
INTRODUCTION
Henry David Thoreau was a great American
transcendentalist thinker His seminal mind and
original thought had an enduring impact on his own
countrymen and also on peoples beyond the bounds of
America His philosophy and life had a deep influence
on all great men of his time Mahatma Gandhi regarded
him as his Guru and his concept of Satyagraha owes its
origin to Thoreaursquos essay on Civil Disobedience which
Gandhiji chanced upon in South Africa On Thoreaursquos
greatness another great American contemporary RW
Emerson once remarked ldquoHis soul was made for the noblest society he had in short life exhausted the capabilities of this world Wherever there is knowledge wherever there is virtue wherever there is beauty he will find a homerdquo
HIS LOVE OF SOLITUDE
Endowed with a rare meditative mind Thoreau loved
lsquosweet solitudersquo for he held that what is truly alone is the
spirit A seeker after perfection he retired to the
solitude of the woods to see with the eyes of the soul ndash
ldquothe higher law in naturerdquo and realize his oneness with
the Cosmic Spirit A lover of the spirit behind the world
of appearance he once said ndash ldquoI love to be alone I never
found the companion that was so companionable as
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RP DWIVEDI Page 144
solitude In solitude of the woods I suddenly recover my
spirits my spirituality I can go from the buttercups to
the life everlastingrdquo His love for loneliness resembles
that of our own sages and saints who shunned the din
and clamour of madding crowds and retired to the
sylvan solitude of the woods for meditation on
mysteries of life It was in the secluded and tranquil
atmosphere of the woods that the great teachers of
mankind cultivated their souls observed austerity and
wrote the holiest scriptures Aranyakas and sacred texts
Gurukul (forest academies)- the ideal nurseries of
higher learning and disciplined rigorous life were setup
here for success in life and self-realization which is a
path-way to God-realization
HIS CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE AND GANDHIJIrsquoS
SATYAGRAHA
Bapu read Thoreaursquos essay on Civil Disobedience for
the second time in jail and was so deeply impressed by
it that he called it ldquoa masterly treatise which left a deep impression on merdquo He copied the words ldquoI did not feel for a moment confined and the walls seemed a great waste of stone and mortarrdquo Gandhiji wrote to Roosevelt
in 1942 ldquoI have profited greatly by the writings of Thoreau and Emersonrdquo He told Roger Baldwin that
Thoreaursquos essay ldquocontained the essence of his political philosophy not only as Indiarsquos struggle related to the British but as to his own views of the relation of citizens to Governmentrdquo As Miller observed ldquoGandhiji received back from America what was fundamentally the philosophy of India after it had been distilled and crystallized in the mind of Thoreaurdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 145
In his Civil Disobedience which as a document of
much ethical and spiritual value is manrsquos most powerful
weapon in dealing with tyranny Thoreau examines the
relation of the individual to the state and offers a candid
exposition when he says ldquoThat Government is best which governs the leastrdquo He believed in the supremacy of
moral laws and his concept of Civil Disobedience is
based on the dictates of conscience Since the nature of
an individual is determined by his conscience there is
always a basic conflict between the laws arbitrarily
made by the Government and the objectives sanctioned
and held sacred by the individualrsquos conscience He
regarded the individual as more important than the
state So in the interests of justice and virtue men with
clean conscience most oppose unjust laws The form of
protest launched by conscientious and holy men against
government is called Civil Disobedience
Thoreau seems to have derived the concept from the
Bhagvad Gita which invests each individual with two
contradictory traits ndash the Divine Attributes and the
Diabolical Propensities Whenever diabolical tendencies
promote arbitrary administration by making unjust
laws and men of clean conscience are forced to obey
them injustice prevails and justice or righteousness is
destroyed In such a situation the Divinity incarnates
itself and sets matters right Declares Lord Krishna
ldquoWhenever righteousness (Virtue) is on the decline and injustice (Vice) is on the ascendant then I body forth myselfrdquo
Bhagvad Gita IV7
To Gandhiji also Satya (Truth) and Ahimsa (Non-
violence) are inter-related and Satyagraha or non-
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RP DWIVEDI Page 146
violent resistance is based on the belief in the power of
spirit the power of truth the power of love by which we
can overcome evil through self-suffering and self-
sacrifice
FORMATIVE INDIAN INFLUENCES
Thoreau was thoroughly immersed in the Indian
scriptures In Emersonrsquos library he read and was deeply
influenced by the Manusmriti Bhagvad Gita Vishnu Puran Hitopadesh Rig-Veda and the Upanishads
Which the Manusmriti led him to seek the Self in
solitude the Bhagvad Gita taught him the ideal of
disinterested action non-attachment meditation and
self-realization He was so overwhelmed by the Gita that
he declared it to be the lsquoUniversal Gospelrsquo Praising its
moral grandeur and sustained sublimity of thoughts he
wrote in Walden ndash ldquoIn the morning I bathe my intellect in the stupendous cosmogonal philosophy of the Bhagvad Gita since whose composition years of the gods have elapsed and in comparison with which our modern world and its literature seems puny and trivial the best Hindu scripture (Gita) is remarkable for its pure intellectuality The reader is nowhere raised into and sustained in a higher purer and rarer region of thought than the Bhagvad Gita It is unquestionably one of the noblest and most sacred scriptures which have come down to us The oriental philosophy assigns their due rank respectively to action and contemplation or rather does full Justice to the latterrdquo
A thorough study of the Upanishads made him exclaim
joyfully ldquoWhat extracts from the Vedas I have read fall on me like the light of a higher and purer luminary which describes a loftier course through a purer stratum ndash free from particulars simple universalrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 147
At a time when the Western philosophers did not
appreciate the significance of contemplation Thoreau
emphasized that contemplation is as important as
action for the latter has to be charged by the former
otherwise action will lead to chaos disillusionment and
despair
HIS TRANSCENDENTALISM
Thoreau was an empirical transcendentalist To him
transcendentalism was a profound exploration of the
spiritual foundations of life His emphasis on intuition
or inner light for a direct relationship with God which
transcends all the conventional avenues of
communication stemmed from an intuitive capacity for
grasping the ultimate truth He was interested less in
the material world than in spiritual reality He regarded
Nature as a viable garment of the spiritual world and
the universe as the embodiment of a single Cosmic Soul
His transcendentalism relied upon the higher planes of
human circumstances its oneness with something
higher than itself While logical reasoning fails to grasp
the truth intuition transcends understanding and is a
synthesizing power to understand the organic whole
which is called the Over-soul
An individual of exceptional self-ascending and self-
reliance he believed that Over-soul is brought down to
earth by action rather than words He therefore did not
preach transcendentalism but actually lived it To him
transcendentalism is ldquoan inquisitive and contemplative access to Godrdquo He believed in the immanence of God in
nature and in man and also the identity of God with the
soul of the individual He said ldquothe creator is still behind the increate the Divinity is so fleeting that its attributes are never expressedthe idea of God is the idea of
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 148
our Spiritual nature purified and enlarged to infinity In ourselves are the elements of Divinity We see God around us because He dwells within usrdquo
This statement reminds us of a verse in the Gita
wherein Lord Krishna declares that every living heart is
His abode
ldquoArjuna God abides in the heart of all creatures causing them to revolve according to their deeds by His illusive power seated as those beings are in the vehicle of the bodyrdquo
At one place Thoreau said ldquoThe whole is whole an organic whole which is called Over-soul or Para-Brahman and the highest aim of life is to realize this truth and be one with the whole or Over-soulrdquo Thoreau seems to have
been moved by our Vedic incantation which says
ldquoThat (the invisible Absolute) is whole whole is this (the visible phenomenal universe) from the invisible whole comes forth the visible whole Though the visible whole has come out from that invisible whole yet the whole remains unalteredrdquo Thus the phenomenal and the
Absolute are inseparable All existence is in the
Absolute and whatever exists must exist in it hence all
manifestation is merely a modification of the one
Supreme Whole and neither increases nor diminishes It
Serene and thoughtful as he was he wrote in his
Journal ldquoThe fact is I am a mystic a transcendentalist and a natural philosopher to bootrdquo
HIS ASCETISM (SANNYASA)
He was a true ascetic or Sannyasi for he preached and
practiced the basic human values of Anasakti (non-
attachment) and Aparigraha (non-possession)
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RP DWIVEDI Page 149
throughout his life He abhorred acquisition of wealth
and regarded worldly possessions as the result of sheer
exploitation of the masses by a few powerful men and
agencies including the State and the Government Since
the universe belongs to God any claim to ownership or
personal possessions is against moral law and is in fact
a sin against divinity Moral laws being superior to
worldly rules his preference for a life of self-abnegation
and renunciation bears a striking similarity to our Vedic
view expressed in the very opening line of the
Ishopanishad
ldquoAll this whatever exists in the universe is inhabited by the Lord Having renounced (the unreal) enjoy (the real) with restraint Do not covet or set your eye on the possession of othersrdquo
To him all worldly attractions and allurements were but
a passing show or fleeting moments (in eternity) which
distract the seekers of truth from cultivating self-culture
and promoting inner spiritual growth
EXPLORER OF THE INNER WORLD OF SPIRIT
Thoreau was an explorer of the inner self He wanted to
pass ldquoan invisible boundaryrdquo establishment within and
around him new universal and more liberal laws and
live with higher order of beings To him every man is
the Lord of the realm beside which the earthly empire
of the Czar is but a petty state a hammock left by the
icethere are continents and seas in the moral
world yet unexplored by him He praised William
Habbingtonrsquos following lines which echoed his own
thoughts
ldquoDirect your eyes right inward and you will find
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 150
A thousand regions in your mind
Yet undiscovered Travel then and be
Expert in home home cosmographyrdquo
Simple living based on extreme reduction of wants and
self-reliance enabled him to lsquocultivate the garden of his soulrsquo In consonance with the concept of an ideal Yogi in
the Gita he wrote
ldquoThe millions are awake enough for physical labour but only one in a million is awake enough for effective intellectual exertion and only one in a hundred millions do a poetic or divine liferdquo How truly does this view echo
the memorable words of Lord Krishna
ldquoAmong thousands of men one rare soul strives for perfection and among those who strive with success one perchance knows me in truthrdquo
Condemning people who go to Africa to hunt giraffes for
pastime he exhorted them to aim at seeking their own
lsquoSelfrsquo He said ldquoIt would be a noble game to shoot onersquos selfrdquo He seems to recall the famous verse of the
Mundakopanishad which says
ldquoThe Pranava is the bow the Atman is the arrow and the Brahman is said to be its mark It should be hit by one who is self-collected and that which hits becomes like the arrow one with the mark ie Brahmanrdquo
When he ordains lsquoto shoot oneselfrsquo he like our Vedic
seers hints at penetrating the truth centre in us with
our mind propelled by the motive force generated in the
voiceless ecstasy of deepest meditation which touches
the Brahman the Ultimate Reality When the individual
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 151
soul gets fully detached from its contacts with matter or
its false identification with material envelopment it
realizes its oneness with the Supreme Brahman How
beautifully has he stressed the value of inner search in
the concluding sentence of Walden
ldquoThe light which puts out our eyes is darkness to us Only that day dawns to which we are awake There is more day to dawn The Sun is but a morning starrdquo
IMMORTALITY OF SOUL AND THE DOCTRINE OF
TRANSMIGRATION
Thoreau firmly believed in the immortality of soul and
its transmigration He had fully imbibed the philosophy
of the Gita which enunciates in unequivocal terms the
permanence of the soul and the transience of the body
Says Lord Krishna
ldquoThis soul is never born and never dies nor does it become only after being born For it is unborn eternal everlasting and ancient even though the body is slain the soul is notrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II20
ldquoAs a man shedding worn-out garments takes other new ones likewise the embodied soul casting off worn-out bodies enters into others which are newrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II22
Thoreau considered his life as a series of many more
lives to come On his return from Waldon Pond he said
ldquoI had several more lives to live and could not spare any more for that onerdquo At another place he refers to the
solitary hired manrsquos lsquosecond birth and peculiar religious
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 152
experiencersquo He evidently recalled the following words of
St John ldquoExcept a man be born again he cannot see the kingdom of Godrdquo In his Waldon he refers to a bug and
declares ldquoWho does not feel his faith in a resurrection and immortality Who knows what beautiful and winged whose egg has been buried for ages under many concentric layers of woodenness in the dead dry life in societyheard perchance of gnawing out now for years by the astonished family of man may unexpectedly come forth from amidst societyrsquos most trivial furniture to enjoy its perfect summer life at lastrdquo
CONCLUSION
Thoreau was a true Yogi or an ascetic modeling on the
Indian tradition of strict moral code of conduct for a
Sannyasi He drew abundant spiritual and moral
sustenance from the Indian scriptures and its rich
lsquoculturersquo and approximated the ideal of a perfect recluse
The concept of an ideal Yogi is similar upto a point to
the postulates of Divinity expressed thus in the Atharva Veda
ldquoThe Yogi is desireless and hence free from the impact of animal nature he is serene in the heroism of the spirit he is satisfied with the essence of things perceived spirituality and hence does not depend on sense-perception for happiness and so he is complete in himself And though the physical body is subject to decay and death he remains unworn and ever youthful in spirit and has no fear of deathrdquo
Atharva Veda XVIII44
Such an enlightenment Yogi or spiritual superman was
Thoreau whose greatness will ever inspire us and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 153
illumine our lifersquos path with light and love His life was
lsquoa chronicle of actions just and brightrsquo and his writings
were lsquowrit with beams of heavenly light on which the eyes of God not rarely lookrsquo
Proof
Printed By Createspace
Digital Proofer
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RP DWIVEDI Page 10
INTRODUCTION
Quest for Truth has always been manrsquos eternal passion
and pursuit Since the very dawn of human civilization
he has been at pains to unravel the mystery that
shrouds life and the world around him And yet the
enigmatic phenomenon of the universe is to quote
Tennyson ldquoan arch wherethrorsquo gleams that untraveled world whose margin fades forever and foreverrdquo as man
moves to reach it but it is never too late ldquoto seek a newer worldrdquo
Manrsquos basic faith and his dauntless persistence in
attaining truth both in the physical world and spiritual
sphere sustains his endeavour and impels him to move
into lsquofresh woods and pastures newrsquo In this sense both
Science and Religion have the identical aim of
discovering Truth and thus helping man to grow
materially and spiritually to achieve fulfillment The
yearning of the poets (selected here) for exploring and
expressing Ultimate Truth or Eternity has been
highlighted
This little volume of articles written at leisure from time
to time as a creative pastime reflects a modest attempt
at tracing out the main thought-currents of the major
English Romantic Poets and two prominent American
Transcendentalists ndash RW Emerson and HD Thoreau
and co-relating them with our own philosophical
thought and rich religio-spiritual heritage
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 11
Since these articles represent my stray and occasional
thoughts they have no claim to a thorough or
comparative study or a comprehensive coverage of all
aspects of the poets The perspective chosen is confined
to some of the distinct echoes of the Vedantic thought in
the poems of selected poets but their publication in the
journals of international repute is indicative of their
acceptance and appeal and their role in blazing the
trails for a further study of their subject for research
scholars and others
The poets in this selection have taken life in its fullness
encompassing both matter and spirit ndash the visible world
and the invisible universe beyond it They have
conceived of the shadow (world) not without substance
and movement not without a moving spirit behind it
Like our own Vedic poetry the poetry of these poets is
intensely religious in the sense of their having felt the
living presence of the Divine in the beauty and glory of
the universe Again like our ancient Vedic poets their
poetry was born out of a joyous and radiant spirit
overflowing with love of life energy for action and a
vision of divinity which needed serene faith for
inspiration They were all transported into another
world by a rare spiritual exaltation for they aspired for
revelation of the inner truth of Reality in their souls
Moreover like our Vedic hymns their poems flowed like
fresh and clear streams gushing out of rocky mountains
as our ancient sages had described long ago lsquoLike joyous streams bursting from the mountain our songs have sounded to Brihaspati (preceptor of Gods)rsquo
What Emerson said of Thoreaursquos greatness could also be
applied to a great extent to most of the poets selected
here Emerson remarked ldquoHis soul was made for the
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 12
noblest society he had in short life exhausted the capabilities of this world Wherever there is knowledge wherever there is virtue wherever there is beauty he will find a homerdquo
These articles amply prove the fundamental fallacy of
Rudyard Kiplingrsquos assertion that ldquothe East is east and the West is west and the twain shall never meetrdquo but
contrary to his view the East and the West represent
complementary views of the world While the West
gives us the perfection and joy of eternal beauty in the
outer world as expressed by Keats the East gives us lsquothe
splendor and joy of the Infinite in the inner world of
Soulrsquos visionrsquo
That the physicist and the mystic reach the truth of
essential unity of all things and events by following
different paths has been beautifully described by
modern scientist Dr Frijof Capra ldquoThus the mystic and the physicist arrive at the same conclusion one starting from the inner realm the other from the outer world The harmony between their views confirms the ancient Indian wisdom that Brahman the ultimate reality without is identical to Atman the reality withinrdquo
Clear and identical traces of our Vedic thought and
scriptural ideas are found scattered all over the corpus
of their poetic works If we take up the outstanding
ideas of each poet for our consideration we find their
striking resemblance with what abounds in our spiritual
heritage Let us consider their predominant thoughts
which find a distinct echo in our Vedic and holy texts
William Blake who was the most prophetic of all
major English poets seems to have attained the rare
super-sensory or transcendental state of consciousness
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 13
which enabled him to perceive reflective communion
with God Such a transcendental perception of Divinity
in all creation and all creation in Divinity gave him a
subtle insight into the lsquovisions of eternityrsquo In other
words this contemplative vision of Infinity in the Finite
and the Finite in Infinity has been regarded as the
distinguishing mark of pure wisdom by Lord Krishna in
the Gita ndash ldquoWhen one sees Eternity in things that pass away and Infinity in finite things then one has pure (सािवक) wisdomrdquo [XVIII20] It was this intimation of
eternity that made Blake declare
ldquoTo see the world in a grain of sand
And a Heaven in a wild flower
Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand
And Eternity in an hourrdquo
Auguries of Innocence
Moreover he strongly condemned man-made divisions
of humanity into numerous castes and creeds and
preached universal brotherhood based on love
understanding and sacrifice
ldquofor man is love
And God is love Every kindness to another is a little death
In the divine image nor can man exist but by brotherhoodrdquo
Jerusalem
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 14
And again he says
ldquoWhere mercy love and pity dwell
There God is dwelling toordquo
The Divine Image
William Wordsworth was essentially a seer-poet He
was perhaps the first English poet to appreciate the
innate kinship of man with Nature and find in her a
calm and invisible spiritual presence in perfect
communion with the Cosmic Soul He recognized the
essential spiritual unity of all things and the
interpenetration of human life with that of the universe
His poetic faith was based on an indwelling spirit in
nature which interpenetrated all life and transformed
and transfigured with its radiance rocks fields trees
and the people who lived close to them He found
something that permeates and transfigures everything
He perceived this indwelling spirit and the vision of the
Infinite (God) in his poetry He concluded that Nature
being the manifestation of God is our best moral guide
and teacher
ldquoOne impulse from a vernal wood
May teach you more of man
Of moral evil and of good
Than all the sages canrdquo
In his Ode to the Intimations of Immortality which is
his spiritual autobiography he expresses his belief in
pre-existence which is also an article of faith in our
scriptural texts
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 15
ldquoOur birth is but a sleep and a forgetting
The soul that rises with us our lifersquos star
Hath had elsewhere its setting
And cometh from afarrdquo
His mystical experience of lsquothat serene and blessed moodrsquo in which we lsquoare laid asleep in body and become a living soulrsquo and his perception of lsquoa sense sublime of something more deeply interfuseda motion and a spirit that impels all thinking things all objects of all thought and rolls through all thingsrsquo reflect not only
his profound pantheism but also find close parallels in
our own religio-spiritual literature
Samuel Taylor Coleridge who was one of the seminal
minds of his generation possessed the most fertile
imagination According to William Hazlitt he lsquohad angelic wings and fed on mannarsquo for his writings are
ethereal mystical and magical Endowed with a rare
lsquomystic idealismrsquo he was besides being a great poet a
speculative philosopher also who considered life as lsquoa vision shadowy of Truthrsquo He justified the phrase ndash
lsquoRenaissance of wonderrsquo for he revived the supernatural
and invested it with indefiniteness and suggestion
which characterize his imagination He drew his
conceptions from lsquomythrsquo and embodied them with
symbols His images express his emotion spiritual state
and metaphysical experience Unlike other poets his
poetry grew from his inner organic law and made
supernatural and romantic subjects credible to human
nature by creating lsquothat willing suspension of disbeliefrsquo that constitutes his poetic faith He was the first great
British idealist of his age who preferred the intellectual
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 16
intuition to the conceptual dialectic The image and
vision of God lsquoimago deirsquo as an intellectual
contemplation (speculari) of the transcendent Absolute
(the prius) of all beings is an aspect of his speculative
mysticism
Byron however stands apart from all other poets
included herein for although his philosophy of life was
altogether different from that of his contemporaries he
was a force a portent and historical phenomenon in his
age He was endowed with a rare fire for liberty
indomitable courage sacrificing spirit and prophetic
zeal which are undoubtedly great human values His
inevitable attitude was revolt both social and personal
As an influence and portent he was the most powerful
poet in his age for he created that Byronic legend which
became a historic phenomenon of lasting fascination of
his personality Endowed with fiery energy his self-
portrait of careless arrogance or even daemonic figure
was a persona of romantic panache He was a portrait
and a symbol whom it was possible to worship or
condemn but never to neglect
PB Shelley who was lsquoone frail form ndash a phantom among men companionlessrsquo (Adonais) occupies a
unique position among Romantic poets Essentially he
was a visionary whose philosophy of enlightenment
made his poetry fanciful and ethereal He was a born
revolutionary who launched a crusade against the
organized religion and society Disgusted by the gloomy
state of the world he dreamed a world of beauty
freedom and virtue and made his poetry a trumpet of
narcissistic fantasy A solitary intellectual lsquowandering companionlessrsquo (Alastor) his poetry is the projection of
his sense of isolation He was fired by rationalist
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 17
revolutionary thought which reflects his visions of the
future Endowed with rationalist speculative intuition
his poetry symbolizes the spirit of human welfare
ldquoI wish no living thing to suffer painrdquo
Prometheus I303
The desire of Shelley reminds us of our scriptural
prayer ndash ldquoसव भवत स13खनः सव सत नरामयाःrdquo His
imagination is idealistic and vision synoptic He deals
with the heavens and light and aspired for the
regeneration of the world through love To him there is
no dualism between the material and spiritual life for
they are the aspects of same reality To him only
Eternity is real while the phenomenal world is but an
illusion or माया ndash a veil that hides true light He echoes a
Vedic truth when he says
ldquoThe One remains the many change and pass
Heavenrsquos light forever shines Earthrsquos shadows fly
Life like a dome of many-coloured glass
Stains the white radiance of Eternityrdquo
Adonais L11
He treats natural objects and forces as symbols for his
own emotional patterns In his lsquoOde to the West Windrsquo
he uses the West Wind as a spirit of destruction and
regeneration or death and rebirth He considers death
as only a prelude to renewed life and this shows his
faith in the transmigration of human soul or the cycle of
death and rebirth He declares
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 18
ldquoIf winter comes can spring be far behindrdquo
Ode to the West Wind
His entire poetry is a vivid and symbolic expression of
the wretched actuality and the radiant idea He wants to
herald a perfect world order based on love and
freedom He treats poetry as a potent instrument of
redemption and it was his deep romantic sensibility and
fanciful ecstatic Platonic love that earned him this
description of lsquopinnacled dim in the intense inanersquo He
was one of the greatest lyricists and an
lsquounacknowledged legislator of the worldrsquo of thought and
imagination
John Keats who in his own words was lsquoa fair creature of an hourrsquo was perhaps the first conscious artist whose
artistic intuition was far ahead of his time By declaring
that ldquoan artist must serve Mammonrdquo he wished to confer
on arts a special status and thus laid the foundation of
the doctrine of lsquoArt for Artrsquos sakersquo His minute delicate
and sensuous observation of the visible world of Nature
inspired his poetry which he wanted to lsquoloadrsquo with a
special excellence His delightful communion with
Nature and the sensuous ecstasies of its sight sound
smell touch and taste formed some of his best poetry
His delicacy and keenness of perception and love for
passive contemplation made him exclaim ndash ldquoO for a life of sensations rather than thoughtrdquo But in fact most of
his sensations were his thoughts for they were
embodied in sensuous pictorial form and rich symbolic
imagery
As a liberal enthusiast he felt that sharing the distress of
humanity or participation in ldquothe agony and strife of human heartsrdquo was essential not only for human growth
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 19
but also for poetic maturity This philanthropic attitude
of Keats brings him very close to our ardent Indian
prayer - ldquoसव भवत स13खनः सव सत नरामयाःrdquo ndash May all be happy may none struck with disease To find an
escape from the fret and fever of life he sought refuge in
an infinite yearning for beauty and turned to the realm
lsquoof Flora and old Panrsquo but soon realized the transience of
the world and started exploring permanence He could
find it in the spirit of beauty which is but a reflection of
eternal truth His passionate pursuit of ideal beauty
which he identified with truth has been beautifully
expressed in the following oft-quoted lines
ldquoBeauty is truth truth beauty that is all
Ye know on earth and all ye need to knowrdquo
Ode on a Grecian Urn
This fundamental unity or oneness of beauty and truth
and their interplay in the visible world are the
mainsprings of his poetic creed
The conflict between transience and permanence forms
the theme of his famous Odes and he longs for a
solution and lasting happiness in the form of Art or lsquoon the viewless wings of Poesyrsquo At the height of his
impassioned contemplation when the life of the spirit is
fused with the objects of immediate sensuous
experience he has glimpses of the permanence of
beauty which reflects Eternal Truth In one of his letters
(281) he declares ldquoI can never feel certain of any truth but from a clean perception of its beautyrdquo And at another
place when he finds mortality and immortality poles
apart he asserts the everlasting value of truth ldquoTruthrdquo
he says ldquomeans that which has lasting valuerdquo This firm
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 20
conviction of Keats seems to be a distinct echo of our
Vedantic dictum
सयमव जयत नानतम सयन पथा वततो दवयानः
यनामतय तत सयय परम नधान ldquoTruth alone triumphs not untruth By truth is laid out the Path Divine along which the seers who are free from desires and cravings ascend the supreme abode of Truthrdquo
Mundak Upanishad III16
Again the Vedic seer says that the Atman (self) is to be
realized only through truth
सयन लampसतपसा यष आमा
मडकोपनषद III15
Thus truth is the foundation of Dharma (righteousness)
for it is an essential and abiding value of human life The
eternal oneness of beauty and truth and vice versa and
their transcendental reality was Keatsrsquo poetic creed and
the realization of this basic spiritual truth raised him to
a level of sublime consciousness which is the mark of a
true seeker of truth or seer
In sum we may say that though lsquoa lily of a dayrsquo Keats
proved that a crowded hour of glory is far better than
an age without a name as has been stressed in our epic
Mahabharat where Queen Vidula exhorts her son
Sanjaya ldquoमहतम 0व1लत 2यो न त धमतम 4चरrdquo ndash ldquoIt is better to flame forth for an instant than to smoke away for agesrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 21
Though Keats died at the young age of 26 years he left
an indelible imprint on the history of English poetry for
his deep and pervasive influence could be easily seen on
Tennysonrsquos early work Moreover he was indisputably
the precursor of the Pre-Raphaelite movement In fact
he had reached near perfection in poetic craftsmanship
which will ever remain worthy of emulation for the
succeeding generations of poets
Ralph Waldo Emerson known as the lsquoSage of Concordrsquo
acted as a bridge between the East and the West His
abiding interest in the Indian scriptures and
particularly the Gita was a source of the Concord
Movement in America According to Swami
Vivekananda all the broad movements in America are
indebted to the Concord Party Mahatma Gandhi
remarked after reading Emersonrsquos Essays ldquoThe Essays to my mind contain the teaching of Indian wisdom in a Western lsquoGurursquo it is interesting to see our own sometimes differently fashionedrdquo Emerson drew freely on the
Upanishads Manusmriti Vishnu Puran and above all
the Gita and his writings reflect his indebtedness to our
holy texts
Pt Jawaharlal Nehru admired Emersonrsquos gospel of self-
reliance and righteousness in particular and regarded
him as one of the builders of America A
transcendentalist and thinker par excellence Emersonrsquos
ideas shaped not only his countrymenrsquos thinking but
had a deep and pervasive influence over many other
nations His main thoughts coloured as they are by our
own Indian religio-philosophical strands are universal
in appeal and are as relevant today as they were in his
own lifetime
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 22
In formulating his concept of Over-Soul Emerson
stressed the fundamental identity of Individual Soul
with Over-Soul He asserted ldquoWithin man is the soul of the whole ndash the wise silence the universal beauty to which every part and particle is equally related the Eternal Oneonly by the vision of that wisdom can the horoscope of ages be readrdquo He firmly believed in the
immortality of soul and the ephemerality of the world
and strongly condemned the futility of manrsquos vanity and
ego-centric attachment to the perishable objects of the
world His writings leave us lsquocalm of mind all passions spentrsquo In fact lsquohe gives men to mankind and mankind to the laws of Godrsquo
Henry David Thoreau was a great empirical
transcendentalist about whom Emerson once remarked
ldquowherever there is knowledge wherever there is virtue wherever there is beauty he will find a homerdquo His essay
on lsquoCivil Disobediencersquo which Gandhiji read twice in a
South African jail impressed him so much so that he
regarded him as his political lsquoGurursquo and his concept of
Satyagraha owes its origin to Thoreaursquos writings
Endowed with a rare meditative mind he loved lsquosweet solitudersquo and retired to the woods for discovering the
lsquohigher lawrsquo and realize his oneness with the Cosmic
Spirit He believed in the supremacy of moral laws and
his doctrine of Civil Disobedience is based on his dictate
of conscience for he considered individual conscience
more important than arbitrary state laws
Thoroughly immersed in the Indian scriptures his
thought-process and philosophy of life was
considerably moulded by our ancient religio-spiritual
heritage His deep love for our scriptural texts is evident
from his declaration of the Gita as lsquoUniversal Gospelrsquo He
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 23
wrote ldquoIn the morning I bathe my intellect in the stupendous cosmogonal philosophy of the Bhagvad GitaIt is unquestionably one of the noblest and most sacred scriptures which have come down to usthe oriental philosophy assigns their due rank respectively to action and contemplationrdquo
About the Vedas he remarked ldquoExtracts from the Vedas fall on me like the light of a higher and purer luminaryrdquo
According to him Over-Soul could be brought down to
earth not by words but by ldquoan inquisitive and contemplative accessrdquo He further states ldquoIn us are the elements of Divinity We see God around us because He dwells within usrdquo
He was a true ascetic (सयासी) for he preached and
practiced non-attachment (अनासि8त) in his life He was
an explorer of the inner world of Spirit In the seclusion
of woods he lsquocultivated the garden of his soul as a true Yogirsquo and he wanted to lsquoshoot his selfrsquo as our Mundaka Upanishad says
ldquoThe Pranava is the bow Atma the arrow the Brahman its mark It should be hit by a self-collected onerdquo
Much of what is stated in this compact volume may be
found scattered over various other critical works but
my earnest endeavour has been to bring together such
material as is of sufficient spiritual value which belongs
to all times This small comparative survey of the realm
of main ideas of some great poets confirms the splendor
of their rich romantic imagination and the unity of all
spiritual vision that makes them not only the creators of
beauty love and light but also brothers in spirit
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 24
I would feel amply rewarded if through this modest
attempt I am able to arouse keen interest in my readers
for further critical study of the subject Any suggestions
for amplification or improvement on the text are most
welcome
RP DWIVEDI
LUCKNOW
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 25
WILLIAM BLAKE
(28 November 1757 ndash 12 August 1827)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 26
WILLIAM BLAKE
English Poet Painter Engraver and Visionary
He was trained as an engraver by James Basire and
afterward attended classes at the Royal Academy Blake
married in 1782 and in 1784 he opened a print shop in
London He developed an innovative technique for
producing coloured engravings and began producing
his own illustrated books of poetrymdashincluding Songs of Innocence (1789) The Marriage of Heaven and Hell (1790) and Songs of Experience (1794)mdashwith his new
method of ldquoIlluminated Printingrdquo Jerusalem (1804[ndash
20]) an epic treating the fall and redemption of
humanity is his most richly decorated book His other
major works include Vala or The Four Zoas
(manuscript 1796ndash1807) and Milton (1804[ndash11]) A
late series of 22 watercolours inspired by the Book of
Job includes some of his best-known pictures He was
called mad because he was single-minded and
unworldly he lived on the edge of poverty and died in
neglect His books form one of the most strikingly
original and independent bodies of work in the Western
cultural tradition Ignored by the public of his day he is
now regarded as one of the earliest and greatest figures
of Romanticism
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 27
CHAPTER ONE
INDIAN SPIRITUALISM IN BLAKErsquoS VISIONS OF ETERNITY
INTRODUCTION
William Blake was by far the most prophetic of all major
English poets In a preface to his famous poem on
Milton he exclaimed lsquoWould to God that all the Lordrsquos people were Prophetsrsquo Elsewhere Blake declared lsquoA Prophet is a seer not an arbitrary dictatorrsquo According to
PH Butter an acclaimed authority on Blake ldquoa prophet sees behind the marks of woe behind the wars and other evils of his time and the attitudes that cause such things But Blake was not the kind of prophet who just present evils but one who saw the Visions of Eternity one whose senses discovered the infinite in everythingrdquo The prophet
is also a spokesman one who speaks or believes he
speaks for God or some other higher power Blake
himself claimed in one of his letters in 1803 ldquoI dare not pretend to be any other than the Secretary the Authors are in Eternityrdquo
His belief in lsquoinspirationrsquo contributed to that lsquoterrifying honestyrsquo which TS Eliot saw in him to keep him
uncompromisingly true to his vision He perceived a
close relationship of the conscious ndash lsquoIrsquo with the deeper
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 28
self through which all inspiration flows He knew that
the prophet must also be a lsquomakerrsquo lsquoa blacksmith laboring at his furnaces to shape the stubborn structure of the languagersquo He further realized that a prophet
should also be a teacher a preacher and a beacon light
to humanity
Explaining the function of the bard or poet (and his own
mission) Blake in his introduction to Songs of Experience declares
ldquoHear the voice of the bard
Who present past and future sees
Whose ears have heard
The Holy word
That walked among the ancient trees
Calling the lapsed soul
And weeping in the evening dew
That might control
The starry pole
And fallen fallen light renewrsquo
Or again elucidating the aim of writing poetry or his
lsquogreat taskrsquo Blake declares
ldquo I rest not from my great task
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 29
To open the Eternal worlds to open the immortal eyes
Of man inwards into the worlds of Thought into Eternity
Ever expanding in the bosom of God the human imaginationrsquo
Like Milton who wanted lsquoto justify the ways of God to Manrsquo or Shelley who held that lsquopoetry is the revelation of the eternal ideas which lie behind the many-coloured ever-shifting veil that we call reality in lifersquo Blake in his
exceptional prophetic zeal set out to open the Eternal
worlds to open the immortal eyes of man inwards into
the worlds of thought into Eternity He was always at
pains to renew the fallen fallen light The poetrsquos divine
task of lsquoever expanding in the bosom of Godrsquo reminds us
of the moving verse of our Rig Veda in which God as
creator of beautiful forms has been conceived of as the
greatest poet whose divine creative energy s his poetic
power which manifests itself in the manifold forms of
beauty and splendor like the Heaven the Sun the Moon
the Sky etc
यो धता भवानानामगया स कवः काया प पपltयत
ऋवद VIII415
lsquoHe who is the supporter of the world of life
Who knows the secret mysterious names of the morning beams
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 30
He poet cherishes manifold forms by His poetic power even as heavenrsquo
Rig Veda VIII415
As a divinely inspired poet Blake seems to have had
experiences of various psychic and even mystic visions
which awakened him to subtle spiritual life It seems
that he must have transcended normal sensory
perceptions and would have attained to super-sensory
status of consciousness when he declares
lsquoI see the savior over me
Spreading his beams of love and dictating the words of mild song
Awake O sleeper of the land of shadows wake
I am in you and you in me mutual in love divinersquo
Jerusalem L4-7
He seems to have attained to that rare transcendental
consciousness when he perceived perfect communion
with God who assured him
lsquoI am not a God afar off I am a brother and friend
Within your bosoms I reside and you reside in me
We are one forgiving all evil not seeking recompensersquo
Jerusalem L18-20
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 31
Here Blake on perceiving a synoptic vision of complete
identity or oneness of God with individual self seems to
have echoed the eternal ancient Holy Scriptures Here
are a few striking parallels
In our Vedas also Go is regarded and adored as our
most-trusted friend Says the Rig Veda
lsquoमा=कर न ऐना सयाच ऋषः
वBमा Cह Dमतमसया 1शवानrsquo
ऋवद X237
lsquoNever may this friendship be severed
Of thee O Deity and the sage Vimada
We know O God Thy brother-like love
With us be Thy auspicious friendshiprsquo
Rig Veda X237
The key-note of this type of worship is the
contemplation of friendly love (described in later
religious literature as - सय ndash friendliness between the
Deity and the worshipper) The following prayer is in
the same spirit
lsquoभवा नः सFन अतमः सखा वधrsquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 32
ऋवद X133
lsquoBe Thou most dear to us for bliss O friend to aidrsquo
Rig Veda X133
Similarly assuring Arjuna of His perennial benediction
Lord Krishna declares in the Gita
ईHवरः सवभतानामतltठत
Kामयसवभतानमायया
ldquoArjuna God abides in the heart of all creatures
Causing them to revolve according to their Karma
By His illusive power seated as those beings are
In the vehicle of the bodyrdquo
Bhagvad Gita XVIII61
And again describing Himself as the truest friend of all
living beings Lord Krishna pronounces
ldquoI am the (disinterested) friend of all living beings and my devotee attains supreme peacerdquo
Bhagvad Gita V29
To turn to William Blake again he has an essential
belief in the closest intimacy of all living beings with
God who is the fountain-head of all life love and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 33
friendship This belief makes him affirm his faith in the
holiness of all life on earth Says he in his Annotations to Lavater
lsquoAll Life is Holyrsquo
Again he says ldquoIt is God in all that is our companion and friend for our God himself says lsquoyou are my brother my sister and my motherrsquo and Saint John said lsquowho so dwelleth in love dwelleth in God and God in himrsquo and such a one cannot judge of any but in loveGod is in lowest effects as well as in the highest causes for he is become a worm that he may nourish the weak For let it be remembered that creation is God descending according to the weakness of man for our Lord is the word of God and everything on earth is the word of God and in its essence is Godrdquo
In our own scriptures the all-pervasiveness of God (the
One) has been conceived not only in the cosmic world
but also in the world of men The very opening verse of
the Ishopanishad stresses the immanence of God in the
universe
ईशावाय इद सवM यािकNय जगया जगत
ईशोपनष I
lsquoUnderstand all this (universe) as inhabited by the Lord
Each moving thing in this moving worldrsquo
Or again says the Atharva Veda
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 34
य समायोऽवPणोयो वदHयः
यो दवोऽवPणोमानषः
lsquoGod is that in which things converge
He is that from which things diverge
He is our own land he is of foreign land
He is divine he is humanrsquo
Atharva Veda IV168
The immanence of God is the entire universe is also
underscored by Lord Krishna when he tells Arjuna
ldquoThere is nothing besides me Arjuna Like clusters of yarn-beads formed by knots all this (universe) is threaded on merdquo
Bhagvad Gita VII7
SYNOPTIC VISION
A firm belief in the all-pervasiveness of God in the
whole universe led him to perceive every object of
Nature as a window through which we may look with a
sense of awe and wonder into the beauty truth and all-
enveloping eternity which is but a reflection of God
Blake must have had palpable intimations of Eternity
when he wrote
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 35
lsquoTo see a world in a grain of sand
And a Heaven in a wild flower
Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand
And Eternity in an hourrsquo
Auguries of Innocence
Such a super-sensuous or transcendental perception of
Divinity in all creation and all creation in Divinity gave
Blake a subtle insight into the lsquoVisions of Eternityrsquo and
made him not only a seer but also lsquoan inhabitant of
other planes another domain of beingrsquo Commenting on
Blakersquos singular other-worldliness our own seer and
prophet Sri Aurobindo says ldquoThere is no other singer of the beyond who is like him or equal him in the strangeness supernatural lucidity power and directness of vision of the beyond and the rhythmic clarity and beauty of his singingrdquo
It is this contemplative knowledge of infinity in finite
and finite in infinity that has been regarded as the
distinguishing mark of the pure wisdom which finally
leads one to transcendental revelation which has been
so beautifully expressed in our own scriptures
सवभतषभावमययमीRत
अवभ8तसािवक
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 36
lsquoWhen one sees Eternity in things that pass away and Infinity in finite things then one has pure knowledgersquo
Bhagvad Gita XVIII20
The same truth has been emphasized again and again in
the Upanishads When man comes to know the real
truth about God nay when he succeeds in realizing the
truth about God how can he ever revile or adversely
criticize any form or aspect of God The Isha Upanishad
says
यत सवा13ण भतान आमयवानपHयत
सवभतष चामना ततो न वजगSसत
ईशोपनष VI
ldquoWhoever beholds all beings in God alone and God in all beings ie who regards all beings as his own self he no more looks down upon any creature for regarding all as his self whom will he hate and howrdquo
Lord Krishna stresses the same equanimity of vision
when he declares
ldquoThe Yogi who is united in identity with the all-pervading infinite consciousness and sees unity everywhere beholds the self present in all beings and all beings as assumed in the selfrdquo
Bhagvad Gita VI29
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 37
Again Lord Krishna declares
यो मा पHयत सव सवM च मय पHयत
तयाह न DणHया1म स च म न DणHयत
भगवगीता VI30
ldquoHe who sees me (the universal self) present in all beings and all beings existing within me never loses sight of me and I never lose sight of himrdquo
Bhagvad Gita VI30
FAITH IN THE LAW OF ETERNITY
Since God is infinite immanent and omnipresent soul
which is an integral and inalienable part of God is also
immortal The forms or objects of the world may change
but in reality they exist forever and are eternal Like
God soul is everlasting unborn undecaying and
undying Blake says
ldquoWhatever can be created can be annihilated
Forms can not
The oak is cut down by the axe the lamb falls by the knife
But their Form Eternal exists for everrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 38
The poet also believes that all sufferings of man if borne
meekly for a noble cause have their rich recompense
sooner or later for God being all-merciful would
certainly reward his suffering children He believes that
lsquoFor a tear is an intellectual thing
And a sigh is a sword of an angel king
And the bitter groan of a martyrrsquos woe
Is an arrow from the Almightyrsquos bowrsquo
Jerusalem
He believes that God Almighty holds out a solemn
promise of reward to sufferers for a lofty cause God
declares
lsquofear not Lo I am with thee always
Only believe in me that I have power to raise from deathrsquo
Jerusalem
MEANS OF LIBERATION
As the greatest and most inventive of Romantic
mythmakers Blake at first explores the contrary states
of human innocence and experience and then speaks of
lsquothe five gatesrsquo our mortal senses which bind us down to
the earth Not so much interested in the art of the
possible as in the visions of the beyond Blake
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 39
constructed a cosmic myth to show manrsquos infinite
potential and how he might attain to final liberation
from this sinful ephemeral world characterized by a
wheel of births and deaths He weaves his myths round
the fall and salvation of man the universal man and his
ultimate waking to eternal life In his poems lsquoMiltonrsquo and
lsquoJerusalemrsquo he regards Satan as the embodiment of
error selfhood and boundless pride and points out that
the means of liberation or freedom from the worldly
bondages lie in the annihilation of selfhood or ego and
the forgiveness of sins He exclaims lsquoI in my selfhood am that Satan I am that evil onersquo and resolves that he would
go down to self-annihilation In lsquoMiltonrsquo he puts the
following words into the mouth of Milton
lsquobut laws of Eternity
Are not such Know thou I come to self-annihilation
Such are the laws of Eternity that each shall mutually
Annihilate himself for others goodrsquo
Reiterating and stressing his poetic purpose or mission
of life Blake resolves
lsquoMine is to teach men to despise death and to go on
In fearless majesty of annihilating self
I come to discover before Heaven and Hell
the self righteousness in all its hypocritical turpitude
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 40
put off
In self-annihilation all that is not God alone
To put off self and all I have ever and everrsquo
Again in a sincere invocation to God Blake prays
lsquoO saviour pour upon me thy spirit of meekness and love
Annihilate the selfhood in me be thou all my life
Guide thou my hand which trembles exceedingly
Upon the rocks of agesrsquo
SPIRITUAL HUMANISM
Inspired by his implicit faith in Godrsquos fatherhood and
menrsquos brotherhood Blake preached the concept of
universal fraternity Considering the whole world as
one large family he maintained that all divisions and
fragmentations of humanity stemmed from manrsquos
ignorance of the eternal truth of one and only one
universal family The world being the home of mankind
all human beings are inextricably interwoven together
in the same warp and woof of life How beautifully has
this cosmopolitan philosophy of manrsquos eternal identity
with his fellow beings been enunciated in the following
memorable words
lsquoWe live as one man for contracting our infinite senses
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 41
We behold multitude or expanding
We behold as one Man all the universal family
and he is in us and we in him
Live in perfect harmony in Eden the land of life
Giving receiving and forgiving each otherrsquos trespassesrsquo
Elsewhere the poet says
lsquoThere is no other God than God
Who is the intellectual fountain of Humanity
I never made friends but by spiritual gifts
By severe contentions of friendship and the burning fire of thought
He who would see the divinity must see him in his children
So he who wishes to see a vision perfect whole
Must see it in its minute particulars organizedrsquo
Preaching universal brotherhood based on love
understanding and sacrifice he again exclaims (in the
words of Jesus)
lsquoWouldst thou live one who never died
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 42
For thee or ever die for one
Who had not died for thee
And if God died not for man and giveth not himself
Eternally for man
Man could not exist for man is love and God is love
Every kindness to another is a little death in the divine image
Nor can man exist but by brotherhoodrsquo
Jerusalem
Condemning man-made divisions of mankind into
various castes and creeds he says
lsquoAnd all must love the human form
In heathen Turk or Jew
Where mercy love and pity dwell
There God is dwelling toorsquo
The Divine Image
How truly are the poetrsquos ideas relevant even today when
the hot wind of doubt and distrust is blowing all over
the world (which has been broken up into fragments by
caste and creed clime and country) can be viewed in
the context of our age-old belief in the worship of God in
the universal form (Vishwaroop) and our religious and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 43
spiritual aspirations for ensuring the maximum good of
the world To serve humanity in a spirit of humility
impelled our people to look upon the world as one
great undivided family or nest (वHवनीड़म) and all men
as our brethren ndash (वसधव कटFबकम)
The ideal of universal brotherhood and selfless service
to humanity found spontaneous utterance in the
following moving words which embody the sublime
aim of a devout manrsquos life
न वह कामय रा0य न वगम ना पनभव
कामय दःख तSतानाम Dा13ण नामातनाशन
lsquoI do not desire earthly kingdom nor heaven nor do I want rebirth I want to reduce the sorrow of people who are sunk in sufferingrsquo
Today when the horizon of humanity is darkened by
national prejudices the need for spiritual humanism
synoptic vision and universal brotherhood is being
increasingly felt by one and all Here it is worthwhile to
turn our attention to great men whose thoughts
transcend myriad artificial barriers and teach us the
ideal of dedication to the common weal
Since truth transcends all religious dogmas and
disinterested service to mankind is a form of true
worship to God our great men have always prayed
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 44
सव भवत स13खनः सव सत नरामयाः
सव भWा13ण पHयत मा किHचX दःख भाYभवत
lsquoMay all be happy may all living beings be free from diseases may we perceive goodness in all and may none be struck with misfortunersquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 45
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
(7 April 1770 ndash 23 April 1850)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 46
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
English Poet
Orphaned at age 13 Wordsworth attended Cambridge
University but he remained rootless and virtually
penniless until 1795 when a legacy made possible a
reunion with his sister Dorothy Wordsworth He
became friends with Samuel Taylor Coleridge with
whom he wrote Lyrical Ballads (1798) the collection
often considered to have launched the English Romantic
movement Wordsworths contributions include
Tintern Abbey and many lyrics controversial for their
common everyday language About 1798 he began
writing The Prelude (1850) the epic autobiographical
poem that would absorb him intermittently for the next
40 years His second verse collection Poems in Two Volumes (1807) includes many of the rest of his finest
works including Ode Intimations of Immortality His
poetry is perhaps most original in its vision of the
organic relation between man and the natural world a
vision that culminated in the sweeping metaphor of
nature as emblematic of the mind of God The most
memorable poems of his middle and late years were
often cast in elegaic mode few match the best of his
earlier works By the time he became widely
appreciated by the critics and the public his poetry had
lost much of its force and his radical politics had yielded
to conservatism In 1843 he became Englands poet
laureate He is regarded as the central figure in the
initiation of English Romanticism
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 47
CHAPTER TWO
VEDANTA IN WORDSWORTHrsquoS POETRY
In many of his famous poems among which Ode on Intimations of immortality and Lines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey occupy pride of place
William Wordsworth one of the greatest seer-poets of
English literature presents ideas which bear striking
similarity to the rich philosophical thought that found
unimpeded flow in our Vedantic literature
In fact there are so many echoes of Vedanta in the
poetry of Wordsworth that one is apt to conclude that
the poetrsquos lsquophilosophic mindrsquo must have led him to drink
deep at the unfailing springs of Upanishadic Helicon
A poet of nature Wordsworth was essentially lsquoa seer of spiritual realities a seer of the calm spirit in naturersquo and
his poetry at its best is a fine harmony of his spiritual
insight ethical sense and profundity of thought He is a
curious amalgam of the seer the poet and the reflective
moralist who dwells philosophically and even
prophetically on Nature Man and Cosmic Soul
The epithets lsquobest philosopherrsquo lsquomighty prophetrsquo and
lsquoseer blestrsquo which Wordsworth uses for the new-born
innocent child in his famous Ode may be well applied to
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 48
the poet himself for ldquovoyaging in strange seas of
thought alonerdquo Wordsworth had found lsquofull many a gem
of purest ray serenersquo which still shed undiminished
luster on the entire fabric of English poetry
A careful study of the Ode on Intimations of immortality Lines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey Ruth Laodamia To Cuckoo and other poems reveals that Wordsworthrsquos sustained
loftiness of thought had taken him to such heights that
on him (to quote his own words)
lsquo those truths do rest which we are toiling all our lives to findrsquo
What indeed are those truths Those are the elemental
truths of life which were keenly perceived realized and
expressed by the seers and savants of the East and
particularly of our Vedantic times A careful study of
Vedanta which is the aphoristic summary of the co-
ordinated Upanishads the Brahmasutras and the
Bhagvad Gita and is in fact the culmination of Indian
religion and Philosophical thought reveals that serious
scholars of the West drew freely upon it Wordsworthrsquos
poetry bears ample testimony to this fact because
numerous echoes of Vedanta can be easily heard in his
poetry
To cite a few comparative examples the Upanishads
assert in unambiguous terms that the whole universe of
names and forms the world of being and becoming
springs from Brahman (Supreme Godhead or Absolute
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 49
Cosmic Soul) ndash the eternal existence consciousness and
bliss Since the universe is the creation and
manifestation of Brahman it is also pervaded by Him
Naturally therefore only Brahman exists all else is non-
existent or illusory The Chhandogya Upanishad
declares lsquoBrahman is verily the Allrsquo God is the subtle
essence underlying phenomenal existence the whole
nature which is Godrsquos handiwork as well as Godrsquos
garment and is filled and inspired by God who is its
inner controller and soul
The immanence of God has been corroborated by
Brihadaranyak Upanishad in two passages the first
being in the form of an answer given by Yagnavalyak to
Uddalak Aruni
lsquoHe is immanent in fire in the intermundia in air in the heavens in the Sun in the quarters in the Moon in the stars in space in darkness in light in all beings in Prana in all things and within all things whom these things do not know whose body these things are who controls all these things from within He is thy soul the inner controller the immortal He is the unseen seer the unheard hearer the unthought thinker the ununderstood understander other than Him there is no seer other than Him there is no hearer other than Him there is no thinker other than Him there is no understander everything besides Him is naughtrsquo
Brihadaranyak Upanishad II7
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RP DWIVEDI Page 50
In another passage Brihadaranyak Upanishad tells us
that God is the All ndash ldquoboth the formed and the formless the mortal and the immortal the stationary and the moving the this and thatHe is the verity of verities the soul of souls and He is the supreme verityrdquo
Brihadaranyak Upanishad IIV15
Wordsworth like these unique revelatory utterances of
the Upanishads codifies this truth in mystical manner in
Lines Composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey when he regards the Cosmic Soul as supreme power or
all-pervading presence
lsquoWhose dwelling is the light of setting Suns
And the round ocean and the living air
And the blue sky and in the mind of man
A motion and a spirit that impels
All thinking things all objects o all thought
And rolls through all thingsrsquo
Since God is All and everything else is Naught the world
is not real it is an appearance It is not the permanent
all-abiding Absolute Reality but a fleeting show and
ephemeral entity having seemingly phenomenal reality
In other words the world is lsquoshadow not substancersquo ndash it
is just a net-work of Maya
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 51
This Vedantic doctrine finds utterance not only in
Wordsworthrsquos poems like To the Cuckoo in which he
calls the earth ldquoan unsubstantial fairy placerdquo but he
seems to have actually experienced this illusory nature
of the world in states of mystic trance that often visited
him since his boyhood
In the introduction to his Ode on Intimations of Immortality he records such an experience in clear
terms
ldquoI was unable to think of external things as having external existence and I communed with all that I saw as something not apart from but inherent in my own immaterial nature Many a times while going to school have I grasped at a wall or tree to recall myself from the abyss of idealism to the realityrdquo
Such an ecstatic state of realizing eternal truths is
referred to in Lines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey as
lsquoThat blessed mod
In which the burden of the mystery
Of all this unintelligible world
Is lightenedrsquo
And finally to quote from the same poem
lsquoWe are laid asleep
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 52
In body and become a living soul
While with an eye made quiet by the power
Of harmony and the deep power of joy
We see into the life of thingsrsquo
One of the basic postulates of our Upanishadic
philosophy has been the idea of transmigration of soul
or faith in the cycle of births deaths and rebirths The
doctrine of transmigration has been explicitly advanced
in the Upanishads and particularly in the
Kathopanishad and Brihadaranyak Upanishad
In the Kathopanishad when the father of Nachiketas
told him that he had made him over to the god of Death
Nachiketas replied that it was no uncommon fate that
was befalling him
ldquoI indeed go at the head of many to the other world but I also go in the midst of many What is the god of Death going to do to me Look at our predecessors (who have already gone) look also at those who have succeeded them Man ripens like corn and like corn he is born againrdquo
Kathopanishad IV6
The Brihadaranyak Upanishad states the same truth
ldquoAnd as a caterpillar after reaching the end of a blade of grass finds another place of support and then draws itself towards it and as a goldsmith after taking a piece
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 53
of gold gives it another newer and more beautiful shape similarly does this Self after having thrown off this body and dispelled ignorance take on another newer and more beautiful form whether it be of one of the man or demi-god or god or of Prajapati or Brahman or of any other beingsrdquo
Brihadaranyak Upanishad IVIII5
The same truth appears in the Bhagvad Gita when Lord
Krishna says to the mentally agitated Arjuna
ldquoAs a man discarding worn-out clothes takes other new ones likewise the embodied soul casting off worn-out bodies enters into others which are newrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II22
And further Lord Krishna says to Arjuna
ldquoFor in that case the death of him who is born is certain and the rebirth of him who is dead is inevitablerdquo
Bhagvad Gita II27
Wordsworth in his famous Ode on Intimations of Immortality confirms his faith in the transmigration of
soul by saying in unmistakable terms
lsquoOur birth is but a sleep and a forgetting
The soul that rises with us our lifersquos star
Hath had elsewhere its setting
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 54
And cometh from afar
Not in entire forgetfulness
And not in utter nakedness
But trailing clouds of glory do we come
From God who is our homersquo
Again when Wordsworth laments the loss of pure
innocence immeasurable bliss and ecstatic vision of
early childhood in the great Ode and exclaims in
memorable words
lsquoWhither is fled the visionary gleam
Where is it now the glory and the dreamrsquo
He attributes the loss to the worldly intellectuality and
attachments as they grow upon man As childhood
grows into youth and youth into manhood the lsquovision splendidrsquo fades the first clear intimations of immortality
are dimmed leaving behind an unillumined waste of
mere thought and moralizing
lsquoAt length the Man perceives it die away
And fade into the light of common dayrsquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
The world of materialism or attachment tames him so
much so that man lsquothe little actorrsquo thinks
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 55
lsquoAs if his whole vocation
Were endless imitationrsquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
Whatever may be the crux of his philosophy of
childhood this belief of the poet can be safely traced
back to the comprehensive doctrine of the Maya in the
Upanishads and the Bhagvad Gita The Upanishads
tell us that the world is a delusion an appearance not
reality The Taittiriya Upanishad says ldquoAll beings spring from the Supreme Being are sustained by Him and return to the same Absolute at the time of dissolution Our life on earth is therefore a sojournrdquo The Isha Upanishad tells us that ldquothe truth is veiled in this universe by a vessel of gold and it invokes the grace of God to lift up the golden lid and allow the truth to be seenrdquo
It follows that our senses cloud our vision and lead us
farther and farther away from our spiritual moorings as
we come of age Senses dupe us and turn us into
worldlings Lord Krishna says to Arjuna in the Bhagvad Gita ldquoAs the wind carries away the barge upon the waters even so of the wandering senses the one to which the mind is joined takes away his discriminationrdquo
Thus the eternal and boundless Supreme Soul is as it
were limited by the sense organs and the body The
Universal Soul shackled by the body becomes the
individual soul (Paramatma becomes Jivatma) Because
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 56
of the presence of the Soul the spark of the Divine the
senses or sense-objects or worldly attractions fail to
dupe man fully from his divine mission This
metaphysical conviction finds expression in
Wordsworthrsquos Ode He says that though
lsquoShades of the prison-house begin to close
Upon the growing boy
But he beholds the light and whence it flows
He sees it in his joyrsquo
However farther man may go away from Nature ndash the manifestation of God and the indwelling Supreme Soul which resides in his own individual soul he can not
lsquoForget the glories he hath known
And that imperial palace whence he camersquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
Since bliss (Anand) is an inevitable attribute of God and
manrsquos soul being a fragment of Supreme Soul it
experiences the presence of God in moments of
Supreme Joy
Of the innumerable expressions in the Vedantic
literature of the joy of life of joy as the all entwining
principle of life and of creative principle of life and life
too the following passage from the Taittiriya Upanishad is very pertinent here
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 57
ldquoJoy is the Brahman from joy are born all living things by joy they are nourished towards joy they move and in joy they are absorbedrdquo Joy as the foundation of life
emanates from the Upanishad philosophy
Wordsworth seems to hold identical belief when he
craves for joy and laments its loss
lsquoO Joy that in our embers
Is something that doth live
That nature yet remembers
What was so fugitiversquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
The same idea finds expression in Lines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey where Wordsworth
declares it as Naturersquos privilege lsquoto lead (us) from joy to joyrsquo
And lastly the classicus locus of the Upanishadic
philosophy is to be found in the idea of immortality of
soul In the Chhandogya and Mundak Upanishads and
above all in the Kathopanishad we find numerous
references to the immortality of the soul We are told in
a passage of Kathopanishad lsquothat while we are dwelling in this body on earth we can visualize that Atman (Soul) as in a mirror that is contrariwise left being to the right and right being to the leftrsquo In the Bhagvad Gita also
Lord Krishna tells Arjuna about the immortality of Soul
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 58
ldquoThis soul is never born nor dies it exists on coming into being for it is unborn eternal everlasting and primeval even though the body is slain the soul is notrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II20
He further says
ldquoFor this soul is incapable of being cut it is proof against fire impervious to water and undriable as well This soul is eternal omnipresent immovable constant and everlastingrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II24
Wordsworth seems to have been fully convinced of this
philosophia perennis of the Vedanta when he eulogizes
immortality by addressing the child in his Ode in the
following words
lsquoThou over whom thy immortality
Broods like the day
A Master over a slave
A presence which is not to be put byrsquo
The poet in speaking of the lsquotruths that wake to perish neverrsquo seems to be reminiscent of the Upanishadic
concept that freed from the trammels of the body the
individual soul loses itself in the All-Soul when he
declares in the rapture
lsquoOur souls have sight of that immortal sea
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 59
Which brought us hither
Can in a moment travel thitherrsquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
Tracing the expression and confirmation of many other
tenets of Vedanta in the poetry of William Wordsworth
forms an interesting literary venture and instances of
close affinity between the Vedantic doctrines and
Wordsworthrsquos ideas may be multiplied Such a
comparative study proves that eternal truths transcend
the barriers of clime or country time or space and shine
through all ages and in all lands We should draw moral
sustenance from them and live a fuller freer life
Even today the wise all over the world maintain a
remarkable identity of views and their thoughts foster
international understanding
ldquoFrom hand to hand the greeting flows
From eye to eye the signals run
From heart to heart the bright hope glows
The seekers of light are onerdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 60
ST COLERIDGE
(21 October 1772 ndash 25 July 1834)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 61
ST COLERIDGE
English Poet Critic and Philosopher
Coleridge studied at the University of Cambridge where
he became closely associated with Robert Southey In
his poetry he perfected a sensuous lyricism that was
echoed by many later poets Lyrical Ballads (1798 with
William Wordsworth) containing the famous Rime of
the Ancient Mariner and Frost at Midnight heralded
the beginning of English Romanticism Other poems in
the ldquofantasticalrdquo style of the Mariner include the
unfinished Christabel and the celebrated Pleasure
Dome of Kubla Khan While in a bad marriage and
addicted to opium he produced Dejection An Ode
(1802) in which he laments the loss of his power to
produce poetry Later partly restored by his revived
Anglican faith he wrote Biographia Literaria 2 vol
(1817) the most significant work of general literary
criticism of the Romantic period Imaginative and
complex with a unique intellect Coleridge led a restless
life full of turmoil and unfulfilled possibilities
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 62
CHAPTER THREE
COLERIDGErsquoS SPIRITUAL QUEST AND INDIAN THOUGHT
INTRODUCTION
Coleridge was by all accounts a genius par excellence
whose versatility flowed albeit impeded in diverse
channels of creativity such as metaphysics poetry
theology and literary criticism Of all the Romantic poets
he possessed the most fertile and powerful imagination
which earned for him a special place in English poetry
and philosophical thought In the words of William
Hazlitt lsquohe had angelic wings and fed on mannarsquo He had
a lsquoseminal mindrsquo which said William Wordsworth
lsquothrew out a series of grand central truthsrsquo We find in
him the poet the philosopher and the theologian rolled
in one Charles Lamb called him lsquoLogician Metaphysician Bardrsquo whose poetry and writings are
tinged with a magical and ethereal quality His thought
made a permanent landmark on the succeeding
generations of English men of letters for he explored the
mysterious working of human mind
His life presents a saga of sharp contrast between
reality and dream blissful confidence and broken
hopes the warmth of human ties and the solitude of
haunted soul He probed human thought and dilemma
with a rare prophetic insight A prodigious thinker and
sincere seeker of truth he once remarked ldquoI would compare the Human Soul to a shiprsquos crew cast on an
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 63
Unknown Islandrdquo His particular fascination for the
unknown drew him instinctively to the German
transcendental or idealistic school of philosophy
represented by Berkeley Kant Schelling and Fichte
Fired by a peculiar mystic idealism he tried to interpret
the lsquoInterruptionrsquo of the spiritual world and beheld the
unseen with an uncommon eye which looked into the
void and found it peopled with lsquopresencesrsquo To him the
universe was lsquoebullient with creative deityrsquo and was
pervaded by lsquoan organizing surgersquo of vital energies
which emanate directly from God He was indeed an
inspired idealist who laid mystical insistence upon the
immanence and transcendence of God
Endowed with a rare penetrating mind Coleridge
ransacked works of comparative religions and
mythology and arrived at the conclusion that all
religious faiths and mythical traditions agree on the
unity of God and immortality of Soul His constant
intellectual search for truth led him to visionary
interests and universal life consciousness expressed
through the phenomena of human agencies Throughout
his intellectual career he remained a visionary and
philosophical mystic who valued a discreet and proper
exercise of the intellect Since his most serious concern
had been philosophy as a continuous trial for self-
education he wrote ldquodoubts rushed in broke upon me from the fountains of the great deep and fell from the windows of heavenrdquo For him lsquoreligionrsquo as both the
cornerstone and keystone of morality must have a
moral origin and a great poet should be lsquoa profound Metaphysician seeking for truth beauty and salvationrsquo In
one of those radiant moments when the poet the
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 64
metaphysician and the theologian of hope are one he
throws light on the process how truth works out in life
ldquoTruth considered in itself and in the effects natural to it may be conceived as a gentle spring or water source warm from the genial earth and breathing up into the snow drift that is piled over and around its outlet It turns the obstacle into its own form and character and as it makes its way increases its streamand arrested in its courseit suffers delay not loss and waits only to awaken and again roll onwardsrdquo
His description of a mystic as one who wanders into an
oasis or garden lsquoat leisure in its maze of Beauty and Sweetness and thirds (sic) his way through the odorous and flowering Thickets into open Spots of Greeneryrsquo (Aids to Reflection) is reminiscent of his own mysticism and
refers to the lsquoenfolding sunny spots of greeneryrsquo in his
famous poem Kubla Khan
Profoundly impressed by the German Idealist Schelling
whose idealistic school of thought dwelt on speculation
concerning the lsquoAbsolutersquo Coleridge viewed lsquomythrsquo as
primordial expression of elemental truths including the
Divine transcendence Inspired by his Biblical studies he
regarded self-consciousness as lying at the centre of his
philosophical and theological thought In Lay Sermons
he says ldquoSelf which then only is when for itself it hath ceased to be Even so doth Religion finitely expresses the unity of the Infinite Spirit by being a total act of the Soulrdquo
For him the lsquoinner lightrsquo is identical with the indwelling
glorious God and life is but lsquoa vision shadowy of Truthrsquo Attributing the pageant of life and the beauty and
splendor of the world to the immanence of Cosmic Soul
(God) he exclaims
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 65
ldquoAh From the soul itself must issue forth
A light a glory a fair luminous cloud
Enveloping the earthrdquo
Dejection An Ode
And again he says ldquoNature is the art of GodThe true system of natural philosophy places the sole reality of things in an Absolute which is at once causa sui effectus in the absolute identity of subject and object which it calls NatureIn this sense lsquowe see all things in Godrsquo is a strict philosophical truthrdquo
Coleridge firmly believed in the essential unity of God as
Absolute which is the creative foundation of the finite
universe and which distinguishes God from creation
He in the spirit of Vedanta stresses the immanence of
God in all and all in God in his famous poem Frost at Midnight Addressing his son he says
ldquoso shalt thou see and hear
The lovely shapes and sound intelligible
Of that eternal language which thy God
Utters who from eternity doth teach
Himself in all and all things in Himselfrdquo
In order to learn this lsquolanguagersquo Coleridge himself
became a lsquovisionaryrsquo lsquoprophetrsquo or lsquoseerrsquo The idea of
Himself (God) in all and all (creation) in Himself or the
concept that there is God in all things and all things are
things are closely interlinked with God bears a striking
resemblance to our age-old Vedic thought In
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 66
consonance with Indian thought Coleridge underscores
the identity of God (Brahman) with the individual soul
(Jivatma) and regards the universe as the reflection or
manifestation of God The seer he says is one who sees
God the creator in all creation and all creation as the
embodiment of God This according to him is the lesson
that God in His eternal language lsquouttersrsquo and doth teach
from eternity
The inherent oneness and sole identity of Brahman
(God) with the universe is a basic postulate of our
Vedanta and as such Coleridgersquos emphasis on the lsquoUnity of infinite Spiritrsquo bears a close identity with the Indian
philosophy The Oneness of God and the universe has
time and again been stressed in our Vedas and other
scriptures It would be pertinent to cite a few instances
here While the Chhandogya Upanishad describes
Brahman as lsquoOne only without a secondrsquo other
Upanishadic texts contain identical statements such as
lsquoHe is Onersquo and lsquoOne Lordrsquo The opening line of
Ishopanishad declares Godrsquos oneness and His universal
presence in unequivocal terms
ldquoUnderstand all this universe as inhabited by Lord
Each moving thing in this moving worldrdquo
Ishopanishad I
And again the same Upanishad says
ldquoThe wise man who perceives all beings as not distinct from his own self at all and his own Self as the self of every being ndash he does not by virtue of that perception hate any onerdquo
Ishopanishad VI
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 67
The same truth has been expressed in the Bhagvad Gita wherein Lord Krishna tells Arjuna
ldquoHe who sees Me (the Universal Self) present in all beings and all beings existing within Me never loses sight of Me and I never lose sight of himrdquo
Bhagvad Gita VI30
Or again
ldquoHe alone truly sees who sees the Supreme Lord as imperishable and abiding equally in all perishable beings both animate and inanimaterdquo
Bhagvad Gita XIII26
And Lord Krishna says again
ldquoThere is nothing else besides Me O Arjuna
Like clusters of yarn-beads formed by knots on a thread
All this (Universe) threaded on Me (God)
As are pearls on stringsrdquo
Bhagvad Gita VII7
THE DOCTRINE OF KARMA (CAUSE amp EFFECT)
Coleridge seems to subscribe sincerely to the Indian
doctrine of Karma which is based on the law of
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 68
Causation or cause and effect In other words Karmavad
stresses poetic justice or law of life ie virtue is
rewarded and vice is punished Since one must reap the
fruits of his good and bad deeds in life it is axiomatic
truth that lsquoas one sows so shall he reaprsquo In Sanskrit
there is a verse which says ldquoOne must bear the consequences of his good and bad deedsrdquo The echoes of
this doctrine could be distinctly heard in his poetry and
particularly in his greatest poem Rime of Ancient Mariner as also Dejection An Ode where he affirms
ldquoO Lady We receive but what we give
And in our life alone doth Nature liverdquo
So strong was his belief in the doctrine of Karma that in
a letter dated 14th October 1797 to his friend Thirlwell
he tells him how fatalistic his philosophy of life is
ldquoand at other times I adopt the Brahman
creed and say ndash lsquoit is better to sit than to stand it is better to lie than to sit it is better to sleep than wake but death is the best of allrsquordquo
His Ancient Mariner serves as an exhaustive
exposition of the law of Nemesis which works surely
but rather imperceptively in human life The poem is a
myth about a dark and troubling crisis in the human
soul It is actually a tale of crime which is due to
perversity of human will Crime is against Nature
Humanity and God He touches equally on guilt and
remorse suffering and relief hate and forgiveness and
grief and joy The marinerrsquos action shows the essential
frivolity of crimes against humanity and the ordered
system of the world and he deserves punishment for his
guilt Spirits are transformed into the powers who
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 69
watch over the good and evil actions of men and requite
them with appropriate rewards and punishments Since
the mariner has committed a hideous act of wantonly
and recklessly killing the albatross which was hailed in
Godrsquos name as if it had been a Christian soul he must
bear the punishment of life-in-death The killing of the
bird marks the breaking of bond between Man and
Nature and consequently the mariner becomes
spiritually dead When he blesses the water-snakes
even unawares it is a psychic rebirth ndash a rebirth that
must happen to all men
The mariner will never be the man that he once was He
has his special past and his special doom His sense of
guilt will end only with his death The Ancient Mariner
is a myth of a guilty soul and marks the passage from
crime through punishment and possible redemption in
the world So the poem is an allegory of redemption and
regeneration It is indeed a vivid representation or
living symbolization of universal psychic experience
The abiding fascination of the poem is that it is a
fragment of a psychic life It does not state a result it
symbolizes a process
Coleridge adds a moral ndash that the mariner is ndash to teach
by his example love and reverence to all things that God
made and loveth He advocates a sound moral
philosophy of life which extends human sympathy and
love to the animal world He affirms
ldquoHe prayeth well who loveth well
Both man and bird and beast
He prayeth best who loveth best
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 70
All things both great and small
For the dear God who loveth us
He made and loveth allrdquo
Rime of Ancient Mariner
PHILOSOPHICAL MYSTICISM AND lsquoTHE VISION OF GODrsquo
Coleridgersquos longing for the lsquounnamable somethingrsquo and
his abiding interest in conveying something of the
enigmatic perception of Godhead as a religious
experience carved for him a special place in the history
of ideas as a Christian poet and philosopher In a
predominantly mythological age he took serious
interest in the Biblical studies and drew upon the
central Christian image of Paradise as a walled garden
and the vision of God as a symbolizing that
transcendent numinous reality which the soul
inchoately and consciously seeks and strives for The
medieval image of the walled garden (paradise) as the
heavenly city (locus of God) is a symbol of divine
transcendence of that which is lsquobeyond beingrsquo This rich
image (of the walled garden) as an eminently
appropriate image of Godrsquos transcendence was used as
such by Church Fathers and also by the 15th century
Christian Platonist Nicholas of Cusa whose book The Vision of God is a paradigm of speculative mysticism
which informs Coleridgersquos metaphysics and much of his
poetry Taking inspiration from Nicholas of Cusarsquos book
The Vision of God Coleridge found it in close affinity to
his own genuinely philosophical mysticism
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 71
Coleridgersquos interest in the Vision of God is in a purely
visionary mystical tradition and his most visionary
poem Kubla Khan bears ample testimony to his
insistence upon life as lsquoa vision shadowy of Truthrsquo His
conviction in the lsquoImago Deirsquo (vision of God) is an
obvious link with the hoary mystical tradition which lay
at the heart of his philosophical and mystical thought
He maintains that the mind of man is a bridge to the
vision of God but by no means its fulfillment He says
ldquoThe vision and faculty divine is the participation of humanity in the Divinerdquo He however further maintains
throughout his intellectual career the conviction in the
reflection or bending back of the soul from the sensual
to the intelligible realm For him Christianity is an lsquoawful recalling of the drowsed soul from dreams and phantom world of sensuality to actual Realityrsquo
On the idea of reawakening he says
ldquoThe moment when the Soul begins to be sufficiently self-conscious to ask concerning itself and its relations is the first moment of its intellectual arrival into the world Its being ndash enigmatic as it must seem ndash is posterior to its existencerdquo
Collected Notes
In a recent study of Coleridge Prof Douglas Headley of
Cambridge University declares ldquoHe is best described as an essentially speculative and mystical philosopher-theologian His was a theology inspired by those Church Fathers who emphasize the vision of God as an intellectual contemplation (speculari) of the transcendent Absolute the prius of all beingrdquo Since the
mystic tradition follows a supersensuous perception
the vision of God is fundamentally lsquoVisio-intuitivarsquo ndash
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 72
intuitive or intellectual vision Coleridge expresses such
a state of mind when he says
ldquoMy mind feels as if it ached to behold and know something great something One and Indivisible and it is only in the faith of this that rocks or waterfalls mountains or caverns give me the sense of sublimity or majesty But in this faith all things counterfeit Infinityrdquo
Since the sublime enlarges and inspires the Soul to
aspire for the Divine it impresses him with the
fundamental Oneness of God and a universal vision
which he hints at in his Religious Musings as under
ldquoThere is One mind One omnipresent mind
His most holy name is Love
Truth of subliming import
lsquoTis sublime in man
Our noontide majesty to know ourselves
Parts and portions of one wondrous wholerdquo
These passages recall to our mind the famous mantra
(verse) of the Yajurveda where the mystic realization
or the direct experience of the Supreme by a Vedic sage
has been beautifully described in terms of his personal
knowledge of the Divine He says
ldquoI have known this sun-coloured Mighty Being
Refulgent as the sun beyond darkness
By knowing Him alone one transcends death
There is no other way to gordquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 73
Yajurveda XXXI18
ldquoI have realized it I have known itrdquo not that I just
believe in it and all else can also realize it This is not the
expression of an opinion but the statement of an
experience Commenting on this verse Sri Aurobindo
says
ldquoThis is one of the grandest utterances in the worldrsquos spiritual literature for it marks the emanation of this Being from across the darkness into our world so that something of the sun colour may come into our dull heads and dim heartsrdquo
Coleridge seems to be in complete agreement with our
own Indian mysticism which owes its origin to the
Vedas wherein the knowledge of the Divine or the
Ultimate Reality (Brahman) has been regarded not as a
process of philosophical thought but as a direct
experience in the depth of the human soul For him the
divine vision is possible in that spiritual meditation
transformation of intellectual rapture in which all
discursive thought is fully sublimated According to him
the lsquovisio intuitivarsquo is the culmination of all knowledge ndash
sensus-ratio-intellectus and is in conjunction with the
concept of Imago Dei In order to see that which not an
object is ie God the human mind must put aside its own
discursive differentiating reflection ndash spiritus altissimus rationis ndash which guards the walls of the garden of
paradise lsquobeyondrsquo which dwells God The highest
transformation or sublimation of conscience can ensure
an intuitive vision of God and in accordance with the
maxim ndash Simile Simili ndash the mind then becomes like its
object by divesting itself of difference in order to
experience the Absolute Reality Says Coleridge
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 74
ldquoAn Immense Being does strongly fill the soul and Omnipotency Omnisciency and Infinite Goodness do enlarge and dilate the Spirit while it fixtly looks upon them They raise strong passions of Love and Admiration which melt our Nature and transform it into the mould and imagery that which we can contemplaterdquo
Notebooks
Mysticism is thus the subtle path of spiritual realization
of That Reality or Divine Presence which has been
described in our Vedic texts as (lying hidden in a cave shrouded in secrecy) God is one One beyond all
diversities In Him all contradictions and conflicts meet
and dissolve through the spiritual transformation of the
lsquoseerrsquo or lsquomysticrsquo whose soul rises above the bewildering
trammels and distortions of life and seeks unity with all
in the unity with One To such an enlightened seer life
becomes an unceasing adventure from unreality to
reality from ephemerality to eternity from the human
to the Divine One who realizes the Divine as the One
(without parallel) loving Lord finds the whole universe
united in Him Such a significantly mystical experience
finds a memorable expression in the following verse of
the Yajurveda where the sage named Vena beholds
such a divine vision
ldquoThe loving sage (Vena) beholds that Mysterious Existence
Wherein the universe comes to have One home (nest)
Therein unites and therefore issues the whole
The Lord is the warp and woof in the Created beingsrdquo
Yajurveda XXXII8
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RP DWIVEDI Page 75
A careful analysis of the above-quoted passage reveals
all the main elements of mysticism viz
(i) Divinity is a subject of personal spiritual
experience
(ii) The ultimate conception of Divinity is a
mystery symbolically expressed as
गहानCहतम
(iii) The abstract conception of the Divine as an
Essence or Existence is symbolized by a
neuter singular तत and
(iv) The whole universe is united in love as birds
in a nest एकनीड़ or men in a home वसधव कटFबक
To sum up wise men the world over hold almost
identical views on vital matters of human life such as
the mystery of existence soul and oversoul (God) Truth
is verily One as God is one but the pathways to reach it
are very many The ancient Rig Veda proclaims एक सद वDा बहधा वदित ndash ldquoTruth is one sages call it by various namesrdquo In our own times Swami Ram Krishna
Paramhansa said यतोमत तथोपथ ndash as many religions
so many pathways And what the Spanish litteacuterateur
and thinker states as lsquouniversal truthrsquo is equally
applicable to the philosophy and poetry of Coleridge
ldquoA deep faith in life cannot but be spiritual even if only partially spiritualThe path of Truth may not be a path of parallel lines but a path that follows one circle by going to the right and climbing the circle or by going to the left and climbing the circle we are bound to meet at the top although we started in apparently
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 76
contrary directions This is bound to be in the end because Truth is onerdquo
In Charles Lambrsquos words Coleridge lsquohad been on the confines of the next world he had a hunger for Eternityrsquo The truth of this statement is abundantly
borne out by Coleridgersquos sincere effort for the
reconciliation of the ration with transcendental belief
He closes his Biographia Literaria which symbolizes
his spiritual voyage with the following words
ldquoIt is night sacred night The upraised eyes views suns of other worlds only to preserve the soul steady and collected in its pure act of inward adoration to the great I Am and to the filial word that re-affirmeth from eternity to eternity whose choral is the universerdquo
As a true metaphysician Coleridgersquos whole being
pulsated with a passionate and unceasing search for
truth Here indeed was a spiritual aspirant and seeker
who in his own words had lsquotraced the fount whence streams of nectar flowrsquo
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RP DWIVEDI Page 77
LORD BYRON
(22 January 1788 ndash 19 April 1824)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 78
LORD BYRON
British Romantic Poet and Satirist
Born with a clubfoot and extremely sensitive about it
he was 10 when he unexpectedly inherited his title and
estates Educated at Cambridge he gained recognition
with English Bards and Scotch Reviewers (1809) a satire
responding to a critical review of his first published
volume Hours of Idleness (1807) At 21 he embarked on
a European grand tour Childe Harolds Pilgrimage
(1812ndash18) a poetic travelogue expressing melancholy
and disillusionment brought him fame while his
complex personality dashing good looks and many
scandalous love affairs with women and with boys
captured the imagination of Europe Settling near
Geneva he wrote the verse tale The Prisoner of Chillon
(1816) a hymn to liberty and an indictment of tyranny
and Manfred (1817) a poetic drama whose hero
reflected Byrons own guilt and frustration His greatest
poem Don Juan (1819ndash24) is an unfinished epic
picaresque satire in ottava rima Among his numerous
other works are verse tales and poetic dramas He died
of fever in Greece while aiding the struggle for
independence making him a Greek national hero
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RP DWIVEDI Page 79
CHAPTER FOUR
BYRON A BLEND OF CLAY AND SPARK
INTRODUCTION
Byron whom Goethe regarded as lsquothe greatest genius of the centuryrsquo and whom Carlyle considered as the noblest
spirit in Europe was one of the most remarkable men
during the 19th Century which was characterized by
liberal optimism He was unquestionably a potent and
force and cause of change in the intellectual outlook and
socio-political structure of his time His colourful figure
his charismatic personality and satiric poetry captured
the imagination of the whole continent As the most
influential English poet he stands out as an important
figure in the history of ideas Representative of a new
age he was the supreme voice which the European
poets recognized for ldquohe put into poetry something that belonged to many men in his time and he was the pioneer of a new outlook and a new art He set his mark on a whole generation and his fame rang from one end of Europe to anotherrdquo
Renowned as the ldquogloomy egoistrdquo he was a sinister yet
great influence in the Romantic Movement His deepest
romantic melancholy his satiric realism and his
aspiration for political realism earned for him such a
wide acclaim that his name became a symbol for all the
great events of his day Commenting on his pervasive
influence Calvert says ndash ldquoIt is impossible not to take Byron seriously and it is disastrous to take him literallyrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 80
A REBEL EXTRAORDINAIRE
Byron was a born rebel Essentially a child of
Revolution his poetry breathes a unique spirit of
revolutionary idealism ldquoI was born for oppositionrdquo he
once remarked and added ldquobeing of no party I shall offend all partiesrdquo Describing him as an aristocratic
rebel Bertrand Russell said
ldquoThe aristocratic rebel of whom Byron was in his day the exemplar is a very different typesuch rebels have philosophy which requires some greater change than their own personal success In their conscious thought there is criticism of the government of the world which takes the form of Titanic Cosmic self-assertion or those who retain some superstition of Satanism Both are to be found in Byron The aristocratic philosophy of rebellionhas inspired a long series of revolutionary movements from the fall of Napoleon to Hitlerrsquos coup in 1933it has inspired a corresponding manner of thought and feeling among intellectuals and artistsrdquo
Byron felt the wild storm of nations akin to the storm
within his own heart and the ruin but the picture of his
own life In his unqualified individualism he takes up an
attitude of hostility towards society Even God appears
to him mirrored in the stormy face of the angry ocean
ldquoThou glorious mirror
Of the Image of Eternityrdquo
He wished to stir the oppressed to revolt and get rid of
tyrants
ldquoFor I will teach if possible the stones
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 81
To rise against earthrsquos tyranny Never let it
Be said that we will truckle into thrones
By ye ndash our childrenrsquos children I think how we
Showed that things were before the world was freerdquo
Don Juan VIIICXXXV4-8
ldquoI have simplified my policiesrdquo wrote he ldquointo a detestation of all existing governmentsrdquo His was the
most dreaded voice of all the revolutionary poets of the
world His voice was the peal of revolutionary thunder
his poetry was the message of the revolutionary forces
He stood as the greatest symbol of a violent and
dreadful revolution
CHAMPION OF LIBERTY
He was essentially a poet of liberty His greatest ideal in
life was how to fight against the forces of tyranny
restriction aggression and enslaving of workers by
puissant exploiters Liberty was an essential part of the
Byronic creed In fact his entire poetic work is
interspersed with some of the finest poetry in praise of
freedom for mankind He composed much splendid
verse for love of freedom His passion for personal
freedom covers national freedom also and the political
freedom in the form of national self-determination
particularly for Italy and Greece He remarks in his
diary of 1821 ldquoDifficulties are the hotbeds of high spirits and Freedom the mother of the new virtues incident to human naturerdquo
Identifying himself completely with the cause of Italy
and Greece he wrote ldquoI shall not fall backbut
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 82
onward It is now the time to act and what signifies ldquoSelfrdquo if a single spark of that which would be worthy of the past can be bequeathed unquenchably to the future It is not one man nor a million but the spirit of liberty which must be spreadrdquo In his Ode to Chillon Castle he characteristically exclaimed
ldquoEternal spirit of the chainless Mind
Brightest in dungeons Liberty thou art
For there thy habitation is the heart
The heart which love of Thee alone bind
And when thy sons to fetters are consignrsquod
To fetters and damp vaultsrsquo dayless gloom
And Freedomrsquos fame finds winds on every windrdquo
Love of liberty lay at the centre of his being and
determined what was best in him ndash belief in individual
liberty and his hatred of tyranny and constraints
whether exercised by individuals or societies Liberty
was an ideal a driving power a summons to make the
best of certain possibilities in him He insisted to be free
and maintained that other men must be free too
Opposition was an integral element in his basic attitude
revolt both personal and social was his forte Love of
freedom is built into the capricious structure of Childe Harold and Don Juan
HIS POLITICAL AND COSMOPOLITAN LIBERALISM
He grew in an atmosphere in which political reaction
against revolutionary ideals was victorious all over
Europe Byron was essentially a liberal by conviction
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RP DWIVEDI Page 83
and could hardly bear the perception of liberals Though
he loved his native country yet he had a large vision for
the freedom and welfare of all nations The excitement
of political liberalism stirred on behalf of the Greeks
against the oppression of their Turkish overlords made
him a symbol of disinterested patriotism and a Greek
national hero The first two cantos of Child Harold are
tinctured with historical and typographical material as
also the appearance of the Byronic hero with his
exhortations to the degenerate Greeks and Spaniards to
remember their glorious past and arise They contain
Byronrsquos passionate feelings for Greece which was to see
the beginning as it was to see the end of his active life
His Faustian daemonic figure and his defiant
resentment of authority found an appropriate object in
the political sphere
His last journey and his death at Missolonghi in the
cause of Greek independence proves in him the moving
combination of nobility futility and romantic or heroic
panache In the words of Graham Hough lsquoBut for once Byron was on the winning side he died but his cause triumphed and he remains one of its heroes For the whole of the 19th Century he remained a portent and a symbol whom it was possible to worship or to condemn but never to neglectrsquo
A MAN OF ACTION
Action remains at the centre of his life and at last he
gladly seized the opportunity when it presented itself in
Greece Leaving poetry behind himself he took a heroic
resolution in favour of action rather than
contemplation He presents a rare example of fusion
between the active and the reflective lsquofor his was the romanticism of actionrsquo The moralist in the garb of the
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 84
pre-romantic rebel hero of the Childe Harold is cast
aside in Don Juan and the moralist in the somber garb
turns dandy in which moral judgment seems to be
ineffective Quite logically he finally abandons literature
for the field of moral action At last Byron flung himself
off into the world of action The dandy finds at last that
such a death even if it is on the sickbed and not the
battlefield is the only gesture untouched by futility ldquoIt is not enough that art perpetrates life life also must complete artrdquo WB Yeats rightly says ldquoone feels that he (Byron) is a man of action made writer by accidentrdquo
Byron did not regard writing as an end in itself on the
contrary he was several times on the point of giving up
writing He had always before him the hope of some
more active life and felt a certain mistrust for the purely
literary life He asserted ldquowho would write who had anything better to do Action- action I say and not writing Least of all rhymerdquo In a letter to Murray
he wrote ldquoYou will see that I shall do something or otherthat like the cosmogony or creation of the world will puzzle the philosophers of all agesrdquo He was
fully alive to the persistent sense both of human
aspirations and the ceaseless flux of eternity and also
knew that he would not fade into oblivion Said he
ldquoBut at the last I have shunned the common shore
And leaving land far out of sight would skim
The ocean of Eternityrdquo
And again he said
ldquoFor the sword outwears its sheath
And the soul wears out the breastrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 85
HIS ROMANTIC SELF-PORTRAITURE
Byron presents manrsquos mixed and imperfect nature His
personality is a queer blend of flesh and spirit
meanness and nobility clay and spark cause and effect
The lasting fascination of his personality despite his bad
temper careless arrogance the excesses the satiety
melancholy and restlessness owes much to Splendour Primier of Miltonrsquos Satan who is ldquomajestic though in ruinrdquo and the gloom and brutality of the heroes of the
novel of terror His exotic sensibility ranging passions
and sensual perversity take refuge in a sort of ldquoCosmic Satanismrdquo He draws of himself a sketch which
reproduces in a dim outline the somber portrait of his
idealized self in the famous stanzas of Lara
ldquoIn him inexplicably mixed appeared
Much to be loved and hated sought and feared
X X X X X X
A hater of his kind
X X X X X X
There was in him a vital scorn of all
As if the worst had fallen which could befall
An erring spirit
X X X X X X
And fiery passions that had poured their wrath
In hurried desolation over his path
And left the better feeling all at strife
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 86
In wild reflection over his stormy liferdquo
And the Giaour (hiding his sinister path beneath a
monkrsquos gown) also portrays Byron
ldquoA noble soul and lineage high
Alas though bestowed in vain
Which Grief could change and Guilt could stainrdquo
HIS CREDO
Despite all his self-mockery and arrogant egoism he had
a star (vision) and he followed it sincerely He was not
without guiding principles and his heroic death in the
cause of Greek independence shows that he was not an
actor but a soldier a man of affairs and a master of men
Keenly aware of something special in him he wished to
realize his powers and translate them into facts He
wished to be true to himself He had a keen appreciation
of the dignity and personal liberty of man
HIS FATAL TRUTH
Even though he disagreed with the moral code of his
age he had his own values He thought that truthfulness
is a permanent virtue and duty and so did not want to
compromise with conventions nor hide behind cant
Despite many ordeals and his own corroding skepticism
he speaks seriously and directly about his convictions
and presents them with irony satire and mockery Don Juan is a racy commentary on life and manners and is a
record of a remarkable personality ndash a poet and a man
of action a dreamer and a wit a great lover and a great
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 87
hater a Whig noble and a revolutionary democrat The
paradoxes of his nature are fully reflected in Don Juan which itself is a romantic epic and a realistic satire He
was full of many romantic longings but tested them by
truth and reality He remained faithful only to those
which meant so much to him that he could not live
without them
Praising Byron Nietzsche says ldquoMan may bleed to death through the truth that he recognizesrdquo Byron expressed
this in his immortal lines
ldquoSorrow is knowledge they who know the most
Must mourn the deepest over the fatal truth
The tree of knowledge is not that of linerdquo
A BELIEVER IN GOD AND IMMORTALITY OF SOUL
Full of snobbery and rebellion as he was Byron was not
altogether without lofty ideals and religious beliefs He
firmly believed in the immanence and transcendence of
God and the transience of human glory His implicit faith
in the immortality of human soul the ephemerality of
physical body and his unwavering trust in God ndash the
eternal Light of Lights is evident from his following
memorable lines
ldquobut this clay will sink
Its spark immortal envying it the light
To which it mounts as if to break the link
That keeps us from yon heaven which woos us to its brinkrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 88
Childe Harold III13-14
His Childe Haroldrsquos pilgrimage is a lament for lost
empire decay of love and triumph of love over human
mortality His lsquovoyage pittoresquersquo is full of historic and
didactic meditations and his oceanic image illustrates
the truism that nothing is constant but the rhythmic
pattern of its flux In the end all things float and toss on
that Great Ocean of which man is the foam and the
historic events are billows
ldquoBetween two worlds life hovers like a starrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquothe eternal surge
Of time and tide rolls on and bears afar our bubbles
while the graves
Of Empires heave but like some passing wavesrdquo
Don Juan XVI99
He maintains throughout his major poetic works a
sense of the presence of God or the gods and often
employs supernatural machinery to substantiate his
concept
IMMORTALITY OF SOUL
He had complete faith in the immortality of soul Said
he ldquoof the immortality of the soul it appears to me that there can be little doubtit acts also so very independent of bodyHuman passions have probably disfigured the divine doctrines Man is born passionate of body but an innate thought secret
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 89
tendency to the love of God is his mainspring of mind But God helps us allMan is eternal always changing but reproducedEternity Eternalrdquo
Again on his belief in God he says ldquoI sometimes think that man may be relic of some higher materialcreation must have had an origin and a creator for a creator is a more natural imagination than a fortuitous concourse of atoms All things remount to a fountain though they may flow to an oceanrdquo He knew
the limitations and ephemerality of phenomenal
existence He exclaims
ldquoFor I wish to know
What after all are all thingsbut a showrdquo
Unable to explore the stars with scientific aid he takes
up poesy to embark across the ocean of Eternity
ldquoI wish to do much by Poesyrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoBut at least I have shunned the common
And leaving land far out of sight would skim
The Ocean of Eternityrdquo
According to him man accepts the eternal voyage but
since man is not himself unlimited the boat capsizes in
the deep
ldquoAnd swimming long in the abyss of thought
Is apt to tire
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 90
For the fall entails not only ignorance and weakness but Human mortalityrdquo
Disconcerted with mankind he turns to the placid
spectacle of Nature and feels his spirit merge into its
objects
ldquoI live not in myself but I become
Portion of that around me and to me
High mountains are a feeling
When the soul can flee
And with the sky ndash the peak ndash the heaving plain
Of Ocean or the stars mingle ndash and not in vainrdquo
Childe Harold III72
This pantheistic ecstasy gives him a sense of quasi-
immortality
ldquoSpinning the clay clod bonds which round our being clingrdquo
The picturesque is translated into a kind of mystical
union with the spirit of the place even with the
universe itself
ldquoAre not the mountains waves and skies a part
Of me and my soul as I of them
(Is not) the universe a breathing part
The spirit is clogged with clayrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 91
HIS PESSIMISM
The myth of Cuvierrsquos undulations of Cosmic history
reflects Byronrsquos consistent and mature pessimism His
pessimism is traceable to his own view of society
Through a metaphor he considers his age as
ldquocatastrophicrdquo ndash an ice age of the human spirit and a
declining moral grandeur His myth of Fall and
recurrence of the Ocean and ice is both comic and
historic social and literary and personal as well The
consequences of the Fall and of manrsquos imperfect nature
are seen in all major human activities Generally fallen
mankind is hounded by its lower appetites spirit
encumbered by flesh The image of Fall is linked in
Byronrsquos imagination with the rhetorical image of the
poetrsquos lsquoflightrsquo which incurs the risk of consequent
lsquosinkingrsquo or bathos And over it all hangs the perplexity
of manrsquos ignorance about his aims his nature his true
identity
ldquoFew mortals know what end they would be at
But whether glory power or love or treasure
The path is through perplexing ways and when
The goal is gained we die you know ndash and thenrdquo
HIS PROPHETIC VISION
Endowed with strong imaginative power he had
experimented in Vulcanian visions of the earth plunged
into darkness by the final extinction or the sun or lsquoa ruined starrsquo plunging on in flames through the wastes of
space This prophetic faculty is amply evident from his
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 92
poem Darkness in which his imagination prefigures the
devastating effects of nuclear weapons
ldquoThe Hour arrived ndash and it became
A wandering mass of shapeless flame
A pathless Comet and a curse
The menace of the Universe
Still rolling on with innate force
Without a sphere without a course
A bright deformity on high
The monster of the upper skyrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoI had a dream which was not at all a dream
The bright sun was extinguished and the stars
Did wander darkling in the eternal space
The habitations of all things which dwell
Were burnt for beacons cities were consumedrdquo
Darkness IV42-45
In sum and in essence Byron exemplifies Shelleyrsquos
pronouncement that poets are the unacknowledged
legislators of the world More than any other Romantic
poet Byron embodies the dictum ndash lsquowhat is to give light must endure burningrsquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 93
PB SHELLEY
(4 August 1792 ndash 8 July 1822)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 94
PB SHELLEY
English Romantic Poet
The heir to rich estates Shelley was a rebellious youth
who was expelled from Oxford in 1811 for refusing to
admit authorship of The Necessity of Atheism Later that
year he eloped with Harriet Westbrook the daughter of
a tavern owner He gradually channeled his passionate
pursuit of personal love and social justice into poetry
His first major poem Queen Mab (1813) is a utopian
political epic revealing his progressive social ideals In
1814 he eloped to France with Mary Wollstonecraft
Godwin in 1816 after Harriet drowned herself they
were married In 1818 the Shelleys moved to Italy
Away from British politics he became less intent on
social reform and more devoted to expressing his ideals
in poetry He composed the verse tragedy The Cenci (1819) and his masterpiece the lyric drama Prometheus Unbound (1820) which was published with some of his
finest shorter poems including Ode to the West Wind
and To a Skylark Epipsychidion (1821) is a Dantean
fable about the relationship of sexual desire to spiritual
love and artistic creation Adonais (1821)
commemorates the death of John Keats Shelley
drowned at age 29 while sailing in a storm off the Italian
coast leaving unfinished his last and possibly greatest
visionary poem The Triumph of Life
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 95
CHAPTER FIVE
SHELLEY A PILGRIM OF ETERNITY
INTRODUCTION
Shelley who in his Adonais eulogized Keats as lsquothe Pilgrim of Eternityrsquo is himself justly entitled to this
appellation He was essentially a poet of the skies and
heavens of light and love of eternity and immortality
Since he loved to pierce through things to their spiritual
essence the material world was less important for him
than that which lies within it and beyond it Says he ldquoI seek in what I see the manifestation of something beyond the present and tangible objectsrsquo He set out to uncover
the absolute real from its visible manifestations and
interpret it through his own poetic vision In a
passionate search for reality he pursued its essence
behind the veil of naked loveliness of Nature and the
mundane human existence Defining poetry he says
lsquoPoetry is the revelation of the eternal ideas which lie behind the many-coloured ever-shifting veil that we call reality in lifersquo For him the poet is also a seer gifted with
a peculiar insight into the nature of reality for it is
through the inspired poetic imagination that he
breathes immortality into the objects of Nature Says he
lsquoBut from these create he can
Forms more real than living man
Nurslings of immortalityrsquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 96
Prometheus Unbound
HIS LOVE OF INDIA
Shelley was an ardent admirer of India In a letter to his
friend employed in the East India Company he
expressed keenness to visit India and settle down here
He was drawn to India for its varied and picturesque
scenic beauty vast literary heritage and age-old cultural
traditions In order to have a closer acquaintance with
our great country he set his heart and mind on serious
studies in the Indian life and letters traditions and
culture
Since he was a visionary par excellence and was
endowed with a highly contemplative mind and a
remarkable prophetic zeal he evinced a deep and
abiding interest in the philosophical and spiritual
thoughts that lie enshrined in our holy texts such as the
Vedas the Upanishads the Brahmasutras and the
Bhagvad Gita It is interesting to trace the influence of
Indian spiritual thought on Shelleyrsquos poetry
VEDANTA IN SHELLEYrsquoS POETRY
The riddle of the origin of life and Nature and the
enigmatic questions such as lsquoWhat is the cause of life
and death What is the source of universe and what will
be its ultimate destinyrsquo have always engaged the
serious attention of all wise men Man has always stood
in awe and wonder at the mysteries of human existence
and the vast world around him Our seers and savants
have not only posed such questions but have also
answered them
In the opening verse of the Kena Upanishad the
disciple asks
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 97
ldquoAt whose behest does the mind think or wander after towards its objects Commanded by whom does the life-force or the breath of life go forth on its journey At whose will do we utter speech Who is that effulgent Being whose power directs the eye and the earrdquo
Similarly in the Svetasvatara Upanishad the disciples
inquire ldquoWhat is the cause of this universe What is Brahman Whence do we come By what power do we live and on what are we established Where shall we at last find rest What rules over our joys and sorrows O Seers of Brahmanrdquo
Identical ideas impelled Shelley to exclaim in his famous
elegy Adonais
ldquoWhence are we and why are we Of what scene
The actors or spectatorsrdquo
Or again he asks in The Triumph of Life
ldquoWhence comest thou And wither goest thou
How did thy course begin I said and whyrdquo
Shelley asks
ldquoHas some unknown omnipotence unfurled
The veil of life and deathrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoAnd what were thou and earth and stars and sea
If to the human mindrsquos imaginings
Silence and solitude were vacancyrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 98
Mont Blanc
Shelley in his famous poem Hymn to Intellectual Beauty answers that there is an unseen (all-pervading) omnipotence (power) behind this phenomenal world of
which all objects are but shadows
ldquoThe awful shadow of some unseen Power
Floats though unseen among us ndash visiting
This various world with as inconstant wing
As summer winds that creep from flower to flowerrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoIt visits with inconstant glance
Each human heart and countenance
Like aught that for its grace may be
Dear and yet dearer for its mysteryrdquo
Again he affirms his faith in such a mysterious
Omnipotent power when he says
ldquoThe works and ways of men their death and birth
And that of him and all that his may be
All things that move and breathe with toil and sound
Are born and die revolve subside and swell
Power dwells apart in its tranquility
Remote serene and inaccessiblerdquo
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RP DWIVEDI Page 99
X X X X X X
ldquoThe secret strength of things
Which governs thought and to the infinite dome
Of Heaven is as a law inhabits theerdquo
Mont Blanc
Vedanta which is the aphoristic summary of the
Upanishads the Brahmasutras and the Bhagvad Gita
is in fact the culmination of Indian religious and
philosophical thought Since Shelley sincerely desired to
unravel the essential reality which is unchanging
timeless and eternal and of which the world of sense
perceptions is but a broken reflection he turned his
attention to the ancient scriptures of India
ONENESS OF BRAHMAN (GOD)
One of the basic postulates of Vedanta is the inherent
oneness or the sole identity of Brahman in the universe
The Chhandogya Upanishad describes Brahman as
एकमव अXवतीय ndash lsquoone only without a secondrsquo and the
other Upanishadic texts also contain parallel statements
such as स एकः ndash lsquoHe is Onersquo and एकोदवः ndash lsquoOne Lordrsquo
Similarly the Rig Veda declares एक सद वDा बहदा वदित ndash lsquoTruth (God)is one but the wise one call it
differentlyrsquo Obviously Brahman the Supreme is one
and only one He is verily one and the same whether we
call Him Brahman Ishwara Paramatma God Allah or
the supreme Cosmic Soul He only exists all other
objects of the world are subject to decay and death
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
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How beautifully have similar thoughts been expressed
by Shelley when he exclaims
ldquoThe one remains the many change and pass
Heavenrsquos light forever shines Earthrsquos shadows fly
Life like a dome of many coloured glass
Stains the white radiance of Eternity
Until Death tramples it to fragmentsrdquo
Adonais L2
The concluding lines of Epipsychidion show that in a
moment of inspiration Shelley seemed to lay hold on the
ineffable spirituality and fundamental unity of
existence
ldquoOne hope within two wils one will beneath
Two overshadowing minds one life one death
One Heaven one hell one immortality
And one annihilationrdquo
Shelley etherealized Nature and believed in a single
power or one spirit permeating the whole universe He
effected a fusion of the Platonic philosophy of love with
the Wordsworthian doctrine of Pantheism
ldquoThe one spiritrsquos plastic stress
Sweeps through the dull dense worldrsquo
Compelling there all new successions
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RP DWIVEDI Page 101
To the forms they wearrdquo
Holding that one universal spirit is the basis and
sustainer of Nature Shelley declares
ldquoThat Power
Which wields the world with never-wearied love
Sustains it from beneath and kindles it aboverdquo
In his pantheistic conception of Nature Shelley
conceived of it as being permeated vitalized and made
real by a universal spirit of love He clearly perceives
the presence of ldquothe awful shadow of the unseen power visiting the various worldrdquo
ldquoSpirit of Nature here
In this interminable wilderness
Of worlds at whose involved immensity
Even soaring fancy staggers
Here is thy fitting templerdquo
Demon of the World
TRANSMIGRATION OF SOUL
The doctrine of transmigration of soul or the cycle of
births and rebirths has been explicitly advanced in the
Upanishadic philosophy In the Kathopanishad
Brihadaranyak Upanishad and the Bhagvad Gita there are moving passages such as these
ldquoMan ripens like corn and like corn he is born againrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 102
Kathopanishad IV6
The Brihadaranyak Upanishad states
ldquoAnd as a caterpillar after reaching the end of a blade of grass finds another place of support and then draws itself towards it and as a goldsmith after taking a piece of gold gives it another newer and more beautiful shape similarly does the self after having thrown off this body and dispelled ignorance take on another newer and more beautiful formrdquo
Brihadaranyak Upanishad IV3-5
Similarly Lord Krishna tells Arjuna
ldquoAs a man discarding worn out clothes takes other new ones likewise the embodied soul casting off worn-out bodies enters into others which are newrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II22
And further Lord Krishna says to Arjuna
ldquofor in that case the death of him who is born is certain and the rebirth for him who is dead is inevitablerdquo
Bhagvad Gita II27
Shelley entertained similar ideas when he says
ldquoThe works and ways of man their death and birth
And that of him and all that his may be
All things that move and breathe with toil and sound
Are borm and die revolve subside and swellrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 103
Mont Blanc 92-95
Or again
ldquoThe splendours of the firmament of time
May be eclipsed but are extinguished not
Like stars to their appointed height they climb
And death is a low mist which cannot blot
The brightness it may veilrdquo
Adonais XLIV
Stressing the ephemerality of worldly objects Shelley
exclaims
ldquoSpirit of Beauty that does consecrate
With thine own hues all thou doth shine upon
Of human thought or formwhere art thou gonerdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoWhy aught should fail and fade that once is shown
Why fear and dream and death and birth
Cast on the daylight of this earth
Such gloomrdquo
Hymn to Intellectual Beauty 11
Lamenting the death of his friend Keats he says
ldquohe went uninterrupted
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 104
Into the gulf of death but his clear spirit
Yet reigns over earthrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoTo that high Capital where Kingly Death
Keeps his pale court in beauty and decay
He came and bought with price of purest breath
A grave among the eternalrdquo
Adonais VII
Again dwelling on the immortality of soul he declares
ldquoNaught we know dies Shall that alone which knows
Be as a sword consumed before the sheath
By sightless lightening The intense atom glows
A moment then is quenched in a most cold reposerdquo
Adonais XX
X X X X X X
ldquoGreat and mean
Meet massed in death who lends what life must borrowrdquo
Adonais XXI
X X X X X X
ldquoDust to dust but the pure spirit shall flow
Black to the burning fountain whence it came
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 105
A portion of the Eternal which must glow
Through time and change unquenchably the same
Whilst thy cold embers choke the sordid hearth shamerdquo
Adonais XXXVIII
THE DOCTRINE OF MAYA (DELUSION)
Our scriptures regard the phenomenal world as Maya
(delusion) They explain that the universe is neither
absolutely real nor absolutely non-existent and that its
phenomenal or apparent surface conceals and
safeguards the external presence of the Absolute
Shelley seems to have pondered over similar ideas
about the world of appearances
ldquoWorlds on worlds are rolling ever
From creation to decay
Like the bubbles on a river
Sparkling bursting borne away
But they are still immortal
Who through birthrsquos oriental portal
And deathrsquos dark chasm hurrying to and fro
Clothe their unceasing flight
In the brief dust and light
Gathered around their chariots as they gordquo
Three Choruses from Hallas
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 106
In his poem Invocation to Misery Shelley says
ldquoAll the wide world beside us
Show like multitudinous
Puppets passing from a scenerdquo
Again describing human life as a veil he says
ldquoLife not the painted veil which thou who live
Call life though unreal shapes be pictured there
And it but mimic all we would believe
With colours idly spreadrdquo
Prometheus Unbound
In the myth of Aurora he gives his own account of the
creation and interpretation of works of art
ldquoAnd lovely apparitions dim at first then radiant in the mind arising bright
From the embrace of beauty whence the forms
Of which these are phantoms casts on them
The gathered rays which are realityrdquo
Shelley seems to hint at the theory of Superimposition
(Vivartavada) which maintains that the universe is a
superimposition upon Brahman It states that the world
of thought and matter has a phenomenon or relative
existence and is superimposed upon Brahman the
unique Absolute Reality
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 107
Since the world is a network of delusion and
appearance not reality our life on earth is a sojourn
and its paramount aim is to have a glimpse of and
realize the eternal Truth or the Absolute Brahman
which is concealed by ignorance and delusion The
Ishopanishad tells us
ldquoThe face of Truth is hidden by a golden orb (disk) O Pushan (the Nourisher the Effulgent Being) uncover (the Face) that I the seeker or worshipper of Truth may hold Theerdquo
Ishopanishad XV
Like a sincere aspirant for the realization of eternal
Truth or the Absolute concealed under the illusory garb
of Maya (Delusion) Shelley in the words of Fairy in his
Queen Mab declares
ldquoAnd it is yet permitted me to rend
The veil of mortal frailty that the spirit
Clothed in its changeless purity may know
How soonest to accomplish the great end
For which it hath its being and may taste
That peace which in the end all life will sharerdquo
Queen Mab
In certain other passages Shelley speaks of the veil
identified with Time which obscured Eternity from the
sight of man The symbol of veil demonstrates that
which conceals truth goodness or happiness When the
veil was torn or rent asunder
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 108
ldquoHope was seen beaming through the mists of fear
Earth was no longer Hell
Love freedom health had given
Their ripeness to the manhood of its prime
And all its pulses beat
Symphonious to the planetary spheresrdquo
Again he uses the same symbol of veil when Cythna
says
ldquoFor with strong speech I tore the veil that hid
Nature and Truth and Liberty and Loverdquo
Shelley uses the same idea of superimposition coupled
with his own robust idealism
ldquoLife may change but it may fly not
Hope may vanish but can die not
Truth be veiled but it burneth
Love repulsed ndash but it returnethrdquo
STATES OF CONSCIOUSNESS
Our Upanishads identify three states of consciousness
crowned by the fourth which transcends all the other
three states They are
(i) The Waking State
(ii) The Dreaming State
(iii) The State of Deep Sleep and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 109
(iv) The State of Pure Consciousness (Turiya)
The fourth state of ecstatic consciousness which
transcends the preceding three has no connection with
the finite mind it is reached when in meditation the
ordinary self is left behind and the Atman or the true
self is fully realized The Mandukya Upanishad describes it thus
ldquoBeyond the senses beyond the understanding beyond all expression is the Fourth It is pure unitary consciousness wherein (all) awareness of the world and of multiplicity is completely obliterated It is effable peace It is the supreme good It is one without a second It is the Self Know it alonerdquo
Mandukya Upanishad VII
Turiya (तर[य) the fourth state is the supreme mystic
experience Shelley seems to have partly attained such a
state of pure ecstatic consciousness when he states
ldquoI seem as in a trance sublime and strange
To muse on my own separate fantasy
My own my human mind which passively
Now renders and receives fast influencing
Holding an unremitting interchange
With the clear universe of things aroundrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoSome say that gleams of a remoter world
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 110
Visit the soul in sleep that death is slumber
And that its shapes the busy thoughts outnumber
Of those who wake and live ndash I look on high
Has some unknown omnipotence unfurled
The veil of life and deathrdquo
Mont Blanc
Another instance of such a mystic experience appears in
his famous poem Triumph of Life on which Shelley was
working at the time of this death in 1822
ldquobefore me fled
The night behind me rose the day the deep
Was at my feet and Heaven above my head
When a strange trance over my fancy grew
Which was not slumber for the shade it spread
Was so transparent that the scene came through
As clear as when a veil of light is drawn
Over evening hill they glimmer and I knew
That I had felt the freshness of that dawnrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoAnd in that trance of wondrous thought I lay
This was the tenor of my waking dreamrdquo
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The Triumph of Life
SHELLEY AS AN ASPIRANT FOR SELF-REALIZATION
Shelley who described himself as
ldquoA splendour among shadows a bright blot
Upon the gloomy scene a spirit that strove
For Truthrdquo
seems to have reached at last that stability or
equanimity of mind which has been described in the
Upanishads and the Bhagvad Gita In a reply to Arjunrsquos
question about the definition of one who is stable of
mind or is finally established in perfect tranquility of
mind Lord Krishna says
ldquoArjun when one thoroughly dismisses all cravings of the mind controls it and is satisfied in the self (through the joy of the self) then he is called stable of mind One whose mind remains unperturbed amid sorrows whose thirst for pleasures has altogether disappeared and who is free from passion fear and anger is called stable of mindrdquo
Bhagvad Gita V56
The Katha Upanishad stresses similar ideas when it
says
ldquoBut he who possesses right discrimination whose mind is under control and is always pure he reaches that goal from which he is not born againrdquo
X X X X X X
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 112
ldquoThe man who has a discriminative intellect for the driver and a controlled mind for the reins reaches the end of the journey the highest place of Vishnu (the all-pervading and unchangeable one)rdquo
Katha Upanishad
Shelley echoes identical thoughts when he says
ldquoMan who man would be
Must rule the empire of himself in it
Must be supreme establishing his throne
On vanquished will quelling the anarchy
Of hopes and fears being himself alonerdquo
Sonnet on Political Greatness
It was in such rare moments of inner consciousness or
lsquoBlessed moodrsquo that Shelley felt lsquoOne with Naturersquo or
lsquoThe Power which wields the world with never-wearied love
Sustains it from beneath and kindles it aboversquo
As a myth-maker or a mythopoeic poet he conjured
visions of a golden age by turning to the grand aspects
of Nature ndash the ether the sky the wind the Sun the
Moon the light and the clouds and employing them as
befitting agencies and vehicles of his evolutionary ideas
ldquoPoetryrdquo he wrote ldquois indeed something divine It is at once the centre and circumference of all knowledgerdquo He
conceived of the universe as alive with a living spirit
behind it He moralizes natural myths and perceives the
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 113
Absolute behind the ephemeral In an exquisite image
he exclaims
ldquoThe sanguine sunrise with his meteor eyes
And his burning plumes outspread
Leaps on the back of my sailing rack
When the morning star shines deadrdquo
As his thoughts reached the zenith of their growth
Shelley identified his individual self with the all-
pervading Cosmic Self or the Brahman of the Vedanta
and felt himself one with the indwelling spirit of the
universe Unity filled his imagination he perceived
eternal harmony in the phenomenal existence and
rejoiced his own being in the vast million-coloured
pageants of the world And finally not only Nature but
all human existence is taken up as an inalienable aspect
of the eternal Cosmic Spirit He reaches the core the
centre of all palpable universe when he declares
ldquoI am the eye with which the Universe
Behold itself and knows itself divine
All harmony of instrument and verse
All prophecy all medicine is mine
All light of art or nature to my song
Victory and praise in its own right belongrdquo
Shelley perceived the transcendental or mystic
consciousness in which one realizes the complete
identity of self with the Supreme Self and which is called
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 114
तर[य अवथा ndash where one sees nothing but One
(Brahman) hears nothing but the One knows nothing
but the One ndash there is the Infinite The same truth is
vividly explained in the Bhagvad Gita when Lord
Krishna tells Arjuna
ldquoWhen one sees Eternity in things that pass away and Infinity in finite things then one has pure knowledgerdquo
Bhagvad Gita XVIII20
Our own great seer-poet and philosopher Sri Aurobindo
Ghose described Shelley as a sovereign voice of the new
spiritual force and a native of the heights with its
luminous ethereality where he managed to dwell
prophetically in a future heaven and earth with
brilliances of a communion with a higher law another
order of existence another meaning behind Nature and
terrestrial things
Sri Aurobindo further praises him as lsquoa seer of spiritual realities who has a poetic grasp of metaphysical truths and can see the forms and hear the voices of higher elements spirits and natural godheads and has a constant feeling of a high spiritual and intellectual beauty He is at once seer poet thinker prophet and artist Light love liberty are the three godheads in whose presence his pure and radiant spirit lived but a celestial light a celestial love a celestial liberty To bring them down to earth without their losing their celestial lustre and here is his passionate endeavour but his wings constantly buoy him upward and cannot beat strongly in an earthlier atmosphere There is an air of luminous mist surrounding his intellectual presentation of his meaning which shows the truths he sees as things to which the mortal eye cannot easily pierce or the life and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 115
temperament of earth rise to realize and live yet to bring about the union of the mortal and immortal terrestrial and the celestial is always his passion Shelley is the bright archangel of this dawn and becomes greater to us as the light he foresaw and lived and he sings half-concealed in the too dense halo of his own ethereal beautyrsquo
And what Juan Mascaro states as universal truth is
equally pertinent to Shelleyrsquos poetry
ldquoA deep faith in life cannot but be spiritual The path of Truth may not be a path of parallel lines but a path that follows one circle because Truth is onerdquo
Infinite is God infinite are His aspects and infinite are
the ways to reach Him In the Atharva Veda we read
ldquoThe one light appears in diverse formsrdquo This ideal of
harmony is carried to its logical conclusion in blending
synthesizing and reconciling conflicting metaphysical
theories and opposed conceptions of spiritual
discipline We read in the pages of Bhagvad Gita
ldquoWhatever wish men bring in worship
That wish I grant them
Whatever path men travel
Is my path
No matter where they walk
It leads to merdquo
Bhagvad Gita IV11
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
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To sum up Shelleyrsquos poetry will always hold irresistible
fascination to the lovers of light and beauty for to
quote Juan Mascaro again
ldquoThe finite in man longs for the Infinite The love that moves the stars moves also the heart of man and a law of spiritual gravitation leads his soul to the soul of the universe Man sees the sun by the light of the sun and he sees the spirit by the light of his own inner spirit The radiance of eternal beauty shines over this vast universe and in moments of contemplation we can see the Eternal in things that pass away This is the message of the great spiritual seers and all poetry and art and beauty is only an infinite variation of this message The spiritual visions of man confirm and illumine each other Great poems in different languages have different values but they all are poetry and the spiritual visions of man come all from one Light In them we have Lamps of Fire that burn to the glory of Godrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
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JOHN KEATS
(31 October 1795 ndash 23 February 1821)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 118
JOHN KEATS
English Romantic Poet
The son of a livery-stable manager he had a limited
formal education He worked as a surgeons apprentice
and assistant for several years before devoting himself
entirely to poetry at age 21 His first mature work was
the sonnet On First Looking into Chapmans Homer
(1816) His long Endymion appeared in the same year
(1818) as the first symptoms of the tuberculosis that
would kill him at age 25 During a few intense months of
1819 he produced many of his greatest works several
great odes (including Ode on a Grecian Urn Ode to a
Nightingale and To Autumnrdquo) two unfinished
versions of the story of the titan Hyperion and La Belle
Dame Sans Merci Most were published in the
landmark collection Lamia Isabella The Eve of St Agnes and Other Poems (1820) Marked by vivid imagery great
sensuous appeal and a yearning for the lost glories of
the Classical world his finest works are among the
greatest of the English tradition His letters are among
the best by any English poet
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 119
CHAPTER SIX
JOHN KEATS A MINSTREL OF BEAUTY AND TRUTH
INTRODUCTION
John Keats who in his own words was lsquoa fair creature of an hourrsquo lived a brief and turbulent life Pre-eminently a
sensuous poet in whom the Romantic sensibility to
outward impressions of sight sound touch and smell
reached its climax the life of Keats was a series of
sensations felt with febrile acuteness
His ideal was passive contemplation rather than active
mental exertion ldquoO for a life of sensations rather than of thoughtrdquo he exclaimed in one of his letters and in
another ldquoit is more noble to sit like Jove than to fly like Mercuryrdquo In fact his was a life of intense sensations
acute poignancy and an infinite yearning for beauty
which he identified with truth
Richness of sensuousness characterizes all his poetry
and his power of expression is marked by a spectacular
vividness which is interspersed with beautiful epithets
heavily charged with subtle messages for the senses His
works are so full of luxuriance of sensations and acute
passions that ordinary readers do not pause to perceive
the unimpeded flow of spiritual thoughts underneath
The pursuit of the spirit of beauty dominates all his
works which have one enduring message ndash the
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 120
lastingness of beauty and its identity with supreme
truth (or God) This message ndash the oneness of beauty
with truth and the eternal existence of truth ndash has been
beautifully enshrined in his famous and oft-quoted lines
(with which he concludes his Ode on a Grecian Urn)
ldquoBeauty is truth truth beauty ndash that is all
Ye know on earth and all ye need to knowrdquo
Keats died at the age of 26 but even from his early age
he had visions of rare spiritual significance Dwelling on
the value of visions in human life and poetry he says
ldquoSince every man whose soul is not a clod
Hath vision
For poesy alone can tell her dreams
With the fine spell of words alone can save
Imagination from the sable chain
And dumb enchantmentrdquo
Since common readers tend to ignore the underlying
spiritual import of his visions and images this article
aims at bringing into play some of the poetrsquos thoughts
which bear a remarkable resemblance to the age-old
hoary spirituality of our ancient land
Stressing the fundamental truths of our Indian thought
and tracing their distinct reflection in the works of great
Western poets seems a worth-while academic pursuit
FUNDAMENTAL UNITY
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 121
From the very beginning Keats could realize the
fundamental unity of Truth and Beauty and could dwell
at length on it to show how diverse paths illumined by
the glory of spirit in man ultimately lead him to the
realization of this abiding lesson of life The supreme
oneness of Truth has been beautifully enunciated by Sri
Krishna in the Bhagvad Gita
ldquoIn any way that men love Me in that same way they find My love for many are the paths of men but they all in the end come to Merdquo
Similar thoughts have found expression in the
introduction to the Upanishads by Juan Mascaro
ldquoThe path of Truth may not be a path of parallel lines but a path that follows one circle by going to the right and climbing the circle or by going to the left and climbing the circle we are bound to meet at the top although we started in apparently contrary directions This is bound to be in the end because Truth is onerdquo
And when Keats was only 22 he could give expression
to deep thoughts that have a curious similarity to the
ideas expressed in the Mundak Upanishad and the
Bhagvad Gita
ldquoNow it appears to me that almost any man may like the spider spin from his own inwards his own airy citadel the points of leaves and twigs on which the spider begins her work are few and she fills the air with a beautiful circuiting Man should be content with as few points to tip with the fine Web of his Soul and weave a tapestry empyrean-full of symbols for his spiritual eye of softness for his spiritual touch of space for his wanderings of distinctness for his luxuryrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 122
ldquoBut the minds of mortals are so different and bent on such diverse journeys that it may at first appear impossible for any common taste and fellowship to exist between two or three under these suppositions It is however quite the contrary Minds would leave each other in contrary directions traverse each other in numberless points and at last greet each other at the journeyrsquos end An old man and a child would talk together and the old man be led on his path and the child left thinkingrdquo
ldquoMan should not dispute or assert but whisper results to his neighbor and thus by every germ of spirit sucking the sap from mould ethereal every human might become great and humanity instead of being a wide heath of furze and briars with here and there a remote oak or pine would become a great democracy of forest treesrdquo
WISDOM
All men of good will are bound to meet if they follow the
wisdom of the words Shakespeare in Hamlet where if
we write SELF or self we find the doctrine of the
Upanishad
ldquoThis above all to thine own self be true
And it must follow as the night the day
Thou canst not then be false to any manrdquo
Now coming back to the theme of beauty and truth and
their ultimate identity in the universe we have to dwell
at large on the concept of beauty as enunciated by Keats
in his poetry From the very beginning Keats realized
that beauty in its true sense illumines manrsquos thoughts
and thus leads him to understand the glory of truth and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 123
the pervading spirit of their identity in whatever he
sees hears and perceives
The eternal identity or oneness of beauty with truth and
their interplay in the world are in fact unfailing
fountains of joy The permanence of beauty as a source
of joy has been beautifully elucidated by the poet in the
opening lines of his famous poem Endymion
ldquoA thing of beauty is a joy forever
Its loveliness increases it will never
Pass into nothingnessrdquo
He goes on to say
ldquoSome shape of beauty moves away the pall
From our dark spirits
An endless fountain of immortal drink
Pouring unto us from the heavenrsquos brink
Nor do we merely feel these essences
For one short hour
glories infinite
Haunt us till they become a cheering light
Unto our souls and bound to us so fast
That whether there be shine or gloom overcast
They always must be with us or we dierdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 124
When he ascribes permanence to joy born of beauty
Keats has in mind the immanence and effulgence of
beauty as a reflection of its creator God Beauty whose
lsquoloveliness increasesrsquo and which lsquowill never pass into nothingnessrsquo is an inalienable attribute of Divinity for it
is lsquoan endless fountain of immortal drinkrsquo
BEAUTY
God (as the poet seems to presuppose) is all Beautiful or
the embodiment of all Beauty and the entire world of
sights and sounds is nothing else but a glorious garment
of God So beauty does not consist only in apparent
physical appearances but is an offspring of inherent
divinity in man and nature which is dimly reflected in
their attractive exterior Such an eternal beauty in his
view presents lsquoglories infinite that haunt us till they become a cheering light unto our souls It is this beauty the glory of spirit which must be with us or we dierdquo
The poetrsquos concept of beauty with its glories infinite
bears a striking resemblance with the path of splendour
of our Vedic and epic scriptures in which our sages
perceived the Divine presence in all that is splendid and
beautiful in the universe
Our Vedic texts are full of the expressions of the sage-
poetrsquos exquisite astonishment before the visions of
glory and wonder The attitude of our Vedic seer-poets
towards beauty as a transcendental reality beyond our
sense-perceptions has been beautifully expressed in
images of beauty and glory as an abstract idea Says Rig Veda
ldquoSinless for noble power under the influence of Savita God
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 125
May we obtain all things that are beautifulrdquo
GOODNESS
Here the power of goodness is contemplated to lead to
the power of beauty Beauty in its myriad forms leads
us to spiritual consciousness of Divinity inherent in
Nature and all living beings Identical thoughts have
been expressed by Sri Krishna in Chapter X of the
Bhagvad Gita where all splendour and glory is said to
be the reflection of God whose manifestation this
universe is Says Sri Krishna to Arjuna
ldquoKnow thou that whatever is beautiful and good whatever has glory and power is only a portion of My own radiancerdquo
Bhagvad Gita X41
Seeing the effulgence of a thousand suns bursting forth
and yet it could hardly match the splendour of the
supreme Lord Arjuna exclaimed in wonder
ldquoI see the splendour of an infinite beauty which illumines the whole universe It is thee With thy crown and scepter and circle How difficult thou art to see But I see thee as fire as the Sun blinding incomprehensiblerdquo
Bhagvad Gita XI17
Besides this concept of ultimate elemental beauty
Keats goes on to underscore its fundamental and
inseparable unity with Truth which is yet another
inalienable facet of Divinity on earth
Truth being an essential attribute of God lies at the
core of all existence and it sustains the entire universe
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 126
with its manifold forms of beauty reflected in countless
objects around us When Keats declares that lsquoBeauty is truth truth beautyrsquo he seems to remind us of the age-old
spiritual consciousness that found sublime utterance in
our Vedas which are the oldest treatises on lsquophilosophia perennisrsquo the eternal philosophy In the Vedas truth has
been described as the essence of Divinity
ldquoThe deity has truth as the law of His beingrdquo
Atharva Veda VIIXXIV1
The Rig Veda calls the deities as various manifestations
of Truth Elsewhere in the Rig Veda the Deity has been
described as true and the path of religious progress is
the ingredient of Dharma Declares the Rig Veda
ldquoBy truth is the earth upheldrdquo
Rig Veda X85
An Upanishadic sage says
ldquoTruth alone triumphs not untruth By Truth the spiritual path is widened that path by which the seers who are free from all cravings and declares travel and reach the supreme abode of Truthrdquo
Mundak Upanishad IIII6
So Truth is a basic postulate of Dharma and an abiding
and ultimate value of life It is the eternal oneness of
beauty and truth and truth and beauty that inspired
Keats to stress their underlying unity and their
transcendental reality When Keats says ldquoThat is all ye know on earth and all ye need to knowrdquo he points to that
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 127
ecstatic wonder which the spiritual realization of this
eternal truth brings to a seeker or seer or a poet
SUBLIMITY
Keats seems to have reached such a sublime plane of
poetic consciousness that is so aptly suggested by our
Vedic seers who have extolled God as a poet (कव) and
His divine creative energy is indicated as the poetic
power (काय) which has assumed manifold forms of
beauty and splendour So God as the supreme creator of
beauty has been described in the Rig Veda as
ldquoHe who is supporter of the world of life
Who knows the secret mysterious names
Of the morning beams
He poet cherishes manifold forms
By His poetic powerrdquo
Rig Veda VIIIXL5
So let me hasten to the conclusion by affirming that as
lsquoa lily for a dayrsquo Keats proved that a crowded hour of
glory is far better than an age without a name he seems
to have lived up to the lofty advice of Queen Vidula to
her son King Sanjaya in the Mahabharat
महतम 0व1लत 2यो न त धमऽतम 4चर
ldquoIt is better to flame forth for an instant than smoke away for agesrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 128
Eternal truths transcend the barriers of time and space
country and clime caste and creed and shine through all
lands and in all ages Even today the enlightened souls
all over the world have a significant identity of ideas
irrespective of the countries to which they belong and
the religious faith to which they are affiliated
Such wise men awaken others from a state of
intellectual and spiritual slumber enkindle in them a
sense of understanding and fraternity It has been
rightly said by HW Longfellow
ldquoLives of great men all remind us
We can make our lives sublime
And departing leave behind us
Footprints on the sand of Timerdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 129
RW EMERSON
(25 May 1803 ndash 27 April 1882)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 130
RW EMERSON
US Poet Essayist and Lecturer
Emerson graduated from Harvard University and was
ordained a Unitarian minister in 1829 His questioning
of traditional doctrine led him to resign the ministry
three years later He formulated his philosophy in
Nature (1836) the book helped initiate New England
Transcendentalism a movement of which he soon
became the leading exponent In 1834 he moved to
Concord Mass the home of his friend Henry David
Thoreau His lectures on the proper role of the scholar
and the waning of the Christian tradition caused
considerable controversy In 1840 with Margaret
Fuller he helped launch The Dial a journal that
provided an outlet for Transcendentalist ideas He
became internationally famous with his Essays (1841
1844) including Self-Reliance Representative Men
(1850) consists of biographies of historical figures The Conduct of Life (1860) his most mature work reveals a
developed humanism and a full awareness of human
limitations His Poems (1847) and May-Day (1867)
established his reputation as a major poet
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 131
CHAPTER SEVEN
EMERSONrsquoS SPIRITUAL QUEST AND INDIAN THOUGHT
INTRODUCTION
Ralph Waldo Emerson the lsquoSage of Concordrsquo as he is
rightly called was an American seer who came into the
world at a time when East and the West were gradually
coming closer to each other in spheres more than one
trade and commerce between the two was gaining
momentum and above all the era of inter-
communication of ideas intellect and spirit was being
ushered in by exchange of books
Emerson was one of the first great Americans who
absorbed himself sufficiently in this phenomenon
ventured into the sacred literature of India and
assimilated its thought to such a remarkable degree that
he became its eminent interpreter to his countrymen in
particular and to the entire West in general
EMERSON AND THE GITA
Let us see what Swami Vivekananda said about the
source of Emersonrsquos inspiration Swamiji said
ldquoThe greatest incident of the (Mahabharata) war was the marvelous and immortal poem of the Gita the Song Celestial It is the popular scripture of India and the loftiest of all teachings I would advise those of you who have not read that book to read it If you only knew how
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 132
much it has influenced your own country (America) even If you want to know the source of Emersonrsquos inspiration it is this book the Gita He went to see Carlyle and Carlyle made him a present of the Gita and that little book is responsible for the Concord Movement All the broad movements in America in one way or other are indebted to the Concord partyrdquo
His interest in the sacred writings of India was probably
aroused at Harvard and he kept it aglow throughout his
life With his motto ldquoTomorrow to fresh fields and pastures newrdquo he set out in search of the True (Satyam)
the Good (Shivam) and the Beautiful (Sundaram)
In busy and bustling New England there came forward
to quote Theodore Parker ldquothis young David a shepherd but to be a king with his garlands and singing robes about him one note upon his new and fresh-string lyre was worth a thousand menrdquo
With unflinching faith in Truth Righteousness and
Beauty and absolute confidence in all the attributes of
infinity he drank deep at the unfailing source of Indian
philosophy and religion and gave his thoughts such a
lucid inimitable expression that his writings have
become a veritable treasure of world literature Revered
the world over held in high esteem by great Indians like
Rabindranath Tagore and Pt Jawaharlal Nehru and
admired by Gandhiji his writings abound in the beauty
of his speech the majesty of his ideas and the loftiness
of his moral sentiments
Perhaps the most fitting commentary on the relevance
of his thoughts to our country was made by Mahatma
Gandhi after reading his Essays Said Mahatma Gandhi
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 133
ldquoThe Essays to my mind contain the teaching of Indian wisdom in a Western Guru It is interesting to see our own sometimes differently fashionedrdquo
There are indeed innumerable points of similarity in
thought and experience between Emerson and the
mainstream of Indian philosophy The philosophy of
Vedanta which was one of the thought currents that
reached America in the first half of the 19th century
influenced Emerson deeply and contributed largely to
his concept of lsquoselfhoodrsquo Emerson found the Vedic
doctrines of soul congenial to his own ideas about manrsquos
relationship to the universe He therefore drew freely
upon the Hindu scriptures which contain a vivid and
well-elaborated doctrine of lsquoSelfrsquo Numerous references
in his essays and journals to the lsquoLaws of Manursquo
(Manusmriti) Vishnu Puran Bhagvad Gita and Katha Upanishad bear ample testimony to this fact
Let us examine some of the striking identities between
Emerson and the Vedanta The Upanishads tell us that
the central core of onersquos self is clearly identifiable with
the Cosmic Reality ldquoThe self within you the resplendent immortal person is the internal self of all things and is the Universal Brahmanrdquo The Chhandogya Upanishad tells
us that ldquothe self which inhabits the body is verily the Brahman and that as soon as the mortal coil is thrown over it will finally merge in Brahmanrdquo
How close was Emersonrsquos spiritual kinship with the
Vedantic doctrines is clear from the following lines
taken from his essay Plato or the Philosopher
ldquoIn all nations there are minds which incline to dwell in the conception of the Fundamental Unity the ecstasy of losing all being in one Being This tendency
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 134
finds its highest expression chiefly in the Indian scriptures in the Vedas the Bhagvad Gita and the Vishnu Puranrdquo
He further quotes Lord Krishna speaking to a sage ldquoYou are fit to apprehend that you are not distinct from meThat which I am thou art and that also in this world with its gods and heroes and mankind Men contemplate distinctions because they are stupefied with ignorance What is the great end of all you shall now learn from me It is soul-one in all bodies pervading uniform perfect pre-eminent over nature exempt from birth growth and decay Omnipresent made up of true knowledge independent unconnected with unrealities with name species and the rest in time past present and to come The knowledge that this spirit which is essentially one is in onersquos own and all other bodies is the wisdom of one who knows the unity of thingsrdquo
In formulating his own concept of the Over-soul
Emerson quotes Lord Krishna once again
ldquoWe live in succession in division in parts in particles Meantime within man is the soul of the whole the wise silence the universal beauty to which every part and particle is equally related the eternal One And this deep power in which we exist and whose beatitude is all accessible to us is not only self-sufficing and perfect in every hour but in the act of seeing and the thing seen the seer and the spectacle the subject and the object are one We see the world piece by piece as the sun the moon the animal the tree but the whole of which these are shining parts is the Soul Only by the vision of that wisdom can the horoscope of ages be readrdquo
The Over-Soul
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 135
A transcendentalist par excellence Emerson who was
influenced by German philosophers like Kant Hegel
Fichte and Schelling and their English interpreters
Coleridge and Carlyle affirmed that man could
apprehend reality by direct spiritual insight To him
intuition knew truths which ldquotranscendedrdquo those
accessible to intellect logical argument and scientific
inquiry Such a transcendentalism or attitude which
provided a metaphysical justification for the ideal of
individual freedom was found writ large in the holy
books of India
Steeped as he was in the oriental lore echoes of
Vedantic philosophy can be distinctly heard in his
writings which shine like ldquoa good deed in a naughty worldrdquo
Some of his poems resemble Vedantic literature in form
as well as in content His two famous poems Brahma
and Hamatreya are striking examples of such a close
affinity both in content and expression Ideas and
images in Brahma reflect certain passages which
Emerson had copied into his journals from the Vishnu
Puran the Bhagvad Gita and Katha Upanishad The first
stanza of Brahma which reads
ldquoIf the red slayer think he slays
Or if the slain think he is slain
They know not well the subtle ways
I keep and pass and turn againrdquo
is essentially an adaptation of these lines from the
Katha Upanishad
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 136
ldquoIf the slayer thinks I slay if the slain thinks I am slain then both of them do not know well It (the soul) does not slay nor is it slainrdquo
Katha Upanishad II19
The same lines with a little variation of course appear
in the Bhagvad Gita
ldquoThey are both ignorant he who knows that the soul to be capable of killing and he who takes it as killed for verily the soul neither kills nor is killedrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II19
The image of Brahma as a red slayer has been derived
from the Vishnu Puran where Lord Shiva the destroyer
of Creation has been depicted as Rudra (the red slayer)
but destruction envisages new creation and therefore
symbolizes the decadence of one and necessitates the
advent of the other This is why Lord Shiva is regarded
as the god not only of extermination but also of
regeneration With this concept is connected the cult of
Shaivagam ndash the ushering in of an era of general good
and prosperity when the world is created anew
The second and third stanzas of Brahma echo the
following lines of the Bhagvad Gita
ldquoI am the ritual action I am the sacrifice I am the ancestral oblation I am the sacred hymn I am the melted butter I am the fire and I am the offeringrdquo
Bhagvad Gita IX16
and also from the same source
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 137
ldquoI am immortality as well as death I am being as well as non-beingrdquo
Bhagvad Gita IX19
In the fourth stanza of Brahma there is a direct
reference to lsquothe Sacred Sevenrsquo ndash the seven highest saints
of our country namely Kashyapa Atri Bharadwaj Vishwamitra Gautam Vashishtha and Jamadagni Thus
we find that Brahma embodies an age-old Vedantic
truth
As regards his next poem Hamatreya its very title is a
variation of a disciplersquos name lsquoMaitreyarsquo to whom the
earth had recited a few verses Before we examine the
poem critically let us read a long passage from the
Vishnu Puran Book IV which Emerson had copied into
his 1845 Journal This passage which sheds ample light
on the background and theme of the poem under
reference reads
ldquoKings who with perishable frames have possessed this ever-enduring world and who blinded with deceptive notions of individual occupation have indulged the feeling that suggests lsquoThis earth is mine it is my sonrsquos it belongs to my dynastyrsquo have all passed awayearth laughs as if smiling with autumnal flowers to behold her kings unable to effect the subjugation of themselvesthese were the verses Maitreya which earth recited and by listening to which ambition fades away like snow before the windrdquo
Journals VII127-130
How futile is human vanity and how ridiculous is the
possessive instinct in man has been thoroughly exposed
by Emerson in the following lines
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 138
ldquoEarth laughs in flowers to see her boastful boys
Earth-proud proud of the earth which is not theirs
Who steer the plough but cannot steer their feet
Clear of the graverdquo
Hamatreya
Man who awaits lsquothe inevitable hourrsquo forgets that all his
heraldry pomp power wealth and lsquopaths of gloryrsquo lead
him lsquobut to the graversquo and grows so proud of his material
achievements and so deeply attached to the fleeting
things of the world that he loses sight of the supreme
philosophical truth - the ephemerality of the world and
the immortality of soul Death which is lurking in the
shadows can lay his icy hands upon us any day yet due
to false pride and sense of meum and attachment we
allow ourselves to be duped by the passing show of the
world without ever thinking of salvation or final release
from the worldly bondages Says Emerson
ldquoAh the hot owner sees not Death who adds
Him to his land a lump of mould the morerdquo
Hamatreya
Here Emerson seems to have been deeply influences by
Indian scriptures and particularly Ishopanishad and
the Bhagvad Gita in which the philosophy of God-
realization through detached action has been succinctly
elaborated In these two sacred books it has been stated
that total renunciation of the sense of meum egotism
and attachment with regard to the world all worldly
objects body and all actions is a path to real love for
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 139
God All worldly objects like land wealth house clothes
all relations like parents wife children friends and all
forms of worldly enjoyment like honour fame prestige
being the creations of Maya are wholly deluding
transient and perishable whereas one God alone the
embodiment of Existence (Sat) Knowledge (Chit) and
Bliss (Anand) is all in all omnipotent omniscient and
omnipresent Therefore all sense of meum egotism and
attachment must be totally renounced for spiritual
growth and pure exclusive love for God If the seed of
egoism is sown sorrow is the fruit On the other hand
the more a man cultivates dispassion and
disinterestedness with regard to the world the more
easily he transcends the barriers of Ignorance (Avidya)
Delusion (Maya) and Aversion (Dvesha) and marches
on the path of self-realization and God-realization A
similar thought current runs through the following
memorable lines of Earth-Song which forms an integral
part of the poem
ldquoThe earth says
They called me theirs who so controlled me
Yet every one wished to stay and is gone
How am I theirs if they cannot hold me
But I hold themrdquo
Hamatreya
These lines remind us of those memorable words of
Lord Krishna in the Bhagvad Gita XII16 where a true
devotee is characterized as one who is ldquodelivered from the egorsquos thrall - the sense of I and minerdquo or the feeling of
doership in all undertakings
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 140
After reading these lines which seem to refer to the
famous Biblical phrase lsquodust thou art to dust returnethrsquo
the readers may feel called upon to cultivate a sense of
detachment and renunciation for their ambition fades
away and their lsquoavarice cooled like dust in the chill of the graversquo
All art it has been said is an attempt to distract man
from his ego Emersonrsquos Hamatreya is certainly an
illustrious example of great art Highly didactic in
content and tone this poem reminds us of that sublime
mood in which Emerson realized the futility of
egocentric attachment to earth and its fleeting objects
which are shadows rather than substances
Emersonrsquos writings leave us to quote John Milton lsquoCalm of mind all passions spentrsquo A fitting comment on the
total impact of Emersonrsquos works on us has been given
by a brilliant American man of letters Theodore Parker
who says
ldquoA good test of the comparative value of books is the state they leave you in Emerson leaves you tranquil resolved on noble manhood fearless of the consequences he gives men to mankind and mankind to the laws of Godrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 141
HD THOREAU
(12 July 1817 ndash 6 May 1862)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 142
HD THOREAU
US Thinker Essayist and Naturalist
Thoreau graduated from Harvard University and taught
school for several years before leaving his job to
become a poet of nature Back in Concord he came
under the influence of Ralph Waldo Emerson and began
to publish pieces in the Transcendentalist magazine The Dial In the years 1845ndash47 to demonstrate how
satisfying a simple life could be he lived in a hut beside
Concords Walden Pond essays recording his daily life
were assembled for his masterwork Walden (1854) His
A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers (1849)
was the only other book he published in his lifetime He
reflected on a night he spent in jail protesting the
Mexican-American War in the essay Civil
Disobedience (1849) which would later influence such
figures as Mohandas K Gandhi and Martin Luther King
Jr In later years his interest in Transcendentalism
waned and he became a dedicated abolitionist His
many nature writings and records of his wanderings in
Canada Maine and Cape Cod display the mind of a keen
naturalist After his death his collected writings were
published in 20 volumes and further writings have
continued to appear in print
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 143
CHAPTER EIGHT
THOREAUrsquoS TRYST WITH INDIAN CULTURE
INTRODUCTION
Henry David Thoreau was a great American
transcendentalist thinker His seminal mind and
original thought had an enduring impact on his own
countrymen and also on peoples beyond the bounds of
America His philosophy and life had a deep influence
on all great men of his time Mahatma Gandhi regarded
him as his Guru and his concept of Satyagraha owes its
origin to Thoreaursquos essay on Civil Disobedience which
Gandhiji chanced upon in South Africa On Thoreaursquos
greatness another great American contemporary RW
Emerson once remarked ldquoHis soul was made for the noblest society he had in short life exhausted the capabilities of this world Wherever there is knowledge wherever there is virtue wherever there is beauty he will find a homerdquo
HIS LOVE OF SOLITUDE
Endowed with a rare meditative mind Thoreau loved
lsquosweet solitudersquo for he held that what is truly alone is the
spirit A seeker after perfection he retired to the
solitude of the woods to see with the eyes of the soul ndash
ldquothe higher law in naturerdquo and realize his oneness with
the Cosmic Spirit A lover of the spirit behind the world
of appearance he once said ndash ldquoI love to be alone I never
found the companion that was so companionable as
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 144
solitude In solitude of the woods I suddenly recover my
spirits my spirituality I can go from the buttercups to
the life everlastingrdquo His love for loneliness resembles
that of our own sages and saints who shunned the din
and clamour of madding crowds and retired to the
sylvan solitude of the woods for meditation on
mysteries of life It was in the secluded and tranquil
atmosphere of the woods that the great teachers of
mankind cultivated their souls observed austerity and
wrote the holiest scriptures Aranyakas and sacred texts
Gurukul (forest academies)- the ideal nurseries of
higher learning and disciplined rigorous life were setup
here for success in life and self-realization which is a
path-way to God-realization
HIS CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE AND GANDHIJIrsquoS
SATYAGRAHA
Bapu read Thoreaursquos essay on Civil Disobedience for
the second time in jail and was so deeply impressed by
it that he called it ldquoa masterly treatise which left a deep impression on merdquo He copied the words ldquoI did not feel for a moment confined and the walls seemed a great waste of stone and mortarrdquo Gandhiji wrote to Roosevelt
in 1942 ldquoI have profited greatly by the writings of Thoreau and Emersonrdquo He told Roger Baldwin that
Thoreaursquos essay ldquocontained the essence of his political philosophy not only as Indiarsquos struggle related to the British but as to his own views of the relation of citizens to Governmentrdquo As Miller observed ldquoGandhiji received back from America what was fundamentally the philosophy of India after it had been distilled and crystallized in the mind of Thoreaurdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 145
In his Civil Disobedience which as a document of
much ethical and spiritual value is manrsquos most powerful
weapon in dealing with tyranny Thoreau examines the
relation of the individual to the state and offers a candid
exposition when he says ldquoThat Government is best which governs the leastrdquo He believed in the supremacy of
moral laws and his concept of Civil Disobedience is
based on the dictates of conscience Since the nature of
an individual is determined by his conscience there is
always a basic conflict between the laws arbitrarily
made by the Government and the objectives sanctioned
and held sacred by the individualrsquos conscience He
regarded the individual as more important than the
state So in the interests of justice and virtue men with
clean conscience most oppose unjust laws The form of
protest launched by conscientious and holy men against
government is called Civil Disobedience
Thoreau seems to have derived the concept from the
Bhagvad Gita which invests each individual with two
contradictory traits ndash the Divine Attributes and the
Diabolical Propensities Whenever diabolical tendencies
promote arbitrary administration by making unjust
laws and men of clean conscience are forced to obey
them injustice prevails and justice or righteousness is
destroyed In such a situation the Divinity incarnates
itself and sets matters right Declares Lord Krishna
ldquoWhenever righteousness (Virtue) is on the decline and injustice (Vice) is on the ascendant then I body forth myselfrdquo
Bhagvad Gita IV7
To Gandhiji also Satya (Truth) and Ahimsa (Non-
violence) are inter-related and Satyagraha or non-
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 146
violent resistance is based on the belief in the power of
spirit the power of truth the power of love by which we
can overcome evil through self-suffering and self-
sacrifice
FORMATIVE INDIAN INFLUENCES
Thoreau was thoroughly immersed in the Indian
scriptures In Emersonrsquos library he read and was deeply
influenced by the Manusmriti Bhagvad Gita Vishnu Puran Hitopadesh Rig-Veda and the Upanishads
Which the Manusmriti led him to seek the Self in
solitude the Bhagvad Gita taught him the ideal of
disinterested action non-attachment meditation and
self-realization He was so overwhelmed by the Gita that
he declared it to be the lsquoUniversal Gospelrsquo Praising its
moral grandeur and sustained sublimity of thoughts he
wrote in Walden ndash ldquoIn the morning I bathe my intellect in the stupendous cosmogonal philosophy of the Bhagvad Gita since whose composition years of the gods have elapsed and in comparison with which our modern world and its literature seems puny and trivial the best Hindu scripture (Gita) is remarkable for its pure intellectuality The reader is nowhere raised into and sustained in a higher purer and rarer region of thought than the Bhagvad Gita It is unquestionably one of the noblest and most sacred scriptures which have come down to us The oriental philosophy assigns their due rank respectively to action and contemplation or rather does full Justice to the latterrdquo
A thorough study of the Upanishads made him exclaim
joyfully ldquoWhat extracts from the Vedas I have read fall on me like the light of a higher and purer luminary which describes a loftier course through a purer stratum ndash free from particulars simple universalrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 147
At a time when the Western philosophers did not
appreciate the significance of contemplation Thoreau
emphasized that contemplation is as important as
action for the latter has to be charged by the former
otherwise action will lead to chaos disillusionment and
despair
HIS TRANSCENDENTALISM
Thoreau was an empirical transcendentalist To him
transcendentalism was a profound exploration of the
spiritual foundations of life His emphasis on intuition
or inner light for a direct relationship with God which
transcends all the conventional avenues of
communication stemmed from an intuitive capacity for
grasping the ultimate truth He was interested less in
the material world than in spiritual reality He regarded
Nature as a viable garment of the spiritual world and
the universe as the embodiment of a single Cosmic Soul
His transcendentalism relied upon the higher planes of
human circumstances its oneness with something
higher than itself While logical reasoning fails to grasp
the truth intuition transcends understanding and is a
synthesizing power to understand the organic whole
which is called the Over-soul
An individual of exceptional self-ascending and self-
reliance he believed that Over-soul is brought down to
earth by action rather than words He therefore did not
preach transcendentalism but actually lived it To him
transcendentalism is ldquoan inquisitive and contemplative access to Godrdquo He believed in the immanence of God in
nature and in man and also the identity of God with the
soul of the individual He said ldquothe creator is still behind the increate the Divinity is so fleeting that its attributes are never expressedthe idea of God is the idea of
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 148
our Spiritual nature purified and enlarged to infinity In ourselves are the elements of Divinity We see God around us because He dwells within usrdquo
This statement reminds us of a verse in the Gita
wherein Lord Krishna declares that every living heart is
His abode
ldquoArjuna God abides in the heart of all creatures causing them to revolve according to their deeds by His illusive power seated as those beings are in the vehicle of the bodyrdquo
At one place Thoreau said ldquoThe whole is whole an organic whole which is called Over-soul or Para-Brahman and the highest aim of life is to realize this truth and be one with the whole or Over-soulrdquo Thoreau seems to have
been moved by our Vedic incantation which says
ldquoThat (the invisible Absolute) is whole whole is this (the visible phenomenal universe) from the invisible whole comes forth the visible whole Though the visible whole has come out from that invisible whole yet the whole remains unalteredrdquo Thus the phenomenal and the
Absolute are inseparable All existence is in the
Absolute and whatever exists must exist in it hence all
manifestation is merely a modification of the one
Supreme Whole and neither increases nor diminishes It
Serene and thoughtful as he was he wrote in his
Journal ldquoThe fact is I am a mystic a transcendentalist and a natural philosopher to bootrdquo
HIS ASCETISM (SANNYASA)
He was a true ascetic or Sannyasi for he preached and
practiced the basic human values of Anasakti (non-
attachment) and Aparigraha (non-possession)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 149
throughout his life He abhorred acquisition of wealth
and regarded worldly possessions as the result of sheer
exploitation of the masses by a few powerful men and
agencies including the State and the Government Since
the universe belongs to God any claim to ownership or
personal possessions is against moral law and is in fact
a sin against divinity Moral laws being superior to
worldly rules his preference for a life of self-abnegation
and renunciation bears a striking similarity to our Vedic
view expressed in the very opening line of the
Ishopanishad
ldquoAll this whatever exists in the universe is inhabited by the Lord Having renounced (the unreal) enjoy (the real) with restraint Do not covet or set your eye on the possession of othersrdquo
To him all worldly attractions and allurements were but
a passing show or fleeting moments (in eternity) which
distract the seekers of truth from cultivating self-culture
and promoting inner spiritual growth
EXPLORER OF THE INNER WORLD OF SPIRIT
Thoreau was an explorer of the inner self He wanted to
pass ldquoan invisible boundaryrdquo establishment within and
around him new universal and more liberal laws and
live with higher order of beings To him every man is
the Lord of the realm beside which the earthly empire
of the Czar is but a petty state a hammock left by the
icethere are continents and seas in the moral
world yet unexplored by him He praised William
Habbingtonrsquos following lines which echoed his own
thoughts
ldquoDirect your eyes right inward and you will find
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 150
A thousand regions in your mind
Yet undiscovered Travel then and be
Expert in home home cosmographyrdquo
Simple living based on extreme reduction of wants and
self-reliance enabled him to lsquocultivate the garden of his soulrsquo In consonance with the concept of an ideal Yogi in
the Gita he wrote
ldquoThe millions are awake enough for physical labour but only one in a million is awake enough for effective intellectual exertion and only one in a hundred millions do a poetic or divine liferdquo How truly does this view echo
the memorable words of Lord Krishna
ldquoAmong thousands of men one rare soul strives for perfection and among those who strive with success one perchance knows me in truthrdquo
Condemning people who go to Africa to hunt giraffes for
pastime he exhorted them to aim at seeking their own
lsquoSelfrsquo He said ldquoIt would be a noble game to shoot onersquos selfrdquo He seems to recall the famous verse of the
Mundakopanishad which says
ldquoThe Pranava is the bow the Atman is the arrow and the Brahman is said to be its mark It should be hit by one who is self-collected and that which hits becomes like the arrow one with the mark ie Brahmanrdquo
When he ordains lsquoto shoot oneselfrsquo he like our Vedic
seers hints at penetrating the truth centre in us with
our mind propelled by the motive force generated in the
voiceless ecstasy of deepest meditation which touches
the Brahman the Ultimate Reality When the individual
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 151
soul gets fully detached from its contacts with matter or
its false identification with material envelopment it
realizes its oneness with the Supreme Brahman How
beautifully has he stressed the value of inner search in
the concluding sentence of Walden
ldquoThe light which puts out our eyes is darkness to us Only that day dawns to which we are awake There is more day to dawn The Sun is but a morning starrdquo
IMMORTALITY OF SOUL AND THE DOCTRINE OF
TRANSMIGRATION
Thoreau firmly believed in the immortality of soul and
its transmigration He had fully imbibed the philosophy
of the Gita which enunciates in unequivocal terms the
permanence of the soul and the transience of the body
Says Lord Krishna
ldquoThis soul is never born and never dies nor does it become only after being born For it is unborn eternal everlasting and ancient even though the body is slain the soul is notrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II20
ldquoAs a man shedding worn-out garments takes other new ones likewise the embodied soul casting off worn-out bodies enters into others which are newrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II22
Thoreau considered his life as a series of many more
lives to come On his return from Waldon Pond he said
ldquoI had several more lives to live and could not spare any more for that onerdquo At another place he refers to the
solitary hired manrsquos lsquosecond birth and peculiar religious
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 152
experiencersquo He evidently recalled the following words of
St John ldquoExcept a man be born again he cannot see the kingdom of Godrdquo In his Waldon he refers to a bug and
declares ldquoWho does not feel his faith in a resurrection and immortality Who knows what beautiful and winged whose egg has been buried for ages under many concentric layers of woodenness in the dead dry life in societyheard perchance of gnawing out now for years by the astonished family of man may unexpectedly come forth from amidst societyrsquos most trivial furniture to enjoy its perfect summer life at lastrdquo
CONCLUSION
Thoreau was a true Yogi or an ascetic modeling on the
Indian tradition of strict moral code of conduct for a
Sannyasi He drew abundant spiritual and moral
sustenance from the Indian scriptures and its rich
lsquoculturersquo and approximated the ideal of a perfect recluse
The concept of an ideal Yogi is similar upto a point to
the postulates of Divinity expressed thus in the Atharva Veda
ldquoThe Yogi is desireless and hence free from the impact of animal nature he is serene in the heroism of the spirit he is satisfied with the essence of things perceived spirituality and hence does not depend on sense-perception for happiness and so he is complete in himself And though the physical body is subject to decay and death he remains unworn and ever youthful in spirit and has no fear of deathrdquo
Atharva Veda XVIII44
Such an enlightenment Yogi or spiritual superman was
Thoreau whose greatness will ever inspire us and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 153
illumine our lifersquos path with light and love His life was
lsquoa chronicle of actions just and brightrsquo and his writings
were lsquowrit with beams of heavenly light on which the eyes of God not rarely lookrsquo
Proof
Printed By Createspace
Digital Proofer
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 12
noblest society he had in short life exhausted the capabilities of this world Wherever there is knowledge wherever there is virtue wherever there is beauty he will find a homerdquo
These articles amply prove the fundamental fallacy of
Rudyard Kiplingrsquos assertion that ldquothe East is east and the West is west and the twain shall never meetrdquo but
contrary to his view the East and the West represent
complementary views of the world While the West
gives us the perfection and joy of eternal beauty in the
outer world as expressed by Keats the East gives us lsquothe
splendor and joy of the Infinite in the inner world of
Soulrsquos visionrsquo
That the physicist and the mystic reach the truth of
essential unity of all things and events by following
different paths has been beautifully described by
modern scientist Dr Frijof Capra ldquoThus the mystic and the physicist arrive at the same conclusion one starting from the inner realm the other from the outer world The harmony between their views confirms the ancient Indian wisdom that Brahman the ultimate reality without is identical to Atman the reality withinrdquo
Clear and identical traces of our Vedic thought and
scriptural ideas are found scattered all over the corpus
of their poetic works If we take up the outstanding
ideas of each poet for our consideration we find their
striking resemblance with what abounds in our spiritual
heritage Let us consider their predominant thoughts
which find a distinct echo in our Vedic and holy texts
William Blake who was the most prophetic of all
major English poets seems to have attained the rare
super-sensory or transcendental state of consciousness
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 13
which enabled him to perceive reflective communion
with God Such a transcendental perception of Divinity
in all creation and all creation in Divinity gave him a
subtle insight into the lsquovisions of eternityrsquo In other
words this contemplative vision of Infinity in the Finite
and the Finite in Infinity has been regarded as the
distinguishing mark of pure wisdom by Lord Krishna in
the Gita ndash ldquoWhen one sees Eternity in things that pass away and Infinity in finite things then one has pure (सािवक) wisdomrdquo [XVIII20] It was this intimation of
eternity that made Blake declare
ldquoTo see the world in a grain of sand
And a Heaven in a wild flower
Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand
And Eternity in an hourrdquo
Auguries of Innocence
Moreover he strongly condemned man-made divisions
of humanity into numerous castes and creeds and
preached universal brotherhood based on love
understanding and sacrifice
ldquofor man is love
And God is love Every kindness to another is a little death
In the divine image nor can man exist but by brotherhoodrdquo
Jerusalem
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 14
And again he says
ldquoWhere mercy love and pity dwell
There God is dwelling toordquo
The Divine Image
William Wordsworth was essentially a seer-poet He
was perhaps the first English poet to appreciate the
innate kinship of man with Nature and find in her a
calm and invisible spiritual presence in perfect
communion with the Cosmic Soul He recognized the
essential spiritual unity of all things and the
interpenetration of human life with that of the universe
His poetic faith was based on an indwelling spirit in
nature which interpenetrated all life and transformed
and transfigured with its radiance rocks fields trees
and the people who lived close to them He found
something that permeates and transfigures everything
He perceived this indwelling spirit and the vision of the
Infinite (God) in his poetry He concluded that Nature
being the manifestation of God is our best moral guide
and teacher
ldquoOne impulse from a vernal wood
May teach you more of man
Of moral evil and of good
Than all the sages canrdquo
In his Ode to the Intimations of Immortality which is
his spiritual autobiography he expresses his belief in
pre-existence which is also an article of faith in our
scriptural texts
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 15
ldquoOur birth is but a sleep and a forgetting
The soul that rises with us our lifersquos star
Hath had elsewhere its setting
And cometh from afarrdquo
His mystical experience of lsquothat serene and blessed moodrsquo in which we lsquoare laid asleep in body and become a living soulrsquo and his perception of lsquoa sense sublime of something more deeply interfuseda motion and a spirit that impels all thinking things all objects of all thought and rolls through all thingsrsquo reflect not only
his profound pantheism but also find close parallels in
our own religio-spiritual literature
Samuel Taylor Coleridge who was one of the seminal
minds of his generation possessed the most fertile
imagination According to William Hazlitt he lsquohad angelic wings and fed on mannarsquo for his writings are
ethereal mystical and magical Endowed with a rare
lsquomystic idealismrsquo he was besides being a great poet a
speculative philosopher also who considered life as lsquoa vision shadowy of Truthrsquo He justified the phrase ndash
lsquoRenaissance of wonderrsquo for he revived the supernatural
and invested it with indefiniteness and suggestion
which characterize his imagination He drew his
conceptions from lsquomythrsquo and embodied them with
symbols His images express his emotion spiritual state
and metaphysical experience Unlike other poets his
poetry grew from his inner organic law and made
supernatural and romantic subjects credible to human
nature by creating lsquothat willing suspension of disbeliefrsquo that constitutes his poetic faith He was the first great
British idealist of his age who preferred the intellectual
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 16
intuition to the conceptual dialectic The image and
vision of God lsquoimago deirsquo as an intellectual
contemplation (speculari) of the transcendent Absolute
(the prius) of all beings is an aspect of his speculative
mysticism
Byron however stands apart from all other poets
included herein for although his philosophy of life was
altogether different from that of his contemporaries he
was a force a portent and historical phenomenon in his
age He was endowed with a rare fire for liberty
indomitable courage sacrificing spirit and prophetic
zeal which are undoubtedly great human values His
inevitable attitude was revolt both social and personal
As an influence and portent he was the most powerful
poet in his age for he created that Byronic legend which
became a historic phenomenon of lasting fascination of
his personality Endowed with fiery energy his self-
portrait of careless arrogance or even daemonic figure
was a persona of romantic panache He was a portrait
and a symbol whom it was possible to worship or
condemn but never to neglect
PB Shelley who was lsquoone frail form ndash a phantom among men companionlessrsquo (Adonais) occupies a
unique position among Romantic poets Essentially he
was a visionary whose philosophy of enlightenment
made his poetry fanciful and ethereal He was a born
revolutionary who launched a crusade against the
organized religion and society Disgusted by the gloomy
state of the world he dreamed a world of beauty
freedom and virtue and made his poetry a trumpet of
narcissistic fantasy A solitary intellectual lsquowandering companionlessrsquo (Alastor) his poetry is the projection of
his sense of isolation He was fired by rationalist
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 17
revolutionary thought which reflects his visions of the
future Endowed with rationalist speculative intuition
his poetry symbolizes the spirit of human welfare
ldquoI wish no living thing to suffer painrdquo
Prometheus I303
The desire of Shelley reminds us of our scriptural
prayer ndash ldquoसव भवत स13खनः सव सत नरामयाःrdquo His
imagination is idealistic and vision synoptic He deals
with the heavens and light and aspired for the
regeneration of the world through love To him there is
no dualism between the material and spiritual life for
they are the aspects of same reality To him only
Eternity is real while the phenomenal world is but an
illusion or माया ndash a veil that hides true light He echoes a
Vedic truth when he says
ldquoThe One remains the many change and pass
Heavenrsquos light forever shines Earthrsquos shadows fly
Life like a dome of many-coloured glass
Stains the white radiance of Eternityrdquo
Adonais L11
He treats natural objects and forces as symbols for his
own emotional patterns In his lsquoOde to the West Windrsquo
he uses the West Wind as a spirit of destruction and
regeneration or death and rebirth He considers death
as only a prelude to renewed life and this shows his
faith in the transmigration of human soul or the cycle of
death and rebirth He declares
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 18
ldquoIf winter comes can spring be far behindrdquo
Ode to the West Wind
His entire poetry is a vivid and symbolic expression of
the wretched actuality and the radiant idea He wants to
herald a perfect world order based on love and
freedom He treats poetry as a potent instrument of
redemption and it was his deep romantic sensibility and
fanciful ecstatic Platonic love that earned him this
description of lsquopinnacled dim in the intense inanersquo He
was one of the greatest lyricists and an
lsquounacknowledged legislator of the worldrsquo of thought and
imagination
John Keats who in his own words was lsquoa fair creature of an hourrsquo was perhaps the first conscious artist whose
artistic intuition was far ahead of his time By declaring
that ldquoan artist must serve Mammonrdquo he wished to confer
on arts a special status and thus laid the foundation of
the doctrine of lsquoArt for Artrsquos sakersquo His minute delicate
and sensuous observation of the visible world of Nature
inspired his poetry which he wanted to lsquoloadrsquo with a
special excellence His delightful communion with
Nature and the sensuous ecstasies of its sight sound
smell touch and taste formed some of his best poetry
His delicacy and keenness of perception and love for
passive contemplation made him exclaim ndash ldquoO for a life of sensations rather than thoughtrdquo But in fact most of
his sensations were his thoughts for they were
embodied in sensuous pictorial form and rich symbolic
imagery
As a liberal enthusiast he felt that sharing the distress of
humanity or participation in ldquothe agony and strife of human heartsrdquo was essential not only for human growth
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 19
but also for poetic maturity This philanthropic attitude
of Keats brings him very close to our ardent Indian
prayer - ldquoसव भवत स13खनः सव सत नरामयाःrdquo ndash May all be happy may none struck with disease To find an
escape from the fret and fever of life he sought refuge in
an infinite yearning for beauty and turned to the realm
lsquoof Flora and old Panrsquo but soon realized the transience of
the world and started exploring permanence He could
find it in the spirit of beauty which is but a reflection of
eternal truth His passionate pursuit of ideal beauty
which he identified with truth has been beautifully
expressed in the following oft-quoted lines
ldquoBeauty is truth truth beauty that is all
Ye know on earth and all ye need to knowrdquo
Ode on a Grecian Urn
This fundamental unity or oneness of beauty and truth
and their interplay in the visible world are the
mainsprings of his poetic creed
The conflict between transience and permanence forms
the theme of his famous Odes and he longs for a
solution and lasting happiness in the form of Art or lsquoon the viewless wings of Poesyrsquo At the height of his
impassioned contemplation when the life of the spirit is
fused with the objects of immediate sensuous
experience he has glimpses of the permanence of
beauty which reflects Eternal Truth In one of his letters
(281) he declares ldquoI can never feel certain of any truth but from a clean perception of its beautyrdquo And at another
place when he finds mortality and immortality poles
apart he asserts the everlasting value of truth ldquoTruthrdquo
he says ldquomeans that which has lasting valuerdquo This firm
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 20
conviction of Keats seems to be a distinct echo of our
Vedantic dictum
सयमव जयत नानतम सयन पथा वततो दवयानः
यनामतय तत सयय परम नधान ldquoTruth alone triumphs not untruth By truth is laid out the Path Divine along which the seers who are free from desires and cravings ascend the supreme abode of Truthrdquo
Mundak Upanishad III16
Again the Vedic seer says that the Atman (self) is to be
realized only through truth
सयन लampसतपसा यष आमा
मडकोपनषद III15
Thus truth is the foundation of Dharma (righteousness)
for it is an essential and abiding value of human life The
eternal oneness of beauty and truth and vice versa and
their transcendental reality was Keatsrsquo poetic creed and
the realization of this basic spiritual truth raised him to
a level of sublime consciousness which is the mark of a
true seeker of truth or seer
In sum we may say that though lsquoa lily of a dayrsquo Keats
proved that a crowded hour of glory is far better than
an age without a name as has been stressed in our epic
Mahabharat where Queen Vidula exhorts her son
Sanjaya ldquoमहतम 0व1लत 2यो न त धमतम 4चरrdquo ndash ldquoIt is better to flame forth for an instant than to smoke away for agesrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 21
Though Keats died at the young age of 26 years he left
an indelible imprint on the history of English poetry for
his deep and pervasive influence could be easily seen on
Tennysonrsquos early work Moreover he was indisputably
the precursor of the Pre-Raphaelite movement In fact
he had reached near perfection in poetic craftsmanship
which will ever remain worthy of emulation for the
succeeding generations of poets
Ralph Waldo Emerson known as the lsquoSage of Concordrsquo
acted as a bridge between the East and the West His
abiding interest in the Indian scriptures and
particularly the Gita was a source of the Concord
Movement in America According to Swami
Vivekananda all the broad movements in America are
indebted to the Concord Party Mahatma Gandhi
remarked after reading Emersonrsquos Essays ldquoThe Essays to my mind contain the teaching of Indian wisdom in a Western lsquoGurursquo it is interesting to see our own sometimes differently fashionedrdquo Emerson drew freely on the
Upanishads Manusmriti Vishnu Puran and above all
the Gita and his writings reflect his indebtedness to our
holy texts
Pt Jawaharlal Nehru admired Emersonrsquos gospel of self-
reliance and righteousness in particular and regarded
him as one of the builders of America A
transcendentalist and thinker par excellence Emersonrsquos
ideas shaped not only his countrymenrsquos thinking but
had a deep and pervasive influence over many other
nations His main thoughts coloured as they are by our
own Indian religio-philosophical strands are universal
in appeal and are as relevant today as they were in his
own lifetime
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 22
In formulating his concept of Over-Soul Emerson
stressed the fundamental identity of Individual Soul
with Over-Soul He asserted ldquoWithin man is the soul of the whole ndash the wise silence the universal beauty to which every part and particle is equally related the Eternal Oneonly by the vision of that wisdom can the horoscope of ages be readrdquo He firmly believed in the
immortality of soul and the ephemerality of the world
and strongly condemned the futility of manrsquos vanity and
ego-centric attachment to the perishable objects of the
world His writings leave us lsquocalm of mind all passions spentrsquo In fact lsquohe gives men to mankind and mankind to the laws of Godrsquo
Henry David Thoreau was a great empirical
transcendentalist about whom Emerson once remarked
ldquowherever there is knowledge wherever there is virtue wherever there is beauty he will find a homerdquo His essay
on lsquoCivil Disobediencersquo which Gandhiji read twice in a
South African jail impressed him so much so that he
regarded him as his political lsquoGurursquo and his concept of
Satyagraha owes its origin to Thoreaursquos writings
Endowed with a rare meditative mind he loved lsquosweet solitudersquo and retired to the woods for discovering the
lsquohigher lawrsquo and realize his oneness with the Cosmic
Spirit He believed in the supremacy of moral laws and
his doctrine of Civil Disobedience is based on his dictate
of conscience for he considered individual conscience
more important than arbitrary state laws
Thoroughly immersed in the Indian scriptures his
thought-process and philosophy of life was
considerably moulded by our ancient religio-spiritual
heritage His deep love for our scriptural texts is evident
from his declaration of the Gita as lsquoUniversal Gospelrsquo He
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 23
wrote ldquoIn the morning I bathe my intellect in the stupendous cosmogonal philosophy of the Bhagvad GitaIt is unquestionably one of the noblest and most sacred scriptures which have come down to usthe oriental philosophy assigns their due rank respectively to action and contemplationrdquo
About the Vedas he remarked ldquoExtracts from the Vedas fall on me like the light of a higher and purer luminaryrdquo
According to him Over-Soul could be brought down to
earth not by words but by ldquoan inquisitive and contemplative accessrdquo He further states ldquoIn us are the elements of Divinity We see God around us because He dwells within usrdquo
He was a true ascetic (सयासी) for he preached and
practiced non-attachment (अनासि8त) in his life He was
an explorer of the inner world of Spirit In the seclusion
of woods he lsquocultivated the garden of his soul as a true Yogirsquo and he wanted to lsquoshoot his selfrsquo as our Mundaka Upanishad says
ldquoThe Pranava is the bow Atma the arrow the Brahman its mark It should be hit by a self-collected onerdquo
Much of what is stated in this compact volume may be
found scattered over various other critical works but
my earnest endeavour has been to bring together such
material as is of sufficient spiritual value which belongs
to all times This small comparative survey of the realm
of main ideas of some great poets confirms the splendor
of their rich romantic imagination and the unity of all
spiritual vision that makes them not only the creators of
beauty love and light but also brothers in spirit
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 24
I would feel amply rewarded if through this modest
attempt I am able to arouse keen interest in my readers
for further critical study of the subject Any suggestions
for amplification or improvement on the text are most
welcome
RP DWIVEDI
LUCKNOW
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 25
WILLIAM BLAKE
(28 November 1757 ndash 12 August 1827)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 26
WILLIAM BLAKE
English Poet Painter Engraver and Visionary
He was trained as an engraver by James Basire and
afterward attended classes at the Royal Academy Blake
married in 1782 and in 1784 he opened a print shop in
London He developed an innovative technique for
producing coloured engravings and began producing
his own illustrated books of poetrymdashincluding Songs of Innocence (1789) The Marriage of Heaven and Hell (1790) and Songs of Experience (1794)mdashwith his new
method of ldquoIlluminated Printingrdquo Jerusalem (1804[ndash
20]) an epic treating the fall and redemption of
humanity is his most richly decorated book His other
major works include Vala or The Four Zoas
(manuscript 1796ndash1807) and Milton (1804[ndash11]) A
late series of 22 watercolours inspired by the Book of
Job includes some of his best-known pictures He was
called mad because he was single-minded and
unworldly he lived on the edge of poverty and died in
neglect His books form one of the most strikingly
original and independent bodies of work in the Western
cultural tradition Ignored by the public of his day he is
now regarded as one of the earliest and greatest figures
of Romanticism
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 27
CHAPTER ONE
INDIAN SPIRITUALISM IN BLAKErsquoS VISIONS OF ETERNITY
INTRODUCTION
William Blake was by far the most prophetic of all major
English poets In a preface to his famous poem on
Milton he exclaimed lsquoWould to God that all the Lordrsquos people were Prophetsrsquo Elsewhere Blake declared lsquoA Prophet is a seer not an arbitrary dictatorrsquo According to
PH Butter an acclaimed authority on Blake ldquoa prophet sees behind the marks of woe behind the wars and other evils of his time and the attitudes that cause such things But Blake was not the kind of prophet who just present evils but one who saw the Visions of Eternity one whose senses discovered the infinite in everythingrdquo The prophet
is also a spokesman one who speaks or believes he
speaks for God or some other higher power Blake
himself claimed in one of his letters in 1803 ldquoI dare not pretend to be any other than the Secretary the Authors are in Eternityrdquo
His belief in lsquoinspirationrsquo contributed to that lsquoterrifying honestyrsquo which TS Eliot saw in him to keep him
uncompromisingly true to his vision He perceived a
close relationship of the conscious ndash lsquoIrsquo with the deeper
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 28
self through which all inspiration flows He knew that
the prophet must also be a lsquomakerrsquo lsquoa blacksmith laboring at his furnaces to shape the stubborn structure of the languagersquo He further realized that a prophet
should also be a teacher a preacher and a beacon light
to humanity
Explaining the function of the bard or poet (and his own
mission) Blake in his introduction to Songs of Experience declares
ldquoHear the voice of the bard
Who present past and future sees
Whose ears have heard
The Holy word
That walked among the ancient trees
Calling the lapsed soul
And weeping in the evening dew
That might control
The starry pole
And fallen fallen light renewrsquo
Or again elucidating the aim of writing poetry or his
lsquogreat taskrsquo Blake declares
ldquo I rest not from my great task
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 29
To open the Eternal worlds to open the immortal eyes
Of man inwards into the worlds of Thought into Eternity
Ever expanding in the bosom of God the human imaginationrsquo
Like Milton who wanted lsquoto justify the ways of God to Manrsquo or Shelley who held that lsquopoetry is the revelation of the eternal ideas which lie behind the many-coloured ever-shifting veil that we call reality in lifersquo Blake in his
exceptional prophetic zeal set out to open the Eternal
worlds to open the immortal eyes of man inwards into
the worlds of thought into Eternity He was always at
pains to renew the fallen fallen light The poetrsquos divine
task of lsquoever expanding in the bosom of Godrsquo reminds us
of the moving verse of our Rig Veda in which God as
creator of beautiful forms has been conceived of as the
greatest poet whose divine creative energy s his poetic
power which manifests itself in the manifold forms of
beauty and splendor like the Heaven the Sun the Moon
the Sky etc
यो धता भवानानामगया स कवः काया प पपltयत
ऋवद VIII415
lsquoHe who is the supporter of the world of life
Who knows the secret mysterious names of the morning beams
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 30
He poet cherishes manifold forms by His poetic power even as heavenrsquo
Rig Veda VIII415
As a divinely inspired poet Blake seems to have had
experiences of various psychic and even mystic visions
which awakened him to subtle spiritual life It seems
that he must have transcended normal sensory
perceptions and would have attained to super-sensory
status of consciousness when he declares
lsquoI see the savior over me
Spreading his beams of love and dictating the words of mild song
Awake O sleeper of the land of shadows wake
I am in you and you in me mutual in love divinersquo
Jerusalem L4-7
He seems to have attained to that rare transcendental
consciousness when he perceived perfect communion
with God who assured him
lsquoI am not a God afar off I am a brother and friend
Within your bosoms I reside and you reside in me
We are one forgiving all evil not seeking recompensersquo
Jerusalem L18-20
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 31
Here Blake on perceiving a synoptic vision of complete
identity or oneness of God with individual self seems to
have echoed the eternal ancient Holy Scriptures Here
are a few striking parallels
In our Vedas also Go is regarded and adored as our
most-trusted friend Says the Rig Veda
lsquoमा=कर न ऐना सयाच ऋषः
वBमा Cह Dमतमसया 1शवानrsquo
ऋवद X237
lsquoNever may this friendship be severed
Of thee O Deity and the sage Vimada
We know O God Thy brother-like love
With us be Thy auspicious friendshiprsquo
Rig Veda X237
The key-note of this type of worship is the
contemplation of friendly love (described in later
religious literature as - सय ndash friendliness between the
Deity and the worshipper) The following prayer is in
the same spirit
lsquoभवा नः सFन अतमः सखा वधrsquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 32
ऋवद X133
lsquoBe Thou most dear to us for bliss O friend to aidrsquo
Rig Veda X133
Similarly assuring Arjuna of His perennial benediction
Lord Krishna declares in the Gita
ईHवरः सवभतानामतltठत
Kामयसवभतानमायया
ldquoArjuna God abides in the heart of all creatures
Causing them to revolve according to their Karma
By His illusive power seated as those beings are
In the vehicle of the bodyrdquo
Bhagvad Gita XVIII61
And again describing Himself as the truest friend of all
living beings Lord Krishna pronounces
ldquoI am the (disinterested) friend of all living beings and my devotee attains supreme peacerdquo
Bhagvad Gita V29
To turn to William Blake again he has an essential
belief in the closest intimacy of all living beings with
God who is the fountain-head of all life love and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 33
friendship This belief makes him affirm his faith in the
holiness of all life on earth Says he in his Annotations to Lavater
lsquoAll Life is Holyrsquo
Again he says ldquoIt is God in all that is our companion and friend for our God himself says lsquoyou are my brother my sister and my motherrsquo and Saint John said lsquowho so dwelleth in love dwelleth in God and God in himrsquo and such a one cannot judge of any but in loveGod is in lowest effects as well as in the highest causes for he is become a worm that he may nourish the weak For let it be remembered that creation is God descending according to the weakness of man for our Lord is the word of God and everything on earth is the word of God and in its essence is Godrdquo
In our own scriptures the all-pervasiveness of God (the
One) has been conceived not only in the cosmic world
but also in the world of men The very opening verse of
the Ishopanishad stresses the immanence of God in the
universe
ईशावाय इद सवM यािकNय जगया जगत
ईशोपनष I
lsquoUnderstand all this (universe) as inhabited by the Lord
Each moving thing in this moving worldrsquo
Or again says the Atharva Veda
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RP DWIVEDI Page 34
य समायोऽवPणोयो वदHयः
यो दवोऽवPणोमानषः
lsquoGod is that in which things converge
He is that from which things diverge
He is our own land he is of foreign land
He is divine he is humanrsquo
Atharva Veda IV168
The immanence of God is the entire universe is also
underscored by Lord Krishna when he tells Arjuna
ldquoThere is nothing besides me Arjuna Like clusters of yarn-beads formed by knots all this (universe) is threaded on merdquo
Bhagvad Gita VII7
SYNOPTIC VISION
A firm belief in the all-pervasiveness of God in the
whole universe led him to perceive every object of
Nature as a window through which we may look with a
sense of awe and wonder into the beauty truth and all-
enveloping eternity which is but a reflection of God
Blake must have had palpable intimations of Eternity
when he wrote
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 35
lsquoTo see a world in a grain of sand
And a Heaven in a wild flower
Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand
And Eternity in an hourrsquo
Auguries of Innocence
Such a super-sensuous or transcendental perception of
Divinity in all creation and all creation in Divinity gave
Blake a subtle insight into the lsquoVisions of Eternityrsquo and
made him not only a seer but also lsquoan inhabitant of
other planes another domain of beingrsquo Commenting on
Blakersquos singular other-worldliness our own seer and
prophet Sri Aurobindo says ldquoThere is no other singer of the beyond who is like him or equal him in the strangeness supernatural lucidity power and directness of vision of the beyond and the rhythmic clarity and beauty of his singingrdquo
It is this contemplative knowledge of infinity in finite
and finite in infinity that has been regarded as the
distinguishing mark of the pure wisdom which finally
leads one to transcendental revelation which has been
so beautifully expressed in our own scriptures
सवभतषभावमययमीRत
अवभ8तसािवक
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RP DWIVEDI Page 36
lsquoWhen one sees Eternity in things that pass away and Infinity in finite things then one has pure knowledgersquo
Bhagvad Gita XVIII20
The same truth has been emphasized again and again in
the Upanishads When man comes to know the real
truth about God nay when he succeeds in realizing the
truth about God how can he ever revile or adversely
criticize any form or aspect of God The Isha Upanishad
says
यत सवा13ण भतान आमयवानपHयत
सवभतष चामना ततो न वजगSसत
ईशोपनष VI
ldquoWhoever beholds all beings in God alone and God in all beings ie who regards all beings as his own self he no more looks down upon any creature for regarding all as his self whom will he hate and howrdquo
Lord Krishna stresses the same equanimity of vision
when he declares
ldquoThe Yogi who is united in identity with the all-pervading infinite consciousness and sees unity everywhere beholds the self present in all beings and all beings as assumed in the selfrdquo
Bhagvad Gita VI29
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RP DWIVEDI Page 37
Again Lord Krishna declares
यो मा पHयत सव सवM च मय पHयत
तयाह न DणHया1म स च म न DणHयत
भगवगीता VI30
ldquoHe who sees me (the universal self) present in all beings and all beings existing within me never loses sight of me and I never lose sight of himrdquo
Bhagvad Gita VI30
FAITH IN THE LAW OF ETERNITY
Since God is infinite immanent and omnipresent soul
which is an integral and inalienable part of God is also
immortal The forms or objects of the world may change
but in reality they exist forever and are eternal Like
God soul is everlasting unborn undecaying and
undying Blake says
ldquoWhatever can be created can be annihilated
Forms can not
The oak is cut down by the axe the lamb falls by the knife
But their Form Eternal exists for everrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 38
The poet also believes that all sufferings of man if borne
meekly for a noble cause have their rich recompense
sooner or later for God being all-merciful would
certainly reward his suffering children He believes that
lsquoFor a tear is an intellectual thing
And a sigh is a sword of an angel king
And the bitter groan of a martyrrsquos woe
Is an arrow from the Almightyrsquos bowrsquo
Jerusalem
He believes that God Almighty holds out a solemn
promise of reward to sufferers for a lofty cause God
declares
lsquofear not Lo I am with thee always
Only believe in me that I have power to raise from deathrsquo
Jerusalem
MEANS OF LIBERATION
As the greatest and most inventive of Romantic
mythmakers Blake at first explores the contrary states
of human innocence and experience and then speaks of
lsquothe five gatesrsquo our mortal senses which bind us down to
the earth Not so much interested in the art of the
possible as in the visions of the beyond Blake
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 39
constructed a cosmic myth to show manrsquos infinite
potential and how he might attain to final liberation
from this sinful ephemeral world characterized by a
wheel of births and deaths He weaves his myths round
the fall and salvation of man the universal man and his
ultimate waking to eternal life In his poems lsquoMiltonrsquo and
lsquoJerusalemrsquo he regards Satan as the embodiment of
error selfhood and boundless pride and points out that
the means of liberation or freedom from the worldly
bondages lie in the annihilation of selfhood or ego and
the forgiveness of sins He exclaims lsquoI in my selfhood am that Satan I am that evil onersquo and resolves that he would
go down to self-annihilation In lsquoMiltonrsquo he puts the
following words into the mouth of Milton
lsquobut laws of Eternity
Are not such Know thou I come to self-annihilation
Such are the laws of Eternity that each shall mutually
Annihilate himself for others goodrsquo
Reiterating and stressing his poetic purpose or mission
of life Blake resolves
lsquoMine is to teach men to despise death and to go on
In fearless majesty of annihilating self
I come to discover before Heaven and Hell
the self righteousness in all its hypocritical turpitude
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 40
put off
In self-annihilation all that is not God alone
To put off self and all I have ever and everrsquo
Again in a sincere invocation to God Blake prays
lsquoO saviour pour upon me thy spirit of meekness and love
Annihilate the selfhood in me be thou all my life
Guide thou my hand which trembles exceedingly
Upon the rocks of agesrsquo
SPIRITUAL HUMANISM
Inspired by his implicit faith in Godrsquos fatherhood and
menrsquos brotherhood Blake preached the concept of
universal fraternity Considering the whole world as
one large family he maintained that all divisions and
fragmentations of humanity stemmed from manrsquos
ignorance of the eternal truth of one and only one
universal family The world being the home of mankind
all human beings are inextricably interwoven together
in the same warp and woof of life How beautifully has
this cosmopolitan philosophy of manrsquos eternal identity
with his fellow beings been enunciated in the following
memorable words
lsquoWe live as one man for contracting our infinite senses
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 41
We behold multitude or expanding
We behold as one Man all the universal family
and he is in us and we in him
Live in perfect harmony in Eden the land of life
Giving receiving and forgiving each otherrsquos trespassesrsquo
Elsewhere the poet says
lsquoThere is no other God than God
Who is the intellectual fountain of Humanity
I never made friends but by spiritual gifts
By severe contentions of friendship and the burning fire of thought
He who would see the divinity must see him in his children
So he who wishes to see a vision perfect whole
Must see it in its minute particulars organizedrsquo
Preaching universal brotherhood based on love
understanding and sacrifice he again exclaims (in the
words of Jesus)
lsquoWouldst thou live one who never died
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 42
For thee or ever die for one
Who had not died for thee
And if God died not for man and giveth not himself
Eternally for man
Man could not exist for man is love and God is love
Every kindness to another is a little death in the divine image
Nor can man exist but by brotherhoodrsquo
Jerusalem
Condemning man-made divisions of mankind into
various castes and creeds he says
lsquoAnd all must love the human form
In heathen Turk or Jew
Where mercy love and pity dwell
There God is dwelling toorsquo
The Divine Image
How truly are the poetrsquos ideas relevant even today when
the hot wind of doubt and distrust is blowing all over
the world (which has been broken up into fragments by
caste and creed clime and country) can be viewed in
the context of our age-old belief in the worship of God in
the universal form (Vishwaroop) and our religious and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 43
spiritual aspirations for ensuring the maximum good of
the world To serve humanity in a spirit of humility
impelled our people to look upon the world as one
great undivided family or nest (वHवनीड़म) and all men
as our brethren ndash (वसधव कटFबकम)
The ideal of universal brotherhood and selfless service
to humanity found spontaneous utterance in the
following moving words which embody the sublime
aim of a devout manrsquos life
न वह कामय रा0य न वगम ना पनभव
कामय दःख तSतानाम Dा13ण नामातनाशन
lsquoI do not desire earthly kingdom nor heaven nor do I want rebirth I want to reduce the sorrow of people who are sunk in sufferingrsquo
Today when the horizon of humanity is darkened by
national prejudices the need for spiritual humanism
synoptic vision and universal brotherhood is being
increasingly felt by one and all Here it is worthwhile to
turn our attention to great men whose thoughts
transcend myriad artificial barriers and teach us the
ideal of dedication to the common weal
Since truth transcends all religious dogmas and
disinterested service to mankind is a form of true
worship to God our great men have always prayed
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 44
सव भवत स13खनः सव सत नरामयाः
सव भWा13ण पHयत मा किHचX दःख भाYभवत
lsquoMay all be happy may all living beings be free from diseases may we perceive goodness in all and may none be struck with misfortunersquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 45
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
(7 April 1770 ndash 23 April 1850)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 46
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
English Poet
Orphaned at age 13 Wordsworth attended Cambridge
University but he remained rootless and virtually
penniless until 1795 when a legacy made possible a
reunion with his sister Dorothy Wordsworth He
became friends with Samuel Taylor Coleridge with
whom he wrote Lyrical Ballads (1798) the collection
often considered to have launched the English Romantic
movement Wordsworths contributions include
Tintern Abbey and many lyrics controversial for their
common everyday language About 1798 he began
writing The Prelude (1850) the epic autobiographical
poem that would absorb him intermittently for the next
40 years His second verse collection Poems in Two Volumes (1807) includes many of the rest of his finest
works including Ode Intimations of Immortality His
poetry is perhaps most original in its vision of the
organic relation between man and the natural world a
vision that culminated in the sweeping metaphor of
nature as emblematic of the mind of God The most
memorable poems of his middle and late years were
often cast in elegaic mode few match the best of his
earlier works By the time he became widely
appreciated by the critics and the public his poetry had
lost much of its force and his radical politics had yielded
to conservatism In 1843 he became Englands poet
laureate He is regarded as the central figure in the
initiation of English Romanticism
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 47
CHAPTER TWO
VEDANTA IN WORDSWORTHrsquoS POETRY
In many of his famous poems among which Ode on Intimations of immortality and Lines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey occupy pride of place
William Wordsworth one of the greatest seer-poets of
English literature presents ideas which bear striking
similarity to the rich philosophical thought that found
unimpeded flow in our Vedantic literature
In fact there are so many echoes of Vedanta in the
poetry of Wordsworth that one is apt to conclude that
the poetrsquos lsquophilosophic mindrsquo must have led him to drink
deep at the unfailing springs of Upanishadic Helicon
A poet of nature Wordsworth was essentially lsquoa seer of spiritual realities a seer of the calm spirit in naturersquo and
his poetry at its best is a fine harmony of his spiritual
insight ethical sense and profundity of thought He is a
curious amalgam of the seer the poet and the reflective
moralist who dwells philosophically and even
prophetically on Nature Man and Cosmic Soul
The epithets lsquobest philosopherrsquo lsquomighty prophetrsquo and
lsquoseer blestrsquo which Wordsworth uses for the new-born
innocent child in his famous Ode may be well applied to
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 48
the poet himself for ldquovoyaging in strange seas of
thought alonerdquo Wordsworth had found lsquofull many a gem
of purest ray serenersquo which still shed undiminished
luster on the entire fabric of English poetry
A careful study of the Ode on Intimations of immortality Lines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey Ruth Laodamia To Cuckoo and other poems reveals that Wordsworthrsquos sustained
loftiness of thought had taken him to such heights that
on him (to quote his own words)
lsquo those truths do rest which we are toiling all our lives to findrsquo
What indeed are those truths Those are the elemental
truths of life which were keenly perceived realized and
expressed by the seers and savants of the East and
particularly of our Vedantic times A careful study of
Vedanta which is the aphoristic summary of the co-
ordinated Upanishads the Brahmasutras and the
Bhagvad Gita and is in fact the culmination of Indian
religion and Philosophical thought reveals that serious
scholars of the West drew freely upon it Wordsworthrsquos
poetry bears ample testimony to this fact because
numerous echoes of Vedanta can be easily heard in his
poetry
To cite a few comparative examples the Upanishads
assert in unambiguous terms that the whole universe of
names and forms the world of being and becoming
springs from Brahman (Supreme Godhead or Absolute
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 49
Cosmic Soul) ndash the eternal existence consciousness and
bliss Since the universe is the creation and
manifestation of Brahman it is also pervaded by Him
Naturally therefore only Brahman exists all else is non-
existent or illusory The Chhandogya Upanishad
declares lsquoBrahman is verily the Allrsquo God is the subtle
essence underlying phenomenal existence the whole
nature which is Godrsquos handiwork as well as Godrsquos
garment and is filled and inspired by God who is its
inner controller and soul
The immanence of God has been corroborated by
Brihadaranyak Upanishad in two passages the first
being in the form of an answer given by Yagnavalyak to
Uddalak Aruni
lsquoHe is immanent in fire in the intermundia in air in the heavens in the Sun in the quarters in the Moon in the stars in space in darkness in light in all beings in Prana in all things and within all things whom these things do not know whose body these things are who controls all these things from within He is thy soul the inner controller the immortal He is the unseen seer the unheard hearer the unthought thinker the ununderstood understander other than Him there is no seer other than Him there is no hearer other than Him there is no thinker other than Him there is no understander everything besides Him is naughtrsquo
Brihadaranyak Upanishad II7
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 50
In another passage Brihadaranyak Upanishad tells us
that God is the All ndash ldquoboth the formed and the formless the mortal and the immortal the stationary and the moving the this and thatHe is the verity of verities the soul of souls and He is the supreme verityrdquo
Brihadaranyak Upanishad IIV15
Wordsworth like these unique revelatory utterances of
the Upanishads codifies this truth in mystical manner in
Lines Composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey when he regards the Cosmic Soul as supreme power or
all-pervading presence
lsquoWhose dwelling is the light of setting Suns
And the round ocean and the living air
And the blue sky and in the mind of man
A motion and a spirit that impels
All thinking things all objects o all thought
And rolls through all thingsrsquo
Since God is All and everything else is Naught the world
is not real it is an appearance It is not the permanent
all-abiding Absolute Reality but a fleeting show and
ephemeral entity having seemingly phenomenal reality
In other words the world is lsquoshadow not substancersquo ndash it
is just a net-work of Maya
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 51
This Vedantic doctrine finds utterance not only in
Wordsworthrsquos poems like To the Cuckoo in which he
calls the earth ldquoan unsubstantial fairy placerdquo but he
seems to have actually experienced this illusory nature
of the world in states of mystic trance that often visited
him since his boyhood
In the introduction to his Ode on Intimations of Immortality he records such an experience in clear
terms
ldquoI was unable to think of external things as having external existence and I communed with all that I saw as something not apart from but inherent in my own immaterial nature Many a times while going to school have I grasped at a wall or tree to recall myself from the abyss of idealism to the realityrdquo
Such an ecstatic state of realizing eternal truths is
referred to in Lines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey as
lsquoThat blessed mod
In which the burden of the mystery
Of all this unintelligible world
Is lightenedrsquo
And finally to quote from the same poem
lsquoWe are laid asleep
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 52
In body and become a living soul
While with an eye made quiet by the power
Of harmony and the deep power of joy
We see into the life of thingsrsquo
One of the basic postulates of our Upanishadic
philosophy has been the idea of transmigration of soul
or faith in the cycle of births deaths and rebirths The
doctrine of transmigration has been explicitly advanced
in the Upanishads and particularly in the
Kathopanishad and Brihadaranyak Upanishad
In the Kathopanishad when the father of Nachiketas
told him that he had made him over to the god of Death
Nachiketas replied that it was no uncommon fate that
was befalling him
ldquoI indeed go at the head of many to the other world but I also go in the midst of many What is the god of Death going to do to me Look at our predecessors (who have already gone) look also at those who have succeeded them Man ripens like corn and like corn he is born againrdquo
Kathopanishad IV6
The Brihadaranyak Upanishad states the same truth
ldquoAnd as a caterpillar after reaching the end of a blade of grass finds another place of support and then draws itself towards it and as a goldsmith after taking a piece
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 53
of gold gives it another newer and more beautiful shape similarly does this Self after having thrown off this body and dispelled ignorance take on another newer and more beautiful form whether it be of one of the man or demi-god or god or of Prajapati or Brahman or of any other beingsrdquo
Brihadaranyak Upanishad IVIII5
The same truth appears in the Bhagvad Gita when Lord
Krishna says to the mentally agitated Arjuna
ldquoAs a man discarding worn-out clothes takes other new ones likewise the embodied soul casting off worn-out bodies enters into others which are newrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II22
And further Lord Krishna says to Arjuna
ldquoFor in that case the death of him who is born is certain and the rebirth of him who is dead is inevitablerdquo
Bhagvad Gita II27
Wordsworth in his famous Ode on Intimations of Immortality confirms his faith in the transmigration of
soul by saying in unmistakable terms
lsquoOur birth is but a sleep and a forgetting
The soul that rises with us our lifersquos star
Hath had elsewhere its setting
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 54
And cometh from afar
Not in entire forgetfulness
And not in utter nakedness
But trailing clouds of glory do we come
From God who is our homersquo
Again when Wordsworth laments the loss of pure
innocence immeasurable bliss and ecstatic vision of
early childhood in the great Ode and exclaims in
memorable words
lsquoWhither is fled the visionary gleam
Where is it now the glory and the dreamrsquo
He attributes the loss to the worldly intellectuality and
attachments as they grow upon man As childhood
grows into youth and youth into manhood the lsquovision splendidrsquo fades the first clear intimations of immortality
are dimmed leaving behind an unillumined waste of
mere thought and moralizing
lsquoAt length the Man perceives it die away
And fade into the light of common dayrsquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
The world of materialism or attachment tames him so
much so that man lsquothe little actorrsquo thinks
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 55
lsquoAs if his whole vocation
Were endless imitationrsquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
Whatever may be the crux of his philosophy of
childhood this belief of the poet can be safely traced
back to the comprehensive doctrine of the Maya in the
Upanishads and the Bhagvad Gita The Upanishads
tell us that the world is a delusion an appearance not
reality The Taittiriya Upanishad says ldquoAll beings spring from the Supreme Being are sustained by Him and return to the same Absolute at the time of dissolution Our life on earth is therefore a sojournrdquo The Isha Upanishad tells us that ldquothe truth is veiled in this universe by a vessel of gold and it invokes the grace of God to lift up the golden lid and allow the truth to be seenrdquo
It follows that our senses cloud our vision and lead us
farther and farther away from our spiritual moorings as
we come of age Senses dupe us and turn us into
worldlings Lord Krishna says to Arjuna in the Bhagvad Gita ldquoAs the wind carries away the barge upon the waters even so of the wandering senses the one to which the mind is joined takes away his discriminationrdquo
Thus the eternal and boundless Supreme Soul is as it
were limited by the sense organs and the body The
Universal Soul shackled by the body becomes the
individual soul (Paramatma becomes Jivatma) Because
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 56
of the presence of the Soul the spark of the Divine the
senses or sense-objects or worldly attractions fail to
dupe man fully from his divine mission This
metaphysical conviction finds expression in
Wordsworthrsquos Ode He says that though
lsquoShades of the prison-house begin to close
Upon the growing boy
But he beholds the light and whence it flows
He sees it in his joyrsquo
However farther man may go away from Nature ndash the manifestation of God and the indwelling Supreme Soul which resides in his own individual soul he can not
lsquoForget the glories he hath known
And that imperial palace whence he camersquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
Since bliss (Anand) is an inevitable attribute of God and
manrsquos soul being a fragment of Supreme Soul it
experiences the presence of God in moments of
Supreme Joy
Of the innumerable expressions in the Vedantic
literature of the joy of life of joy as the all entwining
principle of life and of creative principle of life and life
too the following passage from the Taittiriya Upanishad is very pertinent here
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 57
ldquoJoy is the Brahman from joy are born all living things by joy they are nourished towards joy they move and in joy they are absorbedrdquo Joy as the foundation of life
emanates from the Upanishad philosophy
Wordsworth seems to hold identical belief when he
craves for joy and laments its loss
lsquoO Joy that in our embers
Is something that doth live
That nature yet remembers
What was so fugitiversquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
The same idea finds expression in Lines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey where Wordsworth
declares it as Naturersquos privilege lsquoto lead (us) from joy to joyrsquo
And lastly the classicus locus of the Upanishadic
philosophy is to be found in the idea of immortality of
soul In the Chhandogya and Mundak Upanishads and
above all in the Kathopanishad we find numerous
references to the immortality of the soul We are told in
a passage of Kathopanishad lsquothat while we are dwelling in this body on earth we can visualize that Atman (Soul) as in a mirror that is contrariwise left being to the right and right being to the leftrsquo In the Bhagvad Gita also
Lord Krishna tells Arjuna about the immortality of Soul
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 58
ldquoThis soul is never born nor dies it exists on coming into being for it is unborn eternal everlasting and primeval even though the body is slain the soul is notrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II20
He further says
ldquoFor this soul is incapable of being cut it is proof against fire impervious to water and undriable as well This soul is eternal omnipresent immovable constant and everlastingrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II24
Wordsworth seems to have been fully convinced of this
philosophia perennis of the Vedanta when he eulogizes
immortality by addressing the child in his Ode in the
following words
lsquoThou over whom thy immortality
Broods like the day
A Master over a slave
A presence which is not to be put byrsquo
The poet in speaking of the lsquotruths that wake to perish neverrsquo seems to be reminiscent of the Upanishadic
concept that freed from the trammels of the body the
individual soul loses itself in the All-Soul when he
declares in the rapture
lsquoOur souls have sight of that immortal sea
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 59
Which brought us hither
Can in a moment travel thitherrsquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
Tracing the expression and confirmation of many other
tenets of Vedanta in the poetry of William Wordsworth
forms an interesting literary venture and instances of
close affinity between the Vedantic doctrines and
Wordsworthrsquos ideas may be multiplied Such a
comparative study proves that eternal truths transcend
the barriers of clime or country time or space and shine
through all ages and in all lands We should draw moral
sustenance from them and live a fuller freer life
Even today the wise all over the world maintain a
remarkable identity of views and their thoughts foster
international understanding
ldquoFrom hand to hand the greeting flows
From eye to eye the signals run
From heart to heart the bright hope glows
The seekers of light are onerdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 60
ST COLERIDGE
(21 October 1772 ndash 25 July 1834)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 61
ST COLERIDGE
English Poet Critic and Philosopher
Coleridge studied at the University of Cambridge where
he became closely associated with Robert Southey In
his poetry he perfected a sensuous lyricism that was
echoed by many later poets Lyrical Ballads (1798 with
William Wordsworth) containing the famous Rime of
the Ancient Mariner and Frost at Midnight heralded
the beginning of English Romanticism Other poems in
the ldquofantasticalrdquo style of the Mariner include the
unfinished Christabel and the celebrated Pleasure
Dome of Kubla Khan While in a bad marriage and
addicted to opium he produced Dejection An Ode
(1802) in which he laments the loss of his power to
produce poetry Later partly restored by his revived
Anglican faith he wrote Biographia Literaria 2 vol
(1817) the most significant work of general literary
criticism of the Romantic period Imaginative and
complex with a unique intellect Coleridge led a restless
life full of turmoil and unfulfilled possibilities
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 62
CHAPTER THREE
COLERIDGErsquoS SPIRITUAL QUEST AND INDIAN THOUGHT
INTRODUCTION
Coleridge was by all accounts a genius par excellence
whose versatility flowed albeit impeded in diverse
channels of creativity such as metaphysics poetry
theology and literary criticism Of all the Romantic poets
he possessed the most fertile and powerful imagination
which earned for him a special place in English poetry
and philosophical thought In the words of William
Hazlitt lsquohe had angelic wings and fed on mannarsquo He had
a lsquoseminal mindrsquo which said William Wordsworth
lsquothrew out a series of grand central truthsrsquo We find in
him the poet the philosopher and the theologian rolled
in one Charles Lamb called him lsquoLogician Metaphysician Bardrsquo whose poetry and writings are
tinged with a magical and ethereal quality His thought
made a permanent landmark on the succeeding
generations of English men of letters for he explored the
mysterious working of human mind
His life presents a saga of sharp contrast between
reality and dream blissful confidence and broken
hopes the warmth of human ties and the solitude of
haunted soul He probed human thought and dilemma
with a rare prophetic insight A prodigious thinker and
sincere seeker of truth he once remarked ldquoI would compare the Human Soul to a shiprsquos crew cast on an
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 63
Unknown Islandrdquo His particular fascination for the
unknown drew him instinctively to the German
transcendental or idealistic school of philosophy
represented by Berkeley Kant Schelling and Fichte
Fired by a peculiar mystic idealism he tried to interpret
the lsquoInterruptionrsquo of the spiritual world and beheld the
unseen with an uncommon eye which looked into the
void and found it peopled with lsquopresencesrsquo To him the
universe was lsquoebullient with creative deityrsquo and was
pervaded by lsquoan organizing surgersquo of vital energies
which emanate directly from God He was indeed an
inspired idealist who laid mystical insistence upon the
immanence and transcendence of God
Endowed with a rare penetrating mind Coleridge
ransacked works of comparative religions and
mythology and arrived at the conclusion that all
religious faiths and mythical traditions agree on the
unity of God and immortality of Soul His constant
intellectual search for truth led him to visionary
interests and universal life consciousness expressed
through the phenomena of human agencies Throughout
his intellectual career he remained a visionary and
philosophical mystic who valued a discreet and proper
exercise of the intellect Since his most serious concern
had been philosophy as a continuous trial for self-
education he wrote ldquodoubts rushed in broke upon me from the fountains of the great deep and fell from the windows of heavenrdquo For him lsquoreligionrsquo as both the
cornerstone and keystone of morality must have a
moral origin and a great poet should be lsquoa profound Metaphysician seeking for truth beauty and salvationrsquo In
one of those radiant moments when the poet the
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 64
metaphysician and the theologian of hope are one he
throws light on the process how truth works out in life
ldquoTruth considered in itself and in the effects natural to it may be conceived as a gentle spring or water source warm from the genial earth and breathing up into the snow drift that is piled over and around its outlet It turns the obstacle into its own form and character and as it makes its way increases its streamand arrested in its courseit suffers delay not loss and waits only to awaken and again roll onwardsrdquo
His description of a mystic as one who wanders into an
oasis or garden lsquoat leisure in its maze of Beauty and Sweetness and thirds (sic) his way through the odorous and flowering Thickets into open Spots of Greeneryrsquo (Aids to Reflection) is reminiscent of his own mysticism and
refers to the lsquoenfolding sunny spots of greeneryrsquo in his
famous poem Kubla Khan
Profoundly impressed by the German Idealist Schelling
whose idealistic school of thought dwelt on speculation
concerning the lsquoAbsolutersquo Coleridge viewed lsquomythrsquo as
primordial expression of elemental truths including the
Divine transcendence Inspired by his Biblical studies he
regarded self-consciousness as lying at the centre of his
philosophical and theological thought In Lay Sermons
he says ldquoSelf which then only is when for itself it hath ceased to be Even so doth Religion finitely expresses the unity of the Infinite Spirit by being a total act of the Soulrdquo
For him the lsquoinner lightrsquo is identical with the indwelling
glorious God and life is but lsquoa vision shadowy of Truthrsquo Attributing the pageant of life and the beauty and
splendor of the world to the immanence of Cosmic Soul
(God) he exclaims
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 65
ldquoAh From the soul itself must issue forth
A light a glory a fair luminous cloud
Enveloping the earthrdquo
Dejection An Ode
And again he says ldquoNature is the art of GodThe true system of natural philosophy places the sole reality of things in an Absolute which is at once causa sui effectus in the absolute identity of subject and object which it calls NatureIn this sense lsquowe see all things in Godrsquo is a strict philosophical truthrdquo
Coleridge firmly believed in the essential unity of God as
Absolute which is the creative foundation of the finite
universe and which distinguishes God from creation
He in the spirit of Vedanta stresses the immanence of
God in all and all in God in his famous poem Frost at Midnight Addressing his son he says
ldquoso shalt thou see and hear
The lovely shapes and sound intelligible
Of that eternal language which thy God
Utters who from eternity doth teach
Himself in all and all things in Himselfrdquo
In order to learn this lsquolanguagersquo Coleridge himself
became a lsquovisionaryrsquo lsquoprophetrsquo or lsquoseerrsquo The idea of
Himself (God) in all and all (creation) in Himself or the
concept that there is God in all things and all things are
things are closely interlinked with God bears a striking
resemblance to our age-old Vedic thought In
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 66
consonance with Indian thought Coleridge underscores
the identity of God (Brahman) with the individual soul
(Jivatma) and regards the universe as the reflection or
manifestation of God The seer he says is one who sees
God the creator in all creation and all creation as the
embodiment of God This according to him is the lesson
that God in His eternal language lsquouttersrsquo and doth teach
from eternity
The inherent oneness and sole identity of Brahman
(God) with the universe is a basic postulate of our
Vedanta and as such Coleridgersquos emphasis on the lsquoUnity of infinite Spiritrsquo bears a close identity with the Indian
philosophy The Oneness of God and the universe has
time and again been stressed in our Vedas and other
scriptures It would be pertinent to cite a few instances
here While the Chhandogya Upanishad describes
Brahman as lsquoOne only without a secondrsquo other
Upanishadic texts contain identical statements such as
lsquoHe is Onersquo and lsquoOne Lordrsquo The opening line of
Ishopanishad declares Godrsquos oneness and His universal
presence in unequivocal terms
ldquoUnderstand all this universe as inhabited by Lord
Each moving thing in this moving worldrdquo
Ishopanishad I
And again the same Upanishad says
ldquoThe wise man who perceives all beings as not distinct from his own self at all and his own Self as the self of every being ndash he does not by virtue of that perception hate any onerdquo
Ishopanishad VI
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 67
The same truth has been expressed in the Bhagvad Gita wherein Lord Krishna tells Arjuna
ldquoHe who sees Me (the Universal Self) present in all beings and all beings existing within Me never loses sight of Me and I never lose sight of himrdquo
Bhagvad Gita VI30
Or again
ldquoHe alone truly sees who sees the Supreme Lord as imperishable and abiding equally in all perishable beings both animate and inanimaterdquo
Bhagvad Gita XIII26
And Lord Krishna says again
ldquoThere is nothing else besides Me O Arjuna
Like clusters of yarn-beads formed by knots on a thread
All this (Universe) threaded on Me (God)
As are pearls on stringsrdquo
Bhagvad Gita VII7
THE DOCTRINE OF KARMA (CAUSE amp EFFECT)
Coleridge seems to subscribe sincerely to the Indian
doctrine of Karma which is based on the law of
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 68
Causation or cause and effect In other words Karmavad
stresses poetic justice or law of life ie virtue is
rewarded and vice is punished Since one must reap the
fruits of his good and bad deeds in life it is axiomatic
truth that lsquoas one sows so shall he reaprsquo In Sanskrit
there is a verse which says ldquoOne must bear the consequences of his good and bad deedsrdquo The echoes of
this doctrine could be distinctly heard in his poetry and
particularly in his greatest poem Rime of Ancient Mariner as also Dejection An Ode where he affirms
ldquoO Lady We receive but what we give
And in our life alone doth Nature liverdquo
So strong was his belief in the doctrine of Karma that in
a letter dated 14th October 1797 to his friend Thirlwell
he tells him how fatalistic his philosophy of life is
ldquoand at other times I adopt the Brahman
creed and say ndash lsquoit is better to sit than to stand it is better to lie than to sit it is better to sleep than wake but death is the best of allrsquordquo
His Ancient Mariner serves as an exhaustive
exposition of the law of Nemesis which works surely
but rather imperceptively in human life The poem is a
myth about a dark and troubling crisis in the human
soul It is actually a tale of crime which is due to
perversity of human will Crime is against Nature
Humanity and God He touches equally on guilt and
remorse suffering and relief hate and forgiveness and
grief and joy The marinerrsquos action shows the essential
frivolity of crimes against humanity and the ordered
system of the world and he deserves punishment for his
guilt Spirits are transformed into the powers who
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 69
watch over the good and evil actions of men and requite
them with appropriate rewards and punishments Since
the mariner has committed a hideous act of wantonly
and recklessly killing the albatross which was hailed in
Godrsquos name as if it had been a Christian soul he must
bear the punishment of life-in-death The killing of the
bird marks the breaking of bond between Man and
Nature and consequently the mariner becomes
spiritually dead When he blesses the water-snakes
even unawares it is a psychic rebirth ndash a rebirth that
must happen to all men
The mariner will never be the man that he once was He
has his special past and his special doom His sense of
guilt will end only with his death The Ancient Mariner
is a myth of a guilty soul and marks the passage from
crime through punishment and possible redemption in
the world So the poem is an allegory of redemption and
regeneration It is indeed a vivid representation or
living symbolization of universal psychic experience
The abiding fascination of the poem is that it is a
fragment of a psychic life It does not state a result it
symbolizes a process
Coleridge adds a moral ndash that the mariner is ndash to teach
by his example love and reverence to all things that God
made and loveth He advocates a sound moral
philosophy of life which extends human sympathy and
love to the animal world He affirms
ldquoHe prayeth well who loveth well
Both man and bird and beast
He prayeth best who loveth best
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 70
All things both great and small
For the dear God who loveth us
He made and loveth allrdquo
Rime of Ancient Mariner
PHILOSOPHICAL MYSTICISM AND lsquoTHE VISION OF GODrsquo
Coleridgersquos longing for the lsquounnamable somethingrsquo and
his abiding interest in conveying something of the
enigmatic perception of Godhead as a religious
experience carved for him a special place in the history
of ideas as a Christian poet and philosopher In a
predominantly mythological age he took serious
interest in the Biblical studies and drew upon the
central Christian image of Paradise as a walled garden
and the vision of God as a symbolizing that
transcendent numinous reality which the soul
inchoately and consciously seeks and strives for The
medieval image of the walled garden (paradise) as the
heavenly city (locus of God) is a symbol of divine
transcendence of that which is lsquobeyond beingrsquo This rich
image (of the walled garden) as an eminently
appropriate image of Godrsquos transcendence was used as
such by Church Fathers and also by the 15th century
Christian Platonist Nicholas of Cusa whose book The Vision of God is a paradigm of speculative mysticism
which informs Coleridgersquos metaphysics and much of his
poetry Taking inspiration from Nicholas of Cusarsquos book
The Vision of God Coleridge found it in close affinity to
his own genuinely philosophical mysticism
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 71
Coleridgersquos interest in the Vision of God is in a purely
visionary mystical tradition and his most visionary
poem Kubla Khan bears ample testimony to his
insistence upon life as lsquoa vision shadowy of Truthrsquo His
conviction in the lsquoImago Deirsquo (vision of God) is an
obvious link with the hoary mystical tradition which lay
at the heart of his philosophical and mystical thought
He maintains that the mind of man is a bridge to the
vision of God but by no means its fulfillment He says
ldquoThe vision and faculty divine is the participation of humanity in the Divinerdquo He however further maintains
throughout his intellectual career the conviction in the
reflection or bending back of the soul from the sensual
to the intelligible realm For him Christianity is an lsquoawful recalling of the drowsed soul from dreams and phantom world of sensuality to actual Realityrsquo
On the idea of reawakening he says
ldquoThe moment when the Soul begins to be sufficiently self-conscious to ask concerning itself and its relations is the first moment of its intellectual arrival into the world Its being ndash enigmatic as it must seem ndash is posterior to its existencerdquo
Collected Notes
In a recent study of Coleridge Prof Douglas Headley of
Cambridge University declares ldquoHe is best described as an essentially speculative and mystical philosopher-theologian His was a theology inspired by those Church Fathers who emphasize the vision of God as an intellectual contemplation (speculari) of the transcendent Absolute the prius of all beingrdquo Since the
mystic tradition follows a supersensuous perception
the vision of God is fundamentally lsquoVisio-intuitivarsquo ndash
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 72
intuitive or intellectual vision Coleridge expresses such
a state of mind when he says
ldquoMy mind feels as if it ached to behold and know something great something One and Indivisible and it is only in the faith of this that rocks or waterfalls mountains or caverns give me the sense of sublimity or majesty But in this faith all things counterfeit Infinityrdquo
Since the sublime enlarges and inspires the Soul to
aspire for the Divine it impresses him with the
fundamental Oneness of God and a universal vision
which he hints at in his Religious Musings as under
ldquoThere is One mind One omnipresent mind
His most holy name is Love
Truth of subliming import
lsquoTis sublime in man
Our noontide majesty to know ourselves
Parts and portions of one wondrous wholerdquo
These passages recall to our mind the famous mantra
(verse) of the Yajurveda where the mystic realization
or the direct experience of the Supreme by a Vedic sage
has been beautifully described in terms of his personal
knowledge of the Divine He says
ldquoI have known this sun-coloured Mighty Being
Refulgent as the sun beyond darkness
By knowing Him alone one transcends death
There is no other way to gordquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 73
Yajurveda XXXI18
ldquoI have realized it I have known itrdquo not that I just
believe in it and all else can also realize it This is not the
expression of an opinion but the statement of an
experience Commenting on this verse Sri Aurobindo
says
ldquoThis is one of the grandest utterances in the worldrsquos spiritual literature for it marks the emanation of this Being from across the darkness into our world so that something of the sun colour may come into our dull heads and dim heartsrdquo
Coleridge seems to be in complete agreement with our
own Indian mysticism which owes its origin to the
Vedas wherein the knowledge of the Divine or the
Ultimate Reality (Brahman) has been regarded not as a
process of philosophical thought but as a direct
experience in the depth of the human soul For him the
divine vision is possible in that spiritual meditation
transformation of intellectual rapture in which all
discursive thought is fully sublimated According to him
the lsquovisio intuitivarsquo is the culmination of all knowledge ndash
sensus-ratio-intellectus and is in conjunction with the
concept of Imago Dei In order to see that which not an
object is ie God the human mind must put aside its own
discursive differentiating reflection ndash spiritus altissimus rationis ndash which guards the walls of the garden of
paradise lsquobeyondrsquo which dwells God The highest
transformation or sublimation of conscience can ensure
an intuitive vision of God and in accordance with the
maxim ndash Simile Simili ndash the mind then becomes like its
object by divesting itself of difference in order to
experience the Absolute Reality Says Coleridge
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 74
ldquoAn Immense Being does strongly fill the soul and Omnipotency Omnisciency and Infinite Goodness do enlarge and dilate the Spirit while it fixtly looks upon them They raise strong passions of Love and Admiration which melt our Nature and transform it into the mould and imagery that which we can contemplaterdquo
Notebooks
Mysticism is thus the subtle path of spiritual realization
of That Reality or Divine Presence which has been
described in our Vedic texts as (lying hidden in a cave shrouded in secrecy) God is one One beyond all
diversities In Him all contradictions and conflicts meet
and dissolve through the spiritual transformation of the
lsquoseerrsquo or lsquomysticrsquo whose soul rises above the bewildering
trammels and distortions of life and seeks unity with all
in the unity with One To such an enlightened seer life
becomes an unceasing adventure from unreality to
reality from ephemerality to eternity from the human
to the Divine One who realizes the Divine as the One
(without parallel) loving Lord finds the whole universe
united in Him Such a significantly mystical experience
finds a memorable expression in the following verse of
the Yajurveda where the sage named Vena beholds
such a divine vision
ldquoThe loving sage (Vena) beholds that Mysterious Existence
Wherein the universe comes to have One home (nest)
Therein unites and therefore issues the whole
The Lord is the warp and woof in the Created beingsrdquo
Yajurveda XXXII8
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 75
A careful analysis of the above-quoted passage reveals
all the main elements of mysticism viz
(i) Divinity is a subject of personal spiritual
experience
(ii) The ultimate conception of Divinity is a
mystery symbolically expressed as
गहानCहतम
(iii) The abstract conception of the Divine as an
Essence or Existence is symbolized by a
neuter singular तत and
(iv) The whole universe is united in love as birds
in a nest एकनीड़ or men in a home वसधव कटFबक
To sum up wise men the world over hold almost
identical views on vital matters of human life such as
the mystery of existence soul and oversoul (God) Truth
is verily One as God is one but the pathways to reach it
are very many The ancient Rig Veda proclaims एक सद वDा बहधा वदित ndash ldquoTruth is one sages call it by various namesrdquo In our own times Swami Ram Krishna
Paramhansa said यतोमत तथोपथ ndash as many religions
so many pathways And what the Spanish litteacuterateur
and thinker states as lsquouniversal truthrsquo is equally
applicable to the philosophy and poetry of Coleridge
ldquoA deep faith in life cannot but be spiritual even if only partially spiritualThe path of Truth may not be a path of parallel lines but a path that follows one circle by going to the right and climbing the circle or by going to the left and climbing the circle we are bound to meet at the top although we started in apparently
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 76
contrary directions This is bound to be in the end because Truth is onerdquo
In Charles Lambrsquos words Coleridge lsquohad been on the confines of the next world he had a hunger for Eternityrsquo The truth of this statement is abundantly
borne out by Coleridgersquos sincere effort for the
reconciliation of the ration with transcendental belief
He closes his Biographia Literaria which symbolizes
his spiritual voyage with the following words
ldquoIt is night sacred night The upraised eyes views suns of other worlds only to preserve the soul steady and collected in its pure act of inward adoration to the great I Am and to the filial word that re-affirmeth from eternity to eternity whose choral is the universerdquo
As a true metaphysician Coleridgersquos whole being
pulsated with a passionate and unceasing search for
truth Here indeed was a spiritual aspirant and seeker
who in his own words had lsquotraced the fount whence streams of nectar flowrsquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 77
LORD BYRON
(22 January 1788 ndash 19 April 1824)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 78
LORD BYRON
British Romantic Poet and Satirist
Born with a clubfoot and extremely sensitive about it
he was 10 when he unexpectedly inherited his title and
estates Educated at Cambridge he gained recognition
with English Bards and Scotch Reviewers (1809) a satire
responding to a critical review of his first published
volume Hours of Idleness (1807) At 21 he embarked on
a European grand tour Childe Harolds Pilgrimage
(1812ndash18) a poetic travelogue expressing melancholy
and disillusionment brought him fame while his
complex personality dashing good looks and many
scandalous love affairs with women and with boys
captured the imagination of Europe Settling near
Geneva he wrote the verse tale The Prisoner of Chillon
(1816) a hymn to liberty and an indictment of tyranny
and Manfred (1817) a poetic drama whose hero
reflected Byrons own guilt and frustration His greatest
poem Don Juan (1819ndash24) is an unfinished epic
picaresque satire in ottava rima Among his numerous
other works are verse tales and poetic dramas He died
of fever in Greece while aiding the struggle for
independence making him a Greek national hero
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 79
CHAPTER FOUR
BYRON A BLEND OF CLAY AND SPARK
INTRODUCTION
Byron whom Goethe regarded as lsquothe greatest genius of the centuryrsquo and whom Carlyle considered as the noblest
spirit in Europe was one of the most remarkable men
during the 19th Century which was characterized by
liberal optimism He was unquestionably a potent and
force and cause of change in the intellectual outlook and
socio-political structure of his time His colourful figure
his charismatic personality and satiric poetry captured
the imagination of the whole continent As the most
influential English poet he stands out as an important
figure in the history of ideas Representative of a new
age he was the supreme voice which the European
poets recognized for ldquohe put into poetry something that belonged to many men in his time and he was the pioneer of a new outlook and a new art He set his mark on a whole generation and his fame rang from one end of Europe to anotherrdquo
Renowned as the ldquogloomy egoistrdquo he was a sinister yet
great influence in the Romantic Movement His deepest
romantic melancholy his satiric realism and his
aspiration for political realism earned for him such a
wide acclaim that his name became a symbol for all the
great events of his day Commenting on his pervasive
influence Calvert says ndash ldquoIt is impossible not to take Byron seriously and it is disastrous to take him literallyrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 80
A REBEL EXTRAORDINAIRE
Byron was a born rebel Essentially a child of
Revolution his poetry breathes a unique spirit of
revolutionary idealism ldquoI was born for oppositionrdquo he
once remarked and added ldquobeing of no party I shall offend all partiesrdquo Describing him as an aristocratic
rebel Bertrand Russell said
ldquoThe aristocratic rebel of whom Byron was in his day the exemplar is a very different typesuch rebels have philosophy which requires some greater change than their own personal success In their conscious thought there is criticism of the government of the world which takes the form of Titanic Cosmic self-assertion or those who retain some superstition of Satanism Both are to be found in Byron The aristocratic philosophy of rebellionhas inspired a long series of revolutionary movements from the fall of Napoleon to Hitlerrsquos coup in 1933it has inspired a corresponding manner of thought and feeling among intellectuals and artistsrdquo
Byron felt the wild storm of nations akin to the storm
within his own heart and the ruin but the picture of his
own life In his unqualified individualism he takes up an
attitude of hostility towards society Even God appears
to him mirrored in the stormy face of the angry ocean
ldquoThou glorious mirror
Of the Image of Eternityrdquo
He wished to stir the oppressed to revolt and get rid of
tyrants
ldquoFor I will teach if possible the stones
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 81
To rise against earthrsquos tyranny Never let it
Be said that we will truckle into thrones
By ye ndash our childrenrsquos children I think how we
Showed that things were before the world was freerdquo
Don Juan VIIICXXXV4-8
ldquoI have simplified my policiesrdquo wrote he ldquointo a detestation of all existing governmentsrdquo His was the
most dreaded voice of all the revolutionary poets of the
world His voice was the peal of revolutionary thunder
his poetry was the message of the revolutionary forces
He stood as the greatest symbol of a violent and
dreadful revolution
CHAMPION OF LIBERTY
He was essentially a poet of liberty His greatest ideal in
life was how to fight against the forces of tyranny
restriction aggression and enslaving of workers by
puissant exploiters Liberty was an essential part of the
Byronic creed In fact his entire poetic work is
interspersed with some of the finest poetry in praise of
freedom for mankind He composed much splendid
verse for love of freedom His passion for personal
freedom covers national freedom also and the political
freedom in the form of national self-determination
particularly for Italy and Greece He remarks in his
diary of 1821 ldquoDifficulties are the hotbeds of high spirits and Freedom the mother of the new virtues incident to human naturerdquo
Identifying himself completely with the cause of Italy
and Greece he wrote ldquoI shall not fall backbut
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 82
onward It is now the time to act and what signifies ldquoSelfrdquo if a single spark of that which would be worthy of the past can be bequeathed unquenchably to the future It is not one man nor a million but the spirit of liberty which must be spreadrdquo In his Ode to Chillon Castle he characteristically exclaimed
ldquoEternal spirit of the chainless Mind
Brightest in dungeons Liberty thou art
For there thy habitation is the heart
The heart which love of Thee alone bind
And when thy sons to fetters are consignrsquod
To fetters and damp vaultsrsquo dayless gloom
And Freedomrsquos fame finds winds on every windrdquo
Love of liberty lay at the centre of his being and
determined what was best in him ndash belief in individual
liberty and his hatred of tyranny and constraints
whether exercised by individuals or societies Liberty
was an ideal a driving power a summons to make the
best of certain possibilities in him He insisted to be free
and maintained that other men must be free too
Opposition was an integral element in his basic attitude
revolt both personal and social was his forte Love of
freedom is built into the capricious structure of Childe Harold and Don Juan
HIS POLITICAL AND COSMOPOLITAN LIBERALISM
He grew in an atmosphere in which political reaction
against revolutionary ideals was victorious all over
Europe Byron was essentially a liberal by conviction
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 83
and could hardly bear the perception of liberals Though
he loved his native country yet he had a large vision for
the freedom and welfare of all nations The excitement
of political liberalism stirred on behalf of the Greeks
against the oppression of their Turkish overlords made
him a symbol of disinterested patriotism and a Greek
national hero The first two cantos of Child Harold are
tinctured with historical and typographical material as
also the appearance of the Byronic hero with his
exhortations to the degenerate Greeks and Spaniards to
remember their glorious past and arise They contain
Byronrsquos passionate feelings for Greece which was to see
the beginning as it was to see the end of his active life
His Faustian daemonic figure and his defiant
resentment of authority found an appropriate object in
the political sphere
His last journey and his death at Missolonghi in the
cause of Greek independence proves in him the moving
combination of nobility futility and romantic or heroic
panache In the words of Graham Hough lsquoBut for once Byron was on the winning side he died but his cause triumphed and he remains one of its heroes For the whole of the 19th Century he remained a portent and a symbol whom it was possible to worship or to condemn but never to neglectrsquo
A MAN OF ACTION
Action remains at the centre of his life and at last he
gladly seized the opportunity when it presented itself in
Greece Leaving poetry behind himself he took a heroic
resolution in favour of action rather than
contemplation He presents a rare example of fusion
between the active and the reflective lsquofor his was the romanticism of actionrsquo The moralist in the garb of the
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 84
pre-romantic rebel hero of the Childe Harold is cast
aside in Don Juan and the moralist in the somber garb
turns dandy in which moral judgment seems to be
ineffective Quite logically he finally abandons literature
for the field of moral action At last Byron flung himself
off into the world of action The dandy finds at last that
such a death even if it is on the sickbed and not the
battlefield is the only gesture untouched by futility ldquoIt is not enough that art perpetrates life life also must complete artrdquo WB Yeats rightly says ldquoone feels that he (Byron) is a man of action made writer by accidentrdquo
Byron did not regard writing as an end in itself on the
contrary he was several times on the point of giving up
writing He had always before him the hope of some
more active life and felt a certain mistrust for the purely
literary life He asserted ldquowho would write who had anything better to do Action- action I say and not writing Least of all rhymerdquo In a letter to Murray
he wrote ldquoYou will see that I shall do something or otherthat like the cosmogony or creation of the world will puzzle the philosophers of all agesrdquo He was
fully alive to the persistent sense both of human
aspirations and the ceaseless flux of eternity and also
knew that he would not fade into oblivion Said he
ldquoBut at the last I have shunned the common shore
And leaving land far out of sight would skim
The ocean of Eternityrdquo
And again he said
ldquoFor the sword outwears its sheath
And the soul wears out the breastrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 85
HIS ROMANTIC SELF-PORTRAITURE
Byron presents manrsquos mixed and imperfect nature His
personality is a queer blend of flesh and spirit
meanness and nobility clay and spark cause and effect
The lasting fascination of his personality despite his bad
temper careless arrogance the excesses the satiety
melancholy and restlessness owes much to Splendour Primier of Miltonrsquos Satan who is ldquomajestic though in ruinrdquo and the gloom and brutality of the heroes of the
novel of terror His exotic sensibility ranging passions
and sensual perversity take refuge in a sort of ldquoCosmic Satanismrdquo He draws of himself a sketch which
reproduces in a dim outline the somber portrait of his
idealized self in the famous stanzas of Lara
ldquoIn him inexplicably mixed appeared
Much to be loved and hated sought and feared
X X X X X X
A hater of his kind
X X X X X X
There was in him a vital scorn of all
As if the worst had fallen which could befall
An erring spirit
X X X X X X
And fiery passions that had poured their wrath
In hurried desolation over his path
And left the better feeling all at strife
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RP DWIVEDI Page 86
In wild reflection over his stormy liferdquo
And the Giaour (hiding his sinister path beneath a
monkrsquos gown) also portrays Byron
ldquoA noble soul and lineage high
Alas though bestowed in vain
Which Grief could change and Guilt could stainrdquo
HIS CREDO
Despite all his self-mockery and arrogant egoism he had
a star (vision) and he followed it sincerely He was not
without guiding principles and his heroic death in the
cause of Greek independence shows that he was not an
actor but a soldier a man of affairs and a master of men
Keenly aware of something special in him he wished to
realize his powers and translate them into facts He
wished to be true to himself He had a keen appreciation
of the dignity and personal liberty of man
HIS FATAL TRUTH
Even though he disagreed with the moral code of his
age he had his own values He thought that truthfulness
is a permanent virtue and duty and so did not want to
compromise with conventions nor hide behind cant
Despite many ordeals and his own corroding skepticism
he speaks seriously and directly about his convictions
and presents them with irony satire and mockery Don Juan is a racy commentary on life and manners and is a
record of a remarkable personality ndash a poet and a man
of action a dreamer and a wit a great lover and a great
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 87
hater a Whig noble and a revolutionary democrat The
paradoxes of his nature are fully reflected in Don Juan which itself is a romantic epic and a realistic satire He
was full of many romantic longings but tested them by
truth and reality He remained faithful only to those
which meant so much to him that he could not live
without them
Praising Byron Nietzsche says ldquoMan may bleed to death through the truth that he recognizesrdquo Byron expressed
this in his immortal lines
ldquoSorrow is knowledge they who know the most
Must mourn the deepest over the fatal truth
The tree of knowledge is not that of linerdquo
A BELIEVER IN GOD AND IMMORTALITY OF SOUL
Full of snobbery and rebellion as he was Byron was not
altogether without lofty ideals and religious beliefs He
firmly believed in the immanence and transcendence of
God and the transience of human glory His implicit faith
in the immortality of human soul the ephemerality of
physical body and his unwavering trust in God ndash the
eternal Light of Lights is evident from his following
memorable lines
ldquobut this clay will sink
Its spark immortal envying it the light
To which it mounts as if to break the link
That keeps us from yon heaven which woos us to its brinkrdquo
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RP DWIVEDI Page 88
Childe Harold III13-14
His Childe Haroldrsquos pilgrimage is a lament for lost
empire decay of love and triumph of love over human
mortality His lsquovoyage pittoresquersquo is full of historic and
didactic meditations and his oceanic image illustrates
the truism that nothing is constant but the rhythmic
pattern of its flux In the end all things float and toss on
that Great Ocean of which man is the foam and the
historic events are billows
ldquoBetween two worlds life hovers like a starrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquothe eternal surge
Of time and tide rolls on and bears afar our bubbles
while the graves
Of Empires heave but like some passing wavesrdquo
Don Juan XVI99
He maintains throughout his major poetic works a
sense of the presence of God or the gods and often
employs supernatural machinery to substantiate his
concept
IMMORTALITY OF SOUL
He had complete faith in the immortality of soul Said
he ldquoof the immortality of the soul it appears to me that there can be little doubtit acts also so very independent of bodyHuman passions have probably disfigured the divine doctrines Man is born passionate of body but an innate thought secret
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 89
tendency to the love of God is his mainspring of mind But God helps us allMan is eternal always changing but reproducedEternity Eternalrdquo
Again on his belief in God he says ldquoI sometimes think that man may be relic of some higher materialcreation must have had an origin and a creator for a creator is a more natural imagination than a fortuitous concourse of atoms All things remount to a fountain though they may flow to an oceanrdquo He knew
the limitations and ephemerality of phenomenal
existence He exclaims
ldquoFor I wish to know
What after all are all thingsbut a showrdquo
Unable to explore the stars with scientific aid he takes
up poesy to embark across the ocean of Eternity
ldquoI wish to do much by Poesyrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoBut at least I have shunned the common
And leaving land far out of sight would skim
The Ocean of Eternityrdquo
According to him man accepts the eternal voyage but
since man is not himself unlimited the boat capsizes in
the deep
ldquoAnd swimming long in the abyss of thought
Is apt to tire
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 90
For the fall entails not only ignorance and weakness but Human mortalityrdquo
Disconcerted with mankind he turns to the placid
spectacle of Nature and feels his spirit merge into its
objects
ldquoI live not in myself but I become
Portion of that around me and to me
High mountains are a feeling
When the soul can flee
And with the sky ndash the peak ndash the heaving plain
Of Ocean or the stars mingle ndash and not in vainrdquo
Childe Harold III72
This pantheistic ecstasy gives him a sense of quasi-
immortality
ldquoSpinning the clay clod bonds which round our being clingrdquo
The picturesque is translated into a kind of mystical
union with the spirit of the place even with the
universe itself
ldquoAre not the mountains waves and skies a part
Of me and my soul as I of them
(Is not) the universe a breathing part
The spirit is clogged with clayrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 91
HIS PESSIMISM
The myth of Cuvierrsquos undulations of Cosmic history
reflects Byronrsquos consistent and mature pessimism His
pessimism is traceable to his own view of society
Through a metaphor he considers his age as
ldquocatastrophicrdquo ndash an ice age of the human spirit and a
declining moral grandeur His myth of Fall and
recurrence of the Ocean and ice is both comic and
historic social and literary and personal as well The
consequences of the Fall and of manrsquos imperfect nature
are seen in all major human activities Generally fallen
mankind is hounded by its lower appetites spirit
encumbered by flesh The image of Fall is linked in
Byronrsquos imagination with the rhetorical image of the
poetrsquos lsquoflightrsquo which incurs the risk of consequent
lsquosinkingrsquo or bathos And over it all hangs the perplexity
of manrsquos ignorance about his aims his nature his true
identity
ldquoFew mortals know what end they would be at
But whether glory power or love or treasure
The path is through perplexing ways and when
The goal is gained we die you know ndash and thenrdquo
HIS PROPHETIC VISION
Endowed with strong imaginative power he had
experimented in Vulcanian visions of the earth plunged
into darkness by the final extinction or the sun or lsquoa ruined starrsquo plunging on in flames through the wastes of
space This prophetic faculty is amply evident from his
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 92
poem Darkness in which his imagination prefigures the
devastating effects of nuclear weapons
ldquoThe Hour arrived ndash and it became
A wandering mass of shapeless flame
A pathless Comet and a curse
The menace of the Universe
Still rolling on with innate force
Without a sphere without a course
A bright deformity on high
The monster of the upper skyrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoI had a dream which was not at all a dream
The bright sun was extinguished and the stars
Did wander darkling in the eternal space
The habitations of all things which dwell
Were burnt for beacons cities were consumedrdquo
Darkness IV42-45
In sum and in essence Byron exemplifies Shelleyrsquos
pronouncement that poets are the unacknowledged
legislators of the world More than any other Romantic
poet Byron embodies the dictum ndash lsquowhat is to give light must endure burningrsquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 93
PB SHELLEY
(4 August 1792 ndash 8 July 1822)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 94
PB SHELLEY
English Romantic Poet
The heir to rich estates Shelley was a rebellious youth
who was expelled from Oxford in 1811 for refusing to
admit authorship of The Necessity of Atheism Later that
year he eloped with Harriet Westbrook the daughter of
a tavern owner He gradually channeled his passionate
pursuit of personal love and social justice into poetry
His first major poem Queen Mab (1813) is a utopian
political epic revealing his progressive social ideals In
1814 he eloped to France with Mary Wollstonecraft
Godwin in 1816 after Harriet drowned herself they
were married In 1818 the Shelleys moved to Italy
Away from British politics he became less intent on
social reform and more devoted to expressing his ideals
in poetry He composed the verse tragedy The Cenci (1819) and his masterpiece the lyric drama Prometheus Unbound (1820) which was published with some of his
finest shorter poems including Ode to the West Wind
and To a Skylark Epipsychidion (1821) is a Dantean
fable about the relationship of sexual desire to spiritual
love and artistic creation Adonais (1821)
commemorates the death of John Keats Shelley
drowned at age 29 while sailing in a storm off the Italian
coast leaving unfinished his last and possibly greatest
visionary poem The Triumph of Life
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 95
CHAPTER FIVE
SHELLEY A PILGRIM OF ETERNITY
INTRODUCTION
Shelley who in his Adonais eulogized Keats as lsquothe Pilgrim of Eternityrsquo is himself justly entitled to this
appellation He was essentially a poet of the skies and
heavens of light and love of eternity and immortality
Since he loved to pierce through things to their spiritual
essence the material world was less important for him
than that which lies within it and beyond it Says he ldquoI seek in what I see the manifestation of something beyond the present and tangible objectsrsquo He set out to uncover
the absolute real from its visible manifestations and
interpret it through his own poetic vision In a
passionate search for reality he pursued its essence
behind the veil of naked loveliness of Nature and the
mundane human existence Defining poetry he says
lsquoPoetry is the revelation of the eternal ideas which lie behind the many-coloured ever-shifting veil that we call reality in lifersquo For him the poet is also a seer gifted with
a peculiar insight into the nature of reality for it is
through the inspired poetic imagination that he
breathes immortality into the objects of Nature Says he
lsquoBut from these create he can
Forms more real than living man
Nurslings of immortalityrsquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 96
Prometheus Unbound
HIS LOVE OF INDIA
Shelley was an ardent admirer of India In a letter to his
friend employed in the East India Company he
expressed keenness to visit India and settle down here
He was drawn to India for its varied and picturesque
scenic beauty vast literary heritage and age-old cultural
traditions In order to have a closer acquaintance with
our great country he set his heart and mind on serious
studies in the Indian life and letters traditions and
culture
Since he was a visionary par excellence and was
endowed with a highly contemplative mind and a
remarkable prophetic zeal he evinced a deep and
abiding interest in the philosophical and spiritual
thoughts that lie enshrined in our holy texts such as the
Vedas the Upanishads the Brahmasutras and the
Bhagvad Gita It is interesting to trace the influence of
Indian spiritual thought on Shelleyrsquos poetry
VEDANTA IN SHELLEYrsquoS POETRY
The riddle of the origin of life and Nature and the
enigmatic questions such as lsquoWhat is the cause of life
and death What is the source of universe and what will
be its ultimate destinyrsquo have always engaged the
serious attention of all wise men Man has always stood
in awe and wonder at the mysteries of human existence
and the vast world around him Our seers and savants
have not only posed such questions but have also
answered them
In the opening verse of the Kena Upanishad the
disciple asks
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 97
ldquoAt whose behest does the mind think or wander after towards its objects Commanded by whom does the life-force or the breath of life go forth on its journey At whose will do we utter speech Who is that effulgent Being whose power directs the eye and the earrdquo
Similarly in the Svetasvatara Upanishad the disciples
inquire ldquoWhat is the cause of this universe What is Brahman Whence do we come By what power do we live and on what are we established Where shall we at last find rest What rules over our joys and sorrows O Seers of Brahmanrdquo
Identical ideas impelled Shelley to exclaim in his famous
elegy Adonais
ldquoWhence are we and why are we Of what scene
The actors or spectatorsrdquo
Or again he asks in The Triumph of Life
ldquoWhence comest thou And wither goest thou
How did thy course begin I said and whyrdquo
Shelley asks
ldquoHas some unknown omnipotence unfurled
The veil of life and deathrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoAnd what were thou and earth and stars and sea
If to the human mindrsquos imaginings
Silence and solitude were vacancyrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 98
Mont Blanc
Shelley in his famous poem Hymn to Intellectual Beauty answers that there is an unseen (all-pervading) omnipotence (power) behind this phenomenal world of
which all objects are but shadows
ldquoThe awful shadow of some unseen Power
Floats though unseen among us ndash visiting
This various world with as inconstant wing
As summer winds that creep from flower to flowerrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoIt visits with inconstant glance
Each human heart and countenance
Like aught that for its grace may be
Dear and yet dearer for its mysteryrdquo
Again he affirms his faith in such a mysterious
Omnipotent power when he says
ldquoThe works and ways of men their death and birth
And that of him and all that his may be
All things that move and breathe with toil and sound
Are born and die revolve subside and swell
Power dwells apart in its tranquility
Remote serene and inaccessiblerdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 99
X X X X X X
ldquoThe secret strength of things
Which governs thought and to the infinite dome
Of Heaven is as a law inhabits theerdquo
Mont Blanc
Vedanta which is the aphoristic summary of the
Upanishads the Brahmasutras and the Bhagvad Gita
is in fact the culmination of Indian religious and
philosophical thought Since Shelley sincerely desired to
unravel the essential reality which is unchanging
timeless and eternal and of which the world of sense
perceptions is but a broken reflection he turned his
attention to the ancient scriptures of India
ONENESS OF BRAHMAN (GOD)
One of the basic postulates of Vedanta is the inherent
oneness or the sole identity of Brahman in the universe
The Chhandogya Upanishad describes Brahman as
एकमव अXवतीय ndash lsquoone only without a secondrsquo and the
other Upanishadic texts also contain parallel statements
such as स एकः ndash lsquoHe is Onersquo and एकोदवः ndash lsquoOne Lordrsquo
Similarly the Rig Veda declares एक सद वDा बहदा वदित ndash lsquoTruth (God)is one but the wise one call it
differentlyrsquo Obviously Brahman the Supreme is one
and only one He is verily one and the same whether we
call Him Brahman Ishwara Paramatma God Allah or
the supreme Cosmic Soul He only exists all other
objects of the world are subject to decay and death
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 100
How beautifully have similar thoughts been expressed
by Shelley when he exclaims
ldquoThe one remains the many change and pass
Heavenrsquos light forever shines Earthrsquos shadows fly
Life like a dome of many coloured glass
Stains the white radiance of Eternity
Until Death tramples it to fragmentsrdquo
Adonais L2
The concluding lines of Epipsychidion show that in a
moment of inspiration Shelley seemed to lay hold on the
ineffable spirituality and fundamental unity of
existence
ldquoOne hope within two wils one will beneath
Two overshadowing minds one life one death
One Heaven one hell one immortality
And one annihilationrdquo
Shelley etherealized Nature and believed in a single
power or one spirit permeating the whole universe He
effected a fusion of the Platonic philosophy of love with
the Wordsworthian doctrine of Pantheism
ldquoThe one spiritrsquos plastic stress
Sweeps through the dull dense worldrsquo
Compelling there all new successions
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 101
To the forms they wearrdquo
Holding that one universal spirit is the basis and
sustainer of Nature Shelley declares
ldquoThat Power
Which wields the world with never-wearied love
Sustains it from beneath and kindles it aboverdquo
In his pantheistic conception of Nature Shelley
conceived of it as being permeated vitalized and made
real by a universal spirit of love He clearly perceives
the presence of ldquothe awful shadow of the unseen power visiting the various worldrdquo
ldquoSpirit of Nature here
In this interminable wilderness
Of worlds at whose involved immensity
Even soaring fancy staggers
Here is thy fitting templerdquo
Demon of the World
TRANSMIGRATION OF SOUL
The doctrine of transmigration of soul or the cycle of
births and rebirths has been explicitly advanced in the
Upanishadic philosophy In the Kathopanishad
Brihadaranyak Upanishad and the Bhagvad Gita there are moving passages such as these
ldquoMan ripens like corn and like corn he is born againrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 102
Kathopanishad IV6
The Brihadaranyak Upanishad states
ldquoAnd as a caterpillar after reaching the end of a blade of grass finds another place of support and then draws itself towards it and as a goldsmith after taking a piece of gold gives it another newer and more beautiful shape similarly does the self after having thrown off this body and dispelled ignorance take on another newer and more beautiful formrdquo
Brihadaranyak Upanishad IV3-5
Similarly Lord Krishna tells Arjuna
ldquoAs a man discarding worn out clothes takes other new ones likewise the embodied soul casting off worn-out bodies enters into others which are newrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II22
And further Lord Krishna says to Arjuna
ldquofor in that case the death of him who is born is certain and the rebirth for him who is dead is inevitablerdquo
Bhagvad Gita II27
Shelley entertained similar ideas when he says
ldquoThe works and ways of man their death and birth
And that of him and all that his may be
All things that move and breathe with toil and sound
Are borm and die revolve subside and swellrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 103
Mont Blanc 92-95
Or again
ldquoThe splendours of the firmament of time
May be eclipsed but are extinguished not
Like stars to their appointed height they climb
And death is a low mist which cannot blot
The brightness it may veilrdquo
Adonais XLIV
Stressing the ephemerality of worldly objects Shelley
exclaims
ldquoSpirit of Beauty that does consecrate
With thine own hues all thou doth shine upon
Of human thought or formwhere art thou gonerdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoWhy aught should fail and fade that once is shown
Why fear and dream and death and birth
Cast on the daylight of this earth
Such gloomrdquo
Hymn to Intellectual Beauty 11
Lamenting the death of his friend Keats he says
ldquohe went uninterrupted
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 104
Into the gulf of death but his clear spirit
Yet reigns over earthrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoTo that high Capital where Kingly Death
Keeps his pale court in beauty and decay
He came and bought with price of purest breath
A grave among the eternalrdquo
Adonais VII
Again dwelling on the immortality of soul he declares
ldquoNaught we know dies Shall that alone which knows
Be as a sword consumed before the sheath
By sightless lightening The intense atom glows
A moment then is quenched in a most cold reposerdquo
Adonais XX
X X X X X X
ldquoGreat and mean
Meet massed in death who lends what life must borrowrdquo
Adonais XXI
X X X X X X
ldquoDust to dust but the pure spirit shall flow
Black to the burning fountain whence it came
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 105
A portion of the Eternal which must glow
Through time and change unquenchably the same
Whilst thy cold embers choke the sordid hearth shamerdquo
Adonais XXXVIII
THE DOCTRINE OF MAYA (DELUSION)
Our scriptures regard the phenomenal world as Maya
(delusion) They explain that the universe is neither
absolutely real nor absolutely non-existent and that its
phenomenal or apparent surface conceals and
safeguards the external presence of the Absolute
Shelley seems to have pondered over similar ideas
about the world of appearances
ldquoWorlds on worlds are rolling ever
From creation to decay
Like the bubbles on a river
Sparkling bursting borne away
But they are still immortal
Who through birthrsquos oriental portal
And deathrsquos dark chasm hurrying to and fro
Clothe their unceasing flight
In the brief dust and light
Gathered around their chariots as they gordquo
Three Choruses from Hallas
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 106
In his poem Invocation to Misery Shelley says
ldquoAll the wide world beside us
Show like multitudinous
Puppets passing from a scenerdquo
Again describing human life as a veil he says
ldquoLife not the painted veil which thou who live
Call life though unreal shapes be pictured there
And it but mimic all we would believe
With colours idly spreadrdquo
Prometheus Unbound
In the myth of Aurora he gives his own account of the
creation and interpretation of works of art
ldquoAnd lovely apparitions dim at first then radiant in the mind arising bright
From the embrace of beauty whence the forms
Of which these are phantoms casts on them
The gathered rays which are realityrdquo
Shelley seems to hint at the theory of Superimposition
(Vivartavada) which maintains that the universe is a
superimposition upon Brahman It states that the world
of thought and matter has a phenomenon or relative
existence and is superimposed upon Brahman the
unique Absolute Reality
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 107
Since the world is a network of delusion and
appearance not reality our life on earth is a sojourn
and its paramount aim is to have a glimpse of and
realize the eternal Truth or the Absolute Brahman
which is concealed by ignorance and delusion The
Ishopanishad tells us
ldquoThe face of Truth is hidden by a golden orb (disk) O Pushan (the Nourisher the Effulgent Being) uncover (the Face) that I the seeker or worshipper of Truth may hold Theerdquo
Ishopanishad XV
Like a sincere aspirant for the realization of eternal
Truth or the Absolute concealed under the illusory garb
of Maya (Delusion) Shelley in the words of Fairy in his
Queen Mab declares
ldquoAnd it is yet permitted me to rend
The veil of mortal frailty that the spirit
Clothed in its changeless purity may know
How soonest to accomplish the great end
For which it hath its being and may taste
That peace which in the end all life will sharerdquo
Queen Mab
In certain other passages Shelley speaks of the veil
identified with Time which obscured Eternity from the
sight of man The symbol of veil demonstrates that
which conceals truth goodness or happiness When the
veil was torn or rent asunder
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 108
ldquoHope was seen beaming through the mists of fear
Earth was no longer Hell
Love freedom health had given
Their ripeness to the manhood of its prime
And all its pulses beat
Symphonious to the planetary spheresrdquo
Again he uses the same symbol of veil when Cythna
says
ldquoFor with strong speech I tore the veil that hid
Nature and Truth and Liberty and Loverdquo
Shelley uses the same idea of superimposition coupled
with his own robust idealism
ldquoLife may change but it may fly not
Hope may vanish but can die not
Truth be veiled but it burneth
Love repulsed ndash but it returnethrdquo
STATES OF CONSCIOUSNESS
Our Upanishads identify three states of consciousness
crowned by the fourth which transcends all the other
three states They are
(i) The Waking State
(ii) The Dreaming State
(iii) The State of Deep Sleep and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 109
(iv) The State of Pure Consciousness (Turiya)
The fourth state of ecstatic consciousness which
transcends the preceding three has no connection with
the finite mind it is reached when in meditation the
ordinary self is left behind and the Atman or the true
self is fully realized The Mandukya Upanishad describes it thus
ldquoBeyond the senses beyond the understanding beyond all expression is the Fourth It is pure unitary consciousness wherein (all) awareness of the world and of multiplicity is completely obliterated It is effable peace It is the supreme good It is one without a second It is the Self Know it alonerdquo
Mandukya Upanishad VII
Turiya (तर[य) the fourth state is the supreme mystic
experience Shelley seems to have partly attained such a
state of pure ecstatic consciousness when he states
ldquoI seem as in a trance sublime and strange
To muse on my own separate fantasy
My own my human mind which passively
Now renders and receives fast influencing
Holding an unremitting interchange
With the clear universe of things aroundrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoSome say that gleams of a remoter world
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 110
Visit the soul in sleep that death is slumber
And that its shapes the busy thoughts outnumber
Of those who wake and live ndash I look on high
Has some unknown omnipotence unfurled
The veil of life and deathrdquo
Mont Blanc
Another instance of such a mystic experience appears in
his famous poem Triumph of Life on which Shelley was
working at the time of this death in 1822
ldquobefore me fled
The night behind me rose the day the deep
Was at my feet and Heaven above my head
When a strange trance over my fancy grew
Which was not slumber for the shade it spread
Was so transparent that the scene came through
As clear as when a veil of light is drawn
Over evening hill they glimmer and I knew
That I had felt the freshness of that dawnrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoAnd in that trance of wondrous thought I lay
This was the tenor of my waking dreamrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 111
The Triumph of Life
SHELLEY AS AN ASPIRANT FOR SELF-REALIZATION
Shelley who described himself as
ldquoA splendour among shadows a bright blot
Upon the gloomy scene a spirit that strove
For Truthrdquo
seems to have reached at last that stability or
equanimity of mind which has been described in the
Upanishads and the Bhagvad Gita In a reply to Arjunrsquos
question about the definition of one who is stable of
mind or is finally established in perfect tranquility of
mind Lord Krishna says
ldquoArjun when one thoroughly dismisses all cravings of the mind controls it and is satisfied in the self (through the joy of the self) then he is called stable of mind One whose mind remains unperturbed amid sorrows whose thirst for pleasures has altogether disappeared and who is free from passion fear and anger is called stable of mindrdquo
Bhagvad Gita V56
The Katha Upanishad stresses similar ideas when it
says
ldquoBut he who possesses right discrimination whose mind is under control and is always pure he reaches that goal from which he is not born againrdquo
X X X X X X
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RP DWIVEDI Page 112
ldquoThe man who has a discriminative intellect for the driver and a controlled mind for the reins reaches the end of the journey the highest place of Vishnu (the all-pervading and unchangeable one)rdquo
Katha Upanishad
Shelley echoes identical thoughts when he says
ldquoMan who man would be
Must rule the empire of himself in it
Must be supreme establishing his throne
On vanquished will quelling the anarchy
Of hopes and fears being himself alonerdquo
Sonnet on Political Greatness
It was in such rare moments of inner consciousness or
lsquoBlessed moodrsquo that Shelley felt lsquoOne with Naturersquo or
lsquoThe Power which wields the world with never-wearied love
Sustains it from beneath and kindles it aboversquo
As a myth-maker or a mythopoeic poet he conjured
visions of a golden age by turning to the grand aspects
of Nature ndash the ether the sky the wind the Sun the
Moon the light and the clouds and employing them as
befitting agencies and vehicles of his evolutionary ideas
ldquoPoetryrdquo he wrote ldquois indeed something divine It is at once the centre and circumference of all knowledgerdquo He
conceived of the universe as alive with a living spirit
behind it He moralizes natural myths and perceives the
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RP DWIVEDI Page 113
Absolute behind the ephemeral In an exquisite image
he exclaims
ldquoThe sanguine sunrise with his meteor eyes
And his burning plumes outspread
Leaps on the back of my sailing rack
When the morning star shines deadrdquo
As his thoughts reached the zenith of their growth
Shelley identified his individual self with the all-
pervading Cosmic Self or the Brahman of the Vedanta
and felt himself one with the indwelling spirit of the
universe Unity filled his imagination he perceived
eternal harmony in the phenomenal existence and
rejoiced his own being in the vast million-coloured
pageants of the world And finally not only Nature but
all human existence is taken up as an inalienable aspect
of the eternal Cosmic Spirit He reaches the core the
centre of all palpable universe when he declares
ldquoI am the eye with which the Universe
Behold itself and knows itself divine
All harmony of instrument and verse
All prophecy all medicine is mine
All light of art or nature to my song
Victory and praise in its own right belongrdquo
Shelley perceived the transcendental or mystic
consciousness in which one realizes the complete
identity of self with the Supreme Self and which is called
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RP DWIVEDI Page 114
तर[य अवथा ndash where one sees nothing but One
(Brahman) hears nothing but the One knows nothing
but the One ndash there is the Infinite The same truth is
vividly explained in the Bhagvad Gita when Lord
Krishna tells Arjuna
ldquoWhen one sees Eternity in things that pass away and Infinity in finite things then one has pure knowledgerdquo
Bhagvad Gita XVIII20
Our own great seer-poet and philosopher Sri Aurobindo
Ghose described Shelley as a sovereign voice of the new
spiritual force and a native of the heights with its
luminous ethereality where he managed to dwell
prophetically in a future heaven and earth with
brilliances of a communion with a higher law another
order of existence another meaning behind Nature and
terrestrial things
Sri Aurobindo further praises him as lsquoa seer of spiritual realities who has a poetic grasp of metaphysical truths and can see the forms and hear the voices of higher elements spirits and natural godheads and has a constant feeling of a high spiritual and intellectual beauty He is at once seer poet thinker prophet and artist Light love liberty are the three godheads in whose presence his pure and radiant spirit lived but a celestial light a celestial love a celestial liberty To bring them down to earth without their losing their celestial lustre and here is his passionate endeavour but his wings constantly buoy him upward and cannot beat strongly in an earthlier atmosphere There is an air of luminous mist surrounding his intellectual presentation of his meaning which shows the truths he sees as things to which the mortal eye cannot easily pierce or the life and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 115
temperament of earth rise to realize and live yet to bring about the union of the mortal and immortal terrestrial and the celestial is always his passion Shelley is the bright archangel of this dawn and becomes greater to us as the light he foresaw and lived and he sings half-concealed in the too dense halo of his own ethereal beautyrsquo
And what Juan Mascaro states as universal truth is
equally pertinent to Shelleyrsquos poetry
ldquoA deep faith in life cannot but be spiritual The path of Truth may not be a path of parallel lines but a path that follows one circle because Truth is onerdquo
Infinite is God infinite are His aspects and infinite are
the ways to reach Him In the Atharva Veda we read
ldquoThe one light appears in diverse formsrdquo This ideal of
harmony is carried to its logical conclusion in blending
synthesizing and reconciling conflicting metaphysical
theories and opposed conceptions of spiritual
discipline We read in the pages of Bhagvad Gita
ldquoWhatever wish men bring in worship
That wish I grant them
Whatever path men travel
Is my path
No matter where they walk
It leads to merdquo
Bhagvad Gita IV11
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RP DWIVEDI Page 116
To sum up Shelleyrsquos poetry will always hold irresistible
fascination to the lovers of light and beauty for to
quote Juan Mascaro again
ldquoThe finite in man longs for the Infinite The love that moves the stars moves also the heart of man and a law of spiritual gravitation leads his soul to the soul of the universe Man sees the sun by the light of the sun and he sees the spirit by the light of his own inner spirit The radiance of eternal beauty shines over this vast universe and in moments of contemplation we can see the Eternal in things that pass away This is the message of the great spiritual seers and all poetry and art and beauty is only an infinite variation of this message The spiritual visions of man confirm and illumine each other Great poems in different languages have different values but they all are poetry and the spiritual visions of man come all from one Light In them we have Lamps of Fire that burn to the glory of Godrdquo
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JOHN KEATS
(31 October 1795 ndash 23 February 1821)
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RP DWIVEDI Page 118
JOHN KEATS
English Romantic Poet
The son of a livery-stable manager he had a limited
formal education He worked as a surgeons apprentice
and assistant for several years before devoting himself
entirely to poetry at age 21 His first mature work was
the sonnet On First Looking into Chapmans Homer
(1816) His long Endymion appeared in the same year
(1818) as the first symptoms of the tuberculosis that
would kill him at age 25 During a few intense months of
1819 he produced many of his greatest works several
great odes (including Ode on a Grecian Urn Ode to a
Nightingale and To Autumnrdquo) two unfinished
versions of the story of the titan Hyperion and La Belle
Dame Sans Merci Most were published in the
landmark collection Lamia Isabella The Eve of St Agnes and Other Poems (1820) Marked by vivid imagery great
sensuous appeal and a yearning for the lost glories of
the Classical world his finest works are among the
greatest of the English tradition His letters are among
the best by any English poet
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RP DWIVEDI Page 119
CHAPTER SIX
JOHN KEATS A MINSTREL OF BEAUTY AND TRUTH
INTRODUCTION
John Keats who in his own words was lsquoa fair creature of an hourrsquo lived a brief and turbulent life Pre-eminently a
sensuous poet in whom the Romantic sensibility to
outward impressions of sight sound touch and smell
reached its climax the life of Keats was a series of
sensations felt with febrile acuteness
His ideal was passive contemplation rather than active
mental exertion ldquoO for a life of sensations rather than of thoughtrdquo he exclaimed in one of his letters and in
another ldquoit is more noble to sit like Jove than to fly like Mercuryrdquo In fact his was a life of intense sensations
acute poignancy and an infinite yearning for beauty
which he identified with truth
Richness of sensuousness characterizes all his poetry
and his power of expression is marked by a spectacular
vividness which is interspersed with beautiful epithets
heavily charged with subtle messages for the senses His
works are so full of luxuriance of sensations and acute
passions that ordinary readers do not pause to perceive
the unimpeded flow of spiritual thoughts underneath
The pursuit of the spirit of beauty dominates all his
works which have one enduring message ndash the
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 120
lastingness of beauty and its identity with supreme
truth (or God) This message ndash the oneness of beauty
with truth and the eternal existence of truth ndash has been
beautifully enshrined in his famous and oft-quoted lines
(with which he concludes his Ode on a Grecian Urn)
ldquoBeauty is truth truth beauty ndash that is all
Ye know on earth and all ye need to knowrdquo
Keats died at the age of 26 but even from his early age
he had visions of rare spiritual significance Dwelling on
the value of visions in human life and poetry he says
ldquoSince every man whose soul is not a clod
Hath vision
For poesy alone can tell her dreams
With the fine spell of words alone can save
Imagination from the sable chain
And dumb enchantmentrdquo
Since common readers tend to ignore the underlying
spiritual import of his visions and images this article
aims at bringing into play some of the poetrsquos thoughts
which bear a remarkable resemblance to the age-old
hoary spirituality of our ancient land
Stressing the fundamental truths of our Indian thought
and tracing their distinct reflection in the works of great
Western poets seems a worth-while academic pursuit
FUNDAMENTAL UNITY
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RP DWIVEDI Page 121
From the very beginning Keats could realize the
fundamental unity of Truth and Beauty and could dwell
at length on it to show how diverse paths illumined by
the glory of spirit in man ultimately lead him to the
realization of this abiding lesson of life The supreme
oneness of Truth has been beautifully enunciated by Sri
Krishna in the Bhagvad Gita
ldquoIn any way that men love Me in that same way they find My love for many are the paths of men but they all in the end come to Merdquo
Similar thoughts have found expression in the
introduction to the Upanishads by Juan Mascaro
ldquoThe path of Truth may not be a path of parallel lines but a path that follows one circle by going to the right and climbing the circle or by going to the left and climbing the circle we are bound to meet at the top although we started in apparently contrary directions This is bound to be in the end because Truth is onerdquo
And when Keats was only 22 he could give expression
to deep thoughts that have a curious similarity to the
ideas expressed in the Mundak Upanishad and the
Bhagvad Gita
ldquoNow it appears to me that almost any man may like the spider spin from his own inwards his own airy citadel the points of leaves and twigs on which the spider begins her work are few and she fills the air with a beautiful circuiting Man should be content with as few points to tip with the fine Web of his Soul and weave a tapestry empyrean-full of symbols for his spiritual eye of softness for his spiritual touch of space for his wanderings of distinctness for his luxuryrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 122
ldquoBut the minds of mortals are so different and bent on such diverse journeys that it may at first appear impossible for any common taste and fellowship to exist between two or three under these suppositions It is however quite the contrary Minds would leave each other in contrary directions traverse each other in numberless points and at last greet each other at the journeyrsquos end An old man and a child would talk together and the old man be led on his path and the child left thinkingrdquo
ldquoMan should not dispute or assert but whisper results to his neighbor and thus by every germ of spirit sucking the sap from mould ethereal every human might become great and humanity instead of being a wide heath of furze and briars with here and there a remote oak or pine would become a great democracy of forest treesrdquo
WISDOM
All men of good will are bound to meet if they follow the
wisdom of the words Shakespeare in Hamlet where if
we write SELF or self we find the doctrine of the
Upanishad
ldquoThis above all to thine own self be true
And it must follow as the night the day
Thou canst not then be false to any manrdquo
Now coming back to the theme of beauty and truth and
their ultimate identity in the universe we have to dwell
at large on the concept of beauty as enunciated by Keats
in his poetry From the very beginning Keats realized
that beauty in its true sense illumines manrsquos thoughts
and thus leads him to understand the glory of truth and
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RP DWIVEDI Page 123
the pervading spirit of their identity in whatever he
sees hears and perceives
The eternal identity or oneness of beauty with truth and
their interplay in the world are in fact unfailing
fountains of joy The permanence of beauty as a source
of joy has been beautifully elucidated by the poet in the
opening lines of his famous poem Endymion
ldquoA thing of beauty is a joy forever
Its loveliness increases it will never
Pass into nothingnessrdquo
He goes on to say
ldquoSome shape of beauty moves away the pall
From our dark spirits
An endless fountain of immortal drink
Pouring unto us from the heavenrsquos brink
Nor do we merely feel these essences
For one short hour
glories infinite
Haunt us till they become a cheering light
Unto our souls and bound to us so fast
That whether there be shine or gloom overcast
They always must be with us or we dierdquo
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RP DWIVEDI Page 124
When he ascribes permanence to joy born of beauty
Keats has in mind the immanence and effulgence of
beauty as a reflection of its creator God Beauty whose
lsquoloveliness increasesrsquo and which lsquowill never pass into nothingnessrsquo is an inalienable attribute of Divinity for it
is lsquoan endless fountain of immortal drinkrsquo
BEAUTY
God (as the poet seems to presuppose) is all Beautiful or
the embodiment of all Beauty and the entire world of
sights and sounds is nothing else but a glorious garment
of God So beauty does not consist only in apparent
physical appearances but is an offspring of inherent
divinity in man and nature which is dimly reflected in
their attractive exterior Such an eternal beauty in his
view presents lsquoglories infinite that haunt us till they become a cheering light unto our souls It is this beauty the glory of spirit which must be with us or we dierdquo
The poetrsquos concept of beauty with its glories infinite
bears a striking resemblance with the path of splendour
of our Vedic and epic scriptures in which our sages
perceived the Divine presence in all that is splendid and
beautiful in the universe
Our Vedic texts are full of the expressions of the sage-
poetrsquos exquisite astonishment before the visions of
glory and wonder The attitude of our Vedic seer-poets
towards beauty as a transcendental reality beyond our
sense-perceptions has been beautifully expressed in
images of beauty and glory as an abstract idea Says Rig Veda
ldquoSinless for noble power under the influence of Savita God
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 125
May we obtain all things that are beautifulrdquo
GOODNESS
Here the power of goodness is contemplated to lead to
the power of beauty Beauty in its myriad forms leads
us to spiritual consciousness of Divinity inherent in
Nature and all living beings Identical thoughts have
been expressed by Sri Krishna in Chapter X of the
Bhagvad Gita where all splendour and glory is said to
be the reflection of God whose manifestation this
universe is Says Sri Krishna to Arjuna
ldquoKnow thou that whatever is beautiful and good whatever has glory and power is only a portion of My own radiancerdquo
Bhagvad Gita X41
Seeing the effulgence of a thousand suns bursting forth
and yet it could hardly match the splendour of the
supreme Lord Arjuna exclaimed in wonder
ldquoI see the splendour of an infinite beauty which illumines the whole universe It is thee With thy crown and scepter and circle How difficult thou art to see But I see thee as fire as the Sun blinding incomprehensiblerdquo
Bhagvad Gita XI17
Besides this concept of ultimate elemental beauty
Keats goes on to underscore its fundamental and
inseparable unity with Truth which is yet another
inalienable facet of Divinity on earth
Truth being an essential attribute of God lies at the
core of all existence and it sustains the entire universe
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 126
with its manifold forms of beauty reflected in countless
objects around us When Keats declares that lsquoBeauty is truth truth beautyrsquo he seems to remind us of the age-old
spiritual consciousness that found sublime utterance in
our Vedas which are the oldest treatises on lsquophilosophia perennisrsquo the eternal philosophy In the Vedas truth has
been described as the essence of Divinity
ldquoThe deity has truth as the law of His beingrdquo
Atharva Veda VIIXXIV1
The Rig Veda calls the deities as various manifestations
of Truth Elsewhere in the Rig Veda the Deity has been
described as true and the path of religious progress is
the ingredient of Dharma Declares the Rig Veda
ldquoBy truth is the earth upheldrdquo
Rig Veda X85
An Upanishadic sage says
ldquoTruth alone triumphs not untruth By Truth the spiritual path is widened that path by which the seers who are free from all cravings and declares travel and reach the supreme abode of Truthrdquo
Mundak Upanishad IIII6
So Truth is a basic postulate of Dharma and an abiding
and ultimate value of life It is the eternal oneness of
beauty and truth and truth and beauty that inspired
Keats to stress their underlying unity and their
transcendental reality When Keats says ldquoThat is all ye know on earth and all ye need to knowrdquo he points to that
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 127
ecstatic wonder which the spiritual realization of this
eternal truth brings to a seeker or seer or a poet
SUBLIMITY
Keats seems to have reached such a sublime plane of
poetic consciousness that is so aptly suggested by our
Vedic seers who have extolled God as a poet (कव) and
His divine creative energy is indicated as the poetic
power (काय) which has assumed manifold forms of
beauty and splendour So God as the supreme creator of
beauty has been described in the Rig Veda as
ldquoHe who is supporter of the world of life
Who knows the secret mysterious names
Of the morning beams
He poet cherishes manifold forms
By His poetic powerrdquo
Rig Veda VIIIXL5
So let me hasten to the conclusion by affirming that as
lsquoa lily for a dayrsquo Keats proved that a crowded hour of
glory is far better than an age without a name he seems
to have lived up to the lofty advice of Queen Vidula to
her son King Sanjaya in the Mahabharat
महतम 0व1लत 2यो न त धमऽतम 4चर
ldquoIt is better to flame forth for an instant than smoke away for agesrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 128
Eternal truths transcend the barriers of time and space
country and clime caste and creed and shine through all
lands and in all ages Even today the enlightened souls
all over the world have a significant identity of ideas
irrespective of the countries to which they belong and
the religious faith to which they are affiliated
Such wise men awaken others from a state of
intellectual and spiritual slumber enkindle in them a
sense of understanding and fraternity It has been
rightly said by HW Longfellow
ldquoLives of great men all remind us
We can make our lives sublime
And departing leave behind us
Footprints on the sand of Timerdquo
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RP DWIVEDI Page 129
RW EMERSON
(25 May 1803 ndash 27 April 1882)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 130
RW EMERSON
US Poet Essayist and Lecturer
Emerson graduated from Harvard University and was
ordained a Unitarian minister in 1829 His questioning
of traditional doctrine led him to resign the ministry
three years later He formulated his philosophy in
Nature (1836) the book helped initiate New England
Transcendentalism a movement of which he soon
became the leading exponent In 1834 he moved to
Concord Mass the home of his friend Henry David
Thoreau His lectures on the proper role of the scholar
and the waning of the Christian tradition caused
considerable controversy In 1840 with Margaret
Fuller he helped launch The Dial a journal that
provided an outlet for Transcendentalist ideas He
became internationally famous with his Essays (1841
1844) including Self-Reliance Representative Men
(1850) consists of biographies of historical figures The Conduct of Life (1860) his most mature work reveals a
developed humanism and a full awareness of human
limitations His Poems (1847) and May-Day (1867)
established his reputation as a major poet
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 131
CHAPTER SEVEN
EMERSONrsquoS SPIRITUAL QUEST AND INDIAN THOUGHT
INTRODUCTION
Ralph Waldo Emerson the lsquoSage of Concordrsquo as he is
rightly called was an American seer who came into the
world at a time when East and the West were gradually
coming closer to each other in spheres more than one
trade and commerce between the two was gaining
momentum and above all the era of inter-
communication of ideas intellect and spirit was being
ushered in by exchange of books
Emerson was one of the first great Americans who
absorbed himself sufficiently in this phenomenon
ventured into the sacred literature of India and
assimilated its thought to such a remarkable degree that
he became its eminent interpreter to his countrymen in
particular and to the entire West in general
EMERSON AND THE GITA
Let us see what Swami Vivekananda said about the
source of Emersonrsquos inspiration Swamiji said
ldquoThe greatest incident of the (Mahabharata) war was the marvelous and immortal poem of the Gita the Song Celestial It is the popular scripture of India and the loftiest of all teachings I would advise those of you who have not read that book to read it If you only knew how
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 132
much it has influenced your own country (America) even If you want to know the source of Emersonrsquos inspiration it is this book the Gita He went to see Carlyle and Carlyle made him a present of the Gita and that little book is responsible for the Concord Movement All the broad movements in America in one way or other are indebted to the Concord partyrdquo
His interest in the sacred writings of India was probably
aroused at Harvard and he kept it aglow throughout his
life With his motto ldquoTomorrow to fresh fields and pastures newrdquo he set out in search of the True (Satyam)
the Good (Shivam) and the Beautiful (Sundaram)
In busy and bustling New England there came forward
to quote Theodore Parker ldquothis young David a shepherd but to be a king with his garlands and singing robes about him one note upon his new and fresh-string lyre was worth a thousand menrdquo
With unflinching faith in Truth Righteousness and
Beauty and absolute confidence in all the attributes of
infinity he drank deep at the unfailing source of Indian
philosophy and religion and gave his thoughts such a
lucid inimitable expression that his writings have
become a veritable treasure of world literature Revered
the world over held in high esteem by great Indians like
Rabindranath Tagore and Pt Jawaharlal Nehru and
admired by Gandhiji his writings abound in the beauty
of his speech the majesty of his ideas and the loftiness
of his moral sentiments
Perhaps the most fitting commentary on the relevance
of his thoughts to our country was made by Mahatma
Gandhi after reading his Essays Said Mahatma Gandhi
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 133
ldquoThe Essays to my mind contain the teaching of Indian wisdom in a Western Guru It is interesting to see our own sometimes differently fashionedrdquo
There are indeed innumerable points of similarity in
thought and experience between Emerson and the
mainstream of Indian philosophy The philosophy of
Vedanta which was one of the thought currents that
reached America in the first half of the 19th century
influenced Emerson deeply and contributed largely to
his concept of lsquoselfhoodrsquo Emerson found the Vedic
doctrines of soul congenial to his own ideas about manrsquos
relationship to the universe He therefore drew freely
upon the Hindu scriptures which contain a vivid and
well-elaborated doctrine of lsquoSelfrsquo Numerous references
in his essays and journals to the lsquoLaws of Manursquo
(Manusmriti) Vishnu Puran Bhagvad Gita and Katha Upanishad bear ample testimony to this fact
Let us examine some of the striking identities between
Emerson and the Vedanta The Upanishads tell us that
the central core of onersquos self is clearly identifiable with
the Cosmic Reality ldquoThe self within you the resplendent immortal person is the internal self of all things and is the Universal Brahmanrdquo The Chhandogya Upanishad tells
us that ldquothe self which inhabits the body is verily the Brahman and that as soon as the mortal coil is thrown over it will finally merge in Brahmanrdquo
How close was Emersonrsquos spiritual kinship with the
Vedantic doctrines is clear from the following lines
taken from his essay Plato or the Philosopher
ldquoIn all nations there are minds which incline to dwell in the conception of the Fundamental Unity the ecstasy of losing all being in one Being This tendency
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 134
finds its highest expression chiefly in the Indian scriptures in the Vedas the Bhagvad Gita and the Vishnu Puranrdquo
He further quotes Lord Krishna speaking to a sage ldquoYou are fit to apprehend that you are not distinct from meThat which I am thou art and that also in this world with its gods and heroes and mankind Men contemplate distinctions because they are stupefied with ignorance What is the great end of all you shall now learn from me It is soul-one in all bodies pervading uniform perfect pre-eminent over nature exempt from birth growth and decay Omnipresent made up of true knowledge independent unconnected with unrealities with name species and the rest in time past present and to come The knowledge that this spirit which is essentially one is in onersquos own and all other bodies is the wisdom of one who knows the unity of thingsrdquo
In formulating his own concept of the Over-soul
Emerson quotes Lord Krishna once again
ldquoWe live in succession in division in parts in particles Meantime within man is the soul of the whole the wise silence the universal beauty to which every part and particle is equally related the eternal One And this deep power in which we exist and whose beatitude is all accessible to us is not only self-sufficing and perfect in every hour but in the act of seeing and the thing seen the seer and the spectacle the subject and the object are one We see the world piece by piece as the sun the moon the animal the tree but the whole of which these are shining parts is the Soul Only by the vision of that wisdom can the horoscope of ages be readrdquo
The Over-Soul
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 135
A transcendentalist par excellence Emerson who was
influenced by German philosophers like Kant Hegel
Fichte and Schelling and their English interpreters
Coleridge and Carlyle affirmed that man could
apprehend reality by direct spiritual insight To him
intuition knew truths which ldquotranscendedrdquo those
accessible to intellect logical argument and scientific
inquiry Such a transcendentalism or attitude which
provided a metaphysical justification for the ideal of
individual freedom was found writ large in the holy
books of India
Steeped as he was in the oriental lore echoes of
Vedantic philosophy can be distinctly heard in his
writings which shine like ldquoa good deed in a naughty worldrdquo
Some of his poems resemble Vedantic literature in form
as well as in content His two famous poems Brahma
and Hamatreya are striking examples of such a close
affinity both in content and expression Ideas and
images in Brahma reflect certain passages which
Emerson had copied into his journals from the Vishnu
Puran the Bhagvad Gita and Katha Upanishad The first
stanza of Brahma which reads
ldquoIf the red slayer think he slays
Or if the slain think he is slain
They know not well the subtle ways
I keep and pass and turn againrdquo
is essentially an adaptation of these lines from the
Katha Upanishad
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 136
ldquoIf the slayer thinks I slay if the slain thinks I am slain then both of them do not know well It (the soul) does not slay nor is it slainrdquo
Katha Upanishad II19
The same lines with a little variation of course appear
in the Bhagvad Gita
ldquoThey are both ignorant he who knows that the soul to be capable of killing and he who takes it as killed for verily the soul neither kills nor is killedrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II19
The image of Brahma as a red slayer has been derived
from the Vishnu Puran where Lord Shiva the destroyer
of Creation has been depicted as Rudra (the red slayer)
but destruction envisages new creation and therefore
symbolizes the decadence of one and necessitates the
advent of the other This is why Lord Shiva is regarded
as the god not only of extermination but also of
regeneration With this concept is connected the cult of
Shaivagam ndash the ushering in of an era of general good
and prosperity when the world is created anew
The second and third stanzas of Brahma echo the
following lines of the Bhagvad Gita
ldquoI am the ritual action I am the sacrifice I am the ancestral oblation I am the sacred hymn I am the melted butter I am the fire and I am the offeringrdquo
Bhagvad Gita IX16
and also from the same source
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 137
ldquoI am immortality as well as death I am being as well as non-beingrdquo
Bhagvad Gita IX19
In the fourth stanza of Brahma there is a direct
reference to lsquothe Sacred Sevenrsquo ndash the seven highest saints
of our country namely Kashyapa Atri Bharadwaj Vishwamitra Gautam Vashishtha and Jamadagni Thus
we find that Brahma embodies an age-old Vedantic
truth
As regards his next poem Hamatreya its very title is a
variation of a disciplersquos name lsquoMaitreyarsquo to whom the
earth had recited a few verses Before we examine the
poem critically let us read a long passage from the
Vishnu Puran Book IV which Emerson had copied into
his 1845 Journal This passage which sheds ample light
on the background and theme of the poem under
reference reads
ldquoKings who with perishable frames have possessed this ever-enduring world and who blinded with deceptive notions of individual occupation have indulged the feeling that suggests lsquoThis earth is mine it is my sonrsquos it belongs to my dynastyrsquo have all passed awayearth laughs as if smiling with autumnal flowers to behold her kings unable to effect the subjugation of themselvesthese were the verses Maitreya which earth recited and by listening to which ambition fades away like snow before the windrdquo
Journals VII127-130
How futile is human vanity and how ridiculous is the
possessive instinct in man has been thoroughly exposed
by Emerson in the following lines
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 138
ldquoEarth laughs in flowers to see her boastful boys
Earth-proud proud of the earth which is not theirs
Who steer the plough but cannot steer their feet
Clear of the graverdquo
Hamatreya
Man who awaits lsquothe inevitable hourrsquo forgets that all his
heraldry pomp power wealth and lsquopaths of gloryrsquo lead
him lsquobut to the graversquo and grows so proud of his material
achievements and so deeply attached to the fleeting
things of the world that he loses sight of the supreme
philosophical truth - the ephemerality of the world and
the immortality of soul Death which is lurking in the
shadows can lay his icy hands upon us any day yet due
to false pride and sense of meum and attachment we
allow ourselves to be duped by the passing show of the
world without ever thinking of salvation or final release
from the worldly bondages Says Emerson
ldquoAh the hot owner sees not Death who adds
Him to his land a lump of mould the morerdquo
Hamatreya
Here Emerson seems to have been deeply influences by
Indian scriptures and particularly Ishopanishad and
the Bhagvad Gita in which the philosophy of God-
realization through detached action has been succinctly
elaborated In these two sacred books it has been stated
that total renunciation of the sense of meum egotism
and attachment with regard to the world all worldly
objects body and all actions is a path to real love for
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 139
God All worldly objects like land wealth house clothes
all relations like parents wife children friends and all
forms of worldly enjoyment like honour fame prestige
being the creations of Maya are wholly deluding
transient and perishable whereas one God alone the
embodiment of Existence (Sat) Knowledge (Chit) and
Bliss (Anand) is all in all omnipotent omniscient and
omnipresent Therefore all sense of meum egotism and
attachment must be totally renounced for spiritual
growth and pure exclusive love for God If the seed of
egoism is sown sorrow is the fruit On the other hand
the more a man cultivates dispassion and
disinterestedness with regard to the world the more
easily he transcends the barriers of Ignorance (Avidya)
Delusion (Maya) and Aversion (Dvesha) and marches
on the path of self-realization and God-realization A
similar thought current runs through the following
memorable lines of Earth-Song which forms an integral
part of the poem
ldquoThe earth says
They called me theirs who so controlled me
Yet every one wished to stay and is gone
How am I theirs if they cannot hold me
But I hold themrdquo
Hamatreya
These lines remind us of those memorable words of
Lord Krishna in the Bhagvad Gita XII16 where a true
devotee is characterized as one who is ldquodelivered from the egorsquos thrall - the sense of I and minerdquo or the feeling of
doership in all undertakings
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 140
After reading these lines which seem to refer to the
famous Biblical phrase lsquodust thou art to dust returnethrsquo
the readers may feel called upon to cultivate a sense of
detachment and renunciation for their ambition fades
away and their lsquoavarice cooled like dust in the chill of the graversquo
All art it has been said is an attempt to distract man
from his ego Emersonrsquos Hamatreya is certainly an
illustrious example of great art Highly didactic in
content and tone this poem reminds us of that sublime
mood in which Emerson realized the futility of
egocentric attachment to earth and its fleeting objects
which are shadows rather than substances
Emersonrsquos writings leave us to quote John Milton lsquoCalm of mind all passions spentrsquo A fitting comment on the
total impact of Emersonrsquos works on us has been given
by a brilliant American man of letters Theodore Parker
who says
ldquoA good test of the comparative value of books is the state they leave you in Emerson leaves you tranquil resolved on noble manhood fearless of the consequences he gives men to mankind and mankind to the laws of Godrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 141
HD THOREAU
(12 July 1817 ndash 6 May 1862)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 142
HD THOREAU
US Thinker Essayist and Naturalist
Thoreau graduated from Harvard University and taught
school for several years before leaving his job to
become a poet of nature Back in Concord he came
under the influence of Ralph Waldo Emerson and began
to publish pieces in the Transcendentalist magazine The Dial In the years 1845ndash47 to demonstrate how
satisfying a simple life could be he lived in a hut beside
Concords Walden Pond essays recording his daily life
were assembled for his masterwork Walden (1854) His
A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers (1849)
was the only other book he published in his lifetime He
reflected on a night he spent in jail protesting the
Mexican-American War in the essay Civil
Disobedience (1849) which would later influence such
figures as Mohandas K Gandhi and Martin Luther King
Jr In later years his interest in Transcendentalism
waned and he became a dedicated abolitionist His
many nature writings and records of his wanderings in
Canada Maine and Cape Cod display the mind of a keen
naturalist After his death his collected writings were
published in 20 volumes and further writings have
continued to appear in print
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 143
CHAPTER EIGHT
THOREAUrsquoS TRYST WITH INDIAN CULTURE
INTRODUCTION
Henry David Thoreau was a great American
transcendentalist thinker His seminal mind and
original thought had an enduring impact on his own
countrymen and also on peoples beyond the bounds of
America His philosophy and life had a deep influence
on all great men of his time Mahatma Gandhi regarded
him as his Guru and his concept of Satyagraha owes its
origin to Thoreaursquos essay on Civil Disobedience which
Gandhiji chanced upon in South Africa On Thoreaursquos
greatness another great American contemporary RW
Emerson once remarked ldquoHis soul was made for the noblest society he had in short life exhausted the capabilities of this world Wherever there is knowledge wherever there is virtue wherever there is beauty he will find a homerdquo
HIS LOVE OF SOLITUDE
Endowed with a rare meditative mind Thoreau loved
lsquosweet solitudersquo for he held that what is truly alone is the
spirit A seeker after perfection he retired to the
solitude of the woods to see with the eyes of the soul ndash
ldquothe higher law in naturerdquo and realize his oneness with
the Cosmic Spirit A lover of the spirit behind the world
of appearance he once said ndash ldquoI love to be alone I never
found the companion that was so companionable as
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 144
solitude In solitude of the woods I suddenly recover my
spirits my spirituality I can go from the buttercups to
the life everlastingrdquo His love for loneliness resembles
that of our own sages and saints who shunned the din
and clamour of madding crowds and retired to the
sylvan solitude of the woods for meditation on
mysteries of life It was in the secluded and tranquil
atmosphere of the woods that the great teachers of
mankind cultivated their souls observed austerity and
wrote the holiest scriptures Aranyakas and sacred texts
Gurukul (forest academies)- the ideal nurseries of
higher learning and disciplined rigorous life were setup
here for success in life and self-realization which is a
path-way to God-realization
HIS CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE AND GANDHIJIrsquoS
SATYAGRAHA
Bapu read Thoreaursquos essay on Civil Disobedience for
the second time in jail and was so deeply impressed by
it that he called it ldquoa masterly treatise which left a deep impression on merdquo He copied the words ldquoI did not feel for a moment confined and the walls seemed a great waste of stone and mortarrdquo Gandhiji wrote to Roosevelt
in 1942 ldquoI have profited greatly by the writings of Thoreau and Emersonrdquo He told Roger Baldwin that
Thoreaursquos essay ldquocontained the essence of his political philosophy not only as Indiarsquos struggle related to the British but as to his own views of the relation of citizens to Governmentrdquo As Miller observed ldquoGandhiji received back from America what was fundamentally the philosophy of India after it had been distilled and crystallized in the mind of Thoreaurdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 145
In his Civil Disobedience which as a document of
much ethical and spiritual value is manrsquos most powerful
weapon in dealing with tyranny Thoreau examines the
relation of the individual to the state and offers a candid
exposition when he says ldquoThat Government is best which governs the leastrdquo He believed in the supremacy of
moral laws and his concept of Civil Disobedience is
based on the dictates of conscience Since the nature of
an individual is determined by his conscience there is
always a basic conflict between the laws arbitrarily
made by the Government and the objectives sanctioned
and held sacred by the individualrsquos conscience He
regarded the individual as more important than the
state So in the interests of justice and virtue men with
clean conscience most oppose unjust laws The form of
protest launched by conscientious and holy men against
government is called Civil Disobedience
Thoreau seems to have derived the concept from the
Bhagvad Gita which invests each individual with two
contradictory traits ndash the Divine Attributes and the
Diabolical Propensities Whenever diabolical tendencies
promote arbitrary administration by making unjust
laws and men of clean conscience are forced to obey
them injustice prevails and justice or righteousness is
destroyed In such a situation the Divinity incarnates
itself and sets matters right Declares Lord Krishna
ldquoWhenever righteousness (Virtue) is on the decline and injustice (Vice) is on the ascendant then I body forth myselfrdquo
Bhagvad Gita IV7
To Gandhiji also Satya (Truth) and Ahimsa (Non-
violence) are inter-related and Satyagraha or non-
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 146
violent resistance is based on the belief in the power of
spirit the power of truth the power of love by which we
can overcome evil through self-suffering and self-
sacrifice
FORMATIVE INDIAN INFLUENCES
Thoreau was thoroughly immersed in the Indian
scriptures In Emersonrsquos library he read and was deeply
influenced by the Manusmriti Bhagvad Gita Vishnu Puran Hitopadesh Rig-Veda and the Upanishads
Which the Manusmriti led him to seek the Self in
solitude the Bhagvad Gita taught him the ideal of
disinterested action non-attachment meditation and
self-realization He was so overwhelmed by the Gita that
he declared it to be the lsquoUniversal Gospelrsquo Praising its
moral grandeur and sustained sublimity of thoughts he
wrote in Walden ndash ldquoIn the morning I bathe my intellect in the stupendous cosmogonal philosophy of the Bhagvad Gita since whose composition years of the gods have elapsed and in comparison with which our modern world and its literature seems puny and trivial the best Hindu scripture (Gita) is remarkable for its pure intellectuality The reader is nowhere raised into and sustained in a higher purer and rarer region of thought than the Bhagvad Gita It is unquestionably one of the noblest and most sacred scriptures which have come down to us The oriental philosophy assigns their due rank respectively to action and contemplation or rather does full Justice to the latterrdquo
A thorough study of the Upanishads made him exclaim
joyfully ldquoWhat extracts from the Vedas I have read fall on me like the light of a higher and purer luminary which describes a loftier course through a purer stratum ndash free from particulars simple universalrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 147
At a time when the Western philosophers did not
appreciate the significance of contemplation Thoreau
emphasized that contemplation is as important as
action for the latter has to be charged by the former
otherwise action will lead to chaos disillusionment and
despair
HIS TRANSCENDENTALISM
Thoreau was an empirical transcendentalist To him
transcendentalism was a profound exploration of the
spiritual foundations of life His emphasis on intuition
or inner light for a direct relationship with God which
transcends all the conventional avenues of
communication stemmed from an intuitive capacity for
grasping the ultimate truth He was interested less in
the material world than in spiritual reality He regarded
Nature as a viable garment of the spiritual world and
the universe as the embodiment of a single Cosmic Soul
His transcendentalism relied upon the higher planes of
human circumstances its oneness with something
higher than itself While logical reasoning fails to grasp
the truth intuition transcends understanding and is a
synthesizing power to understand the organic whole
which is called the Over-soul
An individual of exceptional self-ascending and self-
reliance he believed that Over-soul is brought down to
earth by action rather than words He therefore did not
preach transcendentalism but actually lived it To him
transcendentalism is ldquoan inquisitive and contemplative access to Godrdquo He believed in the immanence of God in
nature and in man and also the identity of God with the
soul of the individual He said ldquothe creator is still behind the increate the Divinity is so fleeting that its attributes are never expressedthe idea of God is the idea of
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 148
our Spiritual nature purified and enlarged to infinity In ourselves are the elements of Divinity We see God around us because He dwells within usrdquo
This statement reminds us of a verse in the Gita
wherein Lord Krishna declares that every living heart is
His abode
ldquoArjuna God abides in the heart of all creatures causing them to revolve according to their deeds by His illusive power seated as those beings are in the vehicle of the bodyrdquo
At one place Thoreau said ldquoThe whole is whole an organic whole which is called Over-soul or Para-Brahman and the highest aim of life is to realize this truth and be one with the whole or Over-soulrdquo Thoreau seems to have
been moved by our Vedic incantation which says
ldquoThat (the invisible Absolute) is whole whole is this (the visible phenomenal universe) from the invisible whole comes forth the visible whole Though the visible whole has come out from that invisible whole yet the whole remains unalteredrdquo Thus the phenomenal and the
Absolute are inseparable All existence is in the
Absolute and whatever exists must exist in it hence all
manifestation is merely a modification of the one
Supreme Whole and neither increases nor diminishes It
Serene and thoughtful as he was he wrote in his
Journal ldquoThe fact is I am a mystic a transcendentalist and a natural philosopher to bootrdquo
HIS ASCETISM (SANNYASA)
He was a true ascetic or Sannyasi for he preached and
practiced the basic human values of Anasakti (non-
attachment) and Aparigraha (non-possession)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 149
throughout his life He abhorred acquisition of wealth
and regarded worldly possessions as the result of sheer
exploitation of the masses by a few powerful men and
agencies including the State and the Government Since
the universe belongs to God any claim to ownership or
personal possessions is against moral law and is in fact
a sin against divinity Moral laws being superior to
worldly rules his preference for a life of self-abnegation
and renunciation bears a striking similarity to our Vedic
view expressed in the very opening line of the
Ishopanishad
ldquoAll this whatever exists in the universe is inhabited by the Lord Having renounced (the unreal) enjoy (the real) with restraint Do not covet or set your eye on the possession of othersrdquo
To him all worldly attractions and allurements were but
a passing show or fleeting moments (in eternity) which
distract the seekers of truth from cultivating self-culture
and promoting inner spiritual growth
EXPLORER OF THE INNER WORLD OF SPIRIT
Thoreau was an explorer of the inner self He wanted to
pass ldquoan invisible boundaryrdquo establishment within and
around him new universal and more liberal laws and
live with higher order of beings To him every man is
the Lord of the realm beside which the earthly empire
of the Czar is but a petty state a hammock left by the
icethere are continents and seas in the moral
world yet unexplored by him He praised William
Habbingtonrsquos following lines which echoed his own
thoughts
ldquoDirect your eyes right inward and you will find
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 150
A thousand regions in your mind
Yet undiscovered Travel then and be
Expert in home home cosmographyrdquo
Simple living based on extreme reduction of wants and
self-reliance enabled him to lsquocultivate the garden of his soulrsquo In consonance with the concept of an ideal Yogi in
the Gita he wrote
ldquoThe millions are awake enough for physical labour but only one in a million is awake enough for effective intellectual exertion and only one in a hundred millions do a poetic or divine liferdquo How truly does this view echo
the memorable words of Lord Krishna
ldquoAmong thousands of men one rare soul strives for perfection and among those who strive with success one perchance knows me in truthrdquo
Condemning people who go to Africa to hunt giraffes for
pastime he exhorted them to aim at seeking their own
lsquoSelfrsquo He said ldquoIt would be a noble game to shoot onersquos selfrdquo He seems to recall the famous verse of the
Mundakopanishad which says
ldquoThe Pranava is the bow the Atman is the arrow and the Brahman is said to be its mark It should be hit by one who is self-collected and that which hits becomes like the arrow one with the mark ie Brahmanrdquo
When he ordains lsquoto shoot oneselfrsquo he like our Vedic
seers hints at penetrating the truth centre in us with
our mind propelled by the motive force generated in the
voiceless ecstasy of deepest meditation which touches
the Brahman the Ultimate Reality When the individual
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 151
soul gets fully detached from its contacts with matter or
its false identification with material envelopment it
realizes its oneness with the Supreme Brahman How
beautifully has he stressed the value of inner search in
the concluding sentence of Walden
ldquoThe light which puts out our eyes is darkness to us Only that day dawns to which we are awake There is more day to dawn The Sun is but a morning starrdquo
IMMORTALITY OF SOUL AND THE DOCTRINE OF
TRANSMIGRATION
Thoreau firmly believed in the immortality of soul and
its transmigration He had fully imbibed the philosophy
of the Gita which enunciates in unequivocal terms the
permanence of the soul and the transience of the body
Says Lord Krishna
ldquoThis soul is never born and never dies nor does it become only after being born For it is unborn eternal everlasting and ancient even though the body is slain the soul is notrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II20
ldquoAs a man shedding worn-out garments takes other new ones likewise the embodied soul casting off worn-out bodies enters into others which are newrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II22
Thoreau considered his life as a series of many more
lives to come On his return from Waldon Pond he said
ldquoI had several more lives to live and could not spare any more for that onerdquo At another place he refers to the
solitary hired manrsquos lsquosecond birth and peculiar religious
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 152
experiencersquo He evidently recalled the following words of
St John ldquoExcept a man be born again he cannot see the kingdom of Godrdquo In his Waldon he refers to a bug and
declares ldquoWho does not feel his faith in a resurrection and immortality Who knows what beautiful and winged whose egg has been buried for ages under many concentric layers of woodenness in the dead dry life in societyheard perchance of gnawing out now for years by the astonished family of man may unexpectedly come forth from amidst societyrsquos most trivial furniture to enjoy its perfect summer life at lastrdquo
CONCLUSION
Thoreau was a true Yogi or an ascetic modeling on the
Indian tradition of strict moral code of conduct for a
Sannyasi He drew abundant spiritual and moral
sustenance from the Indian scriptures and its rich
lsquoculturersquo and approximated the ideal of a perfect recluse
The concept of an ideal Yogi is similar upto a point to
the postulates of Divinity expressed thus in the Atharva Veda
ldquoThe Yogi is desireless and hence free from the impact of animal nature he is serene in the heroism of the spirit he is satisfied with the essence of things perceived spirituality and hence does not depend on sense-perception for happiness and so he is complete in himself And though the physical body is subject to decay and death he remains unworn and ever youthful in spirit and has no fear of deathrdquo
Atharva Veda XVIII44
Such an enlightenment Yogi or spiritual superman was
Thoreau whose greatness will ever inspire us and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 153
illumine our lifersquos path with light and love His life was
lsquoa chronicle of actions just and brightrsquo and his writings
were lsquowrit with beams of heavenly light on which the eyes of God not rarely lookrsquo
Proof
Printed By Createspace
Digital Proofer
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 14
And again he says
ldquoWhere mercy love and pity dwell
There God is dwelling toordquo
The Divine Image
William Wordsworth was essentially a seer-poet He
was perhaps the first English poet to appreciate the
innate kinship of man with Nature and find in her a
calm and invisible spiritual presence in perfect
communion with the Cosmic Soul He recognized the
essential spiritual unity of all things and the
interpenetration of human life with that of the universe
His poetic faith was based on an indwelling spirit in
nature which interpenetrated all life and transformed
and transfigured with its radiance rocks fields trees
and the people who lived close to them He found
something that permeates and transfigures everything
He perceived this indwelling spirit and the vision of the
Infinite (God) in his poetry He concluded that Nature
being the manifestation of God is our best moral guide
and teacher
ldquoOne impulse from a vernal wood
May teach you more of man
Of moral evil and of good
Than all the sages canrdquo
In his Ode to the Intimations of Immortality which is
his spiritual autobiography he expresses his belief in
pre-existence which is also an article of faith in our
scriptural texts
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 15
ldquoOur birth is but a sleep and a forgetting
The soul that rises with us our lifersquos star
Hath had elsewhere its setting
And cometh from afarrdquo
His mystical experience of lsquothat serene and blessed moodrsquo in which we lsquoare laid asleep in body and become a living soulrsquo and his perception of lsquoa sense sublime of something more deeply interfuseda motion and a spirit that impels all thinking things all objects of all thought and rolls through all thingsrsquo reflect not only
his profound pantheism but also find close parallels in
our own religio-spiritual literature
Samuel Taylor Coleridge who was one of the seminal
minds of his generation possessed the most fertile
imagination According to William Hazlitt he lsquohad angelic wings and fed on mannarsquo for his writings are
ethereal mystical and magical Endowed with a rare
lsquomystic idealismrsquo he was besides being a great poet a
speculative philosopher also who considered life as lsquoa vision shadowy of Truthrsquo He justified the phrase ndash
lsquoRenaissance of wonderrsquo for he revived the supernatural
and invested it with indefiniteness and suggestion
which characterize his imagination He drew his
conceptions from lsquomythrsquo and embodied them with
symbols His images express his emotion spiritual state
and metaphysical experience Unlike other poets his
poetry grew from his inner organic law and made
supernatural and romantic subjects credible to human
nature by creating lsquothat willing suspension of disbeliefrsquo that constitutes his poetic faith He was the first great
British idealist of his age who preferred the intellectual
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 16
intuition to the conceptual dialectic The image and
vision of God lsquoimago deirsquo as an intellectual
contemplation (speculari) of the transcendent Absolute
(the prius) of all beings is an aspect of his speculative
mysticism
Byron however stands apart from all other poets
included herein for although his philosophy of life was
altogether different from that of his contemporaries he
was a force a portent and historical phenomenon in his
age He was endowed with a rare fire for liberty
indomitable courage sacrificing spirit and prophetic
zeal which are undoubtedly great human values His
inevitable attitude was revolt both social and personal
As an influence and portent he was the most powerful
poet in his age for he created that Byronic legend which
became a historic phenomenon of lasting fascination of
his personality Endowed with fiery energy his self-
portrait of careless arrogance or even daemonic figure
was a persona of romantic panache He was a portrait
and a symbol whom it was possible to worship or
condemn but never to neglect
PB Shelley who was lsquoone frail form ndash a phantom among men companionlessrsquo (Adonais) occupies a
unique position among Romantic poets Essentially he
was a visionary whose philosophy of enlightenment
made his poetry fanciful and ethereal He was a born
revolutionary who launched a crusade against the
organized religion and society Disgusted by the gloomy
state of the world he dreamed a world of beauty
freedom and virtue and made his poetry a trumpet of
narcissistic fantasy A solitary intellectual lsquowandering companionlessrsquo (Alastor) his poetry is the projection of
his sense of isolation He was fired by rationalist
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 17
revolutionary thought which reflects his visions of the
future Endowed with rationalist speculative intuition
his poetry symbolizes the spirit of human welfare
ldquoI wish no living thing to suffer painrdquo
Prometheus I303
The desire of Shelley reminds us of our scriptural
prayer ndash ldquoसव भवत स13खनः सव सत नरामयाःrdquo His
imagination is idealistic and vision synoptic He deals
with the heavens and light and aspired for the
regeneration of the world through love To him there is
no dualism between the material and spiritual life for
they are the aspects of same reality To him only
Eternity is real while the phenomenal world is but an
illusion or माया ndash a veil that hides true light He echoes a
Vedic truth when he says
ldquoThe One remains the many change and pass
Heavenrsquos light forever shines Earthrsquos shadows fly
Life like a dome of many-coloured glass
Stains the white radiance of Eternityrdquo
Adonais L11
He treats natural objects and forces as symbols for his
own emotional patterns In his lsquoOde to the West Windrsquo
he uses the West Wind as a spirit of destruction and
regeneration or death and rebirth He considers death
as only a prelude to renewed life and this shows his
faith in the transmigration of human soul or the cycle of
death and rebirth He declares
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 18
ldquoIf winter comes can spring be far behindrdquo
Ode to the West Wind
His entire poetry is a vivid and symbolic expression of
the wretched actuality and the radiant idea He wants to
herald a perfect world order based on love and
freedom He treats poetry as a potent instrument of
redemption and it was his deep romantic sensibility and
fanciful ecstatic Platonic love that earned him this
description of lsquopinnacled dim in the intense inanersquo He
was one of the greatest lyricists and an
lsquounacknowledged legislator of the worldrsquo of thought and
imagination
John Keats who in his own words was lsquoa fair creature of an hourrsquo was perhaps the first conscious artist whose
artistic intuition was far ahead of his time By declaring
that ldquoan artist must serve Mammonrdquo he wished to confer
on arts a special status and thus laid the foundation of
the doctrine of lsquoArt for Artrsquos sakersquo His minute delicate
and sensuous observation of the visible world of Nature
inspired his poetry which he wanted to lsquoloadrsquo with a
special excellence His delightful communion with
Nature and the sensuous ecstasies of its sight sound
smell touch and taste formed some of his best poetry
His delicacy and keenness of perception and love for
passive contemplation made him exclaim ndash ldquoO for a life of sensations rather than thoughtrdquo But in fact most of
his sensations were his thoughts for they were
embodied in sensuous pictorial form and rich symbolic
imagery
As a liberal enthusiast he felt that sharing the distress of
humanity or participation in ldquothe agony and strife of human heartsrdquo was essential not only for human growth
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 19
but also for poetic maturity This philanthropic attitude
of Keats brings him very close to our ardent Indian
prayer - ldquoसव भवत स13खनः सव सत नरामयाःrdquo ndash May all be happy may none struck with disease To find an
escape from the fret and fever of life he sought refuge in
an infinite yearning for beauty and turned to the realm
lsquoof Flora and old Panrsquo but soon realized the transience of
the world and started exploring permanence He could
find it in the spirit of beauty which is but a reflection of
eternal truth His passionate pursuit of ideal beauty
which he identified with truth has been beautifully
expressed in the following oft-quoted lines
ldquoBeauty is truth truth beauty that is all
Ye know on earth and all ye need to knowrdquo
Ode on a Grecian Urn
This fundamental unity or oneness of beauty and truth
and their interplay in the visible world are the
mainsprings of his poetic creed
The conflict between transience and permanence forms
the theme of his famous Odes and he longs for a
solution and lasting happiness in the form of Art or lsquoon the viewless wings of Poesyrsquo At the height of his
impassioned contemplation when the life of the spirit is
fused with the objects of immediate sensuous
experience he has glimpses of the permanence of
beauty which reflects Eternal Truth In one of his letters
(281) he declares ldquoI can never feel certain of any truth but from a clean perception of its beautyrdquo And at another
place when he finds mortality and immortality poles
apart he asserts the everlasting value of truth ldquoTruthrdquo
he says ldquomeans that which has lasting valuerdquo This firm
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 20
conviction of Keats seems to be a distinct echo of our
Vedantic dictum
सयमव जयत नानतम सयन पथा वततो दवयानः
यनामतय तत सयय परम नधान ldquoTruth alone triumphs not untruth By truth is laid out the Path Divine along which the seers who are free from desires and cravings ascend the supreme abode of Truthrdquo
Mundak Upanishad III16
Again the Vedic seer says that the Atman (self) is to be
realized only through truth
सयन लampसतपसा यष आमा
मडकोपनषद III15
Thus truth is the foundation of Dharma (righteousness)
for it is an essential and abiding value of human life The
eternal oneness of beauty and truth and vice versa and
their transcendental reality was Keatsrsquo poetic creed and
the realization of this basic spiritual truth raised him to
a level of sublime consciousness which is the mark of a
true seeker of truth or seer
In sum we may say that though lsquoa lily of a dayrsquo Keats
proved that a crowded hour of glory is far better than
an age without a name as has been stressed in our epic
Mahabharat where Queen Vidula exhorts her son
Sanjaya ldquoमहतम 0व1लत 2यो न त धमतम 4चरrdquo ndash ldquoIt is better to flame forth for an instant than to smoke away for agesrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 21
Though Keats died at the young age of 26 years he left
an indelible imprint on the history of English poetry for
his deep and pervasive influence could be easily seen on
Tennysonrsquos early work Moreover he was indisputably
the precursor of the Pre-Raphaelite movement In fact
he had reached near perfection in poetic craftsmanship
which will ever remain worthy of emulation for the
succeeding generations of poets
Ralph Waldo Emerson known as the lsquoSage of Concordrsquo
acted as a bridge between the East and the West His
abiding interest in the Indian scriptures and
particularly the Gita was a source of the Concord
Movement in America According to Swami
Vivekananda all the broad movements in America are
indebted to the Concord Party Mahatma Gandhi
remarked after reading Emersonrsquos Essays ldquoThe Essays to my mind contain the teaching of Indian wisdom in a Western lsquoGurursquo it is interesting to see our own sometimes differently fashionedrdquo Emerson drew freely on the
Upanishads Manusmriti Vishnu Puran and above all
the Gita and his writings reflect his indebtedness to our
holy texts
Pt Jawaharlal Nehru admired Emersonrsquos gospel of self-
reliance and righteousness in particular and regarded
him as one of the builders of America A
transcendentalist and thinker par excellence Emersonrsquos
ideas shaped not only his countrymenrsquos thinking but
had a deep and pervasive influence over many other
nations His main thoughts coloured as they are by our
own Indian religio-philosophical strands are universal
in appeal and are as relevant today as they were in his
own lifetime
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 22
In formulating his concept of Over-Soul Emerson
stressed the fundamental identity of Individual Soul
with Over-Soul He asserted ldquoWithin man is the soul of the whole ndash the wise silence the universal beauty to which every part and particle is equally related the Eternal Oneonly by the vision of that wisdom can the horoscope of ages be readrdquo He firmly believed in the
immortality of soul and the ephemerality of the world
and strongly condemned the futility of manrsquos vanity and
ego-centric attachment to the perishable objects of the
world His writings leave us lsquocalm of mind all passions spentrsquo In fact lsquohe gives men to mankind and mankind to the laws of Godrsquo
Henry David Thoreau was a great empirical
transcendentalist about whom Emerson once remarked
ldquowherever there is knowledge wherever there is virtue wherever there is beauty he will find a homerdquo His essay
on lsquoCivil Disobediencersquo which Gandhiji read twice in a
South African jail impressed him so much so that he
regarded him as his political lsquoGurursquo and his concept of
Satyagraha owes its origin to Thoreaursquos writings
Endowed with a rare meditative mind he loved lsquosweet solitudersquo and retired to the woods for discovering the
lsquohigher lawrsquo and realize his oneness with the Cosmic
Spirit He believed in the supremacy of moral laws and
his doctrine of Civil Disobedience is based on his dictate
of conscience for he considered individual conscience
more important than arbitrary state laws
Thoroughly immersed in the Indian scriptures his
thought-process and philosophy of life was
considerably moulded by our ancient religio-spiritual
heritage His deep love for our scriptural texts is evident
from his declaration of the Gita as lsquoUniversal Gospelrsquo He
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 23
wrote ldquoIn the morning I bathe my intellect in the stupendous cosmogonal philosophy of the Bhagvad GitaIt is unquestionably one of the noblest and most sacred scriptures which have come down to usthe oriental philosophy assigns their due rank respectively to action and contemplationrdquo
About the Vedas he remarked ldquoExtracts from the Vedas fall on me like the light of a higher and purer luminaryrdquo
According to him Over-Soul could be brought down to
earth not by words but by ldquoan inquisitive and contemplative accessrdquo He further states ldquoIn us are the elements of Divinity We see God around us because He dwells within usrdquo
He was a true ascetic (सयासी) for he preached and
practiced non-attachment (अनासि8त) in his life He was
an explorer of the inner world of Spirit In the seclusion
of woods he lsquocultivated the garden of his soul as a true Yogirsquo and he wanted to lsquoshoot his selfrsquo as our Mundaka Upanishad says
ldquoThe Pranava is the bow Atma the arrow the Brahman its mark It should be hit by a self-collected onerdquo
Much of what is stated in this compact volume may be
found scattered over various other critical works but
my earnest endeavour has been to bring together such
material as is of sufficient spiritual value which belongs
to all times This small comparative survey of the realm
of main ideas of some great poets confirms the splendor
of their rich romantic imagination and the unity of all
spiritual vision that makes them not only the creators of
beauty love and light but also brothers in spirit
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 24
I would feel amply rewarded if through this modest
attempt I am able to arouse keen interest in my readers
for further critical study of the subject Any suggestions
for amplification or improvement on the text are most
welcome
RP DWIVEDI
LUCKNOW
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 25
WILLIAM BLAKE
(28 November 1757 ndash 12 August 1827)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 26
WILLIAM BLAKE
English Poet Painter Engraver and Visionary
He was trained as an engraver by James Basire and
afterward attended classes at the Royal Academy Blake
married in 1782 and in 1784 he opened a print shop in
London He developed an innovative technique for
producing coloured engravings and began producing
his own illustrated books of poetrymdashincluding Songs of Innocence (1789) The Marriage of Heaven and Hell (1790) and Songs of Experience (1794)mdashwith his new
method of ldquoIlluminated Printingrdquo Jerusalem (1804[ndash
20]) an epic treating the fall and redemption of
humanity is his most richly decorated book His other
major works include Vala or The Four Zoas
(manuscript 1796ndash1807) and Milton (1804[ndash11]) A
late series of 22 watercolours inspired by the Book of
Job includes some of his best-known pictures He was
called mad because he was single-minded and
unworldly he lived on the edge of poverty and died in
neglect His books form one of the most strikingly
original and independent bodies of work in the Western
cultural tradition Ignored by the public of his day he is
now regarded as one of the earliest and greatest figures
of Romanticism
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 27
CHAPTER ONE
INDIAN SPIRITUALISM IN BLAKErsquoS VISIONS OF ETERNITY
INTRODUCTION
William Blake was by far the most prophetic of all major
English poets In a preface to his famous poem on
Milton he exclaimed lsquoWould to God that all the Lordrsquos people were Prophetsrsquo Elsewhere Blake declared lsquoA Prophet is a seer not an arbitrary dictatorrsquo According to
PH Butter an acclaimed authority on Blake ldquoa prophet sees behind the marks of woe behind the wars and other evils of his time and the attitudes that cause such things But Blake was not the kind of prophet who just present evils but one who saw the Visions of Eternity one whose senses discovered the infinite in everythingrdquo The prophet
is also a spokesman one who speaks or believes he
speaks for God or some other higher power Blake
himself claimed in one of his letters in 1803 ldquoI dare not pretend to be any other than the Secretary the Authors are in Eternityrdquo
His belief in lsquoinspirationrsquo contributed to that lsquoterrifying honestyrsquo which TS Eliot saw in him to keep him
uncompromisingly true to his vision He perceived a
close relationship of the conscious ndash lsquoIrsquo with the deeper
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 28
self through which all inspiration flows He knew that
the prophet must also be a lsquomakerrsquo lsquoa blacksmith laboring at his furnaces to shape the stubborn structure of the languagersquo He further realized that a prophet
should also be a teacher a preacher and a beacon light
to humanity
Explaining the function of the bard or poet (and his own
mission) Blake in his introduction to Songs of Experience declares
ldquoHear the voice of the bard
Who present past and future sees
Whose ears have heard
The Holy word
That walked among the ancient trees
Calling the lapsed soul
And weeping in the evening dew
That might control
The starry pole
And fallen fallen light renewrsquo
Or again elucidating the aim of writing poetry or his
lsquogreat taskrsquo Blake declares
ldquo I rest not from my great task
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 29
To open the Eternal worlds to open the immortal eyes
Of man inwards into the worlds of Thought into Eternity
Ever expanding in the bosom of God the human imaginationrsquo
Like Milton who wanted lsquoto justify the ways of God to Manrsquo or Shelley who held that lsquopoetry is the revelation of the eternal ideas which lie behind the many-coloured ever-shifting veil that we call reality in lifersquo Blake in his
exceptional prophetic zeal set out to open the Eternal
worlds to open the immortal eyes of man inwards into
the worlds of thought into Eternity He was always at
pains to renew the fallen fallen light The poetrsquos divine
task of lsquoever expanding in the bosom of Godrsquo reminds us
of the moving verse of our Rig Veda in which God as
creator of beautiful forms has been conceived of as the
greatest poet whose divine creative energy s his poetic
power which manifests itself in the manifold forms of
beauty and splendor like the Heaven the Sun the Moon
the Sky etc
यो धता भवानानामगया स कवः काया प पपltयत
ऋवद VIII415
lsquoHe who is the supporter of the world of life
Who knows the secret mysterious names of the morning beams
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 30
He poet cherishes manifold forms by His poetic power even as heavenrsquo
Rig Veda VIII415
As a divinely inspired poet Blake seems to have had
experiences of various psychic and even mystic visions
which awakened him to subtle spiritual life It seems
that he must have transcended normal sensory
perceptions and would have attained to super-sensory
status of consciousness when he declares
lsquoI see the savior over me
Spreading his beams of love and dictating the words of mild song
Awake O sleeper of the land of shadows wake
I am in you and you in me mutual in love divinersquo
Jerusalem L4-7
He seems to have attained to that rare transcendental
consciousness when he perceived perfect communion
with God who assured him
lsquoI am not a God afar off I am a brother and friend
Within your bosoms I reside and you reside in me
We are one forgiving all evil not seeking recompensersquo
Jerusalem L18-20
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 31
Here Blake on perceiving a synoptic vision of complete
identity or oneness of God with individual self seems to
have echoed the eternal ancient Holy Scriptures Here
are a few striking parallels
In our Vedas also Go is regarded and adored as our
most-trusted friend Says the Rig Veda
lsquoमा=कर न ऐना सयाच ऋषः
वBमा Cह Dमतमसया 1शवानrsquo
ऋवद X237
lsquoNever may this friendship be severed
Of thee O Deity and the sage Vimada
We know O God Thy brother-like love
With us be Thy auspicious friendshiprsquo
Rig Veda X237
The key-note of this type of worship is the
contemplation of friendly love (described in later
religious literature as - सय ndash friendliness between the
Deity and the worshipper) The following prayer is in
the same spirit
lsquoभवा नः सFन अतमः सखा वधrsquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 32
ऋवद X133
lsquoBe Thou most dear to us for bliss O friend to aidrsquo
Rig Veda X133
Similarly assuring Arjuna of His perennial benediction
Lord Krishna declares in the Gita
ईHवरः सवभतानामतltठत
Kामयसवभतानमायया
ldquoArjuna God abides in the heart of all creatures
Causing them to revolve according to their Karma
By His illusive power seated as those beings are
In the vehicle of the bodyrdquo
Bhagvad Gita XVIII61
And again describing Himself as the truest friend of all
living beings Lord Krishna pronounces
ldquoI am the (disinterested) friend of all living beings and my devotee attains supreme peacerdquo
Bhagvad Gita V29
To turn to William Blake again he has an essential
belief in the closest intimacy of all living beings with
God who is the fountain-head of all life love and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 33
friendship This belief makes him affirm his faith in the
holiness of all life on earth Says he in his Annotations to Lavater
lsquoAll Life is Holyrsquo
Again he says ldquoIt is God in all that is our companion and friend for our God himself says lsquoyou are my brother my sister and my motherrsquo and Saint John said lsquowho so dwelleth in love dwelleth in God and God in himrsquo and such a one cannot judge of any but in loveGod is in lowest effects as well as in the highest causes for he is become a worm that he may nourish the weak For let it be remembered that creation is God descending according to the weakness of man for our Lord is the word of God and everything on earth is the word of God and in its essence is Godrdquo
In our own scriptures the all-pervasiveness of God (the
One) has been conceived not only in the cosmic world
but also in the world of men The very opening verse of
the Ishopanishad stresses the immanence of God in the
universe
ईशावाय इद सवM यािकNय जगया जगत
ईशोपनष I
lsquoUnderstand all this (universe) as inhabited by the Lord
Each moving thing in this moving worldrsquo
Or again says the Atharva Veda
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 34
य समायोऽवPणोयो वदHयः
यो दवोऽवPणोमानषः
lsquoGod is that in which things converge
He is that from which things diverge
He is our own land he is of foreign land
He is divine he is humanrsquo
Atharva Veda IV168
The immanence of God is the entire universe is also
underscored by Lord Krishna when he tells Arjuna
ldquoThere is nothing besides me Arjuna Like clusters of yarn-beads formed by knots all this (universe) is threaded on merdquo
Bhagvad Gita VII7
SYNOPTIC VISION
A firm belief in the all-pervasiveness of God in the
whole universe led him to perceive every object of
Nature as a window through which we may look with a
sense of awe and wonder into the beauty truth and all-
enveloping eternity which is but a reflection of God
Blake must have had palpable intimations of Eternity
when he wrote
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 35
lsquoTo see a world in a grain of sand
And a Heaven in a wild flower
Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand
And Eternity in an hourrsquo
Auguries of Innocence
Such a super-sensuous or transcendental perception of
Divinity in all creation and all creation in Divinity gave
Blake a subtle insight into the lsquoVisions of Eternityrsquo and
made him not only a seer but also lsquoan inhabitant of
other planes another domain of beingrsquo Commenting on
Blakersquos singular other-worldliness our own seer and
prophet Sri Aurobindo says ldquoThere is no other singer of the beyond who is like him or equal him in the strangeness supernatural lucidity power and directness of vision of the beyond and the rhythmic clarity and beauty of his singingrdquo
It is this contemplative knowledge of infinity in finite
and finite in infinity that has been regarded as the
distinguishing mark of the pure wisdom which finally
leads one to transcendental revelation which has been
so beautifully expressed in our own scriptures
सवभतषभावमययमीRत
अवभ8तसािवक
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 36
lsquoWhen one sees Eternity in things that pass away and Infinity in finite things then one has pure knowledgersquo
Bhagvad Gita XVIII20
The same truth has been emphasized again and again in
the Upanishads When man comes to know the real
truth about God nay when he succeeds in realizing the
truth about God how can he ever revile or adversely
criticize any form or aspect of God The Isha Upanishad
says
यत सवा13ण भतान आमयवानपHयत
सवभतष चामना ततो न वजगSसत
ईशोपनष VI
ldquoWhoever beholds all beings in God alone and God in all beings ie who regards all beings as his own self he no more looks down upon any creature for regarding all as his self whom will he hate and howrdquo
Lord Krishna stresses the same equanimity of vision
when he declares
ldquoThe Yogi who is united in identity with the all-pervading infinite consciousness and sees unity everywhere beholds the self present in all beings and all beings as assumed in the selfrdquo
Bhagvad Gita VI29
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 37
Again Lord Krishna declares
यो मा पHयत सव सवM च मय पHयत
तयाह न DणHया1म स च म न DणHयत
भगवगीता VI30
ldquoHe who sees me (the universal self) present in all beings and all beings existing within me never loses sight of me and I never lose sight of himrdquo
Bhagvad Gita VI30
FAITH IN THE LAW OF ETERNITY
Since God is infinite immanent and omnipresent soul
which is an integral and inalienable part of God is also
immortal The forms or objects of the world may change
but in reality they exist forever and are eternal Like
God soul is everlasting unborn undecaying and
undying Blake says
ldquoWhatever can be created can be annihilated
Forms can not
The oak is cut down by the axe the lamb falls by the knife
But their Form Eternal exists for everrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 38
The poet also believes that all sufferings of man if borne
meekly for a noble cause have their rich recompense
sooner or later for God being all-merciful would
certainly reward his suffering children He believes that
lsquoFor a tear is an intellectual thing
And a sigh is a sword of an angel king
And the bitter groan of a martyrrsquos woe
Is an arrow from the Almightyrsquos bowrsquo
Jerusalem
He believes that God Almighty holds out a solemn
promise of reward to sufferers for a lofty cause God
declares
lsquofear not Lo I am with thee always
Only believe in me that I have power to raise from deathrsquo
Jerusalem
MEANS OF LIBERATION
As the greatest and most inventive of Romantic
mythmakers Blake at first explores the contrary states
of human innocence and experience and then speaks of
lsquothe five gatesrsquo our mortal senses which bind us down to
the earth Not so much interested in the art of the
possible as in the visions of the beyond Blake
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 39
constructed a cosmic myth to show manrsquos infinite
potential and how he might attain to final liberation
from this sinful ephemeral world characterized by a
wheel of births and deaths He weaves his myths round
the fall and salvation of man the universal man and his
ultimate waking to eternal life In his poems lsquoMiltonrsquo and
lsquoJerusalemrsquo he regards Satan as the embodiment of
error selfhood and boundless pride and points out that
the means of liberation or freedom from the worldly
bondages lie in the annihilation of selfhood or ego and
the forgiveness of sins He exclaims lsquoI in my selfhood am that Satan I am that evil onersquo and resolves that he would
go down to self-annihilation In lsquoMiltonrsquo he puts the
following words into the mouth of Milton
lsquobut laws of Eternity
Are not such Know thou I come to self-annihilation
Such are the laws of Eternity that each shall mutually
Annihilate himself for others goodrsquo
Reiterating and stressing his poetic purpose or mission
of life Blake resolves
lsquoMine is to teach men to despise death and to go on
In fearless majesty of annihilating self
I come to discover before Heaven and Hell
the self righteousness in all its hypocritical turpitude
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 40
put off
In self-annihilation all that is not God alone
To put off self and all I have ever and everrsquo
Again in a sincere invocation to God Blake prays
lsquoO saviour pour upon me thy spirit of meekness and love
Annihilate the selfhood in me be thou all my life
Guide thou my hand which trembles exceedingly
Upon the rocks of agesrsquo
SPIRITUAL HUMANISM
Inspired by his implicit faith in Godrsquos fatherhood and
menrsquos brotherhood Blake preached the concept of
universal fraternity Considering the whole world as
one large family he maintained that all divisions and
fragmentations of humanity stemmed from manrsquos
ignorance of the eternal truth of one and only one
universal family The world being the home of mankind
all human beings are inextricably interwoven together
in the same warp and woof of life How beautifully has
this cosmopolitan philosophy of manrsquos eternal identity
with his fellow beings been enunciated in the following
memorable words
lsquoWe live as one man for contracting our infinite senses
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 41
We behold multitude or expanding
We behold as one Man all the universal family
and he is in us and we in him
Live in perfect harmony in Eden the land of life
Giving receiving and forgiving each otherrsquos trespassesrsquo
Elsewhere the poet says
lsquoThere is no other God than God
Who is the intellectual fountain of Humanity
I never made friends but by spiritual gifts
By severe contentions of friendship and the burning fire of thought
He who would see the divinity must see him in his children
So he who wishes to see a vision perfect whole
Must see it in its minute particulars organizedrsquo
Preaching universal brotherhood based on love
understanding and sacrifice he again exclaims (in the
words of Jesus)
lsquoWouldst thou live one who never died
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 42
For thee or ever die for one
Who had not died for thee
And if God died not for man and giveth not himself
Eternally for man
Man could not exist for man is love and God is love
Every kindness to another is a little death in the divine image
Nor can man exist but by brotherhoodrsquo
Jerusalem
Condemning man-made divisions of mankind into
various castes and creeds he says
lsquoAnd all must love the human form
In heathen Turk or Jew
Where mercy love and pity dwell
There God is dwelling toorsquo
The Divine Image
How truly are the poetrsquos ideas relevant even today when
the hot wind of doubt and distrust is blowing all over
the world (which has been broken up into fragments by
caste and creed clime and country) can be viewed in
the context of our age-old belief in the worship of God in
the universal form (Vishwaroop) and our religious and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 43
spiritual aspirations for ensuring the maximum good of
the world To serve humanity in a spirit of humility
impelled our people to look upon the world as one
great undivided family or nest (वHवनीड़म) and all men
as our brethren ndash (वसधव कटFबकम)
The ideal of universal brotherhood and selfless service
to humanity found spontaneous utterance in the
following moving words which embody the sublime
aim of a devout manrsquos life
न वह कामय रा0य न वगम ना पनभव
कामय दःख तSतानाम Dा13ण नामातनाशन
lsquoI do not desire earthly kingdom nor heaven nor do I want rebirth I want to reduce the sorrow of people who are sunk in sufferingrsquo
Today when the horizon of humanity is darkened by
national prejudices the need for spiritual humanism
synoptic vision and universal brotherhood is being
increasingly felt by one and all Here it is worthwhile to
turn our attention to great men whose thoughts
transcend myriad artificial barriers and teach us the
ideal of dedication to the common weal
Since truth transcends all religious dogmas and
disinterested service to mankind is a form of true
worship to God our great men have always prayed
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 44
सव भवत स13खनः सव सत नरामयाः
सव भWा13ण पHयत मा किHचX दःख भाYभवत
lsquoMay all be happy may all living beings be free from diseases may we perceive goodness in all and may none be struck with misfortunersquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 45
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
(7 April 1770 ndash 23 April 1850)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 46
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
English Poet
Orphaned at age 13 Wordsworth attended Cambridge
University but he remained rootless and virtually
penniless until 1795 when a legacy made possible a
reunion with his sister Dorothy Wordsworth He
became friends with Samuel Taylor Coleridge with
whom he wrote Lyrical Ballads (1798) the collection
often considered to have launched the English Romantic
movement Wordsworths contributions include
Tintern Abbey and many lyrics controversial for their
common everyday language About 1798 he began
writing The Prelude (1850) the epic autobiographical
poem that would absorb him intermittently for the next
40 years His second verse collection Poems in Two Volumes (1807) includes many of the rest of his finest
works including Ode Intimations of Immortality His
poetry is perhaps most original in its vision of the
organic relation between man and the natural world a
vision that culminated in the sweeping metaphor of
nature as emblematic of the mind of God The most
memorable poems of his middle and late years were
often cast in elegaic mode few match the best of his
earlier works By the time he became widely
appreciated by the critics and the public his poetry had
lost much of its force and his radical politics had yielded
to conservatism In 1843 he became Englands poet
laureate He is regarded as the central figure in the
initiation of English Romanticism
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 47
CHAPTER TWO
VEDANTA IN WORDSWORTHrsquoS POETRY
In many of his famous poems among which Ode on Intimations of immortality and Lines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey occupy pride of place
William Wordsworth one of the greatest seer-poets of
English literature presents ideas which bear striking
similarity to the rich philosophical thought that found
unimpeded flow in our Vedantic literature
In fact there are so many echoes of Vedanta in the
poetry of Wordsworth that one is apt to conclude that
the poetrsquos lsquophilosophic mindrsquo must have led him to drink
deep at the unfailing springs of Upanishadic Helicon
A poet of nature Wordsworth was essentially lsquoa seer of spiritual realities a seer of the calm spirit in naturersquo and
his poetry at its best is a fine harmony of his spiritual
insight ethical sense and profundity of thought He is a
curious amalgam of the seer the poet and the reflective
moralist who dwells philosophically and even
prophetically on Nature Man and Cosmic Soul
The epithets lsquobest philosopherrsquo lsquomighty prophetrsquo and
lsquoseer blestrsquo which Wordsworth uses for the new-born
innocent child in his famous Ode may be well applied to
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 48
the poet himself for ldquovoyaging in strange seas of
thought alonerdquo Wordsworth had found lsquofull many a gem
of purest ray serenersquo which still shed undiminished
luster on the entire fabric of English poetry
A careful study of the Ode on Intimations of immortality Lines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey Ruth Laodamia To Cuckoo and other poems reveals that Wordsworthrsquos sustained
loftiness of thought had taken him to such heights that
on him (to quote his own words)
lsquo those truths do rest which we are toiling all our lives to findrsquo
What indeed are those truths Those are the elemental
truths of life which were keenly perceived realized and
expressed by the seers and savants of the East and
particularly of our Vedantic times A careful study of
Vedanta which is the aphoristic summary of the co-
ordinated Upanishads the Brahmasutras and the
Bhagvad Gita and is in fact the culmination of Indian
religion and Philosophical thought reveals that serious
scholars of the West drew freely upon it Wordsworthrsquos
poetry bears ample testimony to this fact because
numerous echoes of Vedanta can be easily heard in his
poetry
To cite a few comparative examples the Upanishads
assert in unambiguous terms that the whole universe of
names and forms the world of being and becoming
springs from Brahman (Supreme Godhead or Absolute
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 49
Cosmic Soul) ndash the eternal existence consciousness and
bliss Since the universe is the creation and
manifestation of Brahman it is also pervaded by Him
Naturally therefore only Brahman exists all else is non-
existent or illusory The Chhandogya Upanishad
declares lsquoBrahman is verily the Allrsquo God is the subtle
essence underlying phenomenal existence the whole
nature which is Godrsquos handiwork as well as Godrsquos
garment and is filled and inspired by God who is its
inner controller and soul
The immanence of God has been corroborated by
Brihadaranyak Upanishad in two passages the first
being in the form of an answer given by Yagnavalyak to
Uddalak Aruni
lsquoHe is immanent in fire in the intermundia in air in the heavens in the Sun in the quarters in the Moon in the stars in space in darkness in light in all beings in Prana in all things and within all things whom these things do not know whose body these things are who controls all these things from within He is thy soul the inner controller the immortal He is the unseen seer the unheard hearer the unthought thinker the ununderstood understander other than Him there is no seer other than Him there is no hearer other than Him there is no thinker other than Him there is no understander everything besides Him is naughtrsquo
Brihadaranyak Upanishad II7
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RP DWIVEDI Page 50
In another passage Brihadaranyak Upanishad tells us
that God is the All ndash ldquoboth the formed and the formless the mortal and the immortal the stationary and the moving the this and thatHe is the verity of verities the soul of souls and He is the supreme verityrdquo
Brihadaranyak Upanishad IIV15
Wordsworth like these unique revelatory utterances of
the Upanishads codifies this truth in mystical manner in
Lines Composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey when he regards the Cosmic Soul as supreme power or
all-pervading presence
lsquoWhose dwelling is the light of setting Suns
And the round ocean and the living air
And the blue sky and in the mind of man
A motion and a spirit that impels
All thinking things all objects o all thought
And rolls through all thingsrsquo
Since God is All and everything else is Naught the world
is not real it is an appearance It is not the permanent
all-abiding Absolute Reality but a fleeting show and
ephemeral entity having seemingly phenomenal reality
In other words the world is lsquoshadow not substancersquo ndash it
is just a net-work of Maya
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 51
This Vedantic doctrine finds utterance not only in
Wordsworthrsquos poems like To the Cuckoo in which he
calls the earth ldquoan unsubstantial fairy placerdquo but he
seems to have actually experienced this illusory nature
of the world in states of mystic trance that often visited
him since his boyhood
In the introduction to his Ode on Intimations of Immortality he records such an experience in clear
terms
ldquoI was unable to think of external things as having external existence and I communed with all that I saw as something not apart from but inherent in my own immaterial nature Many a times while going to school have I grasped at a wall or tree to recall myself from the abyss of idealism to the realityrdquo
Such an ecstatic state of realizing eternal truths is
referred to in Lines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey as
lsquoThat blessed mod
In which the burden of the mystery
Of all this unintelligible world
Is lightenedrsquo
And finally to quote from the same poem
lsquoWe are laid asleep
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 52
In body and become a living soul
While with an eye made quiet by the power
Of harmony and the deep power of joy
We see into the life of thingsrsquo
One of the basic postulates of our Upanishadic
philosophy has been the idea of transmigration of soul
or faith in the cycle of births deaths and rebirths The
doctrine of transmigration has been explicitly advanced
in the Upanishads and particularly in the
Kathopanishad and Brihadaranyak Upanishad
In the Kathopanishad when the father of Nachiketas
told him that he had made him over to the god of Death
Nachiketas replied that it was no uncommon fate that
was befalling him
ldquoI indeed go at the head of many to the other world but I also go in the midst of many What is the god of Death going to do to me Look at our predecessors (who have already gone) look also at those who have succeeded them Man ripens like corn and like corn he is born againrdquo
Kathopanishad IV6
The Brihadaranyak Upanishad states the same truth
ldquoAnd as a caterpillar after reaching the end of a blade of grass finds another place of support and then draws itself towards it and as a goldsmith after taking a piece
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 53
of gold gives it another newer and more beautiful shape similarly does this Self after having thrown off this body and dispelled ignorance take on another newer and more beautiful form whether it be of one of the man or demi-god or god or of Prajapati or Brahman or of any other beingsrdquo
Brihadaranyak Upanishad IVIII5
The same truth appears in the Bhagvad Gita when Lord
Krishna says to the mentally agitated Arjuna
ldquoAs a man discarding worn-out clothes takes other new ones likewise the embodied soul casting off worn-out bodies enters into others which are newrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II22
And further Lord Krishna says to Arjuna
ldquoFor in that case the death of him who is born is certain and the rebirth of him who is dead is inevitablerdquo
Bhagvad Gita II27
Wordsworth in his famous Ode on Intimations of Immortality confirms his faith in the transmigration of
soul by saying in unmistakable terms
lsquoOur birth is but a sleep and a forgetting
The soul that rises with us our lifersquos star
Hath had elsewhere its setting
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 54
And cometh from afar
Not in entire forgetfulness
And not in utter nakedness
But trailing clouds of glory do we come
From God who is our homersquo
Again when Wordsworth laments the loss of pure
innocence immeasurable bliss and ecstatic vision of
early childhood in the great Ode and exclaims in
memorable words
lsquoWhither is fled the visionary gleam
Where is it now the glory and the dreamrsquo
He attributes the loss to the worldly intellectuality and
attachments as they grow upon man As childhood
grows into youth and youth into manhood the lsquovision splendidrsquo fades the first clear intimations of immortality
are dimmed leaving behind an unillumined waste of
mere thought and moralizing
lsquoAt length the Man perceives it die away
And fade into the light of common dayrsquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
The world of materialism or attachment tames him so
much so that man lsquothe little actorrsquo thinks
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 55
lsquoAs if his whole vocation
Were endless imitationrsquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
Whatever may be the crux of his philosophy of
childhood this belief of the poet can be safely traced
back to the comprehensive doctrine of the Maya in the
Upanishads and the Bhagvad Gita The Upanishads
tell us that the world is a delusion an appearance not
reality The Taittiriya Upanishad says ldquoAll beings spring from the Supreme Being are sustained by Him and return to the same Absolute at the time of dissolution Our life on earth is therefore a sojournrdquo The Isha Upanishad tells us that ldquothe truth is veiled in this universe by a vessel of gold and it invokes the grace of God to lift up the golden lid and allow the truth to be seenrdquo
It follows that our senses cloud our vision and lead us
farther and farther away from our spiritual moorings as
we come of age Senses dupe us and turn us into
worldlings Lord Krishna says to Arjuna in the Bhagvad Gita ldquoAs the wind carries away the barge upon the waters even so of the wandering senses the one to which the mind is joined takes away his discriminationrdquo
Thus the eternal and boundless Supreme Soul is as it
were limited by the sense organs and the body The
Universal Soul shackled by the body becomes the
individual soul (Paramatma becomes Jivatma) Because
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 56
of the presence of the Soul the spark of the Divine the
senses or sense-objects or worldly attractions fail to
dupe man fully from his divine mission This
metaphysical conviction finds expression in
Wordsworthrsquos Ode He says that though
lsquoShades of the prison-house begin to close
Upon the growing boy
But he beholds the light and whence it flows
He sees it in his joyrsquo
However farther man may go away from Nature ndash the manifestation of God and the indwelling Supreme Soul which resides in his own individual soul he can not
lsquoForget the glories he hath known
And that imperial palace whence he camersquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
Since bliss (Anand) is an inevitable attribute of God and
manrsquos soul being a fragment of Supreme Soul it
experiences the presence of God in moments of
Supreme Joy
Of the innumerable expressions in the Vedantic
literature of the joy of life of joy as the all entwining
principle of life and of creative principle of life and life
too the following passage from the Taittiriya Upanishad is very pertinent here
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 57
ldquoJoy is the Brahman from joy are born all living things by joy they are nourished towards joy they move and in joy they are absorbedrdquo Joy as the foundation of life
emanates from the Upanishad philosophy
Wordsworth seems to hold identical belief when he
craves for joy and laments its loss
lsquoO Joy that in our embers
Is something that doth live
That nature yet remembers
What was so fugitiversquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
The same idea finds expression in Lines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey where Wordsworth
declares it as Naturersquos privilege lsquoto lead (us) from joy to joyrsquo
And lastly the classicus locus of the Upanishadic
philosophy is to be found in the idea of immortality of
soul In the Chhandogya and Mundak Upanishads and
above all in the Kathopanishad we find numerous
references to the immortality of the soul We are told in
a passage of Kathopanishad lsquothat while we are dwelling in this body on earth we can visualize that Atman (Soul) as in a mirror that is contrariwise left being to the right and right being to the leftrsquo In the Bhagvad Gita also
Lord Krishna tells Arjuna about the immortality of Soul
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 58
ldquoThis soul is never born nor dies it exists on coming into being for it is unborn eternal everlasting and primeval even though the body is slain the soul is notrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II20
He further says
ldquoFor this soul is incapable of being cut it is proof against fire impervious to water and undriable as well This soul is eternal omnipresent immovable constant and everlastingrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II24
Wordsworth seems to have been fully convinced of this
philosophia perennis of the Vedanta when he eulogizes
immortality by addressing the child in his Ode in the
following words
lsquoThou over whom thy immortality
Broods like the day
A Master over a slave
A presence which is not to be put byrsquo
The poet in speaking of the lsquotruths that wake to perish neverrsquo seems to be reminiscent of the Upanishadic
concept that freed from the trammels of the body the
individual soul loses itself in the All-Soul when he
declares in the rapture
lsquoOur souls have sight of that immortal sea
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 59
Which brought us hither
Can in a moment travel thitherrsquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
Tracing the expression and confirmation of many other
tenets of Vedanta in the poetry of William Wordsworth
forms an interesting literary venture and instances of
close affinity between the Vedantic doctrines and
Wordsworthrsquos ideas may be multiplied Such a
comparative study proves that eternal truths transcend
the barriers of clime or country time or space and shine
through all ages and in all lands We should draw moral
sustenance from them and live a fuller freer life
Even today the wise all over the world maintain a
remarkable identity of views and their thoughts foster
international understanding
ldquoFrom hand to hand the greeting flows
From eye to eye the signals run
From heart to heart the bright hope glows
The seekers of light are onerdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 60
ST COLERIDGE
(21 October 1772 ndash 25 July 1834)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 61
ST COLERIDGE
English Poet Critic and Philosopher
Coleridge studied at the University of Cambridge where
he became closely associated with Robert Southey In
his poetry he perfected a sensuous lyricism that was
echoed by many later poets Lyrical Ballads (1798 with
William Wordsworth) containing the famous Rime of
the Ancient Mariner and Frost at Midnight heralded
the beginning of English Romanticism Other poems in
the ldquofantasticalrdquo style of the Mariner include the
unfinished Christabel and the celebrated Pleasure
Dome of Kubla Khan While in a bad marriage and
addicted to opium he produced Dejection An Ode
(1802) in which he laments the loss of his power to
produce poetry Later partly restored by his revived
Anglican faith he wrote Biographia Literaria 2 vol
(1817) the most significant work of general literary
criticism of the Romantic period Imaginative and
complex with a unique intellect Coleridge led a restless
life full of turmoil and unfulfilled possibilities
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 62
CHAPTER THREE
COLERIDGErsquoS SPIRITUAL QUEST AND INDIAN THOUGHT
INTRODUCTION
Coleridge was by all accounts a genius par excellence
whose versatility flowed albeit impeded in diverse
channels of creativity such as metaphysics poetry
theology and literary criticism Of all the Romantic poets
he possessed the most fertile and powerful imagination
which earned for him a special place in English poetry
and philosophical thought In the words of William
Hazlitt lsquohe had angelic wings and fed on mannarsquo He had
a lsquoseminal mindrsquo which said William Wordsworth
lsquothrew out a series of grand central truthsrsquo We find in
him the poet the philosopher and the theologian rolled
in one Charles Lamb called him lsquoLogician Metaphysician Bardrsquo whose poetry and writings are
tinged with a magical and ethereal quality His thought
made a permanent landmark on the succeeding
generations of English men of letters for he explored the
mysterious working of human mind
His life presents a saga of sharp contrast between
reality and dream blissful confidence and broken
hopes the warmth of human ties and the solitude of
haunted soul He probed human thought and dilemma
with a rare prophetic insight A prodigious thinker and
sincere seeker of truth he once remarked ldquoI would compare the Human Soul to a shiprsquos crew cast on an
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 63
Unknown Islandrdquo His particular fascination for the
unknown drew him instinctively to the German
transcendental or idealistic school of philosophy
represented by Berkeley Kant Schelling and Fichte
Fired by a peculiar mystic idealism he tried to interpret
the lsquoInterruptionrsquo of the spiritual world and beheld the
unseen with an uncommon eye which looked into the
void and found it peopled with lsquopresencesrsquo To him the
universe was lsquoebullient with creative deityrsquo and was
pervaded by lsquoan organizing surgersquo of vital energies
which emanate directly from God He was indeed an
inspired idealist who laid mystical insistence upon the
immanence and transcendence of God
Endowed with a rare penetrating mind Coleridge
ransacked works of comparative religions and
mythology and arrived at the conclusion that all
religious faiths and mythical traditions agree on the
unity of God and immortality of Soul His constant
intellectual search for truth led him to visionary
interests and universal life consciousness expressed
through the phenomena of human agencies Throughout
his intellectual career he remained a visionary and
philosophical mystic who valued a discreet and proper
exercise of the intellect Since his most serious concern
had been philosophy as a continuous trial for self-
education he wrote ldquodoubts rushed in broke upon me from the fountains of the great deep and fell from the windows of heavenrdquo For him lsquoreligionrsquo as both the
cornerstone and keystone of morality must have a
moral origin and a great poet should be lsquoa profound Metaphysician seeking for truth beauty and salvationrsquo In
one of those radiant moments when the poet the
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 64
metaphysician and the theologian of hope are one he
throws light on the process how truth works out in life
ldquoTruth considered in itself and in the effects natural to it may be conceived as a gentle spring or water source warm from the genial earth and breathing up into the snow drift that is piled over and around its outlet It turns the obstacle into its own form and character and as it makes its way increases its streamand arrested in its courseit suffers delay not loss and waits only to awaken and again roll onwardsrdquo
His description of a mystic as one who wanders into an
oasis or garden lsquoat leisure in its maze of Beauty and Sweetness and thirds (sic) his way through the odorous and flowering Thickets into open Spots of Greeneryrsquo (Aids to Reflection) is reminiscent of his own mysticism and
refers to the lsquoenfolding sunny spots of greeneryrsquo in his
famous poem Kubla Khan
Profoundly impressed by the German Idealist Schelling
whose idealistic school of thought dwelt on speculation
concerning the lsquoAbsolutersquo Coleridge viewed lsquomythrsquo as
primordial expression of elemental truths including the
Divine transcendence Inspired by his Biblical studies he
regarded self-consciousness as lying at the centre of his
philosophical and theological thought In Lay Sermons
he says ldquoSelf which then only is when for itself it hath ceased to be Even so doth Religion finitely expresses the unity of the Infinite Spirit by being a total act of the Soulrdquo
For him the lsquoinner lightrsquo is identical with the indwelling
glorious God and life is but lsquoa vision shadowy of Truthrsquo Attributing the pageant of life and the beauty and
splendor of the world to the immanence of Cosmic Soul
(God) he exclaims
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 65
ldquoAh From the soul itself must issue forth
A light a glory a fair luminous cloud
Enveloping the earthrdquo
Dejection An Ode
And again he says ldquoNature is the art of GodThe true system of natural philosophy places the sole reality of things in an Absolute which is at once causa sui effectus in the absolute identity of subject and object which it calls NatureIn this sense lsquowe see all things in Godrsquo is a strict philosophical truthrdquo
Coleridge firmly believed in the essential unity of God as
Absolute which is the creative foundation of the finite
universe and which distinguishes God from creation
He in the spirit of Vedanta stresses the immanence of
God in all and all in God in his famous poem Frost at Midnight Addressing his son he says
ldquoso shalt thou see and hear
The lovely shapes and sound intelligible
Of that eternal language which thy God
Utters who from eternity doth teach
Himself in all and all things in Himselfrdquo
In order to learn this lsquolanguagersquo Coleridge himself
became a lsquovisionaryrsquo lsquoprophetrsquo or lsquoseerrsquo The idea of
Himself (God) in all and all (creation) in Himself or the
concept that there is God in all things and all things are
things are closely interlinked with God bears a striking
resemblance to our age-old Vedic thought In
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 66
consonance with Indian thought Coleridge underscores
the identity of God (Brahman) with the individual soul
(Jivatma) and regards the universe as the reflection or
manifestation of God The seer he says is one who sees
God the creator in all creation and all creation as the
embodiment of God This according to him is the lesson
that God in His eternal language lsquouttersrsquo and doth teach
from eternity
The inherent oneness and sole identity of Brahman
(God) with the universe is a basic postulate of our
Vedanta and as such Coleridgersquos emphasis on the lsquoUnity of infinite Spiritrsquo bears a close identity with the Indian
philosophy The Oneness of God and the universe has
time and again been stressed in our Vedas and other
scriptures It would be pertinent to cite a few instances
here While the Chhandogya Upanishad describes
Brahman as lsquoOne only without a secondrsquo other
Upanishadic texts contain identical statements such as
lsquoHe is Onersquo and lsquoOne Lordrsquo The opening line of
Ishopanishad declares Godrsquos oneness and His universal
presence in unequivocal terms
ldquoUnderstand all this universe as inhabited by Lord
Each moving thing in this moving worldrdquo
Ishopanishad I
And again the same Upanishad says
ldquoThe wise man who perceives all beings as not distinct from his own self at all and his own Self as the self of every being ndash he does not by virtue of that perception hate any onerdquo
Ishopanishad VI
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 67
The same truth has been expressed in the Bhagvad Gita wherein Lord Krishna tells Arjuna
ldquoHe who sees Me (the Universal Self) present in all beings and all beings existing within Me never loses sight of Me and I never lose sight of himrdquo
Bhagvad Gita VI30
Or again
ldquoHe alone truly sees who sees the Supreme Lord as imperishable and abiding equally in all perishable beings both animate and inanimaterdquo
Bhagvad Gita XIII26
And Lord Krishna says again
ldquoThere is nothing else besides Me O Arjuna
Like clusters of yarn-beads formed by knots on a thread
All this (Universe) threaded on Me (God)
As are pearls on stringsrdquo
Bhagvad Gita VII7
THE DOCTRINE OF KARMA (CAUSE amp EFFECT)
Coleridge seems to subscribe sincerely to the Indian
doctrine of Karma which is based on the law of
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 68
Causation or cause and effect In other words Karmavad
stresses poetic justice or law of life ie virtue is
rewarded and vice is punished Since one must reap the
fruits of his good and bad deeds in life it is axiomatic
truth that lsquoas one sows so shall he reaprsquo In Sanskrit
there is a verse which says ldquoOne must bear the consequences of his good and bad deedsrdquo The echoes of
this doctrine could be distinctly heard in his poetry and
particularly in his greatest poem Rime of Ancient Mariner as also Dejection An Ode where he affirms
ldquoO Lady We receive but what we give
And in our life alone doth Nature liverdquo
So strong was his belief in the doctrine of Karma that in
a letter dated 14th October 1797 to his friend Thirlwell
he tells him how fatalistic his philosophy of life is
ldquoand at other times I adopt the Brahman
creed and say ndash lsquoit is better to sit than to stand it is better to lie than to sit it is better to sleep than wake but death is the best of allrsquordquo
His Ancient Mariner serves as an exhaustive
exposition of the law of Nemesis which works surely
but rather imperceptively in human life The poem is a
myth about a dark and troubling crisis in the human
soul It is actually a tale of crime which is due to
perversity of human will Crime is against Nature
Humanity and God He touches equally on guilt and
remorse suffering and relief hate and forgiveness and
grief and joy The marinerrsquos action shows the essential
frivolity of crimes against humanity and the ordered
system of the world and he deserves punishment for his
guilt Spirits are transformed into the powers who
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 69
watch over the good and evil actions of men and requite
them with appropriate rewards and punishments Since
the mariner has committed a hideous act of wantonly
and recklessly killing the albatross which was hailed in
Godrsquos name as if it had been a Christian soul he must
bear the punishment of life-in-death The killing of the
bird marks the breaking of bond between Man and
Nature and consequently the mariner becomes
spiritually dead When he blesses the water-snakes
even unawares it is a psychic rebirth ndash a rebirth that
must happen to all men
The mariner will never be the man that he once was He
has his special past and his special doom His sense of
guilt will end only with his death The Ancient Mariner
is a myth of a guilty soul and marks the passage from
crime through punishment and possible redemption in
the world So the poem is an allegory of redemption and
regeneration It is indeed a vivid representation or
living symbolization of universal psychic experience
The abiding fascination of the poem is that it is a
fragment of a psychic life It does not state a result it
symbolizes a process
Coleridge adds a moral ndash that the mariner is ndash to teach
by his example love and reverence to all things that God
made and loveth He advocates a sound moral
philosophy of life which extends human sympathy and
love to the animal world He affirms
ldquoHe prayeth well who loveth well
Both man and bird and beast
He prayeth best who loveth best
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 70
All things both great and small
For the dear God who loveth us
He made and loveth allrdquo
Rime of Ancient Mariner
PHILOSOPHICAL MYSTICISM AND lsquoTHE VISION OF GODrsquo
Coleridgersquos longing for the lsquounnamable somethingrsquo and
his abiding interest in conveying something of the
enigmatic perception of Godhead as a religious
experience carved for him a special place in the history
of ideas as a Christian poet and philosopher In a
predominantly mythological age he took serious
interest in the Biblical studies and drew upon the
central Christian image of Paradise as a walled garden
and the vision of God as a symbolizing that
transcendent numinous reality which the soul
inchoately and consciously seeks and strives for The
medieval image of the walled garden (paradise) as the
heavenly city (locus of God) is a symbol of divine
transcendence of that which is lsquobeyond beingrsquo This rich
image (of the walled garden) as an eminently
appropriate image of Godrsquos transcendence was used as
such by Church Fathers and also by the 15th century
Christian Platonist Nicholas of Cusa whose book The Vision of God is a paradigm of speculative mysticism
which informs Coleridgersquos metaphysics and much of his
poetry Taking inspiration from Nicholas of Cusarsquos book
The Vision of God Coleridge found it in close affinity to
his own genuinely philosophical mysticism
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 71
Coleridgersquos interest in the Vision of God is in a purely
visionary mystical tradition and his most visionary
poem Kubla Khan bears ample testimony to his
insistence upon life as lsquoa vision shadowy of Truthrsquo His
conviction in the lsquoImago Deirsquo (vision of God) is an
obvious link with the hoary mystical tradition which lay
at the heart of his philosophical and mystical thought
He maintains that the mind of man is a bridge to the
vision of God but by no means its fulfillment He says
ldquoThe vision and faculty divine is the participation of humanity in the Divinerdquo He however further maintains
throughout his intellectual career the conviction in the
reflection or bending back of the soul from the sensual
to the intelligible realm For him Christianity is an lsquoawful recalling of the drowsed soul from dreams and phantom world of sensuality to actual Realityrsquo
On the idea of reawakening he says
ldquoThe moment when the Soul begins to be sufficiently self-conscious to ask concerning itself and its relations is the first moment of its intellectual arrival into the world Its being ndash enigmatic as it must seem ndash is posterior to its existencerdquo
Collected Notes
In a recent study of Coleridge Prof Douglas Headley of
Cambridge University declares ldquoHe is best described as an essentially speculative and mystical philosopher-theologian His was a theology inspired by those Church Fathers who emphasize the vision of God as an intellectual contemplation (speculari) of the transcendent Absolute the prius of all beingrdquo Since the
mystic tradition follows a supersensuous perception
the vision of God is fundamentally lsquoVisio-intuitivarsquo ndash
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 72
intuitive or intellectual vision Coleridge expresses such
a state of mind when he says
ldquoMy mind feels as if it ached to behold and know something great something One and Indivisible and it is only in the faith of this that rocks or waterfalls mountains or caverns give me the sense of sublimity or majesty But in this faith all things counterfeit Infinityrdquo
Since the sublime enlarges and inspires the Soul to
aspire for the Divine it impresses him with the
fundamental Oneness of God and a universal vision
which he hints at in his Religious Musings as under
ldquoThere is One mind One omnipresent mind
His most holy name is Love
Truth of subliming import
lsquoTis sublime in man
Our noontide majesty to know ourselves
Parts and portions of one wondrous wholerdquo
These passages recall to our mind the famous mantra
(verse) of the Yajurveda where the mystic realization
or the direct experience of the Supreme by a Vedic sage
has been beautifully described in terms of his personal
knowledge of the Divine He says
ldquoI have known this sun-coloured Mighty Being
Refulgent as the sun beyond darkness
By knowing Him alone one transcends death
There is no other way to gordquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 73
Yajurveda XXXI18
ldquoI have realized it I have known itrdquo not that I just
believe in it and all else can also realize it This is not the
expression of an opinion but the statement of an
experience Commenting on this verse Sri Aurobindo
says
ldquoThis is one of the grandest utterances in the worldrsquos spiritual literature for it marks the emanation of this Being from across the darkness into our world so that something of the sun colour may come into our dull heads and dim heartsrdquo
Coleridge seems to be in complete agreement with our
own Indian mysticism which owes its origin to the
Vedas wherein the knowledge of the Divine or the
Ultimate Reality (Brahman) has been regarded not as a
process of philosophical thought but as a direct
experience in the depth of the human soul For him the
divine vision is possible in that spiritual meditation
transformation of intellectual rapture in which all
discursive thought is fully sublimated According to him
the lsquovisio intuitivarsquo is the culmination of all knowledge ndash
sensus-ratio-intellectus and is in conjunction with the
concept of Imago Dei In order to see that which not an
object is ie God the human mind must put aside its own
discursive differentiating reflection ndash spiritus altissimus rationis ndash which guards the walls of the garden of
paradise lsquobeyondrsquo which dwells God The highest
transformation or sublimation of conscience can ensure
an intuitive vision of God and in accordance with the
maxim ndash Simile Simili ndash the mind then becomes like its
object by divesting itself of difference in order to
experience the Absolute Reality Says Coleridge
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 74
ldquoAn Immense Being does strongly fill the soul and Omnipotency Omnisciency and Infinite Goodness do enlarge and dilate the Spirit while it fixtly looks upon them They raise strong passions of Love and Admiration which melt our Nature and transform it into the mould and imagery that which we can contemplaterdquo
Notebooks
Mysticism is thus the subtle path of spiritual realization
of That Reality or Divine Presence which has been
described in our Vedic texts as (lying hidden in a cave shrouded in secrecy) God is one One beyond all
diversities In Him all contradictions and conflicts meet
and dissolve through the spiritual transformation of the
lsquoseerrsquo or lsquomysticrsquo whose soul rises above the bewildering
trammels and distortions of life and seeks unity with all
in the unity with One To such an enlightened seer life
becomes an unceasing adventure from unreality to
reality from ephemerality to eternity from the human
to the Divine One who realizes the Divine as the One
(without parallel) loving Lord finds the whole universe
united in Him Such a significantly mystical experience
finds a memorable expression in the following verse of
the Yajurveda where the sage named Vena beholds
such a divine vision
ldquoThe loving sage (Vena) beholds that Mysterious Existence
Wherein the universe comes to have One home (nest)
Therein unites and therefore issues the whole
The Lord is the warp and woof in the Created beingsrdquo
Yajurveda XXXII8
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RP DWIVEDI Page 75
A careful analysis of the above-quoted passage reveals
all the main elements of mysticism viz
(i) Divinity is a subject of personal spiritual
experience
(ii) The ultimate conception of Divinity is a
mystery symbolically expressed as
गहानCहतम
(iii) The abstract conception of the Divine as an
Essence or Existence is symbolized by a
neuter singular तत and
(iv) The whole universe is united in love as birds
in a nest एकनीड़ or men in a home वसधव कटFबक
To sum up wise men the world over hold almost
identical views on vital matters of human life such as
the mystery of existence soul and oversoul (God) Truth
is verily One as God is one but the pathways to reach it
are very many The ancient Rig Veda proclaims एक सद वDा बहधा वदित ndash ldquoTruth is one sages call it by various namesrdquo In our own times Swami Ram Krishna
Paramhansa said यतोमत तथोपथ ndash as many religions
so many pathways And what the Spanish litteacuterateur
and thinker states as lsquouniversal truthrsquo is equally
applicable to the philosophy and poetry of Coleridge
ldquoA deep faith in life cannot but be spiritual even if only partially spiritualThe path of Truth may not be a path of parallel lines but a path that follows one circle by going to the right and climbing the circle or by going to the left and climbing the circle we are bound to meet at the top although we started in apparently
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 76
contrary directions This is bound to be in the end because Truth is onerdquo
In Charles Lambrsquos words Coleridge lsquohad been on the confines of the next world he had a hunger for Eternityrsquo The truth of this statement is abundantly
borne out by Coleridgersquos sincere effort for the
reconciliation of the ration with transcendental belief
He closes his Biographia Literaria which symbolizes
his spiritual voyage with the following words
ldquoIt is night sacred night The upraised eyes views suns of other worlds only to preserve the soul steady and collected in its pure act of inward adoration to the great I Am and to the filial word that re-affirmeth from eternity to eternity whose choral is the universerdquo
As a true metaphysician Coleridgersquos whole being
pulsated with a passionate and unceasing search for
truth Here indeed was a spiritual aspirant and seeker
who in his own words had lsquotraced the fount whence streams of nectar flowrsquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 77
LORD BYRON
(22 January 1788 ndash 19 April 1824)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 78
LORD BYRON
British Romantic Poet and Satirist
Born with a clubfoot and extremely sensitive about it
he was 10 when he unexpectedly inherited his title and
estates Educated at Cambridge he gained recognition
with English Bards and Scotch Reviewers (1809) a satire
responding to a critical review of his first published
volume Hours of Idleness (1807) At 21 he embarked on
a European grand tour Childe Harolds Pilgrimage
(1812ndash18) a poetic travelogue expressing melancholy
and disillusionment brought him fame while his
complex personality dashing good looks and many
scandalous love affairs with women and with boys
captured the imagination of Europe Settling near
Geneva he wrote the verse tale The Prisoner of Chillon
(1816) a hymn to liberty and an indictment of tyranny
and Manfred (1817) a poetic drama whose hero
reflected Byrons own guilt and frustration His greatest
poem Don Juan (1819ndash24) is an unfinished epic
picaresque satire in ottava rima Among his numerous
other works are verse tales and poetic dramas He died
of fever in Greece while aiding the struggle for
independence making him a Greek national hero
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RP DWIVEDI Page 79
CHAPTER FOUR
BYRON A BLEND OF CLAY AND SPARK
INTRODUCTION
Byron whom Goethe regarded as lsquothe greatest genius of the centuryrsquo and whom Carlyle considered as the noblest
spirit in Europe was one of the most remarkable men
during the 19th Century which was characterized by
liberal optimism He was unquestionably a potent and
force and cause of change in the intellectual outlook and
socio-political structure of his time His colourful figure
his charismatic personality and satiric poetry captured
the imagination of the whole continent As the most
influential English poet he stands out as an important
figure in the history of ideas Representative of a new
age he was the supreme voice which the European
poets recognized for ldquohe put into poetry something that belonged to many men in his time and he was the pioneer of a new outlook and a new art He set his mark on a whole generation and his fame rang from one end of Europe to anotherrdquo
Renowned as the ldquogloomy egoistrdquo he was a sinister yet
great influence in the Romantic Movement His deepest
romantic melancholy his satiric realism and his
aspiration for political realism earned for him such a
wide acclaim that his name became a symbol for all the
great events of his day Commenting on his pervasive
influence Calvert says ndash ldquoIt is impossible not to take Byron seriously and it is disastrous to take him literallyrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 80
A REBEL EXTRAORDINAIRE
Byron was a born rebel Essentially a child of
Revolution his poetry breathes a unique spirit of
revolutionary idealism ldquoI was born for oppositionrdquo he
once remarked and added ldquobeing of no party I shall offend all partiesrdquo Describing him as an aristocratic
rebel Bertrand Russell said
ldquoThe aristocratic rebel of whom Byron was in his day the exemplar is a very different typesuch rebels have philosophy which requires some greater change than their own personal success In their conscious thought there is criticism of the government of the world which takes the form of Titanic Cosmic self-assertion or those who retain some superstition of Satanism Both are to be found in Byron The aristocratic philosophy of rebellionhas inspired a long series of revolutionary movements from the fall of Napoleon to Hitlerrsquos coup in 1933it has inspired a corresponding manner of thought and feeling among intellectuals and artistsrdquo
Byron felt the wild storm of nations akin to the storm
within his own heart and the ruin but the picture of his
own life In his unqualified individualism he takes up an
attitude of hostility towards society Even God appears
to him mirrored in the stormy face of the angry ocean
ldquoThou glorious mirror
Of the Image of Eternityrdquo
He wished to stir the oppressed to revolt and get rid of
tyrants
ldquoFor I will teach if possible the stones
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 81
To rise against earthrsquos tyranny Never let it
Be said that we will truckle into thrones
By ye ndash our childrenrsquos children I think how we
Showed that things were before the world was freerdquo
Don Juan VIIICXXXV4-8
ldquoI have simplified my policiesrdquo wrote he ldquointo a detestation of all existing governmentsrdquo His was the
most dreaded voice of all the revolutionary poets of the
world His voice was the peal of revolutionary thunder
his poetry was the message of the revolutionary forces
He stood as the greatest symbol of a violent and
dreadful revolution
CHAMPION OF LIBERTY
He was essentially a poet of liberty His greatest ideal in
life was how to fight against the forces of tyranny
restriction aggression and enslaving of workers by
puissant exploiters Liberty was an essential part of the
Byronic creed In fact his entire poetic work is
interspersed with some of the finest poetry in praise of
freedom for mankind He composed much splendid
verse for love of freedom His passion for personal
freedom covers national freedom also and the political
freedom in the form of national self-determination
particularly for Italy and Greece He remarks in his
diary of 1821 ldquoDifficulties are the hotbeds of high spirits and Freedom the mother of the new virtues incident to human naturerdquo
Identifying himself completely with the cause of Italy
and Greece he wrote ldquoI shall not fall backbut
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 82
onward It is now the time to act and what signifies ldquoSelfrdquo if a single spark of that which would be worthy of the past can be bequeathed unquenchably to the future It is not one man nor a million but the spirit of liberty which must be spreadrdquo In his Ode to Chillon Castle he characteristically exclaimed
ldquoEternal spirit of the chainless Mind
Brightest in dungeons Liberty thou art
For there thy habitation is the heart
The heart which love of Thee alone bind
And when thy sons to fetters are consignrsquod
To fetters and damp vaultsrsquo dayless gloom
And Freedomrsquos fame finds winds on every windrdquo
Love of liberty lay at the centre of his being and
determined what was best in him ndash belief in individual
liberty and his hatred of tyranny and constraints
whether exercised by individuals or societies Liberty
was an ideal a driving power a summons to make the
best of certain possibilities in him He insisted to be free
and maintained that other men must be free too
Opposition was an integral element in his basic attitude
revolt both personal and social was his forte Love of
freedom is built into the capricious structure of Childe Harold and Don Juan
HIS POLITICAL AND COSMOPOLITAN LIBERALISM
He grew in an atmosphere in which political reaction
against revolutionary ideals was victorious all over
Europe Byron was essentially a liberal by conviction
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 83
and could hardly bear the perception of liberals Though
he loved his native country yet he had a large vision for
the freedom and welfare of all nations The excitement
of political liberalism stirred on behalf of the Greeks
against the oppression of their Turkish overlords made
him a symbol of disinterested patriotism and a Greek
national hero The first two cantos of Child Harold are
tinctured with historical and typographical material as
also the appearance of the Byronic hero with his
exhortations to the degenerate Greeks and Spaniards to
remember their glorious past and arise They contain
Byronrsquos passionate feelings for Greece which was to see
the beginning as it was to see the end of his active life
His Faustian daemonic figure and his defiant
resentment of authority found an appropriate object in
the political sphere
His last journey and his death at Missolonghi in the
cause of Greek independence proves in him the moving
combination of nobility futility and romantic or heroic
panache In the words of Graham Hough lsquoBut for once Byron was on the winning side he died but his cause triumphed and he remains one of its heroes For the whole of the 19th Century he remained a portent and a symbol whom it was possible to worship or to condemn but never to neglectrsquo
A MAN OF ACTION
Action remains at the centre of his life and at last he
gladly seized the opportunity when it presented itself in
Greece Leaving poetry behind himself he took a heroic
resolution in favour of action rather than
contemplation He presents a rare example of fusion
between the active and the reflective lsquofor his was the romanticism of actionrsquo The moralist in the garb of the
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 84
pre-romantic rebel hero of the Childe Harold is cast
aside in Don Juan and the moralist in the somber garb
turns dandy in which moral judgment seems to be
ineffective Quite logically he finally abandons literature
for the field of moral action At last Byron flung himself
off into the world of action The dandy finds at last that
such a death even if it is on the sickbed and not the
battlefield is the only gesture untouched by futility ldquoIt is not enough that art perpetrates life life also must complete artrdquo WB Yeats rightly says ldquoone feels that he (Byron) is a man of action made writer by accidentrdquo
Byron did not regard writing as an end in itself on the
contrary he was several times on the point of giving up
writing He had always before him the hope of some
more active life and felt a certain mistrust for the purely
literary life He asserted ldquowho would write who had anything better to do Action- action I say and not writing Least of all rhymerdquo In a letter to Murray
he wrote ldquoYou will see that I shall do something or otherthat like the cosmogony or creation of the world will puzzle the philosophers of all agesrdquo He was
fully alive to the persistent sense both of human
aspirations and the ceaseless flux of eternity and also
knew that he would not fade into oblivion Said he
ldquoBut at the last I have shunned the common shore
And leaving land far out of sight would skim
The ocean of Eternityrdquo
And again he said
ldquoFor the sword outwears its sheath
And the soul wears out the breastrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 85
HIS ROMANTIC SELF-PORTRAITURE
Byron presents manrsquos mixed and imperfect nature His
personality is a queer blend of flesh and spirit
meanness and nobility clay and spark cause and effect
The lasting fascination of his personality despite his bad
temper careless arrogance the excesses the satiety
melancholy and restlessness owes much to Splendour Primier of Miltonrsquos Satan who is ldquomajestic though in ruinrdquo and the gloom and brutality of the heroes of the
novel of terror His exotic sensibility ranging passions
and sensual perversity take refuge in a sort of ldquoCosmic Satanismrdquo He draws of himself a sketch which
reproduces in a dim outline the somber portrait of his
idealized self in the famous stanzas of Lara
ldquoIn him inexplicably mixed appeared
Much to be loved and hated sought and feared
X X X X X X
A hater of his kind
X X X X X X
There was in him a vital scorn of all
As if the worst had fallen which could befall
An erring spirit
X X X X X X
And fiery passions that had poured their wrath
In hurried desolation over his path
And left the better feeling all at strife
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 86
In wild reflection over his stormy liferdquo
And the Giaour (hiding his sinister path beneath a
monkrsquos gown) also portrays Byron
ldquoA noble soul and lineage high
Alas though bestowed in vain
Which Grief could change and Guilt could stainrdquo
HIS CREDO
Despite all his self-mockery and arrogant egoism he had
a star (vision) and he followed it sincerely He was not
without guiding principles and his heroic death in the
cause of Greek independence shows that he was not an
actor but a soldier a man of affairs and a master of men
Keenly aware of something special in him he wished to
realize his powers and translate them into facts He
wished to be true to himself He had a keen appreciation
of the dignity and personal liberty of man
HIS FATAL TRUTH
Even though he disagreed with the moral code of his
age he had his own values He thought that truthfulness
is a permanent virtue and duty and so did not want to
compromise with conventions nor hide behind cant
Despite many ordeals and his own corroding skepticism
he speaks seriously and directly about his convictions
and presents them with irony satire and mockery Don Juan is a racy commentary on life and manners and is a
record of a remarkable personality ndash a poet and a man
of action a dreamer and a wit a great lover and a great
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 87
hater a Whig noble and a revolutionary democrat The
paradoxes of his nature are fully reflected in Don Juan which itself is a romantic epic and a realistic satire He
was full of many romantic longings but tested them by
truth and reality He remained faithful only to those
which meant so much to him that he could not live
without them
Praising Byron Nietzsche says ldquoMan may bleed to death through the truth that he recognizesrdquo Byron expressed
this in his immortal lines
ldquoSorrow is knowledge they who know the most
Must mourn the deepest over the fatal truth
The tree of knowledge is not that of linerdquo
A BELIEVER IN GOD AND IMMORTALITY OF SOUL
Full of snobbery and rebellion as he was Byron was not
altogether without lofty ideals and religious beliefs He
firmly believed in the immanence and transcendence of
God and the transience of human glory His implicit faith
in the immortality of human soul the ephemerality of
physical body and his unwavering trust in God ndash the
eternal Light of Lights is evident from his following
memorable lines
ldquobut this clay will sink
Its spark immortal envying it the light
To which it mounts as if to break the link
That keeps us from yon heaven which woos us to its brinkrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 88
Childe Harold III13-14
His Childe Haroldrsquos pilgrimage is a lament for lost
empire decay of love and triumph of love over human
mortality His lsquovoyage pittoresquersquo is full of historic and
didactic meditations and his oceanic image illustrates
the truism that nothing is constant but the rhythmic
pattern of its flux In the end all things float and toss on
that Great Ocean of which man is the foam and the
historic events are billows
ldquoBetween two worlds life hovers like a starrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquothe eternal surge
Of time and tide rolls on and bears afar our bubbles
while the graves
Of Empires heave but like some passing wavesrdquo
Don Juan XVI99
He maintains throughout his major poetic works a
sense of the presence of God or the gods and often
employs supernatural machinery to substantiate his
concept
IMMORTALITY OF SOUL
He had complete faith in the immortality of soul Said
he ldquoof the immortality of the soul it appears to me that there can be little doubtit acts also so very independent of bodyHuman passions have probably disfigured the divine doctrines Man is born passionate of body but an innate thought secret
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 89
tendency to the love of God is his mainspring of mind But God helps us allMan is eternal always changing but reproducedEternity Eternalrdquo
Again on his belief in God he says ldquoI sometimes think that man may be relic of some higher materialcreation must have had an origin and a creator for a creator is a more natural imagination than a fortuitous concourse of atoms All things remount to a fountain though they may flow to an oceanrdquo He knew
the limitations and ephemerality of phenomenal
existence He exclaims
ldquoFor I wish to know
What after all are all thingsbut a showrdquo
Unable to explore the stars with scientific aid he takes
up poesy to embark across the ocean of Eternity
ldquoI wish to do much by Poesyrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoBut at least I have shunned the common
And leaving land far out of sight would skim
The Ocean of Eternityrdquo
According to him man accepts the eternal voyage but
since man is not himself unlimited the boat capsizes in
the deep
ldquoAnd swimming long in the abyss of thought
Is apt to tire
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 90
For the fall entails not only ignorance and weakness but Human mortalityrdquo
Disconcerted with mankind he turns to the placid
spectacle of Nature and feels his spirit merge into its
objects
ldquoI live not in myself but I become
Portion of that around me and to me
High mountains are a feeling
When the soul can flee
And with the sky ndash the peak ndash the heaving plain
Of Ocean or the stars mingle ndash and not in vainrdquo
Childe Harold III72
This pantheistic ecstasy gives him a sense of quasi-
immortality
ldquoSpinning the clay clod bonds which round our being clingrdquo
The picturesque is translated into a kind of mystical
union with the spirit of the place even with the
universe itself
ldquoAre not the mountains waves and skies a part
Of me and my soul as I of them
(Is not) the universe a breathing part
The spirit is clogged with clayrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 91
HIS PESSIMISM
The myth of Cuvierrsquos undulations of Cosmic history
reflects Byronrsquos consistent and mature pessimism His
pessimism is traceable to his own view of society
Through a metaphor he considers his age as
ldquocatastrophicrdquo ndash an ice age of the human spirit and a
declining moral grandeur His myth of Fall and
recurrence of the Ocean and ice is both comic and
historic social and literary and personal as well The
consequences of the Fall and of manrsquos imperfect nature
are seen in all major human activities Generally fallen
mankind is hounded by its lower appetites spirit
encumbered by flesh The image of Fall is linked in
Byronrsquos imagination with the rhetorical image of the
poetrsquos lsquoflightrsquo which incurs the risk of consequent
lsquosinkingrsquo or bathos And over it all hangs the perplexity
of manrsquos ignorance about his aims his nature his true
identity
ldquoFew mortals know what end they would be at
But whether glory power or love or treasure
The path is through perplexing ways and when
The goal is gained we die you know ndash and thenrdquo
HIS PROPHETIC VISION
Endowed with strong imaginative power he had
experimented in Vulcanian visions of the earth plunged
into darkness by the final extinction or the sun or lsquoa ruined starrsquo plunging on in flames through the wastes of
space This prophetic faculty is amply evident from his
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 92
poem Darkness in which his imagination prefigures the
devastating effects of nuclear weapons
ldquoThe Hour arrived ndash and it became
A wandering mass of shapeless flame
A pathless Comet and a curse
The menace of the Universe
Still rolling on with innate force
Without a sphere without a course
A bright deformity on high
The monster of the upper skyrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoI had a dream which was not at all a dream
The bright sun was extinguished and the stars
Did wander darkling in the eternal space
The habitations of all things which dwell
Were burnt for beacons cities were consumedrdquo
Darkness IV42-45
In sum and in essence Byron exemplifies Shelleyrsquos
pronouncement that poets are the unacknowledged
legislators of the world More than any other Romantic
poet Byron embodies the dictum ndash lsquowhat is to give light must endure burningrsquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 93
PB SHELLEY
(4 August 1792 ndash 8 July 1822)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 94
PB SHELLEY
English Romantic Poet
The heir to rich estates Shelley was a rebellious youth
who was expelled from Oxford in 1811 for refusing to
admit authorship of The Necessity of Atheism Later that
year he eloped with Harriet Westbrook the daughter of
a tavern owner He gradually channeled his passionate
pursuit of personal love and social justice into poetry
His first major poem Queen Mab (1813) is a utopian
political epic revealing his progressive social ideals In
1814 he eloped to France with Mary Wollstonecraft
Godwin in 1816 after Harriet drowned herself they
were married In 1818 the Shelleys moved to Italy
Away from British politics he became less intent on
social reform and more devoted to expressing his ideals
in poetry He composed the verse tragedy The Cenci (1819) and his masterpiece the lyric drama Prometheus Unbound (1820) which was published with some of his
finest shorter poems including Ode to the West Wind
and To a Skylark Epipsychidion (1821) is a Dantean
fable about the relationship of sexual desire to spiritual
love and artistic creation Adonais (1821)
commemorates the death of John Keats Shelley
drowned at age 29 while sailing in a storm off the Italian
coast leaving unfinished his last and possibly greatest
visionary poem The Triumph of Life
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 95
CHAPTER FIVE
SHELLEY A PILGRIM OF ETERNITY
INTRODUCTION
Shelley who in his Adonais eulogized Keats as lsquothe Pilgrim of Eternityrsquo is himself justly entitled to this
appellation He was essentially a poet of the skies and
heavens of light and love of eternity and immortality
Since he loved to pierce through things to their spiritual
essence the material world was less important for him
than that which lies within it and beyond it Says he ldquoI seek in what I see the manifestation of something beyond the present and tangible objectsrsquo He set out to uncover
the absolute real from its visible manifestations and
interpret it through his own poetic vision In a
passionate search for reality he pursued its essence
behind the veil of naked loveliness of Nature and the
mundane human existence Defining poetry he says
lsquoPoetry is the revelation of the eternal ideas which lie behind the many-coloured ever-shifting veil that we call reality in lifersquo For him the poet is also a seer gifted with
a peculiar insight into the nature of reality for it is
through the inspired poetic imagination that he
breathes immortality into the objects of Nature Says he
lsquoBut from these create he can
Forms more real than living man
Nurslings of immortalityrsquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 96
Prometheus Unbound
HIS LOVE OF INDIA
Shelley was an ardent admirer of India In a letter to his
friend employed in the East India Company he
expressed keenness to visit India and settle down here
He was drawn to India for its varied and picturesque
scenic beauty vast literary heritage and age-old cultural
traditions In order to have a closer acquaintance with
our great country he set his heart and mind on serious
studies in the Indian life and letters traditions and
culture
Since he was a visionary par excellence and was
endowed with a highly contemplative mind and a
remarkable prophetic zeal he evinced a deep and
abiding interest in the philosophical and spiritual
thoughts that lie enshrined in our holy texts such as the
Vedas the Upanishads the Brahmasutras and the
Bhagvad Gita It is interesting to trace the influence of
Indian spiritual thought on Shelleyrsquos poetry
VEDANTA IN SHELLEYrsquoS POETRY
The riddle of the origin of life and Nature and the
enigmatic questions such as lsquoWhat is the cause of life
and death What is the source of universe and what will
be its ultimate destinyrsquo have always engaged the
serious attention of all wise men Man has always stood
in awe and wonder at the mysteries of human existence
and the vast world around him Our seers and savants
have not only posed such questions but have also
answered them
In the opening verse of the Kena Upanishad the
disciple asks
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 97
ldquoAt whose behest does the mind think or wander after towards its objects Commanded by whom does the life-force or the breath of life go forth on its journey At whose will do we utter speech Who is that effulgent Being whose power directs the eye and the earrdquo
Similarly in the Svetasvatara Upanishad the disciples
inquire ldquoWhat is the cause of this universe What is Brahman Whence do we come By what power do we live and on what are we established Where shall we at last find rest What rules over our joys and sorrows O Seers of Brahmanrdquo
Identical ideas impelled Shelley to exclaim in his famous
elegy Adonais
ldquoWhence are we and why are we Of what scene
The actors or spectatorsrdquo
Or again he asks in The Triumph of Life
ldquoWhence comest thou And wither goest thou
How did thy course begin I said and whyrdquo
Shelley asks
ldquoHas some unknown omnipotence unfurled
The veil of life and deathrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoAnd what were thou and earth and stars and sea
If to the human mindrsquos imaginings
Silence and solitude were vacancyrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 98
Mont Blanc
Shelley in his famous poem Hymn to Intellectual Beauty answers that there is an unseen (all-pervading) omnipotence (power) behind this phenomenal world of
which all objects are but shadows
ldquoThe awful shadow of some unseen Power
Floats though unseen among us ndash visiting
This various world with as inconstant wing
As summer winds that creep from flower to flowerrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoIt visits with inconstant glance
Each human heart and countenance
Like aught that for its grace may be
Dear and yet dearer for its mysteryrdquo
Again he affirms his faith in such a mysterious
Omnipotent power when he says
ldquoThe works and ways of men their death and birth
And that of him and all that his may be
All things that move and breathe with toil and sound
Are born and die revolve subside and swell
Power dwells apart in its tranquility
Remote serene and inaccessiblerdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 99
X X X X X X
ldquoThe secret strength of things
Which governs thought and to the infinite dome
Of Heaven is as a law inhabits theerdquo
Mont Blanc
Vedanta which is the aphoristic summary of the
Upanishads the Brahmasutras and the Bhagvad Gita
is in fact the culmination of Indian religious and
philosophical thought Since Shelley sincerely desired to
unravel the essential reality which is unchanging
timeless and eternal and of which the world of sense
perceptions is but a broken reflection he turned his
attention to the ancient scriptures of India
ONENESS OF BRAHMAN (GOD)
One of the basic postulates of Vedanta is the inherent
oneness or the sole identity of Brahman in the universe
The Chhandogya Upanishad describes Brahman as
एकमव अXवतीय ndash lsquoone only without a secondrsquo and the
other Upanishadic texts also contain parallel statements
such as स एकः ndash lsquoHe is Onersquo and एकोदवः ndash lsquoOne Lordrsquo
Similarly the Rig Veda declares एक सद वDा बहदा वदित ndash lsquoTruth (God)is one but the wise one call it
differentlyrsquo Obviously Brahman the Supreme is one
and only one He is verily one and the same whether we
call Him Brahman Ishwara Paramatma God Allah or
the supreme Cosmic Soul He only exists all other
objects of the world are subject to decay and death
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
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How beautifully have similar thoughts been expressed
by Shelley when he exclaims
ldquoThe one remains the many change and pass
Heavenrsquos light forever shines Earthrsquos shadows fly
Life like a dome of many coloured glass
Stains the white radiance of Eternity
Until Death tramples it to fragmentsrdquo
Adonais L2
The concluding lines of Epipsychidion show that in a
moment of inspiration Shelley seemed to lay hold on the
ineffable spirituality and fundamental unity of
existence
ldquoOne hope within two wils one will beneath
Two overshadowing minds one life one death
One Heaven one hell one immortality
And one annihilationrdquo
Shelley etherealized Nature and believed in a single
power or one spirit permeating the whole universe He
effected a fusion of the Platonic philosophy of love with
the Wordsworthian doctrine of Pantheism
ldquoThe one spiritrsquos plastic stress
Sweeps through the dull dense worldrsquo
Compelling there all new successions
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 101
To the forms they wearrdquo
Holding that one universal spirit is the basis and
sustainer of Nature Shelley declares
ldquoThat Power
Which wields the world with never-wearied love
Sustains it from beneath and kindles it aboverdquo
In his pantheistic conception of Nature Shelley
conceived of it as being permeated vitalized and made
real by a universal spirit of love He clearly perceives
the presence of ldquothe awful shadow of the unseen power visiting the various worldrdquo
ldquoSpirit of Nature here
In this interminable wilderness
Of worlds at whose involved immensity
Even soaring fancy staggers
Here is thy fitting templerdquo
Demon of the World
TRANSMIGRATION OF SOUL
The doctrine of transmigration of soul or the cycle of
births and rebirths has been explicitly advanced in the
Upanishadic philosophy In the Kathopanishad
Brihadaranyak Upanishad and the Bhagvad Gita there are moving passages such as these
ldquoMan ripens like corn and like corn he is born againrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 102
Kathopanishad IV6
The Brihadaranyak Upanishad states
ldquoAnd as a caterpillar after reaching the end of a blade of grass finds another place of support and then draws itself towards it and as a goldsmith after taking a piece of gold gives it another newer and more beautiful shape similarly does the self after having thrown off this body and dispelled ignorance take on another newer and more beautiful formrdquo
Brihadaranyak Upanishad IV3-5
Similarly Lord Krishna tells Arjuna
ldquoAs a man discarding worn out clothes takes other new ones likewise the embodied soul casting off worn-out bodies enters into others which are newrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II22
And further Lord Krishna says to Arjuna
ldquofor in that case the death of him who is born is certain and the rebirth for him who is dead is inevitablerdquo
Bhagvad Gita II27
Shelley entertained similar ideas when he says
ldquoThe works and ways of man their death and birth
And that of him and all that his may be
All things that move and breathe with toil and sound
Are borm and die revolve subside and swellrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 103
Mont Blanc 92-95
Or again
ldquoThe splendours of the firmament of time
May be eclipsed but are extinguished not
Like stars to their appointed height they climb
And death is a low mist which cannot blot
The brightness it may veilrdquo
Adonais XLIV
Stressing the ephemerality of worldly objects Shelley
exclaims
ldquoSpirit of Beauty that does consecrate
With thine own hues all thou doth shine upon
Of human thought or formwhere art thou gonerdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoWhy aught should fail and fade that once is shown
Why fear and dream and death and birth
Cast on the daylight of this earth
Such gloomrdquo
Hymn to Intellectual Beauty 11
Lamenting the death of his friend Keats he says
ldquohe went uninterrupted
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 104
Into the gulf of death but his clear spirit
Yet reigns over earthrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoTo that high Capital where Kingly Death
Keeps his pale court in beauty and decay
He came and bought with price of purest breath
A grave among the eternalrdquo
Adonais VII
Again dwelling on the immortality of soul he declares
ldquoNaught we know dies Shall that alone which knows
Be as a sword consumed before the sheath
By sightless lightening The intense atom glows
A moment then is quenched in a most cold reposerdquo
Adonais XX
X X X X X X
ldquoGreat and mean
Meet massed in death who lends what life must borrowrdquo
Adonais XXI
X X X X X X
ldquoDust to dust but the pure spirit shall flow
Black to the burning fountain whence it came
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 105
A portion of the Eternal which must glow
Through time and change unquenchably the same
Whilst thy cold embers choke the sordid hearth shamerdquo
Adonais XXXVIII
THE DOCTRINE OF MAYA (DELUSION)
Our scriptures regard the phenomenal world as Maya
(delusion) They explain that the universe is neither
absolutely real nor absolutely non-existent and that its
phenomenal or apparent surface conceals and
safeguards the external presence of the Absolute
Shelley seems to have pondered over similar ideas
about the world of appearances
ldquoWorlds on worlds are rolling ever
From creation to decay
Like the bubbles on a river
Sparkling bursting borne away
But they are still immortal
Who through birthrsquos oriental portal
And deathrsquos dark chasm hurrying to and fro
Clothe their unceasing flight
In the brief dust and light
Gathered around their chariots as they gordquo
Three Choruses from Hallas
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 106
In his poem Invocation to Misery Shelley says
ldquoAll the wide world beside us
Show like multitudinous
Puppets passing from a scenerdquo
Again describing human life as a veil he says
ldquoLife not the painted veil which thou who live
Call life though unreal shapes be pictured there
And it but mimic all we would believe
With colours idly spreadrdquo
Prometheus Unbound
In the myth of Aurora he gives his own account of the
creation and interpretation of works of art
ldquoAnd lovely apparitions dim at first then radiant in the mind arising bright
From the embrace of beauty whence the forms
Of which these are phantoms casts on them
The gathered rays which are realityrdquo
Shelley seems to hint at the theory of Superimposition
(Vivartavada) which maintains that the universe is a
superimposition upon Brahman It states that the world
of thought and matter has a phenomenon or relative
existence and is superimposed upon Brahman the
unique Absolute Reality
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 107
Since the world is a network of delusion and
appearance not reality our life on earth is a sojourn
and its paramount aim is to have a glimpse of and
realize the eternal Truth or the Absolute Brahman
which is concealed by ignorance and delusion The
Ishopanishad tells us
ldquoThe face of Truth is hidden by a golden orb (disk) O Pushan (the Nourisher the Effulgent Being) uncover (the Face) that I the seeker or worshipper of Truth may hold Theerdquo
Ishopanishad XV
Like a sincere aspirant for the realization of eternal
Truth or the Absolute concealed under the illusory garb
of Maya (Delusion) Shelley in the words of Fairy in his
Queen Mab declares
ldquoAnd it is yet permitted me to rend
The veil of mortal frailty that the spirit
Clothed in its changeless purity may know
How soonest to accomplish the great end
For which it hath its being and may taste
That peace which in the end all life will sharerdquo
Queen Mab
In certain other passages Shelley speaks of the veil
identified with Time which obscured Eternity from the
sight of man The symbol of veil demonstrates that
which conceals truth goodness or happiness When the
veil was torn or rent asunder
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 108
ldquoHope was seen beaming through the mists of fear
Earth was no longer Hell
Love freedom health had given
Their ripeness to the manhood of its prime
And all its pulses beat
Symphonious to the planetary spheresrdquo
Again he uses the same symbol of veil when Cythna
says
ldquoFor with strong speech I tore the veil that hid
Nature and Truth and Liberty and Loverdquo
Shelley uses the same idea of superimposition coupled
with his own robust idealism
ldquoLife may change but it may fly not
Hope may vanish but can die not
Truth be veiled but it burneth
Love repulsed ndash but it returnethrdquo
STATES OF CONSCIOUSNESS
Our Upanishads identify three states of consciousness
crowned by the fourth which transcends all the other
three states They are
(i) The Waking State
(ii) The Dreaming State
(iii) The State of Deep Sleep and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 109
(iv) The State of Pure Consciousness (Turiya)
The fourth state of ecstatic consciousness which
transcends the preceding three has no connection with
the finite mind it is reached when in meditation the
ordinary self is left behind and the Atman or the true
self is fully realized The Mandukya Upanishad describes it thus
ldquoBeyond the senses beyond the understanding beyond all expression is the Fourth It is pure unitary consciousness wherein (all) awareness of the world and of multiplicity is completely obliterated It is effable peace It is the supreme good It is one without a second It is the Self Know it alonerdquo
Mandukya Upanishad VII
Turiya (तर[य) the fourth state is the supreme mystic
experience Shelley seems to have partly attained such a
state of pure ecstatic consciousness when he states
ldquoI seem as in a trance sublime and strange
To muse on my own separate fantasy
My own my human mind which passively
Now renders and receives fast influencing
Holding an unremitting interchange
With the clear universe of things aroundrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoSome say that gleams of a remoter world
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 110
Visit the soul in sleep that death is slumber
And that its shapes the busy thoughts outnumber
Of those who wake and live ndash I look on high
Has some unknown omnipotence unfurled
The veil of life and deathrdquo
Mont Blanc
Another instance of such a mystic experience appears in
his famous poem Triumph of Life on which Shelley was
working at the time of this death in 1822
ldquobefore me fled
The night behind me rose the day the deep
Was at my feet and Heaven above my head
When a strange trance over my fancy grew
Which was not slumber for the shade it spread
Was so transparent that the scene came through
As clear as when a veil of light is drawn
Over evening hill they glimmer and I knew
That I had felt the freshness of that dawnrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoAnd in that trance of wondrous thought I lay
This was the tenor of my waking dreamrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
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The Triumph of Life
SHELLEY AS AN ASPIRANT FOR SELF-REALIZATION
Shelley who described himself as
ldquoA splendour among shadows a bright blot
Upon the gloomy scene a spirit that strove
For Truthrdquo
seems to have reached at last that stability or
equanimity of mind which has been described in the
Upanishads and the Bhagvad Gita In a reply to Arjunrsquos
question about the definition of one who is stable of
mind or is finally established in perfect tranquility of
mind Lord Krishna says
ldquoArjun when one thoroughly dismisses all cravings of the mind controls it and is satisfied in the self (through the joy of the self) then he is called stable of mind One whose mind remains unperturbed amid sorrows whose thirst for pleasures has altogether disappeared and who is free from passion fear and anger is called stable of mindrdquo
Bhagvad Gita V56
The Katha Upanishad stresses similar ideas when it
says
ldquoBut he who possesses right discrimination whose mind is under control and is always pure he reaches that goal from which he is not born againrdquo
X X X X X X
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 112
ldquoThe man who has a discriminative intellect for the driver and a controlled mind for the reins reaches the end of the journey the highest place of Vishnu (the all-pervading and unchangeable one)rdquo
Katha Upanishad
Shelley echoes identical thoughts when he says
ldquoMan who man would be
Must rule the empire of himself in it
Must be supreme establishing his throne
On vanquished will quelling the anarchy
Of hopes and fears being himself alonerdquo
Sonnet on Political Greatness
It was in such rare moments of inner consciousness or
lsquoBlessed moodrsquo that Shelley felt lsquoOne with Naturersquo or
lsquoThe Power which wields the world with never-wearied love
Sustains it from beneath and kindles it aboversquo
As a myth-maker or a mythopoeic poet he conjured
visions of a golden age by turning to the grand aspects
of Nature ndash the ether the sky the wind the Sun the
Moon the light and the clouds and employing them as
befitting agencies and vehicles of his evolutionary ideas
ldquoPoetryrdquo he wrote ldquois indeed something divine It is at once the centre and circumference of all knowledgerdquo He
conceived of the universe as alive with a living spirit
behind it He moralizes natural myths and perceives the
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 113
Absolute behind the ephemeral In an exquisite image
he exclaims
ldquoThe sanguine sunrise with his meteor eyes
And his burning plumes outspread
Leaps on the back of my sailing rack
When the morning star shines deadrdquo
As his thoughts reached the zenith of their growth
Shelley identified his individual self with the all-
pervading Cosmic Self or the Brahman of the Vedanta
and felt himself one with the indwelling spirit of the
universe Unity filled his imagination he perceived
eternal harmony in the phenomenal existence and
rejoiced his own being in the vast million-coloured
pageants of the world And finally not only Nature but
all human existence is taken up as an inalienable aspect
of the eternal Cosmic Spirit He reaches the core the
centre of all palpable universe when he declares
ldquoI am the eye with which the Universe
Behold itself and knows itself divine
All harmony of instrument and verse
All prophecy all medicine is mine
All light of art or nature to my song
Victory and praise in its own right belongrdquo
Shelley perceived the transcendental or mystic
consciousness in which one realizes the complete
identity of self with the Supreme Self and which is called
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 114
तर[य अवथा ndash where one sees nothing but One
(Brahman) hears nothing but the One knows nothing
but the One ndash there is the Infinite The same truth is
vividly explained in the Bhagvad Gita when Lord
Krishna tells Arjuna
ldquoWhen one sees Eternity in things that pass away and Infinity in finite things then one has pure knowledgerdquo
Bhagvad Gita XVIII20
Our own great seer-poet and philosopher Sri Aurobindo
Ghose described Shelley as a sovereign voice of the new
spiritual force and a native of the heights with its
luminous ethereality where he managed to dwell
prophetically in a future heaven and earth with
brilliances of a communion with a higher law another
order of existence another meaning behind Nature and
terrestrial things
Sri Aurobindo further praises him as lsquoa seer of spiritual realities who has a poetic grasp of metaphysical truths and can see the forms and hear the voices of higher elements spirits and natural godheads and has a constant feeling of a high spiritual and intellectual beauty He is at once seer poet thinker prophet and artist Light love liberty are the three godheads in whose presence his pure and radiant spirit lived but a celestial light a celestial love a celestial liberty To bring them down to earth without their losing their celestial lustre and here is his passionate endeavour but his wings constantly buoy him upward and cannot beat strongly in an earthlier atmosphere There is an air of luminous mist surrounding his intellectual presentation of his meaning which shows the truths he sees as things to which the mortal eye cannot easily pierce or the life and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 115
temperament of earth rise to realize and live yet to bring about the union of the mortal and immortal terrestrial and the celestial is always his passion Shelley is the bright archangel of this dawn and becomes greater to us as the light he foresaw and lived and he sings half-concealed in the too dense halo of his own ethereal beautyrsquo
And what Juan Mascaro states as universal truth is
equally pertinent to Shelleyrsquos poetry
ldquoA deep faith in life cannot but be spiritual The path of Truth may not be a path of parallel lines but a path that follows one circle because Truth is onerdquo
Infinite is God infinite are His aspects and infinite are
the ways to reach Him In the Atharva Veda we read
ldquoThe one light appears in diverse formsrdquo This ideal of
harmony is carried to its logical conclusion in blending
synthesizing and reconciling conflicting metaphysical
theories and opposed conceptions of spiritual
discipline We read in the pages of Bhagvad Gita
ldquoWhatever wish men bring in worship
That wish I grant them
Whatever path men travel
Is my path
No matter where they walk
It leads to merdquo
Bhagvad Gita IV11
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 116
To sum up Shelleyrsquos poetry will always hold irresistible
fascination to the lovers of light and beauty for to
quote Juan Mascaro again
ldquoThe finite in man longs for the Infinite The love that moves the stars moves also the heart of man and a law of spiritual gravitation leads his soul to the soul of the universe Man sees the sun by the light of the sun and he sees the spirit by the light of his own inner spirit The radiance of eternal beauty shines over this vast universe and in moments of contemplation we can see the Eternal in things that pass away This is the message of the great spiritual seers and all poetry and art and beauty is only an infinite variation of this message The spiritual visions of man confirm and illumine each other Great poems in different languages have different values but they all are poetry and the spiritual visions of man come all from one Light In them we have Lamps of Fire that burn to the glory of Godrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 117
JOHN KEATS
(31 October 1795 ndash 23 February 1821)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 118
JOHN KEATS
English Romantic Poet
The son of a livery-stable manager he had a limited
formal education He worked as a surgeons apprentice
and assistant for several years before devoting himself
entirely to poetry at age 21 His first mature work was
the sonnet On First Looking into Chapmans Homer
(1816) His long Endymion appeared in the same year
(1818) as the first symptoms of the tuberculosis that
would kill him at age 25 During a few intense months of
1819 he produced many of his greatest works several
great odes (including Ode on a Grecian Urn Ode to a
Nightingale and To Autumnrdquo) two unfinished
versions of the story of the titan Hyperion and La Belle
Dame Sans Merci Most were published in the
landmark collection Lamia Isabella The Eve of St Agnes and Other Poems (1820) Marked by vivid imagery great
sensuous appeal and a yearning for the lost glories of
the Classical world his finest works are among the
greatest of the English tradition His letters are among
the best by any English poet
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 119
CHAPTER SIX
JOHN KEATS A MINSTREL OF BEAUTY AND TRUTH
INTRODUCTION
John Keats who in his own words was lsquoa fair creature of an hourrsquo lived a brief and turbulent life Pre-eminently a
sensuous poet in whom the Romantic sensibility to
outward impressions of sight sound touch and smell
reached its climax the life of Keats was a series of
sensations felt with febrile acuteness
His ideal was passive contemplation rather than active
mental exertion ldquoO for a life of sensations rather than of thoughtrdquo he exclaimed in one of his letters and in
another ldquoit is more noble to sit like Jove than to fly like Mercuryrdquo In fact his was a life of intense sensations
acute poignancy and an infinite yearning for beauty
which he identified with truth
Richness of sensuousness characterizes all his poetry
and his power of expression is marked by a spectacular
vividness which is interspersed with beautiful epithets
heavily charged with subtle messages for the senses His
works are so full of luxuriance of sensations and acute
passions that ordinary readers do not pause to perceive
the unimpeded flow of spiritual thoughts underneath
The pursuit of the spirit of beauty dominates all his
works which have one enduring message ndash the
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 120
lastingness of beauty and its identity with supreme
truth (or God) This message ndash the oneness of beauty
with truth and the eternal existence of truth ndash has been
beautifully enshrined in his famous and oft-quoted lines
(with which he concludes his Ode on a Grecian Urn)
ldquoBeauty is truth truth beauty ndash that is all
Ye know on earth and all ye need to knowrdquo
Keats died at the age of 26 but even from his early age
he had visions of rare spiritual significance Dwelling on
the value of visions in human life and poetry he says
ldquoSince every man whose soul is not a clod
Hath vision
For poesy alone can tell her dreams
With the fine spell of words alone can save
Imagination from the sable chain
And dumb enchantmentrdquo
Since common readers tend to ignore the underlying
spiritual import of his visions and images this article
aims at bringing into play some of the poetrsquos thoughts
which bear a remarkable resemblance to the age-old
hoary spirituality of our ancient land
Stressing the fundamental truths of our Indian thought
and tracing their distinct reflection in the works of great
Western poets seems a worth-while academic pursuit
FUNDAMENTAL UNITY
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 121
From the very beginning Keats could realize the
fundamental unity of Truth and Beauty and could dwell
at length on it to show how diverse paths illumined by
the glory of spirit in man ultimately lead him to the
realization of this abiding lesson of life The supreme
oneness of Truth has been beautifully enunciated by Sri
Krishna in the Bhagvad Gita
ldquoIn any way that men love Me in that same way they find My love for many are the paths of men but they all in the end come to Merdquo
Similar thoughts have found expression in the
introduction to the Upanishads by Juan Mascaro
ldquoThe path of Truth may not be a path of parallel lines but a path that follows one circle by going to the right and climbing the circle or by going to the left and climbing the circle we are bound to meet at the top although we started in apparently contrary directions This is bound to be in the end because Truth is onerdquo
And when Keats was only 22 he could give expression
to deep thoughts that have a curious similarity to the
ideas expressed in the Mundak Upanishad and the
Bhagvad Gita
ldquoNow it appears to me that almost any man may like the spider spin from his own inwards his own airy citadel the points of leaves and twigs on which the spider begins her work are few and she fills the air with a beautiful circuiting Man should be content with as few points to tip with the fine Web of his Soul and weave a tapestry empyrean-full of symbols for his spiritual eye of softness for his spiritual touch of space for his wanderings of distinctness for his luxuryrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 122
ldquoBut the minds of mortals are so different and bent on such diverse journeys that it may at first appear impossible for any common taste and fellowship to exist between two or three under these suppositions It is however quite the contrary Minds would leave each other in contrary directions traverse each other in numberless points and at last greet each other at the journeyrsquos end An old man and a child would talk together and the old man be led on his path and the child left thinkingrdquo
ldquoMan should not dispute or assert but whisper results to his neighbor and thus by every germ of spirit sucking the sap from mould ethereal every human might become great and humanity instead of being a wide heath of furze and briars with here and there a remote oak or pine would become a great democracy of forest treesrdquo
WISDOM
All men of good will are bound to meet if they follow the
wisdom of the words Shakespeare in Hamlet where if
we write SELF or self we find the doctrine of the
Upanishad
ldquoThis above all to thine own self be true
And it must follow as the night the day
Thou canst not then be false to any manrdquo
Now coming back to the theme of beauty and truth and
their ultimate identity in the universe we have to dwell
at large on the concept of beauty as enunciated by Keats
in his poetry From the very beginning Keats realized
that beauty in its true sense illumines manrsquos thoughts
and thus leads him to understand the glory of truth and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 123
the pervading spirit of their identity in whatever he
sees hears and perceives
The eternal identity or oneness of beauty with truth and
their interplay in the world are in fact unfailing
fountains of joy The permanence of beauty as a source
of joy has been beautifully elucidated by the poet in the
opening lines of his famous poem Endymion
ldquoA thing of beauty is a joy forever
Its loveliness increases it will never
Pass into nothingnessrdquo
He goes on to say
ldquoSome shape of beauty moves away the pall
From our dark spirits
An endless fountain of immortal drink
Pouring unto us from the heavenrsquos brink
Nor do we merely feel these essences
For one short hour
glories infinite
Haunt us till they become a cheering light
Unto our souls and bound to us so fast
That whether there be shine or gloom overcast
They always must be with us or we dierdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 124
When he ascribes permanence to joy born of beauty
Keats has in mind the immanence and effulgence of
beauty as a reflection of its creator God Beauty whose
lsquoloveliness increasesrsquo and which lsquowill never pass into nothingnessrsquo is an inalienable attribute of Divinity for it
is lsquoan endless fountain of immortal drinkrsquo
BEAUTY
God (as the poet seems to presuppose) is all Beautiful or
the embodiment of all Beauty and the entire world of
sights and sounds is nothing else but a glorious garment
of God So beauty does not consist only in apparent
physical appearances but is an offspring of inherent
divinity in man and nature which is dimly reflected in
their attractive exterior Such an eternal beauty in his
view presents lsquoglories infinite that haunt us till they become a cheering light unto our souls It is this beauty the glory of spirit which must be with us or we dierdquo
The poetrsquos concept of beauty with its glories infinite
bears a striking resemblance with the path of splendour
of our Vedic and epic scriptures in which our sages
perceived the Divine presence in all that is splendid and
beautiful in the universe
Our Vedic texts are full of the expressions of the sage-
poetrsquos exquisite astonishment before the visions of
glory and wonder The attitude of our Vedic seer-poets
towards beauty as a transcendental reality beyond our
sense-perceptions has been beautifully expressed in
images of beauty and glory as an abstract idea Says Rig Veda
ldquoSinless for noble power under the influence of Savita God
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 125
May we obtain all things that are beautifulrdquo
GOODNESS
Here the power of goodness is contemplated to lead to
the power of beauty Beauty in its myriad forms leads
us to spiritual consciousness of Divinity inherent in
Nature and all living beings Identical thoughts have
been expressed by Sri Krishna in Chapter X of the
Bhagvad Gita where all splendour and glory is said to
be the reflection of God whose manifestation this
universe is Says Sri Krishna to Arjuna
ldquoKnow thou that whatever is beautiful and good whatever has glory and power is only a portion of My own radiancerdquo
Bhagvad Gita X41
Seeing the effulgence of a thousand suns bursting forth
and yet it could hardly match the splendour of the
supreme Lord Arjuna exclaimed in wonder
ldquoI see the splendour of an infinite beauty which illumines the whole universe It is thee With thy crown and scepter and circle How difficult thou art to see But I see thee as fire as the Sun blinding incomprehensiblerdquo
Bhagvad Gita XI17
Besides this concept of ultimate elemental beauty
Keats goes on to underscore its fundamental and
inseparable unity with Truth which is yet another
inalienable facet of Divinity on earth
Truth being an essential attribute of God lies at the
core of all existence and it sustains the entire universe
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 126
with its manifold forms of beauty reflected in countless
objects around us When Keats declares that lsquoBeauty is truth truth beautyrsquo he seems to remind us of the age-old
spiritual consciousness that found sublime utterance in
our Vedas which are the oldest treatises on lsquophilosophia perennisrsquo the eternal philosophy In the Vedas truth has
been described as the essence of Divinity
ldquoThe deity has truth as the law of His beingrdquo
Atharva Veda VIIXXIV1
The Rig Veda calls the deities as various manifestations
of Truth Elsewhere in the Rig Veda the Deity has been
described as true and the path of religious progress is
the ingredient of Dharma Declares the Rig Veda
ldquoBy truth is the earth upheldrdquo
Rig Veda X85
An Upanishadic sage says
ldquoTruth alone triumphs not untruth By Truth the spiritual path is widened that path by which the seers who are free from all cravings and declares travel and reach the supreme abode of Truthrdquo
Mundak Upanishad IIII6
So Truth is a basic postulate of Dharma and an abiding
and ultimate value of life It is the eternal oneness of
beauty and truth and truth and beauty that inspired
Keats to stress their underlying unity and their
transcendental reality When Keats says ldquoThat is all ye know on earth and all ye need to knowrdquo he points to that
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 127
ecstatic wonder which the spiritual realization of this
eternal truth brings to a seeker or seer or a poet
SUBLIMITY
Keats seems to have reached such a sublime plane of
poetic consciousness that is so aptly suggested by our
Vedic seers who have extolled God as a poet (कव) and
His divine creative energy is indicated as the poetic
power (काय) which has assumed manifold forms of
beauty and splendour So God as the supreme creator of
beauty has been described in the Rig Veda as
ldquoHe who is supporter of the world of life
Who knows the secret mysterious names
Of the morning beams
He poet cherishes manifold forms
By His poetic powerrdquo
Rig Veda VIIIXL5
So let me hasten to the conclusion by affirming that as
lsquoa lily for a dayrsquo Keats proved that a crowded hour of
glory is far better than an age without a name he seems
to have lived up to the lofty advice of Queen Vidula to
her son King Sanjaya in the Mahabharat
महतम 0व1लत 2यो न त धमऽतम 4चर
ldquoIt is better to flame forth for an instant than smoke away for agesrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 128
Eternal truths transcend the barriers of time and space
country and clime caste and creed and shine through all
lands and in all ages Even today the enlightened souls
all over the world have a significant identity of ideas
irrespective of the countries to which they belong and
the religious faith to which they are affiliated
Such wise men awaken others from a state of
intellectual and spiritual slumber enkindle in them a
sense of understanding and fraternity It has been
rightly said by HW Longfellow
ldquoLives of great men all remind us
We can make our lives sublime
And departing leave behind us
Footprints on the sand of Timerdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 129
RW EMERSON
(25 May 1803 ndash 27 April 1882)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 130
RW EMERSON
US Poet Essayist and Lecturer
Emerson graduated from Harvard University and was
ordained a Unitarian minister in 1829 His questioning
of traditional doctrine led him to resign the ministry
three years later He formulated his philosophy in
Nature (1836) the book helped initiate New England
Transcendentalism a movement of which he soon
became the leading exponent In 1834 he moved to
Concord Mass the home of his friend Henry David
Thoreau His lectures on the proper role of the scholar
and the waning of the Christian tradition caused
considerable controversy In 1840 with Margaret
Fuller he helped launch The Dial a journal that
provided an outlet for Transcendentalist ideas He
became internationally famous with his Essays (1841
1844) including Self-Reliance Representative Men
(1850) consists of biographies of historical figures The Conduct of Life (1860) his most mature work reveals a
developed humanism and a full awareness of human
limitations His Poems (1847) and May-Day (1867)
established his reputation as a major poet
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 131
CHAPTER SEVEN
EMERSONrsquoS SPIRITUAL QUEST AND INDIAN THOUGHT
INTRODUCTION
Ralph Waldo Emerson the lsquoSage of Concordrsquo as he is
rightly called was an American seer who came into the
world at a time when East and the West were gradually
coming closer to each other in spheres more than one
trade and commerce between the two was gaining
momentum and above all the era of inter-
communication of ideas intellect and spirit was being
ushered in by exchange of books
Emerson was one of the first great Americans who
absorbed himself sufficiently in this phenomenon
ventured into the sacred literature of India and
assimilated its thought to such a remarkable degree that
he became its eminent interpreter to his countrymen in
particular and to the entire West in general
EMERSON AND THE GITA
Let us see what Swami Vivekananda said about the
source of Emersonrsquos inspiration Swamiji said
ldquoThe greatest incident of the (Mahabharata) war was the marvelous and immortal poem of the Gita the Song Celestial It is the popular scripture of India and the loftiest of all teachings I would advise those of you who have not read that book to read it If you only knew how
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 132
much it has influenced your own country (America) even If you want to know the source of Emersonrsquos inspiration it is this book the Gita He went to see Carlyle and Carlyle made him a present of the Gita and that little book is responsible for the Concord Movement All the broad movements in America in one way or other are indebted to the Concord partyrdquo
His interest in the sacred writings of India was probably
aroused at Harvard and he kept it aglow throughout his
life With his motto ldquoTomorrow to fresh fields and pastures newrdquo he set out in search of the True (Satyam)
the Good (Shivam) and the Beautiful (Sundaram)
In busy and bustling New England there came forward
to quote Theodore Parker ldquothis young David a shepherd but to be a king with his garlands and singing robes about him one note upon his new and fresh-string lyre was worth a thousand menrdquo
With unflinching faith in Truth Righteousness and
Beauty and absolute confidence in all the attributes of
infinity he drank deep at the unfailing source of Indian
philosophy and religion and gave his thoughts such a
lucid inimitable expression that his writings have
become a veritable treasure of world literature Revered
the world over held in high esteem by great Indians like
Rabindranath Tagore and Pt Jawaharlal Nehru and
admired by Gandhiji his writings abound in the beauty
of his speech the majesty of his ideas and the loftiness
of his moral sentiments
Perhaps the most fitting commentary on the relevance
of his thoughts to our country was made by Mahatma
Gandhi after reading his Essays Said Mahatma Gandhi
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 133
ldquoThe Essays to my mind contain the teaching of Indian wisdom in a Western Guru It is interesting to see our own sometimes differently fashionedrdquo
There are indeed innumerable points of similarity in
thought and experience between Emerson and the
mainstream of Indian philosophy The philosophy of
Vedanta which was one of the thought currents that
reached America in the first half of the 19th century
influenced Emerson deeply and contributed largely to
his concept of lsquoselfhoodrsquo Emerson found the Vedic
doctrines of soul congenial to his own ideas about manrsquos
relationship to the universe He therefore drew freely
upon the Hindu scriptures which contain a vivid and
well-elaborated doctrine of lsquoSelfrsquo Numerous references
in his essays and journals to the lsquoLaws of Manursquo
(Manusmriti) Vishnu Puran Bhagvad Gita and Katha Upanishad bear ample testimony to this fact
Let us examine some of the striking identities between
Emerson and the Vedanta The Upanishads tell us that
the central core of onersquos self is clearly identifiable with
the Cosmic Reality ldquoThe self within you the resplendent immortal person is the internal self of all things and is the Universal Brahmanrdquo The Chhandogya Upanishad tells
us that ldquothe self which inhabits the body is verily the Brahman and that as soon as the mortal coil is thrown over it will finally merge in Brahmanrdquo
How close was Emersonrsquos spiritual kinship with the
Vedantic doctrines is clear from the following lines
taken from his essay Plato or the Philosopher
ldquoIn all nations there are minds which incline to dwell in the conception of the Fundamental Unity the ecstasy of losing all being in one Being This tendency
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 134
finds its highest expression chiefly in the Indian scriptures in the Vedas the Bhagvad Gita and the Vishnu Puranrdquo
He further quotes Lord Krishna speaking to a sage ldquoYou are fit to apprehend that you are not distinct from meThat which I am thou art and that also in this world with its gods and heroes and mankind Men contemplate distinctions because they are stupefied with ignorance What is the great end of all you shall now learn from me It is soul-one in all bodies pervading uniform perfect pre-eminent over nature exempt from birth growth and decay Omnipresent made up of true knowledge independent unconnected with unrealities with name species and the rest in time past present and to come The knowledge that this spirit which is essentially one is in onersquos own and all other bodies is the wisdom of one who knows the unity of thingsrdquo
In formulating his own concept of the Over-soul
Emerson quotes Lord Krishna once again
ldquoWe live in succession in division in parts in particles Meantime within man is the soul of the whole the wise silence the universal beauty to which every part and particle is equally related the eternal One And this deep power in which we exist and whose beatitude is all accessible to us is not only self-sufficing and perfect in every hour but in the act of seeing and the thing seen the seer and the spectacle the subject and the object are one We see the world piece by piece as the sun the moon the animal the tree but the whole of which these are shining parts is the Soul Only by the vision of that wisdom can the horoscope of ages be readrdquo
The Over-Soul
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 135
A transcendentalist par excellence Emerson who was
influenced by German philosophers like Kant Hegel
Fichte and Schelling and their English interpreters
Coleridge and Carlyle affirmed that man could
apprehend reality by direct spiritual insight To him
intuition knew truths which ldquotranscendedrdquo those
accessible to intellect logical argument and scientific
inquiry Such a transcendentalism or attitude which
provided a metaphysical justification for the ideal of
individual freedom was found writ large in the holy
books of India
Steeped as he was in the oriental lore echoes of
Vedantic philosophy can be distinctly heard in his
writings which shine like ldquoa good deed in a naughty worldrdquo
Some of his poems resemble Vedantic literature in form
as well as in content His two famous poems Brahma
and Hamatreya are striking examples of such a close
affinity both in content and expression Ideas and
images in Brahma reflect certain passages which
Emerson had copied into his journals from the Vishnu
Puran the Bhagvad Gita and Katha Upanishad The first
stanza of Brahma which reads
ldquoIf the red slayer think he slays
Or if the slain think he is slain
They know not well the subtle ways
I keep and pass and turn againrdquo
is essentially an adaptation of these lines from the
Katha Upanishad
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 136
ldquoIf the slayer thinks I slay if the slain thinks I am slain then both of them do not know well It (the soul) does not slay nor is it slainrdquo
Katha Upanishad II19
The same lines with a little variation of course appear
in the Bhagvad Gita
ldquoThey are both ignorant he who knows that the soul to be capable of killing and he who takes it as killed for verily the soul neither kills nor is killedrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II19
The image of Brahma as a red slayer has been derived
from the Vishnu Puran where Lord Shiva the destroyer
of Creation has been depicted as Rudra (the red slayer)
but destruction envisages new creation and therefore
symbolizes the decadence of one and necessitates the
advent of the other This is why Lord Shiva is regarded
as the god not only of extermination but also of
regeneration With this concept is connected the cult of
Shaivagam ndash the ushering in of an era of general good
and prosperity when the world is created anew
The second and third stanzas of Brahma echo the
following lines of the Bhagvad Gita
ldquoI am the ritual action I am the sacrifice I am the ancestral oblation I am the sacred hymn I am the melted butter I am the fire and I am the offeringrdquo
Bhagvad Gita IX16
and also from the same source
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 137
ldquoI am immortality as well as death I am being as well as non-beingrdquo
Bhagvad Gita IX19
In the fourth stanza of Brahma there is a direct
reference to lsquothe Sacred Sevenrsquo ndash the seven highest saints
of our country namely Kashyapa Atri Bharadwaj Vishwamitra Gautam Vashishtha and Jamadagni Thus
we find that Brahma embodies an age-old Vedantic
truth
As regards his next poem Hamatreya its very title is a
variation of a disciplersquos name lsquoMaitreyarsquo to whom the
earth had recited a few verses Before we examine the
poem critically let us read a long passage from the
Vishnu Puran Book IV which Emerson had copied into
his 1845 Journal This passage which sheds ample light
on the background and theme of the poem under
reference reads
ldquoKings who with perishable frames have possessed this ever-enduring world and who blinded with deceptive notions of individual occupation have indulged the feeling that suggests lsquoThis earth is mine it is my sonrsquos it belongs to my dynastyrsquo have all passed awayearth laughs as if smiling with autumnal flowers to behold her kings unable to effect the subjugation of themselvesthese were the verses Maitreya which earth recited and by listening to which ambition fades away like snow before the windrdquo
Journals VII127-130
How futile is human vanity and how ridiculous is the
possessive instinct in man has been thoroughly exposed
by Emerson in the following lines
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 138
ldquoEarth laughs in flowers to see her boastful boys
Earth-proud proud of the earth which is not theirs
Who steer the plough but cannot steer their feet
Clear of the graverdquo
Hamatreya
Man who awaits lsquothe inevitable hourrsquo forgets that all his
heraldry pomp power wealth and lsquopaths of gloryrsquo lead
him lsquobut to the graversquo and grows so proud of his material
achievements and so deeply attached to the fleeting
things of the world that he loses sight of the supreme
philosophical truth - the ephemerality of the world and
the immortality of soul Death which is lurking in the
shadows can lay his icy hands upon us any day yet due
to false pride and sense of meum and attachment we
allow ourselves to be duped by the passing show of the
world without ever thinking of salvation or final release
from the worldly bondages Says Emerson
ldquoAh the hot owner sees not Death who adds
Him to his land a lump of mould the morerdquo
Hamatreya
Here Emerson seems to have been deeply influences by
Indian scriptures and particularly Ishopanishad and
the Bhagvad Gita in which the philosophy of God-
realization through detached action has been succinctly
elaborated In these two sacred books it has been stated
that total renunciation of the sense of meum egotism
and attachment with regard to the world all worldly
objects body and all actions is a path to real love for
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 139
God All worldly objects like land wealth house clothes
all relations like parents wife children friends and all
forms of worldly enjoyment like honour fame prestige
being the creations of Maya are wholly deluding
transient and perishable whereas one God alone the
embodiment of Existence (Sat) Knowledge (Chit) and
Bliss (Anand) is all in all omnipotent omniscient and
omnipresent Therefore all sense of meum egotism and
attachment must be totally renounced for spiritual
growth and pure exclusive love for God If the seed of
egoism is sown sorrow is the fruit On the other hand
the more a man cultivates dispassion and
disinterestedness with regard to the world the more
easily he transcends the barriers of Ignorance (Avidya)
Delusion (Maya) and Aversion (Dvesha) and marches
on the path of self-realization and God-realization A
similar thought current runs through the following
memorable lines of Earth-Song which forms an integral
part of the poem
ldquoThe earth says
They called me theirs who so controlled me
Yet every one wished to stay and is gone
How am I theirs if they cannot hold me
But I hold themrdquo
Hamatreya
These lines remind us of those memorable words of
Lord Krishna in the Bhagvad Gita XII16 where a true
devotee is characterized as one who is ldquodelivered from the egorsquos thrall - the sense of I and minerdquo or the feeling of
doership in all undertakings
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 140
After reading these lines which seem to refer to the
famous Biblical phrase lsquodust thou art to dust returnethrsquo
the readers may feel called upon to cultivate a sense of
detachment and renunciation for their ambition fades
away and their lsquoavarice cooled like dust in the chill of the graversquo
All art it has been said is an attempt to distract man
from his ego Emersonrsquos Hamatreya is certainly an
illustrious example of great art Highly didactic in
content and tone this poem reminds us of that sublime
mood in which Emerson realized the futility of
egocentric attachment to earth and its fleeting objects
which are shadows rather than substances
Emersonrsquos writings leave us to quote John Milton lsquoCalm of mind all passions spentrsquo A fitting comment on the
total impact of Emersonrsquos works on us has been given
by a brilliant American man of letters Theodore Parker
who says
ldquoA good test of the comparative value of books is the state they leave you in Emerson leaves you tranquil resolved on noble manhood fearless of the consequences he gives men to mankind and mankind to the laws of Godrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 141
HD THOREAU
(12 July 1817 ndash 6 May 1862)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 142
HD THOREAU
US Thinker Essayist and Naturalist
Thoreau graduated from Harvard University and taught
school for several years before leaving his job to
become a poet of nature Back in Concord he came
under the influence of Ralph Waldo Emerson and began
to publish pieces in the Transcendentalist magazine The Dial In the years 1845ndash47 to demonstrate how
satisfying a simple life could be he lived in a hut beside
Concords Walden Pond essays recording his daily life
were assembled for his masterwork Walden (1854) His
A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers (1849)
was the only other book he published in his lifetime He
reflected on a night he spent in jail protesting the
Mexican-American War in the essay Civil
Disobedience (1849) which would later influence such
figures as Mohandas K Gandhi and Martin Luther King
Jr In later years his interest in Transcendentalism
waned and he became a dedicated abolitionist His
many nature writings and records of his wanderings in
Canada Maine and Cape Cod display the mind of a keen
naturalist After his death his collected writings were
published in 20 volumes and further writings have
continued to appear in print
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 143
CHAPTER EIGHT
THOREAUrsquoS TRYST WITH INDIAN CULTURE
INTRODUCTION
Henry David Thoreau was a great American
transcendentalist thinker His seminal mind and
original thought had an enduring impact on his own
countrymen and also on peoples beyond the bounds of
America His philosophy and life had a deep influence
on all great men of his time Mahatma Gandhi regarded
him as his Guru and his concept of Satyagraha owes its
origin to Thoreaursquos essay on Civil Disobedience which
Gandhiji chanced upon in South Africa On Thoreaursquos
greatness another great American contemporary RW
Emerson once remarked ldquoHis soul was made for the noblest society he had in short life exhausted the capabilities of this world Wherever there is knowledge wherever there is virtue wherever there is beauty he will find a homerdquo
HIS LOVE OF SOLITUDE
Endowed with a rare meditative mind Thoreau loved
lsquosweet solitudersquo for he held that what is truly alone is the
spirit A seeker after perfection he retired to the
solitude of the woods to see with the eyes of the soul ndash
ldquothe higher law in naturerdquo and realize his oneness with
the Cosmic Spirit A lover of the spirit behind the world
of appearance he once said ndash ldquoI love to be alone I never
found the companion that was so companionable as
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 144
solitude In solitude of the woods I suddenly recover my
spirits my spirituality I can go from the buttercups to
the life everlastingrdquo His love for loneliness resembles
that of our own sages and saints who shunned the din
and clamour of madding crowds and retired to the
sylvan solitude of the woods for meditation on
mysteries of life It was in the secluded and tranquil
atmosphere of the woods that the great teachers of
mankind cultivated their souls observed austerity and
wrote the holiest scriptures Aranyakas and sacred texts
Gurukul (forest academies)- the ideal nurseries of
higher learning and disciplined rigorous life were setup
here for success in life and self-realization which is a
path-way to God-realization
HIS CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE AND GANDHIJIrsquoS
SATYAGRAHA
Bapu read Thoreaursquos essay on Civil Disobedience for
the second time in jail and was so deeply impressed by
it that he called it ldquoa masterly treatise which left a deep impression on merdquo He copied the words ldquoI did not feel for a moment confined and the walls seemed a great waste of stone and mortarrdquo Gandhiji wrote to Roosevelt
in 1942 ldquoI have profited greatly by the writings of Thoreau and Emersonrdquo He told Roger Baldwin that
Thoreaursquos essay ldquocontained the essence of his political philosophy not only as Indiarsquos struggle related to the British but as to his own views of the relation of citizens to Governmentrdquo As Miller observed ldquoGandhiji received back from America what was fundamentally the philosophy of India after it had been distilled and crystallized in the mind of Thoreaurdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 145
In his Civil Disobedience which as a document of
much ethical and spiritual value is manrsquos most powerful
weapon in dealing with tyranny Thoreau examines the
relation of the individual to the state and offers a candid
exposition when he says ldquoThat Government is best which governs the leastrdquo He believed in the supremacy of
moral laws and his concept of Civil Disobedience is
based on the dictates of conscience Since the nature of
an individual is determined by his conscience there is
always a basic conflict between the laws arbitrarily
made by the Government and the objectives sanctioned
and held sacred by the individualrsquos conscience He
regarded the individual as more important than the
state So in the interests of justice and virtue men with
clean conscience most oppose unjust laws The form of
protest launched by conscientious and holy men against
government is called Civil Disobedience
Thoreau seems to have derived the concept from the
Bhagvad Gita which invests each individual with two
contradictory traits ndash the Divine Attributes and the
Diabolical Propensities Whenever diabolical tendencies
promote arbitrary administration by making unjust
laws and men of clean conscience are forced to obey
them injustice prevails and justice or righteousness is
destroyed In such a situation the Divinity incarnates
itself and sets matters right Declares Lord Krishna
ldquoWhenever righteousness (Virtue) is on the decline and injustice (Vice) is on the ascendant then I body forth myselfrdquo
Bhagvad Gita IV7
To Gandhiji also Satya (Truth) and Ahimsa (Non-
violence) are inter-related and Satyagraha or non-
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 146
violent resistance is based on the belief in the power of
spirit the power of truth the power of love by which we
can overcome evil through self-suffering and self-
sacrifice
FORMATIVE INDIAN INFLUENCES
Thoreau was thoroughly immersed in the Indian
scriptures In Emersonrsquos library he read and was deeply
influenced by the Manusmriti Bhagvad Gita Vishnu Puran Hitopadesh Rig-Veda and the Upanishads
Which the Manusmriti led him to seek the Self in
solitude the Bhagvad Gita taught him the ideal of
disinterested action non-attachment meditation and
self-realization He was so overwhelmed by the Gita that
he declared it to be the lsquoUniversal Gospelrsquo Praising its
moral grandeur and sustained sublimity of thoughts he
wrote in Walden ndash ldquoIn the morning I bathe my intellect in the stupendous cosmogonal philosophy of the Bhagvad Gita since whose composition years of the gods have elapsed and in comparison with which our modern world and its literature seems puny and trivial the best Hindu scripture (Gita) is remarkable for its pure intellectuality The reader is nowhere raised into and sustained in a higher purer and rarer region of thought than the Bhagvad Gita It is unquestionably one of the noblest and most sacred scriptures which have come down to us The oriental philosophy assigns their due rank respectively to action and contemplation or rather does full Justice to the latterrdquo
A thorough study of the Upanishads made him exclaim
joyfully ldquoWhat extracts from the Vedas I have read fall on me like the light of a higher and purer luminary which describes a loftier course through a purer stratum ndash free from particulars simple universalrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 147
At a time when the Western philosophers did not
appreciate the significance of contemplation Thoreau
emphasized that contemplation is as important as
action for the latter has to be charged by the former
otherwise action will lead to chaos disillusionment and
despair
HIS TRANSCENDENTALISM
Thoreau was an empirical transcendentalist To him
transcendentalism was a profound exploration of the
spiritual foundations of life His emphasis on intuition
or inner light for a direct relationship with God which
transcends all the conventional avenues of
communication stemmed from an intuitive capacity for
grasping the ultimate truth He was interested less in
the material world than in spiritual reality He regarded
Nature as a viable garment of the spiritual world and
the universe as the embodiment of a single Cosmic Soul
His transcendentalism relied upon the higher planes of
human circumstances its oneness with something
higher than itself While logical reasoning fails to grasp
the truth intuition transcends understanding and is a
synthesizing power to understand the organic whole
which is called the Over-soul
An individual of exceptional self-ascending and self-
reliance he believed that Over-soul is brought down to
earth by action rather than words He therefore did not
preach transcendentalism but actually lived it To him
transcendentalism is ldquoan inquisitive and contemplative access to Godrdquo He believed in the immanence of God in
nature and in man and also the identity of God with the
soul of the individual He said ldquothe creator is still behind the increate the Divinity is so fleeting that its attributes are never expressedthe idea of God is the idea of
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 148
our Spiritual nature purified and enlarged to infinity In ourselves are the elements of Divinity We see God around us because He dwells within usrdquo
This statement reminds us of a verse in the Gita
wherein Lord Krishna declares that every living heart is
His abode
ldquoArjuna God abides in the heart of all creatures causing them to revolve according to their deeds by His illusive power seated as those beings are in the vehicle of the bodyrdquo
At one place Thoreau said ldquoThe whole is whole an organic whole which is called Over-soul or Para-Brahman and the highest aim of life is to realize this truth and be one with the whole or Over-soulrdquo Thoreau seems to have
been moved by our Vedic incantation which says
ldquoThat (the invisible Absolute) is whole whole is this (the visible phenomenal universe) from the invisible whole comes forth the visible whole Though the visible whole has come out from that invisible whole yet the whole remains unalteredrdquo Thus the phenomenal and the
Absolute are inseparable All existence is in the
Absolute and whatever exists must exist in it hence all
manifestation is merely a modification of the one
Supreme Whole and neither increases nor diminishes It
Serene and thoughtful as he was he wrote in his
Journal ldquoThe fact is I am a mystic a transcendentalist and a natural philosopher to bootrdquo
HIS ASCETISM (SANNYASA)
He was a true ascetic or Sannyasi for he preached and
practiced the basic human values of Anasakti (non-
attachment) and Aparigraha (non-possession)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 149
throughout his life He abhorred acquisition of wealth
and regarded worldly possessions as the result of sheer
exploitation of the masses by a few powerful men and
agencies including the State and the Government Since
the universe belongs to God any claim to ownership or
personal possessions is against moral law and is in fact
a sin against divinity Moral laws being superior to
worldly rules his preference for a life of self-abnegation
and renunciation bears a striking similarity to our Vedic
view expressed in the very opening line of the
Ishopanishad
ldquoAll this whatever exists in the universe is inhabited by the Lord Having renounced (the unreal) enjoy (the real) with restraint Do not covet or set your eye on the possession of othersrdquo
To him all worldly attractions and allurements were but
a passing show or fleeting moments (in eternity) which
distract the seekers of truth from cultivating self-culture
and promoting inner spiritual growth
EXPLORER OF THE INNER WORLD OF SPIRIT
Thoreau was an explorer of the inner self He wanted to
pass ldquoan invisible boundaryrdquo establishment within and
around him new universal and more liberal laws and
live with higher order of beings To him every man is
the Lord of the realm beside which the earthly empire
of the Czar is but a petty state a hammock left by the
icethere are continents and seas in the moral
world yet unexplored by him He praised William
Habbingtonrsquos following lines which echoed his own
thoughts
ldquoDirect your eyes right inward and you will find
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 150
A thousand regions in your mind
Yet undiscovered Travel then and be
Expert in home home cosmographyrdquo
Simple living based on extreme reduction of wants and
self-reliance enabled him to lsquocultivate the garden of his soulrsquo In consonance with the concept of an ideal Yogi in
the Gita he wrote
ldquoThe millions are awake enough for physical labour but only one in a million is awake enough for effective intellectual exertion and only one in a hundred millions do a poetic or divine liferdquo How truly does this view echo
the memorable words of Lord Krishna
ldquoAmong thousands of men one rare soul strives for perfection and among those who strive with success one perchance knows me in truthrdquo
Condemning people who go to Africa to hunt giraffes for
pastime he exhorted them to aim at seeking their own
lsquoSelfrsquo He said ldquoIt would be a noble game to shoot onersquos selfrdquo He seems to recall the famous verse of the
Mundakopanishad which says
ldquoThe Pranava is the bow the Atman is the arrow and the Brahman is said to be its mark It should be hit by one who is self-collected and that which hits becomes like the arrow one with the mark ie Brahmanrdquo
When he ordains lsquoto shoot oneselfrsquo he like our Vedic
seers hints at penetrating the truth centre in us with
our mind propelled by the motive force generated in the
voiceless ecstasy of deepest meditation which touches
the Brahman the Ultimate Reality When the individual
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 151
soul gets fully detached from its contacts with matter or
its false identification with material envelopment it
realizes its oneness with the Supreme Brahman How
beautifully has he stressed the value of inner search in
the concluding sentence of Walden
ldquoThe light which puts out our eyes is darkness to us Only that day dawns to which we are awake There is more day to dawn The Sun is but a morning starrdquo
IMMORTALITY OF SOUL AND THE DOCTRINE OF
TRANSMIGRATION
Thoreau firmly believed in the immortality of soul and
its transmigration He had fully imbibed the philosophy
of the Gita which enunciates in unequivocal terms the
permanence of the soul and the transience of the body
Says Lord Krishna
ldquoThis soul is never born and never dies nor does it become only after being born For it is unborn eternal everlasting and ancient even though the body is slain the soul is notrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II20
ldquoAs a man shedding worn-out garments takes other new ones likewise the embodied soul casting off worn-out bodies enters into others which are newrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II22
Thoreau considered his life as a series of many more
lives to come On his return from Waldon Pond he said
ldquoI had several more lives to live and could not spare any more for that onerdquo At another place he refers to the
solitary hired manrsquos lsquosecond birth and peculiar religious
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 152
experiencersquo He evidently recalled the following words of
St John ldquoExcept a man be born again he cannot see the kingdom of Godrdquo In his Waldon he refers to a bug and
declares ldquoWho does not feel his faith in a resurrection and immortality Who knows what beautiful and winged whose egg has been buried for ages under many concentric layers of woodenness in the dead dry life in societyheard perchance of gnawing out now for years by the astonished family of man may unexpectedly come forth from amidst societyrsquos most trivial furniture to enjoy its perfect summer life at lastrdquo
CONCLUSION
Thoreau was a true Yogi or an ascetic modeling on the
Indian tradition of strict moral code of conduct for a
Sannyasi He drew abundant spiritual and moral
sustenance from the Indian scriptures and its rich
lsquoculturersquo and approximated the ideal of a perfect recluse
The concept of an ideal Yogi is similar upto a point to
the postulates of Divinity expressed thus in the Atharva Veda
ldquoThe Yogi is desireless and hence free from the impact of animal nature he is serene in the heroism of the spirit he is satisfied with the essence of things perceived spirituality and hence does not depend on sense-perception for happiness and so he is complete in himself And though the physical body is subject to decay and death he remains unworn and ever youthful in spirit and has no fear of deathrdquo
Atharva Veda XVIII44
Such an enlightenment Yogi or spiritual superman was
Thoreau whose greatness will ever inspire us and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 153
illumine our lifersquos path with light and love His life was
lsquoa chronicle of actions just and brightrsquo and his writings
were lsquowrit with beams of heavenly light on which the eyes of God not rarely lookrsquo
Proof
Printed By Createspace
Digital Proofer
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 16
intuition to the conceptual dialectic The image and
vision of God lsquoimago deirsquo as an intellectual
contemplation (speculari) of the transcendent Absolute
(the prius) of all beings is an aspect of his speculative
mysticism
Byron however stands apart from all other poets
included herein for although his philosophy of life was
altogether different from that of his contemporaries he
was a force a portent and historical phenomenon in his
age He was endowed with a rare fire for liberty
indomitable courage sacrificing spirit and prophetic
zeal which are undoubtedly great human values His
inevitable attitude was revolt both social and personal
As an influence and portent he was the most powerful
poet in his age for he created that Byronic legend which
became a historic phenomenon of lasting fascination of
his personality Endowed with fiery energy his self-
portrait of careless arrogance or even daemonic figure
was a persona of romantic panache He was a portrait
and a symbol whom it was possible to worship or
condemn but never to neglect
PB Shelley who was lsquoone frail form ndash a phantom among men companionlessrsquo (Adonais) occupies a
unique position among Romantic poets Essentially he
was a visionary whose philosophy of enlightenment
made his poetry fanciful and ethereal He was a born
revolutionary who launched a crusade against the
organized religion and society Disgusted by the gloomy
state of the world he dreamed a world of beauty
freedom and virtue and made his poetry a trumpet of
narcissistic fantasy A solitary intellectual lsquowandering companionlessrsquo (Alastor) his poetry is the projection of
his sense of isolation He was fired by rationalist
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 17
revolutionary thought which reflects his visions of the
future Endowed with rationalist speculative intuition
his poetry symbolizes the spirit of human welfare
ldquoI wish no living thing to suffer painrdquo
Prometheus I303
The desire of Shelley reminds us of our scriptural
prayer ndash ldquoसव भवत स13खनः सव सत नरामयाःrdquo His
imagination is idealistic and vision synoptic He deals
with the heavens and light and aspired for the
regeneration of the world through love To him there is
no dualism between the material and spiritual life for
they are the aspects of same reality To him only
Eternity is real while the phenomenal world is but an
illusion or माया ndash a veil that hides true light He echoes a
Vedic truth when he says
ldquoThe One remains the many change and pass
Heavenrsquos light forever shines Earthrsquos shadows fly
Life like a dome of many-coloured glass
Stains the white radiance of Eternityrdquo
Adonais L11
He treats natural objects and forces as symbols for his
own emotional patterns In his lsquoOde to the West Windrsquo
he uses the West Wind as a spirit of destruction and
regeneration or death and rebirth He considers death
as only a prelude to renewed life and this shows his
faith in the transmigration of human soul or the cycle of
death and rebirth He declares
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 18
ldquoIf winter comes can spring be far behindrdquo
Ode to the West Wind
His entire poetry is a vivid and symbolic expression of
the wretched actuality and the radiant idea He wants to
herald a perfect world order based on love and
freedom He treats poetry as a potent instrument of
redemption and it was his deep romantic sensibility and
fanciful ecstatic Platonic love that earned him this
description of lsquopinnacled dim in the intense inanersquo He
was one of the greatest lyricists and an
lsquounacknowledged legislator of the worldrsquo of thought and
imagination
John Keats who in his own words was lsquoa fair creature of an hourrsquo was perhaps the first conscious artist whose
artistic intuition was far ahead of his time By declaring
that ldquoan artist must serve Mammonrdquo he wished to confer
on arts a special status and thus laid the foundation of
the doctrine of lsquoArt for Artrsquos sakersquo His minute delicate
and sensuous observation of the visible world of Nature
inspired his poetry which he wanted to lsquoloadrsquo with a
special excellence His delightful communion with
Nature and the sensuous ecstasies of its sight sound
smell touch and taste formed some of his best poetry
His delicacy and keenness of perception and love for
passive contemplation made him exclaim ndash ldquoO for a life of sensations rather than thoughtrdquo But in fact most of
his sensations were his thoughts for they were
embodied in sensuous pictorial form and rich symbolic
imagery
As a liberal enthusiast he felt that sharing the distress of
humanity or participation in ldquothe agony and strife of human heartsrdquo was essential not only for human growth
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 19
but also for poetic maturity This philanthropic attitude
of Keats brings him very close to our ardent Indian
prayer - ldquoसव भवत स13खनः सव सत नरामयाःrdquo ndash May all be happy may none struck with disease To find an
escape from the fret and fever of life he sought refuge in
an infinite yearning for beauty and turned to the realm
lsquoof Flora and old Panrsquo but soon realized the transience of
the world and started exploring permanence He could
find it in the spirit of beauty which is but a reflection of
eternal truth His passionate pursuit of ideal beauty
which he identified with truth has been beautifully
expressed in the following oft-quoted lines
ldquoBeauty is truth truth beauty that is all
Ye know on earth and all ye need to knowrdquo
Ode on a Grecian Urn
This fundamental unity or oneness of beauty and truth
and their interplay in the visible world are the
mainsprings of his poetic creed
The conflict between transience and permanence forms
the theme of his famous Odes and he longs for a
solution and lasting happiness in the form of Art or lsquoon the viewless wings of Poesyrsquo At the height of his
impassioned contemplation when the life of the spirit is
fused with the objects of immediate sensuous
experience he has glimpses of the permanence of
beauty which reflects Eternal Truth In one of his letters
(281) he declares ldquoI can never feel certain of any truth but from a clean perception of its beautyrdquo And at another
place when he finds mortality and immortality poles
apart he asserts the everlasting value of truth ldquoTruthrdquo
he says ldquomeans that which has lasting valuerdquo This firm
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 20
conviction of Keats seems to be a distinct echo of our
Vedantic dictum
सयमव जयत नानतम सयन पथा वततो दवयानः
यनामतय तत सयय परम नधान ldquoTruth alone triumphs not untruth By truth is laid out the Path Divine along which the seers who are free from desires and cravings ascend the supreme abode of Truthrdquo
Mundak Upanishad III16
Again the Vedic seer says that the Atman (self) is to be
realized only through truth
सयन लampसतपसा यष आमा
मडकोपनषद III15
Thus truth is the foundation of Dharma (righteousness)
for it is an essential and abiding value of human life The
eternal oneness of beauty and truth and vice versa and
their transcendental reality was Keatsrsquo poetic creed and
the realization of this basic spiritual truth raised him to
a level of sublime consciousness which is the mark of a
true seeker of truth or seer
In sum we may say that though lsquoa lily of a dayrsquo Keats
proved that a crowded hour of glory is far better than
an age without a name as has been stressed in our epic
Mahabharat where Queen Vidula exhorts her son
Sanjaya ldquoमहतम 0व1लत 2यो न त धमतम 4चरrdquo ndash ldquoIt is better to flame forth for an instant than to smoke away for agesrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 21
Though Keats died at the young age of 26 years he left
an indelible imprint on the history of English poetry for
his deep and pervasive influence could be easily seen on
Tennysonrsquos early work Moreover he was indisputably
the precursor of the Pre-Raphaelite movement In fact
he had reached near perfection in poetic craftsmanship
which will ever remain worthy of emulation for the
succeeding generations of poets
Ralph Waldo Emerson known as the lsquoSage of Concordrsquo
acted as a bridge between the East and the West His
abiding interest in the Indian scriptures and
particularly the Gita was a source of the Concord
Movement in America According to Swami
Vivekananda all the broad movements in America are
indebted to the Concord Party Mahatma Gandhi
remarked after reading Emersonrsquos Essays ldquoThe Essays to my mind contain the teaching of Indian wisdom in a Western lsquoGurursquo it is interesting to see our own sometimes differently fashionedrdquo Emerson drew freely on the
Upanishads Manusmriti Vishnu Puran and above all
the Gita and his writings reflect his indebtedness to our
holy texts
Pt Jawaharlal Nehru admired Emersonrsquos gospel of self-
reliance and righteousness in particular and regarded
him as one of the builders of America A
transcendentalist and thinker par excellence Emersonrsquos
ideas shaped not only his countrymenrsquos thinking but
had a deep and pervasive influence over many other
nations His main thoughts coloured as they are by our
own Indian religio-philosophical strands are universal
in appeal and are as relevant today as they were in his
own lifetime
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 22
In formulating his concept of Over-Soul Emerson
stressed the fundamental identity of Individual Soul
with Over-Soul He asserted ldquoWithin man is the soul of the whole ndash the wise silence the universal beauty to which every part and particle is equally related the Eternal Oneonly by the vision of that wisdom can the horoscope of ages be readrdquo He firmly believed in the
immortality of soul and the ephemerality of the world
and strongly condemned the futility of manrsquos vanity and
ego-centric attachment to the perishable objects of the
world His writings leave us lsquocalm of mind all passions spentrsquo In fact lsquohe gives men to mankind and mankind to the laws of Godrsquo
Henry David Thoreau was a great empirical
transcendentalist about whom Emerson once remarked
ldquowherever there is knowledge wherever there is virtue wherever there is beauty he will find a homerdquo His essay
on lsquoCivil Disobediencersquo which Gandhiji read twice in a
South African jail impressed him so much so that he
regarded him as his political lsquoGurursquo and his concept of
Satyagraha owes its origin to Thoreaursquos writings
Endowed with a rare meditative mind he loved lsquosweet solitudersquo and retired to the woods for discovering the
lsquohigher lawrsquo and realize his oneness with the Cosmic
Spirit He believed in the supremacy of moral laws and
his doctrine of Civil Disobedience is based on his dictate
of conscience for he considered individual conscience
more important than arbitrary state laws
Thoroughly immersed in the Indian scriptures his
thought-process and philosophy of life was
considerably moulded by our ancient religio-spiritual
heritage His deep love for our scriptural texts is evident
from his declaration of the Gita as lsquoUniversal Gospelrsquo He
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 23
wrote ldquoIn the morning I bathe my intellect in the stupendous cosmogonal philosophy of the Bhagvad GitaIt is unquestionably one of the noblest and most sacred scriptures which have come down to usthe oriental philosophy assigns their due rank respectively to action and contemplationrdquo
About the Vedas he remarked ldquoExtracts from the Vedas fall on me like the light of a higher and purer luminaryrdquo
According to him Over-Soul could be brought down to
earth not by words but by ldquoan inquisitive and contemplative accessrdquo He further states ldquoIn us are the elements of Divinity We see God around us because He dwells within usrdquo
He was a true ascetic (सयासी) for he preached and
practiced non-attachment (अनासि8त) in his life He was
an explorer of the inner world of Spirit In the seclusion
of woods he lsquocultivated the garden of his soul as a true Yogirsquo and he wanted to lsquoshoot his selfrsquo as our Mundaka Upanishad says
ldquoThe Pranava is the bow Atma the arrow the Brahman its mark It should be hit by a self-collected onerdquo
Much of what is stated in this compact volume may be
found scattered over various other critical works but
my earnest endeavour has been to bring together such
material as is of sufficient spiritual value which belongs
to all times This small comparative survey of the realm
of main ideas of some great poets confirms the splendor
of their rich romantic imagination and the unity of all
spiritual vision that makes them not only the creators of
beauty love and light but also brothers in spirit
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 24
I would feel amply rewarded if through this modest
attempt I am able to arouse keen interest in my readers
for further critical study of the subject Any suggestions
for amplification or improvement on the text are most
welcome
RP DWIVEDI
LUCKNOW
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 25
WILLIAM BLAKE
(28 November 1757 ndash 12 August 1827)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 26
WILLIAM BLAKE
English Poet Painter Engraver and Visionary
He was trained as an engraver by James Basire and
afterward attended classes at the Royal Academy Blake
married in 1782 and in 1784 he opened a print shop in
London He developed an innovative technique for
producing coloured engravings and began producing
his own illustrated books of poetrymdashincluding Songs of Innocence (1789) The Marriage of Heaven and Hell (1790) and Songs of Experience (1794)mdashwith his new
method of ldquoIlluminated Printingrdquo Jerusalem (1804[ndash
20]) an epic treating the fall and redemption of
humanity is his most richly decorated book His other
major works include Vala or The Four Zoas
(manuscript 1796ndash1807) and Milton (1804[ndash11]) A
late series of 22 watercolours inspired by the Book of
Job includes some of his best-known pictures He was
called mad because he was single-minded and
unworldly he lived on the edge of poverty and died in
neglect His books form one of the most strikingly
original and independent bodies of work in the Western
cultural tradition Ignored by the public of his day he is
now regarded as one of the earliest and greatest figures
of Romanticism
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 27
CHAPTER ONE
INDIAN SPIRITUALISM IN BLAKErsquoS VISIONS OF ETERNITY
INTRODUCTION
William Blake was by far the most prophetic of all major
English poets In a preface to his famous poem on
Milton he exclaimed lsquoWould to God that all the Lordrsquos people were Prophetsrsquo Elsewhere Blake declared lsquoA Prophet is a seer not an arbitrary dictatorrsquo According to
PH Butter an acclaimed authority on Blake ldquoa prophet sees behind the marks of woe behind the wars and other evils of his time and the attitudes that cause such things But Blake was not the kind of prophet who just present evils but one who saw the Visions of Eternity one whose senses discovered the infinite in everythingrdquo The prophet
is also a spokesman one who speaks or believes he
speaks for God or some other higher power Blake
himself claimed in one of his letters in 1803 ldquoI dare not pretend to be any other than the Secretary the Authors are in Eternityrdquo
His belief in lsquoinspirationrsquo contributed to that lsquoterrifying honestyrsquo which TS Eliot saw in him to keep him
uncompromisingly true to his vision He perceived a
close relationship of the conscious ndash lsquoIrsquo with the deeper
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 28
self through which all inspiration flows He knew that
the prophet must also be a lsquomakerrsquo lsquoa blacksmith laboring at his furnaces to shape the stubborn structure of the languagersquo He further realized that a prophet
should also be a teacher a preacher and a beacon light
to humanity
Explaining the function of the bard or poet (and his own
mission) Blake in his introduction to Songs of Experience declares
ldquoHear the voice of the bard
Who present past and future sees
Whose ears have heard
The Holy word
That walked among the ancient trees
Calling the lapsed soul
And weeping in the evening dew
That might control
The starry pole
And fallen fallen light renewrsquo
Or again elucidating the aim of writing poetry or his
lsquogreat taskrsquo Blake declares
ldquo I rest not from my great task
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 29
To open the Eternal worlds to open the immortal eyes
Of man inwards into the worlds of Thought into Eternity
Ever expanding in the bosom of God the human imaginationrsquo
Like Milton who wanted lsquoto justify the ways of God to Manrsquo or Shelley who held that lsquopoetry is the revelation of the eternal ideas which lie behind the many-coloured ever-shifting veil that we call reality in lifersquo Blake in his
exceptional prophetic zeal set out to open the Eternal
worlds to open the immortal eyes of man inwards into
the worlds of thought into Eternity He was always at
pains to renew the fallen fallen light The poetrsquos divine
task of lsquoever expanding in the bosom of Godrsquo reminds us
of the moving verse of our Rig Veda in which God as
creator of beautiful forms has been conceived of as the
greatest poet whose divine creative energy s his poetic
power which manifests itself in the manifold forms of
beauty and splendor like the Heaven the Sun the Moon
the Sky etc
यो धता भवानानामगया स कवः काया प पपltयत
ऋवद VIII415
lsquoHe who is the supporter of the world of life
Who knows the secret mysterious names of the morning beams
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 30
He poet cherishes manifold forms by His poetic power even as heavenrsquo
Rig Veda VIII415
As a divinely inspired poet Blake seems to have had
experiences of various psychic and even mystic visions
which awakened him to subtle spiritual life It seems
that he must have transcended normal sensory
perceptions and would have attained to super-sensory
status of consciousness when he declares
lsquoI see the savior over me
Spreading his beams of love and dictating the words of mild song
Awake O sleeper of the land of shadows wake
I am in you and you in me mutual in love divinersquo
Jerusalem L4-7
He seems to have attained to that rare transcendental
consciousness when he perceived perfect communion
with God who assured him
lsquoI am not a God afar off I am a brother and friend
Within your bosoms I reside and you reside in me
We are one forgiving all evil not seeking recompensersquo
Jerusalem L18-20
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 31
Here Blake on perceiving a synoptic vision of complete
identity or oneness of God with individual self seems to
have echoed the eternal ancient Holy Scriptures Here
are a few striking parallels
In our Vedas also Go is regarded and adored as our
most-trusted friend Says the Rig Veda
lsquoमा=कर न ऐना सयाच ऋषः
वBमा Cह Dमतमसया 1शवानrsquo
ऋवद X237
lsquoNever may this friendship be severed
Of thee O Deity and the sage Vimada
We know O God Thy brother-like love
With us be Thy auspicious friendshiprsquo
Rig Veda X237
The key-note of this type of worship is the
contemplation of friendly love (described in later
religious literature as - सय ndash friendliness between the
Deity and the worshipper) The following prayer is in
the same spirit
lsquoभवा नः सFन अतमः सखा वधrsquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 32
ऋवद X133
lsquoBe Thou most dear to us for bliss O friend to aidrsquo
Rig Veda X133
Similarly assuring Arjuna of His perennial benediction
Lord Krishna declares in the Gita
ईHवरः सवभतानामतltठत
Kामयसवभतानमायया
ldquoArjuna God abides in the heart of all creatures
Causing them to revolve according to their Karma
By His illusive power seated as those beings are
In the vehicle of the bodyrdquo
Bhagvad Gita XVIII61
And again describing Himself as the truest friend of all
living beings Lord Krishna pronounces
ldquoI am the (disinterested) friend of all living beings and my devotee attains supreme peacerdquo
Bhagvad Gita V29
To turn to William Blake again he has an essential
belief in the closest intimacy of all living beings with
God who is the fountain-head of all life love and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 33
friendship This belief makes him affirm his faith in the
holiness of all life on earth Says he in his Annotations to Lavater
lsquoAll Life is Holyrsquo
Again he says ldquoIt is God in all that is our companion and friend for our God himself says lsquoyou are my brother my sister and my motherrsquo and Saint John said lsquowho so dwelleth in love dwelleth in God and God in himrsquo and such a one cannot judge of any but in loveGod is in lowest effects as well as in the highest causes for he is become a worm that he may nourish the weak For let it be remembered that creation is God descending according to the weakness of man for our Lord is the word of God and everything on earth is the word of God and in its essence is Godrdquo
In our own scriptures the all-pervasiveness of God (the
One) has been conceived not only in the cosmic world
but also in the world of men The very opening verse of
the Ishopanishad stresses the immanence of God in the
universe
ईशावाय इद सवM यािकNय जगया जगत
ईशोपनष I
lsquoUnderstand all this (universe) as inhabited by the Lord
Each moving thing in this moving worldrsquo
Or again says the Atharva Veda
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 34
य समायोऽवPणोयो वदHयः
यो दवोऽवPणोमानषः
lsquoGod is that in which things converge
He is that from which things diverge
He is our own land he is of foreign land
He is divine he is humanrsquo
Atharva Veda IV168
The immanence of God is the entire universe is also
underscored by Lord Krishna when he tells Arjuna
ldquoThere is nothing besides me Arjuna Like clusters of yarn-beads formed by knots all this (universe) is threaded on merdquo
Bhagvad Gita VII7
SYNOPTIC VISION
A firm belief in the all-pervasiveness of God in the
whole universe led him to perceive every object of
Nature as a window through which we may look with a
sense of awe and wonder into the beauty truth and all-
enveloping eternity which is but a reflection of God
Blake must have had palpable intimations of Eternity
when he wrote
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 35
lsquoTo see a world in a grain of sand
And a Heaven in a wild flower
Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand
And Eternity in an hourrsquo
Auguries of Innocence
Such a super-sensuous or transcendental perception of
Divinity in all creation and all creation in Divinity gave
Blake a subtle insight into the lsquoVisions of Eternityrsquo and
made him not only a seer but also lsquoan inhabitant of
other planes another domain of beingrsquo Commenting on
Blakersquos singular other-worldliness our own seer and
prophet Sri Aurobindo says ldquoThere is no other singer of the beyond who is like him or equal him in the strangeness supernatural lucidity power and directness of vision of the beyond and the rhythmic clarity and beauty of his singingrdquo
It is this contemplative knowledge of infinity in finite
and finite in infinity that has been regarded as the
distinguishing mark of the pure wisdom which finally
leads one to transcendental revelation which has been
so beautifully expressed in our own scriptures
सवभतषभावमययमीRत
अवभ8तसािवक
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 36
lsquoWhen one sees Eternity in things that pass away and Infinity in finite things then one has pure knowledgersquo
Bhagvad Gita XVIII20
The same truth has been emphasized again and again in
the Upanishads When man comes to know the real
truth about God nay when he succeeds in realizing the
truth about God how can he ever revile or adversely
criticize any form or aspect of God The Isha Upanishad
says
यत सवा13ण भतान आमयवानपHयत
सवभतष चामना ततो न वजगSसत
ईशोपनष VI
ldquoWhoever beholds all beings in God alone and God in all beings ie who regards all beings as his own self he no more looks down upon any creature for regarding all as his self whom will he hate and howrdquo
Lord Krishna stresses the same equanimity of vision
when he declares
ldquoThe Yogi who is united in identity with the all-pervading infinite consciousness and sees unity everywhere beholds the self present in all beings and all beings as assumed in the selfrdquo
Bhagvad Gita VI29
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RP DWIVEDI Page 37
Again Lord Krishna declares
यो मा पHयत सव सवM च मय पHयत
तयाह न DणHया1म स च म न DणHयत
भगवगीता VI30
ldquoHe who sees me (the universal self) present in all beings and all beings existing within me never loses sight of me and I never lose sight of himrdquo
Bhagvad Gita VI30
FAITH IN THE LAW OF ETERNITY
Since God is infinite immanent and omnipresent soul
which is an integral and inalienable part of God is also
immortal The forms or objects of the world may change
but in reality they exist forever and are eternal Like
God soul is everlasting unborn undecaying and
undying Blake says
ldquoWhatever can be created can be annihilated
Forms can not
The oak is cut down by the axe the lamb falls by the knife
But their Form Eternal exists for everrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 38
The poet also believes that all sufferings of man if borne
meekly for a noble cause have their rich recompense
sooner or later for God being all-merciful would
certainly reward his suffering children He believes that
lsquoFor a tear is an intellectual thing
And a sigh is a sword of an angel king
And the bitter groan of a martyrrsquos woe
Is an arrow from the Almightyrsquos bowrsquo
Jerusalem
He believes that God Almighty holds out a solemn
promise of reward to sufferers for a lofty cause God
declares
lsquofear not Lo I am with thee always
Only believe in me that I have power to raise from deathrsquo
Jerusalem
MEANS OF LIBERATION
As the greatest and most inventive of Romantic
mythmakers Blake at first explores the contrary states
of human innocence and experience and then speaks of
lsquothe five gatesrsquo our mortal senses which bind us down to
the earth Not so much interested in the art of the
possible as in the visions of the beyond Blake
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 39
constructed a cosmic myth to show manrsquos infinite
potential and how he might attain to final liberation
from this sinful ephemeral world characterized by a
wheel of births and deaths He weaves his myths round
the fall and salvation of man the universal man and his
ultimate waking to eternal life In his poems lsquoMiltonrsquo and
lsquoJerusalemrsquo he regards Satan as the embodiment of
error selfhood and boundless pride and points out that
the means of liberation or freedom from the worldly
bondages lie in the annihilation of selfhood or ego and
the forgiveness of sins He exclaims lsquoI in my selfhood am that Satan I am that evil onersquo and resolves that he would
go down to self-annihilation In lsquoMiltonrsquo he puts the
following words into the mouth of Milton
lsquobut laws of Eternity
Are not such Know thou I come to self-annihilation
Such are the laws of Eternity that each shall mutually
Annihilate himself for others goodrsquo
Reiterating and stressing his poetic purpose or mission
of life Blake resolves
lsquoMine is to teach men to despise death and to go on
In fearless majesty of annihilating self
I come to discover before Heaven and Hell
the self righteousness in all its hypocritical turpitude
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 40
put off
In self-annihilation all that is not God alone
To put off self and all I have ever and everrsquo
Again in a sincere invocation to God Blake prays
lsquoO saviour pour upon me thy spirit of meekness and love
Annihilate the selfhood in me be thou all my life
Guide thou my hand which trembles exceedingly
Upon the rocks of agesrsquo
SPIRITUAL HUMANISM
Inspired by his implicit faith in Godrsquos fatherhood and
menrsquos brotherhood Blake preached the concept of
universal fraternity Considering the whole world as
one large family he maintained that all divisions and
fragmentations of humanity stemmed from manrsquos
ignorance of the eternal truth of one and only one
universal family The world being the home of mankind
all human beings are inextricably interwoven together
in the same warp and woof of life How beautifully has
this cosmopolitan philosophy of manrsquos eternal identity
with his fellow beings been enunciated in the following
memorable words
lsquoWe live as one man for contracting our infinite senses
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 41
We behold multitude or expanding
We behold as one Man all the universal family
and he is in us and we in him
Live in perfect harmony in Eden the land of life
Giving receiving and forgiving each otherrsquos trespassesrsquo
Elsewhere the poet says
lsquoThere is no other God than God
Who is the intellectual fountain of Humanity
I never made friends but by spiritual gifts
By severe contentions of friendship and the burning fire of thought
He who would see the divinity must see him in his children
So he who wishes to see a vision perfect whole
Must see it in its minute particulars organizedrsquo
Preaching universal brotherhood based on love
understanding and sacrifice he again exclaims (in the
words of Jesus)
lsquoWouldst thou live one who never died
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 42
For thee or ever die for one
Who had not died for thee
And if God died not for man and giveth not himself
Eternally for man
Man could not exist for man is love and God is love
Every kindness to another is a little death in the divine image
Nor can man exist but by brotherhoodrsquo
Jerusalem
Condemning man-made divisions of mankind into
various castes and creeds he says
lsquoAnd all must love the human form
In heathen Turk or Jew
Where mercy love and pity dwell
There God is dwelling toorsquo
The Divine Image
How truly are the poetrsquos ideas relevant even today when
the hot wind of doubt and distrust is blowing all over
the world (which has been broken up into fragments by
caste and creed clime and country) can be viewed in
the context of our age-old belief in the worship of God in
the universal form (Vishwaroop) and our religious and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 43
spiritual aspirations for ensuring the maximum good of
the world To serve humanity in a spirit of humility
impelled our people to look upon the world as one
great undivided family or nest (वHवनीड़म) and all men
as our brethren ndash (वसधव कटFबकम)
The ideal of universal brotherhood and selfless service
to humanity found spontaneous utterance in the
following moving words which embody the sublime
aim of a devout manrsquos life
न वह कामय रा0य न वगम ना पनभव
कामय दःख तSतानाम Dा13ण नामातनाशन
lsquoI do not desire earthly kingdom nor heaven nor do I want rebirth I want to reduce the sorrow of people who are sunk in sufferingrsquo
Today when the horizon of humanity is darkened by
national prejudices the need for spiritual humanism
synoptic vision and universal brotherhood is being
increasingly felt by one and all Here it is worthwhile to
turn our attention to great men whose thoughts
transcend myriad artificial barriers and teach us the
ideal of dedication to the common weal
Since truth transcends all religious dogmas and
disinterested service to mankind is a form of true
worship to God our great men have always prayed
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 44
सव भवत स13खनः सव सत नरामयाः
सव भWा13ण पHयत मा किHचX दःख भाYभवत
lsquoMay all be happy may all living beings be free from diseases may we perceive goodness in all and may none be struck with misfortunersquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 45
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
(7 April 1770 ndash 23 April 1850)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 46
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
English Poet
Orphaned at age 13 Wordsworth attended Cambridge
University but he remained rootless and virtually
penniless until 1795 when a legacy made possible a
reunion with his sister Dorothy Wordsworth He
became friends with Samuel Taylor Coleridge with
whom he wrote Lyrical Ballads (1798) the collection
often considered to have launched the English Romantic
movement Wordsworths contributions include
Tintern Abbey and many lyrics controversial for their
common everyday language About 1798 he began
writing The Prelude (1850) the epic autobiographical
poem that would absorb him intermittently for the next
40 years His second verse collection Poems in Two Volumes (1807) includes many of the rest of his finest
works including Ode Intimations of Immortality His
poetry is perhaps most original in its vision of the
organic relation between man and the natural world a
vision that culminated in the sweeping metaphor of
nature as emblematic of the mind of God The most
memorable poems of his middle and late years were
often cast in elegaic mode few match the best of his
earlier works By the time he became widely
appreciated by the critics and the public his poetry had
lost much of its force and his radical politics had yielded
to conservatism In 1843 he became Englands poet
laureate He is regarded as the central figure in the
initiation of English Romanticism
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 47
CHAPTER TWO
VEDANTA IN WORDSWORTHrsquoS POETRY
In many of his famous poems among which Ode on Intimations of immortality and Lines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey occupy pride of place
William Wordsworth one of the greatest seer-poets of
English literature presents ideas which bear striking
similarity to the rich philosophical thought that found
unimpeded flow in our Vedantic literature
In fact there are so many echoes of Vedanta in the
poetry of Wordsworth that one is apt to conclude that
the poetrsquos lsquophilosophic mindrsquo must have led him to drink
deep at the unfailing springs of Upanishadic Helicon
A poet of nature Wordsworth was essentially lsquoa seer of spiritual realities a seer of the calm spirit in naturersquo and
his poetry at its best is a fine harmony of his spiritual
insight ethical sense and profundity of thought He is a
curious amalgam of the seer the poet and the reflective
moralist who dwells philosophically and even
prophetically on Nature Man and Cosmic Soul
The epithets lsquobest philosopherrsquo lsquomighty prophetrsquo and
lsquoseer blestrsquo which Wordsworth uses for the new-born
innocent child in his famous Ode may be well applied to
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 48
the poet himself for ldquovoyaging in strange seas of
thought alonerdquo Wordsworth had found lsquofull many a gem
of purest ray serenersquo which still shed undiminished
luster on the entire fabric of English poetry
A careful study of the Ode on Intimations of immortality Lines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey Ruth Laodamia To Cuckoo and other poems reveals that Wordsworthrsquos sustained
loftiness of thought had taken him to such heights that
on him (to quote his own words)
lsquo those truths do rest which we are toiling all our lives to findrsquo
What indeed are those truths Those are the elemental
truths of life which were keenly perceived realized and
expressed by the seers and savants of the East and
particularly of our Vedantic times A careful study of
Vedanta which is the aphoristic summary of the co-
ordinated Upanishads the Brahmasutras and the
Bhagvad Gita and is in fact the culmination of Indian
religion and Philosophical thought reveals that serious
scholars of the West drew freely upon it Wordsworthrsquos
poetry bears ample testimony to this fact because
numerous echoes of Vedanta can be easily heard in his
poetry
To cite a few comparative examples the Upanishads
assert in unambiguous terms that the whole universe of
names and forms the world of being and becoming
springs from Brahman (Supreme Godhead or Absolute
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 49
Cosmic Soul) ndash the eternal existence consciousness and
bliss Since the universe is the creation and
manifestation of Brahman it is also pervaded by Him
Naturally therefore only Brahman exists all else is non-
existent or illusory The Chhandogya Upanishad
declares lsquoBrahman is verily the Allrsquo God is the subtle
essence underlying phenomenal existence the whole
nature which is Godrsquos handiwork as well as Godrsquos
garment and is filled and inspired by God who is its
inner controller and soul
The immanence of God has been corroborated by
Brihadaranyak Upanishad in two passages the first
being in the form of an answer given by Yagnavalyak to
Uddalak Aruni
lsquoHe is immanent in fire in the intermundia in air in the heavens in the Sun in the quarters in the Moon in the stars in space in darkness in light in all beings in Prana in all things and within all things whom these things do not know whose body these things are who controls all these things from within He is thy soul the inner controller the immortal He is the unseen seer the unheard hearer the unthought thinker the ununderstood understander other than Him there is no seer other than Him there is no hearer other than Him there is no thinker other than Him there is no understander everything besides Him is naughtrsquo
Brihadaranyak Upanishad II7
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 50
In another passage Brihadaranyak Upanishad tells us
that God is the All ndash ldquoboth the formed and the formless the mortal and the immortal the stationary and the moving the this and thatHe is the verity of verities the soul of souls and He is the supreme verityrdquo
Brihadaranyak Upanishad IIV15
Wordsworth like these unique revelatory utterances of
the Upanishads codifies this truth in mystical manner in
Lines Composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey when he regards the Cosmic Soul as supreme power or
all-pervading presence
lsquoWhose dwelling is the light of setting Suns
And the round ocean and the living air
And the blue sky and in the mind of man
A motion and a spirit that impels
All thinking things all objects o all thought
And rolls through all thingsrsquo
Since God is All and everything else is Naught the world
is not real it is an appearance It is not the permanent
all-abiding Absolute Reality but a fleeting show and
ephemeral entity having seemingly phenomenal reality
In other words the world is lsquoshadow not substancersquo ndash it
is just a net-work of Maya
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 51
This Vedantic doctrine finds utterance not only in
Wordsworthrsquos poems like To the Cuckoo in which he
calls the earth ldquoan unsubstantial fairy placerdquo but he
seems to have actually experienced this illusory nature
of the world in states of mystic trance that often visited
him since his boyhood
In the introduction to his Ode on Intimations of Immortality he records such an experience in clear
terms
ldquoI was unable to think of external things as having external existence and I communed with all that I saw as something not apart from but inherent in my own immaterial nature Many a times while going to school have I grasped at a wall or tree to recall myself from the abyss of idealism to the realityrdquo
Such an ecstatic state of realizing eternal truths is
referred to in Lines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey as
lsquoThat blessed mod
In which the burden of the mystery
Of all this unintelligible world
Is lightenedrsquo
And finally to quote from the same poem
lsquoWe are laid asleep
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 52
In body and become a living soul
While with an eye made quiet by the power
Of harmony and the deep power of joy
We see into the life of thingsrsquo
One of the basic postulates of our Upanishadic
philosophy has been the idea of transmigration of soul
or faith in the cycle of births deaths and rebirths The
doctrine of transmigration has been explicitly advanced
in the Upanishads and particularly in the
Kathopanishad and Brihadaranyak Upanishad
In the Kathopanishad when the father of Nachiketas
told him that he had made him over to the god of Death
Nachiketas replied that it was no uncommon fate that
was befalling him
ldquoI indeed go at the head of many to the other world but I also go in the midst of many What is the god of Death going to do to me Look at our predecessors (who have already gone) look also at those who have succeeded them Man ripens like corn and like corn he is born againrdquo
Kathopanishad IV6
The Brihadaranyak Upanishad states the same truth
ldquoAnd as a caterpillar after reaching the end of a blade of grass finds another place of support and then draws itself towards it and as a goldsmith after taking a piece
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 53
of gold gives it another newer and more beautiful shape similarly does this Self after having thrown off this body and dispelled ignorance take on another newer and more beautiful form whether it be of one of the man or demi-god or god or of Prajapati or Brahman or of any other beingsrdquo
Brihadaranyak Upanishad IVIII5
The same truth appears in the Bhagvad Gita when Lord
Krishna says to the mentally agitated Arjuna
ldquoAs a man discarding worn-out clothes takes other new ones likewise the embodied soul casting off worn-out bodies enters into others which are newrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II22
And further Lord Krishna says to Arjuna
ldquoFor in that case the death of him who is born is certain and the rebirth of him who is dead is inevitablerdquo
Bhagvad Gita II27
Wordsworth in his famous Ode on Intimations of Immortality confirms his faith in the transmigration of
soul by saying in unmistakable terms
lsquoOur birth is but a sleep and a forgetting
The soul that rises with us our lifersquos star
Hath had elsewhere its setting
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 54
And cometh from afar
Not in entire forgetfulness
And not in utter nakedness
But trailing clouds of glory do we come
From God who is our homersquo
Again when Wordsworth laments the loss of pure
innocence immeasurable bliss and ecstatic vision of
early childhood in the great Ode and exclaims in
memorable words
lsquoWhither is fled the visionary gleam
Where is it now the glory and the dreamrsquo
He attributes the loss to the worldly intellectuality and
attachments as they grow upon man As childhood
grows into youth and youth into manhood the lsquovision splendidrsquo fades the first clear intimations of immortality
are dimmed leaving behind an unillumined waste of
mere thought and moralizing
lsquoAt length the Man perceives it die away
And fade into the light of common dayrsquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
The world of materialism or attachment tames him so
much so that man lsquothe little actorrsquo thinks
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 55
lsquoAs if his whole vocation
Were endless imitationrsquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
Whatever may be the crux of his philosophy of
childhood this belief of the poet can be safely traced
back to the comprehensive doctrine of the Maya in the
Upanishads and the Bhagvad Gita The Upanishads
tell us that the world is a delusion an appearance not
reality The Taittiriya Upanishad says ldquoAll beings spring from the Supreme Being are sustained by Him and return to the same Absolute at the time of dissolution Our life on earth is therefore a sojournrdquo The Isha Upanishad tells us that ldquothe truth is veiled in this universe by a vessel of gold and it invokes the grace of God to lift up the golden lid and allow the truth to be seenrdquo
It follows that our senses cloud our vision and lead us
farther and farther away from our spiritual moorings as
we come of age Senses dupe us and turn us into
worldlings Lord Krishna says to Arjuna in the Bhagvad Gita ldquoAs the wind carries away the barge upon the waters even so of the wandering senses the one to which the mind is joined takes away his discriminationrdquo
Thus the eternal and boundless Supreme Soul is as it
were limited by the sense organs and the body The
Universal Soul shackled by the body becomes the
individual soul (Paramatma becomes Jivatma) Because
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 56
of the presence of the Soul the spark of the Divine the
senses or sense-objects or worldly attractions fail to
dupe man fully from his divine mission This
metaphysical conviction finds expression in
Wordsworthrsquos Ode He says that though
lsquoShades of the prison-house begin to close
Upon the growing boy
But he beholds the light and whence it flows
He sees it in his joyrsquo
However farther man may go away from Nature ndash the manifestation of God and the indwelling Supreme Soul which resides in his own individual soul he can not
lsquoForget the glories he hath known
And that imperial palace whence he camersquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
Since bliss (Anand) is an inevitable attribute of God and
manrsquos soul being a fragment of Supreme Soul it
experiences the presence of God in moments of
Supreme Joy
Of the innumerable expressions in the Vedantic
literature of the joy of life of joy as the all entwining
principle of life and of creative principle of life and life
too the following passage from the Taittiriya Upanishad is very pertinent here
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 57
ldquoJoy is the Brahman from joy are born all living things by joy they are nourished towards joy they move and in joy they are absorbedrdquo Joy as the foundation of life
emanates from the Upanishad philosophy
Wordsworth seems to hold identical belief when he
craves for joy and laments its loss
lsquoO Joy that in our embers
Is something that doth live
That nature yet remembers
What was so fugitiversquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
The same idea finds expression in Lines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey where Wordsworth
declares it as Naturersquos privilege lsquoto lead (us) from joy to joyrsquo
And lastly the classicus locus of the Upanishadic
philosophy is to be found in the idea of immortality of
soul In the Chhandogya and Mundak Upanishads and
above all in the Kathopanishad we find numerous
references to the immortality of the soul We are told in
a passage of Kathopanishad lsquothat while we are dwelling in this body on earth we can visualize that Atman (Soul) as in a mirror that is contrariwise left being to the right and right being to the leftrsquo In the Bhagvad Gita also
Lord Krishna tells Arjuna about the immortality of Soul
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 58
ldquoThis soul is never born nor dies it exists on coming into being for it is unborn eternal everlasting and primeval even though the body is slain the soul is notrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II20
He further says
ldquoFor this soul is incapable of being cut it is proof against fire impervious to water and undriable as well This soul is eternal omnipresent immovable constant and everlastingrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II24
Wordsworth seems to have been fully convinced of this
philosophia perennis of the Vedanta when he eulogizes
immortality by addressing the child in his Ode in the
following words
lsquoThou over whom thy immortality
Broods like the day
A Master over a slave
A presence which is not to be put byrsquo
The poet in speaking of the lsquotruths that wake to perish neverrsquo seems to be reminiscent of the Upanishadic
concept that freed from the trammels of the body the
individual soul loses itself in the All-Soul when he
declares in the rapture
lsquoOur souls have sight of that immortal sea
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 59
Which brought us hither
Can in a moment travel thitherrsquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
Tracing the expression and confirmation of many other
tenets of Vedanta in the poetry of William Wordsworth
forms an interesting literary venture and instances of
close affinity between the Vedantic doctrines and
Wordsworthrsquos ideas may be multiplied Such a
comparative study proves that eternal truths transcend
the barriers of clime or country time or space and shine
through all ages and in all lands We should draw moral
sustenance from them and live a fuller freer life
Even today the wise all over the world maintain a
remarkable identity of views and their thoughts foster
international understanding
ldquoFrom hand to hand the greeting flows
From eye to eye the signals run
From heart to heart the bright hope glows
The seekers of light are onerdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 60
ST COLERIDGE
(21 October 1772 ndash 25 July 1834)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 61
ST COLERIDGE
English Poet Critic and Philosopher
Coleridge studied at the University of Cambridge where
he became closely associated with Robert Southey In
his poetry he perfected a sensuous lyricism that was
echoed by many later poets Lyrical Ballads (1798 with
William Wordsworth) containing the famous Rime of
the Ancient Mariner and Frost at Midnight heralded
the beginning of English Romanticism Other poems in
the ldquofantasticalrdquo style of the Mariner include the
unfinished Christabel and the celebrated Pleasure
Dome of Kubla Khan While in a bad marriage and
addicted to opium he produced Dejection An Ode
(1802) in which he laments the loss of his power to
produce poetry Later partly restored by his revived
Anglican faith he wrote Biographia Literaria 2 vol
(1817) the most significant work of general literary
criticism of the Romantic period Imaginative and
complex with a unique intellect Coleridge led a restless
life full of turmoil and unfulfilled possibilities
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 62
CHAPTER THREE
COLERIDGErsquoS SPIRITUAL QUEST AND INDIAN THOUGHT
INTRODUCTION
Coleridge was by all accounts a genius par excellence
whose versatility flowed albeit impeded in diverse
channels of creativity such as metaphysics poetry
theology and literary criticism Of all the Romantic poets
he possessed the most fertile and powerful imagination
which earned for him a special place in English poetry
and philosophical thought In the words of William
Hazlitt lsquohe had angelic wings and fed on mannarsquo He had
a lsquoseminal mindrsquo which said William Wordsworth
lsquothrew out a series of grand central truthsrsquo We find in
him the poet the philosopher and the theologian rolled
in one Charles Lamb called him lsquoLogician Metaphysician Bardrsquo whose poetry and writings are
tinged with a magical and ethereal quality His thought
made a permanent landmark on the succeeding
generations of English men of letters for he explored the
mysterious working of human mind
His life presents a saga of sharp contrast between
reality and dream blissful confidence and broken
hopes the warmth of human ties and the solitude of
haunted soul He probed human thought and dilemma
with a rare prophetic insight A prodigious thinker and
sincere seeker of truth he once remarked ldquoI would compare the Human Soul to a shiprsquos crew cast on an
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 63
Unknown Islandrdquo His particular fascination for the
unknown drew him instinctively to the German
transcendental or idealistic school of philosophy
represented by Berkeley Kant Schelling and Fichte
Fired by a peculiar mystic idealism he tried to interpret
the lsquoInterruptionrsquo of the spiritual world and beheld the
unseen with an uncommon eye which looked into the
void and found it peopled with lsquopresencesrsquo To him the
universe was lsquoebullient with creative deityrsquo and was
pervaded by lsquoan organizing surgersquo of vital energies
which emanate directly from God He was indeed an
inspired idealist who laid mystical insistence upon the
immanence and transcendence of God
Endowed with a rare penetrating mind Coleridge
ransacked works of comparative religions and
mythology and arrived at the conclusion that all
religious faiths and mythical traditions agree on the
unity of God and immortality of Soul His constant
intellectual search for truth led him to visionary
interests and universal life consciousness expressed
through the phenomena of human agencies Throughout
his intellectual career he remained a visionary and
philosophical mystic who valued a discreet and proper
exercise of the intellect Since his most serious concern
had been philosophy as a continuous trial for self-
education he wrote ldquodoubts rushed in broke upon me from the fountains of the great deep and fell from the windows of heavenrdquo For him lsquoreligionrsquo as both the
cornerstone and keystone of morality must have a
moral origin and a great poet should be lsquoa profound Metaphysician seeking for truth beauty and salvationrsquo In
one of those radiant moments when the poet the
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 64
metaphysician and the theologian of hope are one he
throws light on the process how truth works out in life
ldquoTruth considered in itself and in the effects natural to it may be conceived as a gentle spring or water source warm from the genial earth and breathing up into the snow drift that is piled over and around its outlet It turns the obstacle into its own form and character and as it makes its way increases its streamand arrested in its courseit suffers delay not loss and waits only to awaken and again roll onwardsrdquo
His description of a mystic as one who wanders into an
oasis or garden lsquoat leisure in its maze of Beauty and Sweetness and thirds (sic) his way through the odorous and flowering Thickets into open Spots of Greeneryrsquo (Aids to Reflection) is reminiscent of his own mysticism and
refers to the lsquoenfolding sunny spots of greeneryrsquo in his
famous poem Kubla Khan
Profoundly impressed by the German Idealist Schelling
whose idealistic school of thought dwelt on speculation
concerning the lsquoAbsolutersquo Coleridge viewed lsquomythrsquo as
primordial expression of elemental truths including the
Divine transcendence Inspired by his Biblical studies he
regarded self-consciousness as lying at the centre of his
philosophical and theological thought In Lay Sermons
he says ldquoSelf which then only is when for itself it hath ceased to be Even so doth Religion finitely expresses the unity of the Infinite Spirit by being a total act of the Soulrdquo
For him the lsquoinner lightrsquo is identical with the indwelling
glorious God and life is but lsquoa vision shadowy of Truthrsquo Attributing the pageant of life and the beauty and
splendor of the world to the immanence of Cosmic Soul
(God) he exclaims
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 65
ldquoAh From the soul itself must issue forth
A light a glory a fair luminous cloud
Enveloping the earthrdquo
Dejection An Ode
And again he says ldquoNature is the art of GodThe true system of natural philosophy places the sole reality of things in an Absolute which is at once causa sui effectus in the absolute identity of subject and object which it calls NatureIn this sense lsquowe see all things in Godrsquo is a strict philosophical truthrdquo
Coleridge firmly believed in the essential unity of God as
Absolute which is the creative foundation of the finite
universe and which distinguishes God from creation
He in the spirit of Vedanta stresses the immanence of
God in all and all in God in his famous poem Frost at Midnight Addressing his son he says
ldquoso shalt thou see and hear
The lovely shapes and sound intelligible
Of that eternal language which thy God
Utters who from eternity doth teach
Himself in all and all things in Himselfrdquo
In order to learn this lsquolanguagersquo Coleridge himself
became a lsquovisionaryrsquo lsquoprophetrsquo or lsquoseerrsquo The idea of
Himself (God) in all and all (creation) in Himself or the
concept that there is God in all things and all things are
things are closely interlinked with God bears a striking
resemblance to our age-old Vedic thought In
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 66
consonance with Indian thought Coleridge underscores
the identity of God (Brahman) with the individual soul
(Jivatma) and regards the universe as the reflection or
manifestation of God The seer he says is one who sees
God the creator in all creation and all creation as the
embodiment of God This according to him is the lesson
that God in His eternal language lsquouttersrsquo and doth teach
from eternity
The inherent oneness and sole identity of Brahman
(God) with the universe is a basic postulate of our
Vedanta and as such Coleridgersquos emphasis on the lsquoUnity of infinite Spiritrsquo bears a close identity with the Indian
philosophy The Oneness of God and the universe has
time and again been stressed in our Vedas and other
scriptures It would be pertinent to cite a few instances
here While the Chhandogya Upanishad describes
Brahman as lsquoOne only without a secondrsquo other
Upanishadic texts contain identical statements such as
lsquoHe is Onersquo and lsquoOne Lordrsquo The opening line of
Ishopanishad declares Godrsquos oneness and His universal
presence in unequivocal terms
ldquoUnderstand all this universe as inhabited by Lord
Each moving thing in this moving worldrdquo
Ishopanishad I
And again the same Upanishad says
ldquoThe wise man who perceives all beings as not distinct from his own self at all and his own Self as the self of every being ndash he does not by virtue of that perception hate any onerdquo
Ishopanishad VI
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 67
The same truth has been expressed in the Bhagvad Gita wherein Lord Krishna tells Arjuna
ldquoHe who sees Me (the Universal Self) present in all beings and all beings existing within Me never loses sight of Me and I never lose sight of himrdquo
Bhagvad Gita VI30
Or again
ldquoHe alone truly sees who sees the Supreme Lord as imperishable and abiding equally in all perishable beings both animate and inanimaterdquo
Bhagvad Gita XIII26
And Lord Krishna says again
ldquoThere is nothing else besides Me O Arjuna
Like clusters of yarn-beads formed by knots on a thread
All this (Universe) threaded on Me (God)
As are pearls on stringsrdquo
Bhagvad Gita VII7
THE DOCTRINE OF KARMA (CAUSE amp EFFECT)
Coleridge seems to subscribe sincerely to the Indian
doctrine of Karma which is based on the law of
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 68
Causation or cause and effect In other words Karmavad
stresses poetic justice or law of life ie virtue is
rewarded and vice is punished Since one must reap the
fruits of his good and bad deeds in life it is axiomatic
truth that lsquoas one sows so shall he reaprsquo In Sanskrit
there is a verse which says ldquoOne must bear the consequences of his good and bad deedsrdquo The echoes of
this doctrine could be distinctly heard in his poetry and
particularly in his greatest poem Rime of Ancient Mariner as also Dejection An Ode where he affirms
ldquoO Lady We receive but what we give
And in our life alone doth Nature liverdquo
So strong was his belief in the doctrine of Karma that in
a letter dated 14th October 1797 to his friend Thirlwell
he tells him how fatalistic his philosophy of life is
ldquoand at other times I adopt the Brahman
creed and say ndash lsquoit is better to sit than to stand it is better to lie than to sit it is better to sleep than wake but death is the best of allrsquordquo
His Ancient Mariner serves as an exhaustive
exposition of the law of Nemesis which works surely
but rather imperceptively in human life The poem is a
myth about a dark and troubling crisis in the human
soul It is actually a tale of crime which is due to
perversity of human will Crime is against Nature
Humanity and God He touches equally on guilt and
remorse suffering and relief hate and forgiveness and
grief and joy The marinerrsquos action shows the essential
frivolity of crimes against humanity and the ordered
system of the world and he deserves punishment for his
guilt Spirits are transformed into the powers who
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 69
watch over the good and evil actions of men and requite
them with appropriate rewards and punishments Since
the mariner has committed a hideous act of wantonly
and recklessly killing the albatross which was hailed in
Godrsquos name as if it had been a Christian soul he must
bear the punishment of life-in-death The killing of the
bird marks the breaking of bond between Man and
Nature and consequently the mariner becomes
spiritually dead When he blesses the water-snakes
even unawares it is a psychic rebirth ndash a rebirth that
must happen to all men
The mariner will never be the man that he once was He
has his special past and his special doom His sense of
guilt will end only with his death The Ancient Mariner
is a myth of a guilty soul and marks the passage from
crime through punishment and possible redemption in
the world So the poem is an allegory of redemption and
regeneration It is indeed a vivid representation or
living symbolization of universal psychic experience
The abiding fascination of the poem is that it is a
fragment of a psychic life It does not state a result it
symbolizes a process
Coleridge adds a moral ndash that the mariner is ndash to teach
by his example love and reverence to all things that God
made and loveth He advocates a sound moral
philosophy of life which extends human sympathy and
love to the animal world He affirms
ldquoHe prayeth well who loveth well
Both man and bird and beast
He prayeth best who loveth best
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 70
All things both great and small
For the dear God who loveth us
He made and loveth allrdquo
Rime of Ancient Mariner
PHILOSOPHICAL MYSTICISM AND lsquoTHE VISION OF GODrsquo
Coleridgersquos longing for the lsquounnamable somethingrsquo and
his abiding interest in conveying something of the
enigmatic perception of Godhead as a religious
experience carved for him a special place in the history
of ideas as a Christian poet and philosopher In a
predominantly mythological age he took serious
interest in the Biblical studies and drew upon the
central Christian image of Paradise as a walled garden
and the vision of God as a symbolizing that
transcendent numinous reality which the soul
inchoately and consciously seeks and strives for The
medieval image of the walled garden (paradise) as the
heavenly city (locus of God) is a symbol of divine
transcendence of that which is lsquobeyond beingrsquo This rich
image (of the walled garden) as an eminently
appropriate image of Godrsquos transcendence was used as
such by Church Fathers and also by the 15th century
Christian Platonist Nicholas of Cusa whose book The Vision of God is a paradigm of speculative mysticism
which informs Coleridgersquos metaphysics and much of his
poetry Taking inspiration from Nicholas of Cusarsquos book
The Vision of God Coleridge found it in close affinity to
his own genuinely philosophical mysticism
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 71
Coleridgersquos interest in the Vision of God is in a purely
visionary mystical tradition and his most visionary
poem Kubla Khan bears ample testimony to his
insistence upon life as lsquoa vision shadowy of Truthrsquo His
conviction in the lsquoImago Deirsquo (vision of God) is an
obvious link with the hoary mystical tradition which lay
at the heart of his philosophical and mystical thought
He maintains that the mind of man is a bridge to the
vision of God but by no means its fulfillment He says
ldquoThe vision and faculty divine is the participation of humanity in the Divinerdquo He however further maintains
throughout his intellectual career the conviction in the
reflection or bending back of the soul from the sensual
to the intelligible realm For him Christianity is an lsquoawful recalling of the drowsed soul from dreams and phantom world of sensuality to actual Realityrsquo
On the idea of reawakening he says
ldquoThe moment when the Soul begins to be sufficiently self-conscious to ask concerning itself and its relations is the first moment of its intellectual arrival into the world Its being ndash enigmatic as it must seem ndash is posterior to its existencerdquo
Collected Notes
In a recent study of Coleridge Prof Douglas Headley of
Cambridge University declares ldquoHe is best described as an essentially speculative and mystical philosopher-theologian His was a theology inspired by those Church Fathers who emphasize the vision of God as an intellectual contemplation (speculari) of the transcendent Absolute the prius of all beingrdquo Since the
mystic tradition follows a supersensuous perception
the vision of God is fundamentally lsquoVisio-intuitivarsquo ndash
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 72
intuitive or intellectual vision Coleridge expresses such
a state of mind when he says
ldquoMy mind feels as if it ached to behold and know something great something One and Indivisible and it is only in the faith of this that rocks or waterfalls mountains or caverns give me the sense of sublimity or majesty But in this faith all things counterfeit Infinityrdquo
Since the sublime enlarges and inspires the Soul to
aspire for the Divine it impresses him with the
fundamental Oneness of God and a universal vision
which he hints at in his Religious Musings as under
ldquoThere is One mind One omnipresent mind
His most holy name is Love
Truth of subliming import
lsquoTis sublime in man
Our noontide majesty to know ourselves
Parts and portions of one wondrous wholerdquo
These passages recall to our mind the famous mantra
(verse) of the Yajurveda where the mystic realization
or the direct experience of the Supreme by a Vedic sage
has been beautifully described in terms of his personal
knowledge of the Divine He says
ldquoI have known this sun-coloured Mighty Being
Refulgent as the sun beyond darkness
By knowing Him alone one transcends death
There is no other way to gordquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 73
Yajurveda XXXI18
ldquoI have realized it I have known itrdquo not that I just
believe in it and all else can also realize it This is not the
expression of an opinion but the statement of an
experience Commenting on this verse Sri Aurobindo
says
ldquoThis is one of the grandest utterances in the worldrsquos spiritual literature for it marks the emanation of this Being from across the darkness into our world so that something of the sun colour may come into our dull heads and dim heartsrdquo
Coleridge seems to be in complete agreement with our
own Indian mysticism which owes its origin to the
Vedas wherein the knowledge of the Divine or the
Ultimate Reality (Brahman) has been regarded not as a
process of philosophical thought but as a direct
experience in the depth of the human soul For him the
divine vision is possible in that spiritual meditation
transformation of intellectual rapture in which all
discursive thought is fully sublimated According to him
the lsquovisio intuitivarsquo is the culmination of all knowledge ndash
sensus-ratio-intellectus and is in conjunction with the
concept of Imago Dei In order to see that which not an
object is ie God the human mind must put aside its own
discursive differentiating reflection ndash spiritus altissimus rationis ndash which guards the walls of the garden of
paradise lsquobeyondrsquo which dwells God The highest
transformation or sublimation of conscience can ensure
an intuitive vision of God and in accordance with the
maxim ndash Simile Simili ndash the mind then becomes like its
object by divesting itself of difference in order to
experience the Absolute Reality Says Coleridge
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 74
ldquoAn Immense Being does strongly fill the soul and Omnipotency Omnisciency and Infinite Goodness do enlarge and dilate the Spirit while it fixtly looks upon them They raise strong passions of Love and Admiration which melt our Nature and transform it into the mould and imagery that which we can contemplaterdquo
Notebooks
Mysticism is thus the subtle path of spiritual realization
of That Reality or Divine Presence which has been
described in our Vedic texts as (lying hidden in a cave shrouded in secrecy) God is one One beyond all
diversities In Him all contradictions and conflicts meet
and dissolve through the spiritual transformation of the
lsquoseerrsquo or lsquomysticrsquo whose soul rises above the bewildering
trammels and distortions of life and seeks unity with all
in the unity with One To such an enlightened seer life
becomes an unceasing adventure from unreality to
reality from ephemerality to eternity from the human
to the Divine One who realizes the Divine as the One
(without parallel) loving Lord finds the whole universe
united in Him Such a significantly mystical experience
finds a memorable expression in the following verse of
the Yajurveda where the sage named Vena beholds
such a divine vision
ldquoThe loving sage (Vena) beholds that Mysterious Existence
Wherein the universe comes to have One home (nest)
Therein unites and therefore issues the whole
The Lord is the warp and woof in the Created beingsrdquo
Yajurveda XXXII8
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 75
A careful analysis of the above-quoted passage reveals
all the main elements of mysticism viz
(i) Divinity is a subject of personal spiritual
experience
(ii) The ultimate conception of Divinity is a
mystery symbolically expressed as
गहानCहतम
(iii) The abstract conception of the Divine as an
Essence or Existence is symbolized by a
neuter singular तत and
(iv) The whole universe is united in love as birds
in a nest एकनीड़ or men in a home वसधव कटFबक
To sum up wise men the world over hold almost
identical views on vital matters of human life such as
the mystery of existence soul and oversoul (God) Truth
is verily One as God is one but the pathways to reach it
are very many The ancient Rig Veda proclaims एक सद वDा बहधा वदित ndash ldquoTruth is one sages call it by various namesrdquo In our own times Swami Ram Krishna
Paramhansa said यतोमत तथोपथ ndash as many religions
so many pathways And what the Spanish litteacuterateur
and thinker states as lsquouniversal truthrsquo is equally
applicable to the philosophy and poetry of Coleridge
ldquoA deep faith in life cannot but be spiritual even if only partially spiritualThe path of Truth may not be a path of parallel lines but a path that follows one circle by going to the right and climbing the circle or by going to the left and climbing the circle we are bound to meet at the top although we started in apparently
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 76
contrary directions This is bound to be in the end because Truth is onerdquo
In Charles Lambrsquos words Coleridge lsquohad been on the confines of the next world he had a hunger for Eternityrsquo The truth of this statement is abundantly
borne out by Coleridgersquos sincere effort for the
reconciliation of the ration with transcendental belief
He closes his Biographia Literaria which symbolizes
his spiritual voyage with the following words
ldquoIt is night sacred night The upraised eyes views suns of other worlds only to preserve the soul steady and collected in its pure act of inward adoration to the great I Am and to the filial word that re-affirmeth from eternity to eternity whose choral is the universerdquo
As a true metaphysician Coleridgersquos whole being
pulsated with a passionate and unceasing search for
truth Here indeed was a spiritual aspirant and seeker
who in his own words had lsquotraced the fount whence streams of nectar flowrsquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 77
LORD BYRON
(22 January 1788 ndash 19 April 1824)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 78
LORD BYRON
British Romantic Poet and Satirist
Born with a clubfoot and extremely sensitive about it
he was 10 when he unexpectedly inherited his title and
estates Educated at Cambridge he gained recognition
with English Bards and Scotch Reviewers (1809) a satire
responding to a critical review of his first published
volume Hours of Idleness (1807) At 21 he embarked on
a European grand tour Childe Harolds Pilgrimage
(1812ndash18) a poetic travelogue expressing melancholy
and disillusionment brought him fame while his
complex personality dashing good looks and many
scandalous love affairs with women and with boys
captured the imagination of Europe Settling near
Geneva he wrote the verse tale The Prisoner of Chillon
(1816) a hymn to liberty and an indictment of tyranny
and Manfred (1817) a poetic drama whose hero
reflected Byrons own guilt and frustration His greatest
poem Don Juan (1819ndash24) is an unfinished epic
picaresque satire in ottava rima Among his numerous
other works are verse tales and poetic dramas He died
of fever in Greece while aiding the struggle for
independence making him a Greek national hero
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 79
CHAPTER FOUR
BYRON A BLEND OF CLAY AND SPARK
INTRODUCTION
Byron whom Goethe regarded as lsquothe greatest genius of the centuryrsquo and whom Carlyle considered as the noblest
spirit in Europe was one of the most remarkable men
during the 19th Century which was characterized by
liberal optimism He was unquestionably a potent and
force and cause of change in the intellectual outlook and
socio-political structure of his time His colourful figure
his charismatic personality and satiric poetry captured
the imagination of the whole continent As the most
influential English poet he stands out as an important
figure in the history of ideas Representative of a new
age he was the supreme voice which the European
poets recognized for ldquohe put into poetry something that belonged to many men in his time and he was the pioneer of a new outlook and a new art He set his mark on a whole generation and his fame rang from one end of Europe to anotherrdquo
Renowned as the ldquogloomy egoistrdquo he was a sinister yet
great influence in the Romantic Movement His deepest
romantic melancholy his satiric realism and his
aspiration for political realism earned for him such a
wide acclaim that his name became a symbol for all the
great events of his day Commenting on his pervasive
influence Calvert says ndash ldquoIt is impossible not to take Byron seriously and it is disastrous to take him literallyrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 80
A REBEL EXTRAORDINAIRE
Byron was a born rebel Essentially a child of
Revolution his poetry breathes a unique spirit of
revolutionary idealism ldquoI was born for oppositionrdquo he
once remarked and added ldquobeing of no party I shall offend all partiesrdquo Describing him as an aristocratic
rebel Bertrand Russell said
ldquoThe aristocratic rebel of whom Byron was in his day the exemplar is a very different typesuch rebels have philosophy which requires some greater change than their own personal success In their conscious thought there is criticism of the government of the world which takes the form of Titanic Cosmic self-assertion or those who retain some superstition of Satanism Both are to be found in Byron The aristocratic philosophy of rebellionhas inspired a long series of revolutionary movements from the fall of Napoleon to Hitlerrsquos coup in 1933it has inspired a corresponding manner of thought and feeling among intellectuals and artistsrdquo
Byron felt the wild storm of nations akin to the storm
within his own heart and the ruin but the picture of his
own life In his unqualified individualism he takes up an
attitude of hostility towards society Even God appears
to him mirrored in the stormy face of the angry ocean
ldquoThou glorious mirror
Of the Image of Eternityrdquo
He wished to stir the oppressed to revolt and get rid of
tyrants
ldquoFor I will teach if possible the stones
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 81
To rise against earthrsquos tyranny Never let it
Be said that we will truckle into thrones
By ye ndash our childrenrsquos children I think how we
Showed that things were before the world was freerdquo
Don Juan VIIICXXXV4-8
ldquoI have simplified my policiesrdquo wrote he ldquointo a detestation of all existing governmentsrdquo His was the
most dreaded voice of all the revolutionary poets of the
world His voice was the peal of revolutionary thunder
his poetry was the message of the revolutionary forces
He stood as the greatest symbol of a violent and
dreadful revolution
CHAMPION OF LIBERTY
He was essentially a poet of liberty His greatest ideal in
life was how to fight against the forces of tyranny
restriction aggression and enslaving of workers by
puissant exploiters Liberty was an essential part of the
Byronic creed In fact his entire poetic work is
interspersed with some of the finest poetry in praise of
freedom for mankind He composed much splendid
verse for love of freedom His passion for personal
freedom covers national freedom also and the political
freedom in the form of national self-determination
particularly for Italy and Greece He remarks in his
diary of 1821 ldquoDifficulties are the hotbeds of high spirits and Freedom the mother of the new virtues incident to human naturerdquo
Identifying himself completely with the cause of Italy
and Greece he wrote ldquoI shall not fall backbut
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 82
onward It is now the time to act and what signifies ldquoSelfrdquo if a single spark of that which would be worthy of the past can be bequeathed unquenchably to the future It is not one man nor a million but the spirit of liberty which must be spreadrdquo In his Ode to Chillon Castle he characteristically exclaimed
ldquoEternal spirit of the chainless Mind
Brightest in dungeons Liberty thou art
For there thy habitation is the heart
The heart which love of Thee alone bind
And when thy sons to fetters are consignrsquod
To fetters and damp vaultsrsquo dayless gloom
And Freedomrsquos fame finds winds on every windrdquo
Love of liberty lay at the centre of his being and
determined what was best in him ndash belief in individual
liberty and his hatred of tyranny and constraints
whether exercised by individuals or societies Liberty
was an ideal a driving power a summons to make the
best of certain possibilities in him He insisted to be free
and maintained that other men must be free too
Opposition was an integral element in his basic attitude
revolt both personal and social was his forte Love of
freedom is built into the capricious structure of Childe Harold and Don Juan
HIS POLITICAL AND COSMOPOLITAN LIBERALISM
He grew in an atmosphere in which political reaction
against revolutionary ideals was victorious all over
Europe Byron was essentially a liberal by conviction
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 83
and could hardly bear the perception of liberals Though
he loved his native country yet he had a large vision for
the freedom and welfare of all nations The excitement
of political liberalism stirred on behalf of the Greeks
against the oppression of their Turkish overlords made
him a symbol of disinterested patriotism and a Greek
national hero The first two cantos of Child Harold are
tinctured with historical and typographical material as
also the appearance of the Byronic hero with his
exhortations to the degenerate Greeks and Spaniards to
remember their glorious past and arise They contain
Byronrsquos passionate feelings for Greece which was to see
the beginning as it was to see the end of his active life
His Faustian daemonic figure and his defiant
resentment of authority found an appropriate object in
the political sphere
His last journey and his death at Missolonghi in the
cause of Greek independence proves in him the moving
combination of nobility futility and romantic or heroic
panache In the words of Graham Hough lsquoBut for once Byron was on the winning side he died but his cause triumphed and he remains one of its heroes For the whole of the 19th Century he remained a portent and a symbol whom it was possible to worship or to condemn but never to neglectrsquo
A MAN OF ACTION
Action remains at the centre of his life and at last he
gladly seized the opportunity when it presented itself in
Greece Leaving poetry behind himself he took a heroic
resolution in favour of action rather than
contemplation He presents a rare example of fusion
between the active and the reflective lsquofor his was the romanticism of actionrsquo The moralist in the garb of the
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 84
pre-romantic rebel hero of the Childe Harold is cast
aside in Don Juan and the moralist in the somber garb
turns dandy in which moral judgment seems to be
ineffective Quite logically he finally abandons literature
for the field of moral action At last Byron flung himself
off into the world of action The dandy finds at last that
such a death even if it is on the sickbed and not the
battlefield is the only gesture untouched by futility ldquoIt is not enough that art perpetrates life life also must complete artrdquo WB Yeats rightly says ldquoone feels that he (Byron) is a man of action made writer by accidentrdquo
Byron did not regard writing as an end in itself on the
contrary he was several times on the point of giving up
writing He had always before him the hope of some
more active life and felt a certain mistrust for the purely
literary life He asserted ldquowho would write who had anything better to do Action- action I say and not writing Least of all rhymerdquo In a letter to Murray
he wrote ldquoYou will see that I shall do something or otherthat like the cosmogony or creation of the world will puzzle the philosophers of all agesrdquo He was
fully alive to the persistent sense both of human
aspirations and the ceaseless flux of eternity and also
knew that he would not fade into oblivion Said he
ldquoBut at the last I have shunned the common shore
And leaving land far out of sight would skim
The ocean of Eternityrdquo
And again he said
ldquoFor the sword outwears its sheath
And the soul wears out the breastrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 85
HIS ROMANTIC SELF-PORTRAITURE
Byron presents manrsquos mixed and imperfect nature His
personality is a queer blend of flesh and spirit
meanness and nobility clay and spark cause and effect
The lasting fascination of his personality despite his bad
temper careless arrogance the excesses the satiety
melancholy and restlessness owes much to Splendour Primier of Miltonrsquos Satan who is ldquomajestic though in ruinrdquo and the gloom and brutality of the heroes of the
novel of terror His exotic sensibility ranging passions
and sensual perversity take refuge in a sort of ldquoCosmic Satanismrdquo He draws of himself a sketch which
reproduces in a dim outline the somber portrait of his
idealized self in the famous stanzas of Lara
ldquoIn him inexplicably mixed appeared
Much to be loved and hated sought and feared
X X X X X X
A hater of his kind
X X X X X X
There was in him a vital scorn of all
As if the worst had fallen which could befall
An erring spirit
X X X X X X
And fiery passions that had poured their wrath
In hurried desolation over his path
And left the better feeling all at strife
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 86
In wild reflection over his stormy liferdquo
And the Giaour (hiding his sinister path beneath a
monkrsquos gown) also portrays Byron
ldquoA noble soul and lineage high
Alas though bestowed in vain
Which Grief could change and Guilt could stainrdquo
HIS CREDO
Despite all his self-mockery and arrogant egoism he had
a star (vision) and he followed it sincerely He was not
without guiding principles and his heroic death in the
cause of Greek independence shows that he was not an
actor but a soldier a man of affairs and a master of men
Keenly aware of something special in him he wished to
realize his powers and translate them into facts He
wished to be true to himself He had a keen appreciation
of the dignity and personal liberty of man
HIS FATAL TRUTH
Even though he disagreed with the moral code of his
age he had his own values He thought that truthfulness
is a permanent virtue and duty and so did not want to
compromise with conventions nor hide behind cant
Despite many ordeals and his own corroding skepticism
he speaks seriously and directly about his convictions
and presents them with irony satire and mockery Don Juan is a racy commentary on life and manners and is a
record of a remarkable personality ndash a poet and a man
of action a dreamer and a wit a great lover and a great
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 87
hater a Whig noble and a revolutionary democrat The
paradoxes of his nature are fully reflected in Don Juan which itself is a romantic epic and a realistic satire He
was full of many romantic longings but tested them by
truth and reality He remained faithful only to those
which meant so much to him that he could not live
without them
Praising Byron Nietzsche says ldquoMan may bleed to death through the truth that he recognizesrdquo Byron expressed
this in his immortal lines
ldquoSorrow is knowledge they who know the most
Must mourn the deepest over the fatal truth
The tree of knowledge is not that of linerdquo
A BELIEVER IN GOD AND IMMORTALITY OF SOUL
Full of snobbery and rebellion as he was Byron was not
altogether without lofty ideals and religious beliefs He
firmly believed in the immanence and transcendence of
God and the transience of human glory His implicit faith
in the immortality of human soul the ephemerality of
physical body and his unwavering trust in God ndash the
eternal Light of Lights is evident from his following
memorable lines
ldquobut this clay will sink
Its spark immortal envying it the light
To which it mounts as if to break the link
That keeps us from yon heaven which woos us to its brinkrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 88
Childe Harold III13-14
His Childe Haroldrsquos pilgrimage is a lament for lost
empire decay of love and triumph of love over human
mortality His lsquovoyage pittoresquersquo is full of historic and
didactic meditations and his oceanic image illustrates
the truism that nothing is constant but the rhythmic
pattern of its flux In the end all things float and toss on
that Great Ocean of which man is the foam and the
historic events are billows
ldquoBetween two worlds life hovers like a starrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquothe eternal surge
Of time and tide rolls on and bears afar our bubbles
while the graves
Of Empires heave but like some passing wavesrdquo
Don Juan XVI99
He maintains throughout his major poetic works a
sense of the presence of God or the gods and often
employs supernatural machinery to substantiate his
concept
IMMORTALITY OF SOUL
He had complete faith in the immortality of soul Said
he ldquoof the immortality of the soul it appears to me that there can be little doubtit acts also so very independent of bodyHuman passions have probably disfigured the divine doctrines Man is born passionate of body but an innate thought secret
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 89
tendency to the love of God is his mainspring of mind But God helps us allMan is eternal always changing but reproducedEternity Eternalrdquo
Again on his belief in God he says ldquoI sometimes think that man may be relic of some higher materialcreation must have had an origin and a creator for a creator is a more natural imagination than a fortuitous concourse of atoms All things remount to a fountain though they may flow to an oceanrdquo He knew
the limitations and ephemerality of phenomenal
existence He exclaims
ldquoFor I wish to know
What after all are all thingsbut a showrdquo
Unable to explore the stars with scientific aid he takes
up poesy to embark across the ocean of Eternity
ldquoI wish to do much by Poesyrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoBut at least I have shunned the common
And leaving land far out of sight would skim
The Ocean of Eternityrdquo
According to him man accepts the eternal voyage but
since man is not himself unlimited the boat capsizes in
the deep
ldquoAnd swimming long in the abyss of thought
Is apt to tire
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RP DWIVEDI Page 90
For the fall entails not only ignorance and weakness but Human mortalityrdquo
Disconcerted with mankind he turns to the placid
spectacle of Nature and feels his spirit merge into its
objects
ldquoI live not in myself but I become
Portion of that around me and to me
High mountains are a feeling
When the soul can flee
And with the sky ndash the peak ndash the heaving plain
Of Ocean or the stars mingle ndash and not in vainrdquo
Childe Harold III72
This pantheistic ecstasy gives him a sense of quasi-
immortality
ldquoSpinning the clay clod bonds which round our being clingrdquo
The picturesque is translated into a kind of mystical
union with the spirit of the place even with the
universe itself
ldquoAre not the mountains waves and skies a part
Of me and my soul as I of them
(Is not) the universe a breathing part
The spirit is clogged with clayrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 91
HIS PESSIMISM
The myth of Cuvierrsquos undulations of Cosmic history
reflects Byronrsquos consistent and mature pessimism His
pessimism is traceable to his own view of society
Through a metaphor he considers his age as
ldquocatastrophicrdquo ndash an ice age of the human spirit and a
declining moral grandeur His myth of Fall and
recurrence of the Ocean and ice is both comic and
historic social and literary and personal as well The
consequences of the Fall and of manrsquos imperfect nature
are seen in all major human activities Generally fallen
mankind is hounded by its lower appetites spirit
encumbered by flesh The image of Fall is linked in
Byronrsquos imagination with the rhetorical image of the
poetrsquos lsquoflightrsquo which incurs the risk of consequent
lsquosinkingrsquo or bathos And over it all hangs the perplexity
of manrsquos ignorance about his aims his nature his true
identity
ldquoFew mortals know what end they would be at
But whether glory power or love or treasure
The path is through perplexing ways and when
The goal is gained we die you know ndash and thenrdquo
HIS PROPHETIC VISION
Endowed with strong imaginative power he had
experimented in Vulcanian visions of the earth plunged
into darkness by the final extinction or the sun or lsquoa ruined starrsquo plunging on in flames through the wastes of
space This prophetic faculty is amply evident from his
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 92
poem Darkness in which his imagination prefigures the
devastating effects of nuclear weapons
ldquoThe Hour arrived ndash and it became
A wandering mass of shapeless flame
A pathless Comet and a curse
The menace of the Universe
Still rolling on with innate force
Without a sphere without a course
A bright deformity on high
The monster of the upper skyrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoI had a dream which was not at all a dream
The bright sun was extinguished and the stars
Did wander darkling in the eternal space
The habitations of all things which dwell
Were burnt for beacons cities were consumedrdquo
Darkness IV42-45
In sum and in essence Byron exemplifies Shelleyrsquos
pronouncement that poets are the unacknowledged
legislators of the world More than any other Romantic
poet Byron embodies the dictum ndash lsquowhat is to give light must endure burningrsquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 93
PB SHELLEY
(4 August 1792 ndash 8 July 1822)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 94
PB SHELLEY
English Romantic Poet
The heir to rich estates Shelley was a rebellious youth
who was expelled from Oxford in 1811 for refusing to
admit authorship of The Necessity of Atheism Later that
year he eloped with Harriet Westbrook the daughter of
a tavern owner He gradually channeled his passionate
pursuit of personal love and social justice into poetry
His first major poem Queen Mab (1813) is a utopian
political epic revealing his progressive social ideals In
1814 he eloped to France with Mary Wollstonecraft
Godwin in 1816 after Harriet drowned herself they
were married In 1818 the Shelleys moved to Italy
Away from British politics he became less intent on
social reform and more devoted to expressing his ideals
in poetry He composed the verse tragedy The Cenci (1819) and his masterpiece the lyric drama Prometheus Unbound (1820) which was published with some of his
finest shorter poems including Ode to the West Wind
and To a Skylark Epipsychidion (1821) is a Dantean
fable about the relationship of sexual desire to spiritual
love and artistic creation Adonais (1821)
commemorates the death of John Keats Shelley
drowned at age 29 while sailing in a storm off the Italian
coast leaving unfinished his last and possibly greatest
visionary poem The Triumph of Life
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 95
CHAPTER FIVE
SHELLEY A PILGRIM OF ETERNITY
INTRODUCTION
Shelley who in his Adonais eulogized Keats as lsquothe Pilgrim of Eternityrsquo is himself justly entitled to this
appellation He was essentially a poet of the skies and
heavens of light and love of eternity and immortality
Since he loved to pierce through things to their spiritual
essence the material world was less important for him
than that which lies within it and beyond it Says he ldquoI seek in what I see the manifestation of something beyond the present and tangible objectsrsquo He set out to uncover
the absolute real from its visible manifestations and
interpret it through his own poetic vision In a
passionate search for reality he pursued its essence
behind the veil of naked loveliness of Nature and the
mundane human existence Defining poetry he says
lsquoPoetry is the revelation of the eternal ideas which lie behind the many-coloured ever-shifting veil that we call reality in lifersquo For him the poet is also a seer gifted with
a peculiar insight into the nature of reality for it is
through the inspired poetic imagination that he
breathes immortality into the objects of Nature Says he
lsquoBut from these create he can
Forms more real than living man
Nurslings of immortalityrsquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 96
Prometheus Unbound
HIS LOVE OF INDIA
Shelley was an ardent admirer of India In a letter to his
friend employed in the East India Company he
expressed keenness to visit India and settle down here
He was drawn to India for its varied and picturesque
scenic beauty vast literary heritage and age-old cultural
traditions In order to have a closer acquaintance with
our great country he set his heart and mind on serious
studies in the Indian life and letters traditions and
culture
Since he was a visionary par excellence and was
endowed with a highly contemplative mind and a
remarkable prophetic zeal he evinced a deep and
abiding interest in the philosophical and spiritual
thoughts that lie enshrined in our holy texts such as the
Vedas the Upanishads the Brahmasutras and the
Bhagvad Gita It is interesting to trace the influence of
Indian spiritual thought on Shelleyrsquos poetry
VEDANTA IN SHELLEYrsquoS POETRY
The riddle of the origin of life and Nature and the
enigmatic questions such as lsquoWhat is the cause of life
and death What is the source of universe and what will
be its ultimate destinyrsquo have always engaged the
serious attention of all wise men Man has always stood
in awe and wonder at the mysteries of human existence
and the vast world around him Our seers and savants
have not only posed such questions but have also
answered them
In the opening verse of the Kena Upanishad the
disciple asks
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 97
ldquoAt whose behest does the mind think or wander after towards its objects Commanded by whom does the life-force or the breath of life go forth on its journey At whose will do we utter speech Who is that effulgent Being whose power directs the eye and the earrdquo
Similarly in the Svetasvatara Upanishad the disciples
inquire ldquoWhat is the cause of this universe What is Brahman Whence do we come By what power do we live and on what are we established Where shall we at last find rest What rules over our joys and sorrows O Seers of Brahmanrdquo
Identical ideas impelled Shelley to exclaim in his famous
elegy Adonais
ldquoWhence are we and why are we Of what scene
The actors or spectatorsrdquo
Or again he asks in The Triumph of Life
ldquoWhence comest thou And wither goest thou
How did thy course begin I said and whyrdquo
Shelley asks
ldquoHas some unknown omnipotence unfurled
The veil of life and deathrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoAnd what were thou and earth and stars and sea
If to the human mindrsquos imaginings
Silence and solitude were vacancyrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 98
Mont Blanc
Shelley in his famous poem Hymn to Intellectual Beauty answers that there is an unseen (all-pervading) omnipotence (power) behind this phenomenal world of
which all objects are but shadows
ldquoThe awful shadow of some unseen Power
Floats though unseen among us ndash visiting
This various world with as inconstant wing
As summer winds that creep from flower to flowerrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoIt visits with inconstant glance
Each human heart and countenance
Like aught that for its grace may be
Dear and yet dearer for its mysteryrdquo
Again he affirms his faith in such a mysterious
Omnipotent power when he says
ldquoThe works and ways of men their death and birth
And that of him and all that his may be
All things that move and breathe with toil and sound
Are born and die revolve subside and swell
Power dwells apart in its tranquility
Remote serene and inaccessiblerdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 99
X X X X X X
ldquoThe secret strength of things
Which governs thought and to the infinite dome
Of Heaven is as a law inhabits theerdquo
Mont Blanc
Vedanta which is the aphoristic summary of the
Upanishads the Brahmasutras and the Bhagvad Gita
is in fact the culmination of Indian religious and
philosophical thought Since Shelley sincerely desired to
unravel the essential reality which is unchanging
timeless and eternal and of which the world of sense
perceptions is but a broken reflection he turned his
attention to the ancient scriptures of India
ONENESS OF BRAHMAN (GOD)
One of the basic postulates of Vedanta is the inherent
oneness or the sole identity of Brahman in the universe
The Chhandogya Upanishad describes Brahman as
एकमव अXवतीय ndash lsquoone only without a secondrsquo and the
other Upanishadic texts also contain parallel statements
such as स एकः ndash lsquoHe is Onersquo and एकोदवः ndash lsquoOne Lordrsquo
Similarly the Rig Veda declares एक सद वDा बहदा वदित ndash lsquoTruth (God)is one but the wise one call it
differentlyrsquo Obviously Brahman the Supreme is one
and only one He is verily one and the same whether we
call Him Brahman Ishwara Paramatma God Allah or
the supreme Cosmic Soul He only exists all other
objects of the world are subject to decay and death
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 100
How beautifully have similar thoughts been expressed
by Shelley when he exclaims
ldquoThe one remains the many change and pass
Heavenrsquos light forever shines Earthrsquos shadows fly
Life like a dome of many coloured glass
Stains the white radiance of Eternity
Until Death tramples it to fragmentsrdquo
Adonais L2
The concluding lines of Epipsychidion show that in a
moment of inspiration Shelley seemed to lay hold on the
ineffable spirituality and fundamental unity of
existence
ldquoOne hope within two wils one will beneath
Two overshadowing minds one life one death
One Heaven one hell one immortality
And one annihilationrdquo
Shelley etherealized Nature and believed in a single
power or one spirit permeating the whole universe He
effected a fusion of the Platonic philosophy of love with
the Wordsworthian doctrine of Pantheism
ldquoThe one spiritrsquos plastic stress
Sweeps through the dull dense worldrsquo
Compelling there all new successions
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 101
To the forms they wearrdquo
Holding that one universal spirit is the basis and
sustainer of Nature Shelley declares
ldquoThat Power
Which wields the world with never-wearied love
Sustains it from beneath and kindles it aboverdquo
In his pantheistic conception of Nature Shelley
conceived of it as being permeated vitalized and made
real by a universal spirit of love He clearly perceives
the presence of ldquothe awful shadow of the unseen power visiting the various worldrdquo
ldquoSpirit of Nature here
In this interminable wilderness
Of worlds at whose involved immensity
Even soaring fancy staggers
Here is thy fitting templerdquo
Demon of the World
TRANSMIGRATION OF SOUL
The doctrine of transmigration of soul or the cycle of
births and rebirths has been explicitly advanced in the
Upanishadic philosophy In the Kathopanishad
Brihadaranyak Upanishad and the Bhagvad Gita there are moving passages such as these
ldquoMan ripens like corn and like corn he is born againrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 102
Kathopanishad IV6
The Brihadaranyak Upanishad states
ldquoAnd as a caterpillar after reaching the end of a blade of grass finds another place of support and then draws itself towards it and as a goldsmith after taking a piece of gold gives it another newer and more beautiful shape similarly does the self after having thrown off this body and dispelled ignorance take on another newer and more beautiful formrdquo
Brihadaranyak Upanishad IV3-5
Similarly Lord Krishna tells Arjuna
ldquoAs a man discarding worn out clothes takes other new ones likewise the embodied soul casting off worn-out bodies enters into others which are newrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II22
And further Lord Krishna says to Arjuna
ldquofor in that case the death of him who is born is certain and the rebirth for him who is dead is inevitablerdquo
Bhagvad Gita II27
Shelley entertained similar ideas when he says
ldquoThe works and ways of man their death and birth
And that of him and all that his may be
All things that move and breathe with toil and sound
Are borm and die revolve subside and swellrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 103
Mont Blanc 92-95
Or again
ldquoThe splendours of the firmament of time
May be eclipsed but are extinguished not
Like stars to their appointed height they climb
And death is a low mist which cannot blot
The brightness it may veilrdquo
Adonais XLIV
Stressing the ephemerality of worldly objects Shelley
exclaims
ldquoSpirit of Beauty that does consecrate
With thine own hues all thou doth shine upon
Of human thought or formwhere art thou gonerdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoWhy aught should fail and fade that once is shown
Why fear and dream and death and birth
Cast on the daylight of this earth
Such gloomrdquo
Hymn to Intellectual Beauty 11
Lamenting the death of his friend Keats he says
ldquohe went uninterrupted
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 104
Into the gulf of death but his clear spirit
Yet reigns over earthrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoTo that high Capital where Kingly Death
Keeps his pale court in beauty and decay
He came and bought with price of purest breath
A grave among the eternalrdquo
Adonais VII
Again dwelling on the immortality of soul he declares
ldquoNaught we know dies Shall that alone which knows
Be as a sword consumed before the sheath
By sightless lightening The intense atom glows
A moment then is quenched in a most cold reposerdquo
Adonais XX
X X X X X X
ldquoGreat and mean
Meet massed in death who lends what life must borrowrdquo
Adonais XXI
X X X X X X
ldquoDust to dust but the pure spirit shall flow
Black to the burning fountain whence it came
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 105
A portion of the Eternal which must glow
Through time and change unquenchably the same
Whilst thy cold embers choke the sordid hearth shamerdquo
Adonais XXXVIII
THE DOCTRINE OF MAYA (DELUSION)
Our scriptures regard the phenomenal world as Maya
(delusion) They explain that the universe is neither
absolutely real nor absolutely non-existent and that its
phenomenal or apparent surface conceals and
safeguards the external presence of the Absolute
Shelley seems to have pondered over similar ideas
about the world of appearances
ldquoWorlds on worlds are rolling ever
From creation to decay
Like the bubbles on a river
Sparkling bursting borne away
But they are still immortal
Who through birthrsquos oriental portal
And deathrsquos dark chasm hurrying to and fro
Clothe their unceasing flight
In the brief dust and light
Gathered around their chariots as they gordquo
Three Choruses from Hallas
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 106
In his poem Invocation to Misery Shelley says
ldquoAll the wide world beside us
Show like multitudinous
Puppets passing from a scenerdquo
Again describing human life as a veil he says
ldquoLife not the painted veil which thou who live
Call life though unreal shapes be pictured there
And it but mimic all we would believe
With colours idly spreadrdquo
Prometheus Unbound
In the myth of Aurora he gives his own account of the
creation and interpretation of works of art
ldquoAnd lovely apparitions dim at first then radiant in the mind arising bright
From the embrace of beauty whence the forms
Of which these are phantoms casts on them
The gathered rays which are realityrdquo
Shelley seems to hint at the theory of Superimposition
(Vivartavada) which maintains that the universe is a
superimposition upon Brahman It states that the world
of thought and matter has a phenomenon or relative
existence and is superimposed upon Brahman the
unique Absolute Reality
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 107
Since the world is a network of delusion and
appearance not reality our life on earth is a sojourn
and its paramount aim is to have a glimpse of and
realize the eternal Truth or the Absolute Brahman
which is concealed by ignorance and delusion The
Ishopanishad tells us
ldquoThe face of Truth is hidden by a golden orb (disk) O Pushan (the Nourisher the Effulgent Being) uncover (the Face) that I the seeker or worshipper of Truth may hold Theerdquo
Ishopanishad XV
Like a sincere aspirant for the realization of eternal
Truth or the Absolute concealed under the illusory garb
of Maya (Delusion) Shelley in the words of Fairy in his
Queen Mab declares
ldquoAnd it is yet permitted me to rend
The veil of mortal frailty that the spirit
Clothed in its changeless purity may know
How soonest to accomplish the great end
For which it hath its being and may taste
That peace which in the end all life will sharerdquo
Queen Mab
In certain other passages Shelley speaks of the veil
identified with Time which obscured Eternity from the
sight of man The symbol of veil demonstrates that
which conceals truth goodness or happiness When the
veil was torn or rent asunder
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 108
ldquoHope was seen beaming through the mists of fear
Earth was no longer Hell
Love freedom health had given
Their ripeness to the manhood of its prime
And all its pulses beat
Symphonious to the planetary spheresrdquo
Again he uses the same symbol of veil when Cythna
says
ldquoFor with strong speech I tore the veil that hid
Nature and Truth and Liberty and Loverdquo
Shelley uses the same idea of superimposition coupled
with his own robust idealism
ldquoLife may change but it may fly not
Hope may vanish but can die not
Truth be veiled but it burneth
Love repulsed ndash but it returnethrdquo
STATES OF CONSCIOUSNESS
Our Upanishads identify three states of consciousness
crowned by the fourth which transcends all the other
three states They are
(i) The Waking State
(ii) The Dreaming State
(iii) The State of Deep Sleep and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 109
(iv) The State of Pure Consciousness (Turiya)
The fourth state of ecstatic consciousness which
transcends the preceding three has no connection with
the finite mind it is reached when in meditation the
ordinary self is left behind and the Atman or the true
self is fully realized The Mandukya Upanishad describes it thus
ldquoBeyond the senses beyond the understanding beyond all expression is the Fourth It is pure unitary consciousness wherein (all) awareness of the world and of multiplicity is completely obliterated It is effable peace It is the supreme good It is one without a second It is the Self Know it alonerdquo
Mandukya Upanishad VII
Turiya (तर[य) the fourth state is the supreme mystic
experience Shelley seems to have partly attained such a
state of pure ecstatic consciousness when he states
ldquoI seem as in a trance sublime and strange
To muse on my own separate fantasy
My own my human mind which passively
Now renders and receives fast influencing
Holding an unremitting interchange
With the clear universe of things aroundrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoSome say that gleams of a remoter world
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 110
Visit the soul in sleep that death is slumber
And that its shapes the busy thoughts outnumber
Of those who wake and live ndash I look on high
Has some unknown omnipotence unfurled
The veil of life and deathrdquo
Mont Blanc
Another instance of such a mystic experience appears in
his famous poem Triumph of Life on which Shelley was
working at the time of this death in 1822
ldquobefore me fled
The night behind me rose the day the deep
Was at my feet and Heaven above my head
When a strange trance over my fancy grew
Which was not slumber for the shade it spread
Was so transparent that the scene came through
As clear as when a veil of light is drawn
Over evening hill they glimmer and I knew
That I had felt the freshness of that dawnrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoAnd in that trance of wondrous thought I lay
This was the tenor of my waking dreamrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 111
The Triumph of Life
SHELLEY AS AN ASPIRANT FOR SELF-REALIZATION
Shelley who described himself as
ldquoA splendour among shadows a bright blot
Upon the gloomy scene a spirit that strove
For Truthrdquo
seems to have reached at last that stability or
equanimity of mind which has been described in the
Upanishads and the Bhagvad Gita In a reply to Arjunrsquos
question about the definition of one who is stable of
mind or is finally established in perfect tranquility of
mind Lord Krishna says
ldquoArjun when one thoroughly dismisses all cravings of the mind controls it and is satisfied in the self (through the joy of the self) then he is called stable of mind One whose mind remains unperturbed amid sorrows whose thirst for pleasures has altogether disappeared and who is free from passion fear and anger is called stable of mindrdquo
Bhagvad Gita V56
The Katha Upanishad stresses similar ideas when it
says
ldquoBut he who possesses right discrimination whose mind is under control and is always pure he reaches that goal from which he is not born againrdquo
X X X X X X
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 112
ldquoThe man who has a discriminative intellect for the driver and a controlled mind for the reins reaches the end of the journey the highest place of Vishnu (the all-pervading and unchangeable one)rdquo
Katha Upanishad
Shelley echoes identical thoughts when he says
ldquoMan who man would be
Must rule the empire of himself in it
Must be supreme establishing his throne
On vanquished will quelling the anarchy
Of hopes and fears being himself alonerdquo
Sonnet on Political Greatness
It was in such rare moments of inner consciousness or
lsquoBlessed moodrsquo that Shelley felt lsquoOne with Naturersquo or
lsquoThe Power which wields the world with never-wearied love
Sustains it from beneath and kindles it aboversquo
As a myth-maker or a mythopoeic poet he conjured
visions of a golden age by turning to the grand aspects
of Nature ndash the ether the sky the wind the Sun the
Moon the light and the clouds and employing them as
befitting agencies and vehicles of his evolutionary ideas
ldquoPoetryrdquo he wrote ldquois indeed something divine It is at once the centre and circumference of all knowledgerdquo He
conceived of the universe as alive with a living spirit
behind it He moralizes natural myths and perceives the
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 113
Absolute behind the ephemeral In an exquisite image
he exclaims
ldquoThe sanguine sunrise with his meteor eyes
And his burning plumes outspread
Leaps on the back of my sailing rack
When the morning star shines deadrdquo
As his thoughts reached the zenith of their growth
Shelley identified his individual self with the all-
pervading Cosmic Self or the Brahman of the Vedanta
and felt himself one with the indwelling spirit of the
universe Unity filled his imagination he perceived
eternal harmony in the phenomenal existence and
rejoiced his own being in the vast million-coloured
pageants of the world And finally not only Nature but
all human existence is taken up as an inalienable aspect
of the eternal Cosmic Spirit He reaches the core the
centre of all palpable universe when he declares
ldquoI am the eye with which the Universe
Behold itself and knows itself divine
All harmony of instrument and verse
All prophecy all medicine is mine
All light of art or nature to my song
Victory and praise in its own right belongrdquo
Shelley perceived the transcendental or mystic
consciousness in which one realizes the complete
identity of self with the Supreme Self and which is called
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 114
तर[य अवथा ndash where one sees nothing but One
(Brahman) hears nothing but the One knows nothing
but the One ndash there is the Infinite The same truth is
vividly explained in the Bhagvad Gita when Lord
Krishna tells Arjuna
ldquoWhen one sees Eternity in things that pass away and Infinity in finite things then one has pure knowledgerdquo
Bhagvad Gita XVIII20
Our own great seer-poet and philosopher Sri Aurobindo
Ghose described Shelley as a sovereign voice of the new
spiritual force and a native of the heights with its
luminous ethereality where he managed to dwell
prophetically in a future heaven and earth with
brilliances of a communion with a higher law another
order of existence another meaning behind Nature and
terrestrial things
Sri Aurobindo further praises him as lsquoa seer of spiritual realities who has a poetic grasp of metaphysical truths and can see the forms and hear the voices of higher elements spirits and natural godheads and has a constant feeling of a high spiritual and intellectual beauty He is at once seer poet thinker prophet and artist Light love liberty are the three godheads in whose presence his pure and radiant spirit lived but a celestial light a celestial love a celestial liberty To bring them down to earth without their losing their celestial lustre and here is his passionate endeavour but his wings constantly buoy him upward and cannot beat strongly in an earthlier atmosphere There is an air of luminous mist surrounding his intellectual presentation of his meaning which shows the truths he sees as things to which the mortal eye cannot easily pierce or the life and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 115
temperament of earth rise to realize and live yet to bring about the union of the mortal and immortal terrestrial and the celestial is always his passion Shelley is the bright archangel of this dawn and becomes greater to us as the light he foresaw and lived and he sings half-concealed in the too dense halo of his own ethereal beautyrsquo
And what Juan Mascaro states as universal truth is
equally pertinent to Shelleyrsquos poetry
ldquoA deep faith in life cannot but be spiritual The path of Truth may not be a path of parallel lines but a path that follows one circle because Truth is onerdquo
Infinite is God infinite are His aspects and infinite are
the ways to reach Him In the Atharva Veda we read
ldquoThe one light appears in diverse formsrdquo This ideal of
harmony is carried to its logical conclusion in blending
synthesizing and reconciling conflicting metaphysical
theories and opposed conceptions of spiritual
discipline We read in the pages of Bhagvad Gita
ldquoWhatever wish men bring in worship
That wish I grant them
Whatever path men travel
Is my path
No matter where they walk
It leads to merdquo
Bhagvad Gita IV11
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RP DWIVEDI Page 116
To sum up Shelleyrsquos poetry will always hold irresistible
fascination to the lovers of light and beauty for to
quote Juan Mascaro again
ldquoThe finite in man longs for the Infinite The love that moves the stars moves also the heart of man and a law of spiritual gravitation leads his soul to the soul of the universe Man sees the sun by the light of the sun and he sees the spirit by the light of his own inner spirit The radiance of eternal beauty shines over this vast universe and in moments of contemplation we can see the Eternal in things that pass away This is the message of the great spiritual seers and all poetry and art and beauty is only an infinite variation of this message The spiritual visions of man confirm and illumine each other Great poems in different languages have different values but they all are poetry and the spiritual visions of man come all from one Light In them we have Lamps of Fire that burn to the glory of Godrdquo
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JOHN KEATS
(31 October 1795 ndash 23 February 1821)
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RP DWIVEDI Page 118
JOHN KEATS
English Romantic Poet
The son of a livery-stable manager he had a limited
formal education He worked as a surgeons apprentice
and assistant for several years before devoting himself
entirely to poetry at age 21 His first mature work was
the sonnet On First Looking into Chapmans Homer
(1816) His long Endymion appeared in the same year
(1818) as the first symptoms of the tuberculosis that
would kill him at age 25 During a few intense months of
1819 he produced many of his greatest works several
great odes (including Ode on a Grecian Urn Ode to a
Nightingale and To Autumnrdquo) two unfinished
versions of the story of the titan Hyperion and La Belle
Dame Sans Merci Most were published in the
landmark collection Lamia Isabella The Eve of St Agnes and Other Poems (1820) Marked by vivid imagery great
sensuous appeal and a yearning for the lost glories of
the Classical world his finest works are among the
greatest of the English tradition His letters are among
the best by any English poet
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RP DWIVEDI Page 119
CHAPTER SIX
JOHN KEATS A MINSTREL OF BEAUTY AND TRUTH
INTRODUCTION
John Keats who in his own words was lsquoa fair creature of an hourrsquo lived a brief and turbulent life Pre-eminently a
sensuous poet in whom the Romantic sensibility to
outward impressions of sight sound touch and smell
reached its climax the life of Keats was a series of
sensations felt with febrile acuteness
His ideal was passive contemplation rather than active
mental exertion ldquoO for a life of sensations rather than of thoughtrdquo he exclaimed in one of his letters and in
another ldquoit is more noble to sit like Jove than to fly like Mercuryrdquo In fact his was a life of intense sensations
acute poignancy and an infinite yearning for beauty
which he identified with truth
Richness of sensuousness characterizes all his poetry
and his power of expression is marked by a spectacular
vividness which is interspersed with beautiful epithets
heavily charged with subtle messages for the senses His
works are so full of luxuriance of sensations and acute
passions that ordinary readers do not pause to perceive
the unimpeded flow of spiritual thoughts underneath
The pursuit of the spirit of beauty dominates all his
works which have one enduring message ndash the
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 120
lastingness of beauty and its identity with supreme
truth (or God) This message ndash the oneness of beauty
with truth and the eternal existence of truth ndash has been
beautifully enshrined in his famous and oft-quoted lines
(with which he concludes his Ode on a Grecian Urn)
ldquoBeauty is truth truth beauty ndash that is all
Ye know on earth and all ye need to knowrdquo
Keats died at the age of 26 but even from his early age
he had visions of rare spiritual significance Dwelling on
the value of visions in human life and poetry he says
ldquoSince every man whose soul is not a clod
Hath vision
For poesy alone can tell her dreams
With the fine spell of words alone can save
Imagination from the sable chain
And dumb enchantmentrdquo
Since common readers tend to ignore the underlying
spiritual import of his visions and images this article
aims at bringing into play some of the poetrsquos thoughts
which bear a remarkable resemblance to the age-old
hoary spirituality of our ancient land
Stressing the fundamental truths of our Indian thought
and tracing their distinct reflection in the works of great
Western poets seems a worth-while academic pursuit
FUNDAMENTAL UNITY
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RP DWIVEDI Page 121
From the very beginning Keats could realize the
fundamental unity of Truth and Beauty and could dwell
at length on it to show how diverse paths illumined by
the glory of spirit in man ultimately lead him to the
realization of this abiding lesson of life The supreme
oneness of Truth has been beautifully enunciated by Sri
Krishna in the Bhagvad Gita
ldquoIn any way that men love Me in that same way they find My love for many are the paths of men but they all in the end come to Merdquo
Similar thoughts have found expression in the
introduction to the Upanishads by Juan Mascaro
ldquoThe path of Truth may not be a path of parallel lines but a path that follows one circle by going to the right and climbing the circle or by going to the left and climbing the circle we are bound to meet at the top although we started in apparently contrary directions This is bound to be in the end because Truth is onerdquo
And when Keats was only 22 he could give expression
to deep thoughts that have a curious similarity to the
ideas expressed in the Mundak Upanishad and the
Bhagvad Gita
ldquoNow it appears to me that almost any man may like the spider spin from his own inwards his own airy citadel the points of leaves and twigs on which the spider begins her work are few and she fills the air with a beautiful circuiting Man should be content with as few points to tip with the fine Web of his Soul and weave a tapestry empyrean-full of symbols for his spiritual eye of softness for his spiritual touch of space for his wanderings of distinctness for his luxuryrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 122
ldquoBut the minds of mortals are so different and bent on such diverse journeys that it may at first appear impossible for any common taste and fellowship to exist between two or three under these suppositions It is however quite the contrary Minds would leave each other in contrary directions traverse each other in numberless points and at last greet each other at the journeyrsquos end An old man and a child would talk together and the old man be led on his path and the child left thinkingrdquo
ldquoMan should not dispute or assert but whisper results to his neighbor and thus by every germ of spirit sucking the sap from mould ethereal every human might become great and humanity instead of being a wide heath of furze and briars with here and there a remote oak or pine would become a great democracy of forest treesrdquo
WISDOM
All men of good will are bound to meet if they follow the
wisdom of the words Shakespeare in Hamlet where if
we write SELF or self we find the doctrine of the
Upanishad
ldquoThis above all to thine own self be true
And it must follow as the night the day
Thou canst not then be false to any manrdquo
Now coming back to the theme of beauty and truth and
their ultimate identity in the universe we have to dwell
at large on the concept of beauty as enunciated by Keats
in his poetry From the very beginning Keats realized
that beauty in its true sense illumines manrsquos thoughts
and thus leads him to understand the glory of truth and
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RP DWIVEDI Page 123
the pervading spirit of their identity in whatever he
sees hears and perceives
The eternal identity or oneness of beauty with truth and
their interplay in the world are in fact unfailing
fountains of joy The permanence of beauty as a source
of joy has been beautifully elucidated by the poet in the
opening lines of his famous poem Endymion
ldquoA thing of beauty is a joy forever
Its loveliness increases it will never
Pass into nothingnessrdquo
He goes on to say
ldquoSome shape of beauty moves away the pall
From our dark spirits
An endless fountain of immortal drink
Pouring unto us from the heavenrsquos brink
Nor do we merely feel these essences
For one short hour
glories infinite
Haunt us till they become a cheering light
Unto our souls and bound to us so fast
That whether there be shine or gloom overcast
They always must be with us or we dierdquo
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RP DWIVEDI Page 124
When he ascribes permanence to joy born of beauty
Keats has in mind the immanence and effulgence of
beauty as a reflection of its creator God Beauty whose
lsquoloveliness increasesrsquo and which lsquowill never pass into nothingnessrsquo is an inalienable attribute of Divinity for it
is lsquoan endless fountain of immortal drinkrsquo
BEAUTY
God (as the poet seems to presuppose) is all Beautiful or
the embodiment of all Beauty and the entire world of
sights and sounds is nothing else but a glorious garment
of God So beauty does not consist only in apparent
physical appearances but is an offspring of inherent
divinity in man and nature which is dimly reflected in
their attractive exterior Such an eternal beauty in his
view presents lsquoglories infinite that haunt us till they become a cheering light unto our souls It is this beauty the glory of spirit which must be with us or we dierdquo
The poetrsquos concept of beauty with its glories infinite
bears a striking resemblance with the path of splendour
of our Vedic and epic scriptures in which our sages
perceived the Divine presence in all that is splendid and
beautiful in the universe
Our Vedic texts are full of the expressions of the sage-
poetrsquos exquisite astonishment before the visions of
glory and wonder The attitude of our Vedic seer-poets
towards beauty as a transcendental reality beyond our
sense-perceptions has been beautifully expressed in
images of beauty and glory as an abstract idea Says Rig Veda
ldquoSinless for noble power under the influence of Savita God
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 125
May we obtain all things that are beautifulrdquo
GOODNESS
Here the power of goodness is contemplated to lead to
the power of beauty Beauty in its myriad forms leads
us to spiritual consciousness of Divinity inherent in
Nature and all living beings Identical thoughts have
been expressed by Sri Krishna in Chapter X of the
Bhagvad Gita where all splendour and glory is said to
be the reflection of God whose manifestation this
universe is Says Sri Krishna to Arjuna
ldquoKnow thou that whatever is beautiful and good whatever has glory and power is only a portion of My own radiancerdquo
Bhagvad Gita X41
Seeing the effulgence of a thousand suns bursting forth
and yet it could hardly match the splendour of the
supreme Lord Arjuna exclaimed in wonder
ldquoI see the splendour of an infinite beauty which illumines the whole universe It is thee With thy crown and scepter and circle How difficult thou art to see But I see thee as fire as the Sun blinding incomprehensiblerdquo
Bhagvad Gita XI17
Besides this concept of ultimate elemental beauty
Keats goes on to underscore its fundamental and
inseparable unity with Truth which is yet another
inalienable facet of Divinity on earth
Truth being an essential attribute of God lies at the
core of all existence and it sustains the entire universe
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 126
with its manifold forms of beauty reflected in countless
objects around us When Keats declares that lsquoBeauty is truth truth beautyrsquo he seems to remind us of the age-old
spiritual consciousness that found sublime utterance in
our Vedas which are the oldest treatises on lsquophilosophia perennisrsquo the eternal philosophy In the Vedas truth has
been described as the essence of Divinity
ldquoThe deity has truth as the law of His beingrdquo
Atharva Veda VIIXXIV1
The Rig Veda calls the deities as various manifestations
of Truth Elsewhere in the Rig Veda the Deity has been
described as true and the path of religious progress is
the ingredient of Dharma Declares the Rig Veda
ldquoBy truth is the earth upheldrdquo
Rig Veda X85
An Upanishadic sage says
ldquoTruth alone triumphs not untruth By Truth the spiritual path is widened that path by which the seers who are free from all cravings and declares travel and reach the supreme abode of Truthrdquo
Mundak Upanishad IIII6
So Truth is a basic postulate of Dharma and an abiding
and ultimate value of life It is the eternal oneness of
beauty and truth and truth and beauty that inspired
Keats to stress their underlying unity and their
transcendental reality When Keats says ldquoThat is all ye know on earth and all ye need to knowrdquo he points to that
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 127
ecstatic wonder which the spiritual realization of this
eternal truth brings to a seeker or seer or a poet
SUBLIMITY
Keats seems to have reached such a sublime plane of
poetic consciousness that is so aptly suggested by our
Vedic seers who have extolled God as a poet (कव) and
His divine creative energy is indicated as the poetic
power (काय) which has assumed manifold forms of
beauty and splendour So God as the supreme creator of
beauty has been described in the Rig Veda as
ldquoHe who is supporter of the world of life
Who knows the secret mysterious names
Of the morning beams
He poet cherishes manifold forms
By His poetic powerrdquo
Rig Veda VIIIXL5
So let me hasten to the conclusion by affirming that as
lsquoa lily for a dayrsquo Keats proved that a crowded hour of
glory is far better than an age without a name he seems
to have lived up to the lofty advice of Queen Vidula to
her son King Sanjaya in the Mahabharat
महतम 0व1लत 2यो न त धमऽतम 4चर
ldquoIt is better to flame forth for an instant than smoke away for agesrdquo
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RP DWIVEDI Page 128
Eternal truths transcend the barriers of time and space
country and clime caste and creed and shine through all
lands and in all ages Even today the enlightened souls
all over the world have a significant identity of ideas
irrespective of the countries to which they belong and
the religious faith to which they are affiliated
Such wise men awaken others from a state of
intellectual and spiritual slumber enkindle in them a
sense of understanding and fraternity It has been
rightly said by HW Longfellow
ldquoLives of great men all remind us
We can make our lives sublime
And departing leave behind us
Footprints on the sand of Timerdquo
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RP DWIVEDI Page 129
RW EMERSON
(25 May 1803 ndash 27 April 1882)
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RP DWIVEDI Page 130
RW EMERSON
US Poet Essayist and Lecturer
Emerson graduated from Harvard University and was
ordained a Unitarian minister in 1829 His questioning
of traditional doctrine led him to resign the ministry
three years later He formulated his philosophy in
Nature (1836) the book helped initiate New England
Transcendentalism a movement of which he soon
became the leading exponent In 1834 he moved to
Concord Mass the home of his friend Henry David
Thoreau His lectures on the proper role of the scholar
and the waning of the Christian tradition caused
considerable controversy In 1840 with Margaret
Fuller he helped launch The Dial a journal that
provided an outlet for Transcendentalist ideas He
became internationally famous with his Essays (1841
1844) including Self-Reliance Representative Men
(1850) consists of biographies of historical figures The Conduct of Life (1860) his most mature work reveals a
developed humanism and a full awareness of human
limitations His Poems (1847) and May-Day (1867)
established his reputation as a major poet
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 131
CHAPTER SEVEN
EMERSONrsquoS SPIRITUAL QUEST AND INDIAN THOUGHT
INTRODUCTION
Ralph Waldo Emerson the lsquoSage of Concordrsquo as he is
rightly called was an American seer who came into the
world at a time when East and the West were gradually
coming closer to each other in spheres more than one
trade and commerce between the two was gaining
momentum and above all the era of inter-
communication of ideas intellect and spirit was being
ushered in by exchange of books
Emerson was one of the first great Americans who
absorbed himself sufficiently in this phenomenon
ventured into the sacred literature of India and
assimilated its thought to such a remarkable degree that
he became its eminent interpreter to his countrymen in
particular and to the entire West in general
EMERSON AND THE GITA
Let us see what Swami Vivekananda said about the
source of Emersonrsquos inspiration Swamiji said
ldquoThe greatest incident of the (Mahabharata) war was the marvelous and immortal poem of the Gita the Song Celestial It is the popular scripture of India and the loftiest of all teachings I would advise those of you who have not read that book to read it If you only knew how
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 132
much it has influenced your own country (America) even If you want to know the source of Emersonrsquos inspiration it is this book the Gita He went to see Carlyle and Carlyle made him a present of the Gita and that little book is responsible for the Concord Movement All the broad movements in America in one way or other are indebted to the Concord partyrdquo
His interest in the sacred writings of India was probably
aroused at Harvard and he kept it aglow throughout his
life With his motto ldquoTomorrow to fresh fields and pastures newrdquo he set out in search of the True (Satyam)
the Good (Shivam) and the Beautiful (Sundaram)
In busy and bustling New England there came forward
to quote Theodore Parker ldquothis young David a shepherd but to be a king with his garlands and singing robes about him one note upon his new and fresh-string lyre was worth a thousand menrdquo
With unflinching faith in Truth Righteousness and
Beauty and absolute confidence in all the attributes of
infinity he drank deep at the unfailing source of Indian
philosophy and religion and gave his thoughts such a
lucid inimitable expression that his writings have
become a veritable treasure of world literature Revered
the world over held in high esteem by great Indians like
Rabindranath Tagore and Pt Jawaharlal Nehru and
admired by Gandhiji his writings abound in the beauty
of his speech the majesty of his ideas and the loftiness
of his moral sentiments
Perhaps the most fitting commentary on the relevance
of his thoughts to our country was made by Mahatma
Gandhi after reading his Essays Said Mahatma Gandhi
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 133
ldquoThe Essays to my mind contain the teaching of Indian wisdom in a Western Guru It is interesting to see our own sometimes differently fashionedrdquo
There are indeed innumerable points of similarity in
thought and experience between Emerson and the
mainstream of Indian philosophy The philosophy of
Vedanta which was one of the thought currents that
reached America in the first half of the 19th century
influenced Emerson deeply and contributed largely to
his concept of lsquoselfhoodrsquo Emerson found the Vedic
doctrines of soul congenial to his own ideas about manrsquos
relationship to the universe He therefore drew freely
upon the Hindu scriptures which contain a vivid and
well-elaborated doctrine of lsquoSelfrsquo Numerous references
in his essays and journals to the lsquoLaws of Manursquo
(Manusmriti) Vishnu Puran Bhagvad Gita and Katha Upanishad bear ample testimony to this fact
Let us examine some of the striking identities between
Emerson and the Vedanta The Upanishads tell us that
the central core of onersquos self is clearly identifiable with
the Cosmic Reality ldquoThe self within you the resplendent immortal person is the internal self of all things and is the Universal Brahmanrdquo The Chhandogya Upanishad tells
us that ldquothe self which inhabits the body is verily the Brahman and that as soon as the mortal coil is thrown over it will finally merge in Brahmanrdquo
How close was Emersonrsquos spiritual kinship with the
Vedantic doctrines is clear from the following lines
taken from his essay Plato or the Philosopher
ldquoIn all nations there are minds which incline to dwell in the conception of the Fundamental Unity the ecstasy of losing all being in one Being This tendency
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 134
finds its highest expression chiefly in the Indian scriptures in the Vedas the Bhagvad Gita and the Vishnu Puranrdquo
He further quotes Lord Krishna speaking to a sage ldquoYou are fit to apprehend that you are not distinct from meThat which I am thou art and that also in this world with its gods and heroes and mankind Men contemplate distinctions because they are stupefied with ignorance What is the great end of all you shall now learn from me It is soul-one in all bodies pervading uniform perfect pre-eminent over nature exempt from birth growth and decay Omnipresent made up of true knowledge independent unconnected with unrealities with name species and the rest in time past present and to come The knowledge that this spirit which is essentially one is in onersquos own and all other bodies is the wisdom of one who knows the unity of thingsrdquo
In formulating his own concept of the Over-soul
Emerson quotes Lord Krishna once again
ldquoWe live in succession in division in parts in particles Meantime within man is the soul of the whole the wise silence the universal beauty to which every part and particle is equally related the eternal One And this deep power in which we exist and whose beatitude is all accessible to us is not only self-sufficing and perfect in every hour but in the act of seeing and the thing seen the seer and the spectacle the subject and the object are one We see the world piece by piece as the sun the moon the animal the tree but the whole of which these are shining parts is the Soul Only by the vision of that wisdom can the horoscope of ages be readrdquo
The Over-Soul
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 135
A transcendentalist par excellence Emerson who was
influenced by German philosophers like Kant Hegel
Fichte and Schelling and their English interpreters
Coleridge and Carlyle affirmed that man could
apprehend reality by direct spiritual insight To him
intuition knew truths which ldquotranscendedrdquo those
accessible to intellect logical argument and scientific
inquiry Such a transcendentalism or attitude which
provided a metaphysical justification for the ideal of
individual freedom was found writ large in the holy
books of India
Steeped as he was in the oriental lore echoes of
Vedantic philosophy can be distinctly heard in his
writings which shine like ldquoa good deed in a naughty worldrdquo
Some of his poems resemble Vedantic literature in form
as well as in content His two famous poems Brahma
and Hamatreya are striking examples of such a close
affinity both in content and expression Ideas and
images in Brahma reflect certain passages which
Emerson had copied into his journals from the Vishnu
Puran the Bhagvad Gita and Katha Upanishad The first
stanza of Brahma which reads
ldquoIf the red slayer think he slays
Or if the slain think he is slain
They know not well the subtle ways
I keep and pass and turn againrdquo
is essentially an adaptation of these lines from the
Katha Upanishad
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 136
ldquoIf the slayer thinks I slay if the slain thinks I am slain then both of them do not know well It (the soul) does not slay nor is it slainrdquo
Katha Upanishad II19
The same lines with a little variation of course appear
in the Bhagvad Gita
ldquoThey are both ignorant he who knows that the soul to be capable of killing and he who takes it as killed for verily the soul neither kills nor is killedrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II19
The image of Brahma as a red slayer has been derived
from the Vishnu Puran where Lord Shiva the destroyer
of Creation has been depicted as Rudra (the red slayer)
but destruction envisages new creation and therefore
symbolizes the decadence of one and necessitates the
advent of the other This is why Lord Shiva is regarded
as the god not only of extermination but also of
regeneration With this concept is connected the cult of
Shaivagam ndash the ushering in of an era of general good
and prosperity when the world is created anew
The second and third stanzas of Brahma echo the
following lines of the Bhagvad Gita
ldquoI am the ritual action I am the sacrifice I am the ancestral oblation I am the sacred hymn I am the melted butter I am the fire and I am the offeringrdquo
Bhagvad Gita IX16
and also from the same source
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 137
ldquoI am immortality as well as death I am being as well as non-beingrdquo
Bhagvad Gita IX19
In the fourth stanza of Brahma there is a direct
reference to lsquothe Sacred Sevenrsquo ndash the seven highest saints
of our country namely Kashyapa Atri Bharadwaj Vishwamitra Gautam Vashishtha and Jamadagni Thus
we find that Brahma embodies an age-old Vedantic
truth
As regards his next poem Hamatreya its very title is a
variation of a disciplersquos name lsquoMaitreyarsquo to whom the
earth had recited a few verses Before we examine the
poem critically let us read a long passage from the
Vishnu Puran Book IV which Emerson had copied into
his 1845 Journal This passage which sheds ample light
on the background and theme of the poem under
reference reads
ldquoKings who with perishable frames have possessed this ever-enduring world and who blinded with deceptive notions of individual occupation have indulged the feeling that suggests lsquoThis earth is mine it is my sonrsquos it belongs to my dynastyrsquo have all passed awayearth laughs as if smiling with autumnal flowers to behold her kings unable to effect the subjugation of themselvesthese were the verses Maitreya which earth recited and by listening to which ambition fades away like snow before the windrdquo
Journals VII127-130
How futile is human vanity and how ridiculous is the
possessive instinct in man has been thoroughly exposed
by Emerson in the following lines
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 138
ldquoEarth laughs in flowers to see her boastful boys
Earth-proud proud of the earth which is not theirs
Who steer the plough but cannot steer their feet
Clear of the graverdquo
Hamatreya
Man who awaits lsquothe inevitable hourrsquo forgets that all his
heraldry pomp power wealth and lsquopaths of gloryrsquo lead
him lsquobut to the graversquo and grows so proud of his material
achievements and so deeply attached to the fleeting
things of the world that he loses sight of the supreme
philosophical truth - the ephemerality of the world and
the immortality of soul Death which is lurking in the
shadows can lay his icy hands upon us any day yet due
to false pride and sense of meum and attachment we
allow ourselves to be duped by the passing show of the
world without ever thinking of salvation or final release
from the worldly bondages Says Emerson
ldquoAh the hot owner sees not Death who adds
Him to his land a lump of mould the morerdquo
Hamatreya
Here Emerson seems to have been deeply influences by
Indian scriptures and particularly Ishopanishad and
the Bhagvad Gita in which the philosophy of God-
realization through detached action has been succinctly
elaborated In these two sacred books it has been stated
that total renunciation of the sense of meum egotism
and attachment with regard to the world all worldly
objects body and all actions is a path to real love for
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 139
God All worldly objects like land wealth house clothes
all relations like parents wife children friends and all
forms of worldly enjoyment like honour fame prestige
being the creations of Maya are wholly deluding
transient and perishable whereas one God alone the
embodiment of Existence (Sat) Knowledge (Chit) and
Bliss (Anand) is all in all omnipotent omniscient and
omnipresent Therefore all sense of meum egotism and
attachment must be totally renounced for spiritual
growth and pure exclusive love for God If the seed of
egoism is sown sorrow is the fruit On the other hand
the more a man cultivates dispassion and
disinterestedness with regard to the world the more
easily he transcends the barriers of Ignorance (Avidya)
Delusion (Maya) and Aversion (Dvesha) and marches
on the path of self-realization and God-realization A
similar thought current runs through the following
memorable lines of Earth-Song which forms an integral
part of the poem
ldquoThe earth says
They called me theirs who so controlled me
Yet every one wished to stay and is gone
How am I theirs if they cannot hold me
But I hold themrdquo
Hamatreya
These lines remind us of those memorable words of
Lord Krishna in the Bhagvad Gita XII16 where a true
devotee is characterized as one who is ldquodelivered from the egorsquos thrall - the sense of I and minerdquo or the feeling of
doership in all undertakings
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 140
After reading these lines which seem to refer to the
famous Biblical phrase lsquodust thou art to dust returnethrsquo
the readers may feel called upon to cultivate a sense of
detachment and renunciation for their ambition fades
away and their lsquoavarice cooled like dust in the chill of the graversquo
All art it has been said is an attempt to distract man
from his ego Emersonrsquos Hamatreya is certainly an
illustrious example of great art Highly didactic in
content and tone this poem reminds us of that sublime
mood in which Emerson realized the futility of
egocentric attachment to earth and its fleeting objects
which are shadows rather than substances
Emersonrsquos writings leave us to quote John Milton lsquoCalm of mind all passions spentrsquo A fitting comment on the
total impact of Emersonrsquos works on us has been given
by a brilliant American man of letters Theodore Parker
who says
ldquoA good test of the comparative value of books is the state they leave you in Emerson leaves you tranquil resolved on noble manhood fearless of the consequences he gives men to mankind and mankind to the laws of Godrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 141
HD THOREAU
(12 July 1817 ndash 6 May 1862)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 142
HD THOREAU
US Thinker Essayist and Naturalist
Thoreau graduated from Harvard University and taught
school for several years before leaving his job to
become a poet of nature Back in Concord he came
under the influence of Ralph Waldo Emerson and began
to publish pieces in the Transcendentalist magazine The Dial In the years 1845ndash47 to demonstrate how
satisfying a simple life could be he lived in a hut beside
Concords Walden Pond essays recording his daily life
were assembled for his masterwork Walden (1854) His
A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers (1849)
was the only other book he published in his lifetime He
reflected on a night he spent in jail protesting the
Mexican-American War in the essay Civil
Disobedience (1849) which would later influence such
figures as Mohandas K Gandhi and Martin Luther King
Jr In later years his interest in Transcendentalism
waned and he became a dedicated abolitionist His
many nature writings and records of his wanderings in
Canada Maine and Cape Cod display the mind of a keen
naturalist After his death his collected writings were
published in 20 volumes and further writings have
continued to appear in print
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 143
CHAPTER EIGHT
THOREAUrsquoS TRYST WITH INDIAN CULTURE
INTRODUCTION
Henry David Thoreau was a great American
transcendentalist thinker His seminal mind and
original thought had an enduring impact on his own
countrymen and also on peoples beyond the bounds of
America His philosophy and life had a deep influence
on all great men of his time Mahatma Gandhi regarded
him as his Guru and his concept of Satyagraha owes its
origin to Thoreaursquos essay on Civil Disobedience which
Gandhiji chanced upon in South Africa On Thoreaursquos
greatness another great American contemporary RW
Emerson once remarked ldquoHis soul was made for the noblest society he had in short life exhausted the capabilities of this world Wherever there is knowledge wherever there is virtue wherever there is beauty he will find a homerdquo
HIS LOVE OF SOLITUDE
Endowed with a rare meditative mind Thoreau loved
lsquosweet solitudersquo for he held that what is truly alone is the
spirit A seeker after perfection he retired to the
solitude of the woods to see with the eyes of the soul ndash
ldquothe higher law in naturerdquo and realize his oneness with
the Cosmic Spirit A lover of the spirit behind the world
of appearance he once said ndash ldquoI love to be alone I never
found the companion that was so companionable as
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 144
solitude In solitude of the woods I suddenly recover my
spirits my spirituality I can go from the buttercups to
the life everlastingrdquo His love for loneliness resembles
that of our own sages and saints who shunned the din
and clamour of madding crowds and retired to the
sylvan solitude of the woods for meditation on
mysteries of life It was in the secluded and tranquil
atmosphere of the woods that the great teachers of
mankind cultivated their souls observed austerity and
wrote the holiest scriptures Aranyakas and sacred texts
Gurukul (forest academies)- the ideal nurseries of
higher learning and disciplined rigorous life were setup
here for success in life and self-realization which is a
path-way to God-realization
HIS CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE AND GANDHIJIrsquoS
SATYAGRAHA
Bapu read Thoreaursquos essay on Civil Disobedience for
the second time in jail and was so deeply impressed by
it that he called it ldquoa masterly treatise which left a deep impression on merdquo He copied the words ldquoI did not feel for a moment confined and the walls seemed a great waste of stone and mortarrdquo Gandhiji wrote to Roosevelt
in 1942 ldquoI have profited greatly by the writings of Thoreau and Emersonrdquo He told Roger Baldwin that
Thoreaursquos essay ldquocontained the essence of his political philosophy not only as Indiarsquos struggle related to the British but as to his own views of the relation of citizens to Governmentrdquo As Miller observed ldquoGandhiji received back from America what was fundamentally the philosophy of India after it had been distilled and crystallized in the mind of Thoreaurdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 145
In his Civil Disobedience which as a document of
much ethical and spiritual value is manrsquos most powerful
weapon in dealing with tyranny Thoreau examines the
relation of the individual to the state and offers a candid
exposition when he says ldquoThat Government is best which governs the leastrdquo He believed in the supremacy of
moral laws and his concept of Civil Disobedience is
based on the dictates of conscience Since the nature of
an individual is determined by his conscience there is
always a basic conflict between the laws arbitrarily
made by the Government and the objectives sanctioned
and held sacred by the individualrsquos conscience He
regarded the individual as more important than the
state So in the interests of justice and virtue men with
clean conscience most oppose unjust laws The form of
protest launched by conscientious and holy men against
government is called Civil Disobedience
Thoreau seems to have derived the concept from the
Bhagvad Gita which invests each individual with two
contradictory traits ndash the Divine Attributes and the
Diabolical Propensities Whenever diabolical tendencies
promote arbitrary administration by making unjust
laws and men of clean conscience are forced to obey
them injustice prevails and justice or righteousness is
destroyed In such a situation the Divinity incarnates
itself and sets matters right Declares Lord Krishna
ldquoWhenever righteousness (Virtue) is on the decline and injustice (Vice) is on the ascendant then I body forth myselfrdquo
Bhagvad Gita IV7
To Gandhiji also Satya (Truth) and Ahimsa (Non-
violence) are inter-related and Satyagraha or non-
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 146
violent resistance is based on the belief in the power of
spirit the power of truth the power of love by which we
can overcome evil through self-suffering and self-
sacrifice
FORMATIVE INDIAN INFLUENCES
Thoreau was thoroughly immersed in the Indian
scriptures In Emersonrsquos library he read and was deeply
influenced by the Manusmriti Bhagvad Gita Vishnu Puran Hitopadesh Rig-Veda and the Upanishads
Which the Manusmriti led him to seek the Self in
solitude the Bhagvad Gita taught him the ideal of
disinterested action non-attachment meditation and
self-realization He was so overwhelmed by the Gita that
he declared it to be the lsquoUniversal Gospelrsquo Praising its
moral grandeur and sustained sublimity of thoughts he
wrote in Walden ndash ldquoIn the morning I bathe my intellect in the stupendous cosmogonal philosophy of the Bhagvad Gita since whose composition years of the gods have elapsed and in comparison with which our modern world and its literature seems puny and trivial the best Hindu scripture (Gita) is remarkable for its pure intellectuality The reader is nowhere raised into and sustained in a higher purer and rarer region of thought than the Bhagvad Gita It is unquestionably one of the noblest and most sacred scriptures which have come down to us The oriental philosophy assigns their due rank respectively to action and contemplation or rather does full Justice to the latterrdquo
A thorough study of the Upanishads made him exclaim
joyfully ldquoWhat extracts from the Vedas I have read fall on me like the light of a higher and purer luminary which describes a loftier course through a purer stratum ndash free from particulars simple universalrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 147
At a time when the Western philosophers did not
appreciate the significance of contemplation Thoreau
emphasized that contemplation is as important as
action for the latter has to be charged by the former
otherwise action will lead to chaos disillusionment and
despair
HIS TRANSCENDENTALISM
Thoreau was an empirical transcendentalist To him
transcendentalism was a profound exploration of the
spiritual foundations of life His emphasis on intuition
or inner light for a direct relationship with God which
transcends all the conventional avenues of
communication stemmed from an intuitive capacity for
grasping the ultimate truth He was interested less in
the material world than in spiritual reality He regarded
Nature as a viable garment of the spiritual world and
the universe as the embodiment of a single Cosmic Soul
His transcendentalism relied upon the higher planes of
human circumstances its oneness with something
higher than itself While logical reasoning fails to grasp
the truth intuition transcends understanding and is a
synthesizing power to understand the organic whole
which is called the Over-soul
An individual of exceptional self-ascending and self-
reliance he believed that Over-soul is brought down to
earth by action rather than words He therefore did not
preach transcendentalism but actually lived it To him
transcendentalism is ldquoan inquisitive and contemplative access to Godrdquo He believed in the immanence of God in
nature and in man and also the identity of God with the
soul of the individual He said ldquothe creator is still behind the increate the Divinity is so fleeting that its attributes are never expressedthe idea of God is the idea of
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 148
our Spiritual nature purified and enlarged to infinity In ourselves are the elements of Divinity We see God around us because He dwells within usrdquo
This statement reminds us of a verse in the Gita
wherein Lord Krishna declares that every living heart is
His abode
ldquoArjuna God abides in the heart of all creatures causing them to revolve according to their deeds by His illusive power seated as those beings are in the vehicle of the bodyrdquo
At one place Thoreau said ldquoThe whole is whole an organic whole which is called Over-soul or Para-Brahman and the highest aim of life is to realize this truth and be one with the whole or Over-soulrdquo Thoreau seems to have
been moved by our Vedic incantation which says
ldquoThat (the invisible Absolute) is whole whole is this (the visible phenomenal universe) from the invisible whole comes forth the visible whole Though the visible whole has come out from that invisible whole yet the whole remains unalteredrdquo Thus the phenomenal and the
Absolute are inseparable All existence is in the
Absolute and whatever exists must exist in it hence all
manifestation is merely a modification of the one
Supreme Whole and neither increases nor diminishes It
Serene and thoughtful as he was he wrote in his
Journal ldquoThe fact is I am a mystic a transcendentalist and a natural philosopher to bootrdquo
HIS ASCETISM (SANNYASA)
He was a true ascetic or Sannyasi for he preached and
practiced the basic human values of Anasakti (non-
attachment) and Aparigraha (non-possession)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 149
throughout his life He abhorred acquisition of wealth
and regarded worldly possessions as the result of sheer
exploitation of the masses by a few powerful men and
agencies including the State and the Government Since
the universe belongs to God any claim to ownership or
personal possessions is against moral law and is in fact
a sin against divinity Moral laws being superior to
worldly rules his preference for a life of self-abnegation
and renunciation bears a striking similarity to our Vedic
view expressed in the very opening line of the
Ishopanishad
ldquoAll this whatever exists in the universe is inhabited by the Lord Having renounced (the unreal) enjoy (the real) with restraint Do not covet or set your eye on the possession of othersrdquo
To him all worldly attractions and allurements were but
a passing show or fleeting moments (in eternity) which
distract the seekers of truth from cultivating self-culture
and promoting inner spiritual growth
EXPLORER OF THE INNER WORLD OF SPIRIT
Thoreau was an explorer of the inner self He wanted to
pass ldquoan invisible boundaryrdquo establishment within and
around him new universal and more liberal laws and
live with higher order of beings To him every man is
the Lord of the realm beside which the earthly empire
of the Czar is but a petty state a hammock left by the
icethere are continents and seas in the moral
world yet unexplored by him He praised William
Habbingtonrsquos following lines which echoed his own
thoughts
ldquoDirect your eyes right inward and you will find
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 150
A thousand regions in your mind
Yet undiscovered Travel then and be
Expert in home home cosmographyrdquo
Simple living based on extreme reduction of wants and
self-reliance enabled him to lsquocultivate the garden of his soulrsquo In consonance with the concept of an ideal Yogi in
the Gita he wrote
ldquoThe millions are awake enough for physical labour but only one in a million is awake enough for effective intellectual exertion and only one in a hundred millions do a poetic or divine liferdquo How truly does this view echo
the memorable words of Lord Krishna
ldquoAmong thousands of men one rare soul strives for perfection and among those who strive with success one perchance knows me in truthrdquo
Condemning people who go to Africa to hunt giraffes for
pastime he exhorted them to aim at seeking their own
lsquoSelfrsquo He said ldquoIt would be a noble game to shoot onersquos selfrdquo He seems to recall the famous verse of the
Mundakopanishad which says
ldquoThe Pranava is the bow the Atman is the arrow and the Brahman is said to be its mark It should be hit by one who is self-collected and that which hits becomes like the arrow one with the mark ie Brahmanrdquo
When he ordains lsquoto shoot oneselfrsquo he like our Vedic
seers hints at penetrating the truth centre in us with
our mind propelled by the motive force generated in the
voiceless ecstasy of deepest meditation which touches
the Brahman the Ultimate Reality When the individual
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 151
soul gets fully detached from its contacts with matter or
its false identification with material envelopment it
realizes its oneness with the Supreme Brahman How
beautifully has he stressed the value of inner search in
the concluding sentence of Walden
ldquoThe light which puts out our eyes is darkness to us Only that day dawns to which we are awake There is more day to dawn The Sun is but a morning starrdquo
IMMORTALITY OF SOUL AND THE DOCTRINE OF
TRANSMIGRATION
Thoreau firmly believed in the immortality of soul and
its transmigration He had fully imbibed the philosophy
of the Gita which enunciates in unequivocal terms the
permanence of the soul and the transience of the body
Says Lord Krishna
ldquoThis soul is never born and never dies nor does it become only after being born For it is unborn eternal everlasting and ancient even though the body is slain the soul is notrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II20
ldquoAs a man shedding worn-out garments takes other new ones likewise the embodied soul casting off worn-out bodies enters into others which are newrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II22
Thoreau considered his life as a series of many more
lives to come On his return from Waldon Pond he said
ldquoI had several more lives to live and could not spare any more for that onerdquo At another place he refers to the
solitary hired manrsquos lsquosecond birth and peculiar religious
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 152
experiencersquo He evidently recalled the following words of
St John ldquoExcept a man be born again he cannot see the kingdom of Godrdquo In his Waldon he refers to a bug and
declares ldquoWho does not feel his faith in a resurrection and immortality Who knows what beautiful and winged whose egg has been buried for ages under many concentric layers of woodenness in the dead dry life in societyheard perchance of gnawing out now for years by the astonished family of man may unexpectedly come forth from amidst societyrsquos most trivial furniture to enjoy its perfect summer life at lastrdquo
CONCLUSION
Thoreau was a true Yogi or an ascetic modeling on the
Indian tradition of strict moral code of conduct for a
Sannyasi He drew abundant spiritual and moral
sustenance from the Indian scriptures and its rich
lsquoculturersquo and approximated the ideal of a perfect recluse
The concept of an ideal Yogi is similar upto a point to
the postulates of Divinity expressed thus in the Atharva Veda
ldquoThe Yogi is desireless and hence free from the impact of animal nature he is serene in the heroism of the spirit he is satisfied with the essence of things perceived spirituality and hence does not depend on sense-perception for happiness and so he is complete in himself And though the physical body is subject to decay and death he remains unworn and ever youthful in spirit and has no fear of deathrdquo
Atharva Veda XVIII44
Such an enlightenment Yogi or spiritual superman was
Thoreau whose greatness will ever inspire us and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 153
illumine our lifersquos path with light and love His life was
lsquoa chronicle of actions just and brightrsquo and his writings
were lsquowrit with beams of heavenly light on which the eyes of God not rarely lookrsquo
Proof
Printed By Createspace
Digital Proofer
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 18
ldquoIf winter comes can spring be far behindrdquo
Ode to the West Wind
His entire poetry is a vivid and symbolic expression of
the wretched actuality and the radiant idea He wants to
herald a perfect world order based on love and
freedom He treats poetry as a potent instrument of
redemption and it was his deep romantic sensibility and
fanciful ecstatic Platonic love that earned him this
description of lsquopinnacled dim in the intense inanersquo He
was one of the greatest lyricists and an
lsquounacknowledged legislator of the worldrsquo of thought and
imagination
John Keats who in his own words was lsquoa fair creature of an hourrsquo was perhaps the first conscious artist whose
artistic intuition was far ahead of his time By declaring
that ldquoan artist must serve Mammonrdquo he wished to confer
on arts a special status and thus laid the foundation of
the doctrine of lsquoArt for Artrsquos sakersquo His minute delicate
and sensuous observation of the visible world of Nature
inspired his poetry which he wanted to lsquoloadrsquo with a
special excellence His delightful communion with
Nature and the sensuous ecstasies of its sight sound
smell touch and taste formed some of his best poetry
His delicacy and keenness of perception and love for
passive contemplation made him exclaim ndash ldquoO for a life of sensations rather than thoughtrdquo But in fact most of
his sensations were his thoughts for they were
embodied in sensuous pictorial form and rich symbolic
imagery
As a liberal enthusiast he felt that sharing the distress of
humanity or participation in ldquothe agony and strife of human heartsrdquo was essential not only for human growth
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 19
but also for poetic maturity This philanthropic attitude
of Keats brings him very close to our ardent Indian
prayer - ldquoसव भवत स13खनः सव सत नरामयाःrdquo ndash May all be happy may none struck with disease To find an
escape from the fret and fever of life he sought refuge in
an infinite yearning for beauty and turned to the realm
lsquoof Flora and old Panrsquo but soon realized the transience of
the world and started exploring permanence He could
find it in the spirit of beauty which is but a reflection of
eternal truth His passionate pursuit of ideal beauty
which he identified with truth has been beautifully
expressed in the following oft-quoted lines
ldquoBeauty is truth truth beauty that is all
Ye know on earth and all ye need to knowrdquo
Ode on a Grecian Urn
This fundamental unity or oneness of beauty and truth
and their interplay in the visible world are the
mainsprings of his poetic creed
The conflict between transience and permanence forms
the theme of his famous Odes and he longs for a
solution and lasting happiness in the form of Art or lsquoon the viewless wings of Poesyrsquo At the height of his
impassioned contemplation when the life of the spirit is
fused with the objects of immediate sensuous
experience he has glimpses of the permanence of
beauty which reflects Eternal Truth In one of his letters
(281) he declares ldquoI can never feel certain of any truth but from a clean perception of its beautyrdquo And at another
place when he finds mortality and immortality poles
apart he asserts the everlasting value of truth ldquoTruthrdquo
he says ldquomeans that which has lasting valuerdquo This firm
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 20
conviction of Keats seems to be a distinct echo of our
Vedantic dictum
सयमव जयत नानतम सयन पथा वततो दवयानः
यनामतय तत सयय परम नधान ldquoTruth alone triumphs not untruth By truth is laid out the Path Divine along which the seers who are free from desires and cravings ascend the supreme abode of Truthrdquo
Mundak Upanishad III16
Again the Vedic seer says that the Atman (self) is to be
realized only through truth
सयन लampसतपसा यष आमा
मडकोपनषद III15
Thus truth is the foundation of Dharma (righteousness)
for it is an essential and abiding value of human life The
eternal oneness of beauty and truth and vice versa and
their transcendental reality was Keatsrsquo poetic creed and
the realization of this basic spiritual truth raised him to
a level of sublime consciousness which is the mark of a
true seeker of truth or seer
In sum we may say that though lsquoa lily of a dayrsquo Keats
proved that a crowded hour of glory is far better than
an age without a name as has been stressed in our epic
Mahabharat where Queen Vidula exhorts her son
Sanjaya ldquoमहतम 0व1लत 2यो न त धमतम 4चरrdquo ndash ldquoIt is better to flame forth for an instant than to smoke away for agesrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 21
Though Keats died at the young age of 26 years he left
an indelible imprint on the history of English poetry for
his deep and pervasive influence could be easily seen on
Tennysonrsquos early work Moreover he was indisputably
the precursor of the Pre-Raphaelite movement In fact
he had reached near perfection in poetic craftsmanship
which will ever remain worthy of emulation for the
succeeding generations of poets
Ralph Waldo Emerson known as the lsquoSage of Concordrsquo
acted as a bridge between the East and the West His
abiding interest in the Indian scriptures and
particularly the Gita was a source of the Concord
Movement in America According to Swami
Vivekananda all the broad movements in America are
indebted to the Concord Party Mahatma Gandhi
remarked after reading Emersonrsquos Essays ldquoThe Essays to my mind contain the teaching of Indian wisdom in a Western lsquoGurursquo it is interesting to see our own sometimes differently fashionedrdquo Emerson drew freely on the
Upanishads Manusmriti Vishnu Puran and above all
the Gita and his writings reflect his indebtedness to our
holy texts
Pt Jawaharlal Nehru admired Emersonrsquos gospel of self-
reliance and righteousness in particular and regarded
him as one of the builders of America A
transcendentalist and thinker par excellence Emersonrsquos
ideas shaped not only his countrymenrsquos thinking but
had a deep and pervasive influence over many other
nations His main thoughts coloured as they are by our
own Indian religio-philosophical strands are universal
in appeal and are as relevant today as they were in his
own lifetime
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 22
In formulating his concept of Over-Soul Emerson
stressed the fundamental identity of Individual Soul
with Over-Soul He asserted ldquoWithin man is the soul of the whole ndash the wise silence the universal beauty to which every part and particle is equally related the Eternal Oneonly by the vision of that wisdom can the horoscope of ages be readrdquo He firmly believed in the
immortality of soul and the ephemerality of the world
and strongly condemned the futility of manrsquos vanity and
ego-centric attachment to the perishable objects of the
world His writings leave us lsquocalm of mind all passions spentrsquo In fact lsquohe gives men to mankind and mankind to the laws of Godrsquo
Henry David Thoreau was a great empirical
transcendentalist about whom Emerson once remarked
ldquowherever there is knowledge wherever there is virtue wherever there is beauty he will find a homerdquo His essay
on lsquoCivil Disobediencersquo which Gandhiji read twice in a
South African jail impressed him so much so that he
regarded him as his political lsquoGurursquo and his concept of
Satyagraha owes its origin to Thoreaursquos writings
Endowed with a rare meditative mind he loved lsquosweet solitudersquo and retired to the woods for discovering the
lsquohigher lawrsquo and realize his oneness with the Cosmic
Spirit He believed in the supremacy of moral laws and
his doctrine of Civil Disobedience is based on his dictate
of conscience for he considered individual conscience
more important than arbitrary state laws
Thoroughly immersed in the Indian scriptures his
thought-process and philosophy of life was
considerably moulded by our ancient religio-spiritual
heritage His deep love for our scriptural texts is evident
from his declaration of the Gita as lsquoUniversal Gospelrsquo He
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 23
wrote ldquoIn the morning I bathe my intellect in the stupendous cosmogonal philosophy of the Bhagvad GitaIt is unquestionably one of the noblest and most sacred scriptures which have come down to usthe oriental philosophy assigns their due rank respectively to action and contemplationrdquo
About the Vedas he remarked ldquoExtracts from the Vedas fall on me like the light of a higher and purer luminaryrdquo
According to him Over-Soul could be brought down to
earth not by words but by ldquoan inquisitive and contemplative accessrdquo He further states ldquoIn us are the elements of Divinity We see God around us because He dwells within usrdquo
He was a true ascetic (सयासी) for he preached and
practiced non-attachment (अनासि8त) in his life He was
an explorer of the inner world of Spirit In the seclusion
of woods he lsquocultivated the garden of his soul as a true Yogirsquo and he wanted to lsquoshoot his selfrsquo as our Mundaka Upanishad says
ldquoThe Pranava is the bow Atma the arrow the Brahman its mark It should be hit by a self-collected onerdquo
Much of what is stated in this compact volume may be
found scattered over various other critical works but
my earnest endeavour has been to bring together such
material as is of sufficient spiritual value which belongs
to all times This small comparative survey of the realm
of main ideas of some great poets confirms the splendor
of their rich romantic imagination and the unity of all
spiritual vision that makes them not only the creators of
beauty love and light but also brothers in spirit
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 24
I would feel amply rewarded if through this modest
attempt I am able to arouse keen interest in my readers
for further critical study of the subject Any suggestions
for amplification or improvement on the text are most
welcome
RP DWIVEDI
LUCKNOW
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 25
WILLIAM BLAKE
(28 November 1757 ndash 12 August 1827)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 26
WILLIAM BLAKE
English Poet Painter Engraver and Visionary
He was trained as an engraver by James Basire and
afterward attended classes at the Royal Academy Blake
married in 1782 and in 1784 he opened a print shop in
London He developed an innovative technique for
producing coloured engravings and began producing
his own illustrated books of poetrymdashincluding Songs of Innocence (1789) The Marriage of Heaven and Hell (1790) and Songs of Experience (1794)mdashwith his new
method of ldquoIlluminated Printingrdquo Jerusalem (1804[ndash
20]) an epic treating the fall and redemption of
humanity is his most richly decorated book His other
major works include Vala or The Four Zoas
(manuscript 1796ndash1807) and Milton (1804[ndash11]) A
late series of 22 watercolours inspired by the Book of
Job includes some of his best-known pictures He was
called mad because he was single-minded and
unworldly he lived on the edge of poverty and died in
neglect His books form one of the most strikingly
original and independent bodies of work in the Western
cultural tradition Ignored by the public of his day he is
now regarded as one of the earliest and greatest figures
of Romanticism
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 27
CHAPTER ONE
INDIAN SPIRITUALISM IN BLAKErsquoS VISIONS OF ETERNITY
INTRODUCTION
William Blake was by far the most prophetic of all major
English poets In a preface to his famous poem on
Milton he exclaimed lsquoWould to God that all the Lordrsquos people were Prophetsrsquo Elsewhere Blake declared lsquoA Prophet is a seer not an arbitrary dictatorrsquo According to
PH Butter an acclaimed authority on Blake ldquoa prophet sees behind the marks of woe behind the wars and other evils of his time and the attitudes that cause such things But Blake was not the kind of prophet who just present evils but one who saw the Visions of Eternity one whose senses discovered the infinite in everythingrdquo The prophet
is also a spokesman one who speaks or believes he
speaks for God or some other higher power Blake
himself claimed in one of his letters in 1803 ldquoI dare not pretend to be any other than the Secretary the Authors are in Eternityrdquo
His belief in lsquoinspirationrsquo contributed to that lsquoterrifying honestyrsquo which TS Eliot saw in him to keep him
uncompromisingly true to his vision He perceived a
close relationship of the conscious ndash lsquoIrsquo with the deeper
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 28
self through which all inspiration flows He knew that
the prophet must also be a lsquomakerrsquo lsquoa blacksmith laboring at his furnaces to shape the stubborn structure of the languagersquo He further realized that a prophet
should also be a teacher a preacher and a beacon light
to humanity
Explaining the function of the bard or poet (and his own
mission) Blake in his introduction to Songs of Experience declares
ldquoHear the voice of the bard
Who present past and future sees
Whose ears have heard
The Holy word
That walked among the ancient trees
Calling the lapsed soul
And weeping in the evening dew
That might control
The starry pole
And fallen fallen light renewrsquo
Or again elucidating the aim of writing poetry or his
lsquogreat taskrsquo Blake declares
ldquo I rest not from my great task
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 29
To open the Eternal worlds to open the immortal eyes
Of man inwards into the worlds of Thought into Eternity
Ever expanding in the bosom of God the human imaginationrsquo
Like Milton who wanted lsquoto justify the ways of God to Manrsquo or Shelley who held that lsquopoetry is the revelation of the eternal ideas which lie behind the many-coloured ever-shifting veil that we call reality in lifersquo Blake in his
exceptional prophetic zeal set out to open the Eternal
worlds to open the immortal eyes of man inwards into
the worlds of thought into Eternity He was always at
pains to renew the fallen fallen light The poetrsquos divine
task of lsquoever expanding in the bosom of Godrsquo reminds us
of the moving verse of our Rig Veda in which God as
creator of beautiful forms has been conceived of as the
greatest poet whose divine creative energy s his poetic
power which manifests itself in the manifold forms of
beauty and splendor like the Heaven the Sun the Moon
the Sky etc
यो धता भवानानामगया स कवः काया प पपltयत
ऋवद VIII415
lsquoHe who is the supporter of the world of life
Who knows the secret mysterious names of the morning beams
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He poet cherishes manifold forms by His poetic power even as heavenrsquo
Rig Veda VIII415
As a divinely inspired poet Blake seems to have had
experiences of various psychic and even mystic visions
which awakened him to subtle spiritual life It seems
that he must have transcended normal sensory
perceptions and would have attained to super-sensory
status of consciousness when he declares
lsquoI see the savior over me
Spreading his beams of love and dictating the words of mild song
Awake O sleeper of the land of shadows wake
I am in you and you in me mutual in love divinersquo
Jerusalem L4-7
He seems to have attained to that rare transcendental
consciousness when he perceived perfect communion
with God who assured him
lsquoI am not a God afar off I am a brother and friend
Within your bosoms I reside and you reside in me
We are one forgiving all evil not seeking recompensersquo
Jerusalem L18-20
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
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Here Blake on perceiving a synoptic vision of complete
identity or oneness of God with individual self seems to
have echoed the eternal ancient Holy Scriptures Here
are a few striking parallels
In our Vedas also Go is regarded and adored as our
most-trusted friend Says the Rig Veda
lsquoमा=कर न ऐना सयाच ऋषः
वBमा Cह Dमतमसया 1शवानrsquo
ऋवद X237
lsquoNever may this friendship be severed
Of thee O Deity and the sage Vimada
We know O God Thy brother-like love
With us be Thy auspicious friendshiprsquo
Rig Veda X237
The key-note of this type of worship is the
contemplation of friendly love (described in later
religious literature as - सय ndash friendliness between the
Deity and the worshipper) The following prayer is in
the same spirit
lsquoभवा नः सFन अतमः सखा वधrsquo
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ऋवद X133
lsquoBe Thou most dear to us for bliss O friend to aidrsquo
Rig Veda X133
Similarly assuring Arjuna of His perennial benediction
Lord Krishna declares in the Gita
ईHवरः सवभतानामतltठत
Kामयसवभतानमायया
ldquoArjuna God abides in the heart of all creatures
Causing them to revolve according to their Karma
By His illusive power seated as those beings are
In the vehicle of the bodyrdquo
Bhagvad Gita XVIII61
And again describing Himself as the truest friend of all
living beings Lord Krishna pronounces
ldquoI am the (disinterested) friend of all living beings and my devotee attains supreme peacerdquo
Bhagvad Gita V29
To turn to William Blake again he has an essential
belief in the closest intimacy of all living beings with
God who is the fountain-head of all life love and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 33
friendship This belief makes him affirm his faith in the
holiness of all life on earth Says he in his Annotations to Lavater
lsquoAll Life is Holyrsquo
Again he says ldquoIt is God in all that is our companion and friend for our God himself says lsquoyou are my brother my sister and my motherrsquo and Saint John said lsquowho so dwelleth in love dwelleth in God and God in himrsquo and such a one cannot judge of any but in loveGod is in lowest effects as well as in the highest causes for he is become a worm that he may nourish the weak For let it be remembered that creation is God descending according to the weakness of man for our Lord is the word of God and everything on earth is the word of God and in its essence is Godrdquo
In our own scriptures the all-pervasiveness of God (the
One) has been conceived not only in the cosmic world
but also in the world of men The very opening verse of
the Ishopanishad stresses the immanence of God in the
universe
ईशावाय इद सवM यािकNय जगया जगत
ईशोपनष I
lsquoUnderstand all this (universe) as inhabited by the Lord
Each moving thing in this moving worldrsquo
Or again says the Atharva Veda
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य समायोऽवPणोयो वदHयः
यो दवोऽवPणोमानषः
lsquoGod is that in which things converge
He is that from which things diverge
He is our own land he is of foreign land
He is divine he is humanrsquo
Atharva Veda IV168
The immanence of God is the entire universe is also
underscored by Lord Krishna when he tells Arjuna
ldquoThere is nothing besides me Arjuna Like clusters of yarn-beads formed by knots all this (universe) is threaded on merdquo
Bhagvad Gita VII7
SYNOPTIC VISION
A firm belief in the all-pervasiveness of God in the
whole universe led him to perceive every object of
Nature as a window through which we may look with a
sense of awe and wonder into the beauty truth and all-
enveloping eternity which is but a reflection of God
Blake must have had palpable intimations of Eternity
when he wrote
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 35
lsquoTo see a world in a grain of sand
And a Heaven in a wild flower
Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand
And Eternity in an hourrsquo
Auguries of Innocence
Such a super-sensuous or transcendental perception of
Divinity in all creation and all creation in Divinity gave
Blake a subtle insight into the lsquoVisions of Eternityrsquo and
made him not only a seer but also lsquoan inhabitant of
other planes another domain of beingrsquo Commenting on
Blakersquos singular other-worldliness our own seer and
prophet Sri Aurobindo says ldquoThere is no other singer of the beyond who is like him or equal him in the strangeness supernatural lucidity power and directness of vision of the beyond and the rhythmic clarity and beauty of his singingrdquo
It is this contemplative knowledge of infinity in finite
and finite in infinity that has been regarded as the
distinguishing mark of the pure wisdom which finally
leads one to transcendental revelation which has been
so beautifully expressed in our own scriptures
सवभतषभावमययमीRत
अवभ8तसािवक
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lsquoWhen one sees Eternity in things that pass away and Infinity in finite things then one has pure knowledgersquo
Bhagvad Gita XVIII20
The same truth has been emphasized again and again in
the Upanishads When man comes to know the real
truth about God nay when he succeeds in realizing the
truth about God how can he ever revile or adversely
criticize any form or aspect of God The Isha Upanishad
says
यत सवा13ण भतान आमयवानपHयत
सवभतष चामना ततो न वजगSसत
ईशोपनष VI
ldquoWhoever beholds all beings in God alone and God in all beings ie who regards all beings as his own self he no more looks down upon any creature for regarding all as his self whom will he hate and howrdquo
Lord Krishna stresses the same equanimity of vision
when he declares
ldquoThe Yogi who is united in identity with the all-pervading infinite consciousness and sees unity everywhere beholds the self present in all beings and all beings as assumed in the selfrdquo
Bhagvad Gita VI29
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Again Lord Krishna declares
यो मा पHयत सव सवM च मय पHयत
तयाह न DणHया1म स च म न DणHयत
भगवगीता VI30
ldquoHe who sees me (the universal self) present in all beings and all beings existing within me never loses sight of me and I never lose sight of himrdquo
Bhagvad Gita VI30
FAITH IN THE LAW OF ETERNITY
Since God is infinite immanent and omnipresent soul
which is an integral and inalienable part of God is also
immortal The forms or objects of the world may change
but in reality they exist forever and are eternal Like
God soul is everlasting unborn undecaying and
undying Blake says
ldquoWhatever can be created can be annihilated
Forms can not
The oak is cut down by the axe the lamb falls by the knife
But their Form Eternal exists for everrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 38
The poet also believes that all sufferings of man if borne
meekly for a noble cause have their rich recompense
sooner or later for God being all-merciful would
certainly reward his suffering children He believes that
lsquoFor a tear is an intellectual thing
And a sigh is a sword of an angel king
And the bitter groan of a martyrrsquos woe
Is an arrow from the Almightyrsquos bowrsquo
Jerusalem
He believes that God Almighty holds out a solemn
promise of reward to sufferers for a lofty cause God
declares
lsquofear not Lo I am with thee always
Only believe in me that I have power to raise from deathrsquo
Jerusalem
MEANS OF LIBERATION
As the greatest and most inventive of Romantic
mythmakers Blake at first explores the contrary states
of human innocence and experience and then speaks of
lsquothe five gatesrsquo our mortal senses which bind us down to
the earth Not so much interested in the art of the
possible as in the visions of the beyond Blake
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 39
constructed a cosmic myth to show manrsquos infinite
potential and how he might attain to final liberation
from this sinful ephemeral world characterized by a
wheel of births and deaths He weaves his myths round
the fall and salvation of man the universal man and his
ultimate waking to eternal life In his poems lsquoMiltonrsquo and
lsquoJerusalemrsquo he regards Satan as the embodiment of
error selfhood and boundless pride and points out that
the means of liberation or freedom from the worldly
bondages lie in the annihilation of selfhood or ego and
the forgiveness of sins He exclaims lsquoI in my selfhood am that Satan I am that evil onersquo and resolves that he would
go down to self-annihilation In lsquoMiltonrsquo he puts the
following words into the mouth of Milton
lsquobut laws of Eternity
Are not such Know thou I come to self-annihilation
Such are the laws of Eternity that each shall mutually
Annihilate himself for others goodrsquo
Reiterating and stressing his poetic purpose or mission
of life Blake resolves
lsquoMine is to teach men to despise death and to go on
In fearless majesty of annihilating self
I come to discover before Heaven and Hell
the self righteousness in all its hypocritical turpitude
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 40
put off
In self-annihilation all that is not God alone
To put off self and all I have ever and everrsquo
Again in a sincere invocation to God Blake prays
lsquoO saviour pour upon me thy spirit of meekness and love
Annihilate the selfhood in me be thou all my life
Guide thou my hand which trembles exceedingly
Upon the rocks of agesrsquo
SPIRITUAL HUMANISM
Inspired by his implicit faith in Godrsquos fatherhood and
menrsquos brotherhood Blake preached the concept of
universal fraternity Considering the whole world as
one large family he maintained that all divisions and
fragmentations of humanity stemmed from manrsquos
ignorance of the eternal truth of one and only one
universal family The world being the home of mankind
all human beings are inextricably interwoven together
in the same warp and woof of life How beautifully has
this cosmopolitan philosophy of manrsquos eternal identity
with his fellow beings been enunciated in the following
memorable words
lsquoWe live as one man for contracting our infinite senses
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 41
We behold multitude or expanding
We behold as one Man all the universal family
and he is in us and we in him
Live in perfect harmony in Eden the land of life
Giving receiving and forgiving each otherrsquos trespassesrsquo
Elsewhere the poet says
lsquoThere is no other God than God
Who is the intellectual fountain of Humanity
I never made friends but by spiritual gifts
By severe contentions of friendship and the burning fire of thought
He who would see the divinity must see him in his children
So he who wishes to see a vision perfect whole
Must see it in its minute particulars organizedrsquo
Preaching universal brotherhood based on love
understanding and sacrifice he again exclaims (in the
words of Jesus)
lsquoWouldst thou live one who never died
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 42
For thee or ever die for one
Who had not died for thee
And if God died not for man and giveth not himself
Eternally for man
Man could not exist for man is love and God is love
Every kindness to another is a little death in the divine image
Nor can man exist but by brotherhoodrsquo
Jerusalem
Condemning man-made divisions of mankind into
various castes and creeds he says
lsquoAnd all must love the human form
In heathen Turk or Jew
Where mercy love and pity dwell
There God is dwelling toorsquo
The Divine Image
How truly are the poetrsquos ideas relevant even today when
the hot wind of doubt and distrust is blowing all over
the world (which has been broken up into fragments by
caste and creed clime and country) can be viewed in
the context of our age-old belief in the worship of God in
the universal form (Vishwaroop) and our religious and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 43
spiritual aspirations for ensuring the maximum good of
the world To serve humanity in a spirit of humility
impelled our people to look upon the world as one
great undivided family or nest (वHवनीड़म) and all men
as our brethren ndash (वसधव कटFबकम)
The ideal of universal brotherhood and selfless service
to humanity found spontaneous utterance in the
following moving words which embody the sublime
aim of a devout manrsquos life
न वह कामय रा0य न वगम ना पनभव
कामय दःख तSतानाम Dा13ण नामातनाशन
lsquoI do not desire earthly kingdom nor heaven nor do I want rebirth I want to reduce the sorrow of people who are sunk in sufferingrsquo
Today when the horizon of humanity is darkened by
national prejudices the need for spiritual humanism
synoptic vision and universal brotherhood is being
increasingly felt by one and all Here it is worthwhile to
turn our attention to great men whose thoughts
transcend myriad artificial barriers and teach us the
ideal of dedication to the common weal
Since truth transcends all religious dogmas and
disinterested service to mankind is a form of true
worship to God our great men have always prayed
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 44
सव भवत स13खनः सव सत नरामयाः
सव भWा13ण पHयत मा किHचX दःख भाYभवत
lsquoMay all be happy may all living beings be free from diseases may we perceive goodness in all and may none be struck with misfortunersquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 45
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
(7 April 1770 ndash 23 April 1850)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 46
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
English Poet
Orphaned at age 13 Wordsworth attended Cambridge
University but he remained rootless and virtually
penniless until 1795 when a legacy made possible a
reunion with his sister Dorothy Wordsworth He
became friends with Samuel Taylor Coleridge with
whom he wrote Lyrical Ballads (1798) the collection
often considered to have launched the English Romantic
movement Wordsworths contributions include
Tintern Abbey and many lyrics controversial for their
common everyday language About 1798 he began
writing The Prelude (1850) the epic autobiographical
poem that would absorb him intermittently for the next
40 years His second verse collection Poems in Two Volumes (1807) includes many of the rest of his finest
works including Ode Intimations of Immortality His
poetry is perhaps most original in its vision of the
organic relation between man and the natural world a
vision that culminated in the sweeping metaphor of
nature as emblematic of the mind of God The most
memorable poems of his middle and late years were
often cast in elegaic mode few match the best of his
earlier works By the time he became widely
appreciated by the critics and the public his poetry had
lost much of its force and his radical politics had yielded
to conservatism In 1843 he became Englands poet
laureate He is regarded as the central figure in the
initiation of English Romanticism
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 47
CHAPTER TWO
VEDANTA IN WORDSWORTHrsquoS POETRY
In many of his famous poems among which Ode on Intimations of immortality and Lines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey occupy pride of place
William Wordsworth one of the greatest seer-poets of
English literature presents ideas which bear striking
similarity to the rich philosophical thought that found
unimpeded flow in our Vedantic literature
In fact there are so many echoes of Vedanta in the
poetry of Wordsworth that one is apt to conclude that
the poetrsquos lsquophilosophic mindrsquo must have led him to drink
deep at the unfailing springs of Upanishadic Helicon
A poet of nature Wordsworth was essentially lsquoa seer of spiritual realities a seer of the calm spirit in naturersquo and
his poetry at its best is a fine harmony of his spiritual
insight ethical sense and profundity of thought He is a
curious amalgam of the seer the poet and the reflective
moralist who dwells philosophically and even
prophetically on Nature Man and Cosmic Soul
The epithets lsquobest philosopherrsquo lsquomighty prophetrsquo and
lsquoseer blestrsquo which Wordsworth uses for the new-born
innocent child in his famous Ode may be well applied to
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 48
the poet himself for ldquovoyaging in strange seas of
thought alonerdquo Wordsworth had found lsquofull many a gem
of purest ray serenersquo which still shed undiminished
luster on the entire fabric of English poetry
A careful study of the Ode on Intimations of immortality Lines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey Ruth Laodamia To Cuckoo and other poems reveals that Wordsworthrsquos sustained
loftiness of thought had taken him to such heights that
on him (to quote his own words)
lsquo those truths do rest which we are toiling all our lives to findrsquo
What indeed are those truths Those are the elemental
truths of life which were keenly perceived realized and
expressed by the seers and savants of the East and
particularly of our Vedantic times A careful study of
Vedanta which is the aphoristic summary of the co-
ordinated Upanishads the Brahmasutras and the
Bhagvad Gita and is in fact the culmination of Indian
religion and Philosophical thought reveals that serious
scholars of the West drew freely upon it Wordsworthrsquos
poetry bears ample testimony to this fact because
numerous echoes of Vedanta can be easily heard in his
poetry
To cite a few comparative examples the Upanishads
assert in unambiguous terms that the whole universe of
names and forms the world of being and becoming
springs from Brahman (Supreme Godhead or Absolute
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 49
Cosmic Soul) ndash the eternal existence consciousness and
bliss Since the universe is the creation and
manifestation of Brahman it is also pervaded by Him
Naturally therefore only Brahman exists all else is non-
existent or illusory The Chhandogya Upanishad
declares lsquoBrahman is verily the Allrsquo God is the subtle
essence underlying phenomenal existence the whole
nature which is Godrsquos handiwork as well as Godrsquos
garment and is filled and inspired by God who is its
inner controller and soul
The immanence of God has been corroborated by
Brihadaranyak Upanishad in two passages the first
being in the form of an answer given by Yagnavalyak to
Uddalak Aruni
lsquoHe is immanent in fire in the intermundia in air in the heavens in the Sun in the quarters in the Moon in the stars in space in darkness in light in all beings in Prana in all things and within all things whom these things do not know whose body these things are who controls all these things from within He is thy soul the inner controller the immortal He is the unseen seer the unheard hearer the unthought thinker the ununderstood understander other than Him there is no seer other than Him there is no hearer other than Him there is no thinker other than Him there is no understander everything besides Him is naughtrsquo
Brihadaranyak Upanishad II7
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 50
In another passage Brihadaranyak Upanishad tells us
that God is the All ndash ldquoboth the formed and the formless the mortal and the immortal the stationary and the moving the this and thatHe is the verity of verities the soul of souls and He is the supreme verityrdquo
Brihadaranyak Upanishad IIV15
Wordsworth like these unique revelatory utterances of
the Upanishads codifies this truth in mystical manner in
Lines Composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey when he regards the Cosmic Soul as supreme power or
all-pervading presence
lsquoWhose dwelling is the light of setting Suns
And the round ocean and the living air
And the blue sky and in the mind of man
A motion and a spirit that impels
All thinking things all objects o all thought
And rolls through all thingsrsquo
Since God is All and everything else is Naught the world
is not real it is an appearance It is not the permanent
all-abiding Absolute Reality but a fleeting show and
ephemeral entity having seemingly phenomenal reality
In other words the world is lsquoshadow not substancersquo ndash it
is just a net-work of Maya
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 51
This Vedantic doctrine finds utterance not only in
Wordsworthrsquos poems like To the Cuckoo in which he
calls the earth ldquoan unsubstantial fairy placerdquo but he
seems to have actually experienced this illusory nature
of the world in states of mystic trance that often visited
him since his boyhood
In the introduction to his Ode on Intimations of Immortality he records such an experience in clear
terms
ldquoI was unable to think of external things as having external existence and I communed with all that I saw as something not apart from but inherent in my own immaterial nature Many a times while going to school have I grasped at a wall or tree to recall myself from the abyss of idealism to the realityrdquo
Such an ecstatic state of realizing eternal truths is
referred to in Lines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey as
lsquoThat blessed mod
In which the burden of the mystery
Of all this unintelligible world
Is lightenedrsquo
And finally to quote from the same poem
lsquoWe are laid asleep
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 52
In body and become a living soul
While with an eye made quiet by the power
Of harmony and the deep power of joy
We see into the life of thingsrsquo
One of the basic postulates of our Upanishadic
philosophy has been the idea of transmigration of soul
or faith in the cycle of births deaths and rebirths The
doctrine of transmigration has been explicitly advanced
in the Upanishads and particularly in the
Kathopanishad and Brihadaranyak Upanishad
In the Kathopanishad when the father of Nachiketas
told him that he had made him over to the god of Death
Nachiketas replied that it was no uncommon fate that
was befalling him
ldquoI indeed go at the head of many to the other world but I also go in the midst of many What is the god of Death going to do to me Look at our predecessors (who have already gone) look also at those who have succeeded them Man ripens like corn and like corn he is born againrdquo
Kathopanishad IV6
The Brihadaranyak Upanishad states the same truth
ldquoAnd as a caterpillar after reaching the end of a blade of grass finds another place of support and then draws itself towards it and as a goldsmith after taking a piece
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 53
of gold gives it another newer and more beautiful shape similarly does this Self after having thrown off this body and dispelled ignorance take on another newer and more beautiful form whether it be of one of the man or demi-god or god or of Prajapati or Brahman or of any other beingsrdquo
Brihadaranyak Upanishad IVIII5
The same truth appears in the Bhagvad Gita when Lord
Krishna says to the mentally agitated Arjuna
ldquoAs a man discarding worn-out clothes takes other new ones likewise the embodied soul casting off worn-out bodies enters into others which are newrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II22
And further Lord Krishna says to Arjuna
ldquoFor in that case the death of him who is born is certain and the rebirth of him who is dead is inevitablerdquo
Bhagvad Gita II27
Wordsworth in his famous Ode on Intimations of Immortality confirms his faith in the transmigration of
soul by saying in unmistakable terms
lsquoOur birth is but a sleep and a forgetting
The soul that rises with us our lifersquos star
Hath had elsewhere its setting
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 54
And cometh from afar
Not in entire forgetfulness
And not in utter nakedness
But trailing clouds of glory do we come
From God who is our homersquo
Again when Wordsworth laments the loss of pure
innocence immeasurable bliss and ecstatic vision of
early childhood in the great Ode and exclaims in
memorable words
lsquoWhither is fled the visionary gleam
Where is it now the glory and the dreamrsquo
He attributes the loss to the worldly intellectuality and
attachments as they grow upon man As childhood
grows into youth and youth into manhood the lsquovision splendidrsquo fades the first clear intimations of immortality
are dimmed leaving behind an unillumined waste of
mere thought and moralizing
lsquoAt length the Man perceives it die away
And fade into the light of common dayrsquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
The world of materialism or attachment tames him so
much so that man lsquothe little actorrsquo thinks
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 55
lsquoAs if his whole vocation
Were endless imitationrsquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
Whatever may be the crux of his philosophy of
childhood this belief of the poet can be safely traced
back to the comprehensive doctrine of the Maya in the
Upanishads and the Bhagvad Gita The Upanishads
tell us that the world is a delusion an appearance not
reality The Taittiriya Upanishad says ldquoAll beings spring from the Supreme Being are sustained by Him and return to the same Absolute at the time of dissolution Our life on earth is therefore a sojournrdquo The Isha Upanishad tells us that ldquothe truth is veiled in this universe by a vessel of gold and it invokes the grace of God to lift up the golden lid and allow the truth to be seenrdquo
It follows that our senses cloud our vision and lead us
farther and farther away from our spiritual moorings as
we come of age Senses dupe us and turn us into
worldlings Lord Krishna says to Arjuna in the Bhagvad Gita ldquoAs the wind carries away the barge upon the waters even so of the wandering senses the one to which the mind is joined takes away his discriminationrdquo
Thus the eternal and boundless Supreme Soul is as it
were limited by the sense organs and the body The
Universal Soul shackled by the body becomes the
individual soul (Paramatma becomes Jivatma) Because
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 56
of the presence of the Soul the spark of the Divine the
senses or sense-objects or worldly attractions fail to
dupe man fully from his divine mission This
metaphysical conviction finds expression in
Wordsworthrsquos Ode He says that though
lsquoShades of the prison-house begin to close
Upon the growing boy
But he beholds the light and whence it flows
He sees it in his joyrsquo
However farther man may go away from Nature ndash the manifestation of God and the indwelling Supreme Soul which resides in his own individual soul he can not
lsquoForget the glories he hath known
And that imperial palace whence he camersquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
Since bliss (Anand) is an inevitable attribute of God and
manrsquos soul being a fragment of Supreme Soul it
experiences the presence of God in moments of
Supreme Joy
Of the innumerable expressions in the Vedantic
literature of the joy of life of joy as the all entwining
principle of life and of creative principle of life and life
too the following passage from the Taittiriya Upanishad is very pertinent here
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 57
ldquoJoy is the Brahman from joy are born all living things by joy they are nourished towards joy they move and in joy they are absorbedrdquo Joy as the foundation of life
emanates from the Upanishad philosophy
Wordsworth seems to hold identical belief when he
craves for joy and laments its loss
lsquoO Joy that in our embers
Is something that doth live
That nature yet remembers
What was so fugitiversquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
The same idea finds expression in Lines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey where Wordsworth
declares it as Naturersquos privilege lsquoto lead (us) from joy to joyrsquo
And lastly the classicus locus of the Upanishadic
philosophy is to be found in the idea of immortality of
soul In the Chhandogya and Mundak Upanishads and
above all in the Kathopanishad we find numerous
references to the immortality of the soul We are told in
a passage of Kathopanishad lsquothat while we are dwelling in this body on earth we can visualize that Atman (Soul) as in a mirror that is contrariwise left being to the right and right being to the leftrsquo In the Bhagvad Gita also
Lord Krishna tells Arjuna about the immortality of Soul
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 58
ldquoThis soul is never born nor dies it exists on coming into being for it is unborn eternal everlasting and primeval even though the body is slain the soul is notrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II20
He further says
ldquoFor this soul is incapable of being cut it is proof against fire impervious to water and undriable as well This soul is eternal omnipresent immovable constant and everlastingrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II24
Wordsworth seems to have been fully convinced of this
philosophia perennis of the Vedanta when he eulogizes
immortality by addressing the child in his Ode in the
following words
lsquoThou over whom thy immortality
Broods like the day
A Master over a slave
A presence which is not to be put byrsquo
The poet in speaking of the lsquotruths that wake to perish neverrsquo seems to be reminiscent of the Upanishadic
concept that freed from the trammels of the body the
individual soul loses itself in the All-Soul when he
declares in the rapture
lsquoOur souls have sight of that immortal sea
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 59
Which brought us hither
Can in a moment travel thitherrsquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
Tracing the expression and confirmation of many other
tenets of Vedanta in the poetry of William Wordsworth
forms an interesting literary venture and instances of
close affinity between the Vedantic doctrines and
Wordsworthrsquos ideas may be multiplied Such a
comparative study proves that eternal truths transcend
the barriers of clime or country time or space and shine
through all ages and in all lands We should draw moral
sustenance from them and live a fuller freer life
Even today the wise all over the world maintain a
remarkable identity of views and their thoughts foster
international understanding
ldquoFrom hand to hand the greeting flows
From eye to eye the signals run
From heart to heart the bright hope glows
The seekers of light are onerdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 60
ST COLERIDGE
(21 October 1772 ndash 25 July 1834)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 61
ST COLERIDGE
English Poet Critic and Philosopher
Coleridge studied at the University of Cambridge where
he became closely associated with Robert Southey In
his poetry he perfected a sensuous lyricism that was
echoed by many later poets Lyrical Ballads (1798 with
William Wordsworth) containing the famous Rime of
the Ancient Mariner and Frost at Midnight heralded
the beginning of English Romanticism Other poems in
the ldquofantasticalrdquo style of the Mariner include the
unfinished Christabel and the celebrated Pleasure
Dome of Kubla Khan While in a bad marriage and
addicted to opium he produced Dejection An Ode
(1802) in which he laments the loss of his power to
produce poetry Later partly restored by his revived
Anglican faith he wrote Biographia Literaria 2 vol
(1817) the most significant work of general literary
criticism of the Romantic period Imaginative and
complex with a unique intellect Coleridge led a restless
life full of turmoil and unfulfilled possibilities
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 62
CHAPTER THREE
COLERIDGErsquoS SPIRITUAL QUEST AND INDIAN THOUGHT
INTRODUCTION
Coleridge was by all accounts a genius par excellence
whose versatility flowed albeit impeded in diverse
channels of creativity such as metaphysics poetry
theology and literary criticism Of all the Romantic poets
he possessed the most fertile and powerful imagination
which earned for him a special place in English poetry
and philosophical thought In the words of William
Hazlitt lsquohe had angelic wings and fed on mannarsquo He had
a lsquoseminal mindrsquo which said William Wordsworth
lsquothrew out a series of grand central truthsrsquo We find in
him the poet the philosopher and the theologian rolled
in one Charles Lamb called him lsquoLogician Metaphysician Bardrsquo whose poetry and writings are
tinged with a magical and ethereal quality His thought
made a permanent landmark on the succeeding
generations of English men of letters for he explored the
mysterious working of human mind
His life presents a saga of sharp contrast between
reality and dream blissful confidence and broken
hopes the warmth of human ties and the solitude of
haunted soul He probed human thought and dilemma
with a rare prophetic insight A prodigious thinker and
sincere seeker of truth he once remarked ldquoI would compare the Human Soul to a shiprsquos crew cast on an
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 63
Unknown Islandrdquo His particular fascination for the
unknown drew him instinctively to the German
transcendental or idealistic school of philosophy
represented by Berkeley Kant Schelling and Fichte
Fired by a peculiar mystic idealism he tried to interpret
the lsquoInterruptionrsquo of the spiritual world and beheld the
unseen with an uncommon eye which looked into the
void and found it peopled with lsquopresencesrsquo To him the
universe was lsquoebullient with creative deityrsquo and was
pervaded by lsquoan organizing surgersquo of vital energies
which emanate directly from God He was indeed an
inspired idealist who laid mystical insistence upon the
immanence and transcendence of God
Endowed with a rare penetrating mind Coleridge
ransacked works of comparative religions and
mythology and arrived at the conclusion that all
religious faiths and mythical traditions agree on the
unity of God and immortality of Soul His constant
intellectual search for truth led him to visionary
interests and universal life consciousness expressed
through the phenomena of human agencies Throughout
his intellectual career he remained a visionary and
philosophical mystic who valued a discreet and proper
exercise of the intellect Since his most serious concern
had been philosophy as a continuous trial for self-
education he wrote ldquodoubts rushed in broke upon me from the fountains of the great deep and fell from the windows of heavenrdquo For him lsquoreligionrsquo as both the
cornerstone and keystone of morality must have a
moral origin and a great poet should be lsquoa profound Metaphysician seeking for truth beauty and salvationrsquo In
one of those radiant moments when the poet the
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 64
metaphysician and the theologian of hope are one he
throws light on the process how truth works out in life
ldquoTruth considered in itself and in the effects natural to it may be conceived as a gentle spring or water source warm from the genial earth and breathing up into the snow drift that is piled over and around its outlet It turns the obstacle into its own form and character and as it makes its way increases its streamand arrested in its courseit suffers delay not loss and waits only to awaken and again roll onwardsrdquo
His description of a mystic as one who wanders into an
oasis or garden lsquoat leisure in its maze of Beauty and Sweetness and thirds (sic) his way through the odorous and flowering Thickets into open Spots of Greeneryrsquo (Aids to Reflection) is reminiscent of his own mysticism and
refers to the lsquoenfolding sunny spots of greeneryrsquo in his
famous poem Kubla Khan
Profoundly impressed by the German Idealist Schelling
whose idealistic school of thought dwelt on speculation
concerning the lsquoAbsolutersquo Coleridge viewed lsquomythrsquo as
primordial expression of elemental truths including the
Divine transcendence Inspired by his Biblical studies he
regarded self-consciousness as lying at the centre of his
philosophical and theological thought In Lay Sermons
he says ldquoSelf which then only is when for itself it hath ceased to be Even so doth Religion finitely expresses the unity of the Infinite Spirit by being a total act of the Soulrdquo
For him the lsquoinner lightrsquo is identical with the indwelling
glorious God and life is but lsquoa vision shadowy of Truthrsquo Attributing the pageant of life and the beauty and
splendor of the world to the immanence of Cosmic Soul
(God) he exclaims
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 65
ldquoAh From the soul itself must issue forth
A light a glory a fair luminous cloud
Enveloping the earthrdquo
Dejection An Ode
And again he says ldquoNature is the art of GodThe true system of natural philosophy places the sole reality of things in an Absolute which is at once causa sui effectus in the absolute identity of subject and object which it calls NatureIn this sense lsquowe see all things in Godrsquo is a strict philosophical truthrdquo
Coleridge firmly believed in the essential unity of God as
Absolute which is the creative foundation of the finite
universe and which distinguishes God from creation
He in the spirit of Vedanta stresses the immanence of
God in all and all in God in his famous poem Frost at Midnight Addressing his son he says
ldquoso shalt thou see and hear
The lovely shapes and sound intelligible
Of that eternal language which thy God
Utters who from eternity doth teach
Himself in all and all things in Himselfrdquo
In order to learn this lsquolanguagersquo Coleridge himself
became a lsquovisionaryrsquo lsquoprophetrsquo or lsquoseerrsquo The idea of
Himself (God) in all and all (creation) in Himself or the
concept that there is God in all things and all things are
things are closely interlinked with God bears a striking
resemblance to our age-old Vedic thought In
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 66
consonance with Indian thought Coleridge underscores
the identity of God (Brahman) with the individual soul
(Jivatma) and regards the universe as the reflection or
manifestation of God The seer he says is one who sees
God the creator in all creation and all creation as the
embodiment of God This according to him is the lesson
that God in His eternal language lsquouttersrsquo and doth teach
from eternity
The inherent oneness and sole identity of Brahman
(God) with the universe is a basic postulate of our
Vedanta and as such Coleridgersquos emphasis on the lsquoUnity of infinite Spiritrsquo bears a close identity with the Indian
philosophy The Oneness of God and the universe has
time and again been stressed in our Vedas and other
scriptures It would be pertinent to cite a few instances
here While the Chhandogya Upanishad describes
Brahman as lsquoOne only without a secondrsquo other
Upanishadic texts contain identical statements such as
lsquoHe is Onersquo and lsquoOne Lordrsquo The opening line of
Ishopanishad declares Godrsquos oneness and His universal
presence in unequivocal terms
ldquoUnderstand all this universe as inhabited by Lord
Each moving thing in this moving worldrdquo
Ishopanishad I
And again the same Upanishad says
ldquoThe wise man who perceives all beings as not distinct from his own self at all and his own Self as the self of every being ndash he does not by virtue of that perception hate any onerdquo
Ishopanishad VI
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 67
The same truth has been expressed in the Bhagvad Gita wherein Lord Krishna tells Arjuna
ldquoHe who sees Me (the Universal Self) present in all beings and all beings existing within Me never loses sight of Me and I never lose sight of himrdquo
Bhagvad Gita VI30
Or again
ldquoHe alone truly sees who sees the Supreme Lord as imperishable and abiding equally in all perishable beings both animate and inanimaterdquo
Bhagvad Gita XIII26
And Lord Krishna says again
ldquoThere is nothing else besides Me O Arjuna
Like clusters of yarn-beads formed by knots on a thread
All this (Universe) threaded on Me (God)
As are pearls on stringsrdquo
Bhagvad Gita VII7
THE DOCTRINE OF KARMA (CAUSE amp EFFECT)
Coleridge seems to subscribe sincerely to the Indian
doctrine of Karma which is based on the law of
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 68
Causation or cause and effect In other words Karmavad
stresses poetic justice or law of life ie virtue is
rewarded and vice is punished Since one must reap the
fruits of his good and bad deeds in life it is axiomatic
truth that lsquoas one sows so shall he reaprsquo In Sanskrit
there is a verse which says ldquoOne must bear the consequences of his good and bad deedsrdquo The echoes of
this doctrine could be distinctly heard in his poetry and
particularly in his greatest poem Rime of Ancient Mariner as also Dejection An Ode where he affirms
ldquoO Lady We receive but what we give
And in our life alone doth Nature liverdquo
So strong was his belief in the doctrine of Karma that in
a letter dated 14th October 1797 to his friend Thirlwell
he tells him how fatalistic his philosophy of life is
ldquoand at other times I adopt the Brahman
creed and say ndash lsquoit is better to sit than to stand it is better to lie than to sit it is better to sleep than wake but death is the best of allrsquordquo
His Ancient Mariner serves as an exhaustive
exposition of the law of Nemesis which works surely
but rather imperceptively in human life The poem is a
myth about a dark and troubling crisis in the human
soul It is actually a tale of crime which is due to
perversity of human will Crime is against Nature
Humanity and God He touches equally on guilt and
remorse suffering and relief hate and forgiveness and
grief and joy The marinerrsquos action shows the essential
frivolity of crimes against humanity and the ordered
system of the world and he deserves punishment for his
guilt Spirits are transformed into the powers who
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 69
watch over the good and evil actions of men and requite
them with appropriate rewards and punishments Since
the mariner has committed a hideous act of wantonly
and recklessly killing the albatross which was hailed in
Godrsquos name as if it had been a Christian soul he must
bear the punishment of life-in-death The killing of the
bird marks the breaking of bond between Man and
Nature and consequently the mariner becomes
spiritually dead When he blesses the water-snakes
even unawares it is a psychic rebirth ndash a rebirth that
must happen to all men
The mariner will never be the man that he once was He
has his special past and his special doom His sense of
guilt will end only with his death The Ancient Mariner
is a myth of a guilty soul and marks the passage from
crime through punishment and possible redemption in
the world So the poem is an allegory of redemption and
regeneration It is indeed a vivid representation or
living symbolization of universal psychic experience
The abiding fascination of the poem is that it is a
fragment of a psychic life It does not state a result it
symbolizes a process
Coleridge adds a moral ndash that the mariner is ndash to teach
by his example love and reverence to all things that God
made and loveth He advocates a sound moral
philosophy of life which extends human sympathy and
love to the animal world He affirms
ldquoHe prayeth well who loveth well
Both man and bird and beast
He prayeth best who loveth best
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 70
All things both great and small
For the dear God who loveth us
He made and loveth allrdquo
Rime of Ancient Mariner
PHILOSOPHICAL MYSTICISM AND lsquoTHE VISION OF GODrsquo
Coleridgersquos longing for the lsquounnamable somethingrsquo and
his abiding interest in conveying something of the
enigmatic perception of Godhead as a religious
experience carved for him a special place in the history
of ideas as a Christian poet and philosopher In a
predominantly mythological age he took serious
interest in the Biblical studies and drew upon the
central Christian image of Paradise as a walled garden
and the vision of God as a symbolizing that
transcendent numinous reality which the soul
inchoately and consciously seeks and strives for The
medieval image of the walled garden (paradise) as the
heavenly city (locus of God) is a symbol of divine
transcendence of that which is lsquobeyond beingrsquo This rich
image (of the walled garden) as an eminently
appropriate image of Godrsquos transcendence was used as
such by Church Fathers and also by the 15th century
Christian Platonist Nicholas of Cusa whose book The Vision of God is a paradigm of speculative mysticism
which informs Coleridgersquos metaphysics and much of his
poetry Taking inspiration from Nicholas of Cusarsquos book
The Vision of God Coleridge found it in close affinity to
his own genuinely philosophical mysticism
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 71
Coleridgersquos interest in the Vision of God is in a purely
visionary mystical tradition and his most visionary
poem Kubla Khan bears ample testimony to his
insistence upon life as lsquoa vision shadowy of Truthrsquo His
conviction in the lsquoImago Deirsquo (vision of God) is an
obvious link with the hoary mystical tradition which lay
at the heart of his philosophical and mystical thought
He maintains that the mind of man is a bridge to the
vision of God but by no means its fulfillment He says
ldquoThe vision and faculty divine is the participation of humanity in the Divinerdquo He however further maintains
throughout his intellectual career the conviction in the
reflection or bending back of the soul from the sensual
to the intelligible realm For him Christianity is an lsquoawful recalling of the drowsed soul from dreams and phantom world of sensuality to actual Realityrsquo
On the idea of reawakening he says
ldquoThe moment when the Soul begins to be sufficiently self-conscious to ask concerning itself and its relations is the first moment of its intellectual arrival into the world Its being ndash enigmatic as it must seem ndash is posterior to its existencerdquo
Collected Notes
In a recent study of Coleridge Prof Douglas Headley of
Cambridge University declares ldquoHe is best described as an essentially speculative and mystical philosopher-theologian His was a theology inspired by those Church Fathers who emphasize the vision of God as an intellectual contemplation (speculari) of the transcendent Absolute the prius of all beingrdquo Since the
mystic tradition follows a supersensuous perception
the vision of God is fundamentally lsquoVisio-intuitivarsquo ndash
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 72
intuitive or intellectual vision Coleridge expresses such
a state of mind when he says
ldquoMy mind feels as if it ached to behold and know something great something One and Indivisible and it is only in the faith of this that rocks or waterfalls mountains or caverns give me the sense of sublimity or majesty But in this faith all things counterfeit Infinityrdquo
Since the sublime enlarges and inspires the Soul to
aspire for the Divine it impresses him with the
fundamental Oneness of God and a universal vision
which he hints at in his Religious Musings as under
ldquoThere is One mind One omnipresent mind
His most holy name is Love
Truth of subliming import
lsquoTis sublime in man
Our noontide majesty to know ourselves
Parts and portions of one wondrous wholerdquo
These passages recall to our mind the famous mantra
(verse) of the Yajurveda where the mystic realization
or the direct experience of the Supreme by a Vedic sage
has been beautifully described in terms of his personal
knowledge of the Divine He says
ldquoI have known this sun-coloured Mighty Being
Refulgent as the sun beyond darkness
By knowing Him alone one transcends death
There is no other way to gordquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 73
Yajurveda XXXI18
ldquoI have realized it I have known itrdquo not that I just
believe in it and all else can also realize it This is not the
expression of an opinion but the statement of an
experience Commenting on this verse Sri Aurobindo
says
ldquoThis is one of the grandest utterances in the worldrsquos spiritual literature for it marks the emanation of this Being from across the darkness into our world so that something of the sun colour may come into our dull heads and dim heartsrdquo
Coleridge seems to be in complete agreement with our
own Indian mysticism which owes its origin to the
Vedas wherein the knowledge of the Divine or the
Ultimate Reality (Brahman) has been regarded not as a
process of philosophical thought but as a direct
experience in the depth of the human soul For him the
divine vision is possible in that spiritual meditation
transformation of intellectual rapture in which all
discursive thought is fully sublimated According to him
the lsquovisio intuitivarsquo is the culmination of all knowledge ndash
sensus-ratio-intellectus and is in conjunction with the
concept of Imago Dei In order to see that which not an
object is ie God the human mind must put aside its own
discursive differentiating reflection ndash spiritus altissimus rationis ndash which guards the walls of the garden of
paradise lsquobeyondrsquo which dwells God The highest
transformation or sublimation of conscience can ensure
an intuitive vision of God and in accordance with the
maxim ndash Simile Simili ndash the mind then becomes like its
object by divesting itself of difference in order to
experience the Absolute Reality Says Coleridge
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 74
ldquoAn Immense Being does strongly fill the soul and Omnipotency Omnisciency and Infinite Goodness do enlarge and dilate the Spirit while it fixtly looks upon them They raise strong passions of Love and Admiration which melt our Nature and transform it into the mould and imagery that which we can contemplaterdquo
Notebooks
Mysticism is thus the subtle path of spiritual realization
of That Reality or Divine Presence which has been
described in our Vedic texts as (lying hidden in a cave shrouded in secrecy) God is one One beyond all
diversities In Him all contradictions and conflicts meet
and dissolve through the spiritual transformation of the
lsquoseerrsquo or lsquomysticrsquo whose soul rises above the bewildering
trammels and distortions of life and seeks unity with all
in the unity with One To such an enlightened seer life
becomes an unceasing adventure from unreality to
reality from ephemerality to eternity from the human
to the Divine One who realizes the Divine as the One
(without parallel) loving Lord finds the whole universe
united in Him Such a significantly mystical experience
finds a memorable expression in the following verse of
the Yajurveda where the sage named Vena beholds
such a divine vision
ldquoThe loving sage (Vena) beholds that Mysterious Existence
Wherein the universe comes to have One home (nest)
Therein unites and therefore issues the whole
The Lord is the warp and woof in the Created beingsrdquo
Yajurveda XXXII8
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 75
A careful analysis of the above-quoted passage reveals
all the main elements of mysticism viz
(i) Divinity is a subject of personal spiritual
experience
(ii) The ultimate conception of Divinity is a
mystery symbolically expressed as
गहानCहतम
(iii) The abstract conception of the Divine as an
Essence or Existence is symbolized by a
neuter singular तत and
(iv) The whole universe is united in love as birds
in a nest एकनीड़ or men in a home वसधव कटFबक
To sum up wise men the world over hold almost
identical views on vital matters of human life such as
the mystery of existence soul and oversoul (God) Truth
is verily One as God is one but the pathways to reach it
are very many The ancient Rig Veda proclaims एक सद वDा बहधा वदित ndash ldquoTruth is one sages call it by various namesrdquo In our own times Swami Ram Krishna
Paramhansa said यतोमत तथोपथ ndash as many religions
so many pathways And what the Spanish litteacuterateur
and thinker states as lsquouniversal truthrsquo is equally
applicable to the philosophy and poetry of Coleridge
ldquoA deep faith in life cannot but be spiritual even if only partially spiritualThe path of Truth may not be a path of parallel lines but a path that follows one circle by going to the right and climbing the circle or by going to the left and climbing the circle we are bound to meet at the top although we started in apparently
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 76
contrary directions This is bound to be in the end because Truth is onerdquo
In Charles Lambrsquos words Coleridge lsquohad been on the confines of the next world he had a hunger for Eternityrsquo The truth of this statement is abundantly
borne out by Coleridgersquos sincere effort for the
reconciliation of the ration with transcendental belief
He closes his Biographia Literaria which symbolizes
his spiritual voyage with the following words
ldquoIt is night sacred night The upraised eyes views suns of other worlds only to preserve the soul steady and collected in its pure act of inward adoration to the great I Am and to the filial word that re-affirmeth from eternity to eternity whose choral is the universerdquo
As a true metaphysician Coleridgersquos whole being
pulsated with a passionate and unceasing search for
truth Here indeed was a spiritual aspirant and seeker
who in his own words had lsquotraced the fount whence streams of nectar flowrsquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 77
LORD BYRON
(22 January 1788 ndash 19 April 1824)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 78
LORD BYRON
British Romantic Poet and Satirist
Born with a clubfoot and extremely sensitive about it
he was 10 when he unexpectedly inherited his title and
estates Educated at Cambridge he gained recognition
with English Bards and Scotch Reviewers (1809) a satire
responding to a critical review of his first published
volume Hours of Idleness (1807) At 21 he embarked on
a European grand tour Childe Harolds Pilgrimage
(1812ndash18) a poetic travelogue expressing melancholy
and disillusionment brought him fame while his
complex personality dashing good looks and many
scandalous love affairs with women and with boys
captured the imagination of Europe Settling near
Geneva he wrote the verse tale The Prisoner of Chillon
(1816) a hymn to liberty and an indictment of tyranny
and Manfred (1817) a poetic drama whose hero
reflected Byrons own guilt and frustration His greatest
poem Don Juan (1819ndash24) is an unfinished epic
picaresque satire in ottava rima Among his numerous
other works are verse tales and poetic dramas He died
of fever in Greece while aiding the struggle for
independence making him a Greek national hero
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 79
CHAPTER FOUR
BYRON A BLEND OF CLAY AND SPARK
INTRODUCTION
Byron whom Goethe regarded as lsquothe greatest genius of the centuryrsquo and whom Carlyle considered as the noblest
spirit in Europe was one of the most remarkable men
during the 19th Century which was characterized by
liberal optimism He was unquestionably a potent and
force and cause of change in the intellectual outlook and
socio-political structure of his time His colourful figure
his charismatic personality and satiric poetry captured
the imagination of the whole continent As the most
influential English poet he stands out as an important
figure in the history of ideas Representative of a new
age he was the supreme voice which the European
poets recognized for ldquohe put into poetry something that belonged to many men in his time and he was the pioneer of a new outlook and a new art He set his mark on a whole generation and his fame rang from one end of Europe to anotherrdquo
Renowned as the ldquogloomy egoistrdquo he was a sinister yet
great influence in the Romantic Movement His deepest
romantic melancholy his satiric realism and his
aspiration for political realism earned for him such a
wide acclaim that his name became a symbol for all the
great events of his day Commenting on his pervasive
influence Calvert says ndash ldquoIt is impossible not to take Byron seriously and it is disastrous to take him literallyrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 80
A REBEL EXTRAORDINAIRE
Byron was a born rebel Essentially a child of
Revolution his poetry breathes a unique spirit of
revolutionary idealism ldquoI was born for oppositionrdquo he
once remarked and added ldquobeing of no party I shall offend all partiesrdquo Describing him as an aristocratic
rebel Bertrand Russell said
ldquoThe aristocratic rebel of whom Byron was in his day the exemplar is a very different typesuch rebels have philosophy which requires some greater change than their own personal success In their conscious thought there is criticism of the government of the world which takes the form of Titanic Cosmic self-assertion or those who retain some superstition of Satanism Both are to be found in Byron The aristocratic philosophy of rebellionhas inspired a long series of revolutionary movements from the fall of Napoleon to Hitlerrsquos coup in 1933it has inspired a corresponding manner of thought and feeling among intellectuals and artistsrdquo
Byron felt the wild storm of nations akin to the storm
within his own heart and the ruin but the picture of his
own life In his unqualified individualism he takes up an
attitude of hostility towards society Even God appears
to him mirrored in the stormy face of the angry ocean
ldquoThou glorious mirror
Of the Image of Eternityrdquo
He wished to stir the oppressed to revolt and get rid of
tyrants
ldquoFor I will teach if possible the stones
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 81
To rise against earthrsquos tyranny Never let it
Be said that we will truckle into thrones
By ye ndash our childrenrsquos children I think how we
Showed that things were before the world was freerdquo
Don Juan VIIICXXXV4-8
ldquoI have simplified my policiesrdquo wrote he ldquointo a detestation of all existing governmentsrdquo His was the
most dreaded voice of all the revolutionary poets of the
world His voice was the peal of revolutionary thunder
his poetry was the message of the revolutionary forces
He stood as the greatest symbol of a violent and
dreadful revolution
CHAMPION OF LIBERTY
He was essentially a poet of liberty His greatest ideal in
life was how to fight against the forces of tyranny
restriction aggression and enslaving of workers by
puissant exploiters Liberty was an essential part of the
Byronic creed In fact his entire poetic work is
interspersed with some of the finest poetry in praise of
freedom for mankind He composed much splendid
verse for love of freedom His passion for personal
freedom covers national freedom also and the political
freedom in the form of national self-determination
particularly for Italy and Greece He remarks in his
diary of 1821 ldquoDifficulties are the hotbeds of high spirits and Freedom the mother of the new virtues incident to human naturerdquo
Identifying himself completely with the cause of Italy
and Greece he wrote ldquoI shall not fall backbut
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 82
onward It is now the time to act and what signifies ldquoSelfrdquo if a single spark of that which would be worthy of the past can be bequeathed unquenchably to the future It is not one man nor a million but the spirit of liberty which must be spreadrdquo In his Ode to Chillon Castle he characteristically exclaimed
ldquoEternal spirit of the chainless Mind
Brightest in dungeons Liberty thou art
For there thy habitation is the heart
The heart which love of Thee alone bind
And when thy sons to fetters are consignrsquod
To fetters and damp vaultsrsquo dayless gloom
And Freedomrsquos fame finds winds on every windrdquo
Love of liberty lay at the centre of his being and
determined what was best in him ndash belief in individual
liberty and his hatred of tyranny and constraints
whether exercised by individuals or societies Liberty
was an ideal a driving power a summons to make the
best of certain possibilities in him He insisted to be free
and maintained that other men must be free too
Opposition was an integral element in his basic attitude
revolt both personal and social was his forte Love of
freedom is built into the capricious structure of Childe Harold and Don Juan
HIS POLITICAL AND COSMOPOLITAN LIBERALISM
He grew in an atmosphere in which political reaction
against revolutionary ideals was victorious all over
Europe Byron was essentially a liberal by conviction
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RP DWIVEDI Page 83
and could hardly bear the perception of liberals Though
he loved his native country yet he had a large vision for
the freedom and welfare of all nations The excitement
of political liberalism stirred on behalf of the Greeks
against the oppression of their Turkish overlords made
him a symbol of disinterested patriotism and a Greek
national hero The first two cantos of Child Harold are
tinctured with historical and typographical material as
also the appearance of the Byronic hero with his
exhortations to the degenerate Greeks and Spaniards to
remember their glorious past and arise They contain
Byronrsquos passionate feelings for Greece which was to see
the beginning as it was to see the end of his active life
His Faustian daemonic figure and his defiant
resentment of authority found an appropriate object in
the political sphere
His last journey and his death at Missolonghi in the
cause of Greek independence proves in him the moving
combination of nobility futility and romantic or heroic
panache In the words of Graham Hough lsquoBut for once Byron was on the winning side he died but his cause triumphed and he remains one of its heroes For the whole of the 19th Century he remained a portent and a symbol whom it was possible to worship or to condemn but never to neglectrsquo
A MAN OF ACTION
Action remains at the centre of his life and at last he
gladly seized the opportunity when it presented itself in
Greece Leaving poetry behind himself he took a heroic
resolution in favour of action rather than
contemplation He presents a rare example of fusion
between the active and the reflective lsquofor his was the romanticism of actionrsquo The moralist in the garb of the
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 84
pre-romantic rebel hero of the Childe Harold is cast
aside in Don Juan and the moralist in the somber garb
turns dandy in which moral judgment seems to be
ineffective Quite logically he finally abandons literature
for the field of moral action At last Byron flung himself
off into the world of action The dandy finds at last that
such a death even if it is on the sickbed and not the
battlefield is the only gesture untouched by futility ldquoIt is not enough that art perpetrates life life also must complete artrdquo WB Yeats rightly says ldquoone feels that he (Byron) is a man of action made writer by accidentrdquo
Byron did not regard writing as an end in itself on the
contrary he was several times on the point of giving up
writing He had always before him the hope of some
more active life and felt a certain mistrust for the purely
literary life He asserted ldquowho would write who had anything better to do Action- action I say and not writing Least of all rhymerdquo In a letter to Murray
he wrote ldquoYou will see that I shall do something or otherthat like the cosmogony or creation of the world will puzzle the philosophers of all agesrdquo He was
fully alive to the persistent sense both of human
aspirations and the ceaseless flux of eternity and also
knew that he would not fade into oblivion Said he
ldquoBut at the last I have shunned the common shore
And leaving land far out of sight would skim
The ocean of Eternityrdquo
And again he said
ldquoFor the sword outwears its sheath
And the soul wears out the breastrdquo
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RP DWIVEDI Page 85
HIS ROMANTIC SELF-PORTRAITURE
Byron presents manrsquos mixed and imperfect nature His
personality is a queer blend of flesh and spirit
meanness and nobility clay and spark cause and effect
The lasting fascination of his personality despite his bad
temper careless arrogance the excesses the satiety
melancholy and restlessness owes much to Splendour Primier of Miltonrsquos Satan who is ldquomajestic though in ruinrdquo and the gloom and brutality of the heroes of the
novel of terror His exotic sensibility ranging passions
and sensual perversity take refuge in a sort of ldquoCosmic Satanismrdquo He draws of himself a sketch which
reproduces in a dim outline the somber portrait of his
idealized self in the famous stanzas of Lara
ldquoIn him inexplicably mixed appeared
Much to be loved and hated sought and feared
X X X X X X
A hater of his kind
X X X X X X
There was in him a vital scorn of all
As if the worst had fallen which could befall
An erring spirit
X X X X X X
And fiery passions that had poured their wrath
In hurried desolation over his path
And left the better feeling all at strife
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RP DWIVEDI Page 86
In wild reflection over his stormy liferdquo
And the Giaour (hiding his sinister path beneath a
monkrsquos gown) also portrays Byron
ldquoA noble soul and lineage high
Alas though bestowed in vain
Which Grief could change and Guilt could stainrdquo
HIS CREDO
Despite all his self-mockery and arrogant egoism he had
a star (vision) and he followed it sincerely He was not
without guiding principles and his heroic death in the
cause of Greek independence shows that he was not an
actor but a soldier a man of affairs and a master of men
Keenly aware of something special in him he wished to
realize his powers and translate them into facts He
wished to be true to himself He had a keen appreciation
of the dignity and personal liberty of man
HIS FATAL TRUTH
Even though he disagreed with the moral code of his
age he had his own values He thought that truthfulness
is a permanent virtue and duty and so did not want to
compromise with conventions nor hide behind cant
Despite many ordeals and his own corroding skepticism
he speaks seriously and directly about his convictions
and presents them with irony satire and mockery Don Juan is a racy commentary on life and manners and is a
record of a remarkable personality ndash a poet and a man
of action a dreamer and a wit a great lover and a great
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 87
hater a Whig noble and a revolutionary democrat The
paradoxes of his nature are fully reflected in Don Juan which itself is a romantic epic and a realistic satire He
was full of many romantic longings but tested them by
truth and reality He remained faithful only to those
which meant so much to him that he could not live
without them
Praising Byron Nietzsche says ldquoMan may bleed to death through the truth that he recognizesrdquo Byron expressed
this in his immortal lines
ldquoSorrow is knowledge they who know the most
Must mourn the deepest over the fatal truth
The tree of knowledge is not that of linerdquo
A BELIEVER IN GOD AND IMMORTALITY OF SOUL
Full of snobbery and rebellion as he was Byron was not
altogether without lofty ideals and religious beliefs He
firmly believed in the immanence and transcendence of
God and the transience of human glory His implicit faith
in the immortality of human soul the ephemerality of
physical body and his unwavering trust in God ndash the
eternal Light of Lights is evident from his following
memorable lines
ldquobut this clay will sink
Its spark immortal envying it the light
To which it mounts as if to break the link
That keeps us from yon heaven which woos us to its brinkrdquo
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RP DWIVEDI Page 88
Childe Harold III13-14
His Childe Haroldrsquos pilgrimage is a lament for lost
empire decay of love and triumph of love over human
mortality His lsquovoyage pittoresquersquo is full of historic and
didactic meditations and his oceanic image illustrates
the truism that nothing is constant but the rhythmic
pattern of its flux In the end all things float and toss on
that Great Ocean of which man is the foam and the
historic events are billows
ldquoBetween two worlds life hovers like a starrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquothe eternal surge
Of time and tide rolls on and bears afar our bubbles
while the graves
Of Empires heave but like some passing wavesrdquo
Don Juan XVI99
He maintains throughout his major poetic works a
sense of the presence of God or the gods and often
employs supernatural machinery to substantiate his
concept
IMMORTALITY OF SOUL
He had complete faith in the immortality of soul Said
he ldquoof the immortality of the soul it appears to me that there can be little doubtit acts also so very independent of bodyHuman passions have probably disfigured the divine doctrines Man is born passionate of body but an innate thought secret
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 89
tendency to the love of God is his mainspring of mind But God helps us allMan is eternal always changing but reproducedEternity Eternalrdquo
Again on his belief in God he says ldquoI sometimes think that man may be relic of some higher materialcreation must have had an origin and a creator for a creator is a more natural imagination than a fortuitous concourse of atoms All things remount to a fountain though they may flow to an oceanrdquo He knew
the limitations and ephemerality of phenomenal
existence He exclaims
ldquoFor I wish to know
What after all are all thingsbut a showrdquo
Unable to explore the stars with scientific aid he takes
up poesy to embark across the ocean of Eternity
ldquoI wish to do much by Poesyrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoBut at least I have shunned the common
And leaving land far out of sight would skim
The Ocean of Eternityrdquo
According to him man accepts the eternal voyage but
since man is not himself unlimited the boat capsizes in
the deep
ldquoAnd swimming long in the abyss of thought
Is apt to tire
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 90
For the fall entails not only ignorance and weakness but Human mortalityrdquo
Disconcerted with mankind he turns to the placid
spectacle of Nature and feels his spirit merge into its
objects
ldquoI live not in myself but I become
Portion of that around me and to me
High mountains are a feeling
When the soul can flee
And with the sky ndash the peak ndash the heaving plain
Of Ocean or the stars mingle ndash and not in vainrdquo
Childe Harold III72
This pantheistic ecstasy gives him a sense of quasi-
immortality
ldquoSpinning the clay clod bonds which round our being clingrdquo
The picturesque is translated into a kind of mystical
union with the spirit of the place even with the
universe itself
ldquoAre not the mountains waves and skies a part
Of me and my soul as I of them
(Is not) the universe a breathing part
The spirit is clogged with clayrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 91
HIS PESSIMISM
The myth of Cuvierrsquos undulations of Cosmic history
reflects Byronrsquos consistent and mature pessimism His
pessimism is traceable to his own view of society
Through a metaphor he considers his age as
ldquocatastrophicrdquo ndash an ice age of the human spirit and a
declining moral grandeur His myth of Fall and
recurrence of the Ocean and ice is both comic and
historic social and literary and personal as well The
consequences of the Fall and of manrsquos imperfect nature
are seen in all major human activities Generally fallen
mankind is hounded by its lower appetites spirit
encumbered by flesh The image of Fall is linked in
Byronrsquos imagination with the rhetorical image of the
poetrsquos lsquoflightrsquo which incurs the risk of consequent
lsquosinkingrsquo or bathos And over it all hangs the perplexity
of manrsquos ignorance about his aims his nature his true
identity
ldquoFew mortals know what end they would be at
But whether glory power or love or treasure
The path is through perplexing ways and when
The goal is gained we die you know ndash and thenrdquo
HIS PROPHETIC VISION
Endowed with strong imaginative power he had
experimented in Vulcanian visions of the earth plunged
into darkness by the final extinction or the sun or lsquoa ruined starrsquo plunging on in flames through the wastes of
space This prophetic faculty is amply evident from his
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 92
poem Darkness in which his imagination prefigures the
devastating effects of nuclear weapons
ldquoThe Hour arrived ndash and it became
A wandering mass of shapeless flame
A pathless Comet and a curse
The menace of the Universe
Still rolling on with innate force
Without a sphere without a course
A bright deformity on high
The monster of the upper skyrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoI had a dream which was not at all a dream
The bright sun was extinguished and the stars
Did wander darkling in the eternal space
The habitations of all things which dwell
Were burnt for beacons cities were consumedrdquo
Darkness IV42-45
In sum and in essence Byron exemplifies Shelleyrsquos
pronouncement that poets are the unacknowledged
legislators of the world More than any other Romantic
poet Byron embodies the dictum ndash lsquowhat is to give light must endure burningrsquo
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RP DWIVEDI Page 93
PB SHELLEY
(4 August 1792 ndash 8 July 1822)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 94
PB SHELLEY
English Romantic Poet
The heir to rich estates Shelley was a rebellious youth
who was expelled from Oxford in 1811 for refusing to
admit authorship of The Necessity of Atheism Later that
year he eloped with Harriet Westbrook the daughter of
a tavern owner He gradually channeled his passionate
pursuit of personal love and social justice into poetry
His first major poem Queen Mab (1813) is a utopian
political epic revealing his progressive social ideals In
1814 he eloped to France with Mary Wollstonecraft
Godwin in 1816 after Harriet drowned herself they
were married In 1818 the Shelleys moved to Italy
Away from British politics he became less intent on
social reform and more devoted to expressing his ideals
in poetry He composed the verse tragedy The Cenci (1819) and his masterpiece the lyric drama Prometheus Unbound (1820) which was published with some of his
finest shorter poems including Ode to the West Wind
and To a Skylark Epipsychidion (1821) is a Dantean
fable about the relationship of sexual desire to spiritual
love and artistic creation Adonais (1821)
commemorates the death of John Keats Shelley
drowned at age 29 while sailing in a storm off the Italian
coast leaving unfinished his last and possibly greatest
visionary poem The Triumph of Life
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 95
CHAPTER FIVE
SHELLEY A PILGRIM OF ETERNITY
INTRODUCTION
Shelley who in his Adonais eulogized Keats as lsquothe Pilgrim of Eternityrsquo is himself justly entitled to this
appellation He was essentially a poet of the skies and
heavens of light and love of eternity and immortality
Since he loved to pierce through things to their spiritual
essence the material world was less important for him
than that which lies within it and beyond it Says he ldquoI seek in what I see the manifestation of something beyond the present and tangible objectsrsquo He set out to uncover
the absolute real from its visible manifestations and
interpret it through his own poetic vision In a
passionate search for reality he pursued its essence
behind the veil of naked loveliness of Nature and the
mundane human existence Defining poetry he says
lsquoPoetry is the revelation of the eternal ideas which lie behind the many-coloured ever-shifting veil that we call reality in lifersquo For him the poet is also a seer gifted with
a peculiar insight into the nature of reality for it is
through the inspired poetic imagination that he
breathes immortality into the objects of Nature Says he
lsquoBut from these create he can
Forms more real than living man
Nurslings of immortalityrsquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 96
Prometheus Unbound
HIS LOVE OF INDIA
Shelley was an ardent admirer of India In a letter to his
friend employed in the East India Company he
expressed keenness to visit India and settle down here
He was drawn to India for its varied and picturesque
scenic beauty vast literary heritage and age-old cultural
traditions In order to have a closer acquaintance with
our great country he set his heart and mind on serious
studies in the Indian life and letters traditions and
culture
Since he was a visionary par excellence and was
endowed with a highly contemplative mind and a
remarkable prophetic zeal he evinced a deep and
abiding interest in the philosophical and spiritual
thoughts that lie enshrined in our holy texts such as the
Vedas the Upanishads the Brahmasutras and the
Bhagvad Gita It is interesting to trace the influence of
Indian spiritual thought on Shelleyrsquos poetry
VEDANTA IN SHELLEYrsquoS POETRY
The riddle of the origin of life and Nature and the
enigmatic questions such as lsquoWhat is the cause of life
and death What is the source of universe and what will
be its ultimate destinyrsquo have always engaged the
serious attention of all wise men Man has always stood
in awe and wonder at the mysteries of human existence
and the vast world around him Our seers and savants
have not only posed such questions but have also
answered them
In the opening verse of the Kena Upanishad the
disciple asks
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 97
ldquoAt whose behest does the mind think or wander after towards its objects Commanded by whom does the life-force or the breath of life go forth on its journey At whose will do we utter speech Who is that effulgent Being whose power directs the eye and the earrdquo
Similarly in the Svetasvatara Upanishad the disciples
inquire ldquoWhat is the cause of this universe What is Brahman Whence do we come By what power do we live and on what are we established Where shall we at last find rest What rules over our joys and sorrows O Seers of Brahmanrdquo
Identical ideas impelled Shelley to exclaim in his famous
elegy Adonais
ldquoWhence are we and why are we Of what scene
The actors or spectatorsrdquo
Or again he asks in The Triumph of Life
ldquoWhence comest thou And wither goest thou
How did thy course begin I said and whyrdquo
Shelley asks
ldquoHas some unknown omnipotence unfurled
The veil of life and deathrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoAnd what were thou and earth and stars and sea
If to the human mindrsquos imaginings
Silence and solitude were vacancyrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 98
Mont Blanc
Shelley in his famous poem Hymn to Intellectual Beauty answers that there is an unseen (all-pervading) omnipotence (power) behind this phenomenal world of
which all objects are but shadows
ldquoThe awful shadow of some unseen Power
Floats though unseen among us ndash visiting
This various world with as inconstant wing
As summer winds that creep from flower to flowerrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoIt visits with inconstant glance
Each human heart and countenance
Like aught that for its grace may be
Dear and yet dearer for its mysteryrdquo
Again he affirms his faith in such a mysterious
Omnipotent power when he says
ldquoThe works and ways of men their death and birth
And that of him and all that his may be
All things that move and breathe with toil and sound
Are born and die revolve subside and swell
Power dwells apart in its tranquility
Remote serene and inaccessiblerdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 99
X X X X X X
ldquoThe secret strength of things
Which governs thought and to the infinite dome
Of Heaven is as a law inhabits theerdquo
Mont Blanc
Vedanta which is the aphoristic summary of the
Upanishads the Brahmasutras and the Bhagvad Gita
is in fact the culmination of Indian religious and
philosophical thought Since Shelley sincerely desired to
unravel the essential reality which is unchanging
timeless and eternal and of which the world of sense
perceptions is but a broken reflection he turned his
attention to the ancient scriptures of India
ONENESS OF BRAHMAN (GOD)
One of the basic postulates of Vedanta is the inherent
oneness or the sole identity of Brahman in the universe
The Chhandogya Upanishad describes Brahman as
एकमव अXवतीय ndash lsquoone only without a secondrsquo and the
other Upanishadic texts also contain parallel statements
such as स एकः ndash lsquoHe is Onersquo and एकोदवः ndash lsquoOne Lordrsquo
Similarly the Rig Veda declares एक सद वDा बहदा वदित ndash lsquoTruth (God)is one but the wise one call it
differentlyrsquo Obviously Brahman the Supreme is one
and only one He is verily one and the same whether we
call Him Brahman Ishwara Paramatma God Allah or
the supreme Cosmic Soul He only exists all other
objects of the world are subject to decay and death
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 100
How beautifully have similar thoughts been expressed
by Shelley when he exclaims
ldquoThe one remains the many change and pass
Heavenrsquos light forever shines Earthrsquos shadows fly
Life like a dome of many coloured glass
Stains the white radiance of Eternity
Until Death tramples it to fragmentsrdquo
Adonais L2
The concluding lines of Epipsychidion show that in a
moment of inspiration Shelley seemed to lay hold on the
ineffable spirituality and fundamental unity of
existence
ldquoOne hope within two wils one will beneath
Two overshadowing minds one life one death
One Heaven one hell one immortality
And one annihilationrdquo
Shelley etherealized Nature and believed in a single
power or one spirit permeating the whole universe He
effected a fusion of the Platonic philosophy of love with
the Wordsworthian doctrine of Pantheism
ldquoThe one spiritrsquos plastic stress
Sweeps through the dull dense worldrsquo
Compelling there all new successions
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 101
To the forms they wearrdquo
Holding that one universal spirit is the basis and
sustainer of Nature Shelley declares
ldquoThat Power
Which wields the world with never-wearied love
Sustains it from beneath and kindles it aboverdquo
In his pantheistic conception of Nature Shelley
conceived of it as being permeated vitalized and made
real by a universal spirit of love He clearly perceives
the presence of ldquothe awful shadow of the unseen power visiting the various worldrdquo
ldquoSpirit of Nature here
In this interminable wilderness
Of worlds at whose involved immensity
Even soaring fancy staggers
Here is thy fitting templerdquo
Demon of the World
TRANSMIGRATION OF SOUL
The doctrine of transmigration of soul or the cycle of
births and rebirths has been explicitly advanced in the
Upanishadic philosophy In the Kathopanishad
Brihadaranyak Upanishad and the Bhagvad Gita there are moving passages such as these
ldquoMan ripens like corn and like corn he is born againrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 102
Kathopanishad IV6
The Brihadaranyak Upanishad states
ldquoAnd as a caterpillar after reaching the end of a blade of grass finds another place of support and then draws itself towards it and as a goldsmith after taking a piece of gold gives it another newer and more beautiful shape similarly does the self after having thrown off this body and dispelled ignorance take on another newer and more beautiful formrdquo
Brihadaranyak Upanishad IV3-5
Similarly Lord Krishna tells Arjuna
ldquoAs a man discarding worn out clothes takes other new ones likewise the embodied soul casting off worn-out bodies enters into others which are newrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II22
And further Lord Krishna says to Arjuna
ldquofor in that case the death of him who is born is certain and the rebirth for him who is dead is inevitablerdquo
Bhagvad Gita II27
Shelley entertained similar ideas when he says
ldquoThe works and ways of man their death and birth
And that of him and all that his may be
All things that move and breathe with toil and sound
Are borm and die revolve subside and swellrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 103
Mont Blanc 92-95
Or again
ldquoThe splendours of the firmament of time
May be eclipsed but are extinguished not
Like stars to their appointed height they climb
And death is a low mist which cannot blot
The brightness it may veilrdquo
Adonais XLIV
Stressing the ephemerality of worldly objects Shelley
exclaims
ldquoSpirit of Beauty that does consecrate
With thine own hues all thou doth shine upon
Of human thought or formwhere art thou gonerdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoWhy aught should fail and fade that once is shown
Why fear and dream and death and birth
Cast on the daylight of this earth
Such gloomrdquo
Hymn to Intellectual Beauty 11
Lamenting the death of his friend Keats he says
ldquohe went uninterrupted
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 104
Into the gulf of death but his clear spirit
Yet reigns over earthrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoTo that high Capital where Kingly Death
Keeps his pale court in beauty and decay
He came and bought with price of purest breath
A grave among the eternalrdquo
Adonais VII
Again dwelling on the immortality of soul he declares
ldquoNaught we know dies Shall that alone which knows
Be as a sword consumed before the sheath
By sightless lightening The intense atom glows
A moment then is quenched in a most cold reposerdquo
Adonais XX
X X X X X X
ldquoGreat and mean
Meet massed in death who lends what life must borrowrdquo
Adonais XXI
X X X X X X
ldquoDust to dust but the pure spirit shall flow
Black to the burning fountain whence it came
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 105
A portion of the Eternal which must glow
Through time and change unquenchably the same
Whilst thy cold embers choke the sordid hearth shamerdquo
Adonais XXXVIII
THE DOCTRINE OF MAYA (DELUSION)
Our scriptures regard the phenomenal world as Maya
(delusion) They explain that the universe is neither
absolutely real nor absolutely non-existent and that its
phenomenal or apparent surface conceals and
safeguards the external presence of the Absolute
Shelley seems to have pondered over similar ideas
about the world of appearances
ldquoWorlds on worlds are rolling ever
From creation to decay
Like the bubbles on a river
Sparkling bursting borne away
But they are still immortal
Who through birthrsquos oriental portal
And deathrsquos dark chasm hurrying to and fro
Clothe their unceasing flight
In the brief dust and light
Gathered around their chariots as they gordquo
Three Choruses from Hallas
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 106
In his poem Invocation to Misery Shelley says
ldquoAll the wide world beside us
Show like multitudinous
Puppets passing from a scenerdquo
Again describing human life as a veil he says
ldquoLife not the painted veil which thou who live
Call life though unreal shapes be pictured there
And it but mimic all we would believe
With colours idly spreadrdquo
Prometheus Unbound
In the myth of Aurora he gives his own account of the
creation and interpretation of works of art
ldquoAnd lovely apparitions dim at first then radiant in the mind arising bright
From the embrace of beauty whence the forms
Of which these are phantoms casts on them
The gathered rays which are realityrdquo
Shelley seems to hint at the theory of Superimposition
(Vivartavada) which maintains that the universe is a
superimposition upon Brahman It states that the world
of thought and matter has a phenomenon or relative
existence and is superimposed upon Brahman the
unique Absolute Reality
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 107
Since the world is a network of delusion and
appearance not reality our life on earth is a sojourn
and its paramount aim is to have a glimpse of and
realize the eternal Truth or the Absolute Brahman
which is concealed by ignorance and delusion The
Ishopanishad tells us
ldquoThe face of Truth is hidden by a golden orb (disk) O Pushan (the Nourisher the Effulgent Being) uncover (the Face) that I the seeker or worshipper of Truth may hold Theerdquo
Ishopanishad XV
Like a sincere aspirant for the realization of eternal
Truth or the Absolute concealed under the illusory garb
of Maya (Delusion) Shelley in the words of Fairy in his
Queen Mab declares
ldquoAnd it is yet permitted me to rend
The veil of mortal frailty that the spirit
Clothed in its changeless purity may know
How soonest to accomplish the great end
For which it hath its being and may taste
That peace which in the end all life will sharerdquo
Queen Mab
In certain other passages Shelley speaks of the veil
identified with Time which obscured Eternity from the
sight of man The symbol of veil demonstrates that
which conceals truth goodness or happiness When the
veil was torn or rent asunder
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 108
ldquoHope was seen beaming through the mists of fear
Earth was no longer Hell
Love freedom health had given
Their ripeness to the manhood of its prime
And all its pulses beat
Symphonious to the planetary spheresrdquo
Again he uses the same symbol of veil when Cythna
says
ldquoFor with strong speech I tore the veil that hid
Nature and Truth and Liberty and Loverdquo
Shelley uses the same idea of superimposition coupled
with his own robust idealism
ldquoLife may change but it may fly not
Hope may vanish but can die not
Truth be veiled but it burneth
Love repulsed ndash but it returnethrdquo
STATES OF CONSCIOUSNESS
Our Upanishads identify three states of consciousness
crowned by the fourth which transcends all the other
three states They are
(i) The Waking State
(ii) The Dreaming State
(iii) The State of Deep Sleep and
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RP DWIVEDI Page 109
(iv) The State of Pure Consciousness (Turiya)
The fourth state of ecstatic consciousness which
transcends the preceding three has no connection with
the finite mind it is reached when in meditation the
ordinary self is left behind and the Atman or the true
self is fully realized The Mandukya Upanishad describes it thus
ldquoBeyond the senses beyond the understanding beyond all expression is the Fourth It is pure unitary consciousness wherein (all) awareness of the world and of multiplicity is completely obliterated It is effable peace It is the supreme good It is one without a second It is the Self Know it alonerdquo
Mandukya Upanishad VII
Turiya (तर[य) the fourth state is the supreme mystic
experience Shelley seems to have partly attained such a
state of pure ecstatic consciousness when he states
ldquoI seem as in a trance sublime and strange
To muse on my own separate fantasy
My own my human mind which passively
Now renders and receives fast influencing
Holding an unremitting interchange
With the clear universe of things aroundrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoSome say that gleams of a remoter world
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RP DWIVEDI Page 110
Visit the soul in sleep that death is slumber
And that its shapes the busy thoughts outnumber
Of those who wake and live ndash I look on high
Has some unknown omnipotence unfurled
The veil of life and deathrdquo
Mont Blanc
Another instance of such a mystic experience appears in
his famous poem Triumph of Life on which Shelley was
working at the time of this death in 1822
ldquobefore me fled
The night behind me rose the day the deep
Was at my feet and Heaven above my head
When a strange trance over my fancy grew
Which was not slumber for the shade it spread
Was so transparent that the scene came through
As clear as when a veil of light is drawn
Over evening hill they glimmer and I knew
That I had felt the freshness of that dawnrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoAnd in that trance of wondrous thought I lay
This was the tenor of my waking dreamrdquo
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The Triumph of Life
SHELLEY AS AN ASPIRANT FOR SELF-REALIZATION
Shelley who described himself as
ldquoA splendour among shadows a bright blot
Upon the gloomy scene a spirit that strove
For Truthrdquo
seems to have reached at last that stability or
equanimity of mind which has been described in the
Upanishads and the Bhagvad Gita In a reply to Arjunrsquos
question about the definition of one who is stable of
mind or is finally established in perfect tranquility of
mind Lord Krishna says
ldquoArjun when one thoroughly dismisses all cravings of the mind controls it and is satisfied in the self (through the joy of the self) then he is called stable of mind One whose mind remains unperturbed amid sorrows whose thirst for pleasures has altogether disappeared and who is free from passion fear and anger is called stable of mindrdquo
Bhagvad Gita V56
The Katha Upanishad stresses similar ideas when it
says
ldquoBut he who possesses right discrimination whose mind is under control and is always pure he reaches that goal from which he is not born againrdquo
X X X X X X
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RP DWIVEDI Page 112
ldquoThe man who has a discriminative intellect for the driver and a controlled mind for the reins reaches the end of the journey the highest place of Vishnu (the all-pervading and unchangeable one)rdquo
Katha Upanishad
Shelley echoes identical thoughts when he says
ldquoMan who man would be
Must rule the empire of himself in it
Must be supreme establishing his throne
On vanquished will quelling the anarchy
Of hopes and fears being himself alonerdquo
Sonnet on Political Greatness
It was in such rare moments of inner consciousness or
lsquoBlessed moodrsquo that Shelley felt lsquoOne with Naturersquo or
lsquoThe Power which wields the world with never-wearied love
Sustains it from beneath and kindles it aboversquo
As a myth-maker or a mythopoeic poet he conjured
visions of a golden age by turning to the grand aspects
of Nature ndash the ether the sky the wind the Sun the
Moon the light and the clouds and employing them as
befitting agencies and vehicles of his evolutionary ideas
ldquoPoetryrdquo he wrote ldquois indeed something divine It is at once the centre and circumference of all knowledgerdquo He
conceived of the universe as alive with a living spirit
behind it He moralizes natural myths and perceives the
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RP DWIVEDI Page 113
Absolute behind the ephemeral In an exquisite image
he exclaims
ldquoThe sanguine sunrise with his meteor eyes
And his burning plumes outspread
Leaps on the back of my sailing rack
When the morning star shines deadrdquo
As his thoughts reached the zenith of their growth
Shelley identified his individual self with the all-
pervading Cosmic Self or the Brahman of the Vedanta
and felt himself one with the indwelling spirit of the
universe Unity filled his imagination he perceived
eternal harmony in the phenomenal existence and
rejoiced his own being in the vast million-coloured
pageants of the world And finally not only Nature but
all human existence is taken up as an inalienable aspect
of the eternal Cosmic Spirit He reaches the core the
centre of all palpable universe when he declares
ldquoI am the eye with which the Universe
Behold itself and knows itself divine
All harmony of instrument and verse
All prophecy all medicine is mine
All light of art or nature to my song
Victory and praise in its own right belongrdquo
Shelley perceived the transcendental or mystic
consciousness in which one realizes the complete
identity of self with the Supreme Self and which is called
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RP DWIVEDI Page 114
तर[य अवथा ndash where one sees nothing but One
(Brahman) hears nothing but the One knows nothing
but the One ndash there is the Infinite The same truth is
vividly explained in the Bhagvad Gita when Lord
Krishna tells Arjuna
ldquoWhen one sees Eternity in things that pass away and Infinity in finite things then one has pure knowledgerdquo
Bhagvad Gita XVIII20
Our own great seer-poet and philosopher Sri Aurobindo
Ghose described Shelley as a sovereign voice of the new
spiritual force and a native of the heights with its
luminous ethereality where he managed to dwell
prophetically in a future heaven and earth with
brilliances of a communion with a higher law another
order of existence another meaning behind Nature and
terrestrial things
Sri Aurobindo further praises him as lsquoa seer of spiritual realities who has a poetic grasp of metaphysical truths and can see the forms and hear the voices of higher elements spirits and natural godheads and has a constant feeling of a high spiritual and intellectual beauty He is at once seer poet thinker prophet and artist Light love liberty are the three godheads in whose presence his pure and radiant spirit lived but a celestial light a celestial love a celestial liberty To bring them down to earth without their losing their celestial lustre and here is his passionate endeavour but his wings constantly buoy him upward and cannot beat strongly in an earthlier atmosphere There is an air of luminous mist surrounding his intellectual presentation of his meaning which shows the truths he sees as things to which the mortal eye cannot easily pierce or the life and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 115
temperament of earth rise to realize and live yet to bring about the union of the mortal and immortal terrestrial and the celestial is always his passion Shelley is the bright archangel of this dawn and becomes greater to us as the light he foresaw and lived and he sings half-concealed in the too dense halo of his own ethereal beautyrsquo
And what Juan Mascaro states as universal truth is
equally pertinent to Shelleyrsquos poetry
ldquoA deep faith in life cannot but be spiritual The path of Truth may not be a path of parallel lines but a path that follows one circle because Truth is onerdquo
Infinite is God infinite are His aspects and infinite are
the ways to reach Him In the Atharva Veda we read
ldquoThe one light appears in diverse formsrdquo This ideal of
harmony is carried to its logical conclusion in blending
synthesizing and reconciling conflicting metaphysical
theories and opposed conceptions of spiritual
discipline We read in the pages of Bhagvad Gita
ldquoWhatever wish men bring in worship
That wish I grant them
Whatever path men travel
Is my path
No matter where they walk
It leads to merdquo
Bhagvad Gita IV11
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RP DWIVEDI Page 116
To sum up Shelleyrsquos poetry will always hold irresistible
fascination to the lovers of light and beauty for to
quote Juan Mascaro again
ldquoThe finite in man longs for the Infinite The love that moves the stars moves also the heart of man and a law of spiritual gravitation leads his soul to the soul of the universe Man sees the sun by the light of the sun and he sees the spirit by the light of his own inner spirit The radiance of eternal beauty shines over this vast universe and in moments of contemplation we can see the Eternal in things that pass away This is the message of the great spiritual seers and all poetry and art and beauty is only an infinite variation of this message The spiritual visions of man confirm and illumine each other Great poems in different languages have different values but they all are poetry and the spiritual visions of man come all from one Light In them we have Lamps of Fire that burn to the glory of Godrdquo
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RP DWIVEDI Page 117
JOHN KEATS
(31 October 1795 ndash 23 February 1821)
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RP DWIVEDI Page 118
JOHN KEATS
English Romantic Poet
The son of a livery-stable manager he had a limited
formal education He worked as a surgeons apprentice
and assistant for several years before devoting himself
entirely to poetry at age 21 His first mature work was
the sonnet On First Looking into Chapmans Homer
(1816) His long Endymion appeared in the same year
(1818) as the first symptoms of the tuberculosis that
would kill him at age 25 During a few intense months of
1819 he produced many of his greatest works several
great odes (including Ode on a Grecian Urn Ode to a
Nightingale and To Autumnrdquo) two unfinished
versions of the story of the titan Hyperion and La Belle
Dame Sans Merci Most were published in the
landmark collection Lamia Isabella The Eve of St Agnes and Other Poems (1820) Marked by vivid imagery great
sensuous appeal and a yearning for the lost glories of
the Classical world his finest works are among the
greatest of the English tradition His letters are among
the best by any English poet
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RP DWIVEDI Page 119
CHAPTER SIX
JOHN KEATS A MINSTREL OF BEAUTY AND TRUTH
INTRODUCTION
John Keats who in his own words was lsquoa fair creature of an hourrsquo lived a brief and turbulent life Pre-eminently a
sensuous poet in whom the Romantic sensibility to
outward impressions of sight sound touch and smell
reached its climax the life of Keats was a series of
sensations felt with febrile acuteness
His ideal was passive contemplation rather than active
mental exertion ldquoO for a life of sensations rather than of thoughtrdquo he exclaimed in one of his letters and in
another ldquoit is more noble to sit like Jove than to fly like Mercuryrdquo In fact his was a life of intense sensations
acute poignancy and an infinite yearning for beauty
which he identified with truth
Richness of sensuousness characterizes all his poetry
and his power of expression is marked by a spectacular
vividness which is interspersed with beautiful epithets
heavily charged with subtle messages for the senses His
works are so full of luxuriance of sensations and acute
passions that ordinary readers do not pause to perceive
the unimpeded flow of spiritual thoughts underneath
The pursuit of the spirit of beauty dominates all his
works which have one enduring message ndash the
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 120
lastingness of beauty and its identity with supreme
truth (or God) This message ndash the oneness of beauty
with truth and the eternal existence of truth ndash has been
beautifully enshrined in his famous and oft-quoted lines
(with which he concludes his Ode on a Grecian Urn)
ldquoBeauty is truth truth beauty ndash that is all
Ye know on earth and all ye need to knowrdquo
Keats died at the age of 26 but even from his early age
he had visions of rare spiritual significance Dwelling on
the value of visions in human life and poetry he says
ldquoSince every man whose soul is not a clod
Hath vision
For poesy alone can tell her dreams
With the fine spell of words alone can save
Imagination from the sable chain
And dumb enchantmentrdquo
Since common readers tend to ignore the underlying
spiritual import of his visions and images this article
aims at bringing into play some of the poetrsquos thoughts
which bear a remarkable resemblance to the age-old
hoary spirituality of our ancient land
Stressing the fundamental truths of our Indian thought
and tracing their distinct reflection in the works of great
Western poets seems a worth-while academic pursuit
FUNDAMENTAL UNITY
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RP DWIVEDI Page 121
From the very beginning Keats could realize the
fundamental unity of Truth and Beauty and could dwell
at length on it to show how diverse paths illumined by
the glory of spirit in man ultimately lead him to the
realization of this abiding lesson of life The supreme
oneness of Truth has been beautifully enunciated by Sri
Krishna in the Bhagvad Gita
ldquoIn any way that men love Me in that same way they find My love for many are the paths of men but they all in the end come to Merdquo
Similar thoughts have found expression in the
introduction to the Upanishads by Juan Mascaro
ldquoThe path of Truth may not be a path of parallel lines but a path that follows one circle by going to the right and climbing the circle or by going to the left and climbing the circle we are bound to meet at the top although we started in apparently contrary directions This is bound to be in the end because Truth is onerdquo
And when Keats was only 22 he could give expression
to deep thoughts that have a curious similarity to the
ideas expressed in the Mundak Upanishad and the
Bhagvad Gita
ldquoNow it appears to me that almost any man may like the spider spin from his own inwards his own airy citadel the points of leaves and twigs on which the spider begins her work are few and she fills the air with a beautiful circuiting Man should be content with as few points to tip with the fine Web of his Soul and weave a tapestry empyrean-full of symbols for his spiritual eye of softness for his spiritual touch of space for his wanderings of distinctness for his luxuryrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 122
ldquoBut the minds of mortals are so different and bent on such diverse journeys that it may at first appear impossible for any common taste and fellowship to exist between two or three under these suppositions It is however quite the contrary Minds would leave each other in contrary directions traverse each other in numberless points and at last greet each other at the journeyrsquos end An old man and a child would talk together and the old man be led on his path and the child left thinkingrdquo
ldquoMan should not dispute or assert but whisper results to his neighbor and thus by every germ of spirit sucking the sap from mould ethereal every human might become great and humanity instead of being a wide heath of furze and briars with here and there a remote oak or pine would become a great democracy of forest treesrdquo
WISDOM
All men of good will are bound to meet if they follow the
wisdom of the words Shakespeare in Hamlet where if
we write SELF or self we find the doctrine of the
Upanishad
ldquoThis above all to thine own self be true
And it must follow as the night the day
Thou canst not then be false to any manrdquo
Now coming back to the theme of beauty and truth and
their ultimate identity in the universe we have to dwell
at large on the concept of beauty as enunciated by Keats
in his poetry From the very beginning Keats realized
that beauty in its true sense illumines manrsquos thoughts
and thus leads him to understand the glory of truth and
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RP DWIVEDI Page 123
the pervading spirit of their identity in whatever he
sees hears and perceives
The eternal identity or oneness of beauty with truth and
their interplay in the world are in fact unfailing
fountains of joy The permanence of beauty as a source
of joy has been beautifully elucidated by the poet in the
opening lines of his famous poem Endymion
ldquoA thing of beauty is a joy forever
Its loveliness increases it will never
Pass into nothingnessrdquo
He goes on to say
ldquoSome shape of beauty moves away the pall
From our dark spirits
An endless fountain of immortal drink
Pouring unto us from the heavenrsquos brink
Nor do we merely feel these essences
For one short hour
glories infinite
Haunt us till they become a cheering light
Unto our souls and bound to us so fast
That whether there be shine or gloom overcast
They always must be with us or we dierdquo
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RP DWIVEDI Page 124
When he ascribes permanence to joy born of beauty
Keats has in mind the immanence and effulgence of
beauty as a reflection of its creator God Beauty whose
lsquoloveliness increasesrsquo and which lsquowill never pass into nothingnessrsquo is an inalienable attribute of Divinity for it
is lsquoan endless fountain of immortal drinkrsquo
BEAUTY
God (as the poet seems to presuppose) is all Beautiful or
the embodiment of all Beauty and the entire world of
sights and sounds is nothing else but a glorious garment
of God So beauty does not consist only in apparent
physical appearances but is an offspring of inherent
divinity in man and nature which is dimly reflected in
their attractive exterior Such an eternal beauty in his
view presents lsquoglories infinite that haunt us till they become a cheering light unto our souls It is this beauty the glory of spirit which must be with us or we dierdquo
The poetrsquos concept of beauty with its glories infinite
bears a striking resemblance with the path of splendour
of our Vedic and epic scriptures in which our sages
perceived the Divine presence in all that is splendid and
beautiful in the universe
Our Vedic texts are full of the expressions of the sage-
poetrsquos exquisite astonishment before the visions of
glory and wonder The attitude of our Vedic seer-poets
towards beauty as a transcendental reality beyond our
sense-perceptions has been beautifully expressed in
images of beauty and glory as an abstract idea Says Rig Veda
ldquoSinless for noble power under the influence of Savita God
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 125
May we obtain all things that are beautifulrdquo
GOODNESS
Here the power of goodness is contemplated to lead to
the power of beauty Beauty in its myriad forms leads
us to spiritual consciousness of Divinity inherent in
Nature and all living beings Identical thoughts have
been expressed by Sri Krishna in Chapter X of the
Bhagvad Gita where all splendour and glory is said to
be the reflection of God whose manifestation this
universe is Says Sri Krishna to Arjuna
ldquoKnow thou that whatever is beautiful and good whatever has glory and power is only a portion of My own radiancerdquo
Bhagvad Gita X41
Seeing the effulgence of a thousand suns bursting forth
and yet it could hardly match the splendour of the
supreme Lord Arjuna exclaimed in wonder
ldquoI see the splendour of an infinite beauty which illumines the whole universe It is thee With thy crown and scepter and circle How difficult thou art to see But I see thee as fire as the Sun blinding incomprehensiblerdquo
Bhagvad Gita XI17
Besides this concept of ultimate elemental beauty
Keats goes on to underscore its fundamental and
inseparable unity with Truth which is yet another
inalienable facet of Divinity on earth
Truth being an essential attribute of God lies at the
core of all existence and it sustains the entire universe
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 126
with its manifold forms of beauty reflected in countless
objects around us When Keats declares that lsquoBeauty is truth truth beautyrsquo he seems to remind us of the age-old
spiritual consciousness that found sublime utterance in
our Vedas which are the oldest treatises on lsquophilosophia perennisrsquo the eternal philosophy In the Vedas truth has
been described as the essence of Divinity
ldquoThe deity has truth as the law of His beingrdquo
Atharva Veda VIIXXIV1
The Rig Veda calls the deities as various manifestations
of Truth Elsewhere in the Rig Veda the Deity has been
described as true and the path of religious progress is
the ingredient of Dharma Declares the Rig Veda
ldquoBy truth is the earth upheldrdquo
Rig Veda X85
An Upanishadic sage says
ldquoTruth alone triumphs not untruth By Truth the spiritual path is widened that path by which the seers who are free from all cravings and declares travel and reach the supreme abode of Truthrdquo
Mundak Upanishad IIII6
So Truth is a basic postulate of Dharma and an abiding
and ultimate value of life It is the eternal oneness of
beauty and truth and truth and beauty that inspired
Keats to stress their underlying unity and their
transcendental reality When Keats says ldquoThat is all ye know on earth and all ye need to knowrdquo he points to that
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 127
ecstatic wonder which the spiritual realization of this
eternal truth brings to a seeker or seer or a poet
SUBLIMITY
Keats seems to have reached such a sublime plane of
poetic consciousness that is so aptly suggested by our
Vedic seers who have extolled God as a poet (कव) and
His divine creative energy is indicated as the poetic
power (काय) which has assumed manifold forms of
beauty and splendour So God as the supreme creator of
beauty has been described in the Rig Veda as
ldquoHe who is supporter of the world of life
Who knows the secret mysterious names
Of the morning beams
He poet cherishes manifold forms
By His poetic powerrdquo
Rig Veda VIIIXL5
So let me hasten to the conclusion by affirming that as
lsquoa lily for a dayrsquo Keats proved that a crowded hour of
glory is far better than an age without a name he seems
to have lived up to the lofty advice of Queen Vidula to
her son King Sanjaya in the Mahabharat
महतम 0व1लत 2यो न त धमऽतम 4चर
ldquoIt is better to flame forth for an instant than smoke away for agesrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 128
Eternal truths transcend the barriers of time and space
country and clime caste and creed and shine through all
lands and in all ages Even today the enlightened souls
all over the world have a significant identity of ideas
irrespective of the countries to which they belong and
the religious faith to which they are affiliated
Such wise men awaken others from a state of
intellectual and spiritual slumber enkindle in them a
sense of understanding and fraternity It has been
rightly said by HW Longfellow
ldquoLives of great men all remind us
We can make our lives sublime
And departing leave behind us
Footprints on the sand of Timerdquo
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RP DWIVEDI Page 129
RW EMERSON
(25 May 1803 ndash 27 April 1882)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 130
RW EMERSON
US Poet Essayist and Lecturer
Emerson graduated from Harvard University and was
ordained a Unitarian minister in 1829 His questioning
of traditional doctrine led him to resign the ministry
three years later He formulated his philosophy in
Nature (1836) the book helped initiate New England
Transcendentalism a movement of which he soon
became the leading exponent In 1834 he moved to
Concord Mass the home of his friend Henry David
Thoreau His lectures on the proper role of the scholar
and the waning of the Christian tradition caused
considerable controversy In 1840 with Margaret
Fuller he helped launch The Dial a journal that
provided an outlet for Transcendentalist ideas He
became internationally famous with his Essays (1841
1844) including Self-Reliance Representative Men
(1850) consists of biographies of historical figures The Conduct of Life (1860) his most mature work reveals a
developed humanism and a full awareness of human
limitations His Poems (1847) and May-Day (1867)
established his reputation as a major poet
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 131
CHAPTER SEVEN
EMERSONrsquoS SPIRITUAL QUEST AND INDIAN THOUGHT
INTRODUCTION
Ralph Waldo Emerson the lsquoSage of Concordrsquo as he is
rightly called was an American seer who came into the
world at a time when East and the West were gradually
coming closer to each other in spheres more than one
trade and commerce between the two was gaining
momentum and above all the era of inter-
communication of ideas intellect and spirit was being
ushered in by exchange of books
Emerson was one of the first great Americans who
absorbed himself sufficiently in this phenomenon
ventured into the sacred literature of India and
assimilated its thought to such a remarkable degree that
he became its eminent interpreter to his countrymen in
particular and to the entire West in general
EMERSON AND THE GITA
Let us see what Swami Vivekananda said about the
source of Emersonrsquos inspiration Swamiji said
ldquoThe greatest incident of the (Mahabharata) war was the marvelous and immortal poem of the Gita the Song Celestial It is the popular scripture of India and the loftiest of all teachings I would advise those of you who have not read that book to read it If you only knew how
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 132
much it has influenced your own country (America) even If you want to know the source of Emersonrsquos inspiration it is this book the Gita He went to see Carlyle and Carlyle made him a present of the Gita and that little book is responsible for the Concord Movement All the broad movements in America in one way or other are indebted to the Concord partyrdquo
His interest in the sacred writings of India was probably
aroused at Harvard and he kept it aglow throughout his
life With his motto ldquoTomorrow to fresh fields and pastures newrdquo he set out in search of the True (Satyam)
the Good (Shivam) and the Beautiful (Sundaram)
In busy and bustling New England there came forward
to quote Theodore Parker ldquothis young David a shepherd but to be a king with his garlands and singing robes about him one note upon his new and fresh-string lyre was worth a thousand menrdquo
With unflinching faith in Truth Righteousness and
Beauty and absolute confidence in all the attributes of
infinity he drank deep at the unfailing source of Indian
philosophy and religion and gave his thoughts such a
lucid inimitable expression that his writings have
become a veritable treasure of world literature Revered
the world over held in high esteem by great Indians like
Rabindranath Tagore and Pt Jawaharlal Nehru and
admired by Gandhiji his writings abound in the beauty
of his speech the majesty of his ideas and the loftiness
of his moral sentiments
Perhaps the most fitting commentary on the relevance
of his thoughts to our country was made by Mahatma
Gandhi after reading his Essays Said Mahatma Gandhi
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 133
ldquoThe Essays to my mind contain the teaching of Indian wisdom in a Western Guru It is interesting to see our own sometimes differently fashionedrdquo
There are indeed innumerable points of similarity in
thought and experience between Emerson and the
mainstream of Indian philosophy The philosophy of
Vedanta which was one of the thought currents that
reached America in the first half of the 19th century
influenced Emerson deeply and contributed largely to
his concept of lsquoselfhoodrsquo Emerson found the Vedic
doctrines of soul congenial to his own ideas about manrsquos
relationship to the universe He therefore drew freely
upon the Hindu scriptures which contain a vivid and
well-elaborated doctrine of lsquoSelfrsquo Numerous references
in his essays and journals to the lsquoLaws of Manursquo
(Manusmriti) Vishnu Puran Bhagvad Gita and Katha Upanishad bear ample testimony to this fact
Let us examine some of the striking identities between
Emerson and the Vedanta The Upanishads tell us that
the central core of onersquos self is clearly identifiable with
the Cosmic Reality ldquoThe self within you the resplendent immortal person is the internal self of all things and is the Universal Brahmanrdquo The Chhandogya Upanishad tells
us that ldquothe self which inhabits the body is verily the Brahman and that as soon as the mortal coil is thrown over it will finally merge in Brahmanrdquo
How close was Emersonrsquos spiritual kinship with the
Vedantic doctrines is clear from the following lines
taken from his essay Plato or the Philosopher
ldquoIn all nations there are minds which incline to dwell in the conception of the Fundamental Unity the ecstasy of losing all being in one Being This tendency
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 134
finds its highest expression chiefly in the Indian scriptures in the Vedas the Bhagvad Gita and the Vishnu Puranrdquo
He further quotes Lord Krishna speaking to a sage ldquoYou are fit to apprehend that you are not distinct from meThat which I am thou art and that also in this world with its gods and heroes and mankind Men contemplate distinctions because they are stupefied with ignorance What is the great end of all you shall now learn from me It is soul-one in all bodies pervading uniform perfect pre-eminent over nature exempt from birth growth and decay Omnipresent made up of true knowledge independent unconnected with unrealities with name species and the rest in time past present and to come The knowledge that this spirit which is essentially one is in onersquos own and all other bodies is the wisdom of one who knows the unity of thingsrdquo
In formulating his own concept of the Over-soul
Emerson quotes Lord Krishna once again
ldquoWe live in succession in division in parts in particles Meantime within man is the soul of the whole the wise silence the universal beauty to which every part and particle is equally related the eternal One And this deep power in which we exist and whose beatitude is all accessible to us is not only self-sufficing and perfect in every hour but in the act of seeing and the thing seen the seer and the spectacle the subject and the object are one We see the world piece by piece as the sun the moon the animal the tree but the whole of which these are shining parts is the Soul Only by the vision of that wisdom can the horoscope of ages be readrdquo
The Over-Soul
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 135
A transcendentalist par excellence Emerson who was
influenced by German philosophers like Kant Hegel
Fichte and Schelling and their English interpreters
Coleridge and Carlyle affirmed that man could
apprehend reality by direct spiritual insight To him
intuition knew truths which ldquotranscendedrdquo those
accessible to intellect logical argument and scientific
inquiry Such a transcendentalism or attitude which
provided a metaphysical justification for the ideal of
individual freedom was found writ large in the holy
books of India
Steeped as he was in the oriental lore echoes of
Vedantic philosophy can be distinctly heard in his
writings which shine like ldquoa good deed in a naughty worldrdquo
Some of his poems resemble Vedantic literature in form
as well as in content His two famous poems Brahma
and Hamatreya are striking examples of such a close
affinity both in content and expression Ideas and
images in Brahma reflect certain passages which
Emerson had copied into his journals from the Vishnu
Puran the Bhagvad Gita and Katha Upanishad The first
stanza of Brahma which reads
ldquoIf the red slayer think he slays
Or if the slain think he is slain
They know not well the subtle ways
I keep and pass and turn againrdquo
is essentially an adaptation of these lines from the
Katha Upanishad
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 136
ldquoIf the slayer thinks I slay if the slain thinks I am slain then both of them do not know well It (the soul) does not slay nor is it slainrdquo
Katha Upanishad II19
The same lines with a little variation of course appear
in the Bhagvad Gita
ldquoThey are both ignorant he who knows that the soul to be capable of killing and he who takes it as killed for verily the soul neither kills nor is killedrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II19
The image of Brahma as a red slayer has been derived
from the Vishnu Puran where Lord Shiva the destroyer
of Creation has been depicted as Rudra (the red slayer)
but destruction envisages new creation and therefore
symbolizes the decadence of one and necessitates the
advent of the other This is why Lord Shiva is regarded
as the god not only of extermination but also of
regeneration With this concept is connected the cult of
Shaivagam ndash the ushering in of an era of general good
and prosperity when the world is created anew
The second and third stanzas of Brahma echo the
following lines of the Bhagvad Gita
ldquoI am the ritual action I am the sacrifice I am the ancestral oblation I am the sacred hymn I am the melted butter I am the fire and I am the offeringrdquo
Bhagvad Gita IX16
and also from the same source
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 137
ldquoI am immortality as well as death I am being as well as non-beingrdquo
Bhagvad Gita IX19
In the fourth stanza of Brahma there is a direct
reference to lsquothe Sacred Sevenrsquo ndash the seven highest saints
of our country namely Kashyapa Atri Bharadwaj Vishwamitra Gautam Vashishtha and Jamadagni Thus
we find that Brahma embodies an age-old Vedantic
truth
As regards his next poem Hamatreya its very title is a
variation of a disciplersquos name lsquoMaitreyarsquo to whom the
earth had recited a few verses Before we examine the
poem critically let us read a long passage from the
Vishnu Puran Book IV which Emerson had copied into
his 1845 Journal This passage which sheds ample light
on the background and theme of the poem under
reference reads
ldquoKings who with perishable frames have possessed this ever-enduring world and who blinded with deceptive notions of individual occupation have indulged the feeling that suggests lsquoThis earth is mine it is my sonrsquos it belongs to my dynastyrsquo have all passed awayearth laughs as if smiling with autumnal flowers to behold her kings unable to effect the subjugation of themselvesthese were the verses Maitreya which earth recited and by listening to which ambition fades away like snow before the windrdquo
Journals VII127-130
How futile is human vanity and how ridiculous is the
possessive instinct in man has been thoroughly exposed
by Emerson in the following lines
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 138
ldquoEarth laughs in flowers to see her boastful boys
Earth-proud proud of the earth which is not theirs
Who steer the plough but cannot steer their feet
Clear of the graverdquo
Hamatreya
Man who awaits lsquothe inevitable hourrsquo forgets that all his
heraldry pomp power wealth and lsquopaths of gloryrsquo lead
him lsquobut to the graversquo and grows so proud of his material
achievements and so deeply attached to the fleeting
things of the world that he loses sight of the supreme
philosophical truth - the ephemerality of the world and
the immortality of soul Death which is lurking in the
shadows can lay his icy hands upon us any day yet due
to false pride and sense of meum and attachment we
allow ourselves to be duped by the passing show of the
world without ever thinking of salvation or final release
from the worldly bondages Says Emerson
ldquoAh the hot owner sees not Death who adds
Him to his land a lump of mould the morerdquo
Hamatreya
Here Emerson seems to have been deeply influences by
Indian scriptures and particularly Ishopanishad and
the Bhagvad Gita in which the philosophy of God-
realization through detached action has been succinctly
elaborated In these two sacred books it has been stated
that total renunciation of the sense of meum egotism
and attachment with regard to the world all worldly
objects body and all actions is a path to real love for
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 139
God All worldly objects like land wealth house clothes
all relations like parents wife children friends and all
forms of worldly enjoyment like honour fame prestige
being the creations of Maya are wholly deluding
transient and perishable whereas one God alone the
embodiment of Existence (Sat) Knowledge (Chit) and
Bliss (Anand) is all in all omnipotent omniscient and
omnipresent Therefore all sense of meum egotism and
attachment must be totally renounced for spiritual
growth and pure exclusive love for God If the seed of
egoism is sown sorrow is the fruit On the other hand
the more a man cultivates dispassion and
disinterestedness with regard to the world the more
easily he transcends the barriers of Ignorance (Avidya)
Delusion (Maya) and Aversion (Dvesha) and marches
on the path of self-realization and God-realization A
similar thought current runs through the following
memorable lines of Earth-Song which forms an integral
part of the poem
ldquoThe earth says
They called me theirs who so controlled me
Yet every one wished to stay and is gone
How am I theirs if they cannot hold me
But I hold themrdquo
Hamatreya
These lines remind us of those memorable words of
Lord Krishna in the Bhagvad Gita XII16 where a true
devotee is characterized as one who is ldquodelivered from the egorsquos thrall - the sense of I and minerdquo or the feeling of
doership in all undertakings
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 140
After reading these lines which seem to refer to the
famous Biblical phrase lsquodust thou art to dust returnethrsquo
the readers may feel called upon to cultivate a sense of
detachment and renunciation for their ambition fades
away and their lsquoavarice cooled like dust in the chill of the graversquo
All art it has been said is an attempt to distract man
from his ego Emersonrsquos Hamatreya is certainly an
illustrious example of great art Highly didactic in
content and tone this poem reminds us of that sublime
mood in which Emerson realized the futility of
egocentric attachment to earth and its fleeting objects
which are shadows rather than substances
Emersonrsquos writings leave us to quote John Milton lsquoCalm of mind all passions spentrsquo A fitting comment on the
total impact of Emersonrsquos works on us has been given
by a brilliant American man of letters Theodore Parker
who says
ldquoA good test of the comparative value of books is the state they leave you in Emerson leaves you tranquil resolved on noble manhood fearless of the consequences he gives men to mankind and mankind to the laws of Godrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 141
HD THOREAU
(12 July 1817 ndash 6 May 1862)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 142
HD THOREAU
US Thinker Essayist and Naturalist
Thoreau graduated from Harvard University and taught
school for several years before leaving his job to
become a poet of nature Back in Concord he came
under the influence of Ralph Waldo Emerson and began
to publish pieces in the Transcendentalist magazine The Dial In the years 1845ndash47 to demonstrate how
satisfying a simple life could be he lived in a hut beside
Concords Walden Pond essays recording his daily life
were assembled for his masterwork Walden (1854) His
A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers (1849)
was the only other book he published in his lifetime He
reflected on a night he spent in jail protesting the
Mexican-American War in the essay Civil
Disobedience (1849) which would later influence such
figures as Mohandas K Gandhi and Martin Luther King
Jr In later years his interest in Transcendentalism
waned and he became a dedicated abolitionist His
many nature writings and records of his wanderings in
Canada Maine and Cape Cod display the mind of a keen
naturalist After his death his collected writings were
published in 20 volumes and further writings have
continued to appear in print
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 143
CHAPTER EIGHT
THOREAUrsquoS TRYST WITH INDIAN CULTURE
INTRODUCTION
Henry David Thoreau was a great American
transcendentalist thinker His seminal mind and
original thought had an enduring impact on his own
countrymen and also on peoples beyond the bounds of
America His philosophy and life had a deep influence
on all great men of his time Mahatma Gandhi regarded
him as his Guru and his concept of Satyagraha owes its
origin to Thoreaursquos essay on Civil Disobedience which
Gandhiji chanced upon in South Africa On Thoreaursquos
greatness another great American contemporary RW
Emerson once remarked ldquoHis soul was made for the noblest society he had in short life exhausted the capabilities of this world Wherever there is knowledge wherever there is virtue wherever there is beauty he will find a homerdquo
HIS LOVE OF SOLITUDE
Endowed with a rare meditative mind Thoreau loved
lsquosweet solitudersquo for he held that what is truly alone is the
spirit A seeker after perfection he retired to the
solitude of the woods to see with the eyes of the soul ndash
ldquothe higher law in naturerdquo and realize his oneness with
the Cosmic Spirit A lover of the spirit behind the world
of appearance he once said ndash ldquoI love to be alone I never
found the companion that was so companionable as
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 144
solitude In solitude of the woods I suddenly recover my
spirits my spirituality I can go from the buttercups to
the life everlastingrdquo His love for loneliness resembles
that of our own sages and saints who shunned the din
and clamour of madding crowds and retired to the
sylvan solitude of the woods for meditation on
mysteries of life It was in the secluded and tranquil
atmosphere of the woods that the great teachers of
mankind cultivated their souls observed austerity and
wrote the holiest scriptures Aranyakas and sacred texts
Gurukul (forest academies)- the ideal nurseries of
higher learning and disciplined rigorous life were setup
here for success in life and self-realization which is a
path-way to God-realization
HIS CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE AND GANDHIJIrsquoS
SATYAGRAHA
Bapu read Thoreaursquos essay on Civil Disobedience for
the second time in jail and was so deeply impressed by
it that he called it ldquoa masterly treatise which left a deep impression on merdquo He copied the words ldquoI did not feel for a moment confined and the walls seemed a great waste of stone and mortarrdquo Gandhiji wrote to Roosevelt
in 1942 ldquoI have profited greatly by the writings of Thoreau and Emersonrdquo He told Roger Baldwin that
Thoreaursquos essay ldquocontained the essence of his political philosophy not only as Indiarsquos struggle related to the British but as to his own views of the relation of citizens to Governmentrdquo As Miller observed ldquoGandhiji received back from America what was fundamentally the philosophy of India after it had been distilled and crystallized in the mind of Thoreaurdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 145
In his Civil Disobedience which as a document of
much ethical and spiritual value is manrsquos most powerful
weapon in dealing with tyranny Thoreau examines the
relation of the individual to the state and offers a candid
exposition when he says ldquoThat Government is best which governs the leastrdquo He believed in the supremacy of
moral laws and his concept of Civil Disobedience is
based on the dictates of conscience Since the nature of
an individual is determined by his conscience there is
always a basic conflict between the laws arbitrarily
made by the Government and the objectives sanctioned
and held sacred by the individualrsquos conscience He
regarded the individual as more important than the
state So in the interests of justice and virtue men with
clean conscience most oppose unjust laws The form of
protest launched by conscientious and holy men against
government is called Civil Disobedience
Thoreau seems to have derived the concept from the
Bhagvad Gita which invests each individual with two
contradictory traits ndash the Divine Attributes and the
Diabolical Propensities Whenever diabolical tendencies
promote arbitrary administration by making unjust
laws and men of clean conscience are forced to obey
them injustice prevails and justice or righteousness is
destroyed In such a situation the Divinity incarnates
itself and sets matters right Declares Lord Krishna
ldquoWhenever righteousness (Virtue) is on the decline and injustice (Vice) is on the ascendant then I body forth myselfrdquo
Bhagvad Gita IV7
To Gandhiji also Satya (Truth) and Ahimsa (Non-
violence) are inter-related and Satyagraha or non-
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 146
violent resistance is based on the belief in the power of
spirit the power of truth the power of love by which we
can overcome evil through self-suffering and self-
sacrifice
FORMATIVE INDIAN INFLUENCES
Thoreau was thoroughly immersed in the Indian
scriptures In Emersonrsquos library he read and was deeply
influenced by the Manusmriti Bhagvad Gita Vishnu Puran Hitopadesh Rig-Veda and the Upanishads
Which the Manusmriti led him to seek the Self in
solitude the Bhagvad Gita taught him the ideal of
disinterested action non-attachment meditation and
self-realization He was so overwhelmed by the Gita that
he declared it to be the lsquoUniversal Gospelrsquo Praising its
moral grandeur and sustained sublimity of thoughts he
wrote in Walden ndash ldquoIn the morning I bathe my intellect in the stupendous cosmogonal philosophy of the Bhagvad Gita since whose composition years of the gods have elapsed and in comparison with which our modern world and its literature seems puny and trivial the best Hindu scripture (Gita) is remarkable for its pure intellectuality The reader is nowhere raised into and sustained in a higher purer and rarer region of thought than the Bhagvad Gita It is unquestionably one of the noblest and most sacred scriptures which have come down to us The oriental philosophy assigns their due rank respectively to action and contemplation or rather does full Justice to the latterrdquo
A thorough study of the Upanishads made him exclaim
joyfully ldquoWhat extracts from the Vedas I have read fall on me like the light of a higher and purer luminary which describes a loftier course through a purer stratum ndash free from particulars simple universalrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 147
At a time when the Western philosophers did not
appreciate the significance of contemplation Thoreau
emphasized that contemplation is as important as
action for the latter has to be charged by the former
otherwise action will lead to chaos disillusionment and
despair
HIS TRANSCENDENTALISM
Thoreau was an empirical transcendentalist To him
transcendentalism was a profound exploration of the
spiritual foundations of life His emphasis on intuition
or inner light for a direct relationship with God which
transcends all the conventional avenues of
communication stemmed from an intuitive capacity for
grasping the ultimate truth He was interested less in
the material world than in spiritual reality He regarded
Nature as a viable garment of the spiritual world and
the universe as the embodiment of a single Cosmic Soul
His transcendentalism relied upon the higher planes of
human circumstances its oneness with something
higher than itself While logical reasoning fails to grasp
the truth intuition transcends understanding and is a
synthesizing power to understand the organic whole
which is called the Over-soul
An individual of exceptional self-ascending and self-
reliance he believed that Over-soul is brought down to
earth by action rather than words He therefore did not
preach transcendentalism but actually lived it To him
transcendentalism is ldquoan inquisitive and contemplative access to Godrdquo He believed in the immanence of God in
nature and in man and also the identity of God with the
soul of the individual He said ldquothe creator is still behind the increate the Divinity is so fleeting that its attributes are never expressedthe idea of God is the idea of
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 148
our Spiritual nature purified and enlarged to infinity In ourselves are the elements of Divinity We see God around us because He dwells within usrdquo
This statement reminds us of a verse in the Gita
wherein Lord Krishna declares that every living heart is
His abode
ldquoArjuna God abides in the heart of all creatures causing them to revolve according to their deeds by His illusive power seated as those beings are in the vehicle of the bodyrdquo
At one place Thoreau said ldquoThe whole is whole an organic whole which is called Over-soul or Para-Brahman and the highest aim of life is to realize this truth and be one with the whole or Over-soulrdquo Thoreau seems to have
been moved by our Vedic incantation which says
ldquoThat (the invisible Absolute) is whole whole is this (the visible phenomenal universe) from the invisible whole comes forth the visible whole Though the visible whole has come out from that invisible whole yet the whole remains unalteredrdquo Thus the phenomenal and the
Absolute are inseparable All existence is in the
Absolute and whatever exists must exist in it hence all
manifestation is merely a modification of the one
Supreme Whole and neither increases nor diminishes It
Serene and thoughtful as he was he wrote in his
Journal ldquoThe fact is I am a mystic a transcendentalist and a natural philosopher to bootrdquo
HIS ASCETISM (SANNYASA)
He was a true ascetic or Sannyasi for he preached and
practiced the basic human values of Anasakti (non-
attachment) and Aparigraha (non-possession)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 149
throughout his life He abhorred acquisition of wealth
and regarded worldly possessions as the result of sheer
exploitation of the masses by a few powerful men and
agencies including the State and the Government Since
the universe belongs to God any claim to ownership or
personal possessions is against moral law and is in fact
a sin against divinity Moral laws being superior to
worldly rules his preference for a life of self-abnegation
and renunciation bears a striking similarity to our Vedic
view expressed in the very opening line of the
Ishopanishad
ldquoAll this whatever exists in the universe is inhabited by the Lord Having renounced (the unreal) enjoy (the real) with restraint Do not covet or set your eye on the possession of othersrdquo
To him all worldly attractions and allurements were but
a passing show or fleeting moments (in eternity) which
distract the seekers of truth from cultivating self-culture
and promoting inner spiritual growth
EXPLORER OF THE INNER WORLD OF SPIRIT
Thoreau was an explorer of the inner self He wanted to
pass ldquoan invisible boundaryrdquo establishment within and
around him new universal and more liberal laws and
live with higher order of beings To him every man is
the Lord of the realm beside which the earthly empire
of the Czar is but a petty state a hammock left by the
icethere are continents and seas in the moral
world yet unexplored by him He praised William
Habbingtonrsquos following lines which echoed his own
thoughts
ldquoDirect your eyes right inward and you will find
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 150
A thousand regions in your mind
Yet undiscovered Travel then and be
Expert in home home cosmographyrdquo
Simple living based on extreme reduction of wants and
self-reliance enabled him to lsquocultivate the garden of his soulrsquo In consonance with the concept of an ideal Yogi in
the Gita he wrote
ldquoThe millions are awake enough for physical labour but only one in a million is awake enough for effective intellectual exertion and only one in a hundred millions do a poetic or divine liferdquo How truly does this view echo
the memorable words of Lord Krishna
ldquoAmong thousands of men one rare soul strives for perfection and among those who strive with success one perchance knows me in truthrdquo
Condemning people who go to Africa to hunt giraffes for
pastime he exhorted them to aim at seeking their own
lsquoSelfrsquo He said ldquoIt would be a noble game to shoot onersquos selfrdquo He seems to recall the famous verse of the
Mundakopanishad which says
ldquoThe Pranava is the bow the Atman is the arrow and the Brahman is said to be its mark It should be hit by one who is self-collected and that which hits becomes like the arrow one with the mark ie Brahmanrdquo
When he ordains lsquoto shoot oneselfrsquo he like our Vedic
seers hints at penetrating the truth centre in us with
our mind propelled by the motive force generated in the
voiceless ecstasy of deepest meditation which touches
the Brahman the Ultimate Reality When the individual
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 151
soul gets fully detached from its contacts with matter or
its false identification with material envelopment it
realizes its oneness with the Supreme Brahman How
beautifully has he stressed the value of inner search in
the concluding sentence of Walden
ldquoThe light which puts out our eyes is darkness to us Only that day dawns to which we are awake There is more day to dawn The Sun is but a morning starrdquo
IMMORTALITY OF SOUL AND THE DOCTRINE OF
TRANSMIGRATION
Thoreau firmly believed in the immortality of soul and
its transmigration He had fully imbibed the philosophy
of the Gita which enunciates in unequivocal terms the
permanence of the soul and the transience of the body
Says Lord Krishna
ldquoThis soul is never born and never dies nor does it become only after being born For it is unborn eternal everlasting and ancient even though the body is slain the soul is notrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II20
ldquoAs a man shedding worn-out garments takes other new ones likewise the embodied soul casting off worn-out bodies enters into others which are newrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II22
Thoreau considered his life as a series of many more
lives to come On his return from Waldon Pond he said
ldquoI had several more lives to live and could not spare any more for that onerdquo At another place he refers to the
solitary hired manrsquos lsquosecond birth and peculiar religious
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 152
experiencersquo He evidently recalled the following words of
St John ldquoExcept a man be born again he cannot see the kingdom of Godrdquo In his Waldon he refers to a bug and
declares ldquoWho does not feel his faith in a resurrection and immortality Who knows what beautiful and winged whose egg has been buried for ages under many concentric layers of woodenness in the dead dry life in societyheard perchance of gnawing out now for years by the astonished family of man may unexpectedly come forth from amidst societyrsquos most trivial furniture to enjoy its perfect summer life at lastrdquo
CONCLUSION
Thoreau was a true Yogi or an ascetic modeling on the
Indian tradition of strict moral code of conduct for a
Sannyasi He drew abundant spiritual and moral
sustenance from the Indian scriptures and its rich
lsquoculturersquo and approximated the ideal of a perfect recluse
The concept of an ideal Yogi is similar upto a point to
the postulates of Divinity expressed thus in the Atharva Veda
ldquoThe Yogi is desireless and hence free from the impact of animal nature he is serene in the heroism of the spirit he is satisfied with the essence of things perceived spirituality and hence does not depend on sense-perception for happiness and so he is complete in himself And though the physical body is subject to decay and death he remains unworn and ever youthful in spirit and has no fear of deathrdquo
Atharva Veda XVIII44
Such an enlightenment Yogi or spiritual superman was
Thoreau whose greatness will ever inspire us and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 153
illumine our lifersquos path with light and love His life was
lsquoa chronicle of actions just and brightrsquo and his writings
were lsquowrit with beams of heavenly light on which the eyes of God not rarely lookrsquo
Proof
Printed By Createspace
Digital Proofer
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 20
conviction of Keats seems to be a distinct echo of our
Vedantic dictum
सयमव जयत नानतम सयन पथा वततो दवयानः
यनामतय तत सयय परम नधान ldquoTruth alone triumphs not untruth By truth is laid out the Path Divine along which the seers who are free from desires and cravings ascend the supreme abode of Truthrdquo
Mundak Upanishad III16
Again the Vedic seer says that the Atman (self) is to be
realized only through truth
सयन लampसतपसा यष आमा
मडकोपनषद III15
Thus truth is the foundation of Dharma (righteousness)
for it is an essential and abiding value of human life The
eternal oneness of beauty and truth and vice versa and
their transcendental reality was Keatsrsquo poetic creed and
the realization of this basic spiritual truth raised him to
a level of sublime consciousness which is the mark of a
true seeker of truth or seer
In sum we may say that though lsquoa lily of a dayrsquo Keats
proved that a crowded hour of glory is far better than
an age without a name as has been stressed in our epic
Mahabharat where Queen Vidula exhorts her son
Sanjaya ldquoमहतम 0व1लत 2यो न त धमतम 4चरrdquo ndash ldquoIt is better to flame forth for an instant than to smoke away for agesrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 21
Though Keats died at the young age of 26 years he left
an indelible imprint on the history of English poetry for
his deep and pervasive influence could be easily seen on
Tennysonrsquos early work Moreover he was indisputably
the precursor of the Pre-Raphaelite movement In fact
he had reached near perfection in poetic craftsmanship
which will ever remain worthy of emulation for the
succeeding generations of poets
Ralph Waldo Emerson known as the lsquoSage of Concordrsquo
acted as a bridge between the East and the West His
abiding interest in the Indian scriptures and
particularly the Gita was a source of the Concord
Movement in America According to Swami
Vivekananda all the broad movements in America are
indebted to the Concord Party Mahatma Gandhi
remarked after reading Emersonrsquos Essays ldquoThe Essays to my mind contain the teaching of Indian wisdom in a Western lsquoGurursquo it is interesting to see our own sometimes differently fashionedrdquo Emerson drew freely on the
Upanishads Manusmriti Vishnu Puran and above all
the Gita and his writings reflect his indebtedness to our
holy texts
Pt Jawaharlal Nehru admired Emersonrsquos gospel of self-
reliance and righteousness in particular and regarded
him as one of the builders of America A
transcendentalist and thinker par excellence Emersonrsquos
ideas shaped not only his countrymenrsquos thinking but
had a deep and pervasive influence over many other
nations His main thoughts coloured as they are by our
own Indian religio-philosophical strands are universal
in appeal and are as relevant today as they were in his
own lifetime
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 22
In formulating his concept of Over-Soul Emerson
stressed the fundamental identity of Individual Soul
with Over-Soul He asserted ldquoWithin man is the soul of the whole ndash the wise silence the universal beauty to which every part and particle is equally related the Eternal Oneonly by the vision of that wisdom can the horoscope of ages be readrdquo He firmly believed in the
immortality of soul and the ephemerality of the world
and strongly condemned the futility of manrsquos vanity and
ego-centric attachment to the perishable objects of the
world His writings leave us lsquocalm of mind all passions spentrsquo In fact lsquohe gives men to mankind and mankind to the laws of Godrsquo
Henry David Thoreau was a great empirical
transcendentalist about whom Emerson once remarked
ldquowherever there is knowledge wherever there is virtue wherever there is beauty he will find a homerdquo His essay
on lsquoCivil Disobediencersquo which Gandhiji read twice in a
South African jail impressed him so much so that he
regarded him as his political lsquoGurursquo and his concept of
Satyagraha owes its origin to Thoreaursquos writings
Endowed with a rare meditative mind he loved lsquosweet solitudersquo and retired to the woods for discovering the
lsquohigher lawrsquo and realize his oneness with the Cosmic
Spirit He believed in the supremacy of moral laws and
his doctrine of Civil Disobedience is based on his dictate
of conscience for he considered individual conscience
more important than arbitrary state laws
Thoroughly immersed in the Indian scriptures his
thought-process and philosophy of life was
considerably moulded by our ancient religio-spiritual
heritage His deep love for our scriptural texts is evident
from his declaration of the Gita as lsquoUniversal Gospelrsquo He
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 23
wrote ldquoIn the morning I bathe my intellect in the stupendous cosmogonal philosophy of the Bhagvad GitaIt is unquestionably one of the noblest and most sacred scriptures which have come down to usthe oriental philosophy assigns their due rank respectively to action and contemplationrdquo
About the Vedas he remarked ldquoExtracts from the Vedas fall on me like the light of a higher and purer luminaryrdquo
According to him Over-Soul could be brought down to
earth not by words but by ldquoan inquisitive and contemplative accessrdquo He further states ldquoIn us are the elements of Divinity We see God around us because He dwells within usrdquo
He was a true ascetic (सयासी) for he preached and
practiced non-attachment (अनासि8त) in his life He was
an explorer of the inner world of Spirit In the seclusion
of woods he lsquocultivated the garden of his soul as a true Yogirsquo and he wanted to lsquoshoot his selfrsquo as our Mundaka Upanishad says
ldquoThe Pranava is the bow Atma the arrow the Brahman its mark It should be hit by a self-collected onerdquo
Much of what is stated in this compact volume may be
found scattered over various other critical works but
my earnest endeavour has been to bring together such
material as is of sufficient spiritual value which belongs
to all times This small comparative survey of the realm
of main ideas of some great poets confirms the splendor
of their rich romantic imagination and the unity of all
spiritual vision that makes them not only the creators of
beauty love and light but also brothers in spirit
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 24
I would feel amply rewarded if through this modest
attempt I am able to arouse keen interest in my readers
for further critical study of the subject Any suggestions
for amplification or improvement on the text are most
welcome
RP DWIVEDI
LUCKNOW
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 25
WILLIAM BLAKE
(28 November 1757 ndash 12 August 1827)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 26
WILLIAM BLAKE
English Poet Painter Engraver and Visionary
He was trained as an engraver by James Basire and
afterward attended classes at the Royal Academy Blake
married in 1782 and in 1784 he opened a print shop in
London He developed an innovative technique for
producing coloured engravings and began producing
his own illustrated books of poetrymdashincluding Songs of Innocence (1789) The Marriage of Heaven and Hell (1790) and Songs of Experience (1794)mdashwith his new
method of ldquoIlluminated Printingrdquo Jerusalem (1804[ndash
20]) an epic treating the fall and redemption of
humanity is his most richly decorated book His other
major works include Vala or The Four Zoas
(manuscript 1796ndash1807) and Milton (1804[ndash11]) A
late series of 22 watercolours inspired by the Book of
Job includes some of his best-known pictures He was
called mad because he was single-minded and
unworldly he lived on the edge of poverty and died in
neglect His books form one of the most strikingly
original and independent bodies of work in the Western
cultural tradition Ignored by the public of his day he is
now regarded as one of the earliest and greatest figures
of Romanticism
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 27
CHAPTER ONE
INDIAN SPIRITUALISM IN BLAKErsquoS VISIONS OF ETERNITY
INTRODUCTION
William Blake was by far the most prophetic of all major
English poets In a preface to his famous poem on
Milton he exclaimed lsquoWould to God that all the Lordrsquos people were Prophetsrsquo Elsewhere Blake declared lsquoA Prophet is a seer not an arbitrary dictatorrsquo According to
PH Butter an acclaimed authority on Blake ldquoa prophet sees behind the marks of woe behind the wars and other evils of his time and the attitudes that cause such things But Blake was not the kind of prophet who just present evils but one who saw the Visions of Eternity one whose senses discovered the infinite in everythingrdquo The prophet
is also a spokesman one who speaks or believes he
speaks for God or some other higher power Blake
himself claimed in one of his letters in 1803 ldquoI dare not pretend to be any other than the Secretary the Authors are in Eternityrdquo
His belief in lsquoinspirationrsquo contributed to that lsquoterrifying honestyrsquo which TS Eliot saw in him to keep him
uncompromisingly true to his vision He perceived a
close relationship of the conscious ndash lsquoIrsquo with the deeper
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 28
self through which all inspiration flows He knew that
the prophet must also be a lsquomakerrsquo lsquoa blacksmith laboring at his furnaces to shape the stubborn structure of the languagersquo He further realized that a prophet
should also be a teacher a preacher and a beacon light
to humanity
Explaining the function of the bard or poet (and his own
mission) Blake in his introduction to Songs of Experience declares
ldquoHear the voice of the bard
Who present past and future sees
Whose ears have heard
The Holy word
That walked among the ancient trees
Calling the lapsed soul
And weeping in the evening dew
That might control
The starry pole
And fallen fallen light renewrsquo
Or again elucidating the aim of writing poetry or his
lsquogreat taskrsquo Blake declares
ldquo I rest not from my great task
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 29
To open the Eternal worlds to open the immortal eyes
Of man inwards into the worlds of Thought into Eternity
Ever expanding in the bosom of God the human imaginationrsquo
Like Milton who wanted lsquoto justify the ways of God to Manrsquo or Shelley who held that lsquopoetry is the revelation of the eternal ideas which lie behind the many-coloured ever-shifting veil that we call reality in lifersquo Blake in his
exceptional prophetic zeal set out to open the Eternal
worlds to open the immortal eyes of man inwards into
the worlds of thought into Eternity He was always at
pains to renew the fallen fallen light The poetrsquos divine
task of lsquoever expanding in the bosom of Godrsquo reminds us
of the moving verse of our Rig Veda in which God as
creator of beautiful forms has been conceived of as the
greatest poet whose divine creative energy s his poetic
power which manifests itself in the manifold forms of
beauty and splendor like the Heaven the Sun the Moon
the Sky etc
यो धता भवानानामगया स कवः काया प पपltयत
ऋवद VIII415
lsquoHe who is the supporter of the world of life
Who knows the secret mysterious names of the morning beams
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 30
He poet cherishes manifold forms by His poetic power even as heavenrsquo
Rig Veda VIII415
As a divinely inspired poet Blake seems to have had
experiences of various psychic and even mystic visions
which awakened him to subtle spiritual life It seems
that he must have transcended normal sensory
perceptions and would have attained to super-sensory
status of consciousness when he declares
lsquoI see the savior over me
Spreading his beams of love and dictating the words of mild song
Awake O sleeper of the land of shadows wake
I am in you and you in me mutual in love divinersquo
Jerusalem L4-7
He seems to have attained to that rare transcendental
consciousness when he perceived perfect communion
with God who assured him
lsquoI am not a God afar off I am a brother and friend
Within your bosoms I reside and you reside in me
We are one forgiving all evil not seeking recompensersquo
Jerusalem L18-20
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 31
Here Blake on perceiving a synoptic vision of complete
identity or oneness of God with individual self seems to
have echoed the eternal ancient Holy Scriptures Here
are a few striking parallels
In our Vedas also Go is regarded and adored as our
most-trusted friend Says the Rig Veda
lsquoमा=कर न ऐना सयाच ऋषः
वBमा Cह Dमतमसया 1शवानrsquo
ऋवद X237
lsquoNever may this friendship be severed
Of thee O Deity and the sage Vimada
We know O God Thy brother-like love
With us be Thy auspicious friendshiprsquo
Rig Veda X237
The key-note of this type of worship is the
contemplation of friendly love (described in later
religious literature as - सय ndash friendliness between the
Deity and the worshipper) The following prayer is in
the same spirit
lsquoभवा नः सFन अतमः सखा वधrsquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 32
ऋवद X133
lsquoBe Thou most dear to us for bliss O friend to aidrsquo
Rig Veda X133
Similarly assuring Arjuna of His perennial benediction
Lord Krishna declares in the Gita
ईHवरः सवभतानामतltठत
Kामयसवभतानमायया
ldquoArjuna God abides in the heart of all creatures
Causing them to revolve according to their Karma
By His illusive power seated as those beings are
In the vehicle of the bodyrdquo
Bhagvad Gita XVIII61
And again describing Himself as the truest friend of all
living beings Lord Krishna pronounces
ldquoI am the (disinterested) friend of all living beings and my devotee attains supreme peacerdquo
Bhagvad Gita V29
To turn to William Blake again he has an essential
belief in the closest intimacy of all living beings with
God who is the fountain-head of all life love and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 33
friendship This belief makes him affirm his faith in the
holiness of all life on earth Says he in his Annotations to Lavater
lsquoAll Life is Holyrsquo
Again he says ldquoIt is God in all that is our companion and friend for our God himself says lsquoyou are my brother my sister and my motherrsquo and Saint John said lsquowho so dwelleth in love dwelleth in God and God in himrsquo and such a one cannot judge of any but in loveGod is in lowest effects as well as in the highest causes for he is become a worm that he may nourish the weak For let it be remembered that creation is God descending according to the weakness of man for our Lord is the word of God and everything on earth is the word of God and in its essence is Godrdquo
In our own scriptures the all-pervasiveness of God (the
One) has been conceived not only in the cosmic world
but also in the world of men The very opening verse of
the Ishopanishad stresses the immanence of God in the
universe
ईशावाय इद सवM यािकNय जगया जगत
ईशोपनष I
lsquoUnderstand all this (universe) as inhabited by the Lord
Each moving thing in this moving worldrsquo
Or again says the Atharva Veda
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 34
य समायोऽवPणोयो वदHयः
यो दवोऽवPणोमानषः
lsquoGod is that in which things converge
He is that from which things diverge
He is our own land he is of foreign land
He is divine he is humanrsquo
Atharva Veda IV168
The immanence of God is the entire universe is also
underscored by Lord Krishna when he tells Arjuna
ldquoThere is nothing besides me Arjuna Like clusters of yarn-beads formed by knots all this (universe) is threaded on merdquo
Bhagvad Gita VII7
SYNOPTIC VISION
A firm belief in the all-pervasiveness of God in the
whole universe led him to perceive every object of
Nature as a window through which we may look with a
sense of awe and wonder into the beauty truth and all-
enveloping eternity which is but a reflection of God
Blake must have had palpable intimations of Eternity
when he wrote
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 35
lsquoTo see a world in a grain of sand
And a Heaven in a wild flower
Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand
And Eternity in an hourrsquo
Auguries of Innocence
Such a super-sensuous or transcendental perception of
Divinity in all creation and all creation in Divinity gave
Blake a subtle insight into the lsquoVisions of Eternityrsquo and
made him not only a seer but also lsquoan inhabitant of
other planes another domain of beingrsquo Commenting on
Blakersquos singular other-worldliness our own seer and
prophet Sri Aurobindo says ldquoThere is no other singer of the beyond who is like him or equal him in the strangeness supernatural lucidity power and directness of vision of the beyond and the rhythmic clarity and beauty of his singingrdquo
It is this contemplative knowledge of infinity in finite
and finite in infinity that has been regarded as the
distinguishing mark of the pure wisdom which finally
leads one to transcendental revelation which has been
so beautifully expressed in our own scriptures
सवभतषभावमययमीRत
अवभ8तसािवक
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 36
lsquoWhen one sees Eternity in things that pass away and Infinity in finite things then one has pure knowledgersquo
Bhagvad Gita XVIII20
The same truth has been emphasized again and again in
the Upanishads When man comes to know the real
truth about God nay when he succeeds in realizing the
truth about God how can he ever revile or adversely
criticize any form or aspect of God The Isha Upanishad
says
यत सवा13ण भतान आमयवानपHयत
सवभतष चामना ततो न वजगSसत
ईशोपनष VI
ldquoWhoever beholds all beings in God alone and God in all beings ie who regards all beings as his own self he no more looks down upon any creature for regarding all as his self whom will he hate and howrdquo
Lord Krishna stresses the same equanimity of vision
when he declares
ldquoThe Yogi who is united in identity with the all-pervading infinite consciousness and sees unity everywhere beholds the self present in all beings and all beings as assumed in the selfrdquo
Bhagvad Gita VI29
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 37
Again Lord Krishna declares
यो मा पHयत सव सवM च मय पHयत
तयाह न DणHया1म स च म न DणHयत
भगवगीता VI30
ldquoHe who sees me (the universal self) present in all beings and all beings existing within me never loses sight of me and I never lose sight of himrdquo
Bhagvad Gita VI30
FAITH IN THE LAW OF ETERNITY
Since God is infinite immanent and omnipresent soul
which is an integral and inalienable part of God is also
immortal The forms or objects of the world may change
but in reality they exist forever and are eternal Like
God soul is everlasting unborn undecaying and
undying Blake says
ldquoWhatever can be created can be annihilated
Forms can not
The oak is cut down by the axe the lamb falls by the knife
But their Form Eternal exists for everrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 38
The poet also believes that all sufferings of man if borne
meekly for a noble cause have their rich recompense
sooner or later for God being all-merciful would
certainly reward his suffering children He believes that
lsquoFor a tear is an intellectual thing
And a sigh is a sword of an angel king
And the bitter groan of a martyrrsquos woe
Is an arrow from the Almightyrsquos bowrsquo
Jerusalem
He believes that God Almighty holds out a solemn
promise of reward to sufferers for a lofty cause God
declares
lsquofear not Lo I am with thee always
Only believe in me that I have power to raise from deathrsquo
Jerusalem
MEANS OF LIBERATION
As the greatest and most inventive of Romantic
mythmakers Blake at first explores the contrary states
of human innocence and experience and then speaks of
lsquothe five gatesrsquo our mortal senses which bind us down to
the earth Not so much interested in the art of the
possible as in the visions of the beyond Blake
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 39
constructed a cosmic myth to show manrsquos infinite
potential and how he might attain to final liberation
from this sinful ephemeral world characterized by a
wheel of births and deaths He weaves his myths round
the fall and salvation of man the universal man and his
ultimate waking to eternal life In his poems lsquoMiltonrsquo and
lsquoJerusalemrsquo he regards Satan as the embodiment of
error selfhood and boundless pride and points out that
the means of liberation or freedom from the worldly
bondages lie in the annihilation of selfhood or ego and
the forgiveness of sins He exclaims lsquoI in my selfhood am that Satan I am that evil onersquo and resolves that he would
go down to self-annihilation In lsquoMiltonrsquo he puts the
following words into the mouth of Milton
lsquobut laws of Eternity
Are not such Know thou I come to self-annihilation
Such are the laws of Eternity that each shall mutually
Annihilate himself for others goodrsquo
Reiterating and stressing his poetic purpose or mission
of life Blake resolves
lsquoMine is to teach men to despise death and to go on
In fearless majesty of annihilating self
I come to discover before Heaven and Hell
the self righteousness in all its hypocritical turpitude
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 40
put off
In self-annihilation all that is not God alone
To put off self and all I have ever and everrsquo
Again in a sincere invocation to God Blake prays
lsquoO saviour pour upon me thy spirit of meekness and love
Annihilate the selfhood in me be thou all my life
Guide thou my hand which trembles exceedingly
Upon the rocks of agesrsquo
SPIRITUAL HUMANISM
Inspired by his implicit faith in Godrsquos fatherhood and
menrsquos brotherhood Blake preached the concept of
universal fraternity Considering the whole world as
one large family he maintained that all divisions and
fragmentations of humanity stemmed from manrsquos
ignorance of the eternal truth of one and only one
universal family The world being the home of mankind
all human beings are inextricably interwoven together
in the same warp and woof of life How beautifully has
this cosmopolitan philosophy of manrsquos eternal identity
with his fellow beings been enunciated in the following
memorable words
lsquoWe live as one man for contracting our infinite senses
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 41
We behold multitude or expanding
We behold as one Man all the universal family
and he is in us and we in him
Live in perfect harmony in Eden the land of life
Giving receiving and forgiving each otherrsquos trespassesrsquo
Elsewhere the poet says
lsquoThere is no other God than God
Who is the intellectual fountain of Humanity
I never made friends but by spiritual gifts
By severe contentions of friendship and the burning fire of thought
He who would see the divinity must see him in his children
So he who wishes to see a vision perfect whole
Must see it in its minute particulars organizedrsquo
Preaching universal brotherhood based on love
understanding and sacrifice he again exclaims (in the
words of Jesus)
lsquoWouldst thou live one who never died
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 42
For thee or ever die for one
Who had not died for thee
And if God died not for man and giveth not himself
Eternally for man
Man could not exist for man is love and God is love
Every kindness to another is a little death in the divine image
Nor can man exist but by brotherhoodrsquo
Jerusalem
Condemning man-made divisions of mankind into
various castes and creeds he says
lsquoAnd all must love the human form
In heathen Turk or Jew
Where mercy love and pity dwell
There God is dwelling toorsquo
The Divine Image
How truly are the poetrsquos ideas relevant even today when
the hot wind of doubt and distrust is blowing all over
the world (which has been broken up into fragments by
caste and creed clime and country) can be viewed in
the context of our age-old belief in the worship of God in
the universal form (Vishwaroop) and our religious and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 43
spiritual aspirations for ensuring the maximum good of
the world To serve humanity in a spirit of humility
impelled our people to look upon the world as one
great undivided family or nest (वHवनीड़म) and all men
as our brethren ndash (वसधव कटFबकम)
The ideal of universal brotherhood and selfless service
to humanity found spontaneous utterance in the
following moving words which embody the sublime
aim of a devout manrsquos life
न वह कामय रा0य न वगम ना पनभव
कामय दःख तSतानाम Dा13ण नामातनाशन
lsquoI do not desire earthly kingdom nor heaven nor do I want rebirth I want to reduce the sorrow of people who are sunk in sufferingrsquo
Today when the horizon of humanity is darkened by
national prejudices the need for spiritual humanism
synoptic vision and universal brotherhood is being
increasingly felt by one and all Here it is worthwhile to
turn our attention to great men whose thoughts
transcend myriad artificial barriers and teach us the
ideal of dedication to the common weal
Since truth transcends all religious dogmas and
disinterested service to mankind is a form of true
worship to God our great men have always prayed
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 44
सव भवत स13खनः सव सत नरामयाः
सव भWा13ण पHयत मा किHचX दःख भाYभवत
lsquoMay all be happy may all living beings be free from diseases may we perceive goodness in all and may none be struck with misfortunersquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 45
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
(7 April 1770 ndash 23 April 1850)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 46
WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
English Poet
Orphaned at age 13 Wordsworth attended Cambridge
University but he remained rootless and virtually
penniless until 1795 when a legacy made possible a
reunion with his sister Dorothy Wordsworth He
became friends with Samuel Taylor Coleridge with
whom he wrote Lyrical Ballads (1798) the collection
often considered to have launched the English Romantic
movement Wordsworths contributions include
Tintern Abbey and many lyrics controversial for their
common everyday language About 1798 he began
writing The Prelude (1850) the epic autobiographical
poem that would absorb him intermittently for the next
40 years His second verse collection Poems in Two Volumes (1807) includes many of the rest of his finest
works including Ode Intimations of Immortality His
poetry is perhaps most original in its vision of the
organic relation between man and the natural world a
vision that culminated in the sweeping metaphor of
nature as emblematic of the mind of God The most
memorable poems of his middle and late years were
often cast in elegaic mode few match the best of his
earlier works By the time he became widely
appreciated by the critics and the public his poetry had
lost much of its force and his radical politics had yielded
to conservatism In 1843 he became Englands poet
laureate He is regarded as the central figure in the
initiation of English Romanticism
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 47
CHAPTER TWO
VEDANTA IN WORDSWORTHrsquoS POETRY
In many of his famous poems among which Ode on Intimations of immortality and Lines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey occupy pride of place
William Wordsworth one of the greatest seer-poets of
English literature presents ideas which bear striking
similarity to the rich philosophical thought that found
unimpeded flow in our Vedantic literature
In fact there are so many echoes of Vedanta in the
poetry of Wordsworth that one is apt to conclude that
the poetrsquos lsquophilosophic mindrsquo must have led him to drink
deep at the unfailing springs of Upanishadic Helicon
A poet of nature Wordsworth was essentially lsquoa seer of spiritual realities a seer of the calm spirit in naturersquo and
his poetry at its best is a fine harmony of his spiritual
insight ethical sense and profundity of thought He is a
curious amalgam of the seer the poet and the reflective
moralist who dwells philosophically and even
prophetically on Nature Man and Cosmic Soul
The epithets lsquobest philosopherrsquo lsquomighty prophetrsquo and
lsquoseer blestrsquo which Wordsworth uses for the new-born
innocent child in his famous Ode may be well applied to
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 48
the poet himself for ldquovoyaging in strange seas of
thought alonerdquo Wordsworth had found lsquofull many a gem
of purest ray serenersquo which still shed undiminished
luster on the entire fabric of English poetry
A careful study of the Ode on Intimations of immortality Lines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey Ruth Laodamia To Cuckoo and other poems reveals that Wordsworthrsquos sustained
loftiness of thought had taken him to such heights that
on him (to quote his own words)
lsquo those truths do rest which we are toiling all our lives to findrsquo
What indeed are those truths Those are the elemental
truths of life which were keenly perceived realized and
expressed by the seers and savants of the East and
particularly of our Vedantic times A careful study of
Vedanta which is the aphoristic summary of the co-
ordinated Upanishads the Brahmasutras and the
Bhagvad Gita and is in fact the culmination of Indian
religion and Philosophical thought reveals that serious
scholars of the West drew freely upon it Wordsworthrsquos
poetry bears ample testimony to this fact because
numerous echoes of Vedanta can be easily heard in his
poetry
To cite a few comparative examples the Upanishads
assert in unambiguous terms that the whole universe of
names and forms the world of being and becoming
springs from Brahman (Supreme Godhead or Absolute
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 49
Cosmic Soul) ndash the eternal existence consciousness and
bliss Since the universe is the creation and
manifestation of Brahman it is also pervaded by Him
Naturally therefore only Brahman exists all else is non-
existent or illusory The Chhandogya Upanishad
declares lsquoBrahman is verily the Allrsquo God is the subtle
essence underlying phenomenal existence the whole
nature which is Godrsquos handiwork as well as Godrsquos
garment and is filled and inspired by God who is its
inner controller and soul
The immanence of God has been corroborated by
Brihadaranyak Upanishad in two passages the first
being in the form of an answer given by Yagnavalyak to
Uddalak Aruni
lsquoHe is immanent in fire in the intermundia in air in the heavens in the Sun in the quarters in the Moon in the stars in space in darkness in light in all beings in Prana in all things and within all things whom these things do not know whose body these things are who controls all these things from within He is thy soul the inner controller the immortal He is the unseen seer the unheard hearer the unthought thinker the ununderstood understander other than Him there is no seer other than Him there is no hearer other than Him there is no thinker other than Him there is no understander everything besides Him is naughtrsquo
Brihadaranyak Upanishad II7
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 50
In another passage Brihadaranyak Upanishad tells us
that God is the All ndash ldquoboth the formed and the formless the mortal and the immortal the stationary and the moving the this and thatHe is the verity of verities the soul of souls and He is the supreme verityrdquo
Brihadaranyak Upanishad IIV15
Wordsworth like these unique revelatory utterances of
the Upanishads codifies this truth in mystical manner in
Lines Composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey when he regards the Cosmic Soul as supreme power or
all-pervading presence
lsquoWhose dwelling is the light of setting Suns
And the round ocean and the living air
And the blue sky and in the mind of man
A motion and a spirit that impels
All thinking things all objects o all thought
And rolls through all thingsrsquo
Since God is All and everything else is Naught the world
is not real it is an appearance It is not the permanent
all-abiding Absolute Reality but a fleeting show and
ephemeral entity having seemingly phenomenal reality
In other words the world is lsquoshadow not substancersquo ndash it
is just a net-work of Maya
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 51
This Vedantic doctrine finds utterance not only in
Wordsworthrsquos poems like To the Cuckoo in which he
calls the earth ldquoan unsubstantial fairy placerdquo but he
seems to have actually experienced this illusory nature
of the world in states of mystic trance that often visited
him since his boyhood
In the introduction to his Ode on Intimations of Immortality he records such an experience in clear
terms
ldquoI was unable to think of external things as having external existence and I communed with all that I saw as something not apart from but inherent in my own immaterial nature Many a times while going to school have I grasped at a wall or tree to recall myself from the abyss of idealism to the realityrdquo
Such an ecstatic state of realizing eternal truths is
referred to in Lines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey as
lsquoThat blessed mod
In which the burden of the mystery
Of all this unintelligible world
Is lightenedrsquo
And finally to quote from the same poem
lsquoWe are laid asleep
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 52
In body and become a living soul
While with an eye made quiet by the power
Of harmony and the deep power of joy
We see into the life of thingsrsquo
One of the basic postulates of our Upanishadic
philosophy has been the idea of transmigration of soul
or faith in the cycle of births deaths and rebirths The
doctrine of transmigration has been explicitly advanced
in the Upanishads and particularly in the
Kathopanishad and Brihadaranyak Upanishad
In the Kathopanishad when the father of Nachiketas
told him that he had made him over to the god of Death
Nachiketas replied that it was no uncommon fate that
was befalling him
ldquoI indeed go at the head of many to the other world but I also go in the midst of many What is the god of Death going to do to me Look at our predecessors (who have already gone) look also at those who have succeeded them Man ripens like corn and like corn he is born againrdquo
Kathopanishad IV6
The Brihadaranyak Upanishad states the same truth
ldquoAnd as a caterpillar after reaching the end of a blade of grass finds another place of support and then draws itself towards it and as a goldsmith after taking a piece
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 53
of gold gives it another newer and more beautiful shape similarly does this Self after having thrown off this body and dispelled ignorance take on another newer and more beautiful form whether it be of one of the man or demi-god or god or of Prajapati or Brahman or of any other beingsrdquo
Brihadaranyak Upanishad IVIII5
The same truth appears in the Bhagvad Gita when Lord
Krishna says to the mentally agitated Arjuna
ldquoAs a man discarding worn-out clothes takes other new ones likewise the embodied soul casting off worn-out bodies enters into others which are newrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II22
And further Lord Krishna says to Arjuna
ldquoFor in that case the death of him who is born is certain and the rebirth of him who is dead is inevitablerdquo
Bhagvad Gita II27
Wordsworth in his famous Ode on Intimations of Immortality confirms his faith in the transmigration of
soul by saying in unmistakable terms
lsquoOur birth is but a sleep and a forgetting
The soul that rises with us our lifersquos star
Hath had elsewhere its setting
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 54
And cometh from afar
Not in entire forgetfulness
And not in utter nakedness
But trailing clouds of glory do we come
From God who is our homersquo
Again when Wordsworth laments the loss of pure
innocence immeasurable bliss and ecstatic vision of
early childhood in the great Ode and exclaims in
memorable words
lsquoWhither is fled the visionary gleam
Where is it now the glory and the dreamrsquo
He attributes the loss to the worldly intellectuality and
attachments as they grow upon man As childhood
grows into youth and youth into manhood the lsquovision splendidrsquo fades the first clear intimations of immortality
are dimmed leaving behind an unillumined waste of
mere thought and moralizing
lsquoAt length the Man perceives it die away
And fade into the light of common dayrsquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
The world of materialism or attachment tames him so
much so that man lsquothe little actorrsquo thinks
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 55
lsquoAs if his whole vocation
Were endless imitationrsquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
Whatever may be the crux of his philosophy of
childhood this belief of the poet can be safely traced
back to the comprehensive doctrine of the Maya in the
Upanishads and the Bhagvad Gita The Upanishads
tell us that the world is a delusion an appearance not
reality The Taittiriya Upanishad says ldquoAll beings spring from the Supreme Being are sustained by Him and return to the same Absolute at the time of dissolution Our life on earth is therefore a sojournrdquo The Isha Upanishad tells us that ldquothe truth is veiled in this universe by a vessel of gold and it invokes the grace of God to lift up the golden lid and allow the truth to be seenrdquo
It follows that our senses cloud our vision and lead us
farther and farther away from our spiritual moorings as
we come of age Senses dupe us and turn us into
worldlings Lord Krishna says to Arjuna in the Bhagvad Gita ldquoAs the wind carries away the barge upon the waters even so of the wandering senses the one to which the mind is joined takes away his discriminationrdquo
Thus the eternal and boundless Supreme Soul is as it
were limited by the sense organs and the body The
Universal Soul shackled by the body becomes the
individual soul (Paramatma becomes Jivatma) Because
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 56
of the presence of the Soul the spark of the Divine the
senses or sense-objects or worldly attractions fail to
dupe man fully from his divine mission This
metaphysical conviction finds expression in
Wordsworthrsquos Ode He says that though
lsquoShades of the prison-house begin to close
Upon the growing boy
But he beholds the light and whence it flows
He sees it in his joyrsquo
However farther man may go away from Nature ndash the manifestation of God and the indwelling Supreme Soul which resides in his own individual soul he can not
lsquoForget the glories he hath known
And that imperial palace whence he camersquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
Since bliss (Anand) is an inevitable attribute of God and
manrsquos soul being a fragment of Supreme Soul it
experiences the presence of God in moments of
Supreme Joy
Of the innumerable expressions in the Vedantic
literature of the joy of life of joy as the all entwining
principle of life and of creative principle of life and life
too the following passage from the Taittiriya Upanishad is very pertinent here
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 57
ldquoJoy is the Brahman from joy are born all living things by joy they are nourished towards joy they move and in joy they are absorbedrdquo Joy as the foundation of life
emanates from the Upanishad philosophy
Wordsworth seems to hold identical belief when he
craves for joy and laments its loss
lsquoO Joy that in our embers
Is something that doth live
That nature yet remembers
What was so fugitiversquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
The same idea finds expression in Lines composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey where Wordsworth
declares it as Naturersquos privilege lsquoto lead (us) from joy to joyrsquo
And lastly the classicus locus of the Upanishadic
philosophy is to be found in the idea of immortality of
soul In the Chhandogya and Mundak Upanishads and
above all in the Kathopanishad we find numerous
references to the immortality of the soul We are told in
a passage of Kathopanishad lsquothat while we are dwelling in this body on earth we can visualize that Atman (Soul) as in a mirror that is contrariwise left being to the right and right being to the leftrsquo In the Bhagvad Gita also
Lord Krishna tells Arjuna about the immortality of Soul
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 58
ldquoThis soul is never born nor dies it exists on coming into being for it is unborn eternal everlasting and primeval even though the body is slain the soul is notrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II20
He further says
ldquoFor this soul is incapable of being cut it is proof against fire impervious to water and undriable as well This soul is eternal omnipresent immovable constant and everlastingrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II24
Wordsworth seems to have been fully convinced of this
philosophia perennis of the Vedanta when he eulogizes
immortality by addressing the child in his Ode in the
following words
lsquoThou over whom thy immortality
Broods like the day
A Master over a slave
A presence which is not to be put byrsquo
The poet in speaking of the lsquotruths that wake to perish neverrsquo seems to be reminiscent of the Upanishadic
concept that freed from the trammels of the body the
individual soul loses itself in the All-Soul when he
declares in the rapture
lsquoOur souls have sight of that immortal sea
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 59
Which brought us hither
Can in a moment travel thitherrsquo
Ode on intimations of Immortality
Tracing the expression and confirmation of many other
tenets of Vedanta in the poetry of William Wordsworth
forms an interesting literary venture and instances of
close affinity between the Vedantic doctrines and
Wordsworthrsquos ideas may be multiplied Such a
comparative study proves that eternal truths transcend
the barriers of clime or country time or space and shine
through all ages and in all lands We should draw moral
sustenance from them and live a fuller freer life
Even today the wise all over the world maintain a
remarkable identity of views and their thoughts foster
international understanding
ldquoFrom hand to hand the greeting flows
From eye to eye the signals run
From heart to heart the bright hope glows
The seekers of light are onerdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 60
ST COLERIDGE
(21 October 1772 ndash 25 July 1834)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 61
ST COLERIDGE
English Poet Critic and Philosopher
Coleridge studied at the University of Cambridge where
he became closely associated with Robert Southey In
his poetry he perfected a sensuous lyricism that was
echoed by many later poets Lyrical Ballads (1798 with
William Wordsworth) containing the famous Rime of
the Ancient Mariner and Frost at Midnight heralded
the beginning of English Romanticism Other poems in
the ldquofantasticalrdquo style of the Mariner include the
unfinished Christabel and the celebrated Pleasure
Dome of Kubla Khan While in a bad marriage and
addicted to opium he produced Dejection An Ode
(1802) in which he laments the loss of his power to
produce poetry Later partly restored by his revived
Anglican faith he wrote Biographia Literaria 2 vol
(1817) the most significant work of general literary
criticism of the Romantic period Imaginative and
complex with a unique intellect Coleridge led a restless
life full of turmoil and unfulfilled possibilities
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 62
CHAPTER THREE
COLERIDGErsquoS SPIRITUAL QUEST AND INDIAN THOUGHT
INTRODUCTION
Coleridge was by all accounts a genius par excellence
whose versatility flowed albeit impeded in diverse
channels of creativity such as metaphysics poetry
theology and literary criticism Of all the Romantic poets
he possessed the most fertile and powerful imagination
which earned for him a special place in English poetry
and philosophical thought In the words of William
Hazlitt lsquohe had angelic wings and fed on mannarsquo He had
a lsquoseminal mindrsquo which said William Wordsworth
lsquothrew out a series of grand central truthsrsquo We find in
him the poet the philosopher and the theologian rolled
in one Charles Lamb called him lsquoLogician Metaphysician Bardrsquo whose poetry and writings are
tinged with a magical and ethereal quality His thought
made a permanent landmark on the succeeding
generations of English men of letters for he explored the
mysterious working of human mind
His life presents a saga of sharp contrast between
reality and dream blissful confidence and broken
hopes the warmth of human ties and the solitude of
haunted soul He probed human thought and dilemma
with a rare prophetic insight A prodigious thinker and
sincere seeker of truth he once remarked ldquoI would compare the Human Soul to a shiprsquos crew cast on an
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 63
Unknown Islandrdquo His particular fascination for the
unknown drew him instinctively to the German
transcendental or idealistic school of philosophy
represented by Berkeley Kant Schelling and Fichte
Fired by a peculiar mystic idealism he tried to interpret
the lsquoInterruptionrsquo of the spiritual world and beheld the
unseen with an uncommon eye which looked into the
void and found it peopled with lsquopresencesrsquo To him the
universe was lsquoebullient with creative deityrsquo and was
pervaded by lsquoan organizing surgersquo of vital energies
which emanate directly from God He was indeed an
inspired idealist who laid mystical insistence upon the
immanence and transcendence of God
Endowed with a rare penetrating mind Coleridge
ransacked works of comparative religions and
mythology and arrived at the conclusion that all
religious faiths and mythical traditions agree on the
unity of God and immortality of Soul His constant
intellectual search for truth led him to visionary
interests and universal life consciousness expressed
through the phenomena of human agencies Throughout
his intellectual career he remained a visionary and
philosophical mystic who valued a discreet and proper
exercise of the intellect Since his most serious concern
had been philosophy as a continuous trial for self-
education he wrote ldquodoubts rushed in broke upon me from the fountains of the great deep and fell from the windows of heavenrdquo For him lsquoreligionrsquo as both the
cornerstone and keystone of morality must have a
moral origin and a great poet should be lsquoa profound Metaphysician seeking for truth beauty and salvationrsquo In
one of those radiant moments when the poet the
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 64
metaphysician and the theologian of hope are one he
throws light on the process how truth works out in life
ldquoTruth considered in itself and in the effects natural to it may be conceived as a gentle spring or water source warm from the genial earth and breathing up into the snow drift that is piled over and around its outlet It turns the obstacle into its own form and character and as it makes its way increases its streamand arrested in its courseit suffers delay not loss and waits only to awaken and again roll onwardsrdquo
His description of a mystic as one who wanders into an
oasis or garden lsquoat leisure in its maze of Beauty and Sweetness and thirds (sic) his way through the odorous and flowering Thickets into open Spots of Greeneryrsquo (Aids to Reflection) is reminiscent of his own mysticism and
refers to the lsquoenfolding sunny spots of greeneryrsquo in his
famous poem Kubla Khan
Profoundly impressed by the German Idealist Schelling
whose idealistic school of thought dwelt on speculation
concerning the lsquoAbsolutersquo Coleridge viewed lsquomythrsquo as
primordial expression of elemental truths including the
Divine transcendence Inspired by his Biblical studies he
regarded self-consciousness as lying at the centre of his
philosophical and theological thought In Lay Sermons
he says ldquoSelf which then only is when for itself it hath ceased to be Even so doth Religion finitely expresses the unity of the Infinite Spirit by being a total act of the Soulrdquo
For him the lsquoinner lightrsquo is identical with the indwelling
glorious God and life is but lsquoa vision shadowy of Truthrsquo Attributing the pageant of life and the beauty and
splendor of the world to the immanence of Cosmic Soul
(God) he exclaims
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 65
ldquoAh From the soul itself must issue forth
A light a glory a fair luminous cloud
Enveloping the earthrdquo
Dejection An Ode
And again he says ldquoNature is the art of GodThe true system of natural philosophy places the sole reality of things in an Absolute which is at once causa sui effectus in the absolute identity of subject and object which it calls NatureIn this sense lsquowe see all things in Godrsquo is a strict philosophical truthrdquo
Coleridge firmly believed in the essential unity of God as
Absolute which is the creative foundation of the finite
universe and which distinguishes God from creation
He in the spirit of Vedanta stresses the immanence of
God in all and all in God in his famous poem Frost at Midnight Addressing his son he says
ldquoso shalt thou see and hear
The lovely shapes and sound intelligible
Of that eternal language which thy God
Utters who from eternity doth teach
Himself in all and all things in Himselfrdquo
In order to learn this lsquolanguagersquo Coleridge himself
became a lsquovisionaryrsquo lsquoprophetrsquo or lsquoseerrsquo The idea of
Himself (God) in all and all (creation) in Himself or the
concept that there is God in all things and all things are
things are closely interlinked with God bears a striking
resemblance to our age-old Vedic thought In
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 66
consonance with Indian thought Coleridge underscores
the identity of God (Brahman) with the individual soul
(Jivatma) and regards the universe as the reflection or
manifestation of God The seer he says is one who sees
God the creator in all creation and all creation as the
embodiment of God This according to him is the lesson
that God in His eternal language lsquouttersrsquo and doth teach
from eternity
The inherent oneness and sole identity of Brahman
(God) with the universe is a basic postulate of our
Vedanta and as such Coleridgersquos emphasis on the lsquoUnity of infinite Spiritrsquo bears a close identity with the Indian
philosophy The Oneness of God and the universe has
time and again been stressed in our Vedas and other
scriptures It would be pertinent to cite a few instances
here While the Chhandogya Upanishad describes
Brahman as lsquoOne only without a secondrsquo other
Upanishadic texts contain identical statements such as
lsquoHe is Onersquo and lsquoOne Lordrsquo The opening line of
Ishopanishad declares Godrsquos oneness and His universal
presence in unequivocal terms
ldquoUnderstand all this universe as inhabited by Lord
Each moving thing in this moving worldrdquo
Ishopanishad I
And again the same Upanishad says
ldquoThe wise man who perceives all beings as not distinct from his own self at all and his own Self as the self of every being ndash he does not by virtue of that perception hate any onerdquo
Ishopanishad VI
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 67
The same truth has been expressed in the Bhagvad Gita wherein Lord Krishna tells Arjuna
ldquoHe who sees Me (the Universal Self) present in all beings and all beings existing within Me never loses sight of Me and I never lose sight of himrdquo
Bhagvad Gita VI30
Or again
ldquoHe alone truly sees who sees the Supreme Lord as imperishable and abiding equally in all perishable beings both animate and inanimaterdquo
Bhagvad Gita XIII26
And Lord Krishna says again
ldquoThere is nothing else besides Me O Arjuna
Like clusters of yarn-beads formed by knots on a thread
All this (Universe) threaded on Me (God)
As are pearls on stringsrdquo
Bhagvad Gita VII7
THE DOCTRINE OF KARMA (CAUSE amp EFFECT)
Coleridge seems to subscribe sincerely to the Indian
doctrine of Karma which is based on the law of
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 68
Causation or cause and effect In other words Karmavad
stresses poetic justice or law of life ie virtue is
rewarded and vice is punished Since one must reap the
fruits of his good and bad deeds in life it is axiomatic
truth that lsquoas one sows so shall he reaprsquo In Sanskrit
there is a verse which says ldquoOne must bear the consequences of his good and bad deedsrdquo The echoes of
this doctrine could be distinctly heard in his poetry and
particularly in his greatest poem Rime of Ancient Mariner as also Dejection An Ode where he affirms
ldquoO Lady We receive but what we give
And in our life alone doth Nature liverdquo
So strong was his belief in the doctrine of Karma that in
a letter dated 14th October 1797 to his friend Thirlwell
he tells him how fatalistic his philosophy of life is
ldquoand at other times I adopt the Brahman
creed and say ndash lsquoit is better to sit than to stand it is better to lie than to sit it is better to sleep than wake but death is the best of allrsquordquo
His Ancient Mariner serves as an exhaustive
exposition of the law of Nemesis which works surely
but rather imperceptively in human life The poem is a
myth about a dark and troubling crisis in the human
soul It is actually a tale of crime which is due to
perversity of human will Crime is against Nature
Humanity and God He touches equally on guilt and
remorse suffering and relief hate and forgiveness and
grief and joy The marinerrsquos action shows the essential
frivolity of crimes against humanity and the ordered
system of the world and he deserves punishment for his
guilt Spirits are transformed into the powers who
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 69
watch over the good and evil actions of men and requite
them with appropriate rewards and punishments Since
the mariner has committed a hideous act of wantonly
and recklessly killing the albatross which was hailed in
Godrsquos name as if it had been a Christian soul he must
bear the punishment of life-in-death The killing of the
bird marks the breaking of bond between Man and
Nature and consequently the mariner becomes
spiritually dead When he blesses the water-snakes
even unawares it is a psychic rebirth ndash a rebirth that
must happen to all men
The mariner will never be the man that he once was He
has his special past and his special doom His sense of
guilt will end only with his death The Ancient Mariner
is a myth of a guilty soul and marks the passage from
crime through punishment and possible redemption in
the world So the poem is an allegory of redemption and
regeneration It is indeed a vivid representation or
living symbolization of universal psychic experience
The abiding fascination of the poem is that it is a
fragment of a psychic life It does not state a result it
symbolizes a process
Coleridge adds a moral ndash that the mariner is ndash to teach
by his example love and reverence to all things that God
made and loveth He advocates a sound moral
philosophy of life which extends human sympathy and
love to the animal world He affirms
ldquoHe prayeth well who loveth well
Both man and bird and beast
He prayeth best who loveth best
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 70
All things both great and small
For the dear God who loveth us
He made and loveth allrdquo
Rime of Ancient Mariner
PHILOSOPHICAL MYSTICISM AND lsquoTHE VISION OF GODrsquo
Coleridgersquos longing for the lsquounnamable somethingrsquo and
his abiding interest in conveying something of the
enigmatic perception of Godhead as a religious
experience carved for him a special place in the history
of ideas as a Christian poet and philosopher In a
predominantly mythological age he took serious
interest in the Biblical studies and drew upon the
central Christian image of Paradise as a walled garden
and the vision of God as a symbolizing that
transcendent numinous reality which the soul
inchoately and consciously seeks and strives for The
medieval image of the walled garden (paradise) as the
heavenly city (locus of God) is a symbol of divine
transcendence of that which is lsquobeyond beingrsquo This rich
image (of the walled garden) as an eminently
appropriate image of Godrsquos transcendence was used as
such by Church Fathers and also by the 15th century
Christian Platonist Nicholas of Cusa whose book The Vision of God is a paradigm of speculative mysticism
which informs Coleridgersquos metaphysics and much of his
poetry Taking inspiration from Nicholas of Cusarsquos book
The Vision of God Coleridge found it in close affinity to
his own genuinely philosophical mysticism
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 71
Coleridgersquos interest in the Vision of God is in a purely
visionary mystical tradition and his most visionary
poem Kubla Khan bears ample testimony to his
insistence upon life as lsquoa vision shadowy of Truthrsquo His
conviction in the lsquoImago Deirsquo (vision of God) is an
obvious link with the hoary mystical tradition which lay
at the heart of his philosophical and mystical thought
He maintains that the mind of man is a bridge to the
vision of God but by no means its fulfillment He says
ldquoThe vision and faculty divine is the participation of humanity in the Divinerdquo He however further maintains
throughout his intellectual career the conviction in the
reflection or bending back of the soul from the sensual
to the intelligible realm For him Christianity is an lsquoawful recalling of the drowsed soul from dreams and phantom world of sensuality to actual Realityrsquo
On the idea of reawakening he says
ldquoThe moment when the Soul begins to be sufficiently self-conscious to ask concerning itself and its relations is the first moment of its intellectual arrival into the world Its being ndash enigmatic as it must seem ndash is posterior to its existencerdquo
Collected Notes
In a recent study of Coleridge Prof Douglas Headley of
Cambridge University declares ldquoHe is best described as an essentially speculative and mystical philosopher-theologian His was a theology inspired by those Church Fathers who emphasize the vision of God as an intellectual contemplation (speculari) of the transcendent Absolute the prius of all beingrdquo Since the
mystic tradition follows a supersensuous perception
the vision of God is fundamentally lsquoVisio-intuitivarsquo ndash
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 72
intuitive or intellectual vision Coleridge expresses such
a state of mind when he says
ldquoMy mind feels as if it ached to behold and know something great something One and Indivisible and it is only in the faith of this that rocks or waterfalls mountains or caverns give me the sense of sublimity or majesty But in this faith all things counterfeit Infinityrdquo
Since the sublime enlarges and inspires the Soul to
aspire for the Divine it impresses him with the
fundamental Oneness of God and a universal vision
which he hints at in his Religious Musings as under
ldquoThere is One mind One omnipresent mind
His most holy name is Love
Truth of subliming import
lsquoTis sublime in man
Our noontide majesty to know ourselves
Parts and portions of one wondrous wholerdquo
These passages recall to our mind the famous mantra
(verse) of the Yajurveda where the mystic realization
or the direct experience of the Supreme by a Vedic sage
has been beautifully described in terms of his personal
knowledge of the Divine He says
ldquoI have known this sun-coloured Mighty Being
Refulgent as the sun beyond darkness
By knowing Him alone one transcends death
There is no other way to gordquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 73
Yajurveda XXXI18
ldquoI have realized it I have known itrdquo not that I just
believe in it and all else can also realize it This is not the
expression of an opinion but the statement of an
experience Commenting on this verse Sri Aurobindo
says
ldquoThis is one of the grandest utterances in the worldrsquos spiritual literature for it marks the emanation of this Being from across the darkness into our world so that something of the sun colour may come into our dull heads and dim heartsrdquo
Coleridge seems to be in complete agreement with our
own Indian mysticism which owes its origin to the
Vedas wherein the knowledge of the Divine or the
Ultimate Reality (Brahman) has been regarded not as a
process of philosophical thought but as a direct
experience in the depth of the human soul For him the
divine vision is possible in that spiritual meditation
transformation of intellectual rapture in which all
discursive thought is fully sublimated According to him
the lsquovisio intuitivarsquo is the culmination of all knowledge ndash
sensus-ratio-intellectus and is in conjunction with the
concept of Imago Dei In order to see that which not an
object is ie God the human mind must put aside its own
discursive differentiating reflection ndash spiritus altissimus rationis ndash which guards the walls of the garden of
paradise lsquobeyondrsquo which dwells God The highest
transformation or sublimation of conscience can ensure
an intuitive vision of God and in accordance with the
maxim ndash Simile Simili ndash the mind then becomes like its
object by divesting itself of difference in order to
experience the Absolute Reality Says Coleridge
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 74
ldquoAn Immense Being does strongly fill the soul and Omnipotency Omnisciency and Infinite Goodness do enlarge and dilate the Spirit while it fixtly looks upon them They raise strong passions of Love and Admiration which melt our Nature and transform it into the mould and imagery that which we can contemplaterdquo
Notebooks
Mysticism is thus the subtle path of spiritual realization
of That Reality or Divine Presence which has been
described in our Vedic texts as (lying hidden in a cave shrouded in secrecy) God is one One beyond all
diversities In Him all contradictions and conflicts meet
and dissolve through the spiritual transformation of the
lsquoseerrsquo or lsquomysticrsquo whose soul rises above the bewildering
trammels and distortions of life and seeks unity with all
in the unity with One To such an enlightened seer life
becomes an unceasing adventure from unreality to
reality from ephemerality to eternity from the human
to the Divine One who realizes the Divine as the One
(without parallel) loving Lord finds the whole universe
united in Him Such a significantly mystical experience
finds a memorable expression in the following verse of
the Yajurveda where the sage named Vena beholds
such a divine vision
ldquoThe loving sage (Vena) beholds that Mysterious Existence
Wherein the universe comes to have One home (nest)
Therein unites and therefore issues the whole
The Lord is the warp and woof in the Created beingsrdquo
Yajurveda XXXII8
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 75
A careful analysis of the above-quoted passage reveals
all the main elements of mysticism viz
(i) Divinity is a subject of personal spiritual
experience
(ii) The ultimate conception of Divinity is a
mystery symbolically expressed as
गहानCहतम
(iii) The abstract conception of the Divine as an
Essence or Existence is symbolized by a
neuter singular तत and
(iv) The whole universe is united in love as birds
in a nest एकनीड़ or men in a home वसधव कटFबक
To sum up wise men the world over hold almost
identical views on vital matters of human life such as
the mystery of existence soul and oversoul (God) Truth
is verily One as God is one but the pathways to reach it
are very many The ancient Rig Veda proclaims एक सद वDा बहधा वदित ndash ldquoTruth is one sages call it by various namesrdquo In our own times Swami Ram Krishna
Paramhansa said यतोमत तथोपथ ndash as many religions
so many pathways And what the Spanish litteacuterateur
and thinker states as lsquouniversal truthrsquo is equally
applicable to the philosophy and poetry of Coleridge
ldquoA deep faith in life cannot but be spiritual even if only partially spiritualThe path of Truth may not be a path of parallel lines but a path that follows one circle by going to the right and climbing the circle or by going to the left and climbing the circle we are bound to meet at the top although we started in apparently
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 76
contrary directions This is bound to be in the end because Truth is onerdquo
In Charles Lambrsquos words Coleridge lsquohad been on the confines of the next world he had a hunger for Eternityrsquo The truth of this statement is abundantly
borne out by Coleridgersquos sincere effort for the
reconciliation of the ration with transcendental belief
He closes his Biographia Literaria which symbolizes
his spiritual voyage with the following words
ldquoIt is night sacred night The upraised eyes views suns of other worlds only to preserve the soul steady and collected in its pure act of inward adoration to the great I Am and to the filial word that re-affirmeth from eternity to eternity whose choral is the universerdquo
As a true metaphysician Coleridgersquos whole being
pulsated with a passionate and unceasing search for
truth Here indeed was a spiritual aspirant and seeker
who in his own words had lsquotraced the fount whence streams of nectar flowrsquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 77
LORD BYRON
(22 January 1788 ndash 19 April 1824)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 78
LORD BYRON
British Romantic Poet and Satirist
Born with a clubfoot and extremely sensitive about it
he was 10 when he unexpectedly inherited his title and
estates Educated at Cambridge he gained recognition
with English Bards and Scotch Reviewers (1809) a satire
responding to a critical review of his first published
volume Hours of Idleness (1807) At 21 he embarked on
a European grand tour Childe Harolds Pilgrimage
(1812ndash18) a poetic travelogue expressing melancholy
and disillusionment brought him fame while his
complex personality dashing good looks and many
scandalous love affairs with women and with boys
captured the imagination of Europe Settling near
Geneva he wrote the verse tale The Prisoner of Chillon
(1816) a hymn to liberty and an indictment of tyranny
and Manfred (1817) a poetic drama whose hero
reflected Byrons own guilt and frustration His greatest
poem Don Juan (1819ndash24) is an unfinished epic
picaresque satire in ottava rima Among his numerous
other works are verse tales and poetic dramas He died
of fever in Greece while aiding the struggle for
independence making him a Greek national hero
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RP DWIVEDI Page 79
CHAPTER FOUR
BYRON A BLEND OF CLAY AND SPARK
INTRODUCTION
Byron whom Goethe regarded as lsquothe greatest genius of the centuryrsquo and whom Carlyle considered as the noblest
spirit in Europe was one of the most remarkable men
during the 19th Century which was characterized by
liberal optimism He was unquestionably a potent and
force and cause of change in the intellectual outlook and
socio-political structure of his time His colourful figure
his charismatic personality and satiric poetry captured
the imagination of the whole continent As the most
influential English poet he stands out as an important
figure in the history of ideas Representative of a new
age he was the supreme voice which the European
poets recognized for ldquohe put into poetry something that belonged to many men in his time and he was the pioneer of a new outlook and a new art He set his mark on a whole generation and his fame rang from one end of Europe to anotherrdquo
Renowned as the ldquogloomy egoistrdquo he was a sinister yet
great influence in the Romantic Movement His deepest
romantic melancholy his satiric realism and his
aspiration for political realism earned for him such a
wide acclaim that his name became a symbol for all the
great events of his day Commenting on his pervasive
influence Calvert says ndash ldquoIt is impossible not to take Byron seriously and it is disastrous to take him literallyrdquo
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RP DWIVEDI Page 80
A REBEL EXTRAORDINAIRE
Byron was a born rebel Essentially a child of
Revolution his poetry breathes a unique spirit of
revolutionary idealism ldquoI was born for oppositionrdquo he
once remarked and added ldquobeing of no party I shall offend all partiesrdquo Describing him as an aristocratic
rebel Bertrand Russell said
ldquoThe aristocratic rebel of whom Byron was in his day the exemplar is a very different typesuch rebels have philosophy which requires some greater change than their own personal success In their conscious thought there is criticism of the government of the world which takes the form of Titanic Cosmic self-assertion or those who retain some superstition of Satanism Both are to be found in Byron The aristocratic philosophy of rebellionhas inspired a long series of revolutionary movements from the fall of Napoleon to Hitlerrsquos coup in 1933it has inspired a corresponding manner of thought and feeling among intellectuals and artistsrdquo
Byron felt the wild storm of nations akin to the storm
within his own heart and the ruin but the picture of his
own life In his unqualified individualism he takes up an
attitude of hostility towards society Even God appears
to him mirrored in the stormy face of the angry ocean
ldquoThou glorious mirror
Of the Image of Eternityrdquo
He wished to stir the oppressed to revolt and get rid of
tyrants
ldquoFor I will teach if possible the stones
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RP DWIVEDI Page 81
To rise against earthrsquos tyranny Never let it
Be said that we will truckle into thrones
By ye ndash our childrenrsquos children I think how we
Showed that things were before the world was freerdquo
Don Juan VIIICXXXV4-8
ldquoI have simplified my policiesrdquo wrote he ldquointo a detestation of all existing governmentsrdquo His was the
most dreaded voice of all the revolutionary poets of the
world His voice was the peal of revolutionary thunder
his poetry was the message of the revolutionary forces
He stood as the greatest symbol of a violent and
dreadful revolution
CHAMPION OF LIBERTY
He was essentially a poet of liberty His greatest ideal in
life was how to fight against the forces of tyranny
restriction aggression and enslaving of workers by
puissant exploiters Liberty was an essential part of the
Byronic creed In fact his entire poetic work is
interspersed with some of the finest poetry in praise of
freedom for mankind He composed much splendid
verse for love of freedom His passion for personal
freedom covers national freedom also and the political
freedom in the form of national self-determination
particularly for Italy and Greece He remarks in his
diary of 1821 ldquoDifficulties are the hotbeds of high spirits and Freedom the mother of the new virtues incident to human naturerdquo
Identifying himself completely with the cause of Italy
and Greece he wrote ldquoI shall not fall backbut
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 82
onward It is now the time to act and what signifies ldquoSelfrdquo if a single spark of that which would be worthy of the past can be bequeathed unquenchably to the future It is not one man nor a million but the spirit of liberty which must be spreadrdquo In his Ode to Chillon Castle he characteristically exclaimed
ldquoEternal spirit of the chainless Mind
Brightest in dungeons Liberty thou art
For there thy habitation is the heart
The heart which love of Thee alone bind
And when thy sons to fetters are consignrsquod
To fetters and damp vaultsrsquo dayless gloom
And Freedomrsquos fame finds winds on every windrdquo
Love of liberty lay at the centre of his being and
determined what was best in him ndash belief in individual
liberty and his hatred of tyranny and constraints
whether exercised by individuals or societies Liberty
was an ideal a driving power a summons to make the
best of certain possibilities in him He insisted to be free
and maintained that other men must be free too
Opposition was an integral element in his basic attitude
revolt both personal and social was his forte Love of
freedom is built into the capricious structure of Childe Harold and Don Juan
HIS POLITICAL AND COSMOPOLITAN LIBERALISM
He grew in an atmosphere in which political reaction
against revolutionary ideals was victorious all over
Europe Byron was essentially a liberal by conviction
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RP DWIVEDI Page 83
and could hardly bear the perception of liberals Though
he loved his native country yet he had a large vision for
the freedom and welfare of all nations The excitement
of political liberalism stirred on behalf of the Greeks
against the oppression of their Turkish overlords made
him a symbol of disinterested patriotism and a Greek
national hero The first two cantos of Child Harold are
tinctured with historical and typographical material as
also the appearance of the Byronic hero with his
exhortations to the degenerate Greeks and Spaniards to
remember their glorious past and arise They contain
Byronrsquos passionate feelings for Greece which was to see
the beginning as it was to see the end of his active life
His Faustian daemonic figure and his defiant
resentment of authority found an appropriate object in
the political sphere
His last journey and his death at Missolonghi in the
cause of Greek independence proves in him the moving
combination of nobility futility and romantic or heroic
panache In the words of Graham Hough lsquoBut for once Byron was on the winning side he died but his cause triumphed and he remains one of its heroes For the whole of the 19th Century he remained a portent and a symbol whom it was possible to worship or to condemn but never to neglectrsquo
A MAN OF ACTION
Action remains at the centre of his life and at last he
gladly seized the opportunity when it presented itself in
Greece Leaving poetry behind himself he took a heroic
resolution in favour of action rather than
contemplation He presents a rare example of fusion
between the active and the reflective lsquofor his was the romanticism of actionrsquo The moralist in the garb of the
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 84
pre-romantic rebel hero of the Childe Harold is cast
aside in Don Juan and the moralist in the somber garb
turns dandy in which moral judgment seems to be
ineffective Quite logically he finally abandons literature
for the field of moral action At last Byron flung himself
off into the world of action The dandy finds at last that
such a death even if it is on the sickbed and not the
battlefield is the only gesture untouched by futility ldquoIt is not enough that art perpetrates life life also must complete artrdquo WB Yeats rightly says ldquoone feels that he (Byron) is a man of action made writer by accidentrdquo
Byron did not regard writing as an end in itself on the
contrary he was several times on the point of giving up
writing He had always before him the hope of some
more active life and felt a certain mistrust for the purely
literary life He asserted ldquowho would write who had anything better to do Action- action I say and not writing Least of all rhymerdquo In a letter to Murray
he wrote ldquoYou will see that I shall do something or otherthat like the cosmogony or creation of the world will puzzle the philosophers of all agesrdquo He was
fully alive to the persistent sense both of human
aspirations and the ceaseless flux of eternity and also
knew that he would not fade into oblivion Said he
ldquoBut at the last I have shunned the common shore
And leaving land far out of sight would skim
The ocean of Eternityrdquo
And again he said
ldquoFor the sword outwears its sheath
And the soul wears out the breastrdquo
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RP DWIVEDI Page 85
HIS ROMANTIC SELF-PORTRAITURE
Byron presents manrsquos mixed and imperfect nature His
personality is a queer blend of flesh and spirit
meanness and nobility clay and spark cause and effect
The lasting fascination of his personality despite his bad
temper careless arrogance the excesses the satiety
melancholy and restlessness owes much to Splendour Primier of Miltonrsquos Satan who is ldquomajestic though in ruinrdquo and the gloom and brutality of the heroes of the
novel of terror His exotic sensibility ranging passions
and sensual perversity take refuge in a sort of ldquoCosmic Satanismrdquo He draws of himself a sketch which
reproduces in a dim outline the somber portrait of his
idealized self in the famous stanzas of Lara
ldquoIn him inexplicably mixed appeared
Much to be loved and hated sought and feared
X X X X X X
A hater of his kind
X X X X X X
There was in him a vital scorn of all
As if the worst had fallen which could befall
An erring spirit
X X X X X X
And fiery passions that had poured their wrath
In hurried desolation over his path
And left the better feeling all at strife
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RP DWIVEDI Page 86
In wild reflection over his stormy liferdquo
And the Giaour (hiding his sinister path beneath a
monkrsquos gown) also portrays Byron
ldquoA noble soul and lineage high
Alas though bestowed in vain
Which Grief could change and Guilt could stainrdquo
HIS CREDO
Despite all his self-mockery and arrogant egoism he had
a star (vision) and he followed it sincerely He was not
without guiding principles and his heroic death in the
cause of Greek independence shows that he was not an
actor but a soldier a man of affairs and a master of men
Keenly aware of something special in him he wished to
realize his powers and translate them into facts He
wished to be true to himself He had a keen appreciation
of the dignity and personal liberty of man
HIS FATAL TRUTH
Even though he disagreed with the moral code of his
age he had his own values He thought that truthfulness
is a permanent virtue and duty and so did not want to
compromise with conventions nor hide behind cant
Despite many ordeals and his own corroding skepticism
he speaks seriously and directly about his convictions
and presents them with irony satire and mockery Don Juan is a racy commentary on life and manners and is a
record of a remarkable personality ndash a poet and a man
of action a dreamer and a wit a great lover and a great
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 87
hater a Whig noble and a revolutionary democrat The
paradoxes of his nature are fully reflected in Don Juan which itself is a romantic epic and a realistic satire He
was full of many romantic longings but tested them by
truth and reality He remained faithful only to those
which meant so much to him that he could not live
without them
Praising Byron Nietzsche says ldquoMan may bleed to death through the truth that he recognizesrdquo Byron expressed
this in his immortal lines
ldquoSorrow is knowledge they who know the most
Must mourn the deepest over the fatal truth
The tree of knowledge is not that of linerdquo
A BELIEVER IN GOD AND IMMORTALITY OF SOUL
Full of snobbery and rebellion as he was Byron was not
altogether without lofty ideals and religious beliefs He
firmly believed in the immanence and transcendence of
God and the transience of human glory His implicit faith
in the immortality of human soul the ephemerality of
physical body and his unwavering trust in God ndash the
eternal Light of Lights is evident from his following
memorable lines
ldquobut this clay will sink
Its spark immortal envying it the light
To which it mounts as if to break the link
That keeps us from yon heaven which woos us to its brinkrdquo
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RP DWIVEDI Page 88
Childe Harold III13-14
His Childe Haroldrsquos pilgrimage is a lament for lost
empire decay of love and triumph of love over human
mortality His lsquovoyage pittoresquersquo is full of historic and
didactic meditations and his oceanic image illustrates
the truism that nothing is constant but the rhythmic
pattern of its flux In the end all things float and toss on
that Great Ocean of which man is the foam and the
historic events are billows
ldquoBetween two worlds life hovers like a starrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquothe eternal surge
Of time and tide rolls on and bears afar our bubbles
while the graves
Of Empires heave but like some passing wavesrdquo
Don Juan XVI99
He maintains throughout his major poetic works a
sense of the presence of God or the gods and often
employs supernatural machinery to substantiate his
concept
IMMORTALITY OF SOUL
He had complete faith in the immortality of soul Said
he ldquoof the immortality of the soul it appears to me that there can be little doubtit acts also so very independent of bodyHuman passions have probably disfigured the divine doctrines Man is born passionate of body but an innate thought secret
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 89
tendency to the love of God is his mainspring of mind But God helps us allMan is eternal always changing but reproducedEternity Eternalrdquo
Again on his belief in God he says ldquoI sometimes think that man may be relic of some higher materialcreation must have had an origin and a creator for a creator is a more natural imagination than a fortuitous concourse of atoms All things remount to a fountain though they may flow to an oceanrdquo He knew
the limitations and ephemerality of phenomenal
existence He exclaims
ldquoFor I wish to know
What after all are all thingsbut a showrdquo
Unable to explore the stars with scientific aid he takes
up poesy to embark across the ocean of Eternity
ldquoI wish to do much by Poesyrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoBut at least I have shunned the common
And leaving land far out of sight would skim
The Ocean of Eternityrdquo
According to him man accepts the eternal voyage but
since man is not himself unlimited the boat capsizes in
the deep
ldquoAnd swimming long in the abyss of thought
Is apt to tire
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 90
For the fall entails not only ignorance and weakness but Human mortalityrdquo
Disconcerted with mankind he turns to the placid
spectacle of Nature and feels his spirit merge into its
objects
ldquoI live not in myself but I become
Portion of that around me and to me
High mountains are a feeling
When the soul can flee
And with the sky ndash the peak ndash the heaving plain
Of Ocean or the stars mingle ndash and not in vainrdquo
Childe Harold III72
This pantheistic ecstasy gives him a sense of quasi-
immortality
ldquoSpinning the clay clod bonds which round our being clingrdquo
The picturesque is translated into a kind of mystical
union with the spirit of the place even with the
universe itself
ldquoAre not the mountains waves and skies a part
Of me and my soul as I of them
(Is not) the universe a breathing part
The spirit is clogged with clayrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 91
HIS PESSIMISM
The myth of Cuvierrsquos undulations of Cosmic history
reflects Byronrsquos consistent and mature pessimism His
pessimism is traceable to his own view of society
Through a metaphor he considers his age as
ldquocatastrophicrdquo ndash an ice age of the human spirit and a
declining moral grandeur His myth of Fall and
recurrence of the Ocean and ice is both comic and
historic social and literary and personal as well The
consequences of the Fall and of manrsquos imperfect nature
are seen in all major human activities Generally fallen
mankind is hounded by its lower appetites spirit
encumbered by flesh The image of Fall is linked in
Byronrsquos imagination with the rhetorical image of the
poetrsquos lsquoflightrsquo which incurs the risk of consequent
lsquosinkingrsquo or bathos And over it all hangs the perplexity
of manrsquos ignorance about his aims his nature his true
identity
ldquoFew mortals know what end they would be at
But whether glory power or love or treasure
The path is through perplexing ways and when
The goal is gained we die you know ndash and thenrdquo
HIS PROPHETIC VISION
Endowed with strong imaginative power he had
experimented in Vulcanian visions of the earth plunged
into darkness by the final extinction or the sun or lsquoa ruined starrsquo plunging on in flames through the wastes of
space This prophetic faculty is amply evident from his
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 92
poem Darkness in which his imagination prefigures the
devastating effects of nuclear weapons
ldquoThe Hour arrived ndash and it became
A wandering mass of shapeless flame
A pathless Comet and a curse
The menace of the Universe
Still rolling on with innate force
Without a sphere without a course
A bright deformity on high
The monster of the upper skyrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoI had a dream which was not at all a dream
The bright sun was extinguished and the stars
Did wander darkling in the eternal space
The habitations of all things which dwell
Were burnt for beacons cities were consumedrdquo
Darkness IV42-45
In sum and in essence Byron exemplifies Shelleyrsquos
pronouncement that poets are the unacknowledged
legislators of the world More than any other Romantic
poet Byron embodies the dictum ndash lsquowhat is to give light must endure burningrsquo
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RP DWIVEDI Page 93
PB SHELLEY
(4 August 1792 ndash 8 July 1822)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 94
PB SHELLEY
English Romantic Poet
The heir to rich estates Shelley was a rebellious youth
who was expelled from Oxford in 1811 for refusing to
admit authorship of The Necessity of Atheism Later that
year he eloped with Harriet Westbrook the daughter of
a tavern owner He gradually channeled his passionate
pursuit of personal love and social justice into poetry
His first major poem Queen Mab (1813) is a utopian
political epic revealing his progressive social ideals In
1814 he eloped to France with Mary Wollstonecraft
Godwin in 1816 after Harriet drowned herself they
were married In 1818 the Shelleys moved to Italy
Away from British politics he became less intent on
social reform and more devoted to expressing his ideals
in poetry He composed the verse tragedy The Cenci (1819) and his masterpiece the lyric drama Prometheus Unbound (1820) which was published with some of his
finest shorter poems including Ode to the West Wind
and To a Skylark Epipsychidion (1821) is a Dantean
fable about the relationship of sexual desire to spiritual
love and artistic creation Adonais (1821)
commemorates the death of John Keats Shelley
drowned at age 29 while sailing in a storm off the Italian
coast leaving unfinished his last and possibly greatest
visionary poem The Triumph of Life
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 95
CHAPTER FIVE
SHELLEY A PILGRIM OF ETERNITY
INTRODUCTION
Shelley who in his Adonais eulogized Keats as lsquothe Pilgrim of Eternityrsquo is himself justly entitled to this
appellation He was essentially a poet of the skies and
heavens of light and love of eternity and immortality
Since he loved to pierce through things to their spiritual
essence the material world was less important for him
than that which lies within it and beyond it Says he ldquoI seek in what I see the manifestation of something beyond the present and tangible objectsrsquo He set out to uncover
the absolute real from its visible manifestations and
interpret it through his own poetic vision In a
passionate search for reality he pursued its essence
behind the veil of naked loveliness of Nature and the
mundane human existence Defining poetry he says
lsquoPoetry is the revelation of the eternal ideas which lie behind the many-coloured ever-shifting veil that we call reality in lifersquo For him the poet is also a seer gifted with
a peculiar insight into the nature of reality for it is
through the inspired poetic imagination that he
breathes immortality into the objects of Nature Says he
lsquoBut from these create he can
Forms more real than living man
Nurslings of immortalityrsquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 96
Prometheus Unbound
HIS LOVE OF INDIA
Shelley was an ardent admirer of India In a letter to his
friend employed in the East India Company he
expressed keenness to visit India and settle down here
He was drawn to India for its varied and picturesque
scenic beauty vast literary heritage and age-old cultural
traditions In order to have a closer acquaintance with
our great country he set his heart and mind on serious
studies in the Indian life and letters traditions and
culture
Since he was a visionary par excellence and was
endowed with a highly contemplative mind and a
remarkable prophetic zeal he evinced a deep and
abiding interest in the philosophical and spiritual
thoughts that lie enshrined in our holy texts such as the
Vedas the Upanishads the Brahmasutras and the
Bhagvad Gita It is interesting to trace the influence of
Indian spiritual thought on Shelleyrsquos poetry
VEDANTA IN SHELLEYrsquoS POETRY
The riddle of the origin of life and Nature and the
enigmatic questions such as lsquoWhat is the cause of life
and death What is the source of universe and what will
be its ultimate destinyrsquo have always engaged the
serious attention of all wise men Man has always stood
in awe and wonder at the mysteries of human existence
and the vast world around him Our seers and savants
have not only posed such questions but have also
answered them
In the opening verse of the Kena Upanishad the
disciple asks
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 97
ldquoAt whose behest does the mind think or wander after towards its objects Commanded by whom does the life-force or the breath of life go forth on its journey At whose will do we utter speech Who is that effulgent Being whose power directs the eye and the earrdquo
Similarly in the Svetasvatara Upanishad the disciples
inquire ldquoWhat is the cause of this universe What is Brahman Whence do we come By what power do we live and on what are we established Where shall we at last find rest What rules over our joys and sorrows O Seers of Brahmanrdquo
Identical ideas impelled Shelley to exclaim in his famous
elegy Adonais
ldquoWhence are we and why are we Of what scene
The actors or spectatorsrdquo
Or again he asks in The Triumph of Life
ldquoWhence comest thou And wither goest thou
How did thy course begin I said and whyrdquo
Shelley asks
ldquoHas some unknown omnipotence unfurled
The veil of life and deathrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoAnd what were thou and earth and stars and sea
If to the human mindrsquos imaginings
Silence and solitude were vacancyrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 98
Mont Blanc
Shelley in his famous poem Hymn to Intellectual Beauty answers that there is an unseen (all-pervading) omnipotence (power) behind this phenomenal world of
which all objects are but shadows
ldquoThe awful shadow of some unseen Power
Floats though unseen among us ndash visiting
This various world with as inconstant wing
As summer winds that creep from flower to flowerrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoIt visits with inconstant glance
Each human heart and countenance
Like aught that for its grace may be
Dear and yet dearer for its mysteryrdquo
Again he affirms his faith in such a mysterious
Omnipotent power when he says
ldquoThe works and ways of men their death and birth
And that of him and all that his may be
All things that move and breathe with toil and sound
Are born and die revolve subside and swell
Power dwells apart in its tranquility
Remote serene and inaccessiblerdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 99
X X X X X X
ldquoThe secret strength of things
Which governs thought and to the infinite dome
Of Heaven is as a law inhabits theerdquo
Mont Blanc
Vedanta which is the aphoristic summary of the
Upanishads the Brahmasutras and the Bhagvad Gita
is in fact the culmination of Indian religious and
philosophical thought Since Shelley sincerely desired to
unravel the essential reality which is unchanging
timeless and eternal and of which the world of sense
perceptions is but a broken reflection he turned his
attention to the ancient scriptures of India
ONENESS OF BRAHMAN (GOD)
One of the basic postulates of Vedanta is the inherent
oneness or the sole identity of Brahman in the universe
The Chhandogya Upanishad describes Brahman as
एकमव अXवतीय ndash lsquoone only without a secondrsquo and the
other Upanishadic texts also contain parallel statements
such as स एकः ndash lsquoHe is Onersquo and एकोदवः ndash lsquoOne Lordrsquo
Similarly the Rig Veda declares एक सद वDा बहदा वदित ndash lsquoTruth (God)is one but the wise one call it
differentlyrsquo Obviously Brahman the Supreme is one
and only one He is verily one and the same whether we
call Him Brahman Ishwara Paramatma God Allah or
the supreme Cosmic Soul He only exists all other
objects of the world are subject to decay and death
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 100
How beautifully have similar thoughts been expressed
by Shelley when he exclaims
ldquoThe one remains the many change and pass
Heavenrsquos light forever shines Earthrsquos shadows fly
Life like a dome of many coloured glass
Stains the white radiance of Eternity
Until Death tramples it to fragmentsrdquo
Adonais L2
The concluding lines of Epipsychidion show that in a
moment of inspiration Shelley seemed to lay hold on the
ineffable spirituality and fundamental unity of
existence
ldquoOne hope within two wils one will beneath
Two overshadowing minds one life one death
One Heaven one hell one immortality
And one annihilationrdquo
Shelley etherealized Nature and believed in a single
power or one spirit permeating the whole universe He
effected a fusion of the Platonic philosophy of love with
the Wordsworthian doctrine of Pantheism
ldquoThe one spiritrsquos plastic stress
Sweeps through the dull dense worldrsquo
Compelling there all new successions
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 101
To the forms they wearrdquo
Holding that one universal spirit is the basis and
sustainer of Nature Shelley declares
ldquoThat Power
Which wields the world with never-wearied love
Sustains it from beneath and kindles it aboverdquo
In his pantheistic conception of Nature Shelley
conceived of it as being permeated vitalized and made
real by a universal spirit of love He clearly perceives
the presence of ldquothe awful shadow of the unseen power visiting the various worldrdquo
ldquoSpirit of Nature here
In this interminable wilderness
Of worlds at whose involved immensity
Even soaring fancy staggers
Here is thy fitting templerdquo
Demon of the World
TRANSMIGRATION OF SOUL
The doctrine of transmigration of soul or the cycle of
births and rebirths has been explicitly advanced in the
Upanishadic philosophy In the Kathopanishad
Brihadaranyak Upanishad and the Bhagvad Gita there are moving passages such as these
ldquoMan ripens like corn and like corn he is born againrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 102
Kathopanishad IV6
The Brihadaranyak Upanishad states
ldquoAnd as a caterpillar after reaching the end of a blade of grass finds another place of support and then draws itself towards it and as a goldsmith after taking a piece of gold gives it another newer and more beautiful shape similarly does the self after having thrown off this body and dispelled ignorance take on another newer and more beautiful formrdquo
Brihadaranyak Upanishad IV3-5
Similarly Lord Krishna tells Arjuna
ldquoAs a man discarding worn out clothes takes other new ones likewise the embodied soul casting off worn-out bodies enters into others which are newrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II22
And further Lord Krishna says to Arjuna
ldquofor in that case the death of him who is born is certain and the rebirth for him who is dead is inevitablerdquo
Bhagvad Gita II27
Shelley entertained similar ideas when he says
ldquoThe works and ways of man their death and birth
And that of him and all that his may be
All things that move and breathe with toil and sound
Are borm and die revolve subside and swellrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 103
Mont Blanc 92-95
Or again
ldquoThe splendours of the firmament of time
May be eclipsed but are extinguished not
Like stars to their appointed height they climb
And death is a low mist which cannot blot
The brightness it may veilrdquo
Adonais XLIV
Stressing the ephemerality of worldly objects Shelley
exclaims
ldquoSpirit of Beauty that does consecrate
With thine own hues all thou doth shine upon
Of human thought or formwhere art thou gonerdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoWhy aught should fail and fade that once is shown
Why fear and dream and death and birth
Cast on the daylight of this earth
Such gloomrdquo
Hymn to Intellectual Beauty 11
Lamenting the death of his friend Keats he says
ldquohe went uninterrupted
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 104
Into the gulf of death but his clear spirit
Yet reigns over earthrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoTo that high Capital where Kingly Death
Keeps his pale court in beauty and decay
He came and bought with price of purest breath
A grave among the eternalrdquo
Adonais VII
Again dwelling on the immortality of soul he declares
ldquoNaught we know dies Shall that alone which knows
Be as a sword consumed before the sheath
By sightless lightening The intense atom glows
A moment then is quenched in a most cold reposerdquo
Adonais XX
X X X X X X
ldquoGreat and mean
Meet massed in death who lends what life must borrowrdquo
Adonais XXI
X X X X X X
ldquoDust to dust but the pure spirit shall flow
Black to the burning fountain whence it came
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 105
A portion of the Eternal which must glow
Through time and change unquenchably the same
Whilst thy cold embers choke the sordid hearth shamerdquo
Adonais XXXVIII
THE DOCTRINE OF MAYA (DELUSION)
Our scriptures regard the phenomenal world as Maya
(delusion) They explain that the universe is neither
absolutely real nor absolutely non-existent and that its
phenomenal or apparent surface conceals and
safeguards the external presence of the Absolute
Shelley seems to have pondered over similar ideas
about the world of appearances
ldquoWorlds on worlds are rolling ever
From creation to decay
Like the bubbles on a river
Sparkling bursting borne away
But they are still immortal
Who through birthrsquos oriental portal
And deathrsquos dark chasm hurrying to and fro
Clothe their unceasing flight
In the brief dust and light
Gathered around their chariots as they gordquo
Three Choruses from Hallas
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 106
In his poem Invocation to Misery Shelley says
ldquoAll the wide world beside us
Show like multitudinous
Puppets passing from a scenerdquo
Again describing human life as a veil he says
ldquoLife not the painted veil which thou who live
Call life though unreal shapes be pictured there
And it but mimic all we would believe
With colours idly spreadrdquo
Prometheus Unbound
In the myth of Aurora he gives his own account of the
creation and interpretation of works of art
ldquoAnd lovely apparitions dim at first then radiant in the mind arising bright
From the embrace of beauty whence the forms
Of which these are phantoms casts on them
The gathered rays which are realityrdquo
Shelley seems to hint at the theory of Superimposition
(Vivartavada) which maintains that the universe is a
superimposition upon Brahman It states that the world
of thought and matter has a phenomenon or relative
existence and is superimposed upon Brahman the
unique Absolute Reality
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 107
Since the world is a network of delusion and
appearance not reality our life on earth is a sojourn
and its paramount aim is to have a glimpse of and
realize the eternal Truth or the Absolute Brahman
which is concealed by ignorance and delusion The
Ishopanishad tells us
ldquoThe face of Truth is hidden by a golden orb (disk) O Pushan (the Nourisher the Effulgent Being) uncover (the Face) that I the seeker or worshipper of Truth may hold Theerdquo
Ishopanishad XV
Like a sincere aspirant for the realization of eternal
Truth or the Absolute concealed under the illusory garb
of Maya (Delusion) Shelley in the words of Fairy in his
Queen Mab declares
ldquoAnd it is yet permitted me to rend
The veil of mortal frailty that the spirit
Clothed in its changeless purity may know
How soonest to accomplish the great end
For which it hath its being and may taste
That peace which in the end all life will sharerdquo
Queen Mab
In certain other passages Shelley speaks of the veil
identified with Time which obscured Eternity from the
sight of man The symbol of veil demonstrates that
which conceals truth goodness or happiness When the
veil was torn or rent asunder
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 108
ldquoHope was seen beaming through the mists of fear
Earth was no longer Hell
Love freedom health had given
Their ripeness to the manhood of its prime
And all its pulses beat
Symphonious to the planetary spheresrdquo
Again he uses the same symbol of veil when Cythna
says
ldquoFor with strong speech I tore the veil that hid
Nature and Truth and Liberty and Loverdquo
Shelley uses the same idea of superimposition coupled
with his own robust idealism
ldquoLife may change but it may fly not
Hope may vanish but can die not
Truth be veiled but it burneth
Love repulsed ndash but it returnethrdquo
STATES OF CONSCIOUSNESS
Our Upanishads identify three states of consciousness
crowned by the fourth which transcends all the other
three states They are
(i) The Waking State
(ii) The Dreaming State
(iii) The State of Deep Sleep and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 109
(iv) The State of Pure Consciousness (Turiya)
The fourth state of ecstatic consciousness which
transcends the preceding three has no connection with
the finite mind it is reached when in meditation the
ordinary self is left behind and the Atman or the true
self is fully realized The Mandukya Upanishad describes it thus
ldquoBeyond the senses beyond the understanding beyond all expression is the Fourth It is pure unitary consciousness wherein (all) awareness of the world and of multiplicity is completely obliterated It is effable peace It is the supreme good It is one without a second It is the Self Know it alonerdquo
Mandukya Upanishad VII
Turiya (तर[य) the fourth state is the supreme mystic
experience Shelley seems to have partly attained such a
state of pure ecstatic consciousness when he states
ldquoI seem as in a trance sublime and strange
To muse on my own separate fantasy
My own my human mind which passively
Now renders and receives fast influencing
Holding an unremitting interchange
With the clear universe of things aroundrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoSome say that gleams of a remoter world
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 110
Visit the soul in sleep that death is slumber
And that its shapes the busy thoughts outnumber
Of those who wake and live ndash I look on high
Has some unknown omnipotence unfurled
The veil of life and deathrdquo
Mont Blanc
Another instance of such a mystic experience appears in
his famous poem Triumph of Life on which Shelley was
working at the time of this death in 1822
ldquobefore me fled
The night behind me rose the day the deep
Was at my feet and Heaven above my head
When a strange trance over my fancy grew
Which was not slumber for the shade it spread
Was so transparent that the scene came through
As clear as when a veil of light is drawn
Over evening hill they glimmer and I knew
That I had felt the freshness of that dawnrdquo
X X X X X X
ldquoAnd in that trance of wondrous thought I lay
This was the tenor of my waking dreamrdquo
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RP DWIVEDI Page 111
The Triumph of Life
SHELLEY AS AN ASPIRANT FOR SELF-REALIZATION
Shelley who described himself as
ldquoA splendour among shadows a bright blot
Upon the gloomy scene a spirit that strove
For Truthrdquo
seems to have reached at last that stability or
equanimity of mind which has been described in the
Upanishads and the Bhagvad Gita In a reply to Arjunrsquos
question about the definition of one who is stable of
mind or is finally established in perfect tranquility of
mind Lord Krishna says
ldquoArjun when one thoroughly dismisses all cravings of the mind controls it and is satisfied in the self (through the joy of the self) then he is called stable of mind One whose mind remains unperturbed amid sorrows whose thirst for pleasures has altogether disappeared and who is free from passion fear and anger is called stable of mindrdquo
Bhagvad Gita V56
The Katha Upanishad stresses similar ideas when it
says
ldquoBut he who possesses right discrimination whose mind is under control and is always pure he reaches that goal from which he is not born againrdquo
X X X X X X
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 112
ldquoThe man who has a discriminative intellect for the driver and a controlled mind for the reins reaches the end of the journey the highest place of Vishnu (the all-pervading and unchangeable one)rdquo
Katha Upanishad
Shelley echoes identical thoughts when he says
ldquoMan who man would be
Must rule the empire of himself in it
Must be supreme establishing his throne
On vanquished will quelling the anarchy
Of hopes and fears being himself alonerdquo
Sonnet on Political Greatness
It was in such rare moments of inner consciousness or
lsquoBlessed moodrsquo that Shelley felt lsquoOne with Naturersquo or
lsquoThe Power which wields the world with never-wearied love
Sustains it from beneath and kindles it aboversquo
As a myth-maker or a mythopoeic poet he conjured
visions of a golden age by turning to the grand aspects
of Nature ndash the ether the sky the wind the Sun the
Moon the light and the clouds and employing them as
befitting agencies and vehicles of his evolutionary ideas
ldquoPoetryrdquo he wrote ldquois indeed something divine It is at once the centre and circumference of all knowledgerdquo He
conceived of the universe as alive with a living spirit
behind it He moralizes natural myths and perceives the
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 113
Absolute behind the ephemeral In an exquisite image
he exclaims
ldquoThe sanguine sunrise with his meteor eyes
And his burning plumes outspread
Leaps on the back of my sailing rack
When the morning star shines deadrdquo
As his thoughts reached the zenith of their growth
Shelley identified his individual self with the all-
pervading Cosmic Self or the Brahman of the Vedanta
and felt himself one with the indwelling spirit of the
universe Unity filled his imagination he perceived
eternal harmony in the phenomenal existence and
rejoiced his own being in the vast million-coloured
pageants of the world And finally not only Nature but
all human existence is taken up as an inalienable aspect
of the eternal Cosmic Spirit He reaches the core the
centre of all palpable universe when he declares
ldquoI am the eye with which the Universe
Behold itself and knows itself divine
All harmony of instrument and verse
All prophecy all medicine is mine
All light of art or nature to my song
Victory and praise in its own right belongrdquo
Shelley perceived the transcendental or mystic
consciousness in which one realizes the complete
identity of self with the Supreme Self and which is called
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 114
तर[य अवथा ndash where one sees nothing but One
(Brahman) hears nothing but the One knows nothing
but the One ndash there is the Infinite The same truth is
vividly explained in the Bhagvad Gita when Lord
Krishna tells Arjuna
ldquoWhen one sees Eternity in things that pass away and Infinity in finite things then one has pure knowledgerdquo
Bhagvad Gita XVIII20
Our own great seer-poet and philosopher Sri Aurobindo
Ghose described Shelley as a sovereign voice of the new
spiritual force and a native of the heights with its
luminous ethereality where he managed to dwell
prophetically in a future heaven and earth with
brilliances of a communion with a higher law another
order of existence another meaning behind Nature and
terrestrial things
Sri Aurobindo further praises him as lsquoa seer of spiritual realities who has a poetic grasp of metaphysical truths and can see the forms and hear the voices of higher elements spirits and natural godheads and has a constant feeling of a high spiritual and intellectual beauty He is at once seer poet thinker prophet and artist Light love liberty are the three godheads in whose presence his pure and radiant spirit lived but a celestial light a celestial love a celestial liberty To bring them down to earth without their losing their celestial lustre and here is his passionate endeavour but his wings constantly buoy him upward and cannot beat strongly in an earthlier atmosphere There is an air of luminous mist surrounding his intellectual presentation of his meaning which shows the truths he sees as things to which the mortal eye cannot easily pierce or the life and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 115
temperament of earth rise to realize and live yet to bring about the union of the mortal and immortal terrestrial and the celestial is always his passion Shelley is the bright archangel of this dawn and becomes greater to us as the light he foresaw and lived and he sings half-concealed in the too dense halo of his own ethereal beautyrsquo
And what Juan Mascaro states as universal truth is
equally pertinent to Shelleyrsquos poetry
ldquoA deep faith in life cannot but be spiritual The path of Truth may not be a path of parallel lines but a path that follows one circle because Truth is onerdquo
Infinite is God infinite are His aspects and infinite are
the ways to reach Him In the Atharva Veda we read
ldquoThe one light appears in diverse formsrdquo This ideal of
harmony is carried to its logical conclusion in blending
synthesizing and reconciling conflicting metaphysical
theories and opposed conceptions of spiritual
discipline We read in the pages of Bhagvad Gita
ldquoWhatever wish men bring in worship
That wish I grant them
Whatever path men travel
Is my path
No matter where they walk
It leads to merdquo
Bhagvad Gita IV11
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RP DWIVEDI Page 116
To sum up Shelleyrsquos poetry will always hold irresistible
fascination to the lovers of light and beauty for to
quote Juan Mascaro again
ldquoThe finite in man longs for the Infinite The love that moves the stars moves also the heart of man and a law of spiritual gravitation leads his soul to the soul of the universe Man sees the sun by the light of the sun and he sees the spirit by the light of his own inner spirit The radiance of eternal beauty shines over this vast universe and in moments of contemplation we can see the Eternal in things that pass away This is the message of the great spiritual seers and all poetry and art and beauty is only an infinite variation of this message The spiritual visions of man confirm and illumine each other Great poems in different languages have different values but they all are poetry and the spiritual visions of man come all from one Light In them we have Lamps of Fire that burn to the glory of Godrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 117
JOHN KEATS
(31 October 1795 ndash 23 February 1821)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 118
JOHN KEATS
English Romantic Poet
The son of a livery-stable manager he had a limited
formal education He worked as a surgeons apprentice
and assistant for several years before devoting himself
entirely to poetry at age 21 His first mature work was
the sonnet On First Looking into Chapmans Homer
(1816) His long Endymion appeared in the same year
(1818) as the first symptoms of the tuberculosis that
would kill him at age 25 During a few intense months of
1819 he produced many of his greatest works several
great odes (including Ode on a Grecian Urn Ode to a
Nightingale and To Autumnrdquo) two unfinished
versions of the story of the titan Hyperion and La Belle
Dame Sans Merci Most were published in the
landmark collection Lamia Isabella The Eve of St Agnes and Other Poems (1820) Marked by vivid imagery great
sensuous appeal and a yearning for the lost glories of
the Classical world his finest works are among the
greatest of the English tradition His letters are among
the best by any English poet
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 119
CHAPTER SIX
JOHN KEATS A MINSTREL OF BEAUTY AND TRUTH
INTRODUCTION
John Keats who in his own words was lsquoa fair creature of an hourrsquo lived a brief and turbulent life Pre-eminently a
sensuous poet in whom the Romantic sensibility to
outward impressions of sight sound touch and smell
reached its climax the life of Keats was a series of
sensations felt with febrile acuteness
His ideal was passive contemplation rather than active
mental exertion ldquoO for a life of sensations rather than of thoughtrdquo he exclaimed in one of his letters and in
another ldquoit is more noble to sit like Jove than to fly like Mercuryrdquo In fact his was a life of intense sensations
acute poignancy and an infinite yearning for beauty
which he identified with truth
Richness of sensuousness characterizes all his poetry
and his power of expression is marked by a spectacular
vividness which is interspersed with beautiful epithets
heavily charged with subtle messages for the senses His
works are so full of luxuriance of sensations and acute
passions that ordinary readers do not pause to perceive
the unimpeded flow of spiritual thoughts underneath
The pursuit of the spirit of beauty dominates all his
works which have one enduring message ndash the
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 120
lastingness of beauty and its identity with supreme
truth (or God) This message ndash the oneness of beauty
with truth and the eternal existence of truth ndash has been
beautifully enshrined in his famous and oft-quoted lines
(with which he concludes his Ode on a Grecian Urn)
ldquoBeauty is truth truth beauty ndash that is all
Ye know on earth and all ye need to knowrdquo
Keats died at the age of 26 but even from his early age
he had visions of rare spiritual significance Dwelling on
the value of visions in human life and poetry he says
ldquoSince every man whose soul is not a clod
Hath vision
For poesy alone can tell her dreams
With the fine spell of words alone can save
Imagination from the sable chain
And dumb enchantmentrdquo
Since common readers tend to ignore the underlying
spiritual import of his visions and images this article
aims at bringing into play some of the poetrsquos thoughts
which bear a remarkable resemblance to the age-old
hoary spirituality of our ancient land
Stressing the fundamental truths of our Indian thought
and tracing their distinct reflection in the works of great
Western poets seems a worth-while academic pursuit
FUNDAMENTAL UNITY
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 121
From the very beginning Keats could realize the
fundamental unity of Truth and Beauty and could dwell
at length on it to show how diverse paths illumined by
the glory of spirit in man ultimately lead him to the
realization of this abiding lesson of life The supreme
oneness of Truth has been beautifully enunciated by Sri
Krishna in the Bhagvad Gita
ldquoIn any way that men love Me in that same way they find My love for many are the paths of men but they all in the end come to Merdquo
Similar thoughts have found expression in the
introduction to the Upanishads by Juan Mascaro
ldquoThe path of Truth may not be a path of parallel lines but a path that follows one circle by going to the right and climbing the circle or by going to the left and climbing the circle we are bound to meet at the top although we started in apparently contrary directions This is bound to be in the end because Truth is onerdquo
And when Keats was only 22 he could give expression
to deep thoughts that have a curious similarity to the
ideas expressed in the Mundak Upanishad and the
Bhagvad Gita
ldquoNow it appears to me that almost any man may like the spider spin from his own inwards his own airy citadel the points of leaves and twigs on which the spider begins her work are few and she fills the air with a beautiful circuiting Man should be content with as few points to tip with the fine Web of his Soul and weave a tapestry empyrean-full of symbols for his spiritual eye of softness for his spiritual touch of space for his wanderings of distinctness for his luxuryrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 122
ldquoBut the minds of mortals are so different and bent on such diverse journeys that it may at first appear impossible for any common taste and fellowship to exist between two or three under these suppositions It is however quite the contrary Minds would leave each other in contrary directions traverse each other in numberless points and at last greet each other at the journeyrsquos end An old man and a child would talk together and the old man be led on his path and the child left thinkingrdquo
ldquoMan should not dispute or assert but whisper results to his neighbor and thus by every germ of spirit sucking the sap from mould ethereal every human might become great and humanity instead of being a wide heath of furze and briars with here and there a remote oak or pine would become a great democracy of forest treesrdquo
WISDOM
All men of good will are bound to meet if they follow the
wisdom of the words Shakespeare in Hamlet where if
we write SELF or self we find the doctrine of the
Upanishad
ldquoThis above all to thine own self be true
And it must follow as the night the day
Thou canst not then be false to any manrdquo
Now coming back to the theme of beauty and truth and
their ultimate identity in the universe we have to dwell
at large on the concept of beauty as enunciated by Keats
in his poetry From the very beginning Keats realized
that beauty in its true sense illumines manrsquos thoughts
and thus leads him to understand the glory of truth and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 123
the pervading spirit of their identity in whatever he
sees hears and perceives
The eternal identity or oneness of beauty with truth and
their interplay in the world are in fact unfailing
fountains of joy The permanence of beauty as a source
of joy has been beautifully elucidated by the poet in the
opening lines of his famous poem Endymion
ldquoA thing of beauty is a joy forever
Its loveliness increases it will never
Pass into nothingnessrdquo
He goes on to say
ldquoSome shape of beauty moves away the pall
From our dark spirits
An endless fountain of immortal drink
Pouring unto us from the heavenrsquos brink
Nor do we merely feel these essences
For one short hour
glories infinite
Haunt us till they become a cheering light
Unto our souls and bound to us so fast
That whether there be shine or gloom overcast
They always must be with us or we dierdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 124
When he ascribes permanence to joy born of beauty
Keats has in mind the immanence and effulgence of
beauty as a reflection of its creator God Beauty whose
lsquoloveliness increasesrsquo and which lsquowill never pass into nothingnessrsquo is an inalienable attribute of Divinity for it
is lsquoan endless fountain of immortal drinkrsquo
BEAUTY
God (as the poet seems to presuppose) is all Beautiful or
the embodiment of all Beauty and the entire world of
sights and sounds is nothing else but a glorious garment
of God So beauty does not consist only in apparent
physical appearances but is an offspring of inherent
divinity in man and nature which is dimly reflected in
their attractive exterior Such an eternal beauty in his
view presents lsquoglories infinite that haunt us till they become a cheering light unto our souls It is this beauty the glory of spirit which must be with us or we dierdquo
The poetrsquos concept of beauty with its glories infinite
bears a striking resemblance with the path of splendour
of our Vedic and epic scriptures in which our sages
perceived the Divine presence in all that is splendid and
beautiful in the universe
Our Vedic texts are full of the expressions of the sage-
poetrsquos exquisite astonishment before the visions of
glory and wonder The attitude of our Vedic seer-poets
towards beauty as a transcendental reality beyond our
sense-perceptions has been beautifully expressed in
images of beauty and glory as an abstract idea Says Rig Veda
ldquoSinless for noble power under the influence of Savita God
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 125
May we obtain all things that are beautifulrdquo
GOODNESS
Here the power of goodness is contemplated to lead to
the power of beauty Beauty in its myriad forms leads
us to spiritual consciousness of Divinity inherent in
Nature and all living beings Identical thoughts have
been expressed by Sri Krishna in Chapter X of the
Bhagvad Gita where all splendour and glory is said to
be the reflection of God whose manifestation this
universe is Says Sri Krishna to Arjuna
ldquoKnow thou that whatever is beautiful and good whatever has glory and power is only a portion of My own radiancerdquo
Bhagvad Gita X41
Seeing the effulgence of a thousand suns bursting forth
and yet it could hardly match the splendour of the
supreme Lord Arjuna exclaimed in wonder
ldquoI see the splendour of an infinite beauty which illumines the whole universe It is thee With thy crown and scepter and circle How difficult thou art to see But I see thee as fire as the Sun blinding incomprehensiblerdquo
Bhagvad Gita XI17
Besides this concept of ultimate elemental beauty
Keats goes on to underscore its fundamental and
inseparable unity with Truth which is yet another
inalienable facet of Divinity on earth
Truth being an essential attribute of God lies at the
core of all existence and it sustains the entire universe
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 126
with its manifold forms of beauty reflected in countless
objects around us When Keats declares that lsquoBeauty is truth truth beautyrsquo he seems to remind us of the age-old
spiritual consciousness that found sublime utterance in
our Vedas which are the oldest treatises on lsquophilosophia perennisrsquo the eternal philosophy In the Vedas truth has
been described as the essence of Divinity
ldquoThe deity has truth as the law of His beingrdquo
Atharva Veda VIIXXIV1
The Rig Veda calls the deities as various manifestations
of Truth Elsewhere in the Rig Veda the Deity has been
described as true and the path of religious progress is
the ingredient of Dharma Declares the Rig Veda
ldquoBy truth is the earth upheldrdquo
Rig Veda X85
An Upanishadic sage says
ldquoTruth alone triumphs not untruth By Truth the spiritual path is widened that path by which the seers who are free from all cravings and declares travel and reach the supreme abode of Truthrdquo
Mundak Upanishad IIII6
So Truth is a basic postulate of Dharma and an abiding
and ultimate value of life It is the eternal oneness of
beauty and truth and truth and beauty that inspired
Keats to stress their underlying unity and their
transcendental reality When Keats says ldquoThat is all ye know on earth and all ye need to knowrdquo he points to that
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 127
ecstatic wonder which the spiritual realization of this
eternal truth brings to a seeker or seer or a poet
SUBLIMITY
Keats seems to have reached such a sublime plane of
poetic consciousness that is so aptly suggested by our
Vedic seers who have extolled God as a poet (कव) and
His divine creative energy is indicated as the poetic
power (काय) which has assumed manifold forms of
beauty and splendour So God as the supreme creator of
beauty has been described in the Rig Veda as
ldquoHe who is supporter of the world of life
Who knows the secret mysterious names
Of the morning beams
He poet cherishes manifold forms
By His poetic powerrdquo
Rig Veda VIIIXL5
So let me hasten to the conclusion by affirming that as
lsquoa lily for a dayrsquo Keats proved that a crowded hour of
glory is far better than an age without a name he seems
to have lived up to the lofty advice of Queen Vidula to
her son King Sanjaya in the Mahabharat
महतम 0व1लत 2यो न त धमऽतम 4चर
ldquoIt is better to flame forth for an instant than smoke away for agesrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 128
Eternal truths transcend the barriers of time and space
country and clime caste and creed and shine through all
lands and in all ages Even today the enlightened souls
all over the world have a significant identity of ideas
irrespective of the countries to which they belong and
the religious faith to which they are affiliated
Such wise men awaken others from a state of
intellectual and spiritual slumber enkindle in them a
sense of understanding and fraternity It has been
rightly said by HW Longfellow
ldquoLives of great men all remind us
We can make our lives sublime
And departing leave behind us
Footprints on the sand of Timerdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 129
RW EMERSON
(25 May 1803 ndash 27 April 1882)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 130
RW EMERSON
US Poet Essayist and Lecturer
Emerson graduated from Harvard University and was
ordained a Unitarian minister in 1829 His questioning
of traditional doctrine led him to resign the ministry
three years later He formulated his philosophy in
Nature (1836) the book helped initiate New England
Transcendentalism a movement of which he soon
became the leading exponent In 1834 he moved to
Concord Mass the home of his friend Henry David
Thoreau His lectures on the proper role of the scholar
and the waning of the Christian tradition caused
considerable controversy In 1840 with Margaret
Fuller he helped launch The Dial a journal that
provided an outlet for Transcendentalist ideas He
became internationally famous with his Essays (1841
1844) including Self-Reliance Representative Men
(1850) consists of biographies of historical figures The Conduct of Life (1860) his most mature work reveals a
developed humanism and a full awareness of human
limitations His Poems (1847) and May-Day (1867)
established his reputation as a major poet
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 131
CHAPTER SEVEN
EMERSONrsquoS SPIRITUAL QUEST AND INDIAN THOUGHT
INTRODUCTION
Ralph Waldo Emerson the lsquoSage of Concordrsquo as he is
rightly called was an American seer who came into the
world at a time when East and the West were gradually
coming closer to each other in spheres more than one
trade and commerce between the two was gaining
momentum and above all the era of inter-
communication of ideas intellect and spirit was being
ushered in by exchange of books
Emerson was one of the first great Americans who
absorbed himself sufficiently in this phenomenon
ventured into the sacred literature of India and
assimilated its thought to such a remarkable degree that
he became its eminent interpreter to his countrymen in
particular and to the entire West in general
EMERSON AND THE GITA
Let us see what Swami Vivekananda said about the
source of Emersonrsquos inspiration Swamiji said
ldquoThe greatest incident of the (Mahabharata) war was the marvelous and immortal poem of the Gita the Song Celestial It is the popular scripture of India and the loftiest of all teachings I would advise those of you who have not read that book to read it If you only knew how
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 132
much it has influenced your own country (America) even If you want to know the source of Emersonrsquos inspiration it is this book the Gita He went to see Carlyle and Carlyle made him a present of the Gita and that little book is responsible for the Concord Movement All the broad movements in America in one way or other are indebted to the Concord partyrdquo
His interest in the sacred writings of India was probably
aroused at Harvard and he kept it aglow throughout his
life With his motto ldquoTomorrow to fresh fields and pastures newrdquo he set out in search of the True (Satyam)
the Good (Shivam) and the Beautiful (Sundaram)
In busy and bustling New England there came forward
to quote Theodore Parker ldquothis young David a shepherd but to be a king with his garlands and singing robes about him one note upon his new and fresh-string lyre was worth a thousand menrdquo
With unflinching faith in Truth Righteousness and
Beauty and absolute confidence in all the attributes of
infinity he drank deep at the unfailing source of Indian
philosophy and religion and gave his thoughts such a
lucid inimitable expression that his writings have
become a veritable treasure of world literature Revered
the world over held in high esteem by great Indians like
Rabindranath Tagore and Pt Jawaharlal Nehru and
admired by Gandhiji his writings abound in the beauty
of his speech the majesty of his ideas and the loftiness
of his moral sentiments
Perhaps the most fitting commentary on the relevance
of his thoughts to our country was made by Mahatma
Gandhi after reading his Essays Said Mahatma Gandhi
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 133
ldquoThe Essays to my mind contain the teaching of Indian wisdom in a Western Guru It is interesting to see our own sometimes differently fashionedrdquo
There are indeed innumerable points of similarity in
thought and experience between Emerson and the
mainstream of Indian philosophy The philosophy of
Vedanta which was one of the thought currents that
reached America in the first half of the 19th century
influenced Emerson deeply and contributed largely to
his concept of lsquoselfhoodrsquo Emerson found the Vedic
doctrines of soul congenial to his own ideas about manrsquos
relationship to the universe He therefore drew freely
upon the Hindu scriptures which contain a vivid and
well-elaborated doctrine of lsquoSelfrsquo Numerous references
in his essays and journals to the lsquoLaws of Manursquo
(Manusmriti) Vishnu Puran Bhagvad Gita and Katha Upanishad bear ample testimony to this fact
Let us examine some of the striking identities between
Emerson and the Vedanta The Upanishads tell us that
the central core of onersquos self is clearly identifiable with
the Cosmic Reality ldquoThe self within you the resplendent immortal person is the internal self of all things and is the Universal Brahmanrdquo The Chhandogya Upanishad tells
us that ldquothe self which inhabits the body is verily the Brahman and that as soon as the mortal coil is thrown over it will finally merge in Brahmanrdquo
How close was Emersonrsquos spiritual kinship with the
Vedantic doctrines is clear from the following lines
taken from his essay Plato or the Philosopher
ldquoIn all nations there are minds which incline to dwell in the conception of the Fundamental Unity the ecstasy of losing all being in one Being This tendency
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 134
finds its highest expression chiefly in the Indian scriptures in the Vedas the Bhagvad Gita and the Vishnu Puranrdquo
He further quotes Lord Krishna speaking to a sage ldquoYou are fit to apprehend that you are not distinct from meThat which I am thou art and that also in this world with its gods and heroes and mankind Men contemplate distinctions because they are stupefied with ignorance What is the great end of all you shall now learn from me It is soul-one in all bodies pervading uniform perfect pre-eminent over nature exempt from birth growth and decay Omnipresent made up of true knowledge independent unconnected with unrealities with name species and the rest in time past present and to come The knowledge that this spirit which is essentially one is in onersquos own and all other bodies is the wisdom of one who knows the unity of thingsrdquo
In formulating his own concept of the Over-soul
Emerson quotes Lord Krishna once again
ldquoWe live in succession in division in parts in particles Meantime within man is the soul of the whole the wise silence the universal beauty to which every part and particle is equally related the eternal One And this deep power in which we exist and whose beatitude is all accessible to us is not only self-sufficing and perfect in every hour but in the act of seeing and the thing seen the seer and the spectacle the subject and the object are one We see the world piece by piece as the sun the moon the animal the tree but the whole of which these are shining parts is the Soul Only by the vision of that wisdom can the horoscope of ages be readrdquo
The Over-Soul
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 135
A transcendentalist par excellence Emerson who was
influenced by German philosophers like Kant Hegel
Fichte and Schelling and their English interpreters
Coleridge and Carlyle affirmed that man could
apprehend reality by direct spiritual insight To him
intuition knew truths which ldquotranscendedrdquo those
accessible to intellect logical argument and scientific
inquiry Such a transcendentalism or attitude which
provided a metaphysical justification for the ideal of
individual freedom was found writ large in the holy
books of India
Steeped as he was in the oriental lore echoes of
Vedantic philosophy can be distinctly heard in his
writings which shine like ldquoa good deed in a naughty worldrdquo
Some of his poems resemble Vedantic literature in form
as well as in content His two famous poems Brahma
and Hamatreya are striking examples of such a close
affinity both in content and expression Ideas and
images in Brahma reflect certain passages which
Emerson had copied into his journals from the Vishnu
Puran the Bhagvad Gita and Katha Upanishad The first
stanza of Brahma which reads
ldquoIf the red slayer think he slays
Or if the slain think he is slain
They know not well the subtle ways
I keep and pass and turn againrdquo
is essentially an adaptation of these lines from the
Katha Upanishad
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 136
ldquoIf the slayer thinks I slay if the slain thinks I am slain then both of them do not know well It (the soul) does not slay nor is it slainrdquo
Katha Upanishad II19
The same lines with a little variation of course appear
in the Bhagvad Gita
ldquoThey are both ignorant he who knows that the soul to be capable of killing and he who takes it as killed for verily the soul neither kills nor is killedrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II19
The image of Brahma as a red slayer has been derived
from the Vishnu Puran where Lord Shiva the destroyer
of Creation has been depicted as Rudra (the red slayer)
but destruction envisages new creation and therefore
symbolizes the decadence of one and necessitates the
advent of the other This is why Lord Shiva is regarded
as the god not only of extermination but also of
regeneration With this concept is connected the cult of
Shaivagam ndash the ushering in of an era of general good
and prosperity when the world is created anew
The second and third stanzas of Brahma echo the
following lines of the Bhagvad Gita
ldquoI am the ritual action I am the sacrifice I am the ancestral oblation I am the sacred hymn I am the melted butter I am the fire and I am the offeringrdquo
Bhagvad Gita IX16
and also from the same source
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 137
ldquoI am immortality as well as death I am being as well as non-beingrdquo
Bhagvad Gita IX19
In the fourth stanza of Brahma there is a direct
reference to lsquothe Sacred Sevenrsquo ndash the seven highest saints
of our country namely Kashyapa Atri Bharadwaj Vishwamitra Gautam Vashishtha and Jamadagni Thus
we find that Brahma embodies an age-old Vedantic
truth
As regards his next poem Hamatreya its very title is a
variation of a disciplersquos name lsquoMaitreyarsquo to whom the
earth had recited a few verses Before we examine the
poem critically let us read a long passage from the
Vishnu Puran Book IV which Emerson had copied into
his 1845 Journal This passage which sheds ample light
on the background and theme of the poem under
reference reads
ldquoKings who with perishable frames have possessed this ever-enduring world and who blinded with deceptive notions of individual occupation have indulged the feeling that suggests lsquoThis earth is mine it is my sonrsquos it belongs to my dynastyrsquo have all passed awayearth laughs as if smiling with autumnal flowers to behold her kings unable to effect the subjugation of themselvesthese were the verses Maitreya which earth recited and by listening to which ambition fades away like snow before the windrdquo
Journals VII127-130
How futile is human vanity and how ridiculous is the
possessive instinct in man has been thoroughly exposed
by Emerson in the following lines
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 138
ldquoEarth laughs in flowers to see her boastful boys
Earth-proud proud of the earth which is not theirs
Who steer the plough but cannot steer their feet
Clear of the graverdquo
Hamatreya
Man who awaits lsquothe inevitable hourrsquo forgets that all his
heraldry pomp power wealth and lsquopaths of gloryrsquo lead
him lsquobut to the graversquo and grows so proud of his material
achievements and so deeply attached to the fleeting
things of the world that he loses sight of the supreme
philosophical truth - the ephemerality of the world and
the immortality of soul Death which is lurking in the
shadows can lay his icy hands upon us any day yet due
to false pride and sense of meum and attachment we
allow ourselves to be duped by the passing show of the
world without ever thinking of salvation or final release
from the worldly bondages Says Emerson
ldquoAh the hot owner sees not Death who adds
Him to his land a lump of mould the morerdquo
Hamatreya
Here Emerson seems to have been deeply influences by
Indian scriptures and particularly Ishopanishad and
the Bhagvad Gita in which the philosophy of God-
realization through detached action has been succinctly
elaborated In these two sacred books it has been stated
that total renunciation of the sense of meum egotism
and attachment with regard to the world all worldly
objects body and all actions is a path to real love for
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 139
God All worldly objects like land wealth house clothes
all relations like parents wife children friends and all
forms of worldly enjoyment like honour fame prestige
being the creations of Maya are wholly deluding
transient and perishable whereas one God alone the
embodiment of Existence (Sat) Knowledge (Chit) and
Bliss (Anand) is all in all omnipotent omniscient and
omnipresent Therefore all sense of meum egotism and
attachment must be totally renounced for spiritual
growth and pure exclusive love for God If the seed of
egoism is sown sorrow is the fruit On the other hand
the more a man cultivates dispassion and
disinterestedness with regard to the world the more
easily he transcends the barriers of Ignorance (Avidya)
Delusion (Maya) and Aversion (Dvesha) and marches
on the path of self-realization and God-realization A
similar thought current runs through the following
memorable lines of Earth-Song which forms an integral
part of the poem
ldquoThe earth says
They called me theirs who so controlled me
Yet every one wished to stay and is gone
How am I theirs if they cannot hold me
But I hold themrdquo
Hamatreya
These lines remind us of those memorable words of
Lord Krishna in the Bhagvad Gita XII16 where a true
devotee is characterized as one who is ldquodelivered from the egorsquos thrall - the sense of I and minerdquo or the feeling of
doership in all undertakings
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 140
After reading these lines which seem to refer to the
famous Biblical phrase lsquodust thou art to dust returnethrsquo
the readers may feel called upon to cultivate a sense of
detachment and renunciation for their ambition fades
away and their lsquoavarice cooled like dust in the chill of the graversquo
All art it has been said is an attempt to distract man
from his ego Emersonrsquos Hamatreya is certainly an
illustrious example of great art Highly didactic in
content and tone this poem reminds us of that sublime
mood in which Emerson realized the futility of
egocentric attachment to earth and its fleeting objects
which are shadows rather than substances
Emersonrsquos writings leave us to quote John Milton lsquoCalm of mind all passions spentrsquo A fitting comment on the
total impact of Emersonrsquos works on us has been given
by a brilliant American man of letters Theodore Parker
who says
ldquoA good test of the comparative value of books is the state they leave you in Emerson leaves you tranquil resolved on noble manhood fearless of the consequences he gives men to mankind and mankind to the laws of Godrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 141
HD THOREAU
(12 July 1817 ndash 6 May 1862)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 142
HD THOREAU
US Thinker Essayist and Naturalist
Thoreau graduated from Harvard University and taught
school for several years before leaving his job to
become a poet of nature Back in Concord he came
under the influence of Ralph Waldo Emerson and began
to publish pieces in the Transcendentalist magazine The Dial In the years 1845ndash47 to demonstrate how
satisfying a simple life could be he lived in a hut beside
Concords Walden Pond essays recording his daily life
were assembled for his masterwork Walden (1854) His
A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers (1849)
was the only other book he published in his lifetime He
reflected on a night he spent in jail protesting the
Mexican-American War in the essay Civil
Disobedience (1849) which would later influence such
figures as Mohandas K Gandhi and Martin Luther King
Jr In later years his interest in Transcendentalism
waned and he became a dedicated abolitionist His
many nature writings and records of his wanderings in
Canada Maine and Cape Cod display the mind of a keen
naturalist After his death his collected writings were
published in 20 volumes and further writings have
continued to appear in print
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 143
CHAPTER EIGHT
THOREAUrsquoS TRYST WITH INDIAN CULTURE
INTRODUCTION
Henry David Thoreau was a great American
transcendentalist thinker His seminal mind and
original thought had an enduring impact on his own
countrymen and also on peoples beyond the bounds of
America His philosophy and life had a deep influence
on all great men of his time Mahatma Gandhi regarded
him as his Guru and his concept of Satyagraha owes its
origin to Thoreaursquos essay on Civil Disobedience which
Gandhiji chanced upon in South Africa On Thoreaursquos
greatness another great American contemporary RW
Emerson once remarked ldquoHis soul was made for the noblest society he had in short life exhausted the capabilities of this world Wherever there is knowledge wherever there is virtue wherever there is beauty he will find a homerdquo
HIS LOVE OF SOLITUDE
Endowed with a rare meditative mind Thoreau loved
lsquosweet solitudersquo for he held that what is truly alone is the
spirit A seeker after perfection he retired to the
solitude of the woods to see with the eyes of the soul ndash
ldquothe higher law in naturerdquo and realize his oneness with
the Cosmic Spirit A lover of the spirit behind the world
of appearance he once said ndash ldquoI love to be alone I never
found the companion that was so companionable as
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 144
solitude In solitude of the woods I suddenly recover my
spirits my spirituality I can go from the buttercups to
the life everlastingrdquo His love for loneliness resembles
that of our own sages and saints who shunned the din
and clamour of madding crowds and retired to the
sylvan solitude of the woods for meditation on
mysteries of life It was in the secluded and tranquil
atmosphere of the woods that the great teachers of
mankind cultivated their souls observed austerity and
wrote the holiest scriptures Aranyakas and sacred texts
Gurukul (forest academies)- the ideal nurseries of
higher learning and disciplined rigorous life were setup
here for success in life and self-realization which is a
path-way to God-realization
HIS CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE AND GANDHIJIrsquoS
SATYAGRAHA
Bapu read Thoreaursquos essay on Civil Disobedience for
the second time in jail and was so deeply impressed by
it that he called it ldquoa masterly treatise which left a deep impression on merdquo He copied the words ldquoI did not feel for a moment confined and the walls seemed a great waste of stone and mortarrdquo Gandhiji wrote to Roosevelt
in 1942 ldquoI have profited greatly by the writings of Thoreau and Emersonrdquo He told Roger Baldwin that
Thoreaursquos essay ldquocontained the essence of his political philosophy not only as Indiarsquos struggle related to the British but as to his own views of the relation of citizens to Governmentrdquo As Miller observed ldquoGandhiji received back from America what was fundamentally the philosophy of India after it had been distilled and crystallized in the mind of Thoreaurdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 145
In his Civil Disobedience which as a document of
much ethical and spiritual value is manrsquos most powerful
weapon in dealing with tyranny Thoreau examines the
relation of the individual to the state and offers a candid
exposition when he says ldquoThat Government is best which governs the leastrdquo He believed in the supremacy of
moral laws and his concept of Civil Disobedience is
based on the dictates of conscience Since the nature of
an individual is determined by his conscience there is
always a basic conflict between the laws arbitrarily
made by the Government and the objectives sanctioned
and held sacred by the individualrsquos conscience He
regarded the individual as more important than the
state So in the interests of justice and virtue men with
clean conscience most oppose unjust laws The form of
protest launched by conscientious and holy men against
government is called Civil Disobedience
Thoreau seems to have derived the concept from the
Bhagvad Gita which invests each individual with two
contradictory traits ndash the Divine Attributes and the
Diabolical Propensities Whenever diabolical tendencies
promote arbitrary administration by making unjust
laws and men of clean conscience are forced to obey
them injustice prevails and justice or righteousness is
destroyed In such a situation the Divinity incarnates
itself and sets matters right Declares Lord Krishna
ldquoWhenever righteousness (Virtue) is on the decline and injustice (Vice) is on the ascendant then I body forth myselfrdquo
Bhagvad Gita IV7
To Gandhiji also Satya (Truth) and Ahimsa (Non-
violence) are inter-related and Satyagraha or non-
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 146
violent resistance is based on the belief in the power of
spirit the power of truth the power of love by which we
can overcome evil through self-suffering and self-
sacrifice
FORMATIVE INDIAN INFLUENCES
Thoreau was thoroughly immersed in the Indian
scriptures In Emersonrsquos library he read and was deeply
influenced by the Manusmriti Bhagvad Gita Vishnu Puran Hitopadesh Rig-Veda and the Upanishads
Which the Manusmriti led him to seek the Self in
solitude the Bhagvad Gita taught him the ideal of
disinterested action non-attachment meditation and
self-realization He was so overwhelmed by the Gita that
he declared it to be the lsquoUniversal Gospelrsquo Praising its
moral grandeur and sustained sublimity of thoughts he
wrote in Walden ndash ldquoIn the morning I bathe my intellect in the stupendous cosmogonal philosophy of the Bhagvad Gita since whose composition years of the gods have elapsed and in comparison with which our modern world and its literature seems puny and trivial the best Hindu scripture (Gita) is remarkable for its pure intellectuality The reader is nowhere raised into and sustained in a higher purer and rarer region of thought than the Bhagvad Gita It is unquestionably one of the noblest and most sacred scriptures which have come down to us The oriental philosophy assigns their due rank respectively to action and contemplation or rather does full Justice to the latterrdquo
A thorough study of the Upanishads made him exclaim
joyfully ldquoWhat extracts from the Vedas I have read fall on me like the light of a higher and purer luminary which describes a loftier course through a purer stratum ndash free from particulars simple universalrdquo
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 147
At a time when the Western philosophers did not
appreciate the significance of contemplation Thoreau
emphasized that contemplation is as important as
action for the latter has to be charged by the former
otherwise action will lead to chaos disillusionment and
despair
HIS TRANSCENDENTALISM
Thoreau was an empirical transcendentalist To him
transcendentalism was a profound exploration of the
spiritual foundations of life His emphasis on intuition
or inner light for a direct relationship with God which
transcends all the conventional avenues of
communication stemmed from an intuitive capacity for
grasping the ultimate truth He was interested less in
the material world than in spiritual reality He regarded
Nature as a viable garment of the spiritual world and
the universe as the embodiment of a single Cosmic Soul
His transcendentalism relied upon the higher planes of
human circumstances its oneness with something
higher than itself While logical reasoning fails to grasp
the truth intuition transcends understanding and is a
synthesizing power to understand the organic whole
which is called the Over-soul
An individual of exceptional self-ascending and self-
reliance he believed that Over-soul is brought down to
earth by action rather than words He therefore did not
preach transcendentalism but actually lived it To him
transcendentalism is ldquoan inquisitive and contemplative access to Godrdquo He believed in the immanence of God in
nature and in man and also the identity of God with the
soul of the individual He said ldquothe creator is still behind the increate the Divinity is so fleeting that its attributes are never expressedthe idea of God is the idea of
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 148
our Spiritual nature purified and enlarged to infinity In ourselves are the elements of Divinity We see God around us because He dwells within usrdquo
This statement reminds us of a verse in the Gita
wherein Lord Krishna declares that every living heart is
His abode
ldquoArjuna God abides in the heart of all creatures causing them to revolve according to their deeds by His illusive power seated as those beings are in the vehicle of the bodyrdquo
At one place Thoreau said ldquoThe whole is whole an organic whole which is called Over-soul or Para-Brahman and the highest aim of life is to realize this truth and be one with the whole or Over-soulrdquo Thoreau seems to have
been moved by our Vedic incantation which says
ldquoThat (the invisible Absolute) is whole whole is this (the visible phenomenal universe) from the invisible whole comes forth the visible whole Though the visible whole has come out from that invisible whole yet the whole remains unalteredrdquo Thus the phenomenal and the
Absolute are inseparable All existence is in the
Absolute and whatever exists must exist in it hence all
manifestation is merely a modification of the one
Supreme Whole and neither increases nor diminishes It
Serene and thoughtful as he was he wrote in his
Journal ldquoThe fact is I am a mystic a transcendentalist and a natural philosopher to bootrdquo
HIS ASCETISM (SANNYASA)
He was a true ascetic or Sannyasi for he preached and
practiced the basic human values of Anasakti (non-
attachment) and Aparigraha (non-possession)
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 149
throughout his life He abhorred acquisition of wealth
and regarded worldly possessions as the result of sheer
exploitation of the masses by a few powerful men and
agencies including the State and the Government Since
the universe belongs to God any claim to ownership or
personal possessions is against moral law and is in fact
a sin against divinity Moral laws being superior to
worldly rules his preference for a life of self-abnegation
and renunciation bears a striking similarity to our Vedic
view expressed in the very opening line of the
Ishopanishad
ldquoAll this whatever exists in the universe is inhabited by the Lord Having renounced (the unreal) enjoy (the real) with restraint Do not covet or set your eye on the possession of othersrdquo
To him all worldly attractions and allurements were but
a passing show or fleeting moments (in eternity) which
distract the seekers of truth from cultivating self-culture
and promoting inner spiritual growth
EXPLORER OF THE INNER WORLD OF SPIRIT
Thoreau was an explorer of the inner self He wanted to
pass ldquoan invisible boundaryrdquo establishment within and
around him new universal and more liberal laws and
live with higher order of beings To him every man is
the Lord of the realm beside which the earthly empire
of the Czar is but a petty state a hammock left by the
icethere are continents and seas in the moral
world yet unexplored by him He praised William
Habbingtonrsquos following lines which echoed his own
thoughts
ldquoDirect your eyes right inward and you will find
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 150
A thousand regions in your mind
Yet undiscovered Travel then and be
Expert in home home cosmographyrdquo
Simple living based on extreme reduction of wants and
self-reliance enabled him to lsquocultivate the garden of his soulrsquo In consonance with the concept of an ideal Yogi in
the Gita he wrote
ldquoThe millions are awake enough for physical labour but only one in a million is awake enough for effective intellectual exertion and only one in a hundred millions do a poetic or divine liferdquo How truly does this view echo
the memorable words of Lord Krishna
ldquoAmong thousands of men one rare soul strives for perfection and among those who strive with success one perchance knows me in truthrdquo
Condemning people who go to Africa to hunt giraffes for
pastime he exhorted them to aim at seeking their own
lsquoSelfrsquo He said ldquoIt would be a noble game to shoot onersquos selfrdquo He seems to recall the famous verse of the
Mundakopanishad which says
ldquoThe Pranava is the bow the Atman is the arrow and the Brahman is said to be its mark It should be hit by one who is self-collected and that which hits becomes like the arrow one with the mark ie Brahmanrdquo
When he ordains lsquoto shoot oneselfrsquo he like our Vedic
seers hints at penetrating the truth centre in us with
our mind propelled by the motive force generated in the
voiceless ecstasy of deepest meditation which touches
the Brahman the Ultimate Reality When the individual
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 151
soul gets fully detached from its contacts with matter or
its false identification with material envelopment it
realizes its oneness with the Supreme Brahman How
beautifully has he stressed the value of inner search in
the concluding sentence of Walden
ldquoThe light which puts out our eyes is darkness to us Only that day dawns to which we are awake There is more day to dawn The Sun is but a morning starrdquo
IMMORTALITY OF SOUL AND THE DOCTRINE OF
TRANSMIGRATION
Thoreau firmly believed in the immortality of soul and
its transmigration He had fully imbibed the philosophy
of the Gita which enunciates in unequivocal terms the
permanence of the soul and the transience of the body
Says Lord Krishna
ldquoThis soul is never born and never dies nor does it become only after being born For it is unborn eternal everlasting and ancient even though the body is slain the soul is notrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II20
ldquoAs a man shedding worn-out garments takes other new ones likewise the embodied soul casting off worn-out bodies enters into others which are newrdquo
Bhagvad Gita II22
Thoreau considered his life as a series of many more
lives to come On his return from Waldon Pond he said
ldquoI had several more lives to live and could not spare any more for that onerdquo At another place he refers to the
solitary hired manrsquos lsquosecond birth and peculiar religious
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 152
experiencersquo He evidently recalled the following words of
St John ldquoExcept a man be born again he cannot see the kingdom of Godrdquo In his Waldon he refers to a bug and
declares ldquoWho does not feel his faith in a resurrection and immortality Who knows what beautiful and winged whose egg has been buried for ages under many concentric layers of woodenness in the dead dry life in societyheard perchance of gnawing out now for years by the astonished family of man may unexpectedly come forth from amidst societyrsquos most trivial furniture to enjoy its perfect summer life at lastrdquo
CONCLUSION
Thoreau was a true Yogi or an ascetic modeling on the
Indian tradition of strict moral code of conduct for a
Sannyasi He drew abundant spiritual and moral
sustenance from the Indian scriptures and its rich
lsquoculturersquo and approximated the ideal of a perfect recluse
The concept of an ideal Yogi is similar upto a point to
the postulates of Divinity expressed thus in the Atharva Veda
ldquoThe Yogi is desireless and hence free from the impact of animal nature he is serene in the heroism of the spirit he is satisfied with the essence of things perceived spirituality and hence does not depend on sense-perception for happiness and so he is complete in himself And though the physical body is subject to decay and death he remains unworn and ever youthful in spirit and has no fear of deathrdquo
Atharva Veda XVIII44
Such an enlightenment Yogi or spiritual superman was
Thoreau whose greatness will ever inspire us and
EXPLORERS OF ETERNITY
RP DWIVEDI Page 153
illumine our lifersquos path with light and love His life was
lsquoa chronicle of actions just and brightrsquo and his writings
were lsquowrit with beams of heavenly light on which the eyes of God not rarely lookrsquo
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