The Complete Works of Swami Vivekananda/Volume 2/Practical Vedanta and other lectures/Cosmology
COSMOLOGY
There are two worlds, the microcosm, and the macrocosm, the internal and the
external. We get truth from both of these by means of experience. The truth
gathered from internal experience is psychology, metaphysics, and religion;
from external experience, the physical sciences. Now a perfect truth should
be in harmony with experiences in both these worlds. The microcosm must bear
testimony to the macrocosm, and the macrocosm to the microcosm; physical
truth must have its counterpart in the internal world, and the internal
world must have its verification outside. Yet, as a rule, we find that many
of these truths are in conflict. At one period of the world's history, the
internals become supreme, and they begin to fight the externals. At the
present time the externals, the physicists, have become supreme, and they
have put down many claims of psychologists and metaphysicians. So far as my
knowledge goes, I find that the real, essential parts of psychology are in
perfect accord with the essential parts of modern physical knowledge. It is
not given to one individual to be great in every respect; it is not given to
one race or nation to be equally strong in the research of all fields of
knowledge. The modern European nations are very strong in their research of
external physical knowledge, but they are not so strong in their study of
the inner nature of man. On the other hand, the Orientals have not been very
strong in their researches of the external physical world, but very strong
in their researches of the internal. Therefore we find that Oriental physics
and other sciences are not in accordance with Occidental Sciences; nor is
Occidental psychology in harmony with Oriental psychology. The Oriental
physicists have been routed by Occidental scientists. At the same time, each
claims to rest on truth; and as we stated before, real truth in any field of
knowledge will not contradict itself; the truths internal are in harmony
with the truths external.
We all know the theories of the cosmos according to the modern astronomers
and physicists; and at the same time we all know how woefully they undermine
the theology of Europe, how these scientific discoveries that are made act
as a bomb thrown at its stronghold; and we know how theologians have in all
times attempted to put down these researches.
I want here to go over the psychological ideas of the Orientals about
cosmology and all that pertains to it, and you will find how wonderfully
they are in accordance with the latest discoveries of modern science; and
where there is disharmony, you will find that it is modern science which
lacks and not they. We all use the word nature. The old Sânkhya philosophers
called it by two different names, Prakriti, which is very much the same as
the word nature, and the more scientific name, Avyakta, undifferentiated,
from which everything proceeds, such as atoms, molecules, and forces, mind,
thought, and intelligence. It is startling to find that the philosophers and
metaphysicians of India stated ages ago that mind is material. What are our
present materialists trying to do, but to show that mind is as much a
product of nature as the body? And so is thought, and, we shall find by and
by, intelligence also: all issue from that nature which is called Avyakta,
the undifferentiated. The Sankhyas define it as the equilibrium of three
forces, one of which is called Sattva, another Rajas, and the third Tamas.
Tamas, the lowest force, is that of attraction; a little higher is Rajas,
that of repulsion; and the highest is the balance of these two, Sattva; so
that when these two forces, attraction and repulsion, are held in perfect
control by the Sattva there is no creation, no movement in the world. As
soon as this equilibrium is lost, the balance is disturbed, and one of these
forces gets stronger than the other, motion sets in, and creation begins.
This state of things goes on cyclically, periodically. That is to say, there
is a period of disturbance of the balance, when forces begin to combine and
recombine, and things project outwards. At the same time, everything has a
tendency to go back to the primal state of equilibrium, and the time comes
when that total annihilation of all manifestation is reached. Again, after a
period, the whole thing is disturbed, projected outwards, and again it
slowly goes down — like waves. All motion, everything in this universe, can
be likened to waves undergoing successive rise and fall. Some of these
philosophers hold that the whole universe quiets down for a period. Others
hold that this quieting down applies only to systems; that is to say, that
while our system here, this solar system, will quiet down and go back into
the undifferentiated state, millions of other systems will go the other way,
and will project outwards. I should rather favour the second opinion, that
this quieting down is not simultaneous over the whole of the universe, and
that in different parts different things go on. But the principle remains
the same, that all we see — that is, nature herself — is progressing in
successive rises and falls. The one stage, falling down, going back to
balance, the perfect equilibrium, is called Pralaya, the end of a cycle. The
projection and the Pralaya of the universe have been compared by theistical
writers in India to the outbreathing and inbreathing of God; God, as it
were, breathes out the universe, and it comes into Him again. When it quiets
down, what becomes of the universe? It exists, only in finer forms, in the
form of cause, as it is called in the Sankhya philosophy. It does not get
rid of causation, time, and space; they are there, only it comes to very
fine and minute forms. Supposing that this whole universe begins to shrink,
till every one of us becomes just a little molecule, we should not feel the
change at all, because everything relating to us would be shrinking at the
same time. The whole thing goes down, and again projects out, the cause
brings out the effect, and so it goes on.
What we call matter in modern times was called by; the ancient psychologists
Bhutas, the external elements. There is one element which, according to
them, is eternal ; every other element is produced out of this one. It is
called Âkâsha. It is somewhat similar to the idea of ether of the moderns,
though not exactly similar. Along with this element, there is the primal
energy called Prâna. Prana and Akasha combine and recombine and form the
elements out of them. Then at the end of the Kalpa; everything subsides, and
goes back to Akasha and Prana. There is in the Rig-Veda, the oldest human
writing in existence, a beautiful passage describing creation, and it is
most poetical — "When there was neither aught nor naught, when darkness was
rolling over darkness, what existed?" and the answer is given, "It then
existed without vibration". This Prana existed then, but there was no motion
in it; Ânidavâtam means "existed without vibration". Vibration had stopped.
Then when the Kalpa begins, after an immense interval, the Anidavatam
(unvibrating atom) commences to vibrate, and blow after blow is given by
Prana to Akasha. The atoms become condensed, and as they are condensed
different elements are formed. We generally find these things very curiously
translated; people do not go to the philosophers or the commentators for
their translation, and have not the brains to understand them themselves. A
silly man reads three letters of Sanskrit and translates a whole book. They
translate the, elements as air, fire, and so on; if they would go to the
commentators, they would find they do not mean air or anything of the sort.
The Akasha, acted upon by the repeated blows of Prana, produces Vâyu or
vibrations. This Vayu vibrates, and the vibrations growing more and more
rapid result in friction giving rise to heat, Tejas. Then this heat ends in
liquefaction, Âpah. Then that liquid becomes solid. We had ether, and
motion, then came heat, then it became liquefied, and then it condensed into
gross matter; and it goes back in exactly the reverse way. The solid will be
liquefied and will then be converted into a mass of heat, and that will
slowly get back into motion; that motion will stop, and this Kalpa will be
destroyed. Then, again it will come back and again dissolve into ether.
Prana cannot work alone without the help of Akasha. All that we know in the
form of motion, vibration, or thought is a modification of the Prana, and
everything that we know in the shape of matter, either as form or as
resistance, is a modification of the Akasha. The Prana cannot live alone, or
act without a medium; when it is pure Prana, it has the Akasha itself to
live in, and when it changes into forces of nature, say gravitation, or
centrifugal force, it must have matter. You have never seen force without
matter or matter without force; what we call force and matter are simply the
gross manifestations of these same things, which, when superfine, are called
Prana and Akasha. Prana you can call in English life, the vital force; but
you must not restrict it to the life of man; at the same time you must not
identify it with Spirit, Atman. So this goes on. Creation cannot have either
a beginning or an end; it is an eternal on-going.
We shall state another position of these old psychologists, which is that
all gross things are the results of fine ones. Everything that is gross is
composed of fine things, which they call the Tanmâtras, the fine particles.
I smell a flower. To smell, something must come in contact with my nose; the
flower is there, but I do not see it move towards me. That which comes from
the flower and in contact with my nose is called the Tanmatra, fine
molecules of that flower. So with heat, light and everything. These
Tanmatras can again be subdivided into atoms. Different philosophers have
different theories, and we know these are only theories. It is sufficient
for our purpose to know that everything gross is composed of things that are
very, very fine. We first get the gross elements which we feel externally,
and then come the fine elements with which the nose, eyes, and ears come in
contact. Ether waves touch my eyes; I cannot see them, yet I know they must
come in contact with my eyes before I can see light.
Here are the eyes, but the eyes do not see. Take away the brain centre; the
eyes will still be there, as also the picture of the outside world complete
on the retinae; yet the eyes will not see. So the eyes are only a secondary
instrument, not the organ of vision. The organ of vision is the nerve-centre
in the brain. Likewise the nose is an instrument, and there is an organ
behind it. The senses are simply the external instruments. It may be said
that these different organs, Indriyas, as they are called in Sanskrit, are
the real seats of perception.
It is necessary for the mind to be joined to an organ to perceive. It is a
common experience that we do not hear the clock strike when we happen to be
buried in study. Why? The ear was there, the sound was carried through it to
the brain; yet it was not heard, because the mind did not attach itself to
the organ of hearing.
There is a different organ for each different instrument. For, if one served
for all, we should find that when the mind joined itself to it, all the
senses would be equally active. But it is not so, as we have seen from the
instance of the clock. If there was only one organ for all the instruments,
the mind would see and hear at the same time, would see and hear and smell
at the same time, and it would be impossible for it not to do all these at
one and the same time. Therefore it is necessary that there should be a
separate organ for each sense. This has been borne out by modern physiology.
It is certainly possible for us to hear and see at the same time, but that
is because the mind attaches itself partially to the two centres.
What are the organs made of? We see that the instruments — eyes, nose, and
ears — are made of gross materials. The organs are also made of matter. Just
as the body is composed of gross materials, and manufactures Prana into
different gross forces, so the organs are composed of the fine elements,
Akasha, Vayu, Tejas, etc., and manufacture Prana into the finer forces of
perception. The organs, the Prana functions, the mind and the Buddhi
combined, are called the finer body of man — the Linga or Sukshma Sharira.
The Linga Sharira has a real form because everything material must have a
form.
The mind is called the Manas, the Chitta in Vritti or vibrating, the
unsettled state. If you throw a stone in a lake, first there will be
vibration, and then resistance. For a moment the water will vibrate and then
it will react on the stone. So when any impression comes on the Chitta, it
first vibrates a little. That is called the Manas. The mind carries the
impression farther in, and presents it to the determinative faculty, Buddhi,
which reacts. Behind Buddhi is Ahamkâra, egoism, the self-consciousness
which says, "I am". Behind Ahamkara is Mahat, intelligence, the highest form
of nature's existence. Each one is the effect of the succeeding one. In the
case of the lake, every blow that comes to it is from the external world,
while in the case of the mind, the blow may come either from the external or
the internal world. Behind the intelligence is the Self of man, the Purusha,
the Atman, the pure, the perfect, who alone is the seer, and for whom is all
this change.
Man looks on all these changes; he himself is never impure; but through what
the Vedantists call Adhyâsa, by reflection, by implication, he seems to be
impure. It is like the appearance of a crystal when a red or a blue flower
is brought before it: the colour is reflected on it, but the crystal itself
is pure. We shall take it for granted that there are many selves, and each
self is pure and perfect; various kinds of gross and fine matter superimpose
themselves on the self and make it multicoloured. Why does nature do all
this? Nature is undergoing all these changes for the development of the
soul; all this creation is for the benefit of the soul, so that it may be
free. This immense book which we call the universe is stretched out before
man so that he may read; and he discovers eventually that he is an
omniscient and omnipotent being. I must here tell you that some of our best
psychologists do not believe in God in the sense in which you believe in
Him. The father of our psychology, Kapila, denies the existence of God. His
idea is that a Personal God is quite unnecessary; nature itself is
sufficient to work out the whole of creation. What is called the Design
Theory, he knocked on the head, and said that a more childish theory was
never advanced. But he admits a peculiar kind of God. He says we are all
struggling to get free; and when we become free, we can, as it were, melt
away into nature, only to come out at the beginning of the next cycle and be
its ruler. We come out omniscient and omnipotent beings. In that sense we
can be called Gods; you and I and the humblest beings can be Gods in
different cycles. He says such a God will be temporal; but an eternal God,
eternally omnipotent and ruler of the universe cannot be. If there was such
a God, there would be this difficulty: He must be either a bound spirit or a
free one. A God who is perfectly free would not create: there is no
necessity for it. If He were bound, He would not create, because He could
not: He would be powerless. In either case, there cannot be any omniscient
or omnipotent eternal ruler. In our scriptures, wherever the word God is
mentioned, he says, it means those human beings who have become free.
Kapila does not believe in the unity of all souls. His analysis, so far as
it goes, is simply marvellous. He is the father of Indian thinkers; Buddhism
and other systems are the outcome of his thought.
According to his psychology, all souls can regain their freedom and their
natural rights, which are omnipotence and omniscience. But the question
arises: Where is this bondage? Kapila says it is without beginning. But if
it is without beginning, it must be without end, and we shall never be free.
He says that though bondage is without beginning, it is not of that constant
uniform character as the soul is. In other words, nature (the cause of
bondage) is without beginning and end, but not in the same sense as soul,
because nature has no individuality; it is like a river which gets a fresh
body of water every moment; the sum total of these bodies of water is the
river, but the river is not a constant quantity. Everything in nature is
constantly changing, but the soul never changes; so, as nature is always
changing, it is possible for the soul to come out of its bondage.
The whole of the universe is built upon the same plan as a part of it. So,
just as I have a mind, there is a cosmic mind. As in the individual, so in
the universal. There is the universal gross body; behind that, a universal
fine body; behind that, a universal mind; behind that, a universal egoism,
or consciousness; and behind that, a universal intelligence. And all this is
in nature, the manifestation of nature, not outside of it.
We have the gross bodies from our parents, as also our consciousness. Strict
heredity says my body is a part of my parents' bodies, the material of my
consciousness and egoism is a part of my parents'. We can add to the little
portion inherited from our parents by drawing upon the universal
consciousness. There is an infinite storehouse of intelligence out of which
we draw what we require; there is an infinite storehouse of mental force in
the universe out of which we are drawing eternally; but the seed must come
from the parents. Our theory is heredity coupled with reincarnation. By the
law of heredity, the reincarnating soul receives from parents the material
out of which to manufacture a man.
Some of the European philosophers have asserted that this world exists
because I exist; and if I do not exist, the world will not exist. Sometimes
it is stated thus: If all the people in the world were to die, and there
were no more human beings, and no animals with powers of perception and
intelligence, all these manifestations would disappear. But these European
philosophers do not know the psychology of it, although they know the
principle; modern philosophy has got only a glimpse of it. This becomes easy
of understanding when looked at from the Sankhya point of view. According to
Sankhya, it is impossible for anything to be, which has not as its material,
some portion of my mind. I do not know this table as it is. An impression
from it comes to the eyes, then to, the Indriya, and then to the mind; and
the mind reacts, and that reaction is what I call the table. It is just the
same as throwing a stone in a lake; the lake throws a wave towards the
stone; this wave is what we know. What is external nobody knows; when I try
to know it, it has to become that material which I furnish. I, with my own
mind, have furnished the material for my eyes. There is something which is
outside, which is only, the occasion, the suggestion, and upon that
suggestion I project my mind; and it takes the form that I see. How do we
all see the same things? Because we all have; similar parts of the cosmic
mind. Those who have like minds will see like things, and those who have not
will not see alike.