Book II—The
Book of the Traveller of the Worlds
Canto 1
The World-Stair
Fourteen sounds came from Shiva’s rattle-drum,
Fourteen waves surged on the ocean of calm;
Fourteen desires gathered in the world’s desire.
From materials of these many realms
Was formed this earth, darling of the dancer.
Angels, demons, gods of the great spirit
Took firm stations up the viewless ladder
And poured their riches on this little soul.
But haunted was she by a grisly shade
And Aswapati, to redeem her woe,
Sought a power beyond the afflicter’s reach.
The seer within set him on the climbing route.
The Vishva Yoga begins. Here is a Universe well-planned
and many-tiered. It has limits neither in Space nor in Time. Experience after
experience displays the rainbow moods of the Power that brought it into
existence. It is as if from one string issued out numberless harmonies, each
with its own frozen perfection. They climb one above the other and disappear in
the original Hush. It is up on these ascending slopes of Heaven that the
aspiring soul of man moves. So too these worlds influence in several ways the
working of this earth, her grief and her joy. Our souls were attracted by its
mystery and accepted the travail. In the process slowly the meaning of the
cosmic scheme itself becomes evident. The Seer is born within, and whatever
knowledge is necessary is received. In the exploration of this scheme no term
has been fixed for Aswapati and his march is towards the indiscernible end. He
sees Nature’s climbing hierarchy and sets himself on the way.
The Kingdom of Subtle Matter
First he entered the world of exquisite matter
That could house beauty and all its sweetness
And bring unflawed wonders to time-made things.
A quiet flame burned in the gold lamp of joy
And filled room and room with the light of its truth.
But then came mind and fragmented the dream;
A wave dashed on the hoary rock of night
And in its spume and spray dimly glistened
A million planktons of the vague early form,
And only lingered a fading memory.
Of yore alone there lived the atomic being,
Preparing the body of a deathless god.
The first port of entry is the world of Subtle Matter.
Here are present the prototypal forms, the shining origins of things on earth.
All here is beautiful, faultless, dream-hued, outlasting death and birth.
Though so close to earth, they suffer no deformation. Even as the soul is
radiant, material substance in this region bears the signature of power and
authority. From here occurs the fall into darker and denser reality that is
ours. This makes us humble, but also it can make us noble, to be stars. Here is
a possibility of our mortal body becoming glorious if it should hold sufficient
truth in it. The divine substance is now present in this proximate world
marking a new beginning towards that divinity on earth. But prior to that,
Aswapati has to discover what lies beyond this material
Canto 3
The Glory and Fall of Life
Heavenly queen wore flowing purple dresses
In the sky and drove her car of adventure
On roads of swift brightsome moods. Sun nor moon
Nor countless stars of the unbounded world
Drew limits to life’s zestful vineyard song.
Eagle-winged flying over the viewless Everest
Or a worm crawling on the Pacific’s floor,
Is her spirit hazardously valiant.
No wonder, in her amaranthine craze
She hailed death and took him as her husband.
Out of that wedlock were born grim children,
But Aswapati discerned there another will.
Not symmetric charm and carved dreams, but the spirit of
adventure is what gives vibrancy to existence. Life bothers the least about the
pros and cons, hazards to assert herself in every circumstance. Her high birth
disdains her not from entering into the squalid earth. Indeed, whatever can
serve her questing delight she gambles, unmindful of the peril. She risks even
the extremes. Be they meadows of laughter or fields of toil, for her everything
is for creative enjoyment. Because of her alone the dull material substance
becomes sensitive to dynamic possibilities of the revealing Spirit. She builds
the foundation for greater powers to step into this physical manifestation.
However, in the process, Matter’s stiffness or jadatva overpowers her
and she is no more her old self here. Life meets Death and they together now
drive the insecure cart of dubious immortality.
Canto 4
The Kingdoms of the Little Life
Earth’s thick shadow swallowed the bold angel
And in that occult mystery began
The quizzical march; the eclipsed moon of joy
Explored the emptiness with its blind eye,
Compelling yet the desert of the universe
To feel and flower in the laughter of god.
Soon out of dull matter’s crevices hissed
Someone and from its terrifying fangs
Poured quick poison on the Cleopatran breast.
Yet she adventured into the Jurassic
And gave early thought to the Neanderthal.
A sense that suffered triple gloom was now here.
The great power has succumbed and earth failed to keep
the joy she had brought with her. Not only that. She herself has become an
abject being crawling in the lowly mud. Yet in her arrival glimmers a faint
hope urging the mortal’s soul on the wakened path. Aswapati sees this pitiful
state of fallen Life surviving on Death. Here perpetuity is her immortality.
But then there are gains also. There is a climbing of life from below. The
first creation is followed by the instinct of a thinking sense. An animal
experiment then begins. In it all is done to satisfy the body’s wants and
survival of the fittest becomes the law. But with the physical mind opening to
higher Light the possibility of transformation becomes distinct. Presently an
instrument personality is born and all is dictated by habits. Everything looks
species-based and repetitive; around the little glow of life there is the
nescient haze.
Canto 5
The Godheads of the Little Life
Crossing the destinies of sorrows and of joys
Child of jagat-shakti, the maimed goddess
Bore children in whom burned no benign flame.
Soulless creatures lived feeding on slush
Or relished frog-liver cooked in cruelty
And, croaking throughout the night, hungered for more.
At times a trembling ray squirmed under the life-mind
And looked at things with squinting scarlet eyes;
At times some ghost of thought rushed quickly by
Or the animal leaped to seize wisdom’s word.
Yet from elsewhere awareness must come
And bring gain to the godheads of little life.
There is nothing angelic in this empire of little life.
Chaos governs the infernal creatures inhabiting it. Life has force and she is
driven by idea, but the Idea-Force is absent. Instinct is followed by thought
and thought by will. Out of this queer stuff was shaped man and it could be
proclaimed that he was well made. Still man lives just for a brief while—only
to enjoy and suffer and die. He has essentially remained the same, yet greatly
prone to error. His mind is but a doll manipulated by unseen forces and such
cannot be the end of Life’s adventure. She has to move forward to receive truer
gifts from the hands of Fortune. Not Man nor Nature but the Avatar alone can
help her receive these rewards. He pays the price for that. If the body’s cells
have to be filled with divine joy he has to eliminate the wrong afflicting
them. Sacrificing his triple glory he accepts the mortal state, bears its
anguish. Aswapati moves through it with his spirit’s alert flame.
Canto 6
The Kingdoms and Godheads of the Greater Life
Led by his spirit’s promptings Aswapati
Reached the rainbow land where in colourful haste
The celestial artist worked out his wonders.
Life sang golden reality’s nether song
And a miracle was wrought in matter’s womb.
Thus alone would it suffer the pregnant change,
The rock-image of Shiva beget offspring.
But presently all saw just a faint gleam
In the brute stuff wherein lies imprisoned
The idea that gives meaning to our lives,
As if failed the intention which bore truth.
A power that denied grace held her in sway.
Stepping into the wider Life, Aswapati notices her
attempt to seize the boundless in birth. Thus she would claim back her heavenly
state she had lost long ago. She made this creation of many hues but missed the
True. Yet she moves on towards the far-off Light. Aswapati glimpses a ray of
hope in her thousand expressions. He hears the heartbeats of a hidden reality.
But he also hears the weeping of her soul within. She has become hostile and
has consorted herself with hidden death. She is a riddle unto herself and yet
slays the puzzled wayfarer. But Aswapati reads clearly the hieratic script and
the Word of Life is not a mystery to him. He discerns the gap between what she
came to do and what she now is. Pause she would not in her attempt to bring
glory to the material inanity, though her knowledge be incomplete. He must
probe in the night itself the cause of this failure.
Canto 7
The Descent into Night
Another reality the spirit met.
A dark river flowed ’neath the currents of time
And swam gargantuan fish swallowing
Gargantuan fish, god’s shadow but god.
On its grimy bank a citadel was built
And a fierce scarecrow shouted through the night.
In it stayed the fatal woman wearing
As a forehead mark destiny’s black sun.
From the dreadfulness of her nixie past
Peered eyes that deepened the mystery of hell
Even as she proclaimed the Tao of evil.
But in that cave too Aswapati saw Vishnu.
The problem of Life’s abysmal condition is a central
issue, and Aswapati cannot rest content without tackling it. What could have
been in the service of good has become an instrument of vice. In this world of
fallen Life fair is foul and foul fair. If there is creative Darkness engendering
pain, wickedness, suffering, corrupting truth, then it could be here. Now
Ignorance, Falsehood, Error, Ego walk in its thick shadow and the Satanic
votaries proclaim: “Evil, be thou my God.” Life in that gloom with her perilous
charm and beauty lies cursed under the Gorgon spell. There Aswapati felt that
his body was licked by the hostile Power and he suffered fear. But this had to
be borne. He endures and with his bare spirit masters her. The stepping of the
Incarnate into the worlds of Night is a wonderful thing that can happen to her
and in it is her opportunity to change.
Canto 8
The World of Falsehood, the Mother of Evil and the Sons
of Darkness
In dismal river was born the
tadpole ego
Who claimed forthwith the universe
for its use
And brought falsehood to run the enterprise,
And hired a serpent to guard the sleeping treasure.
Soon in countless numbers burned these dark stars
Working out in the ways of night the fate
Ruinous of this creation, soul’s quick downfall.
The terrible adventuress grew hostile
And gave to the interminable nothing
A chance to win divinity,—through death.
Then in the rocky insensate trance was heard
Wing-flap of birds and chime of distant bells.
God created Hell in his mood of infinite love and
justice, but this love has to first conquer the appalling Inane. The
existential problem is the denial to all that is God’s. Here are titan rebels
and maniac powers and cruel operators; here, allowed by the mighty Spirit, work
determinedly terrible agencies. But Aswapati, in the strength of his soul,
takes up the challenge. He probes penetratingly this kingdom of pain, this
world of sorrow and hate, of wickedness and malignancy. Not only that.
Shiva-like, he drinks all the poison, till not a drop is left. The radiant
truth in him yet remains intact. In the vastness of Existence he even feels the
smallness of this queer material creation. Aswapati observes that the
inconscient Being is asleep, and knows not what it built. But he puts his
finger upon the error and the pain, and at once awakens there new knowledge. He
has opened the Book of Bliss and Life’s truth is revealed. The dichotomy
between Matter and Spirit is resolved.
Canto 9
The
If darkness gave to her a grimacing face,
Under the flowering acacia life was sweet,
A bloom of happiness in god’s smiling grove.
Music trailed in the cadence of the stream
And the note of love gave wings to the singing bird,
King and queen strolled in the moonlit garden,
As if by a magic wand came a new world
Into birth to heal the wounds of the past.
A warm air urged the traveller on his way,
The chariot wheels setting into motion
Swift rhythms that trace the orbits for the suns.
In its rush a fiery wonder filled his soul.
In the occult abyss was the rendezvous with the Night.
Aswapati had gone there to woo her dark and dangerous heart. On the track
leading to the meeting place his footprints have become the seals of divinity
and thence shall gush radiant fountains. Around him all is felicitous and
wonderful and the daylight of conscious suns is within him. After that wounding
experience here is something healing and marvellous. The dread is over and an
Elysian fragrance fills the air. He is in the company of Gods and Goddesses and
is thrilled with beauty, peace, love, might, desire, pleasure, dream,
sweetness. Forms are shaped here by the divine light and mind is made immortal
by music. Aswapati’s whole being is flooded with bliss and an undying power
fills his strength. But he has also the perception that this cannot be the
journey’s end and that the Highest must be reached.
Canto 10
The Kingdoms and Godheads of the Little Mind
Could it be that a great thought made the world,—
Light plunged in the night and became the stars
And life awoke feelings in the dumb mass
And the blue-tinged brain found its reason to be?
A thinking ape was not an accident
And the braying mind was not without design
And never was the atom elemental.
Yet was implanted denial in the dna
And a swift-footed pride in the forest raged
And a serene mistress read nature’s tomes.
Still from the invisible fount of wisdom
Poured sudden truths that bring vision to our sight.
Across the land of sensuous beauty are the realms of
observation and understanding. Now in the play of Nature has been set into
motion another faculty, that of the early mind. First appears the physical
mind, marking the beginning of the thinking mind. It is tied to habits and it
toils in ignorance. Soon arrives Reason. She has come and made great
inventions, built philosophies and rational disciplines, drawn on the map of
knowledge a few lines of reality. But there is no goal and the game is
inconclusive. In the process she stumbles upon the fissioned atom and in it
sees the omnipotent’s force. Yet what is witnessed is the tyranny of Matter’s
logic imposed upon the Spirit’s swiftness of thought. There has to be a greater
Mind to see a greater truth. Only rarely does intuition bring to us superior
knowledge, the higher gnosis. Sometimes Life-Thoughts come like shining Maruts,
or else the pure Thought-Mind brings bodiless ideas in our midst.
Canto 11
The Kingdoms and Godheads of the Greater Mind
Ascending the slopes of mind Aswapati
Stepped into regions of sapphire thought
That looks at unborn luminous ideas
Knowing themselves which live in spirit alone.
Needless here were reason’s heavy glasses
And broadened the vista unto the unseen.
Magic word was a key for truth’s locked cave
And numbers and forms became visible links
And doors of awareness led to Platonic gold.
So could he walk in eminence of these realms
And bright immortalities freely breathe.
Yet truth like sun is vaster than all its flames.
But these wonderful powers of Mind are not of great
avail. There is a truth by which things can be seen in an unerring manner and that
is altogether beyond their reach. Aswapati now meets in the Ideal’s world the
Thinker or Manishi. Across the first realms of Mind he is in the company of
shining archangels and kings of thought. Theirs is an attempt to grasp Truth’s
absolute. The creative Word sets into motion these many worlds and the
will-to-be is seized in things. The divine power of hearing comes as a natural
gift. But Mind is incapable of understanding these works of Truth. Even sages
and seers find her to be beyond their grasp. There is no way to know her and it
is only by surrendering to the absolute will of hers that a ray of her radiant
wonder can enter into our life’s many dimnesses. Or else she would remain
forever unknown to us.
Canto 12
The Heavens of the Ideal
Mountains of time climbed towards timeless peaks
And god’s felicities flamed high in god.
It was a silent chant, a pilgrim march
Of the petite who saw marvellous worlds
And soared in the calm of creation’s joy.
The aspiring soul of earth breathed wonders
And the truth that answers made it beauteous.
In splendid will of the spirit was lit
A fire that gives to mortals seerhood
And raises the sacrifice to heaven.
A leader has arrived, friendly knower,
And he shall escort us on the shining path.
But the Ideal is always a bright spur for the explorer.
At each step is seen a luminous world rising in honour of the high Truth. On
one side are the kingdoms of love, beauty, joy, sweetness all bringing to earth
their gracious marvels. What remained dormant until now opens to spiritual
greatnesses. Here is felt the Immortal’s touch. On the other side of this
climbing pathway burns the deathless flame of will, the force of utter divine
consciousness. Even as it climbs the ascending slopes, there is a call to reach
the summits of existence. Aswapati moves through these worlds with the
household ease. But he finds that here while beauty and greatness, sweetness
and might, the Rose and the Flame, come together yet they stand apart. They
would not find themselves in the single soul of the world. The spiritual path
and the occult-psychic path run parallel but do not yet become one. Aswapati
must therefore advance towards the diviner spheres.
Canto 13
In the Self of Mind
What of victory drums, what of the grieving heart?
Armies of Hitler set the world on fire,
Maniacs of time destroy the towers of pride,
And what of the river-song through luxuriant fields,
Of Sistine Chapel and the caves of
Aloof and untouched watches the witness eye,
Else consents to the whims in nature’s play.
Passive has become the thinker, listless the thought,
And the Vedantist himself an illusion,
Gods, creatures, imperious death but shadows.
The will to be disappeared in that calm
And remained the mute alone and self-absorbed.
On his onward march Aswapati has now entered the
passive world of the superior being of Mind who is simultaneously impersonal
also. He stands on the summit and is a silent witness, sākshi, of things
carried out by Nature, Prakriti. He watches indifferently the good and the bad
of life; he is unconcerned about victory or defeat. Yet without his consent the
movements of Prakriti would not take place. He is anumantā, giving
approval for her actions. Aswapati lived in this still self, and its quiet
vastness was in him. But there was no urge to stay in it. That self seemed but
a shadow of a vaster and more forceful a reality. Peace is all right, but there
has also to be the Truth’s dynamism. It is this dynamic aspect which gives
credibility to this world. Aswapati found love and sweetness of the
Mother-force absent here. This would not satisfy him and he is prompted to go
beyond the realization of this silent self.
Canto 14
The World-Soul
Shadows of night turned into splendours of god
And a delicate fragrance filled the air
And in the etheric hush surged forth sounds
That speak of the truer infinity’s urgings;
The calm pace of the yogin-traveller
Took him to the temple-palace of Sophia,
Self-luminous and divine, creation’s heart.
His will burned in the will of the bright goddess,
The builder of the worlds to build a new world.
Her almighty power he must house in his soul’s deep,—
Not for himself but to change the lot of man,
Bring immortal happiness to this deathful life.
In search of the active power who shapes the course of
events, Aswapati is led by a mysterious sound and he comes to a wonderful
realm. There consciousness, mind, life, body are all made of soul-stuff and
spiritual sense is the instrument of knowledge. Those who have by the practices
of virtue accumulated great merit in life on earth ascend to this splendid
abode. Here wait the liberated souls for a new adventure in the world of
opportunities. Beyond it are regions of happiness and peace, of light, hope,
love. Aswapati grows aware of them. He sees Shiva and Shakti in a fulfilling
union’s poise. Behind them stands the omnipotent Goddess, Chidvilasini or
Consciousness-Force by whose act this creation has come out from the Unknowable.
Aswapati’s spirit has now become a vessel to hold her luminous might. In her he
finds an answer to his long search and surrenders to her. Indeed, this is the
offering of the World-Soul to the Higher Power who alone can assure the success
of his work. His quest bears fruit in her.
Canto 15
The Kingdoms of the Greater Knowledge
Then Brahma engaged himself in gold-bright tapas
And the directions were born and the word
And out of the truth-idea, the splendid womb
Sprang readily seven rhythms of creation
And the great rishis took radiant daughters
For their spouses and in their rich company
Held sessions of the undying triple fire,
Made offerings of the earth, the mid-region
And, when had set the sun, the blazing heaven.
And Aswapati partook in the hearth
And the table of the gods. His body-mind
Opened to things that are to come to time.
Aswapati, after such a wonderful experience on the border
touching the Transcendent, returns to the things of Time. Now wherever he goes
he carries along with him the consciousness of Passive Brahman, the quiescent
Sachchidananda as a foundation for all of his activities in the world. He sees
the powers that supervise the world and beyond them looks for that which can
bring about a cosmic change. He makes a total yogic surrender to the Reality
which sustains the Earth, the Mid-region, and Heaven,—Bhur, Bhuvar, Swar. In
that sacrifice he is newborn and even his body partakes in its joy. Yet this
supernal birth is his alone and cannot be of great avail for the collective on
the earth. The individual’s supernal birth has to become a larger supernal
birth. Its key is with the Divine Mother and therefore Aswapati must approach
her. With this Siddhi attained, and with the cosmic forces now under his
control, he becomes the Lord of Life. Hence onward his march is towards that
transcendence where is her home.