Essays on the Gita

130 <strong>Essays</strong> on the Gitaand acting and moving, under her impulsion entirely, in this oneinfinite Being; our own finite existence is seen and felt to beonly one of these and its workings are seen and felt to be thoseof Nature, not of our real self which is the silent, impersonalunity. The ego claimed them as its own doings and thereforewe thought them ours; but the ego is now dead and henceforththey are no longer ours, but Nature’s. We have achieved by theslaying of ego impersonality in our being and consciousness;we have achieved by the renunciation of desire impersonalityin the works of our nature. We are free not only in inaction,but in action; our liberty does not depend on a physical andtemperamental immobility and vacancy, nor do we fall fromfreedom directly we act. Even in a full current of natural actionthe impersonal soul in us remains calm, still and free.The liberation given by this perfect impersonality is real, iscomplete, is indispensable; but is it the last word, the end of thewhole matter? All life, all world-existence, we have said, is thesacrifice offered by Nature to the Purusha, the one and secretsoul in Nature, in whom all her workings take place; but its realsense is obscured in us by ego, by desire, by our limited, active,multiple personality. We have risen out of ego and desire andlimited personality and by impersonality, its great corrective,we have found the impersonal Godhead; we have identified ourbeing with the one self and soul in whom all exist. The sacrificeof works continues, conducted not by ourselves any longer, butby Nature, — Nature operating through the finite part of ourbeing, mind, senses, body, — but in our infinite being. But towhom then is this sacrifice offered and with what object? For theimpersonal has no activity and no desires, no object to be gained,no dependence for anything on all this world of creatures; itexists for itself, in its own self-delight, in its own immutableeternal being. We may have to do works without desire as ameans in order to reach this impersonal self-existence and selfdelight,but, that movement once executed, the object of works isfinished; the sacrifice is no longer needed. Works may even thencontinue because Nature continues and her activities; but thereis no longer any further object in these works. The sole reason