‘Do thy duty without any attachment' at once raises the question, what is duty? We all understand duty generally, but when important issues arise, one is baffled or unclear about one's duty. Man mistaking his desire to be his duty is common. Taking his own opinion or conviction to be DUTY is more usual. For one who thinks and analyses, duty varies. It is often social duty, sometimes duty to conscience, which is psychological duty. What is DUTY, in the absolute sense?  To all righteous men of accomplishment, this question constantly presents itself.

Walking is an essential activity. Incidentally, it is an excellent exercise as it strains most of the muscles in the body to some extent. People in the village walking ten miles was common in those days. Even when there is a bus service, some people would prefer to walk. E.I.D. Parry & Co. has several legends in its long history. One such was the most important cane farmer in the seventies was one who walked 19 miles from his village without taking the bus or train in order to save 18 np. The journey is 38 miles up and down. Today it is unthinkable.

One can get addicted to tobacco, coffee, etc. They are physical habits. Addiction has a psychological dimension. Watching TV and reading light material become such addictions. Any activity, however exalted it is, can become an addiction if one outlives its need.  Such a commendable practice like meditation can become a habit from which one cannot extricate himself, when his consciousness rises to an intensity where meditation serves no useful purpose. There are great scholars in various universities whose scholarship is prodigious.

Efficiency secures a job and helps to secure promotions. That efficiency helps to lose a job is not well known. When the strikers are on the ascendant, one common demand is to dismiss the efficient foreman. Employees retain their job or secure their promotions, not because they are efficient, but because they are in the favour of the employer. The employer loves obedience more than capacity, tale-bearing more than efficiency. An employee who has no character or reliability will not be chosen by any company just because he is efficient.

After the demise of the Cold War, several minor conflicts survive, such as Kashmir, the Arab-Israeli conflict, Sri Lanka, and Ireland. The Sri Lankan conflict is of recent origin, Kashmir is sixty years old, Arab is age-old. The Irish problem is five hundred years old, but during the last hundred or two hundred years, particularly since 1798, the issue remains hot. In 1921, Ireland became a republic, but it left a remainder of Northern Ireland.

The Westerner has realised Brahman in Matter, is what Sri Aurobindo said. Brahman is many things and all things. Pre-eminently, Brahman is TRUTH. Truth is powerful because it is the first expression of Spirit in cosmic creation. Therefore, Truth is a direct door to Spirit. Informed readers, particularly students of economics and politics are fully aware of the wholesale damage the 1929 economic crash did. Wealthy families in India that became bankrupt in the 30s lost their all in that crash.

Terrorism is the topic of the hour. It is a heinous crime to kill innocent people for an ideology one has in his own mind. He who indulges in it often risks his life, feeling he is a noble martyr. On any showing, it is indefensible. Sri Aurobindo says that behind any powerful statement or act lies a truth that escapes our attention. Is there a truth behind the series of terrorist attacks on most innocent people? Or is it a retrogressive movement? Lord Mountbatten was killed by a bomb in his yacht planted by the Irish Republican Army. They owned it was their doing.

A famous French writer said that an Idea whose TIME has come is irresistible. The French Revolution was thought to be one when the time for liberty came. The whole of Europe briefly came under the domination of France and all the nations welcomed the Code of Napoleon as an article of faith. Up to now, the Code of Napoleon has ruled all of Europe and beyond. Such an idea is called an evolutionary Idea. Nature functions in Time and her movements wait for the right time. The Force I speak of is not functioning in Nature or through Nature.

The Chairman of the International Commission on Peace and Food (ICPF) desired us to review the relevance of the recommendations since it is now ten years after the release of the Report. The review is to be done in a conference in Delhi in the last week of November sponsored by four or five world organisations. The Chairman of ICPD, the successor organisation to ICPF, is 85 years old. We hesitated to invite him to travel from Washington, but he was in earnest, indeed eager, in spite of his frail health.