“Undoubtedly each man is competent in his own sphere, to say what he wants for his town or village and who will serve it best among those he knows. But when it comes to a question of deciding intricate issues of national and international import, it is but common sense that only those should exercise… Read More
Categoria: Liberalism: its Problems
Proposal of a System in Harmony with the Law of the Universal Brotherhood (Annie Besant, N. Sri Ram and Jai Prakash Narain)
“Some time ago Pandit Nehru, in one of his speeches, threw out rather vaguely the idea that some day, instead of the present manner of elections to the Indian Parliament, some system, less direct and more suited to conditions in India, might be considered. Since then, Mr. Jai Prakash Narain (…) has more definitely proposed,… Read More
India Should Evolve a New Model of Democracy
“If India can evolve a form of democracy in which there is some chance for the needed wisdom to come to the top, she will thereby be serving the best interests of her own people, as well as setting an example that might help and inspire other peoples.” (N. Sri Ram. On the Watch Tower, p.… Read More
Participatory Democracy (or the Democracy of the Future), in the Vision of Professor C.B. Macpherson
“Let me turn finally to the question of how a participatory democracy might be run if we did achieve the prerequisites. How participatory could it be, given that at any level beyond the neighbourhood it would have to be an indirect or representative system rather than face-do-face direct democracy? If one looks at the question… Read More
Principle of the Democracy of the Future in One of the Oldest Books: the I CHING
A worldview that contemplates an essential unity in relation to the deep nature of human beings’ consciences and, at the same time, a great diversity of capabilities, is certainly not something new. Millennia ago this same general notion, about the decisive importance of a clear perception, as well as a fair equation and a harmonization… Read More
How to Find the Best Is the Problem: To Solve It You Must Realise the Hopelessness of the Present Line of Ruling
“Brotherhood applied to Government claims for the wise and not for the ignorant (…) how to find the best? The Ideal is that the best should rule; but how to find them, that is the problem. Every one of us who studies must try to solve this problem, and the suggestions I am here making… Read More
Above All Things Teach the Doctrine of the Spiritual Grades or Levels, Which Have No Relation to the Outward Condition of Life
“Above all things teach the doctrine of the Spiritual Grades or Levels. The Christians made a serious mistake in requiring the same rule of all persons. Castes are as ladders whereby to ascend from the lower to the higher. They are properly spiritual grades, and have no relation to the outward condition of life. Like… Read More
Influence and Responsibility of the Leaders of Thought
“(…) this our generation seems to evince but a very rudimentary spiritual grasp while apparently developed in intellect to the utmost extent possible. It is, indeed, a hard, materialistic age: a fragment of sparkling quartz is its appropriate symbol. And yet of what ‘age’ and ‘generation’ do we speak? Not of that of the masses,… Read More
Universal Brotherhood: a Principle Little Understood and the One Essential Both to Buddhism and Christianity
“How little this principle of Universal Brotherhood is understood by the masses of mankind, how seldom its transcendent importance is recognized, may be seen in the diversity of opinions and fictitious interpretations regarding the Theosophical Society. This Society was organized on this one principle, the essential Brotherhood of Man, as herein briefly outlined and imperfectly… Read More
Great Mission of True Theosophy (Altruism, or Divne Wisdom): Working Out of Clear Ethic Ideas and Duties, and Modelling of Their Institutions
“The problem of true Theosophy (NT: Altruism, or Divine Wisdom) and its great mission is the working out of clear, unequivocal conceptions of ethic ideas and duties which would satisfy most and best the altruistic and right feelings in us; and the modelling of these conceptions for their adaptation into such forms of daily life… Read More