Question: What is the difference between the mind of a world-renowned statesman and the mind of a world-renowned scientist?¹²⁶

Sri Chinmoy: A scientist uses the strength of imagination-reality. Imagination is a reality in its own plane, but we do not believe in it until we see it manifested on the physical plane with our ordinary, naked human eyes. The scientist often goes to the intuitive world also, which is one step higher. He enters into the subtle worlds and brings forward their capacity; his discovery has a physical shape, but its real essence comes from the imagination-world or the intuitive world. He may think that he has used his mind, but it is a reality in subtle form that he has brought into physical form, in its own way.

Only on very, very rare occasions in world history has a statesman had the capacity to enter into the intuitive world like that. Once or twice Churchill’s utterances during the Second World War came from the psychic or intuitive plane. When he spoke, it was on a very high level. Kennedy and Nehru also spoke sometimes from the intuitive and psychic planes. But these are all very rare exceptions. Usually statesmen try to dominate the physical world with their vital strength.

So a world statesman will have access to vital or dynamic worlds, whereas the scientist will have access to imaginative or intuitive worlds. The worlds that the scientist explores are much higher than those explored by eminent political figures. But even the scientist has to surrender to spirituality, since spirituality houses everything, including science. What the great spiritual giants have achieved in the march of evolution is far beyond the imagination of the scientist. Their spiritual discoveries are not yet possible for the scientist to accept, so he denies them. The scientist wants constant proof on the physical, vital and mental plane, and he does not give value to the spiritual life.

Spirituality will say to science: “I come from a very far-off land, which is totally pure and absolutely authentic. As the physical plane is real to you, even so, the spiritual plane is real to me. If you want to taste my achievement, then come to the place where I can supply nectar. Why do I have to prove my achievement by coming down to your level? If I try to prove my achievement to you on a mental level, then instead of giving you illumination, I will only add more confusion to your life. Your scientific discoveries will not and cannot give you abiding satisfaction, because they are mixed up with the mental and physical world.”

Politics and science are both trying to operate on a particular level, and both are correct according to their own standards. According to their own level of evolution, each is trying to tell the world how creation has to be accepted. Spirituality also tries to offer its truth. It says, “I do not want to explain. Become one and then enjoy.” In politics and science you have to prove your capacity, but in spirituality it is not necessary because you become what you achieve. The politician can give a most wonderful speech to the nation, but there may be a vast gulf between the consciousness of the speech and the reality of his life. In his life he does not remain in that kind of elevated consciousness. The scientist may go to a very high intuitive world to discover a great invention, but he does not remain on that plane or even have free access to it. In politics and science, you can claim whatever you have created as your own, but you do not become inseparably one with it. There is always a gap between you and your achievement. In spirituality, however, whatever you realise on the spiritual plane, you become.