Until modern times all human societies recognised a reality beyond the physical and a certain proportion of the population, hermits, wandering holy men, shamans, monks, nuns and the like, turned their backs on public life to concentrate on the world within. Even today in India married couples of a certain age, having fulfilled their obligations to society by earning a living and bringing up children, retire to separate ashrams to ‘look at the other side of life’.
The author, who did at one time himself think of becoming a monk, discusses the origins and aims of the contemplative life and argues that it is a bad thing for society that we have now got so completely enmeshed in the here and now — “Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers” ( Wordsworth).
Until modern times all human societies recognised a reality beyond the physical and a certain proportion of the population, hermits, wandering holy men, shamans, monks, nuns and the like, turned their backs on public life to concentrate on the world within. Even today in India married couples of a certain age, having fulfilled their obligations to society by earning a living and bringing up children, retire to separate ashrams to ‘look at the other side of life’.