PROUT, What It Stands For: 4th fundamental principle

From the booklet PROUT, What It Stands For

There should be a proper adjustment among these physical, metaphysical, mundane, supramundane and spiritual utilizations

Proper Adjustment Among Utilizations

The maximum utilization on which so much emphasis has been given in the second and third principles should not be confined to any particular sphere as that may lead to certain disadvantages. First, if the persons having herculean strength are given more importance than others in society this idea may creep into their minds that they are more useful to society than others. Owing to this superior complex such physically powerful persons may be tempted to hate, torture and even exploit the weaker. In the beginning and toward the end of the warrior era this sort of exploitation was perpetrated on the toiling class. The same thing may happen with the intellectuals as well. The exploitation during the intellectual era amply corroborates this statement.

So along with maximum utilization there should be mutual adjustments also. It means that a human being has to be a spiritual aspirant, intelligent and intrepid. To this end the physically strong persons will have to come in contact with competent teachers to be initiated into intellectual and spiritual domains. On the other hand those who are spiritually elevated and intellectually developed will have to approach the physical experts to be conversant with the art. In this way shall evolve a well integrated personality. Secondly, subtler faculties should be given top priority for their best utilization. Of the physical, mental and spiritual wealths, the spiritual is the subtlest; next comes mental followed by physical. Those that have spiritual power are capable of doing the greatest service to the cause of society. Next come those who have intellectual power. Those that have only physical strength are not unimportant, though they cannot do anything by themselves. They toil at the instance of those that are endowed with intellectual and spiritual powers.

The law of parallelism further stipulates that while taking service from a person who is physically, mentally and spiritually developed, society shall follow a well balanced policy of equity and fair play. If only one of the three endowments — physical, intellectual or spiritual — be found developed and manifest in a person, society shall take such service from him or her as is suitable to that particular endowment or aptitude. If two endowments, viz. physical and intellectual, are found sufficiently developed society shall follow a well balanced policy by taking from him or her intellectual service in greater measure and physical service only sparingly, for intellectual power is comparatively subtle and rare. If all three endowments are found in one person, society shall make greater use of his or her spiritual services, less use of the intellectual and still less of the physical.

In the course of evolution human intellectual power far surpasses physical strength. The difference between the present human being and one who lived a few centuries ago is this: The latter used to collect huge stones for the construction of houses with the sheer strength of muscles whereas present human beings can lift and make use of the same or even heavier load in a moment with the help of cranes invented by intellectual power. In future, when human intellect will reach a high degree of development, the importance of physical strength will naturally be devalued to a large extent. Then society will be required to contribute to human intellectual development. But whatever little strength left will have to be properly utilized. That indeed will be a stage of economy of full employment. The cry for sending intellectuals to till the land and do other types of physical labour in the name of socialism and equality is as unjustifiable and ludicrous as it is detrimental to social interest. Any sensible person will admit that what Albert Einstein would produce by working in the fields for days together would by no means be equated to the result of his researches in the laboratory even for a few hours. Hence in the fourth principle of PROUT, while supporting the ideas of making best utilization of wealth of every kind, a proper adjustment should always be maintained among them.

Copyright Proutist Universal 2011

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