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Thus, while aphoristic poetry carries the strength of personal affirmation, it needs must hold itself aloof from the situational details from which it arose. The result is a sharpening of outline, an almost sculptural structuring of the processes of experience. This may be clearly seen in the following poem by Sri Chinmoy:
MY TRUTH-DISCOVERIES
I think, therefore I am
My mind has discovered this truth.
I pray, therefore I am
My heart has discovered this truth.
I was, therefore I am
My soul has discovered this truth.
I shall be, therefore I am
My life has discovered this truth.[5]
The great discovery of Descartes, Cogito ergo sum, has passed into our civilisation as one of its most momentous statements. Descartes has done more than give voice to a personal opinion. His statement presumes to define the condition of man: I think, therefore I am. Descartes shows that we can only arrive at this universal premise, this clear, distinct and indubitable knowledge of self, through a consciousness of what our own existence implies-the impossibility of thinking unless we exist. The inference contained within this recognition is the self-evident fact that my thinking necessarily implies my existence. Descartes' vision succeeded to this point: the ultimate discovery of the mind.
Sri Chinmoy repeats Descartes' great formulation in such a way as to preserve its power, while at the same time dilating on its meaning. The qualification he adds to it is challenging. The poet suggests that the truth of Descartes' assertion may only be partial, since it is not the whole man but only one of his faculties, the mind, that has discovered it. In effect, Sri Chinmoy declares that the mind knows itself to exist to the extent that it is able to conceptualise, reason and otherwise perform the operations of the mind.
Using Descartes' quasi-imperative assertion and his own qualification as the model upon which to construct the remaining stanzas of the poem, Sri Chinmoy introduces successive modulations to this idea. He intimates that even as the mind knows itself to exist through fulfilling its nature, so the heart, when used as an instrument of prayer, becomes Aware of its own existence.
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