(Table of Contents)

Chapter 10 - Knowledge by Identity and Separative Knowledge

· Fourfold order of knowledge
§ Knowledge by identity; by intimate direct contact; by separative direct contact; by indirect contact.
§ Surface only has knowledge by identity in awareness of its own existence; it has no other content.
§ Happens to some degree in knowledge of movements of our subjective consciousness.
§ This identification is possible because the movements are becomings of our being.
§ But also a detached observation is possible.
§ In the surface, three movements come together: a kind of knowledge by identity, by direct contact, and a wholly separative knowledge dependent on them.
· Thought and knowledge by identity
§ Separation of thinker and thought more difficult; but a simultaneous action and conscious direction can be done.
§ But still, the knowledge of our inner movements is of a double nature, separation and direct contact.
§ Separative is method of the reason, intimate is method of the sensation, emotional mind.
· Knowledge of external things
§ Entirely separative and indirect, through the senses.
§ But there is a sense-mind and vital intuition which intervene, equating the image with the object or with the idea of the object.
§ But the image and the intuition are limited.
§ Finally, supplemented and coordinated by the reason.
§ Even so, this knowledge is narrow and imperfect.
· Limitation of surface state
§ Evidently a mix of knowledge and ignorance.
§ Cause is our concentration on the surface.
§ And ego-individual has to defend itself against the cosmic infinite, shuts it out as not-self.
§ Senses are provided by the body so that we can know and master the external to some degree.
§ Knowledge gained is pragmatic and limited.
§ This self-limitation is only a provisional means of the consciousness-force, to establish an instrumental formation in the ignorance.
§ This can only grow towards self knowledge as we open to a greater inner existence, and break down the walls of ego and sense.
· Awakening to inner realities
§ Prior necessity before opening to the cosmic.
§ Surface knowledge of self is only a sum of sections, and vitiated by the vital being's self-affirmation, desire, ego.
§ This adds an organized self-deception to the organized ignorance.
§ Inner has a larger mental, vital, subtle-physical being.
§ Opening this up, we find the separate sources and pure operations and powers, which on the surface are vague, confused, and intermixed.
§ Contradictions of the surface are largely the result of mutually discordant tendencies of these parts.
§ Once the inner is opened, a harmonization by the mental being or psychic being is possible.
§ And also the ability to distinguish what arises from within and what comes in from the outside.
· Knowledge of the inner being
§ Same elements as the surface, but greater clarity, more powerful instrumentation, better arrangement.
§ Knowledge by identity deepens and enlarges.
§ Greater detachment and control.
§ More accurate mental feeling and vision.
§ But also the possibility of a greater, because more self-affirming ignorance, because it is not an integral knowledge. May be contact with powers of the ignorance.
· Contact with the world
§ Subliminal has larger direct contact with the world.
§ Images, scenes, symbols of powers or potentialities.
§ Here is where telepathy, clairvoyance, etc. are located.
§ But can be confusing or misleading.
· Direct contact with other consciousness and objects
§ Through a self-communicating impact of thoughts, feelings, forces.
§ Fragmentarily called "psychic" phenomena.
§ Abnormal to the surface, but normal to the subliminal consciousness.
§ Can only be truly explored and explained by opening up the wall to the inner.
· Surface knowledge of others
§ This is only partial, through sympathy, mutual experience, inference.
§ But there is a constant mental, vital, subtle-physical interchange between all who meet or live together.
§ When the subliminal opens, this can become conscious.
· Dealing with world forces
§ On surface we get premonitions, attractions, warnings, suggestions.
§ Inner being has a greater action to sense coming events, distant happenings.
§ Still a mixture of knowledge and ignorance, because it is knowledge by direct contact, not identity.
§ This can be cured by going deeper, to the psychic being.
· Exact character of the deeper cognition
§ Knowledge by direct contact with the object or other consciousness.
§ Which is itself an outcome of a secret knowledge by identity.
§ In subliminal, arises as a thing remembered or seen, self-evident.
§ Unlike on the surface, where it arises as seen from outside, learned.
§ Inner is separated from the cosmic by the more transparent sheaths of the mental, vital, subtle-physical beings, as opposed to the body and senses that the surface self uses.
§ These form the circumconscient, which allows the inner to deal with contacts before they enter.
§ The circumconscient can be widened indefinitely, and eventually can enter into the cosmic being.
§ This is the merger of the ego into the world-being.
· Cosmic consciousness
§ Knowledge here is founded upon identity.
§ One with all that it contains.
§ There is a power that prevents it from being imprisoned in the objects it contains.
§ Individualization is proper to the object, but not the cosmic being.
§ On the side of action, moves in masses, waves, currents constantly constituting beings and objects.
§ Individuals are really dynamos for reception and propagation of these forces.
§ In the individual the selection of these is necessarily incomplete.
· Knowledge by identity
§ To get this, must go farther, into the subconscient or the superconscient.
§ The subconscient is blind; must be done in the superconscient.
§ In the timeless existence, the being is aware absolutely, without need of act of knowledge.
§ This is the essential knowledge by identity.
§ Another status can develop, a subordinate awareness by inclusion and indwelling.
§ Becomes the triple knowledge: all in the self; all as the self; the self in all.
§ Which leads to knowledge as we know it, with separation of knower, knowledge, object.
· Tertiary powers
§ Enter in when the subject draws back from itself as object.
§ Vision, feeling, conception, emotion, joy.
§ In origin these are essential, not instrumental - they are the luminous self-aware substance made active on itself.
· Origin of separative knowledge
§ Arises when the sense of differentiation overwhelms the sense of identity.
§ Ends with the loss of identity.
§ Even so, there is some power of the original knowledge.
§ At that point, externalized existence has to be included by an attained knowledge, a concentration.
§ All the powers are there (penetration, contact), but limited.
§ This is the first separative ignorance, a knowledge by direct contact.
§ It is native to the inner being and its main instrumentation, but foreign to the surface.
· Entire separation
§ Direct contact is entirely veiled.
§ Nature then uses indirect means: physical organs of sense, nerves, mind.
§ Also reason, intelligence, intuition assist.
§ Ultimately, the inconscience is a vast involved trance, but has still a concealed knowledge by identity.
§ This acts through an automatic energy, a mute and involved Real-Idea, an intrinsic knowledge.
· Material existence
§ Has a material individuality, with a subliminal presence determining its operations.
§ From outside, things (plants, animals) have properties, but no faculty or means of communication.
§ This opens into life vibrations, then overtly conscious life.
§ This then has a growing ability to receive and respond.
§ Sense, life-mind, emotion, thought all emerge.
§ But all are obscured by the separative ignorance, until the subliminal is open.

Chapter 11 - The Boundaries of the Ignorance

In our surface mentality we are ignorant of our own inner being, of the world around, and of our superconscient being. The world currents run in us, but we think that these things take place separately.

· Separative knowledge
§ A succession of waves from below and above, which become mentalised cognition.
§ Coordinated by perception, memory, intelligence, and gathered into consistency around the ego-sense, which gives it a first basis of coherence.
§ The ego-sense and ego-idea maintain a constructed symbol of self, so the surface mentality is always ego-centric.
· Surface consciousness
§ Small part of sensations and perceptions used by surface mentality.
§ Greater part is used by nature, and stored, to be used subconsciously.
§ We are even ignorant of a great part of our own individual being; of our subconscient, or subliminal, we are unaware.
· Inner being
§ Perceives all that touches us or enters our environment, and retains everything.
§ Can grasp significance immediately.
§ Perceptions are not limited to the physical senses.
· Limits of inner being, and relation of subconscient to the subliminal
§ Subconscient is not synonymous with subliminal; inside there is a greater consciousness.
§ Mind is largely unaware of body and vital movements.
§ But this is because we identify mind with consciousness, so that all consciousness seems to be mental.
§ In reality, life, body have a consciousness of their own. These are submental, not really subconscious.
§ There is a gradation of nervous and sensation consciousness, different from the mind.
§ True subconscious is below this, in the inconscient.
· Subliminal self
§ Full possession of a mind, life-force, subtle-physical sense.
§ Also a direct awareness of being, which exceeds the physical organs.
§ Only subconscious in the sense of not bringing it all to the surface.
§ In reality, it is a secret circumconscient, because it envelops and supports.
· Three elements in our being
§ 1. Submental and subconscient.
§ 2. Subliminal or inner being.
§ 3. Waking consciousness.
· Superconscient
§ High above both surface and inner, and envelops both.
§ A supreme reality, god, oversoul, spirit.
§ Ultimately, it is our own highest and deepest self.
§ Reflected in ourselves as Sacchidananda; has descended into the inconscient; dwells in the inner being.
§ An ether which constitutes, contains, overroofs, determines the movements of the sea.
§ The succession of moments is only one of its modes; not limited by time.
§ But the surface mind knows only our physical birth.
· Ignorance of the surface mind
§ Ignorant of both the superconscient, and the world around.
§ Evidence of this ignorance is our treating the world as separate.
§ Also thinks of god and even subliminal as separate from self.
§ Also limited in consciousness to a single body in space.
§ We imagine that we live, think by ourselves; but the world lives, thinks in us.

Chapter 12 - The Origin of the Ignorance

Being is unitary, so ignorance must be a movement of the one conscious reality. Just as the experience of passive and active Brahman must be a seeming alternation, not a fundamental one, so the ignorance cannot be primal and original - it must be a partial and relative movement of the reality.

· How does this self-limiting knowledge or separative ignorance arise in an absolute consciousness?
§ Being cannot be ignorant of itself.
§ But we are certainly ignorant of ourselves and things.
§ Even if mind is a thing of Maya, still, Maya must be a power of Brahman.
§ So ignorance must be a part of the movement of the one, knowingly adopted.
§ Cannot say that Jivatman and supreme are not one - easier to accept the fact of unity in difference.
· Unknowable
§ May be a supreme state of Sacchidananda, beyond conception.
§ May be the inmost sense of Nirvana.
§ Out of absolute nothingness, nothing can come. So the being must be an absolute potentiality.
§ May be an absolute chaos, where anything may be true.
§ But with this starting point, all opinions become equally valid or invalid.
· True starting point
§ An absolute in which all truths can stand and find reconciliation.
§ That absolute is in its manifest nature Sacchidananda.
§ Solution must be an action that limits knowledge in such a way as to create ignorance.
§ Since ignorance is a creation of the force of consciousness, we must consider that force.
§ In us the force of consciousness can be applied to ourselves or to external objects. In Sacchidananda, this distinction would not apply.
§ Also the distinction between conscious and subconscious would not apply.
· Relation of the force to the immobility
§ In us there seems to be an active consciousness, and a passive one existing only as a status.
§ Is the force really absent in the passive?
§ By opening to the passivity in us, we can find a greater power working through us.
§ In the static, there is a concentration of consciousness, of power.
§ It is equally by force of tapas that force of being is dispensed and drawn back; the passive and active are not different and incompatible.
§ In our minds we make the distinction between passive and active Brahman, but in reality there is one Brahman.
§ The opposition of passive and active is true only in relation to the activities of its consciousness.
§ The alternation between pravrtti and nirvrtti happens because only part of our being performs the movement.
· Integral reality of Brahman
§ Cannot pass alternately between passive and active, because if so, while the universe existed, there would be no passive Brahman, or vice versa.
§ So both are simultaneous; the seeming alternation is by some partial activity in us.
§ Brahman cannot be unaware of both or separated from its own activities.
§ Which again means that the origin of the ignorance cannot be in the integral Brahman; it must be in some partial action of our being.
§ Which means that there can be no original and primal ignorance.
· Nature of ignorance
§ If it is a power of Brahman, must be a transcendent knowledge.
§ Can only be a partial and relative movement.
§ Physical body is the outward sign and lowest basis of the apparent division.
§ In the soul-consciousness, obstacles to unity lessen.
§ So division is not inherent in multiplicity of souls.
§ And since Brahman is aware of the multiplicity of souls, it cannot be the origin of ignorance.
§ Ignorance comes in at a later stage, in some self-absorbed concentration of tapas, conscious force.
§ In us this takes the nature of mind identifying itself with separative movements.

Chapter 13 - Exclusive Concentration of Consciousness-Force and the Ignorance

Ignorance is really a positive power of the infinite for exclusive concentration. It is required for the individual to exist and evolve in the cosmos. The ignorance of inconscient matter is complete, but superficial, and underneath it is the awareness of the eternal.

· Ignorance as exclusive concentration
§ Ignorance must be a subordinate phenomenon, an exclusive concentration, taking place in the force of active being, prakriti.
§ This is the only possibility that squares with the facts of existence.
§ Ignorance is not the natural character of the soul, but rather the outcome of some particularizing action of conscious force, absorbed in its works.
· Nature of concentration
§ Four states of concentration, tapas.
§ 1) The essential, superconscient silence, self-gathered of the Eternal in itself.
§ 2) Total consciousness of Sacchidananda, a total-multiple, integral, supramental.
§ 3) Multiple, globalizing overmental.
§ 4) Separative, characteristic of the ignorance. This is not a denial of the spirit's awareness, but one form of the self-gathering of tapas. It erects a wall limiting itself to a single field, so that all else appears outside itself.
· Mental concentration
§ Ordinarily by the person we mean the sum of apparent inner and outer movement, the stream of energy in time. Behind this there is the sea of consciousness which is aware of the stream, but not vice-versa.
§ Tapas in the superficial person is concentrated on the surface, and all the rest it has put behind.
§ The sea is not ignorant, even if the wave is absorbed in its movement.
§ This is the limited, practical self-oblivion, the exclusive concentration.
· Living in the present
§ Even though the stream is capable of acting only by force of its past force, it yet lives absorbed in the moment.
§ The true consciousness within holds the past active, and can open to future knowledge.
§ This living in the present is the second absorption of exclusive concentration.
· Pragmatic effects
§ By memory and anticipation we link to the past and future, with an ego-sense and intuition of self tying them together.
§ Our existence in the moment is a practical truth of our being, but not the whole truth.
§ The knowledge behind really determines all.
§ Analogy of the person who plays a role (poet, soldier): success is due to the putting aside the rest of oneself, but the stamp of the work depends on the whole person.
§ The present actor is a force of being organized for a particular kind of action.
§ Similar in kind to the deeper self-absorption, though the wall of separation is less complete and enduring.
§ Power of exclusive concentration can extend to the particular action; we can become lost in a work; a person becomes anger, or the force of inspiration.
· Inconscience
§ This power of concentration reaches its extreme in material nature.
§ Here the universal consciousness of prakriti is bound in a swoon of concentration, unable to go back to its real self.
§ The executive force becomes unaware of the conscious being, purusha.
§ This too is superficial, like the waking consciousness, but it is complete.
§ Only through evolution does it come back to itself.
§ In general, such ignorance is effective and valid within its bounds, but phenomenal, partial, superficial - not essentially real, not integral.
· Reason for the ignorance
§ Without it the world would have been impossible.
§ It was the only way that the human could exist in the stream of time and work out relations from the knot of individuality.
§ The egotistic ignorance was necessary to protect the individual from the light and largeness of the universal; behind this defense, a temporal individuality can be worked out.
§ Without this exclusive concentration, the manifestation would be limited to the higher worlds, or a typal non-evolving cosmos.
§ It was needed so that the spirit could have the joy of self-finding in the apparent opposites of its being - to realize the ananda of the self in other conditions than the supracosmic.
§ It was a purposeful descent, to create out of matter a temple of divinity.
· Mind and integrality
§ Ignorance is in the apparent prakriti, not the soul.
§ And there, only on the plane of mind.
§ Yet the integral force is present, simply occult to the frontal awareness.
§ To remove the veil, conscious force uses a reverse action of the exclusive concentration.
§ It quiets the frontal movement in the individual and concentrates on the inner being.
§ Once done, it can resume its integral consciousness.
§ This power of self-limitation is one of the powers we should expect from the infinite.
§ The ignorance is a natural capacity of variation in knowledge, one possible poise.

Chapter 14 - The Origin and Remedy of Falsehood, Error, Wrong and Evil

Origin of falsehood and evil is a limited consciousness growing out of nescience, personal attachment to the limitation, a consciousness governed by the life-ego. The true solution is to find the soul, become one with all beings, realize the divine, and heal the division between nature and supernature.

· Question of evil
§ If ignorance is a form of self-limiting knowledge, then what of the problem of evil?
§ There must be some necessity for contrary phenomena; they cannot come about by chance, nor a mystery to the indwelling spirit.
§ Can be approached by three points of view: relation to the absolute; in cosmic workings; in the individual.
§ Falsehood and evil are not in the absolute, but results of the ignorance.
§ So there can be no absolute of falsehood - but there can be no obstacle to the absoluteness of truth and good.
· Relativity of truth
§ Truth is relative in us because our knowledge is surrounded by ignorance.
§ No mental statement can be altogether true; mental word is not directly real.
§ But there is a direct action of consciousness that can have a limited but authentic knowledge by identity.
§ Ignorance is a limitation of knowledge, but knowledge rises from a native existence in the depths.
· Good and evil
§ Similarly, good exists by a true consciousness but evil only by wrong consciousness.
§ Human and historical values of good and evil are relative, but this is a circumstance and not the fundamental truth. The relation is not mutual, but more like light and shadow.
· Possibility of evil
§ Once a good manifests, its opposite becomes possible.
§ This is only in cosmic manifestation, not the timeless being, and only by limitation of the good.
§ Where there is oneness or sufficient mutuality, harmony and truth will be sovereign.
§ There is no inevitable cosmicity of falsehood and evil.
· Where opposites enter in
§ In the mental/vital planes, or only on the physical?
§ Traditional knowledge tells us that there are supraphysical beings attached to ignorance and darkness.
§ Supported by experience.
§ Whatever is formulated in the cosmos has forces to support it.
§ The forces of light and darkness struggle: this has given rise to idea of titan/gods, asura, Zoroastrian, etc.
· Cosmic forces
§ If we go beneath the surface consciousness, we find that we are moved by forces not in our control.
§ These seem to belong not just to the physical, but to the planes of mind and life.
§ Seem often to surpass human measures, and a person may be pushed to immense excesses.
§ But this is immense, not absolute.
§ Their appearance does not extend beyond the lower life planes; they are creations of life or of mind in life.
· Emergence from the inconscient
§ World of pure matter is neutral.
§ Duality first begins with life, vital mind, with sensation. Here is the sense of evil.
§ But even in animal life the moral and mental idea is missing.
§ May be thought that these are mental constructions, but although below and above morality is absent, it has a place in awakening us in the middle ground.
· Awakening to good in the human
§ First in the vital, as sensational.
§ Then utilitarian and social.
§ Then intellectual, rational, idea of law.
§ But real sanction is deeper, spiritual, psychic.
§ The soul-personality insists on the distinction, because it points always toward the higher light.
§ It takes delight in all experiences, but it is the secret divine sense and essence.
· How evil and falsehood arise in the inconscience
§ Mind awakes in an indeterminate stuff of vital and physical consciousness.
§ And life has to affirm itself against the principle of inanimate inertia, and the outside world.
§ These give rise to the self-affirming vital/physical individual.
§ The rise of consciousness in matter cannot be accounted for unless there is an inherent, native, concealed consciousness.
· Emergence of consciousness
§ In the animal, the conscious-force sends a modicum of intuition, which becomes instinct.
§ Can err if intelligence enters in, or becomes mechanical.
§ Other source is contact with the world, but in fact this depends on the subliminal latency.
§ The subliminal has a direct contact, but the evolutionary intention is to evolve through a growing surface awareness.
§ Mind slowly disengages itself from these automatisms.
· Intelligence
§ This adds conscious will and intention.
§ Which interferes with intuition and instinct.
§ The range is greatly widened, but so is the capacity for error.
§ If it were always open to intuition, error would not be possible.
§ But the hold of inconscience on the surface consciousness makes this impossible.
· First general condition: surface nescience
§ In the evolution, the conscious being works between two poles: a surface nescience and the secret consciousness-force.
§ The surface works as a nescience trying to be conscious, and the means used is contact with the world.
§ This releases a spark of awareness, but by receiving it imperfectly, the surface changes it and obscures it.
§ So error is a necessary condition or step toward knowledge.
§ At each step in mentality, different possibilities of fact, relation present themselves.
§ Consciousness thus proceeds from the unknown to the known, and builds up a structure comparing past to new knowledge.
· Second general condition: ego
§ This is bent on vital self-affirmation; the surface mental individuality is ego-centric.
§ This is a huge source of distortion, will to error, preference.
§ In Sankhya terms, there is the tamasic physical, rajasic vital, and a sattwic mind.
§ The tamasic physical is obscure, recalcitrant, inert to new ideas.
§ The rajasic is defensive, violent, aggressive, passionate, insistent.
§ The sattwic is open and balanced, but unable to enlarge itself completely, and still has a mental ego.
§ The limitation by personality is an inevitable source of error.
· Vital element
§ Same is true in the realm of action, where the vital element is concerned with self-affirmation and satisfaction of desire, for possession, growth.
§ This spirit of self-affirmation also comes into the realm of ideas and religion.
§ Vital element is not itself evil; it affirms alike the good and the evil.
· Summary
§ Origin of falsehood and evil is a limited consciousness growing out of nescience, personal attachment to the limitation, a consciousness governed by the life-ego.
§ Ego is a pragmatic fiction used by the cosmic force in its drive for self-expression.
§ Because the will to expand and possess takes place in a separate ego, discord and conflict arise.
§ Nature accepts these as necessary circumstances; evil as well as good is used, and evolutionary nature seems to have no preference for either.
· How the evolutionary intention fulfills itself
§ In mind, through selection and rejection, an ethical ideal or moral rule.
§ But such standards are relative and symptomatic.
§ Next, more profound motive is to reshape ourselves, our nature, according to an ideal.
§ But because these ideals are selective, they cannot meet the call of the infinite.
§ Then the only remedy is the push for escape, which is the way of religion
· Solution: heal the divide of the ego
§ Because the cause is our roots in the obscurity of the inconscient, the only true solution is a transformation of our nature.
§ Because the cause is limited and separative consciousness, the solution must be an integration.
§ First division to be healed is that of the ego division from others.
§ But larger mind, heart, altruism is insufficient, because still essentially egotistic.
§ True solution is to become one self with all beings.
§ Even this must be oneness in the soul, not with their ignorance.
· Three steps to achievement
§ Discovery of the soul.
§ Awareness of the eternal unborn self.
§ Knowledge of the divine, cosmic, transcendent being, becoming channels of that shakti.
§ Lastly, healing the division between our nature and supernature.

Book II - The Knowledge and the Ignorance - The Spiritual Evolution

Chapter 15 - Reality and the Integral Knowledge

Integral conception sees finite/infinite, many/one, etc. as complementary. Both the subjective and the objective must be known, in their entirety, and we must have freedom in our methods. The sevenfold ignorance must be replaced by a sevenfold knowledge.

· Integral reality and the ignorance
§ Boundaries of the ignorance are determined by our separative consciousness.
§ Return to integrality is by overpassing the separativeness.
§ The knowledge is not new, but something to be uncovered.
§ Integral consciousness is interpretative; it does not abolish the universe. It presupposes an integral reality.
§ Absolute transcendence must also be transcended.
§ Upanishads affirm the absolute, but also the cosmic and the reality in the individual.
§ Absolute can be presented as an eternal sole being, or as an absolute that is not limitable by either positives or negatives.
§ No rejection of the universe is inevitable. Such a rejection is a product of our mental consciousness passing beyond its limits.
· Condemning the becoming
§ Can be based on the partial, misleading reality of the relative universe.
§ Supposes a fixed opposition.
§ The inconscient is a sleep or prison.
· Integral conception
§ Sees finite/infinite, etc. as complementary, not opposites; two faces of one reality.
§ Knowledge of the becoming is only ignorance because we are imprisoned in it.
§ Brahman is not only featureless, but also the multiplicity.
§ Details are the expression of it, and it finds itself there.
§ To reveal the superconscient in the inconscient is the aim and delight of the divine.
· View that all is a creation of mind
§ Objective reality is an illusion.
§ All objects are merely mental structures.
§ This view only true if we regard the surface as the whole of consciousness.
· Creation out of consciousness
§ Then everything is a subjective creation of that consciousness.
§ Leads to a duality of being and consciousness.
§ Also depends on whether the consciousness is of the nature of mind, or something else.
· Creation as mind or truth consciousness
§ Mind is obviously a secondary power, limited.
§ A consciousness proceeding from the essence, and knowledge, would not be mind.
§ The truth in this idea is that objects proceed from something within them and independent of the interpretation our minds give them.
§ All things are symbols through which we approach the reality.
§ The things themselves are not symbols, but rather realities.
· Objective reality as the entire truth
§ Physical existence has the sole reality; all else is derivative.
§ Leaves much unexplained; looks only at one side of existence.
· Subjectivity and objectivity
§ Depend upon each other; are the reality looking at itself as subject or object.
§ Objective is in fact only known through the subjective, through senses.
§ Understanding and verification is necessary in both; but the supraphysical must have another method than the physical.
§ Objective order of reality is only one; there are others.
§ Subjective is known to oneself, but inward lives of others are known indirectly.
§ This egocentric limitation of the physical mind, the requirement that experience be verified by common experience, is a recent standard, and a superstition of the physical mind.
§ Refusing to enquire on different grounds is a kind of obscurantism.
§ Inner discoveries cannot be brought before the tribunal of the common mind, just as scientific truths cannot be judged by untrained minds.
§ The spirit must be free to sound the depths of inner reality.
· Freedom and exploration
§ Integral knowledge demands a freedom to explore all possible domains.
§ The inner or occult is one great domain.
§ Science itself, by bringing to light hidden formulas, is a kind of occultism.
§ The objective as solely real takes its basis on matter.
§ But even science shows that behind matter is energy.
§ Such an interpretation is based on a one-sided concentration or preoccupation.
§ In an integral knowledge, neither the inner nor the objective can be the sole basis.
· Integral knowledge
§ Must be the knowledge of the truth of all sides, separately and in relation.
§ To get there, we had first to discover the extent of the ignorance.
§ This take seven forms: 1. Absolute: taking partial for the whole. 2. cosmic: taking constant mobility for the whole. 3. egoistic: taking ego for true self. 4. temporal: taking our moments in time as whole in time. 5. psychological: taking surface for whole existence. 6. constitutional: taking our constitution as mind/life/body. 7. practical: practical ignorance in thought, will, action.
§ Integral knowledge cancels these seven through self-revelation.
§ But it is not intellectual; it can only come through an evolution of our nature.
§ Which results from a change in consciousness, in which will and endeavor have a part.

Chapter 16 - The Integral Knowledge and the Aim of Life; Four Theories of Existence

The four theories are the supracosmic; terrestrial; other-worldly; integral. Taking into account the absolute as the origin, and involution/evolution, the only sense of life must be that of an evolution in consciousness towards a perfect expression of the spirit here and elsewhere.

· Absolute as the origin
§ An integral theory of the reality must also determine the aim of life.
§ First, the absolute must be the origin and support of all things.
§ It manifests in two terms, being and becoming; becoming can only know itself wholly when it knows itself as being.
§ To do that is the supreme aim of our existence.
· Triple aspect
§ Second, that fundamental reality is a divine existence-consciousness-delight, both supracosmic and underlying the manifestation.
§ Oneness includes an infinite plurality.
§ The being presents to us in three poises: supracosmic, cosmic, and individual self.
§ The multiplicity admits of a phenomenal division, an effectual ignorance.
§ The triple aspect must be included in the total truth.
§ Divine being is both personal and impersonal; the soul must grow into this truth of itself.
· Descent and involution
§ Seven gradations, with spirit and matter at the poles.
§ Three universals (sat-chit-ananda) and supramental truth-consciousness make up an upper hemisphere, with complete freedom and knowledge.
§ Three lower (mind, life, matter) make up a lower hemisphere, where a lapse into separation has taken place.
§ The lapse into inconscience means consciousness has to emerge by a gradual evolution.
§ This evolution is part of the destiny of the soul in the becoming.
· Emergence of mind and life
§ Matter, life, and mind each have a creative principle, but none are the sole reality.
§ When life and mind emerge, they become dominant.
§ But mind is derivative and must be supplanted by the divine supermind.
§ The three lower are built upon the inconscient, but there is a conscient spirit emerging in them.
§ These metaphysical truths must be realizable in our inner being and outer activities.
· Four theories of the aim of life
§ Supracosmic; terrestrial; other-worldly; integral.
· Supracosmic
§ Supreme reality alone has meaning; human existence has no meaning.
§ Main goal is to escape, get away from all living.
§ Rule is an extinction in the absolute, nirvana.
§ But vanity of life is not inevitable; there is room for a truth of the becoming.
§ Defect in this view is the absence of reality of the individual or his spiritual activity.
· Terrestrial
§ Cosmic, terrestrial existence alone is real.
§ Accepts or endures our mortality, and deals only with our personal or collective life.
§ Works with the laws of the becoming, nature.
§ Welfare of humanity is the highest good.
· Other-worldly
§ Accepts the reality of the cosmos, but gives more permanent duration and importance to worlds or heavens beyond; earth life is just an episode.
§ Belief in the immortality of the individual spirit is the keyword.
§ This life is our one opportunity - this is the least rational form.
§ Or life on earth is a stage.
§ Has three essential characteristics: individual immortality; earth life as an episode; development of ethical/spiritual being is the highest aim.
· General considerations
§ Care of the body and terrestrial life is in fact a major part of most person's lives, and any rule which belittles this is unfit or incomplete.
§ We also have the intuition of something beyond.
§ And a perception that there is something supracosmic, beyond both of these.
· Integral conception
§ Since development is clearly the law of the soul, it must be an evolutionary synthesis.
§ Attempted in India with the four stages of life; but exaggerated the stage of renunciation, which destroyed the symmetry of it.
§ Link needed is a spiritual evolution, of which the person is the central instrument.
§ And must recognize the three attractions: earth, heaven, supreme.
§ Mind and life grow by widening to greater consciousness.
§ The spiritual is such a wideness: it is not colorless purity, nor the limitation of heaven.
· Supraterrestrial in the integral view
§ Is the supreme truth, the highest reach, but has put forth the cosmic.
§ Individual must become cosmic, and spirit have a perfect self-expression in the terrestrial.
§ Earth life and supraterrestrial are possible worlds; earth is not a lapse.
§ Power of a greater consciousness develops there; earth knows itself by opening to its immortality.
§ This kind of integration would not be possible if spiritual evolution were not the sense of our existence.
§ Involution to inconscience, evolution in ignorance, consummation in spirit's consciousness here is the cycle.

Chapter 17 - The Progress to Knowledge - God, Man, and Nature

God, individual, nature are the three categories, approaches in our search for knowledge. In the conscious unity, all three are realized and harmonized.

· Emergence of consciousness
§ The emergence of consciousness from matter, through vital vibrations and mind, is the goal of nature.
§ The human goal is first to affirm oneself, but then to arrive at a free and wide harmony, knowledge, will, action, character.
§ Can only be done by widening into a larger being and consciousness.
§ Knowledge we need is not intellectual, nor can it be pragmatic or ethical.
§ Our surface self is not the spiritual being, so we must exceed ourselves, our current ego.
· Intellectual knowledge
§ Intellectual knowledge and practical action are devices of nature, but are not our only means.
§ We must raise all our means and instruments, and arrive at a divine universality.
§ But we are obliged to move step by step, at first obscurely.
· God, individual, nature
§ These are the three categories in our search for knowledge.
§ Individual is what we see.
§ Nature or world is the rest of existence, the other.
§ The third we sense, the divine, absolute, cause.
§ We have denied one or the other, but must come to a unity of them.
· Integration versus exclusion
§ Naturalistic atheism does not satisfy the secret knowledge in us.
§ Visible cosmos does not explain itself; we feel there must be an infinite.
§ Thought needs an absolute, an ultimate truth, a being or creative force.
§ Absolute cannot be affirmed by itself; the heart, the will need a meaning.
§ We have to enlarge our knowledge of ourselves, the world, and god until we reach a totality and oneness.
· Supreme
§ Supreme is self-existent, and cosmos/individual exist by virtue of that.
§ But we arrive at that through knowledge of self and world, not by rejecting the manifestation.
· Early steps
§ First preparation is to possess and make rich our individuality; this affirms the ego.
§ Egoistic development is necessary, even with all its sins and crudities.
· Cosmos and individual
§ Evolutionary emergence works through the individual and through cosmos.
§ Cosmic remains subliminal to the surface, and creates collective powers.
§ Only as the individual becomes more conscious, can the group also.
§ The group is itself vague, half-formed, prone to blind movement, customary notions.
§ It can have great effect, but is an efficiency of the outer life.
§ The growth of the mind and soul depend on the freedom of the individual.
§ The individual is the diviner of truth; the group is a field of formation.
§ Individual must retire within to find oneness with all; otherwise the individual can become overpowered by the mass consciousness.
§ Great evolutionary periods have been when the individual is mentally, spiritual alive.
· Perfection of the individual and the collective
§ Must be the spiritual individual, not the egoistic person.
§ First we must distinguish our natural elements, our own psychology.
§ But what we are seeking to discover is perfection of our individual self-existence.
§ Because there is a spiritual person, inner divinity, perfection has to be individual, not collective.
§ Must get beyond the ego, but find the self that is one with all.
· Stages of progress
§ First, to realize that this natural life is not all.
§ Second, discover that the surface is a small part of our being.
§ Third, there is something in us other than the body/life/mind.
§ This leads to discovery of self, and god - and the unity of the three categories.
· Knowledge of the unity
§ By finding unity with cosmos and with god, discover that the self has become all these beings.
§ Knowledge of the universe leads to the same revelation.
§ Quest for god begins with questioning of nature, a sense of something in her.
§ Obscurity of its beginnings do not detract from the value of the quest.
§ Unity behind diversity is the secret of all religions and philosophies.
§ Because everything is that one, there must be an endless variety in the approach.

Chapter 18 - The Evolutionary Process - Ascent and Integration

Evolution has the triple character of development of forms, progress of consciousness, and integration of previous elements. In each, a latent power of consciousness emerges. Human development so far has been on the surface; the next stage is the conscious and inner development.

· General principles
§ Evolution into spiritual consciousness must have the triple character of development of forms, progress of consciousness, and integration.
§ At some point the action of ignorance must be replaced by the action of knowledge, of a fundamentally true consciousness.
§ Evolution in its very nature must be a development of something involved in itself.
§ What emerges will be modified by what exists, and only the emergence of the original principle of existence will be able to bring about an entire transformation.
· Evolution in a material universe
§ Mind and life are limited by matter; they modify it, but are bound to death.
§ Neither are the original creative power; they are intermediaries.
§ The original creative power cannot be an inconscient matter, for then life/mind would not exist.
§ So there must be a secret consciousness more essential than any of the three; supramental, spiritual (and not material).
§ The full law of the spirit, this supramental, must evolve and decisively change the evolution.
· Conditions of the evolution
§ Proceeds by an awakening and ascent of the involved consciousness.
§ Law of each step is partly determined by the material conditions, form.
§ Each grade has a class of existences: vegetable; animal; human.
§ Because of continuity of evolution, no rigid separation between them.
§ Humanity is at the summit, but is not the culmination; we are transitional beings.
· Gradations
§ Leap from one grade of consciousness to another seems immense.
§ Seems like a transformation rather than a progression.
§ Studying physical evolution, science has come to believe in continuity despite missing links.
§ Gaps appear narrower but deeper as we rise higher in the scale of nature.
· Inner side of the progression
§ Difference of the action of consciousness in each lies in the principle of being of each gradation.
§ Matter is in the inconscient; plant in the subconscient; animal in the vital mind; human in the mental.
§ Ascent does not abandon the lower grades; rudiments of the higher are in the lower, and lower is present and taken up in the higher.
§ The lower always reaches a point at which the higher can manifest in it.
· Consciousness latent and awaking
§ Life, mind, supermind are present but latent even in matter, the atom.
§ Matter is the eternal somnambulist, driven by an unfelt existence, he who is awake in the sleeper.
§ In the plant this outer form-consciousness is full of nervous dreams, on the point of awaking.
§ Animal being is mentally, sensationally aware, and has a wide range of activities: memories, impulses, volitions, emotions, associations, even practical intelligence.
· Human level
§ Reflective, thinking mind emerges completely.
§ Imagination, esthetic creation, intelligence.
§ A widening, and a taking up and mentalizing of the lower grades; an intelligent sense of life and body.
§ We see the turning downward of the eye of the spirit, in the power of will and of knowledge, and the intention to include the lower notes and raise them up.
§ This heightening, deepening, and intensification is the method from the beginning.
· Turning the gaze upward
§ Gaze upward and inward has become present in the human.
§ Natural impulse is to climb to higher altitudes, find a greater scope, by conscious evolution.
§ Not individuals only, but the race, all of humanity.
· Stages of humanity
§ 1) Physical-mental person.
Gives most importance to objective things and outer life.
Concerned with the practical, habitual, common.
Customary, traditional mentality.
Subjective life seen as pleasant imaginations, not inner realities.
§ 2) Vital person
Gives most importance to satisfaction of life force.
Power, ambition, strong character, love, passion, adventure.
Life experience and experiment; the kinetic individual, fighter, champion.
§ 3) Thinker
Gives most importance to things of the mental world.
Intellectual, dreamer, person of the word.
Vital and physical are not the most highly developed.
Mind of pure intelligence is open to the subliminal plane and influences.
Sage is the normal summit of this type.
§ 4) Seer and mystic
Uses the inner and higher, whereas the others use the surface.
This is the secret of a new evolution, by breaking lids and boundaries.
This has begun the evolution of the spiritual being.
· Spiritual person
§ This is our only true way of self-exceeding.
§ Differs from the previous in two respects: conducted by conscious effort; and is not confined to the surface.
§ For this to happen, have to live deeper within.
§ By doing this, we could create a new principle of consciousness.
§ The physical intelligence still dominates, giving us skepticism, intellectual timidity, conservation.
§ Not only the individual, but the entire race must advance, or at least a widespread endeavor.

Chapter 19 - Out of the Sevenfold Ignorance towards the Sevenfold Knowledge

The method and result of a conscious spiritual evolution is a transformation of the ignorant mental life into the divine life of the truth-conscious spirit, a self-expansion. It is a heightening and a greatening of consciousness.

· Evolution
§ Evolution is in essence a heightening of the force of consciousness.
§ But our call must be to live on a new height with all our being.
§ Mental, vital, physical can become much greater, richer, more perfect.
· Physical, sense mind (constitutional ignorance) (1)
§ Crux of our ignorance is the mental, sense-mind's constitutional ignorance of the true character of our being, our natural materialism.
§ This is not complete nescience, but a limiting, dividing, and largely falsifying knowledge.
§ Preoccupation with life and matter is necessary in the beginning, but its utmost widening is not the essential goal for us.
§ True happiness lies in the growth of the whole being, not just physical comfort.
§ First step is growth into the full mental being.
· Perfection of the mental being
§ Gives us the possibility of a subtler, higher, wider existence, with more power over life.
§ Purely mental aims and pursuits get value.
§ Harmonizes, refines life.
§ This is the Greek ideal.
§ But its largest play is a half-light; because we are spiritual beings, we must go into the spirit to heighten our forces of consciousness.
· Psychological ignorance (2)
§ Limitation to the waking self.
§ Must break through to our occult being and live within.
§ An obscure activity extends to a submerged sense mind, where all that is rejected from the surface sinks and can take other forms in dreams, unbalance.
§ Effects of this on the mind and body are mostly automatic.
§ Only by drawing back into subliminal or superconscient can we control this region.
§ Must be done, because this area reinforces all in us that refuses to change.
§ Intraconscient, circumconscient even more important.
§ Inner vital, sense-mind, subtle-physical are here.
§ Subliminal forms an envelope around that separates us from the cosmic.
§ Higher planes also must be included: mental planes, supramental.
§ As a preliminary stage, can receive their influence even if not ascending to them.
· Temporal ignorance (3)
§ By opening to the inner, can realize our persistent existence in time.
§ We are immortal by our self-existence, not fundamentally by a personal survival of the body.
§ Comes by knowledge of the self and soul through all changes.
§ Also includes the timeless existence.
§ An ascent and a stepping back are essential for this step.
· Egoistic ignorance (4)
§ Ego does not survive as we widen into the spirit and highest self.
§ We lose our wall of separation, and become universal.
· Cosmic ignorance (5)
§ The discovery of the divine in the universe.
§ Through this we can approach the absolute as the source of all.
· Practical ignorance (6)
§ Self-knowledge cures the wrong-doing, suffering, falsehood, error.

Chapter 20 - The Philosophy of Rebirth

If there is an evolution of consciousness in a body, and an individual soul inhabiting the body, then rebirth is a necessary machinery for progressive experience.

§ Birth and death are the double mystery of the physical universe.
§ The question is what we were before, and what after.
· Matter only
§ In this case, the "before" and "after" would be physical elements.
§ But matter does not explain mind - or indeed itself.
· Souls created by god in matter
§ Paradoxical: beings have a beginning but no end.
§ Paradox: we are born by the birth of the body, but do not end by its end.
· Provisional assumptions
§ That which has no end must have no beginning; all that begins has an end.
If soul persists as embodied being, there must be a subtle body.
§ If we see a development in time, there must have been a past.
If soul enters body, it must have been prepared elsewhere.
· Theory of a temporary soul
§ Could be the outcome of several theories: modern; Buddhist; sole being and Maya.
§ Persistent self is an illusion, and individuality has a beginning and an end in time.
§ What we call soul is a stream of phenomena.
§ As each form is developed, a consciousness develops also.
§ Rebirth is not necessary.
· Modern version
§ Starts from the physical body as the basis.
§ Mental consciousness is associated with the body, but does not survive its dissolution.
§ Nothing compels us to believe in a psychic entity that survives death.
§ But if the mental being did not depend completely on the body, then either a psychic entity pre-exists, or the soul develops here in the material world.
· Universal life
§ Soul may have evolved in lower animal forms, adapting to each shape.
§ The animal's conscious individualization does not seem sufficient to bear a transfer.
§ Rebirth or transmigration would still not be inevitable; human personality might rise away from the earth on death.
§ Personality might still be creation of the universal life; a vitalistic Buddhism.
· Mayavada and Buddhism
§ Started with the belief in supraphysical planes and a commerce between them and us.
§ Admitted the passage to other worlds; but Buddhism denied a rebirth of a real person.
§ So rebirth could only mean a kind of continuity, which creates a fictitious individual.
§ In Mayavada also, there is no real and eternal individual.
§ Even release, escape, nirvana take place only in the cosmic dream.
· Vedanta of the Upanishads
§ Each individual is in himself the eternal, and universe is real.
§ Kept on the wheel of birth by desire.
§ Even here, the reality of the individual is temporal, with no enduring foundation.
§ No necessity for the purpose of an individual consciousness.
§ And no determining truth to the manifestation.
· Integral conception
§ Only has to be admitted that the spirit has involved itself in the inconscience and is manifesting itself by evolution.
§ Rebirth is then an indispensable machinery for working it out.
§ Evolution is inevitable, because that which is involved must emerge.
§ It is through the conscious individual that the evolving consciousness is organized and is capable of waking.
· Spiritual individual
§ In this kind of spiritual evolution, there must be a spiritual person or individual.
§ This is where the reality discloses its transcendence and total existence.
§ In the real world of difference, the separative form becomes the foundation. So the purusha has to assume a body, base itself upon a form.
§ The assumption of a body is what we call birth.
· Birth
§ In such an evolution, one isolated birth would have no significance.
§ The development of consciousness would need great and slow unfolding through time.
§ Ascent can only take place by re-birth in the ascending order.
§ And is a complex of two elements, the eternal spiritual person, and the mutable soul of personality.
· Succession of forms
§ Has a universal and individual aspect.
§ Universal grades and ordered variations are developed.
§ And individual must have followed this line of development.
§ Must be so, because spirit before human level did not depend upon human mentality,
§ Spirit assumes various forms, but is not constituted by them.
§ Nature takes up past elements and transforms them into the new, such as matter by life, life by mind.
· Transmigration and rebirth
§ So the soul has had a long succession of rebirths, through lower forms.
§ Can the soul go back?
§ Unlikely, because the human is a decisive step.
§ Why not just one human birth?
§ Because humanity is not the final or highest possibility, even perhaps in a Plato or Shankara.
§ Inevitable if the mind is not the highest principle, or if there is a supramental principle.

Chapter 21 - The Order of the Worlds

Inner experience indicates that there are other worlds, independent of the physical, which communicate with the physical and have influences here. They are based on the seven principles of the spirit (sat-chit-ananda-supermind-mind-life).

§ If there is a spiritual evolution with repeated rebirth, then the question arises what the relation is between this process of evolution and the larger totality.
· Matter and spirit as only realms
§ Abrupt precipitation of soul into the physical world.
§ Perhaps an inexplicable urge, fiat, desire for the plunge.
§ Whole cosmos would be an evolution out of the inconscient.
§ And purpose of evolution of consciousness would only be to escape.
§ Such a theory gives premier importance to either mind or the individual; world would have to be created for the play of consciousness of the individual ego.
§ But the integral view sees the spirit as the original power.
§ The world-participating individual must have been awake before the world existed.
§ A will must have originated in it, or in the many who come, to precipitate them downward.
§ So the individual soul depends on the all-soul.
§ Since this will comes from the supreme, it cannot be desire, which does not exist in the highest reality.
§ The material world could be the sole possibility only if matter were the original creative power.
§ But that would be a materialistic pantheism; everything has evolved here; and there is no superconscience.
§ Problem is that mind and life are too different from matter to be products of it; they must be independent products of a spiritual energy.
§ So spirit must be capable of basing its manifestation on mind or life; there should logically be worlds of life or of mind.
· Questions about other worlds
§ Three questions: any evidence for them? Their nature? Independent?
§ Physical proof would be illogical; ordinarily they would produce an effect on our life-being or mind-being, and only indirectly affect the physical.
§ Subtle senses, special states do in fact demonstrate this.
§ Such experience may be deceptive, but this is true of physical experience also; this is a reason for scrutinizing it closely.
§ Belief by itself is not evidence for reality.
· Summary of inner experience
§ Conveys the existence and action upon us of larger planes of being and consciousness.
§ Which penetrate and envelope the physical.
§ In the subjective, they shape in us life-intentions, impulses, and pressure of mind in the form of ideas, suggestions.
§ Generally taken as formations of our own life and mind, until we go inward.
· Worlds
§ Also experiences that are subjective-objective, worlds with a law and substance all their own.
§ Often enters into communication with us, though not always.
§ Earth can seem a vast field of battle between these supraphysical forces.
§ Some beings are divine, benign; others are demonic, harmful.
§ Also beings that are behind the veil in this world, rather than part of others.
§ In subliminal states, we can enter into these worlds.
§ This explanation has been similar in various countries and ages.
· Created by mind
§ We create the worlds, as a myth of developing consciousness.
§ Or cosmic imaginations by the universal idea-force.
§ But in this case, everything assumes a hue of unreality.
§ But no proof or likelihood that mind can create this way.
§ More likely that as mind grows, it comes into contact with these ranges of being.
§ We do create images, symbols; but these are not the things themselves.
· Worlds created after the physical
§ Perhaps they were created after the physical, to help evolution.
§ This keeps matter as the basis, and spiritual in a dependence on matter.
§ But in fact they seem to be not based on the material, rather they are greater terms of being.
§ The human consciousness is rather the intermediary by which they reveal their light, power.
· World stair
§ Elements of subliminal experience indicate a parallel gradation, for involution and evolution.
§ This gives to the ascending gradation a purpose for the worlds and their pre-formations of good and evil.
§ Formations in the life world would then have a truth of their own, be able to arrive at their expression freely.
§ What is inordinate here would be normal in that domain.
§ Powers of mind also have their own field of fullness.
§ In other words, the worlds are typal, not evolutionary.
§ Our accounts of them includes much that is imagination and translation, but also points to other-world realities.
§ Other viewpoints, other ways of grading them are possible.
§ If the worlds did not exist, the spirit would depend only on matter, and there would be no place for a full and free manifestation of any power of being.
· Order of the worlds
§ The reality is free to create a world based on each principle of its being.
§ Being (sat); force/will (chit); delight (ananda); supermind; mind; life worlds are all possible.
§ Experience shows that these are different harmonies, levels, planes from the physical.
§ And that at every moment these are in communication with and acting on the physical.
§ They are prior to the physical in consequence, if not temporally, and provide formative powers for evolution here.
§ What we create are not the worlds themselves, but images of them, and the fitness of our soul to respond to them.
§ The effect of their action on the subliminal self has been to liberate life and mind from matter, lastly a spiritual consciousness.

Chapter 22 - Rebirth and Other Worlds; Karma, the Soul, and Immortality

The nature of evolution and other worlds necessitates an internatal period, and ultimately the soul goes to its own plane for assimilation of experiences. The processes of reincarnation involve all our energies and bodies, as well as the conscious will of the soul. What continues is the spiritual person, not the outer personality.

§ The existence of other worlds raises three questions: process of rebirth; process of passage to other worlds; process of spiritual evolution itself.
§ If matter were the only world, thee could only be direct transmigration from one body to another.
§ But the existence of other worlds means the possibility of projection or transference into them after death.
· Period after death
§ Interregnum is needed because there is an attraction for the mental and vital being; and an interval is needed for assimilation of life experience.
§ But the period may only be needed if the individuality has been sufficiently developed.
§ Possibility that direct transmigration is the rule while soul is still unripe.
§ In popular ideas of heaven/hell, the idea of spiritual evolution is not explicit.
· Necessity for a period after death
§ World principles are interdependent and interwoven.
§ Immediate transmigration might be necessary until the psychic individuality is sufficiently developed to exist in itself.
§ Until then, downward attachment, incompleteness of life-experience might compel soul to immediate rebirth.
§ In order to pass to mind or life planes, the mind and life must be sufficiently developed to pass without disintegration and exist there for a time.
§ And the psychic person must be individualized enough not to depend on a past mental or life body.
· Dwelling place
§ Would seem to be on the mental plane, because we are primarily mental beings.
§ But our being is more complex, includes vital, soul.
§ And post-mortal state must correspond in some sense to the development here - the relation we develop with higher planes while here must be the predominant effect.
§ May linger in an annexe created by beliefs, images.
§ Also desire-worlds may have been built up.
§ Because imagination is a creative force in the mental being.
§ These would be temporary, however, in the passage to a true supraphysical state.
§ Would only be able to live there consciously if there had been sufficient mental or soul development in this life.
§ Final stage would be pure psychic; to be awake here, a certain development would be indispensable.
· Necessity for internatal periods
§ Decisive part played by the higher planes in earth evolution.
§ Most development takes place in subliminal, and is stored there.
§ And a new life does not take up immediately where the old left off; there must be assimilation, new ordering.
§ Probable that the positive preparation would be on the plane of the soul itself.
· Multiple beings
§ By saying that we evolve a vital, etc., we mean that the soul manifests these (vital, mental, etc. beings) in the conditions of the physical nature.
§ And most of their presence is concealed; through these beings we receive shaping influences.
§ And logical that through the development of their powers in our conscious evolution should be our internatal resort.
· Reincarnation as automatic result of karma, desire
§ Old view is that karma is the result of desire and ignorance; reincarnation is metaphysical and moral.
§ The character of incarnation is automatic, based on good/bad actions in the past.
§ This system has no real reason for the world; the only point being to get out of it.
§ If we are here for true spiritual growth, this law would be too puerile, barbarian.
· All energy has a result
§ This is a higher, more plausible principle.
§ Each being reaps what he sows, now or afterward.
§ What we are now is the result of the past, what we do now is the creator of the future.
§ But the simplistic formula of good actions=good results, and law of justice, are overstated.
§ Chain of causation of karma is a machinery only, not the sole and absolute determinant.
· Spirit and consciousness in addition to karma
§ There is being and consciousness in addition to law and process.
§ Our fundamental reality is spiritual; soul determines its own evolution; karma is only one of its processes.
§ The more we go within, the soul's power of choice is increasingly felt.
§ Spirit cannot be an automaton, the secret will cannot be mechanical.
§ True principle is the development of the nature through cosmic experience.
§ Karma and consciousness are both elements; physical destiny only binds so long as a greater law does not intervene.
· Different kinds of energies
§ Mind, life, desire, knowledge, ethical good, pleasure, collective objects, etc.
§ Morality cannot be the sole cosmic principle.
§ The energy put into any area must have a fitting response from nature.
§ Giving the credit for good luck to virtuous actions in the past is too simple.
§ The standard of good and evil comes from our vital-physical, vital being.
§ A system of ethical rewards/punishments debases ethics itself.
§ Lines of energy can act on each other, but not by a rigid law.
· Cosmic experience
§ Reactions of nature are not in essence rewards/punishments.
§ Rather there is a relation, and a lesson of experience.
§ Soul enters into rebirth for growth; all the rest is accessory.
· Survival of the personality
§ Rebirth would not have any utility if the superficial person were the same in the next life.
§ For growth, a new personality is necessary, otherwise we would repeat the same forever.
§ Personality is only the mental, vital, physical form which the psychic puts forward.
§ Only the essential elements are kept from birth to birth.
§ Latent potentials or contrary elements may emerge in a new birth.
· Memory of past lives
§ In this view, the false importance attached to memory of past lives disappears.
§ If rebirth were a system of rewards/punishments, it makes no sense not to have memory of our past actions.
§ But if it is a constant development, then memory might be a serious obstacle, prolonging old temperament.
§ Absence of memory is to be expected, if a new personality is taken.
§ Subliminal being may remember, but detailed memory is of minor importance to nature.
· Immortality of the soul
§ The "I" of this life is only a formation, and what is imperishable is the self within, the person that we are.
§ Outer personality might survive if powerfully individualized, one with the inner mind and purusha, and open to the plastic action of the infinite.
§ So the old form would no longer need to dissolve to form a new one.
§ Such a survival would only persist in the subtle body.
§ Might happen with the body, if it were plastic to the progress of the inner person.