In search of the miraculous

conceptions of the hierarchy, their dogmas, and their rules.

'Esoteric schools, that is, not pseudo-esoteric schools, which perhaps exist in some countries of the East, are difficult to find because they exist there in the guise of ordinary monasteries and temples. Tibetan monasteries are usually built in the form of four concentric circles or four concentric courts divided by high walls. Indian temples, especially those in Southern India, are built on the same plan but in the form of squares, one contained within the other. Worshipers usually have access to the first outer court, and sometimes, as an exception, persons of another religion and Europeans; access to the second court is for people of a certain caste only or for those having special permission; access to the third court is only for persons belonging to the temple; and access to the fourth is only for Brahmins and priests. Organizations of this kind which, with minor variations, are everywhere in existence, enable esoteric schools to exist without being recognized. Out of dozens of monasteries one is a school. But how is it to be recognized? If you get inside it you will only be inside the first court; to the second court only pupils have access. But this you do not know, you are told they belong to a special caste. As regards the third and fourth courts you cannot even know anything about them. And you can, in fact, observe the same order in all temples and until you are told you cannot distinguish an esoteric temple or monastery from an ordinary one.

'The idea of initiation, which reaches us through pseudo-esoteric systems, is also transmitted to us in a completely wrong form. The legends concerning the outward rites of initiation have been created out of the scraps of information we possess in regard to the ancient Mysteries. The Mysteries represented a special kind of way in which, side by side with a difficult and prolonged period of study, theatrical representations of a special kind were given which depicted in allegorical forms the whole path of the evolution of man and the world.

'Transitions from one level of being to another were marked by ceremonies of presentation of a special kind, that is, initiation. But a change of being cannot be brought about by any rites. Rites can only mark an accomplished transition. And it is only in pseudo-esoteric systems in which there is nothing else except these rites, that they begin to attribute to the rites an independent meaning. It is supposed that a rite, in being transformed into a sacrament, transmits or communicates certain forces

to the initiate. This again relates to the psychology of an imitation way. There is not, nor can there be, any outward initiation. In reality only self-initiation, self- presentation exist. Systems and schools can indicate methods and ways, but no system or school whatever can do for a man the work that he must do himself. Inner growth, a change of being, depend entirely upon the work which a man must do on himself.'

Chapter Sixteen

BY THIS time, that is, by November, 1916, the position of affairs in Russia had begun to assume a very gloomy aspect. Up to this time we, at any rate most of us, had by some miracle kept clear of 'events.' Now 'events' were drawing nearer to us, that is to say, they were drawing nearer to each one of us personally, and we could no longer fail to notice them.

It in no way enters into my task either to describe or to analyze what was taking place. At the same time it was such an exceptional period that I cannot altogether avoid all mention of what was going on around us, otherwise I should have to admit that I had been both blind and deaf. Besides, nothing could have given such material for the study of the 'mechanicalness' of events, that is, of the entire and complete absence of any element of will, as the observation of events at this period. Some things appeared or might have appeared to be dependent on somebody's will, but even this was illusion and in reality it had never been so clear that everything happens, that no one does anything.

In the first place it was clear to everyone who was able and who wanted to see it that the war was coming to an end and that it was coming to an end by itself through some deep inner weariness and from the realization, though dull and obscure yet firmly rooted, of the senselessness of all this horror. No one believed now in words of any kind. No attempts of any kind to galvanize the war were able to lead to anything. At the same time it was impossible to stop anything and all talk about the necessity of continuing the war or of the necessity of stopping the war merely showed the helplessness of the human mind which was even incapable of realizing its own helplessness. In the second place it was clear that the crash was approaching. And it was clear that nobody could stop anything nor could they avert events or direct them into some safe channel. Everything was going in the only way it could go and it could go in no other way. I was particularly struck at this time by the position of professional politicians of the left who, up to this time, had played a passive role but were now preparing to pass into an active one. To be precise they showed themselves to be the blindest, the most unprepared, and the most in­capable of understanding what they were really doing, where they were going to, what they were preparing, even for themselves.

I remember Petersburg so well during the last winter of its life. Who could have known then, even assuming the very worst, that this was its last winter? But too many people hated this city and too many feared it and its last days were numbered.

Our meetings continued. During the last months of 1916 G. did not come to Petersburg but some of the members of our group went to Moscow and brought back new diagrams and some notes which had been made by G.'s Moscow pupils under his instruction.

Many new people made their appearance in our groups at this time, and although it was clear that everything must come to some unknown end, G.'s system gave us a certain feeling of confidence and security. We often spoke at this time of how we should feel in the midst of all this chaos if we had not got the system which was becoming more and more our own. Now we could not imagine how we could live without it and find our way in the labyrinth of all existing contradictions.

This period marks the beginning of talks about Noah's Ark. I had always considered the myth of Noah's Ark to be an esoteric allegory. Many of our company had now begun to see that this myth was not merely an allegory of the general idea of esotericism but was, at the same time, a plan of any esoteric work, our own included. The system itself was an 'ark' in which we could hope to save ourselves at the time of the 'flood.'

G. arrived only at the beginning of February, 1917. At one of the first talks he showed us an entirely new side to everything he had spoken about up till then.

'So far,' he said, 'we have looked upon the 'table of hydrogens' as a table of vibrations and of the densities of matter which are in an inverse proportion to them. We must now realize that the density of vibrations and the density of matter express many other properties of matter. For instance, till now we have said nothing about the intelligence or the consciousness of matter. Meanwhile the speed of vibrations of a matter shows the degree of intelligence of the given matter. You must remember that there is nothing dead or inanimate in nature. Everything in its own way is alive, everything in its own way is intelligent and conscious. Only this consciousness and intelligence is expressed in a different way on different levels of being—that is, on different scales. But you must understand once and for all that nothing is dead or inanimate in nature, there are simply different degrees of animation and different scales.

'The 'table of hydrogens,' while serving to determine the density of matter and the speed of vibrations, serves at the same time to determine the degree of intelligence and consciousness because the degree of con-

sciousness corresponds to the degree of density or the speed or vibrations. This means that the denser the matter the less conscious it is, the less intelligent. And the denser the vibrations, the more conscious and the more intelligent the matter.

'Really dead matter begins where vibrations cease. But under ordinary conditions of life on the earth's surface we have no concern with dead matter. And science cannot procure it. All the matter we know is living matter and in its own way it is intelligent.

'In determining the degree of density of matter the 'table of hydrogens' also determines by this the degree of intelligence. This means that in making comparisons between the matters which occupy different places in the 'table of hydrogens,' we determine not only their density but also their intelligence. And not only can we say how many times this or that 'hydrogen' is denser or lighter than another, but we can say how many times one 'hydrogen' is more intelligent than another.

'The application of the 'table of hydrogens' for the determination of the different properties of things and of living creatures which consist of many 'hydrogens' is based on the principle that in each living creature and in each thing there is one definite 'hydrogen' which is the center of gravity; it is, so to speak, the 'average hydrogen' of all the 'hydrogens' constituting the given creature or thing. To find this 'average hydrogen' we will, to begin with, speak about living creatures. First of all it is neces­sary to know the level of being of the creature in question. The level of being is primarily determined by the number of stories in the given machine. So far we have spoken only about man.