In search of the miraculous

'Yes?' he said. 'How odd. I do not remember anything about it.'

'But aren't you interested in it?'

'No, it does not interest me at all.'

'Are you not thinking of the consequences of all that is now taking place, of the results for Russia, for the whole of civilization?'

He shook his head as though with regret.

'I do not understand what you are talking about,' he said, 'it does not interest me at all and I know nothing about it.'

'Well then, you spoke before of your family. Would it not be very much easier for you if they became interested in our ideas and joined the work?'

'Yes, perhaps,' again in an uncertain voice. 'But why should I think about it?'

'Well, you said you were afraid of the gulf, as you expressed it, which was growing between you and them.'

No reply.

'But what do you think about it now?'

'I am not thinking about it at all.'

'If you were asked what you would like, what would you say?'

Again a wondering glance—'I do not want anything.'

'But think, what would you like?'

On the small table beside him there stood an unfinished glass of tea. He gazed at it for a long time as though considering something. He glanced around him twice, then again looked at the glass, and said in such a serious voice and with such serious intonations that we all looked at one another:

'I think I should like some raspberry jam.'

'Why are you questioning him?' said a voice from the corner which we hardly recognized.

This was the second 'experiment.'

'Can you not see that he is asleep?'

'And you yourself?' asked one of us.

'I, on the contrary, have woken up.'

'Why has he gone to sleep while you have woken up?'

'I do not know.'

With this the experiment ended.

Neither of them remembered anything the next day. G. explained to us that with the first man everything that constituted the subject of his ordinary conversation, of his alarms and agitation, was in personality. And when his personality was asleep practically nothing remained. In the personality of the other there was also a great deal of undue talkativeness but behind the personality there was an essence which knew as much as the personality and knew it better, and when personality went to sleep essence took its place to which it had a much greater right.

'Note that contrary to his custom he spoke very little,' said G. 'But he was observing all of you and everything that was taking place, and nothing escaped him.'

'But of what use is it to him if he also does not remember?' said one of us.

'Essence remembers,' said G., 'personality has forgotten. And this was necessary because otherwise personality would have perverted everything and would have ascribed all this to itself.'

'But this is a kind of black magic,' said one of us. 'Worse,' said G. 'Wait and you will see worse than that'

When speaking of 'types' G. once said:

'Have you noticed what a tremendous part 'type' plays in the relationship between man and woman?'

'I have noticed,' I said, 'that throughout his whole life every man comes into contact with women of a definite type and every woman comes into contact with men of a definite type. As though .the type of woman for every man had been predetermined and the type of man predetermined for every woman.'

'There is a good deal of truth in that,' said G. 'But in that form it is, of course, much too general. Actually you did not see types of men and women but types of events. What I speak of refers to the real type, that is to say, to essence. If people were to live in essence one type would always find the other type and wrong types would never come together. But people live in personality. Personality has its own interests and its own tastes which have nothing in common with the interests and the tastes of essence. Personality in our case is the result of the wrong work of centers. For this reason personality can dislike precisely what essence likes—and like what essence does not like. Here is where the struggle between essence and personality begins. Essence knows what it wants but cannot explain it. Personality does not want to hear of it and takes no account of it. It has its own desires. And it acts in its own way. But its power does not continue beyond that moment. After that, in some way or other, the two essences have to live together. And they hate one another. No sort of acting can help here. In one way or another essence or type gains the upper hand and decides.

'In this case nothing can be done by reason or by calculation. Neither can so-called love help because, in the real meaning of the word, mechanical man cannot love—with him it loves or it does not love.

'At the same time sex plays a tremendous role in maintaining the mechanicalness of life. Everything that people do is connected with 'sex': politics, religion, art, the theater, music, is all 'sex.' Do you think people go to the theater or to church to pray or to see some new play? That is only for the sake of appearances. The principal thing, in the theater as well as in church, is that there will be a lot of women or a lot of men. This is the center of gravity of all gatherings. What do you think brings people to cafes, to restaurants, to various fetes? One thing only. Sex: it is the principal motive force of all mechanicalness. All sleep, all hypnosis, depends upon it.

'You must try to understand what I mean. Mechanicalness is especially dangerous when people try to explain it by something else and not by what it really is. When sex is clearly conscious of itself and does not cover itself up by anything else it is not the mechanicalness about which I am speaking. On the contrary sex which exists by itself and is not dependent on anything else is already a great achievement. But the evil lies in this constant self- deception!'

'What then is the deduction; should it be so or should it be changed?' asked someone.

G. smiled.

'That is something people always ask,' he said. 'Whatever they may be speaking about, they ask: Ought it to be like that and how can it be changed, that is, what ought to be done in such a case? As though it were possible to change anything, as though it were possible to do anything. You at least ought to have realized by now how naive such questions are. Cosmic forces have created this state of affairs and cosmic forces control this state of affairs. And you ask: Can it be left like that or should it be changed! God himself could change nothing. Do you remember what was said about the forty-eight laws? They cannot be changed, but liberation from a considerable portion of them is possible, that is to say, there is a possibility of changing the state of affairs for oneself, it is possible to escape from the general law. You should understand that in this case as well as in all others the general law cannot be changed. But one can change one's own position in relation to this law;

one can escape from the general law. The more so since in this law about which I speak, that is, in the power of sex over people, are included many different possibilities. It includes the chief form of slavery and it is also the chief possibility of liberation. This is what you must understand.

' 'New birth,' of which we have spoken before, depends as much upon sex energy as do physical birth and the propagation of species.

''Hydrogen' si 12 is the 'hydrogen' which represents the final product of the transformation of food in the human organism. This is the matter with which sex works and which sex manufactures. It is 'seed' or 'fruit.'

' 'Hydrogen' si 12 can pass into do of the next octave with the help of an 'additional shock.' But this 'shock' can be of a dual nature and different octaves can begin, one outside the organism which has produced si, and the other in the organism itself. The union of male and female si 12 and all that accompanies it constitutes the 'shock' of the first kind and the new octave begun with its help develops independently as a new organism or a new life.