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of being on the right side of the fence! and must decline to do so. This is the
The Buddhist leaves no chances of this answer to those who accuse the Buddha of
kind; in all his categories he is infinitely hurling his Arahats (and himself) from
unextended; though the categories themselves Samma Samadhi to annihilation.
exist; he is in fact 0A+B+C+D+E+..+N and capable Pray observe in the first place that my
of no conceivable change, unless we imagine solution of the Great Problem permits the
Nirvana to be incomprehensibly divided by co-existence of an indefinite number of
Nirvana, which would (supposing the two means: they need not even be compatible;
Nirvanas to possess identical cate-gories) Karma, rebirth, Providence, prayer, sacri-
result in the production of the original 00. But fice, baptism, there is room for all. On
a further change would be necessary even the old and, I hope, now finally discredited
then before serious mischief could result. In hypothesis of an infinite being, the
short, I think we may dismiss from our supporters of these various ideas, while ex-
minds any alarm in respect of this plicitly affirming them, implicitly denied.
contingency. Similarly, note that the Qabalistic idea
On mature consideration, therefore, I con- of a supreme God (and innumerable hier-
fidently and deliberately take my refuge in archies) is quite compatible with this theory,
the Triple Gem. provided that the supreme God is not in-
Namo Tasso Bhagavato Arahato Samma- finite.
sambuddhasa!3 Now as to our weapons. The more ad-
Let there be hereafter no discussion of vanced Yogis of the East, like the Noncon-
the classical problems of philosophy and formists at home, have practically abandoned
religion! In the light of this exposition the ceremonial as idle. I have yet to learn,
however, by what dissenters have replaced
1
Wala, one whose business is connected with
it! I take this to be an error, except in the
anything. E.g. Jangli-wala, one who lives in,
case of a very advanced Yogi. For there
or has business with, a jungle, i.e. a wild man,
exists a true magical ceremonial, vital and
or a Forest Conservator.
2
direct, whose purpose has, however, at any
The Hindus see this as well as any one,
and call Atman Sat-chit-ananda, these being
rate of recent times, been hopelessly mis-
above the pairs of opposites, rather on the
understood.
Hegelian lines of the reconciliation (rather than
Nobody any longer supposes that any
the identity) of opposites in a master-idea. We
means but that of meditation is of avail to
have dismissed infinity as the figment of a morbid
mathematic: but in any case the same grasp the immediate causes of our being ;
disproof applies to it as to God. A.C.
if some person retort that he prefers to rely
3
Hail unto Thee, the Blessed One, the Perfect
on a Glorified Redeemer, I simply answer
One, the Enlightened One!
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tycarb
that he is the very nobody to whom I now For, needless to say, the universe, including
refer. the thinker, exists only by virtue of the
Meditation is then the means; but only thinker s thought.1
the supreme means. The agony column of In yet one other way is magic a capital
the Times is the supreme means of meeting training ground for the Arahat. True
with the gentleman in the brown billycock symbols do really awake those macrocosmic
and frock coat, wearing a green tie and forces of which they are the eidola, and it is
chewing a straw, who was at the soirée of possible in this manner very largely to
the Carlton Club last Monday night; no increase the magical  potential to borrow a
doubt ! but this means is seldom or never term from electrical science.
used in the similar contingency of a cow- Of course, there are bad and invalid pro-
elephant desiring her bull in the jungles of cesses, which tend rather to disperse or to
Ceylon. excite the mind-stuff than to control it; these
Meditation is not within the reach of we must discard. But there is a true magical
every one ; not all possess the ability ; very ceremonial, the central Arcanum alike of
few indeed (in the West at least) have the Eastern and Western practical
opportunity. transcendentalism. Needless to observe, if I
In any case what the Easterns call  one- knew it, I should not disclose it.
pointedness is an essential preliminary to I therefore affirm the validity of the
even early stages of true meditation. And Qabalistic tradition in its practical part as
iron will-power is a still earlier qualifica- well as in those exalted regions of thought
tion. through which we have to recently, and so
By meditation I do not mean merely hardly, travelled.
 thinking about anything, however pro- Eight are the limbs of Yoga: morality and
foundly, but the absolute restraint of the mind virtue, control of body, thought, and force,
to the contemplation of a single object, leading to concentration, meditation, and
whether gross, fine, or altogether spiritual. rapture.
Now true magical ceremony is entirely Only when the last of these has been
directed to attain this end, and forms a attained, and itself refined upon by removing
magnificent gymnasium for those who are the gross and even the fine objects of its
not already finished mental athletes. By act,
1
word, and thought, both in quantity and
See Berkeley and his expounders, for the
quality, the one object of the ceremony is
Western shape of this Eastern commonplace.
being constantly indicated. Every fumiga- Huxley, however, curiously enough, states the fact [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]