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Paul Brunton's Notebooks: Category 6, Emotions and Ethics

CLASS at Wisdom's Goldenrod, Hector, NY

with Anthony Damiani (AD)

January 5, 1983

PB PARAS; EMOTIONS & ETHICS

TOPIC: PB Paras

SUBJECT: Emotions & Ethics

SUBSUBJECTS: Character, Virtues, Stoics

CONTENTS:

PB PARAS ON THE IMPORTANCE OF BUILDING WORTHWHILE CHARACTER

UNLIKE THE STOICS, PHILOSOPHY PLACES KNOWLEDGE ABOVE CHARACTER

THE VIRTUES ARE A PREREQUISITE TO THE RECOGNITION OF THE PRINCIPLE OF KNOWLEDGE WITHIN YOU

THE PRINCIPLE OF INTELLECTION WITHIN YOU IS SUPERIOR TO THE PRACTICE OF ANY VIRTUE

THE VIRTUES ARE TO SAFEGUARD YOU FROM THE ABUSE OF THIS KNOWLEDGE

IF YOU FIND OUT THAT YOU'RE MIND, THEN IT INEVITABLY FORCES A REORIENTATION OF YOUR ATTITUDE TOWARDS LIFE

HOW MUCH PHILOSOPHY A PERSON UNDERSTANDS IS SHOWN BY THEIR CHARACTER

ONCE YOU HAVE MENTAL PEACE, THEN YOU'RE DISPASSIONATE ABOUT EVERYTHING, SO YOU CAN GET A BETTER VIEW OF YOURSELF

THE IMPORTANCE OF SELF-EXAMINATION

PB PARAS ON THE LONG STRUGGLE TO MASTER THE LOWER NATURE AND PURIFY THE EMOTIONS

BOOKS READ FROM OR REFERENCED:

Paul Brunton, Notebooks. 16 vols; Vol. 1 entitled Perspectives, published 1984-1988. Some Paul Brunton Notebook paras are, as of 2018, unpublished, and are noted as such.
Benedict de Spinoza, The Ethics
Marie-Louise von Franz, Aurora Consurgens: A Document Attributed to Thomas Aquinas on the Problem of Opposites in Alchemy
Paul Brunton, The Hidden Teaching Beyond Yoga

NOTES:

PB paras from 6v (Red volume in WG library).
Unpublished PB paras, even if sourced, should be proofread.
Other, earlier transcript versions may exist.

TRANSCRIBED Verbatim by IT 2018; reformatted by JRM & JF from V11a version 2019-2020. Subheads and Table of Contents added by JRM 2019. IT reformats again in 2023 to accord with new conventions, updates audio file name, fixes typos and minor errors, completes Book List, adds new note within transcript. In 2025, MW adds Subsubjects and alters Subheads to make more accurate. Archival verbatim transcript – V14.1a.

AUDIO FILES: 1983 0105a, 1983 0105b. [Note: "Tape" and "Side" refer to original audio cassette tapes later digitized into .MP3 Audio Files.]

Highlight:

1983 01/05 at Wisdom's Goldenrod

PB Paras; Emotions & Ethics

Archival Verbatim Transcript

[Audio File 1983 0105a Begins]

RC: [half word inaudible] and Ethics. [short pause] And I'll-- I'll read one and then mention something that a few people told me during the week [one word inaudible] and then we can go on from there.

[15 second pause]

PB [unpublished, 8a-defn.0 (6v/85/162), RC reading]: "The ego will do anything rather than to make confession of, and find redemption from, its own errors. Hence, its evasive tactics are many, various, and skillful. One is to lay its own fault at another man's door. Another is to escape facing the main problem by a raising of petty side-issues."

RC: I feel sort of awkward to mention it but since a few people mentioned it to me during the week I think it's worth saying. You may catch yourself or not catch yourself noticing that some quotes, when they're read you think immediately, "Boy, I sure hope so and so is listening to that." (laughter) And if that happens you probably ought to ask to have it read again for attention. (laughter)

S: Yeah. (bit more laughter)

S: Ok [one/two words inaudible] (now ask Dickie)(./?)

EM (simultaneously): I'm not saying a word. (laughter)

[few seconds of background student talking]

S (simultaneously): What?

DB: Read that again [possibly one word inaudible] (laughter, student words)

VM (amidst laughter): Read that again for both of us. (laughter)

EM (amidst laughter): It's going to be a quiet night, yeah.

VM/S(?): Uh-hm, yeah, right.

AH (simultaneously): I gotta make sure David heard that. (laughter)

BS: But why'd you [DB/S(?) simultaneously: Oh.] pick that one? Never mind, yeah. (laughter)

S (amidst laughter): (He got a good method.)

RC: Ok. And besides that we have to avoid petty side-issues.

[20¾ second pause with faint background student talking]

PB PARAS ON THE IMPORTANCE OF BUILDING WORTHWHILE CHARACTER

PB [V5, 6:1.22, RC reading]: "We must not, like the mystics, talk as if man were nothing else but a divine being. We are philosophical students and should not be so one-sided. We must tell men the whole and not a half-truth, which means we must tell them that they are a mixed lot, divine at the centre but slightly devilish at the circumference; (bit of laughter) altruistic in their potential nature but somewhat selfish in their actual one."

[15½ second pause]

PB [V5, 6:1.75, RC reading]: "It is a prime rule that quality of character and education of conscience are more important than nature of belief. And this is much more applicable to would-be philosophers than to would-be religionists."

[short pause]

JG: Would you reread this?

[short pause]

[16 second pause]

PB [unpublished, 6a.1 (6v/117/36), RC reading]: "To comprehend one's nature is one thing. But to control it, to learn to obey deep intuitions [RC reads: intuition] rather than rash impulses, is quite another."

JG: Would you reread that too?

S (faint): Yeah.

PB [unpublished, 6a.1 (6v/117/36), RC reading]: "To comprehend one's nature is one thing. But to control it, to learn to obey deep intuitions rather than rash impulses, is quite another."

[12¾ second pause]

PB [V13, 20:1.26, RC reading]: "Philosophy is not a matter of theory alone. It is also a matter of conduct. It imposes responsibilities on the conscience and restraints on the will."

[24 second pause]

[Transcriber note: It sounds like RC reads the following two quotes as if they were one quote.]

PB [V5, 6:1.404, RC reading]: "The continued study of [this] philosophy will inevitably lead the student to accept its practical consequences and thus make the universal welfare of mankind his dominant ethical motive."

PB [V5, 6:1.45, RC reading]: "The value of such study is immense. It involves a re-education of the whole mind of man. It strikes at the root of his ethical ignorance and destroys the selfishness and greed which are its malignant growths."

JG: Could you repeat?

DB: What is the root of one's ethical ignorance?

[short pause]

RC: This-- [three/few inaudible DB words simultaneous with RC] that basic separateness that we talked about in terms of the ego. As long as you're operating with that separateness, ethos is not a possible thing. [9 second pause] And probably that quote we did last time is relevant about-- see that separateness was not to be understood as the separateness that you feel from another person on the level of the personality but the separateness from the higher self in which the souls are united despite whatever differences might be in the personality.

[22¾ second pause]

PB [unpublished, 6a.1 (6v/114/1), RC reading]: "If he is willing to know the grim worst about his character without turning aside from the quest in despair, and without seeking alibis to justify it, then he will make a good beginning."

[39 second pause]

PB [V5, 6:1.29, RC reading]: "The truth will become truth for him not merely when he can understand it intellectually but also when he can accept it emotionally, and still more when he can incorporate it into his behaviour patterns."

[17 second pause]

PB [V5, 6:1.33, RC reading]: "It must be remembered always that mere intellectual study is not so essential as the building of worthwhile character, which is far more important in preparing for the great battle with the ego."

S: Please read that one more time.

PB [V5, 6:1.33, RC reading]: "It must be remembered [always] that mere intellectual study is not so essential as the building of worthwhile character, which is far more important in preparing for the great battle with the ego."

[24 second pause]

PB [V5, 6:1.2, RC reading]: "Face yourself if you would find yourself. By this I do not only mean that you are to seek out and study the pathetic weaknesses of your lower nature, but also the noble inspirations of your higher nature."

[21½ second pause]

PB [V5, 6:1.306, RC reading]: "The virtue which he is to practise is not bounded by the standards set by law and custom, nor even by conventional morality. His standards are far higher and far nobler. For they are not measured by human weakness but by human possibility. If for so much of his lifetime they have to exist side by side with his shortcomings, the latter are not accepted but are resisted."

[short pause]

S: Would you read that again?

PB [V5, 6:1.306, RC reading]: "The virtue which he is to practise is not bounded by the standards set by law and custom, nor even by conventional morality. His standards are far higher and far nobler. For they are not measured by human weakness but by human possibility. If for so much of his lifetime they [RC reads: these standards] have to exist side by side with his shortcomings, the latter are not accepted but are resisted."

[21¾ second pause]

PB [unpublished, 6a-pers.1 (6v/150/205), RC reading]: "This effort to improve character, harden will, and purify feeling should ceaselessly engage him."

[16½ second pause]

PB [V5, 6:1.28, RC reading]: "His spiritual progress will be measured not so much by his meditational progress as by his moral awakening."

[short pause]

S (very faint): Please do that one again.

S (faint whisper, possibly part of background): Yeah.

PB [V5, 6:1.28, RC reading]: "His spiritual progress will be measured not so much by his meditational progress as [RC reads: but] by his moral awakening."

[14¼ second pause]

PB [V5, 6:1.446, RC reading]: "The man who seeks to release himself from moral responsibility for his actions or his fortunes can in no way make any real progress on the spiritual path. He may improve his capacity to meditate, he may become more sensitive psychically, but his real battle--against the ego--remains unfought and therefore unwon."

[15 second pause]

LR: Read the beginning. Randy, could you reread that?

[19 second pause]

UNLIKE THE STOICS, PHILOSOPHY PLACES KNOWLEDGE ABOVE CHARACTER

PB [V5, 6:2.52, RC reading]: "The Roman Stoics, who sought to control their emotions and master their passions, placed character above knowledge. We pursue a similar albeit less rigorous discipline in controlling feelings by reason because we place knowledge above character. The latter is made a preliminary to attainment of the former."

[short pause]

SD: Randy is he-- is he using "knowledge" in two different senses there?

RC: Yeah the one before was the mere intellectual study or theory of-- One of the last things he said to me is probably relevant here, uh-- [short pause] Saying (if/it)-- that first of all you have to realize that divinity within you is a knowing divinity. And only once you are convinced of that, that it is a knowing divinity, can you become receptive so that it could become a guiding divinity.

[11 second pause]

DB: Excuse me, Randy? I'm not sure how I-- how to understand the divinity in another sense. I mean, as oppo-- a knowing divinity as opposed to what?

[short pause]

RC: I don't understand.

DB: Well, he mentioned that-- the necessity or the importance of coming to the understanding that divinity within oneself is a knowing divinity. Is that correct?

RC: Uh-hm.

DB: Now, as opposed to what other kind of divinity I mean that we could imagine? [short pause] (I mean--)

S (faint): (Go ahead.)

DB: What was it?

RC: Swift's article about time(./?)

S (faint): What?

JG: What did you say? (some laughter) It was [one/two words inaudible]

RC: Um-- I don't know exactly, I didn't think about alternatives I guess. But in terms of the actual divinities that we worship they don't-- the ones that we actually worship don't seem to me to be knowing divinities so much as [short pause] something more in terms of a blind necessity that we regularly lea-- kneel our-- kneel down before in terms of how we spend our time.

JG: Maybe you could ex-- use another example. (JG laughs a bit) You do your worshipping and all that business, so to speak. But the knowing is done by you, not by God, to be somewhat cynical.

DB: Yeah I just-- the idea-- I'm--

JG: Well if you really believe that it is a knowing divinity you would act accordingly. You wouldn't fret about not know-- you know, getting to know because you would be guided. That's what I meant to say.

EM: Uh-hm, you could negate yourself.

AH: At one--

JG (simultaneously): Yeah so--

EM (simultaneously): Yeah, unless--

JG: Do you believe in a-- we don't act that way and what we really believe is quite the contrary, I would think. Well it doesn't matter.

AH: Just another distinction might be in keeping with what-- what's been said is a knowing divinity as contrasted with a known divinity. Like if we permit-- it's some kind of an object, it's not what you'd speak of.

RC: I know what my experience of it has been and in terms of my own reactions to it it's been much more of a very deep respect for real knowledge, I mean, on any level in the sense of, if you know how something should be done or you know what's needed to be done then it becomes more a matter of living up to what you know. Whereas it seems that a lot of the time you find yourself in a situation where you know something would be better but for some reason it's not expedient at the moment and you just don't do what you know you should do. And you don't recognize that knowing principle as the divinity within you.

LD: Why not knowing in distinction to feeling or willing? Instead of a feeling divinity or a divinity that wills, a divinity that knows, which would imply more of an impersonal detached point of view it seems.

RC: Yeah, the quote said controlling feeling by reason, or we place knowledge above character.

VM: Well read the quote because I [JG assents] can't understand how this discussion ties in with the quote quite.

[10¾ second pause]

PB [V5, 6:2.52, RC reading]: "The Roman Stoics, who sought to control their emotions and master their passions, placed character above knowledge. We pursue a similar albeit less rigorous discipline in controlling feelings by reason because we place knowledge above character. The latter [RC: character] is made a preliminary to attainment of the former."

JG: That was not the quote.

VM (faint): Yes, that was the quote.

AH (simultaneously): Yes.

S: No.

JG: No, the divinity within you--

AH (simultaneously): Does "the latter" refer to character or to knowledge [VM simultaneously: No, no.] above character?

SD (simultaneously): That was from before.

S (simultaneously): That was from his experience.

VM (simultaneously): No, no, no, that was-- that was a personal reminiscence.

JG: Oh, I see, (yes).

AH (simultaneously): Randy, a technical and a radical question, does-- does "the latter" in that sentence refer to character [S simultaneously: Or to both.] or to knowledge and character, the former being emotion-- reason controlling emotion? Like is it-- There's two possibilities there [student assents, faint] that "the latter" refers to.

RC: No the discipline is controlling feelings by reason.

AH: Yes.

RC: And the outcome is that the character which is thereby developed is a preliminary to getting real knowledge.

AH: Could you do the quote once more please?

PB [V5, 6:2.52, RC reading]: "We pursue a similar albeit less rigorous discipline in controlling feelings by reason because we place knowledge above character."

AH: You see the first part of the quote-- do the whole quote please.

AH: I think he's-- I think "the latter" refers to knowledge above character rather than--

RC (simultaneously): I think you'll see as we read more that he's going to keep saying if you want to get real knowledge, then you have to purify your character.

S: Uh-hm.

AH: That's not what I'm hearing in the quote tonight. It's against something quite obvious.

LR: Randy, there's something I'd like [couple words inaudible] In the same volume, PB quotes Spinoza.

RC: Uh-hm.

LR: Do you recall that passage?

RC: Uh-hm.

LR: He says, "Human pow--" this is Spinoza who PB is quoting. He says--

PB [V5, 6:3.111, LR reading]: "[Baruch Spinoza wrote in his Ethics:]"Human power in controlling the emotions consists solely in the Understanding, it follows that no one rejoices in blessedness because he has controlled his lusts, but contrariwise his power of controlling his lusts arises [LR reads: arise] from this [LR reads: the] blessedness itself.""

S: [couple words inaudible] itself--

LR (simultaneously): I think that's similar to the idea he's (hitting) at, that you--

BS: What was-- what was the last part of that sentence, you sort of dropped off on--

[couple seconds of laughter and background student talking]

RC (simultaneously): Let's maybe read [LR simultaneously: What Bert? (I didn't hear you.)] four or five more and come back to it, [student assents] because these-- these things run together. And I think after we've read a few of (them/those), it would be easier to talk about it.

[9½ second pause]

PB [V5, 6:1.5, RC reading]: "These ideals have been reiterated too often to be new, but concrete application of them to the actual state of affairs would be new."

[laughter followed by pause, 14¾ seconds]

PB [V5, 6:1.254, RC reading]: "Unless there is honest effort to apply practically the knowledge got and the understanding gained from this teaching, unless there is real striving after personal betterment and individual discipline, the interest shown is mere dabbling, not study."

[21½ second pause]

PB [V5, 6:1.31, RC reading]: "He must walk towards the highest with every part of his being, with his whole psyche matured and balanced. He must not only seek to intuit what is real, but also to will what is good."

[18 second pause]

PB [V5, 6:1.57 and Perspectives, Chapter 6: Emotions and Ethics, #26, RC reading]: "Many people talk mysticism or play with psychism so long as either promises them wonderful powers which most other people haven't got or wonderful experiences which most other people do not have. But when they come to philosophy and [RC reads: they] find that it demands from them a renovation of their entire character, they are seized with fear and retreat. Philosophy is not for such people, for it does not conform to their wishes. It tells them what they do not like to hear. It disturbs their egoistic vanity and troubles their superficial serenity when it throws a glaring spotlight on their lower nature, [their] baser motives, and [their] ugly weaknesses."

[20¾ second pause]

PB [V5, 6:1.466, RC reading]: "So long as a man carries a flattering picture of himself, deterioration of character waits in ambush for him." (bit of laughter)

[students assent] (bit of laughter)

DB: Is the corollary then true? And if-- if you've got a rotten picture of yourself [couple/few words inaudible] (laughter, student words)

S: Yes.

RC (simultaneously): Up to a certain point, um--

S: (Let me guess.)

RC: When he talks-- a lot of the quotes about the Long Path, which I don't have now, talks about the necessity of spending a certain amount of time being real disgusted with yourself. [student assents] (And--) [student assents, faint] and having [couple/three inaudible student words simultaneous with RC] to go a long ways with that. And some of the things talk in terms of what we normally call an inferiority complex might just be grounded in the fact that in your soul you know you should be a lot more together than you are and you just can't stand yourself as long as that continues to be a state of affairs. [14¼ second pause] There's one quote in here somewhere if we get to it tonight where he talks about that a little bit.

[42½ second pause]

PB [unpublished, 6a-rep.1 (6v/127/8), RC reading]: "There is no room on this quest for those who insist always on finding reassuring excuses for their conduct, or for blaming others for their own troubles, and on looking in every direction except that of their own ego. He must study his character and examine his actions, taking care to guard against self-deception."

[16½ second pause]

PB [V5, 6:1.491, RC reading]: "To accept our moral weaknesses, to overlook our failure to practise control of thoughts, and smugly to condone this unsatisfactory condition by calling it"natural," is to show how powerful is the ego's hold upon us."

[22¼ second pause]

PB [V5, 6:1.72, RC reading]: "After a lifetime of world-wandering, after a varied experience among different races of people and in different classes of society, we have come to the firm and settled conviction that what is most to be looked for in a man is character. The best test of character is neither [RC reads: not] intellectual hair-splitting nor emotional, wordy gush, not [RC reads: nor] high-flown idealistic professions [RC reads: profession], nor flowery mystical pretensions [RC reads: pretension], but deeds."

S (faint): Should we go to David?

PB [V5, 6:1.72, RC reading]: "After a lifetime of world-wandering, after a varied experience among different races of people and in different classes of society, we have come to the firm and settled conviction that what is most to be looked for in a man is character. [RC: It's underlined.] [RC adds: And that] The best test of character is neither [RC reads: not] intellectual hair-splitting nor emotional, wordy gush, not [RC reads: nor] high-flown idealistic professions [RC reads: profession], nor flowery mystical pretensions, but deeds."

[30½ second pause]

PB [V5, 6:1.105, RC reading]: "The ethical standards of the disciple are, or should be, as far beyond those of conventional good men, as their standards [RC reads: as the standards of conventional good men] are beyond those of evil men [RC reads: ones]."

[52 second pause]

PB [V5, 6:1.7, RC reading]: "We have free will to change our character, but we must also call upon God's assistance. We are likely to fail without it and it is possible by striving too earnestly all alone to make ourselves mentally or physically ill. We should Pray and ask for God's help even when trying to make ourselves have faith in a Higher Power as well as in ourselves [RC reads: ourself]."

JG: Again please.

[14 second pause]

PB [V5, 6:1.294, RC reading]: "With most people the reaction to their environment and to events is mainly impulsive and mostly uncontrolled. So the first step for them is to become conscious of what they are doing, the second being [RC reads: the second step is] to refuse to do it when reflection and wisdom dictate a better course. All this implies a taking hold of the self and a disciplining of its mechanism--body, feelings, and thoughts. It leads to using the self with awareness and functioning in it with efficiency."

[15¾ second pause]

DB: Once again please?

AD: (Wait a minute.) An echo chamber over here? Let's go back to the quote that you were-- you had problems with. Let's see if--

RC: The quote that we had problems with?

VM: Starting with Stoics.

S (simultaneously): Stoics.

S: The Roman Stoics.

AD: Doesn't have to be Roman, as long as he's a Stoic.

[students assent, faint]

[21 second pause]

THE VIRTUES ARE A PREREQUISITE TO THE RECOGNITION OF THE PRINCIPLE OF KNOWLEDGE WITHIN YOU

AH: [one/two words inaudible] I'm convinced that "the latter" refers to the duality of knowledge above character, [MB: Yeah.] after having read the rest of this quote. It's like we pursue a discipline that's similar but not as rigorous because we place knowledge above character. The real discipline is the inversion of-- of that where character is superior to knowledge. That's the way I understand-- had understood the quote earlier tonight.

S: Me too and you can see why--

AD: What's the paraphrase of that sentence, I didn't get you, Andrew. What is he simply saying there?

AH: He's saying that, we pursue a discipline like the Stoics--

AD: In your own words, what is he saying? (Different word(s).)

AH (simultaneously): Well we can't-- we can't start out without knowledge. We have to have knowledge to-- in order to understand what it means to improve our character. But ultimately knowledge is subservient to character.

DC: He's saying that knowledge doesn't become real for you until you refine and improve your character, that's the way to get knowledge to him.

RC (simultaneously): So which comes first, Devon?

DC: I don't-- I don't thi--

AD (simultaneously): Is he saying that there?

S (faint): Yeah.

S: Yes?

AD: Let me hear another interpretation. (bit of laughter)

EM: My interpretation would be that first you need to use your reason in order to understand what you must do. So in other words in that situation you're using reason or knowledge-- you're making that more important than character or making that dominant. But then, after there's a certain knowledge, then it must be put into practice and character becomes dominant, [students assent, faint] the development of character.

[short pause]

EM/S(?) (very faint): It's probably wrong but--

PC: I think he's saying developing character is prerequisite to-- to knowledge.

EM/S(?): That's what--

TS: Uh-hm.

S (very faint): Yeah.

PC: But knowledge isn't going to really [student assents, faint] be possible until you have a developed character.

EM: But there was that first part where it seemed like you-- well--

PC: I don't think he's read-- that should be read that way.

EM (simultaneously): I thought that there were two levels happening there, where first you'd have to have developed the reason-- the reason has to preside over the animal body in order to develop character and then ultimately what you say is correct. Ultimately then after a certain amount of reason has been brought to bear on it, the character becomes dominant. That's the way I-- that's what I thought the two--

MB: Not that the [PC simultaneously: No but I think--] character becomes dominant [one word inaudible]

PC (simultaneously): Yeah.

EM: Well, maybe I'm not using the right words but--

MB (simultaneously): That-- he says knowledge-- he says for the Stoics that character is more important than knowledge, that that's what they were working on. Then he says but for us we place knowledge above character, knowledge is ultimately more important and it's ultimately the goal but we can't get to it without the development of the character.

[students assent, very faint]

BS: If reason-- if reason refine-- or if reason can control the feelings, do you think PB means reason to be the knowledge in this case? Or the knowledge would be that which can be gained after the reason controls the feelings.

S: The latter.

SC: That's [student assents, faint] what I think.

S (faint): Oh.

BS: Ok. (bit of laughter)

RC: But the knowledge is gained after reason-- after the feelings are brought into (or/of) convincing them to being disciplined by reason.

EM: Yeah.

DB: Well--

BS (simultaneously): So-- so reason controlling feelings would be the development of the character. [students assent, faint] But the result would be knowledge in this case. [students assent] Then knowledge would be superior to character. Superior in just in the way we're talking about it.

RC: Uh-hm. I think the only place that he's differing with the Stoics is that he's not going to be satisfied with a stupid Saint.

BS: With a stupid--

RC: With a stupid Saint. (bit of laughter)

DB: Also it's possible definition he's using of knowledge [few words inaudible]

S (simultaneously, in background): Stupid what?

JG: Stupid Saint.

S (simultaneously): Saint.

AH: Could you read it again please? (bit of laughter)

[few seconds of background student talking]

BS: We still got to get it from--

AH (simultaneously): I don't-- I don't agree--

BS (simultaneously): Still got to get it from the back.

AH: I don't-- I don't agree with that interpretation. I don't know why I'm so a--

AD: It's (a no-brainer).

AH: I think there's evidence that there's another interpretation.

RC: Well there's one-- there's one quote from-- I can't think of the title now but it's-- it's that book that's supposed to be-- Aurora Consurgens. [Note: Aurora Consurgens: A Document Attributed to Thomas Aquinas on the Problem of Opposites in Alchemy, edited with a commentary by Marie-Louise von Franz.] There's a section in there where he says you will know just that much of the Father, capital F, Father, as you become. And that's the way I'm understanding this, that insofar as the vehicle itself actually becomes an instantiation of the Ideas, you will come into possession of real knowledge. [student assents, faint] Otherwise, you have theory. So that the development of the character is essential in that those higher Ideas can instantiate within you. But, it's not an end in itself but a vehicle to having (the Love).

AH: But that seems contradictory to the tone of all the quotes that we've read tonight.

VM(?) (faint): Oh. Why is that?

S (simultaneously): No.

AH: No, let me finish, he said-- he defined the epitome of philosophy as deeds. And deeds are consequence of character.

(Side 1 of original cassette tape digitized as 1983 0105a Ends; Side 2 begins)

RC: --gave him new deeds.

S: Sure.

[short pause]

PB [V5, 6:2.128, RC reading]: "[When the adept views those who are suffering from the effects of their own ungoverned emotion or their own uncontrolled passion and desire], he does not [RC reads: doesn't] sink with the victims into those [RC reads: the] emotions, passions, and desires, even though he feels self-identity with them. He cannot permit such feelings to enter his consciousness. [If] he does not shrink from his own suffering, it is [RC reads: it's] hardly likely that the adept will shrink from the sufferings of others. Consequently it is [RC reads: it's] hardly likely that the emotional sympathy which arises in the ordinary man's heart at the sight of suffering will arise in precisely the same way in the adept's heart. He does not really regard himself as apart from them. In some curious way, both they and he [RC reads: he and they] are part of [one and] the same life. If he does not pity himself for his own sufferings in the usual egoistic and emotional way, how can he bring himself to pity the sufferings of others in the same kind of way? This does not [RC reads: doesn't] mean [that] he will become coldly indifferent [towards them]. On the contrary, the feeling of identification with their inmost being would [alone] prevent that utterly; but it means that the pity which arises within him takes a different form, [a] form which is far nobler and truer because emotional agitation and egotistic reaction are absent from it."

RC: Remember where it goes on from there, it was a long one?

AH/S(?): Yeah I remember.

RC: Where he's talking in terms of having brought his character in conformity with the higher knowledge.

AH/S(?) (faint): Yeah, uh-hm.

JG (simultaneously): Would you mind to read it anyways?

[short pause]

PB [V5, 6:2.128, RC reading]: "He feels with and for the sufferings of others, but he never allows himself to be lost in them; and just as he is [RC reads: he's] never lost in fear or anxiety about his own sufferings [RC reads: suffering], so he cannot become lost in those emotions or [the] sufferings of others. The calmness with which he approaches his own sufferings [RC reads: suffering] cannot be given up because he is approaching other people's sufferings [RC reads: suffering]. He has [RC reads: He's] bought that calmness at a heavy price--[RC adds: and] it is too precious to be thrown away for anything. And because the pity which he feels in his heart is not mixed up with emotional excitement or personal fear, his mind is not obscured by these excrescences, and [RC adds: he] is able to see what needs to be done [RC adds: and] to relieve the suffering ones far better than an obscured mind could see. He does not make a show of his pity, but his help is far more effectual than the help of those who do."

AD: Well what's this got to do with the fact of the virtues as a prerequisite to the recognition of the principle of knowledge within you, what's that got to do with this?

S (very faint): I don't see a point, yeah.

S (very faint): Yeah.

AD: Andrew? What's that got to do with this? I asked for an understanding of that last quote and you have us reading all the quotes previous all over again.

S (very faint): I don't know.

AD: I just want to understand this (quote/one).

AH (simultaneously): I-- I just-- I just wanted to hear that quote again, the one we're discussing.

AD: It's not gonna help you.

AH: I think-- I-- the issue I think--

AD (simultaneously): Stick to the quote-- stick to the quote that I asked you to explain.

AH: Yeah that's (the one/what) I'm talking about.

EM(?): Yeah.

AD: Well, what is the explanation of that quote?

AH: Well I think [AS simultaneously: (one/two words inaudible) worry.] it's a ques-- I think it's a question of how we're going to define knowledge in the last phrase, if we--

AD (simultaneously): Well, obviously knowledge is your principle of Intellection within you. Knowledge, K.

AH: Well then "latter" refers to knowledge above character. Then I concede the point.

AD (simultaneously): Well, do you think, do you think that the ultimate principle of knowledge within you is superior to the virtues of the soul or not?

AH: No I don't think so but apparent--

AD (simultaneously): You don't? Oh.

AH: --apparently that's the conclusion [one/two words inaudible]

AD (simultaneously): Well that's the whole pro-- problem, isn't it?

AH: Yeah, we're being pushed to that conclusion. (bit of laughter)

AD: No, there's people who have no character and still get this knowledge.

AH: Yeah. And then they have problems. See--

THE PRINCIPLE OF INTELLECTION WITHIN YOU IS SUPERIOR TO THE PRACTICES OF ANY VIRTUE

AD: Just read the quote again and all he's saying there is these virtues are requisite to rec-- to the recognition of the principle of knowledge which is within you. That's all he's saying. And it is a superior principle. The Intellectual-Principle within you is far superior to the virtues of the soul. Can we read it again now?

AD: And make sure you understand that this does not create that Intellectual-Principle in you. That knowledge is not a result of practicing virtue.

LR: I think that's one of the quotes (Spinoza) [few words inaudible]

AD (simultaneously): No, no, let's stick to this quote, let's stick to this quote. One quote.

AH (simultaneously): Now I'm really confused.

AD: The point he's making here, he's making it very clear, that the principle of Intellection within us is superior to the practices of any virtue. But he's not going to dispense with the virtues as necessary in order to get to that principle.

AB(?): Isn't the superiority of the knowing to the virtues that-- shown in the fact-- the virtues are virtues precisely because they (aim into) that knowledge.

Anthony: No!

AB(?): No?

AD: No.

AB/S(?): Ok.

AH: I-- I'm still a little confused Anthony.

AD: What does the ultimate principle of Intellection have to do with you being a good citizen of Valois? (bit of laughter)

AB(?): No, that isn't what I was going to say. What being a good citizen is means acting in conformity with that knowledge. Otherwise it wouldn't have meaning as being a virtue, if there wasn't a-- something which it was in accord with as virtuous. [11 second pause] I'm still off?

[short pause]

AD: You haven't met people that aren't so virtuous who recognize the Intellectual-Principle operative within them? You haven't come across that in your study of Platonism?

AB/S(?): There are people who it would seem would know better.

[9 second pause]

MB: If-- if there are people that recognize that without the virtue then that-- those people would contradict that quote, wouldn't they?

AD: Not necessarily.

MB: Because they haven't developed the virtue or the prereq-- prerequisite. And yet somehow that knowl-- that superior knowledge of [few words inaudible]

AD (simultaneously): Yeah, you're disagreeing with what you said before Myra. Before you made the point too that knowledge was a superior principle through which we know what we do, and that it was-- the virtues were a prerequisite. But they don't fabricate that knowledge.

MB: They don't fabricate. So that means that in an occasional case--

AD: You can have a person who-- yeah.

MB (simultaneously): --the knowledge will come in even though the prerequisite has not been established.

AD: Uh-hm. And it's not established in the virtuous, sure.

MB: So we're not exactly contradicting the quote, we're just saying once in a while an exceptional case--

AD: Well the reason I'm making that point is to show that first of all, knowledge is not the result of the virtues. Knowledge does not come into principle because you happen to be a nice guy (bit of laughter) and you practice all the virtues.

MB: To a certain extent though could we say that the virtues do mean establishing a vehicle that is more harmonious with that knowledge?

AD (simultaneously, faint): Prepares it, of course. Prepares it, yes, prepares it.

AH: Anthony, I-- I'd still like to understand-- I understand I think your point that you're making. I'd like to understand the discussion of the Stoics and like they place character above knowledge. That's the first thing. So--

AD (simultaneously): What else would a Roman do?

[students assent, faint]

AH: Yes. (laughter, student words)

AD (amidst laughter): Andrew, what else would a Roman do?

AH: That's the way of the will.

AD: That's-- yeah. That's exactly what a Roman would do, he's got to show he's on top of everything.

AH: Yes. You see-- yeah but we pursue a less rigorous discipline, then we put reason above emotions.

AD: Same thing, character and knowledge.

AH: That's knowledge above character, reason above emotion.

AD (simultaneously): He's just reversing it, he's says it's not really that way. Knowledge is not superior to character. I mean character is not superior to knowledge, knowledge is superior to character, that's the first principle. And it certainly should be obvious by now that that is the ultimate principle in us. That is the ultimate, that is the jnana principle in every person.

[short pause]

AD: Let's continue. I had enough of [couple/three words inaudible]

RC (simultaneously): Anthony, I got the sense from what little-- what little Stoicism we overhear from reading other things that they tended to operate as if they didn't have any notion of a World-Idea, that the world was basically a (certain/sinning) thing, and that they were to transcend it in terms of their own personal character.

AD (faint): Yeah, yeah.

RC: But there was no World-Idea they should be conforming to. [SD assents, very faint] And it seems--

AD (simultaneously): Do you remember the story about one of them who wanted to show his devotion to the Roman Republic and he burns his arm in a fire and he says, "Do you see how superior I am?" Yeah, the Stoics will be preoccupied with that. They try to remain (immune) to the fate, to the circumstances of the world, but as far as-- as far as knowledge, they had no idea of this principle of Intellection.

RC: And I get the sense that--

AD: Who strangely enough Plotinus taught in Rome.

S (faint): Yeah.

LR: That's not character.

EC: That's not character.

LR: Sticking you arm in [one/two words inaudible] of fire doesn't show what a tough character you have.

AD (simultaneously): Well he was showing, he was showing a certain value is-- you know, that the Roman Republic was very important, and he was showing the civic virtues, which by the way they say is part of the necessary growth of (a/the) person, the civic virtues are included. But you're right, the Stoics did not have a conception of the World-Idea or the World-Principle, the Intellectual-Principle.

RC: And most of these quotes to me in terms of PB's perspective on character development is becoming inwardly capable of responding to the demands of the World-Idea. And that breaking down these barriers of separateness and so on and so forth are essential to be able to get on the phone list, so to speak. (bit of laughter)

AD: But, if you go through the history of mystical philosophy, you will find the queerest assortment of people (bit of laughter) who have Intellectual knowledge, who have had vision of the cosmos and the Idea that's developing within them. And yet they live on, let's say, coffee and bread. (bit of laughter) (You all know who) I'm referring. (bit of laughter)

RC: Is it knowledge?

AD: Hm?

RC: Is it really knowledge? That's sort of the question (I have).

THE VIRTUES ARE TO SAFEGUARD YOU FROM THE ABUSE OF THIS KNOWLEDGE

AD (simultaneously): Well, they had knowledge, yes. Knowledge came to them in a vision, they had knowledge. I think the point that he's making here is that, from our point of view, from the point of view of philosophy, the principle of knowledge which is operative within us is superior and primary. This-- the virtues are secondary and necessary in the sense that they're prerequisites. But they do not cause this knowledge.

PC: Why are they prerequisites if the knowledge can come by itself and there are-- there are people who don't have--

AD: It's to safeguard you.

RC: There were a lot of quotes that he talks in terms of the glimpses. But, the reason they're only glimpses is because now you have to get to work on the things in you that obstruct it from being permanent.

AD/S(?) (faint): (Oh yeah.)

RC: And that getting to work on those things that obstruct it from being permanent is the context of character development.

BS: Is-- what do you mean "safeguard"?

AD: Well, in answer to what Peter said?

BS: Yeah.

AD: The virtues are to safeguard you from the abuse of this knowledge, number one.

BS: Uh-hm.

AD: And, the other point is-- the other point Randy is that the history of philosophy assures me that people can get this knowledge and very often do get it. And even if they get it only in these-- you know, a glimpse could last a year. [RC assents] It could last for ten years too. And you can get an awful lot of knowledge in those-- in that time.

RC: Yeah but the moment you're out of that state, you don't have knowledge anymore.

AD: Yeah but, in five years you can get an awful lot of knowledge.

RC: And you'd think that it-- it would persist for like five or ten years for someone who--

AD: For a glim-- a glimpse? Sure, I know people who've had the glimpse for a couple of years and lo-- lose it but in that-- within that time they've had the knowledge and after that time they-- they knew who the Intellectual-Principle or what the knower in them was. And the point he's making here is simply-- and this is-- this is philosophic, I mean we're-- it's a philosophic issue. The primary value is placed on the Intellect within us, the Intellectual-Principle within us. But-- and the secondary is the necessary conform-- conformity of character to these-- this highest philosophic understanding. But this prerequisite is for our benefit. It isn't that a person can't come across this knowledge and not have let's say a fully developed character.

DB: It would almost seem as if the-- the character development was prerequisite to the stability of that knowledge, but the knowledge itself is absolutely necessary before you can speak of any meaningful character development. Because it's in accordance with that knowledge--

AD: No, no.

DB: No?

S (very faint): Uh-hm.

AD: If you wait for that knowledge to come to you to develop that character you might be waiting a long time. (bit of laughter)

DB: Well--

AD: And you have to go on developing the character even without having that knowledge.

DB: Yes but-- but even-- even so, I mean, that the knowledge that is guiding the development of the-- of the character would in some ha-- in some sense if it wasn't coming from within the individual--

AD: That's not the way knowledge is being used here. He's peaking of knowledge with a capital K.

DB: Yes. Alright. But I mean hasn't it been in accordance with this knowledge as presented by PB and Plotinus and various other people that, you know, what attempts at the character development that have taken place here have been in accordance with? I mean there has to be some appreciation of the value of this knowledge in order to guide the character development because--

AD: I can't hear a word. I didn't hear a word David.

DB: Well, let me try it again.

AD: Do you hear me?

DB: Yeah, the-- this-- it's acoustically bad in the corner. (bit of laughter)

JG: What an excuse.

AD (simultaneously): It's worse here. (bit of laughter, student words)

DB: Granted, ok.

AD: Alright? Let's try again.

DB: Alright. What I was saying was basically that, any form of character development that is going to be ultimately useful and valuable has to be gui-- guided by this knowledge--

AD: No!

DB (simultaneously): --with a-- with a capital K.

AD (simultaneously, passionately): No! You don't have to know that the Intellectual-Principle is within you. Your mother taught you to be honest! (bit of laughter)

PC: But Anthony--

AD (simultaneously): You didn't have to have the Intellectual words within you.

DB (simultaneously): No, no, you know what-- no. I'm sorry, that's-- that's perhaps true. (laughter) I can't remember. (laughter) [couple words inaudible] if I knew anyway. (bit more laughter) No, but I mean the-- the char-- the kind of character development that PB's talking about is that-- is he speaks about it as different from a conventionally good man as the conventionally good man is different from an evil man. Now, it would seem that that-- (if/it's) that level of honesty(--/.) I mean my mother might have told me that I wasn't supposed to, you know, steal bubble gum from the store but she didn't tell me I couldn't lie to myself, and this is-- I mean this is the kind of difference I think that he's talking about.

LD: Even in the highest level of character like you would see in a Saint, that is not superior to the knowledge the Sage has. And--

DB: No. I-- loo-- look, my point was that any kind of character development, ok, whether it's from a point of view of religion or from the point of view of philosophy, has to come from, ultimately, like in-- the-- what Randy's been reading for the last few months, from-- from any inspired individual.

AD: It's gonna come from crushing blows of (faith/fate) and not from the Intellectual-Principle.

DB: Ok so then-- (laughter) So then in order for the character to be developed you just have to wait until you get [S simultaneously: Beaten up.] the mighty whack. (some laughter)

AD: When you get hammered enough (you'll know), you got the point. It's not going to be the Intellectual-Principle that comes down and tells you why you should have good character.

EC: Anthony, the short path is the emphasis on the knowledge and the long path is character?

AD (simultaneously): No, no, no, we're not discussing that, look Eleanor--

EC: Yeah but I just-- I know, but if-- I'd like to see--

AD (simultaneously): If we listen to this quotation, all I want to know is what does that quotation means, alright. That's all I want to know, Eleanor. I didn't want to know anything about the long path, the short path. (bit of laughter)

EC: No but, but-- (bit of laughter) I'm not making myself-- ok. I thought (I asked) [one/two words inaudible]

AD (simultaneously): Again, you could practice the short path without the Intellectual-Principle operating in you. As a matter of fact, the way you operate is you go read somebody who says practice it.

EC: Well I thought that was practicing (on it).

PC: Anthony I--

AD: All I want to understand is what he's saying in this quotation. And if I follow the quotation all he's simply saying: look, the Stoics thought that character was superior to knowledge. Well, we'll agree or disagree a little bit, either way it doesn't really matter, because for us, the ultimate principle is knowledge, that's primary, character development is secondary. I don't see why you want to make it more than that.

AH: But doesn't he say that we follow a path like the Stoics except it's less rigorous?

SD: Yeah but that's not putting it down. [AH simultaneously: Yeah but he--] And rigorous here doesn't necessarily mean better.

AB: Yeah, the Stoics [AH simultaneously: No but this--] were very into denial of the body and tremendous, you know, asceticism and everything because they were, you know, trying to assert-- [AH simultaneously: So what (one/two words inaudible)] control that, so that's what he might mean by less rigorous.

AH: Well, I thought there was-- I'm very confused in, you know-- may I pursue it? It's-- it's worthwhile but he said the Stoics place character above knowledge. Then the quote says we pa-- practice a similar path except it's dissimilar because it's less rigorous. It's-- it's similar, it's not different than. I thought that's what the quote said, now maybe--

VM (simultaneously): But why can't you take similarity as being that we appreciate the value of character in-- insofar as it's an aid to obtaining knowledge. On the other hand, he clearly states towards the end of the quote that knowledge is superior to character. So the similarity consists in appreciating the value of character development [AH assents, faint] for the attainment of knowledge. The dissimilarity occurs in seeing that knowledge is superior [student assents] to character. I mean, that's one way of trying to make it consistent.

RC: Yeah, there's a similar method, it's [one word inaudible] the method was, they sought to control the emotions and master the passions. He's going to tell you to do the exact same thing. But he's not going to do it because character is above knowledge.

VM: And just one more point about the rigorous business. There's one thing that PB stresses through all his writings and this is his notion of balance and not getting involved in excessive asceticism and austerities and so on. And so in that sense it would be less rigorous than putting your arm in fires and other heroic feats that-- that the Stoics may have gotten involved in.

AH: That seems to-- that seems to (follow) through.

S: [one word inaudible]

HS (simultaneously): Anthony, in this discussion now when you say it's possible to achieve or have a realization of the Intellectual nature of the world, is there any demand then for the unfoldment of the character in terms of virtue to follow for individual? Or is that something that-- that's, so to say, specific for any-- for this kind of-- like for a full philosophic understanding, then that would follow?

VM: To answer that Herbert, wasn't there a quote that we read in the middle of the evening somewhere where he said that the natural result of an appreciation or a real understanding of philosophy is to-- the Bodhisattva ideal, I don't remember the exact words he used.

HS: Well-- [couple inaudible VM words simultaneous with HS] well to the point though, the--

VM: So I'm saying-- what I'm trying to suggest is that if we just remember this quote somewhere back a ways, the natural result of the philosophic attainment is-- is, let's say, manifested in moral and-- in moral deeds.

HS: Ok fine, so would you say that a realization of the Intellectual is not necessary to philosophic realization?

VM: I guess I'm making a synonym between philosophic realization and appreciation of the Intellectual-Principal, or I don't mean appreciation now, let's say attainment, a [AB simultaneously: But--] knowledge of the Intellect.

AB: (Yes, but) Vic--

DB (simultaneously): Well look, in order-- in order to attain that in a fully com-- a completely stable basis, the ego's completely annihilated. Now, I mean-- or perfected. Now, (bit of laughter) what are we talking about?

VM: How do you mean annihilated? Again, that's not--

DB (simultaneously): Alright, perfected. I mean the separation between the individual, the-- the root of the ethical malfeasance or whatever is completely eliminated. (laughter) Now--

VM (simultaneously): Ok, the ego becomes a servant rather than the master, let's-- maybe we could say that.

HS: Now is the ego the place of the virtues in this discussion?

VM (faint): Don't know.

S: [one word inaudible]

DB (simultaneously): See, there's a-- there was a quote earlier Herbert where he speaks about the utility of developing virtue because sooner or later there's this grand battle with the ego without which having those virtues cultivated you're gonna-- [VM: Sure, fail, yeah.] first round [student assents] knock out. (laughter) And I wanted to go into that a little bit actually.

VM: Herbert I don't know if we--

HS: No we didn't.

VM: Well let's do it again then. (some laughter)

AH: Can I reply to Herbert?

HS/S(?): That's it.

AH: Perhaps Herbie I wanted--

AB: Herbert wanted someone else to reply.

AH: Oh, well then I should be quiet, go ahead Herbie.

HS: You gotta learn how to talk everybody, that's one of the virtues. (bit of laughter)

AD: You also have to stick to the point that you're discussing and not ramble over four hundred other quotations you've read. [HS simultaneously: This one, yeah.] You want to understand this one quotation. Stick to that one.

HS: Can I ask again to you? Is that-- If the--

AD: I won't answer it unless they're about the quote.

HS: I think it's-- I-- Well, I'll ask it and you do what you want. (bit of laughter) In this discussion, attainment of an Intellectual understanding in a capital I, there's no ne-- there's no necessity for-- is there a necessity for the virtues to unfold for an individual? In other words, you get Intellectual realization, are you going to become virtuous by necessity or do you have to like sort of intend to it?

S (very faint): Yeah.

[short pause]

AD: I answered by saying before that I know people who have not unfolded intellectual virtues so prominently that it would satisfy me that they should understand the things that they do.

S (faint): [one/two words inaudible]

HS: Yeah. So you could have that and then there'd be like an extra added thing--

AD: That doesn't mean that you can have that and then not do something about the way you are.

HS: Oh ok.

AD: And the next point was that this knowledge is not the result of those virtues. And although we place the value on the (reason's/reasons) controlling the character and disciplining the character, it is only a necessary prerequisite or vehicle or safeguard. But the virtues of the soul are one thing. The knower within you or the wisdom within you is another. They are connected, yes, because we have to develop them. Wisdom and character has to be developed.

PC: But Anthony, for a person to really become a Sage and not just have a--

AD: But we're not talking about a person's becoming a Sage.

PC: But I think we're-- aren't we talking about the--

AD: I-- he's not talking about that in that-- in that passage.

PC: Yeah but we're talking about the ultimate value.

AD: If you're talking about a Sage then you're talking about a man who's perfected his ego or developed it to the utmost and who has a complete-- or let's say an understanding of the principle within him.

PC: But aren't we trying to understand the ultimate value of--

AD: I'm just trying to understand that quote! [three/few words inaudible]

PC (simultaneously): Right, but isn't there something [couple inaudible student words simultaneous with PC] in the quote about character and its-- its value, and we're trying to understand it on a level that's a little higher than the civic virtues? And I'm just trying to see its place in the overall philosophic scheme.

AD: Well isn't he in the quotation saying that character is not superior to knowledge?

LC: He did but I feel he also said that character was necessary to attain that knowledge.

AD: Uh-huh, yes.

LC: Ok.

AD: Now, what would that mean, character? Your opinion of what character is is one thing, my opinion would be another, and then we need the person who has some knowledge of that and he has [couple inaudible student words simultaneous with AD] [one word inaudible] the ability to [one word inaudible] virginal mind.

LC: Um-- Well, I was just going on what-- the quotes from before where [one/two words inaudible] something about morals.

AD (simultaneously): There's someone you know personally! (bit of laughter)

LC: Yeah.

AD: Someone you know personally here [short pause] who has that understanding and doesn't have the character that you would think should accompany that. Alright, let's-- let's go on to another quote then.

S (faint): [couple/three words inaudible] (laughter)

[few seconds of background student talking amidst laughter]

AD (faint): No sir.

VM (faint): They always like to [one/two words inaudible] (bit of laughter) Like (half (this/his) joke is laughter).

[few seconds of background student talking]

AD: It's-- it's like a Rorschach reel. (laughter, student words)

[short pause]

JB: Randy, I'd like to venture a last inquiry, I find it-- (bit of laughter, student words) The knowledge used to train the emotions or subdue the emotions, that's small k, is that right?

S (faint whisper, possibly part of background): Yeah.

JB: That's like a knowledge that you either take from reading or being told to do something, like told not to lie, and it's not connected to the [RC simultaneously: I don't think--] big K, is-- that's the confusion though [one/two words inaudible]

RC (simultaneously): No I think we really-- when you actually do it, (laughter) whether-- whether or not you're conscious at the level of the ego or not, for you to actually do it and to actually apply the cathartic discipline [JB assents] and to-- to start struggling with-- grappling with the ego, his soul is having some reminiscence and I think that reminiscence is the knowledge which is guiding the act.

JB: So you need knowledge to control the emotions, and in that respect knowledge is higher than or stronger than the emotions. And that's how I understood Andrew's interpretation of that quote. Now there is yet another level at which knowledge with a big K is higher still even than virtue. But even in that next lower level, you need knowledge at some level to subdue the emotions, which is no doubt also what the Stoics intended.

RC/S(?) (faint): Definitely.

LH: I mean-- no.

MB (simultaneously): No, that's where they differ. Because they didn't-- it-- I think they just used physical (means) to subdue the emotions. And then what we--

JB (simultaneously): Right, but the reason to subdue them had to be a reason.

MB: The-- using reason to subdue them is what he says is actually less rigorous because the-- the animal nature will eventually succumb to reason more so than force.

JB: Well why would you have the will to subdue emotion without a reason to do so?

S: [few words inaudible] Vic.

MB (simultaneously): They did it, I don't know. That was what they--

JB (simultaneously): Is that the idea, that the Stoics are will over emotion? And we suggest--

MB (simultaneously): That was what I-- I don't really know that much about Stoics but that's where I think they thought they [couple words inaudible]

AS (simultaneously): Yeah right. The last two, what you said, [JB simultaneously: Oh ok.] will-- will over the emotions [student assents] rather than-- They didn't do it for any reason to-- for any reasonable [S simultaneously: That could also--] or even or Intellectual reason.

S: That's also true of religious, [MB simultaneously: They made it an end in itself.] you know, controlling [couple inaudible student words simultaneous with S] emotions. It's really will.

AS (simultaneously): Right, and [couple/three words inaudible] Exercise the will over their emotion.

MB: But this-- the question that David asked is sort of interesting because there are different standards for ethics in different cultures. And, you know, how-- how we're going to refine our whole question of morality and ethics to achieve them, the most high and most refined notion of it--

RC: I think we've read quotes already and we'll read more where he makes it clear that this goodness he's talking about is not conventional standards of any particular country or any particular time.

MB (simultaneously): It starts-- and maybe it starts with conventional standards [RC simultaneously: It may but--] to a certain extent but goes beyond them. I mean it can't necessarily deny conventional standards.

RC: It can. Certainly can.

S: Sure it can.

VM: Sure it can.

DB: Oh yeah. In fact-- (bit of laughter) (It's alright) [couple words inaudible] (laughter) That's the point.

RC: In fact, I mean, given the state of affairs now if-- if you're not experiencing that, I mean-- given the [MB simultaneously: It depends on--] conventional standards and what you expect from yourself.

MB: It depends on how conven-- I mean what you mean by conventional, but you--

RC: Exactly, that does mean what-- (bit of laughter) depends on what you mean by the conventional.

S (faint): That's right.

DB (simultaneously): Twentieth century America, twentieth century Europe, I guess(--/.)

S: Hm.

RC: But I think more and more of that'll come up in terms of how this goodness that he's talking about, developing the strength to respond to what you know in the deepest level you should be doing, regardless of whether it's expedient or approved of by other people around you who either don't feel that demand or right-- resent your responding to it because they feel it too but they don't want to do it. It's too much work.

JB: I have a funny story about that if that's permitted.

S (very faint): (Right/Uh-hm).

S (very faint): What?

S (very faint): Nice.

S (faint): That's (permitted).

S: No we'd like funny stories.

RC: Funny would be nice, uh-- (laughter)

JB: Some fifteen years ago I applied to the Rosicrucians in San Jose, the AMORC guys, and receiving their literature-- along with the questionnaire, you know, you send money and the whole thing. And one of the questions is, do you swear or avow or-- who knows, whatever it was in those days, that you will uphold with all your strength and might, whatever, the laws (and/in) the Constitution of the United States? And I thought, "Oh finally, a trick question." And in my naïve way wrote, "Not if they conflict with what I see to be a higher law, you know, a law of my inner self or God." And they wrote back saying that because of this unacceptable answer I couldn't join them, they returned the money and everything. (bit of laughter) So this is a difference between conventional virtue-- (laughter) Even those guys had to yield to the conventional virtue.

RC: Yeah. If I would-- if I had stayed in Switzerland much longer I would have had to make out a form. One of the things-- in Switzerland if there's a blank you got to fill it in. (laughter, student words) And one of the things was religion. And PB said, "What are you going to put in that line?" I said, "I don't know, I was just gonna leave it blank". He said, "You can't leave it blank." (laughter)

S (amidst laughter): [couple/three words inaudible] Tao. (laughter)

VM/S(?) (faint): You leave it blank?

RC: He says "They'll kick you out." He said, "Put something in there, make something out-- make something up. They won't know what it is, they won't care, but the blank won't be empty." (laughs)

DB: Reformed Zulu. (laughter)

[few seconds of laughter, background student talking]

AD: What'd you put down, Randy? (laughter)

JG: He didn't have to.

RC (simultaneously): I didn't have to stay that long. (laughter, student words) Go on?

S: Yeah.

S: Please.

S: You have to. (laughter)

EM/S(?) (simultaneously): Oh yes, go on.

[couple seconds of background student words, laughter]

PB [V5, 6:1.289, RC reading]: "It is [RC reads: It's] true that environment contributes to the molding of character but [RC adds: it is] not true that it creates or even dominates character. Thought and will are linked with our own reincarnational past. Character can be improved by effort and Grace. If we will only attend to the first and persistently carry out the inner work required on [RC reads: upon] ourselves, destiny will attend to the second and not seldom remove the outer obstacles or improve the outer environment in the process."

JG: Would you read that that again please?

RC: I think Anthony would want us to substitute "swift blows of fate" [S simultaneously: Yes.] for "Grace".

S (faint): Uh-hm.

S: Crushing (the ego). (laughter, student words)

S (amidst laughter, faint): It's a different view.

PB [V5, 6:1.289, RC reading]: "It is true that environment contributes to the molding of character but not true that it creates or even dominates character. Thought and will are linked with our own reincarnational past. Character can be improved by effort and Grace. If we will only attend to the first and persistently carry out the inner work required on ourselves, destiny will attend to the second and not seldom remove the outer obstacles or improve the outer environment in the process."

[11¾ second pause]

JB: That's almost like a promise that if you make the effort, destiny gives the Grace, but that's unlike other things I've heard. Grace is more wild than that.

RC (simultaneously): Oh, sooner or later. I mean there-- most of the quotes and they talk in terms of sooner or later. That just because you can't say when, whether tomorrow or fifty lives from now, [JB: Right.] you'd have to call it Grace.

JB/S(?): Ok.

S: And also you don't know what form the Grace will come in.

S: Right.

S: You might not like it.

S: Right. (bit of laughter)

S: A crushing blow.

S: (Maybe 'cause you make it.) (S laughing, laughter, student words)

S: Grace?

[laughter, background student talking, possibly few inaudible words from AD, 10¼ seconds]

IF YOU FIND OUT THAT YOU'RE MIND, THEN IT INEVITABLY FORCES A REORIENTATION OF YOUR ATTITUDE TOWARDS LIFE

PB [V5, 6:1.77, RC reading]: "But philosophy does not trust to developed reason alone to control emotion and subjugate passion. It trusts also to psychological knowledge and metaphysical truth, to developed will and creative meditation, to counter-emotions and the prayer for Grace. All these different elements are welded into one solid power working for him."

S: Could you do that again please?

S (simultaneously): Read that over.

[short pause]

S: Randy, can you read louder please?

RC: Ok. Did you hear that one or should I read it again? Read it again?

S (faint): Yeah.

S: I can hear you.

[9 second pause]

JB: They're all parts of philosophy or here philosophy means the work, the--

RC: The work. Yeah.

S (faint): Yeah.

RC: There's philosophy and the philosophic discipline and in some senses I guess they're pretty much synonymous.

AH: That is(,/--) reason is being used in-- in a way that is a little confusing for me. Like in the quote that we discussed at length a while ago you said the way our path, unlike the Stoics, is that reason subjugates emotion. [RC: Uh-hm.] Now he's saying that we can't trust just reason to subjugate emotion but we have to have these other-- other things. And then all of these things together, is that the knowledge that we were talking about in the earlier quotes?

RC: No, I think this is still method. I don't know that there's a conflict. For me it's only reasonable to do all these other things.

VM: Uh-hm, yeah. (bit of laughter) Seems like an extended use of "reason".

[short pause]

HE: Randy?

S: Uh-hm, yeah.

HE (simultaneously): Counter-emotions.

RC: Yes.

HE: Is that even when you feel a negative emotion you try to replace it by a positive, [RC simultaneously: Its opposite?] is that what he means?

RC: Yeah, immediately.

[short pause]

PC: Randy, would you-- would you say that all these forms of inner work that we're talking about developing character are all part of developing the life of reason? [student assents, very faint] Or coming to active conformity with reason?

S (faint): Yeah.

RC: I would be inclined to say that, and I think that-- I'm inclined at this point to say that it would even be a step further than that.

PC: Meaning?

RC: Developing a character which can stand up to the confrontation with the Void and come back and be balanced.

PC: Oh, ok.

[simultaneously] [student assents, faint]

[11 second pause]

RC: Which can submit to the Grace of the experience and pick up and go on from there.

[short pause]

HS: How does metaphysical truth help you develop your character, would you say?

[short pause]

RC: Well-- I don't know if this is an example, uh--

LR(?): Humility?

S (very faint): Uh-hm. I guess so.

RC: Yeah.

AD: If you understand mentalism do-- don't it lead to modifications in your character?

HS: Necessarily it would lead to mod--

AD: Well what do you think?

S: Sure.

HS: I would--

AD: If the world isn't made of matter but made of Mind--

HS: Ok, it would lead to me seeing that if my mind is in this world there's a demand--

AD: You begin to suspect that there's some intelligence behind it.

HS: Yeah.

AD: And that maybe you won't get away with whatever you want to do.

HS: And that would lead me to change my character?

AD (simultaneously): To modify your character a little bit, tiny little bit.

[student(s) assenting, bit of laughter, few seconds of faint background student talking]

HS: The-- that's-- and that's a metaphysical truth, a kind of a-- a belief that God is watching over me, is that what you mean in that context?

AD: Well I wasn't speaking about God, I was speaking about the fact if you recognize that the world is only your idea of it and (that/then) leads you into mentalism and mentalism leads you into the understanding that Mind is the substratum of everything and Mind is intelligent, then you might hesitate about, you know, doing the wrong thing.

HS: Acting stupidly.

[short pause]

AD: I mean that's the idea of studying mentalism. You begin to see that you are your own lawgiver. When you get hung, that's because you have passed judgment on yourself. [S, faint: Yeah you did.] [HS, faint: And you built the scaffold.] And the hangman simply obliges you.

PC: So, why is it that the s-- that this study should lead you to that, but if you experience the Intellectual-Principle directly it may not lead you to improvement in character?

S (faint): Oh.

AD: Why--

PC: Well, ok, earlier you said that if you-- you can experience the Intellectual-Principle directly and it might not necessarily lead to any improvement in character.

AD (simultaneously): No, no, wait a minute. [AS simultaneously: No, no (couple/three words inaudible)] Earlier I was speaking about the other quote. Let's forget the other quote. (laughter, student words)

S: That was (classic).

AD: All I was--

[Audio File 1983 0105a Ends]

[Audio File 1983 0105b Begins]

PC: It seems to me if this type of knowledge is superior to the exalted type of character which PB's talking about, then it must be a knowledge which would produce results on a level of character.

AD: But sir, if you understand the rules and regulations by which the game is played, aren't you a little more careful then how to play the game? You're not supposed to cross the street when there's a red light, alright, then you don't. Because now you understand that you can get run over. But if you don't believe in mentalism then you believe that you can cross the street with a red light. You believe you can do what you want because you have a belief that there's only matter and ultimately you're going to be reduced to calcium carbonate and so many different other kinds of chemicals. But if you find out that you're mind, then it inevitably forces a reorientation of your attitude towards life.

PC: But experiencing--

AD: It doesn't require great insight to see that Peter.

PC: I know but-- (bit of laughter) But the ex-- you're saying the experience-- I mean maybe I'm going back to the other point and I shouldn't, but you're saying the experience of real knowledge isn't going to provide you with that ins--

AD (simultaneously): Well he was speaking about the need for metaphysical principles. The understanding of metaphysics helps the person gain better character. No? What was he talking of, wasn't [student assents] that the quote?

S: Yeah, yeah.

AD: Alright. So one of the reasons for studying metaphysics is to understand some of the laws that are governing-- governing our spiritual growth.

LR: Peter's simply asking [three/few words inaudible] (laughter) Peter's simply saying, before the knowledge didn't necessarily lead to development of character, in this quote it does lead to development of character.

S (simultaneously, very faint): No.

AD: Before [S simultaneously: No.] [S: No.] ain't got nothing to do with this because the quotation [LR simultaneously: It does actually have something to do (with it) so--] before-- the quotation before was to place jnana or insight-reality above and beyond any equation [LR simultaneously: Yeah.] with character development.

LR (simultaneously): You made the [AS simultaneously: No but I--] statement that knowledge does not-- [S simultaneously: That--] that knowledge does not necessarily make one become virtuous.

VM: Oh no [couple/few words inaudible]

AS (simultaneously): I think there was slightly--

S (simultaneously): That was not what he said.

S: No.

S: No, no, that's not what he said.

AS (simultaneously): I think it was the other way around.

S: It was the other way around.

S (simultaneously): Right.

S (simultaneously): Isn't it when?

AS: That--

S: Oh.

LR: No, what Peter's [AS simultaneously: Becau--] saying, is that what you're saying Peter?

AS (simultaneously): No, but-- but the point was there [PC simultaneously: Well, that's what I'm saying.] that having-- suppose the guy-- or if a person got this glimpse of true knowledge, K, didn't mean that necessarily these virtues had been developed. That doesn't imply that after their knowledge really does deepen, even more than a theoretical knowledge, a true knowledge of reality should ultimately also lead to the person being virtuous. However, there [three inaudible student words simultaneous with AS] is a hitch, but the hitch is that what you call virtuous may not-- I mean-- that just means the person will act in conformity to their true nature and that may or not be what you want to call virtue.

LR (faint): Ok. [S, faint: Yeah.] It may or may not be.

S: Yeah.

AS: Well I don't see--

LR (simultaneously): [three/few words inaudible]

AS: Yeah, but still, it's hard to see how eventually that knowledge wouldn't seep in and lead to virtuous action. I mean it seems not likely.

S: That's true.

PC (simultaneously): Well that's what I was trying to ask. And it seems like the kind of [AS(?), faint: Well that isn't (one word inaudible)] virtue that he's talking about here anyway is acting in conformity with your nature and not, you know-- Yeah. And not something on a civic virtue kind of level.

AH: But (here you) want to be strict about the definition of knowledge as being reality. [S: (Metaphysics.)] Virtue and all other things would be in contradistinction [S simultaneously: No.] to that reality, would be unreal, if you can forgive the expression.

AS: Irrelevant.

AH: Irrelevant to the point of view (of) reality.

HS: Yeah but you got a living person, I mean, in the world.

AH (simultaneously): Yeah but he's not going to-- he's not going to last forever and ever.

S (faint): Uh-hm.

HS: Well--

AH: But, let it go.

VM (simultaneously): Wait, that-- it doesn't-- (laughter)

S: What did you say?

VM: It seems like we-- somehow the discussion has become more complicated than it really need be, I think Andrew was continuing to make the point that knowledge is superior to virtue. And that just because you get a glimpse of genuine knowledge does not mean the virtues are firmly established. On the other hand, as Avery was trying to remind us too, some assimilation of this true knowledge will eventually encourage, lead to, point towards a certain development of character. And be-- I don't see how it could do otherwise [PC/AS(?) simultaneously: Why not?] in some ways. And I don't know why we have to circle it around and around.

AD: Herbie, if you understand [HS simultaneously: Yeah.] that the circuit is a form of Divine Justice, [HS: Yeah.] do you think you'll become or try to be a little better?

HS: Ok, now that's different than the other one.

AD: No, it's mentalism.

HS: (Even if) they have mentalism in common. 'Cause I-- with the other one I could-- I could postulate seeing knowing the-- in a simple mechanistic way, the laws of mentalism and becoming, God forbid, a negative genius as it were. Ok but now when you're saying it that way, yeah, at that point you were positing the responsibility for the behavior back to your activity. So in that sense, yeah.

AD: So the more you understand the philosophic truths without let's say the Logos actually coming to birth in you does help you reorientate your attitude in life. You don't need to have the cosmic vision of the World-Idea.

HS: So you just got a metaphysical understanding that this is the way it works.

AD (simultaneously): ((Show/Know) that) you understand it, sure.

HS: And because it works this way you better conform in a certain way. Ok, I could see that, I could see that.

AH: Is-- is it appropriate to ask like in terms of the goal, see, is it virtue that is sought or is it knowledge that is sought?

AD: Knowledge.

AH: Yeah. Now if that's so, that knowledge is the goal, that seems to put perspective on the-- the distinction between knowledge and virtue.

AD: That seems to what?

AH: That gives some perspective that there is a distinction between knowledge and virtue. You know, if the goal is knowledge, virtue is relegated to the level of ethics or to human life.

LH: Yeah but Andrew, doesn't it go without saying that you can't claim any kind of understanding without that requisite character development.

S (very faint): Yeah.

AH: No that's-- [one/two inaudible student words simultaneous with AH] I think Larry what's being suggested, that it's possible, or theoretically possible, if (we/you) can use that word, to have--

LH (simultaneously): I said that wrong, you can claim some kind of understanding but you can't claim a total or a complete understanding. You can't claim to-- to have attained that knowledge of truth without the requisite development of character.

VM (simultaneously): Yes.

AH: Because-- because in most cases where a person has attained to the knowledge of reality there's something about that person's character that we admire, I don't think we're allowed the conclusion that-- that knowledge is denied one without character, like--

MB: I think that person is the exception Andrew. The flavor that I get from PB's quote-- from this whole chapter, (he/you) wouldn't bother to write so much about it.

AH: Yes. [one/two words inaudible]

MB (simultaneously): He puts a great emphasis on the development of character and [AH assents] higher ethics and maybe not only because it leads us to the attainment of knowledge, maybe there are other reasons that we haven't gotten to yet. But that that person that gets the knowledge without the development of character is an exception rather than the general rule.

AH: Yes I agree, Myra, I was just interested in the theoretical possibility of knowledge--

MB (simultaneously): Theoretical possibility is because one is principally higher than the other.

AH: Yeah.

S (faint): Yeah.

RC: Anthony, [MB simultaneously: But--] what do you make of this passage that says that the--

HOW MUCH PHILOSOPHY A PERSON UNDERSTANDS IS SHOWN BY THEIR CHARACTER

PB [V5, 6:1.28, RC reading]: "His spiritual progress will be measured not [so much] by his meditational progress as by his [RC reads: but by the extent of his] moral awakening."

AD: Like you could be deluded by your meditational progress, very often people get very advanced or let's say they get visions and ecstasies and (blisters), you know, and get all kinds of visions. And they may think that they're quite advanced and yet when you look at their character unfoldment you begin to have doubts about-- about how well-established philosophic truths are. Because it's in the character development that you see whether the philosophic truths have become concretized or they're still in the, you know, verbal sphere.

RC: So would you say that in the case of a person we have been talking about, where someone gets some kind of inner breakthrough in terms of meditation and does come into a state of knowledge, but they don't have a moral awakening, that that knowledge that they have is not spiritual? Their possession of it is not spiritual?

AD: Their possession? I wouldn't put it that way Randy, I wouldn't say that they possess knowledge. I would say they got a glimpse of it, not that they possess it.

RC: Well in terms of his saying that a person's spiritual progress is going to be measured not by the depth of these meditations but by their moral awakening, then what-- what's happening with the word "spiritual"?

S (very faint): Then spiritual [one word inaudible]

AH: Well you might say that if there is-- if there is a glimpse of that, there'll be a response to that glimpse, that it would be virtuous or otherwise on the part of the personality. Like if you-- if you have an experience of that knowledge, the consequence is not necessity of a virtuous life, there might be quite the opposite reaction.

[short pause]

RC: He told me once that he would take-- he once had really traveled great distances to seek out men that he admired, that-- (for/well) yogis that possess super normal powers of introspection and expression. But then more-- it was very similar to this quote. But then more and more he began to feel that a person was more spiritually developed if they had a character that could be relied upon and that that became much more-- much more meaningful to him than the possession of the yogic powers.

S: Yeah.

RC: So I'm just wondering how these two things fit together, like, is it possible to have an unspiritual glimpse or an unspiritual state of knowledge?

S (faint): Right.

AD: I-- I don't-- I think I'm a little mixed up as to what you're saying. I follow the quote well enough, that ultimately when all is said and done how much philosophy a person understands tends-- and is shown by the character he had. [RC assents] Because if it's not incorporated into his character, then the philosophy hasn't, so to speak, turned into a vasana like you just said. [student assents, faint] And that seems a perfectly legitimate way to test the spiritual growth of a person. Well I don't under-- understand the other part, that the-- a person could get a spiritual vision or let's say he could have a meditational ecstasis. [RC assents] Could you take it up from there?

RC: And if they don't have some kind of consequent moral awakening that goes along with it, do they really understand what happened to them?

AD (simultaneously): Well, when you have the glimpse, there is-- there is no need for moral rearmament.

RC: Sure.

AD: Because in the glimpse you are that higher self, you're not the ego.

RC: Uh-huh.

AD: It's when you come out of it that you're speaking about now.

[students assent, faint]

RC: Ok, so you're talking then about a person who's in the state of having a glimpse but their character is something else.

AD: Yes.

RC: If-- ok.

AD: Because a glimpse means that for that period of time that the glimpse endured, whether a minute or a year, he is that higher self. And the ego is completely subservient to that.

RC: Ok.

AD: But once that glimpse is gone, then the normal character that he has returns. Now the work begins. As a matter of fact, I think it's, you know, common knowledge, when you get the glimpse now you start the work, alright, you-- bait is held up, if we could use a vulgar expression. But I don't see the point you're getting at Randy because I'm sure you're getting to a point.

RC: Well I-- I wasn't understanding what you were saying before and I do now so I could drop it at this point but--

AD: Oh you mean the quotation about character and knowledge?

S: Uh-hm.

RC: No--

VM(?): Yeah.

RC: Yeah.

AD: Alright. I'd rather drop it.

RC: Yeah.

AD: It's not worth it.

RC: But you-- it seems now that it's clear you're saying that--

AD: You know it's the same thing in the Vedanta, they have the same thing. Can you get liberated except through knowledge, can you get liberated by karma, by devotion, by anything except knowledge? There's no-- no other way to get liberated. But then you know if a person is liberated by the kind of character he's-- he's living with or that he displays. But the knowledge is always-- there's only one way to liberation, that's through knowledge, you've got to, through identity, know that you're That. Now the Stoics were naïve enough to believe that their development of character was superior to the World-Idea. As a matter of fact the highest conception that they had of the World-Idea was the physical spermatikos. Physical reason-principle of the universe was the highest philosophic conception you had so(,/--) PB couldn't possibly agree with that. He wouldn't say that the Stoics were wrong insofar that they wanted to develop character. But to place it above knowledge, that was absurd. In principle, that's absurd. I don't care who writes it. [RC assents, faint] There's many a black magician who has quite a bit of knowledge.

JB: So you have to wait till after the glimpse is over to test--

AD: I can't hear you!

JB: (Aye.) Can I ask now if that means you have to wait until the glimpse is over to test whether there's been any spiritual development or not.

AD (with some intensity): It'd be wiser to push through while the glimpse is going on. If you wait for it to be over, and we do wait for it to be over, (bit of laughter) it's really hard.

JB: But any test done during a glimpse would have a false consequence, it would say you attained some spiritual development. But when you came out of it, if you hadn't done anything, you'd be the same you and you'd have to start again.

AD: No.

JB: (No?)

AD (simultaneously): As a matter of fact one of the Buddhist techniques is if you get a glimpse, a breakthrough, then they try to bring into operation techniques that keep you there.

RC: (Embrace) you, yeah.

[short pause]

AD: Alright, Randy, [RC simultaneously: Do you want me to--] go on now. Now let's-- let's not anchor it [one word inaudible] Let's look at it as a divergence of opinion.

[10 second pause]

PB [V5, 6:1.30, RC reading]: "He must look within himself for the impurities and falsities, the malice and envy, the prejudice and bitterness [RC reads: bitternesses] which belong to his lower nature. And he must work with all his willpower and thinking power to cast them out."

[short pause]

ONCE YOU HAVE MENTAL PEACE, THEN YOU'RE DISPASSIONATE ABOUT EVERYTHING, SO YOU CAN GET A BETTER VIEW OF YOURSELF

PB [V4, Part 1, 4:4.171, RC reading]: "To recognize our guilt in tracing the source of certain troubles is always hard--so blinded by egoism are we. The philosophic discipline aims at creating the requisite personal disinterestedness in us."

[short pause]

DB: Now that's a profoundly different perspective than walking around with a whip and going "mea culpa". (bit of laughter) I mean--

VM: I agree.

DB: You know--

LR: Can't hear you David. (bit of laughter)

DB: Really?

S: Maybe just talk louder.

DB (simultaneously): I really tried to talk loud that time. (some laughter) I said "I'm going to talk [S simultaneously, faint: Yes you did.] loud that time." Didn't work. Ok, I s-- I was saying that that disintere-- disinterest-- disinterestedness that Randy just spoke of is a very different thing than walking around saying "I'm so bad, I'm so bad" and-- and hating yourself. I mean, it's his whole point but seems like the philosophic detachment he's talking about here is a little bit different than an egotific preoccupation with your lower nature as being--

S: Right.

RC: He doesn't want you to just feel guilty. He wants you to trace the source with particular troubles and then do something about them. In order to do that tracing [couple/few words inaudible]

DB (simultaneously): Right. I mean because otherwise guilt-- guilt in itself seems like a sufficient punishment for whatever you (bit of laughter) think you're guilty about, oh-- (some laughter) oh I left so bad because I'm guilty-- you know, I'm guilty that I-- that [VM simultaneously: I feel bad, isn't that enough.] way you don't have to do anything about it [S simultaneously: No.] because I've already suffered enough.

RC: (And sometimes) it's not enough you feel bad.

DB: Right.

RC: You got to step back for--

AD (simultaneously): (You got a) meditation, I've been exonerated from all my sins. (laughter)

AH: Is it suggestion that if you look for the source, if the source would result in this insight of a-- of a personal disinterest?

RC: No he's saying that the discipline aims at creating the personal disinterestedness which is capable of doing this.

AD: See that-- that's almost like the first initiation, to bring about that disinterestedness. In other words, that's the state of mental peace.

AH: It'd be disinterest in-- in one's-- oneself? What is the-- what is the disinterest aim toward? Would it be--

AD (simultaneously): Everything. Once you have the mental peace, then you're disinterested or dispassionate about everything. And that means that you can get a better view of yourself. That's [JB simultaneously: Talking about first initiation?] very hard to get a good view of yourself as long as you're too biased.

AH: You'd be-- you'd be dispassionate about everything?

AD: The disinterestedness extends to everything. If you have that first initiation which I think Randy told her a couple weeks ago when he speaks about four-- about the window being clean and then more clean and-- and the first-- the first cleansing, cleaning of the window was a kind of mental peace that settles down on a person. He still has thoughts but they're very gentle, they arise very quietly, they don't make a big fuss or bother, you remember? Then the second one where even cerebral action stops. Well the first is required, that disinterestedness is required before you can become that impersonal about yourself. [short pause] Let's hear it again Randy, I--

[short pause]

AD: And then you can understand a little better. [short pause] Not your sins.

AH: The dis-- the disinterest-- understanding is possible because there's no longer as much identity with that ego individual entity. Like you don't s-- you-- you would s-- you wouldn't experience the quest as my quest or you wouldn't experience philosophy as my ideas or--

AD: Yeah, you become more impersonal. But see, he does make the point that the philosophic discipline is concerned with bringing that about so that you could deal with let's say the problems that you have much more effectively. [short pause] He's pretty astute this fellow. (some laughter) Alright Randy.

PB [V5, 6:1.336, RC reading]: "As his sensitivity develops and his conscience [RC reads: consciousness] refines, he comes to regard certain actions as sinful which he formerly regarded as innocent."

[students assent, faint]

PC: Once more please.

PB [V5, 6:1.336, RC reading]: "As his sensitivity develops and his conscience [RC reads: consciousness] refines, he comes to regard certain actions as sinful which he formerly regarded as innocent."

[short pause with faint background student talking, some laughter]

MB: Not the other way around, right? (bit of laughter)

RC: Not this one. (laughter)

[16½ second pause with faint background student whispering/talking]

PB [V5, 6:1.470, RC reading]: "The very fact that he has become aware of these faults arises because the light has come into existence and [RC adds: has] begun to play upon the dark places in his character, thus generating a conscious desire for self-improvement. This awareness is not a matter for depression, therefore. [RC reads: This awareness is not therefore a matter for depression.]" (some laughter)

S (faint): Oh. (more laughter)

S: I see. [RC simultaneously: Let us--] It just feels that way. (some laughter)

DB: Excuse me, I just-- I can't help but overemphasize or see the legitimacy of that-- that particular point because otherwise one ends up turning self-hatred into some kind of virtue and what he's talking about I think this is different.

RC: Yeah that disinterestedness is what he's aiming at.

DB: Right.

PC: Could you read the last one again once more?

AD: In other words when you find faults you should feel happy.

S (faint): It's very [one word inaudible]

AD: Well if not happy at least [couple words inaudible] (laughter) Never mind, go. (laughter)

S: Don't [one/two words inaudible] and you should feel gloomy.

RC (simultaneously): I think maybe you should wait for that. (bit of laughter)

S (amidst laughter, very faint): I see.

EM: Yeah, well--

[short pause]

THE IMPORTANCE OF SELF-EXAMINATION

[Transcriber note: It sounds like RC reads the following two quotes as if they were one quote.]

PB [V4, Part 1, 4:4.121, RC reading]: "He should develop the [RC reads: a] sense of self-criticism to a high and even painful degree. He cannot any longer afford to protect his ego, as he did in the past, or to seek excuses for its sorry frailties and foolishnesses."

PB [V4, Part 1, 4:4.147, RC reading]: "If the results of such an examination disturb his self-confidence and shake his vanity, so much the better for his quest." (bit of laughter)

TS: Hm.

[short pause]

PB [V7, 11:2.9, RC reading]: "Ultimately he must find fault with himself when he seeks to trace the cause of most of his troubles. But this will require him to bring great moral courage to the examination of his life's course. For the personal ego is an inveterate alibi-hunter. If he is to overcome its insidious suggestions, its slippery arguments, he must see himself in the worst light."

[19 second pause]

PB [V5, 6:4.11, RC reading]: "So many of our feelings and so many of our thoughts have until now been dictated by the body. Is it not time [RC adds: for us] to think and feel also as the true self would have us do?"

[11 second pause]

SC: Randy? When you-- or when PB's speaking of thinking and feeling as the true self would have us do as opposed to thinking and feeling as dictated by the body, would you say the difference is is that one thinking and feeling has to do with the powers of the soul?

RC: I would, yeah. I would.

SC (simultaneously): As opposed to the instinctive level or that which is a habit?

RC: Yeah. I'd call one character and the other consequence.

AH: Yeah. You m-- you might also describe that as-- earlier we talked about a necessity for psychological knowledge and also metaphysical truths. I-- Certainly it's only "as if" but if we-- I think we could experience that, you know, like how would the higher self require us to think and feel under these circumstances, we'd come up with a conceptual possibility but you might not be able to actually achieve. You know, you-- I-- the point is, in response to what you said Sam, you wouldn't have to call it the powers of the soul. It could also be done as an exercise reaching toward that power. Like, you know, given any circumstance that we might be confronted with where the-- the response is based upon having a body. But you can abstract what a philosophical response might be to that event.

SC: So that even when you're using the thinking and feeling that's given to you by the body, the habitual thinking and feeling that you're given, you can use-- you're saying that you can use those to create exercises that'll lead you towards the former, but it wouldn't be the former.

AH: I think that's probably the-- the most important reason for studying philosophy is to have concepts about truth that we can attempt to align our behavior with.

SC: But still I-- I agree with Randy that the distinction made was really the distinction between all that falls under the habitual aspects of life that are given by the body and that thinking and feeling which is beyond that, which is that of the soul and [AH assent] related to the higher s-- higher self.

AH: I guess Sam I was suggesting an intermediary step. You know, I was thinking of the "As-If" exercise in meditation. Like, there has to be some connection between what a Sage thinks and feels and the body-bound thinking and feeling. [short pause] I mean how do we aspire toward those soul powers from the point of view of being bound to the body's thinking and feeling? Except by idealizing philosophical truth.

[short pause]

JB: Is that the only way?

AH: Certainly seems the most-- most direct way.

[14 second pause]

PB PARAS ON THE LONG STRUGGLE TO MASTER THE LOWER NATURE AND PURIFY THE EMOTIONS

PB [unpublished, 6a.1 (6v/36/262), RC reading]: "Only those who feel the truth of these teachings are likely to be lifted above their own lower self to the extent of expressing them in action."

[11 second pause]

PB [unpublished, 6a.1 (6v/36/268), RC reading]: "He should aspire after those virtues which he does not possess but ought to possess."

[12 second pause]

PB [V5, 6:6.2, RC reading]: "It would appear that ideals that seem too remote for realization and goals that seem too high for achievement are not worth the trouble of setting up. Yet to abandon them altogether would be to lose the sense of right direction. [RC adds: And] That would be a mistake. It is wiser to keep them as ultimate ideals and goals, drawing from them inspirational and directional value. It is here and for such a purpose that the dreaming idealists themselves have their place, not in the all-or-nothing revolutionary way that they [themselves] think they do. It is needful to make a compromise between the facts about human nature in its present state and the ideals which it can [RC reads: could] hope to realize only in some future state. It is not necessary to go all the way with the extremists, whether in art, mysticism, politics, or economics in order to realize that we can learn something from each of them. Let us take what is adaptable [in their views], but let us reject what is decidedly extreme."

[11¾ second pause]

PB [6a.0 (6v/55/49), RC reading]: "When thought feeling and conduct…"

[short pause]

PB [6a.0 (6v/55/49), RC reading]: "When ... reactions in human thought feeling and conduct to outward stimuli are brought under control by reason will and intuition instead of being left as they usually are to their own blind instinctive response, the development of higher human potential will become possible to an extent beyond reach today." [jf note: in monster.srt/PB database begins: "When human reactions..."]

[short pause]

JG: Could you--

S: Yeah.

PB [6a.0 (6v/55/49), RC reading]: "When reactions in human thought feeling and conduct to outward stimuli are brought under control by reason will and intuition instead of being left as they usually are to their own blind instinctive response, the development of higher human potential [RC reads: potentialities] will become possible to an extent beyond reach today."

[25 second pause]

PB [unpublished, 6a.1 (6v/107/422), RC reading]: "It is an essential part of the philosophic discipline that he shall give up all the conceits, the attachments, and the prejudices of his personality."

[11½ second pause]

AH: Could you read that one again please?

[short pause]

[13 second pause]

PB [V5, 6:1.204, RC reading]: "He must become thoroughly sick of his mistakes and sins before he will take the trouble to develop by self-training his discriminatory faculties and moral ideals."

JG: Would you read that once more?

PB [V5, 6:1.204, RC reading]: "He must become thoroughly sick of his mistakes and sins before he will take the trouble to develop by self-training his discriminatory faculties and moral ideals."

[13½ second pause]

PB [unpublished, 6a-pat.1 (6v/63/96), RC reading]: "Most beginners must resign themselves with moral patience than intellectual far-sightedness to the fact that the removal of these old tendencies in character and the remedying of these old lacks in mentality will take several lives on Earth. It is going to be a hard long struggle to master the lower nature, to purify the emotions, to subjugate the ego, and to acquire the strength to contemplate easily. But little by little, all this can be done given sufficient time."

S (very faint): [couple words inaudible]

S: Uh-hm.

LR: Randy, you know that one similar to that, that real long one that says once he's begun--

RC: Yeah.

S (simultaneously): Yeah.

LR: --there's no turning back?

RC: Yeah I've got-- I got both of them like that on the list here but I don't remember which numbers they are. We'll come to them. But I don't know which one it is.

LR: Oh.

RC: There's two of them. There's one that says [one word inaudible] turn back and there's another one that says you couldn't if you wanted to.

JB(?): Uh-hm.

LR (simultaneously): Right.

S (faint): Uh-hm.

LR: Well, I've got them if you want them at some point.

RC (simultaneously): You got it? Sure.

LR: Well no, you may not want them now. You want to wait?

[short pause]

RC: I guess I did when I made the list but it doesn't matter now if you want to read them.

LR (simultaneously): Alright. No, that's fine, I just--

SC: Just (a little/deliver).

LR/S(?): I just--

[short pause]

PB [V15, 23:1.10, RC reading]: "What it asserts is that the real truth already exists in the pithy core of man's mind, that it can be seen by anyone who will undo the illusions which cover it so thickly, the passions which obscure it so agitatedly, and, above all, the egoism which fears it so greatly. This does not imply the development of new things: it implies the removal of old ones. It is concerned with the discovery of what we really are, not [RC adds: with] what we shall one day become."

[18¾ second pause]

PB [V5, 6:1.250, RC reading]: "The truth comes when it is sought, but [RC adds: it] is found only when we are ready. This is why the aspirant must take himself in hand, must improve his character and discipline his emotions."

[short pause]

PB [V5, 6:3.35, RC reading]: "The lower emotions and the moods they produce are his first enemies. Every antagonism and envy, every wrathful temper and animal lust, every self-injuring desire and socially harmful greed bars his way. And it will not move out of the way without a long fight."

[10 second pause]

PB [unpublished, 6a-pat.1 (6v/66/99), RC reading]: "The process is not abrupt, sudden, and dramatic. It is slow and very gradual. He must wait in patience while these seeds germinate and bear their flowers and later their fruits."

[27½ second pause]

PB [V5, 6:1.79 RC reading]: "It is not so much that we have to change ourselves as to give up ourselves. We are so imperfect and faulty, so selfish and weak, so sinful and ignorant, that giving up our own selves means being more than willing to part with what is not worth keeping. But to what are we to give [them] up and how are we to do it? We are to invoke the higher self, request it daily to take possession of our hearts, minds, and wills, and to strive actively to purify them. Much of our striving will be in the form of surrendering egoistic thoughts, impulses, and feelings by crushing them at the moment of birth. In that [RC reads: this] way we slowly give up our [inner] selves and submit the conduct of our outer selves to a higher will."

S: Again?

PB [V5, 6:1.79, RC reading]: "It is not so much that we have to change ourselves as to give up ourselves. We are so imperfect and faulty, so selfish and weak, so sinful and ignorant, that giving up our own selves means being more than willing to part with what is not worth keeping. But to what are we to give [them] up and how are we to do it? We are to invoke the higher self, request it daily to take possession of our hearts, minds, and wills, and to strive actively to purify them. Much of our striving will be in the form of surrendering egoistic thoughts, impulses, and feelings by crushing them at the moment of birth. In that way we slowly give up our inner selves and submit the conduct of our outer selves to a higher will."

[20¾ second pause]

PB [V5, 6:5.307, RC reading]: "The student should not go about [RC reads: around] criticizing [RC adds: others] or abusing others. He should not do so because it is mentally unhealthy and hinders his own progress, because it will one day bring down criticism or abuse upon his own head, because he has to foster a compassionate outlook, and because he ought to understand that everybody on earth is indeed here owing to [his own] imperfection so that the labor of showing up faults would be an endless one."

[laughter followed by pause with faint background student talking, 40¾ seconds]

PB [V5, 6:1.458, RC reading]: "It is a useful practice, both for general moral self-improvement and for [combatting our ego, every time we become aware that we are preoccupying ourselves with other people's faults, to turn that preoccupation upon ourselves and let it deal with our own faults, which we usually overlook. For we earn the right to judge others only after we have judged ourselves]."

(Side 1 of original cassette tape digitized as 1983 0105b Ends; Side 2 begins)

S (faint): [one/two words inaudible]

AH (faint): Uh-huh, I--

[12¾ second pause]

PB [V5, 6:5.259, RC reading]: "It is admitted that someone else may well have been the principal cause of [RC adds: a] personal hurt or ill from which we suffer, but it is also needful that we honestly examine whether we ought not to take a share of the blame ourselves. For there is in us an instinctive wish to escape from our own responsibility in every painful situation."

[14 second pause]

PB [V5, 6:5.328, RC reading]: "He should not waste time, thought-- He should not waste thought or harm…"

RC: Wait a minute.

PB [V5, 6:5.328, RC reading]: "He should not waste thought or harm others by destructively criticizing them. Instead, if his life-path forces him to deal with them and therefore to understand them exactly as they are, he will calmly [and] constructively, gently and impersonally, analyse them. He will see their weakness without involving himself in egotistically emotional reactions to it [RC reads: them]--unless they are compassionate recognitions of the sorrowful results [RC adds: that] it must inevitably bring."

[10 second pause]

PB [V5, 6:5.260, RC reading]: "He should be vigilant against his own violations of ethical standards but indifferent towards [RC reads: toward] other people's sins where duty does not call upon him to deal with them."

[18 second pause]

PB [V5, 6:5.283, RC reading]: "Some well-meaning moralists who say that the disciple should no longer look for the evil in others, swing to the other extreme and say that he should look only for the good. Philosophy, however, does not endorse either point of view, except to remark that we have no business to judge those who are weaker than ourselves and less business to condemn them. It further says that to look only for the good [RC reads: look for the good only] in others would be to give a false picture of them, for a proper picture must combine the bright and the dark sides. Therefore it prefers mentally to leave them alone and not to set any valuation upon them, to mind its own affairs and to leave them to the unerring judgement of their own Karma. The only exception to this rule is when a disciple is forced to have dealings with another [man] which make it necessary for him to understand the character of the person with whom he is dealing; but even this understanding must be fair, just, calmly made, impartial, and unprejudiced. Above all, it must not arouse personal emotions or egoistic reactions: in short, he will have to be absolutely impersonal. But it is seldom that a disciple will have to make such an exception. He should refrain from giving attention to the imperfections and shortcomings of others, and he should certainly never blame them for these. He should turn his critical gaze towards himself alone--unless he is specifically asked by others to examine them--and exercise it to correct himself [and] improve himself and reform himself."

[31¼ second pause]

PB [V5, 6:3.164, RC reading]: "The emotional hurts which meant so much and felt so deep [RC reads: were felt so deeply] when he was spiritually juvenile, will come to signify less and less [RC reads: will come to have less and less significance] as he becomes spiritually adult. For he sees increasingly that they made him unhappy only because he [himself] allowed them to do so, only because, from two possible attitudes, he himself chose the little ego's with its negative and petty emotionalism as against the higher mind's positive and universal rationality."

[10¾ second pause]

PB [V15, 24:3.30, RC reading]: "He will find, with time, that this increasing detachment from his own person will reflect itself back in an increasing detachment from other persons. Consequently, irritation with their faults, quarrels with their views, and interference with their lives will show themselves less and less. It is pertinent to note, however, [RC adds: that] the difference between the ordinary mystic's detachment from personalities and the philosophical mystic's [RC reads: and that of the philosophic mystic's-- and that of the philosophic mystic]. The first tends [finally] to become mere indifference, whereas the second always becomes compassionate."

[25 second pause]

PB [V5, 6:5.297, RC reading]: "We aspirants ought not to waste our time or sully our minds to criticize [RC reads: in criticizing] the weaknesses of others. There are countless people in this world who expend their energies in this useless task. It brings them no gain. [RC reads: There are countless people in this world who expend their energies in this useless task which brings no gain.] It keeps them tied to the lower nature. It attracts worldly troubles to them. We are to be as constructive and positive as they are destructive and negative. This will lessen the disharmony in our surroundings and increase the harmony in our hearts."

[short pause]

PB [V5, 6:3.11, RC reading]: "Anger and hatred are dangerous emotions to carry about with you. Whether or not they lead to actions harmful to the person they are directed against, they are certainly harmful to you. Conquer them quickly, get these psychological poisons out of your system."

DB (faint): (Very good quote.) Once more repeat.

RC: With feeling?

DB: Yeah. (bit of laughter)

S: Yeah. (bit more laughter)

[24 second pause]

AD: Alright Randy. [rings bell]

S (faint, possibly part of background): Stop here?

AD: Randy I-- I know-- I might suggest that those of you who are interested, start looking over the Hidden Teaching. Because the next category we're going to do is mentalism. So, if you get a chance, look it through. But there's still quite a bit on this, isn't there Randy?

RC: There's an awful lot on this, um--

[background student and AD talking, milling around till the end]

[Audio File 1983 0105b Ends]

Anthony Damiani Archive

Class

Wednesday, January 5th, 1983