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Tertium Organum (P.D. Ouspensky) · 137 of 225 · tr. Nicholas Bessaraboff and Claude Bragdon

Chapter XVII (part 10)

By ourselves we are simply out of relation with each other, for we are both of us there, and different from each other, which is a positive relation. What we are without knowing, it knows that we are. It is as if the total universe of inner life had a sort of grain or direction, a sort of valvular structure, permitting knowledge to flow in one way only, so that the wider might always have the narrower under observation, but never the narrower the wider. Fechner likens our individual persons on the earth unto so many sense-organs of the earth-soul. We add to its perceptive life. . . . It absorbs our perceptions into its larger sphere of knowledge, and combines them with the other data there. The memories and conceptual relations that have spun themselves round the perceptions of a certain p. 212 person remain in the larger earth-life as distinct as ever, and form new relations. . . ." Fechner's ideas are expounded in his book, Zendavesta . I have made such a lengthy quotation from Prof. James' book in order to show that the ideas of the animism and of the rationality of the world are neither new nor paradoxical. It is a natural and logical necessity, resulting from a broader view of the world than that which we usually permit ourselves to hold. Logically we must either recognize life and rationality in everything, in all "dead nature," or deny them completely, even IN OURSELVES. Footnotes 208:1 "The Great Initiates," by E. Schure.
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Themes
Living Godtheology

The divine conceived as active, present, and dynamic—not an abstract principle but a personal responsive reality.

The passage argues for recognizing life and rationality in everything, including dead nature, implying a living universe.

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Mechanical Humanityanthropology

Gurdjieff and Ouspensky's claim that ordinary human beings live in a state of waking sleep, reacting mechanically without unified will or consciousness, and that the spiritual path begins with recognising this condition.

Implies humans operate in a state of not knowing what they are, consistent with Ouspensky's concept of waking sleep.

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Microcosm Macrocosmcosmology

The human being as a small-scale image of the entire cosmos; the body, soul, and intellect mirroring the structure of the heavens and the divine — distinct from correspondence in that it makes the human the privileged mirror.

Fechner's analogy explicitly likens individual persons to sense-organs of the earth-soul, mirroring the larger whole.

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Paradox As Teachingethics

Using apparent contradiction, reversal, or riddle to destabilise ordinary understanding and induce insight.

Presents a logical dilemma requiring recognition of life in all nature or denial even within ourselves.

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Separation From Sourcesoteriology

The felt condition of exile from one's divine origin — Rumi's reed flute torn from its bed, Plotinus's 'we have forgotten,' the Gnostic forgetfulness; the affective wound that complements return_to_source and gives the return its motive.

States that by ourselves we are simply out of relation with each other and the wider whole.

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Unity Of Beingtheology

The doctrine that all existence is ultimately one substance or one divine reality; non-duality as a theological claim.

Describes a total universe of inner life where individual perceptions are absorbed into a larger sphere of knowledge.

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Related passages · 6 parallels
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Shared concept: Unity Of Being — The doctrine that all existence is ultimately one substance or one divine reality; non-duality as a theological claim. (derived)
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“But neither does the cause [of the energies] of more excellent natures subsist as a certain middle instrument, nor does he who invokes operate through him who prophesies; for to assert these things is impious. And it is much more true to sa…”
Shared concept: Living God — The divine conceived as active, present, and dynamic—not an abstract principle but a personal responsive reality. (derived)
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“HEARKEN to the reed-flute, how it complains, Lamenting its banishment from its home: "Ever since they tore me from my osier bed, My plaintive notes have moved men and women to tears. I burst my breast, striving to give vent to sighs, And t…”
Shared concept: Separation From Source — The felt condition of exile from one's divine origin — Rumi's reed flute torn from its bed, Plotinus's 'we have forgotten,' the Gnostic forgetfulness; the affective wound that complements return_to_source and gives the return its motive. (derived)
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“That He Who is the Pre-eminent Cause of everything intelligibly perceived is not Himself any one of the things intelligibly perceived. Once more, ascending yet higher we maintain 537 537 It is not (1) a Thinking Subject; nor (2) an Act or…”
Shared concept: Paradox As Teaching — Using apparent contradiction, reversal, or riddle to destabilise ordinary understanding and induce insight. (derived)
neoplatonism|Iamblichus: On the Mysteries|Chapter VIII-r
“But there are a certain few who by employing a certain supernatural power of intellect, are removed from nature , &c. The class to which these few belong is beautifully unfolded, as follows, by Plotinus, in the beginning of his Treatise on…”
Shared concept: Separation From Source — The felt condition of exile from one's divine origin — Rumi's reed flute torn from its bed, Plotinus's 'we have forgotten,' the Gnostic forgetfulness; the affective wound that complements return_to_source and gives the return its motive. (derived)