FROM ANTIQUITY

"From Antiquity: A grateful tribute from a pupil of G.I.Gurdjieff"
Basil Tilley

Chapter 1: 'Know Thyself'

Who is this who is forever looking over my shoulder? He uses such words as perhaps, should, should not, can or cannot.

Sometimes he disapproves and sometimes he admires. What is he at, what are his standards? Of course he goes away from time to time and I am happy to get on with what I wish to do, but sooner or later he returns to have a look at what is going on. But also he can be very helpful as, for instance, when I am in a state of imagination about money, sex, or even my own death. At such a moment he can remind me that none of these things I anticipate are happening at this moment. This is a great relief: I had not really seen that! Usually I am only dimly aware that he is there at all: it is a kind of twilight in which my life takes place impinging on my consciousness.

But who is he? Although he appears to be the same person who gives or withholds his approval, his standards of behaviour vary over a wide range. What he wishes to convince me of today, he will pay no attention to tomorrow, and suggests some quite other way of quietening myself from my usual hurry and rush. I even begin to see that we change places - sometimes I am he and sometimes he is me, and in any case who am I? This twilight situation persists, I am only dimly aware that I am not one.

Surely I can't be the only one who has such a situation? Is it perhaps the way "man" is constructed? I look around and see a certain evidence that such phrases as 'I couldn't make up my mind' or 'what would you have done?' cause me to suppose that the state of affairs in myself may be the general state for all us humans. The mass media is providing a wonderful stage to highlight this, peace-keeping forces, political manifestos, racial equality, and so on, and so on, and so on. It begins to be more clear that we are all made up of two opposites - yes or no, for or against, black or white.

Still I am only dimly aware of this and I see that each of us and each nation, indeed every human unit of people, plans and acts as if he were one or a unity. Disagreement is not seen to be inevitable. This is in the routine of things as they are, but there are more serious aspects to consider about this man who looks over my shoulder. He is by no means demanding when it should be necessary to be so, and consequently a good deal of 'getting by' takes place. Indeed he does not insist, in the usual way, that I should look very carefully at my achievements, he allows me to think that I know best. However, there are occasions, as in the case of extreme danger, or sadness, or love, when both he and I disappear; we just have no place.

This is a very strange thing to discover: is there a third person who only appears at moments of great emotion, and also watches what is going on between myself and the one who is looking over my shoulder?

All of us have during our lives strange experiences when we seem to be out of our usual place and time. We go into a room and suddenly everything is still, and, although I may never have been in that room before, I feel that it is familiar to me. Or I have a moment of great emotion and of great intensity which is inexplicable, but which also takes me out of place and time. At such moments am I still the usual person together with the one looking over my shoulder? What makes these moments so alive is that the other two have gone away, I know not where. Or I have gone away, I know not where, and who am I?

So could there be a third participant in my life? In fact all the traditions tell of this possibility. Read the Koran, the Upanishads, the Greeks, the Bible. But you will realize nothing unless you are fortunate to have the key which has been brought through all the ages and offered to man, and which at the present time is offered by Gurdjieff. He puts it plainly in words: we do not remember ourselves. So why do we go on living in the twilight? That is the riddle to be solved - the ko-an as it is called in Zen.


Chapter 2: The Nature of Influences

History shows that all times there has been a struggle for power. This has been on various scales, from huge movements of races, like the Goths, to much smaller struggles between rulers and their more powerful subjects. The modern possibility to have immediate news by radio from all over the world highlights this unceasing struggle. War and peace are seen to be relative conditions and relative in their content.

At the side of this power struggle there is another activity, sometimes involving larger bodies of men and sometimes only individuals. The surface of the earth is littered with the ruins of former constructions of an artistic and religious interpretation such as those in Peru, in Indochina, in Egypt or Greece, which show great skill as well as manifesting something of a special order through what we call beauty. These, too, have had their rise and fall - their time for construction and their time for decay.

Whole nations and races become involved in a struggle for power - often the victims of the ambition of a single man. In the case of the temples and the works of art, the involvement is of a quite different order, but however humble the contributor, he cannot be described as a victim.

There is a third and almost hidden activity which threads through history, and that is the restatement of ancient truths. Buddhism, Christianity, to name but two, originated with a leader assisted by a handful of devoted followers, but as time went on the influence spread, so that large sections of humanity responded to it and a new religion came into being. It can be seen that the periods of the struggle for power are comparatively short-lived compared with the hundreds of years over which a religion spreads its influence. In between there are varying lengths of time during which the centers of culture hold sway. But it is clear that all three have different characteristics and causation and also different requirements. Threading through these three lines have been three dominating ideas. In the first is the idea of race or nation, in the second the idea of beauty, and in the third the idea of Truth. The idea of race remains a constant, only depending on whose race - mine or the enemies. The idea of beauty is more relative and is fundamental to the laws of proportion and scale. But the idea of Truth - ah! Here is a question! Since ancient times conflict has arisen in this sphere and believers and unbelievers remain locked in the struggle for supremacy. In fact Truth is above the level of humanity and remains what it is, whatever the formulation. The desire to possess it and to use it for personal aggrandizement results in holy wars and the inquisition. Instinctively, Truth is felt to be unquestionable: in fact true. And then we try to interpret it!

In certain times in history have been men who stood head and shoulders above the rest, and such men have been concerned to lift the search for Truth up from the level of dispute and killing and to return it to its rightful place. To restore again a beacon of purpose towards which man can strive so that Truth may be absolute and impartial. Such men have had to struggle and suffer in order to realize in themselves the fundamentals of Truth. Little is known of them beyond their names, but each seems to represent a link in a chain coming from antiquity. Evidence of their lives appears in those very temples and cathedrals and paintings which will radiate their message to those who can receive.

If a man takes an impartial look inside himself it is evident that something similar takes place there also. Inside we have the 'multitude' of the gospels. And they are not all by any means in agreement. They strive for power over each other and pull in opposite directions, and we dimly realize the absence of peace in ourselves. There are also those in us who appreciate the harmony of music and the riches of art, but often their day is denied them by others who struggle to achieve ends of a quite different order.

Quietly, and almost unable to make himself audible, there lives in us a Searcher for Truth, and he it is who may be one of the small band who respond when the thread running through the ages appears in his time. It is a miracle if the Searcher is allowed by the multitude to make the response with sufficient force to bring any tangible result and to maintain it.

So here is the drama as over and over again, in the time of Moses in Egypt, in ancient Greece, in Galilee, the Truth is offered. The drama lies between the offer and the response which ebbs and flows as do all things in the universe. This eventually takes a form which we term traditional, the form being of value only when it brings us back from the inevitable deviations. For Europeans the form is usually of a religious character; in other parts of the world it can be the way of the yogi or the way of the fakir.

It seems that the message brought by Gurdjieff issued from his deep understanding of the weakness of the Searcher in us when faced with the 'multitude' with their host of opposing desires. First Gurdjieff calls us to open our eyes - to try to know ourselves as we are with the conflicting demands of the 'multitude' and to face the fact of where they will certainly lead us, and to recognize also where the Searcher could lead us if he could gather sufficient support from the others.


Chapter 3: A Meaning for Living.

Sooner or later the question arises for every child: What are you going to do when you grow up? The question may or may not be answered, but most children have a picture of a favorite nature which supplies a possibility for the future. To be an engine driver, a ballet dancer, a poet. But few steps are taken to implant the wish at that stage. However later on, there enters a word that is formulated as ambition. A man may even have the ambition to be Prime Minister and evidently achieve this. By such means we find meaning for our life.

Not so very long ago, the search for meaning was not so pronounced - we had our ambition it is true, but the meaning of life was clearly stated, since we all went to church on Sunday and we heard that the meaning of life was 'to Glorify God', and in a certain way this blessed all our other activities.

For the time being, however, such a formulation appears not to satisfy and we hear much about meaning and meaningfulness. A man must find meaning for his life, one cannot live without that. And so it is said that a man loses himself in his work, in his family or in his ambition to become. Nevertheless, the search still goes on. Look at the shelves in the bookshops. Not only are they filled to overflowing with books on sex and crime, but also with books of a psychological and spiritual nature, as well as the older books which are being reprinted, such as St. John of the Cross, the Cloud of Unknowing and so on. And they all sell.

But the search goes on. What is the meaning of life? Why do we live and suffer? Much interest is shown in the balance of nature, but although we would prefer to preserve rare species of animals and birds, and not clear away forests, the feeding of mankind seems always to take priority. So evidently we believe that mankind has considerable purposes - perhaps as a part of the whole of animals and birds and forests? Perhaps man is an organism and carries within him the possibility of growth as an individual - a seed?

This is in fact what Gurdjieff tells us: That man has the possibility of inner development. This is not new - it was clearly stated in the Gospels long ago, but at the present time the idea of the sower and the seed is only a picturesque formulation.

Gurdjieff goes further. Not only is man to be likened to an organism, but just as there is a balance necessary in nature, so there is a balance necessary in man. As a rule, man's center of gravity either is predominantly in his intellect, his feeling, or his body. But Gurdjieff calls us to be a balanced whole - the harmonious development of man.


Chapter 4: A Man's Search for His Place

One of the most evident facts which science reveals is the existence of a tremendous order lying behind the natural forms which we are able to observe. The tiniest insect as well as the largest animal feeds on material the source of which had its origin in the basic elements of our cosmos. This brings a man to see that he is also in the same position and he wonders what is the nature of his own relationship to this order. He is dependent on the products of the earth no matter in what refined form that food may eventually reach him. It was perhaps more evident in other times when his needs had to be satisfied by methods more closely involving his intelligent labor, than today when machinery in all its varied forms brings prepared food to the table, and thus obscures the question of his place between the known and the unknown.

Belief or unbelief is conditioned by the background of childhood: A man may have a background of agnosticism, plain disbelief, evangelical religion, or a more profoundly authoritative religion. But whether he conforms to his background or not, questions about the meaning of life will not let him alone. If he is honest in his questioning he will come to realize that, whatever his beliefs, he fails to fulfill them, and in fact is not one man following a certain direction, but composed of many pulling in conflicting directions. The computer may solve problems, the artificial fertilizer may increase crops, the new drugs may have taken the danger out of many illnesses, but in spite of all these achievements, man finds himself remarkably out of control. Still he has to acknowledge the truth of the old Biblical saying, No man by taking thought can add one cubit to his stature. The unanswerable question remains: Why does man suffer, why does man live? In an effort to silence these questions he is driven to engage even more in the tangible yet transitory activities of his immediate life. He shuts himself to deeper questions or in any case leaves them to be attended to 'tomorrow.'

But for some men these questions will not be silenced and the need to know continues to nag. From the basic elements known in ancient times as earth, air, fire, and water, originate a multitude of interdependent forms of life upon a selected number of which man finds himself dependent. In common with all other forms, he must also serve the general requirements of the cosmos. The scientist, the naturalist and others in the fields of research see traces of this interdependence. But can an individual man see his own connections with the relevant indebtedness towards what we make use of? Such thoughts remain to baffle his search for purpose: There is some mystery which a man cannot solve.

Gurdjieff labored and searched to find material which would provide a key to this mystery in terms of present day needs. Such a key has always existed in one form or another in all Traditions, and is so simple that when a man hears of it he is amazed that it was not apparent to him before. Gurdjieff puts the proposition that the truths to which we seek to relate are above the ordinary level of life, and definite work connected with self-knowledge is necessary in order to achieve that relationship. He indicated a direction in which to search, which suggested a change of attitude towards the whole mystery of life. He sought to show the very process of searching is itself a step towards 'awakening' from the level of 'dreaming' or towards life from death. Using the idiom of our day, Gurdjieff reminds man of his possible evolution as an individual. But before a man can begin to move towards this evolution he must face and acknowledge his incompleteness, not as a philosophical concept but as a hard fact. Such direct experience is against all his habitual attitudes, for except in definite moments of bitter realization he has the conviction that he is already complete, already conscious - always the same individual person, which he is not.

Gurdjieff offers us a view of the universe and of man in this universe, of man as a microcosmos or little universe governed by the same laws of the great universe. This universal hierarchy of energies and consciousness contains the scale in which and by which man lives. But he is imprisoned in his troubled dream of living and his self-limiting logic, and is unaware of these potentialities or of his rightful place. Gurdjieff has much to say about this, and in an entirely fresh approach to the study of psychology and physiology opens the way to a real study of man. Ideas received in the mind constitute only a skeleton-like structure to which must be added the flesh and blood of experience in all aspects of life, so that there may be created a living breathing body of understanding. Words cannot impart the necessary understanding, a man needs the help of others struggling in the same direction, and he also needs the guidance of a searcher more experienced than himself.

Chapter 5: The Conditions Required by Life

The passing of time is one of the most implacable conditions of human life; as implacable as the seasons themselves and the definite character of each one. The Old Testament writer knew well: 'To everything there is a season and a time to every purpose under heaven; a time to be born, and a time to die, a time to plant and a time to pluck up that which is planted.'

At a certain season the birds come to this country from distant parts, they remain for a certain definite period before they return once more to whence they came. Where they came from, and to where they return, is an organic necessity of their lives totally without other possibilities.

There are laws everywhere demanding ceaseless exchanges between manifestations of life. The drought of the summer of 1976 brought a realization of the powerlessness of man. It would not rain and nothing could alter that fact. Our total dependence on water was suddenly manifest to us in England though often apparent elsewhere. The web of life is evident everywhere. Lions take the flesh of smaller beasts for their food; a field mouse is the prey of the barn owl. The idea of balance in nature is of course known, but its implacable character defies man's attempt to be the master.

In human life too, only with time can relationship change place in the family. There is a time for looking forward and a time for looking back. Gradually the life of man ceases to be all in the future and finally becomes all in the past. The child becomes the father and then the grandfather.

No longer for instance is it suitable, as in Elizabethan days, to build vast houses for a single family, but we hesitate to let them fall into ruin and are ourselves impoverished by the cost of maintaining them. The stone crumbles, the paint peels and the brickwork falls. Gradually the fabric returns to its original material as part of the earth. In its own time dust returns to dust.

It is as if man had two lives - the life of facts and the life of hopes. The life of hopes is engaged in hoping that facts will not be found to be facts:
Hope it will or will not rain, hoping things will be better soon, hoping people will be different. Such hopes bring us to unhappiness because man is unable to accept the implacability of life - as ye sow so shall ye reap.

The message of Gurdjieff lives in the realization that man dreams and, by dreaming avoids the discipline of facing life's implacable terms: the lawfulness of cause and effect. Gurdjieff speaks of a different kind of hope which is the right of every man who awakes to the laws of the universe, but only at the price of that awakening.

Otherwise, Gurdjieff says, 'They always hope in something, and disappointment is the result.'

Man claims he has the right to be happy, but does not accept the conditions for happiness.


Chapter 6, The Problem of Existence

The very word 'existence' has come to mean the least that can be expected from life. We speak of mere existence. This denotes a life devoid of outside pleasure - just passing our lives. And yet it is not the external events that would make life the miracle that it is. If we could realize what goes on inside each one of us, then existence itself would be miraculous.

We know from the textbooks that if a man were denied air that he would die, but every moment that we live we are taking in and exhaling air, and we have no realization of it. The air which we take in immediately revivifies the blood, but we are only aware of this if something goes wrong. We eat foods of all kinds - too much - too little - things that we shouldn't eat, and the body takes care of it and transforms it into substances suitable for the tissues or rejects it. But we eat while we read a newspaper or listen to the radio and the process goes on without our aid.

We have all developed certain faculties during our lives. There were many latent in us at birth and some of them have been developed. Nothing that was not latent could exist in us now. We even had to learn to walk or speak! We do so many things, many things, yet all these activities take place quite automatically once the initial learning has taken place. Indeed we know that if we interfered, and try to think about them, the activities would fail. But there is a difference between letting these activities carry on as they have been learned to do and indifference to the marvel of a typist's fingers running off a letter at great speed and spelling difficult words without her participation. And what about the astonishing work of our instinct. If a fly approaches my eye, immediately the shutter of my eyelid comes down. If I cut my finger, the tissues set to work to heal the wound. If I eat something poisonous, my stomach throws it out. A biologist will do minute research into organic life, a physician will perform delicate operations on a heart or a brain, but are these men aware of their own miracle which is being enacted in themselves?

The ideas of Gurdjieff make us begin to notice our inner world, and we can read about it in books, but this will not make us actually aware of it: It has to be experienced. So we begin to receive direct experiences of the constant changes in the condition of our blood. Have you ever seen breath stop as someone dies? Suddenly one realizes that the process has ceased in someone else.

It is common knowledge that we need all sorts of different tissues to build and sustain the body: We need different tissues for bone, for skin, for brain cells, for fingernails, for hair. How does the differentiation take place from the food we eat to the parts of the body which it sustains?

Any one of our functions is in itself a cross-section of the marvel of them all. For instance, consider how my eyes select from what is in front of them and the resulting description which comes out of my mouth.

Gurdjieff refers to man as a three-brained being. We have spoken of our instinctive inner world, what of our emotional world? In our present age the power of outside happenings hammers at us through the media. Day after day we are hammered by fear of extermination, by lesser wars, by drownings, by total loss in air crashes. Do we ever hear any good news? The use of the media is well understood by our world leaders. We are disturbed all the time and uncertainty is the instrument of diplomacy.

These influences touch us in our emotions: If we think for a moment we shall realize that havoc is created in our inner world by what comes to us in the form of news. We may be feeling quite cheerful until we turn on the news and what was lighthearted before becomes as heavy as lead inside us. We twist the knob for something to cheer us up and we find an amusing play. We may not find an amusing play, but one which is gloomy; at least it is on our scale so we can share in the emotions of the actors and give release to our own heaviness. Our inner world changes again - even though the play is fictional! In our own personal drama we hate one person and love another: Sometimes we love and hate the same person. All these experiences continually change our metabolism: We feel light, we feel heavy.

What happens to us when we are on the street and we see a parade of soldiers in their scarlet uniforms with a brass band playing? Up come our emotions and we have what is called a lump in our throat.

Am I my own master? As it says in the church service: 'I have left undone those things which I ought to have done, and have done those things which I ought not to have done.'

There are so many mysteries which pass us by. An artist paints or a musician plays so that people are moved. How are we moved? We say a musician puts feeling into his playing - how does he do it? We see perspective in an old Master, but what in fact is perspective? How is the hand and brain coordinated so that a certain result is achieved?

It is said that the earliest packs of cards embodied a system of knowledge and such a one is the Tarot. In the pack there is a card depicting a man with a sack on his back which contains all the means for using the instruments of his inner world, and another where he is seeking for knowledge with a lantern in the light of the day. This is surely our position.

In all times sages have said 'Know thyself.' That would be a real task, and it would reveal for us not borrowed knowledge, but that inner world which we possess. If I am honest what do I know or care about myself and this knowledge within. I breathe, I love, I hate, I eat; in short my life passes.

My life, what is it? It is conducted from the miraculous inner world which I contain and which I ignore.


Chapter 7: Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow

The first time I came into contact with Ouspensky there were no published books of the 'ideas'. Consequently, when, at his first lecture, I heard it said that 'We do not remember ourselves' it was as if I had heard something totally new which I could never have thought of myself. It was a new thought - the missing link in my attempt to understand the meaning of our lives.

For many years and by various means I had tried to be a Christian - to be good. But no amount of wishing made any difference, and I already realized I was not one whole, and never knew from day to day who I would be. So I had given up the unequal struggle and was searching in myself to find a meaning. I knew nothing of esotericism, and it could be said that I arrived at Ouspensky's lecture without even expressing the wish to be there. For everyone who hears for the first times those words, "We do not remember ourselves", it can be the supreme moment of realization.

But the strength of this impression soon ceased to be active, and very often it was in the nature of information rather than knowledge. Very soon the old situation asserted itself, but instead of feeing I ought to be a Christian, I began to feel I ought to remember myself! Here was a sterility of living which was only revealed to me later when I met Gurdjieff. Within a few hours of meeting Gurdjieff he had implanted in me something like a new organ of perception. He showed me I was living on the exterior and only "thinking" about remembering myself. He gave me the taste of an awareness of the whole of myself - my body and all it contains of sensitive perception - deeply received inside.

It was not long before this realization also began to fade and again the word ought held sway. Only little by little I began to perceive that Gurdjieff had lifted me up to another level where new knowledge was available, and that the meaning of life was the possibility given to struggle towards that level - not as something that I ought to do, but in answer to a call.

I was often close to Gurdjieff until the last few days of his life and then, suddenly, he was not there anymore - he was gone from us.

I was one of many who had participated in the life around Gurdjieff without any particular sense of responsibility for the work he had undertaken, and now I was supported by those who realized this aspect.

It was like an outflowing stream from those who had received from Gurdjieff: Each found his place, and his relative ability to strive to bring to life this unique moment of perception which each had received. And to bring to life meant to let it grow by trying to be a channel so that a wider and wider influence could touch people in many places of the world.

The writings of Gurdjieff were published, and also, at his request, the account by Ouspensky of his time with Gurdjieff, which is contained in his book In Search of the Miraculous. Little by little small units were strengthened in Paris, London and New York, and from these three centers the influence radiated to other places beyond.

Apart from this spreading from the source, many people throughout the world were touched by the truth of what they could now read in the published books, and translations began to be made as people took what satisfied their needs and by this means the name of Gurdjieff has become known far and wide.

But his teaching is an inexhaustible well of new experiences, and for those who knew him, or are in touch with those who knew him, there is a living possibility for the knowledge to grow through the simple fact that it is discovery of what is lacking rather than what I ought to have. Just as when I first heard that I did not remember myself it came as a new realization, so now, as I search for further inner awareness, it is kept alive only in so far as I allow it to make an increasing demand - not stabilized in formulas but beyond words.

But after all, Gurdjieff was born only 100 years ago and religiousness has been in man since the creation of the world so how could that new knowledge come suddenly from him?

Just as I need to be reminded to remember myself, so humanity needs to receive reminders through the long line of time, from the knowing of Moses down to our day. All myths tell us this too - awakening is necessary, but forgetting is the usual state in which man lives and has always lived. It is like a gong reverberating through the centuries, sounded by those who have known the need to beat it. And now it is our time to hear of knowledge which is always Truth to be revealed in its present form in our moment of awakening. This becomes strangely evident when, after receiving the new knowledge from Gurdjieff, one turns again to the writings of the great Traditions. Suddenly a new meaning is revealed, and one is related for all time to those who have struggled since the world began to touch another level in themselves, only dimly suspected when the search began, and remaining elusive as the search is revealed as eternal and unending.