In search of the miraculous

"That is an entirely different thing," said G. "These people came under a general law. We do not speak of them and we cannot. We can only speak of people who, thanks to chance, or fate, or their own cleverness, do not come under a general law, that is, who stay outside the action of any general law of destruction. For instance it is known through statistics that a certain definite number of people have to fall under trams in Moscow during the year. Then if a man, even one with a great hunger, falls under a tram and the tram crushes him we can no longer speak of him from the point of view of work on the ways. We can speak only of those who are alive and only while they are alive. Trams or war—they are exactly the same thing. One is merely larger, the other smaller. We are speaking of those who do not fall under trams.

"A man, if he is hungry, has a chance to come into contact with the beginning of a way. But besides hunger still other 'rolls' are necessary. Otherwise a man will not see the way. Imagine that an educated European, that is, a man who knows nothing about religion, comes into touch with the possibility of a religious way. He will see 'nothing and he will understand nothing. For him it will be stupidity and superstition. But at the same time he may have a great hunger though formulated intellectually. It is exactly the same thing for a man who has never heard of yoga methods, of the development of consciousness and so on. For him, if he comes into touch with a yoga way, everything he hears will be dead. The fourth way is still more difficult. In order to give the fourth way a right valuation a man must have thought and felt and been disappointed in many things beforehand. He ought, if not actually to have tried the way of the fakir, the way of the monk, and the way of the yogi previously, at least to have known and thought about them and to be convinced that they are no good for him. It is not necessary to understand what I say literally. This thinking process can be unknown to the man himself. But the results of this process must be in him and only they can help him to recognize the fourth way. Otherwise he can stand very near to it and not see it

"But it is certainly wrong to say that unless a man enters one of these ways he has no more chances. 'Ways' are simply help; help given to people according to their type. At the same time the 'ways' the accelerated ways, the ways of personal, individual evolution as distinct from general evolution, can precede it, can lead up to it, but in any case they are distinct from it.

"Whether general evolution is proceeding or not is again another question. It is enough for us to realize that it is possible, and therefore evolu-

' on for people outside the 'ways' is possible. Speaking more correctly there are two 'ways.' One we will call the 'subjective way.' It includes all four ways of which we have spoken. The other we will call the 'objective way.' This is the way of people in life. You must not take the names 'subjective' and 'objective' too literally. They express only one aspect. I take them only because there are no other words."

"Would it be possible to say 'individual' and 'general' ways?" asked someone.

"No," said G. "It would be more incorrect than 'subjective' and 'objective' because the subjective way is not individual in the general meaning of this word, because this way is a 'school way.' From this point of view the 'objective way' is much more individual because it admits of many more individual peculiarities. No, it is better to leave these names— 'subjective' and 'objective.' They are not altogether suitable but we will take them conditionally.

"People of the objective way simply live in life. They are those whom we call good people. Particular systems and methods are not necessary for them; making use of ordinary religious or intellectual teachings and ordinary morality, they live at the same time according to conscience. They do not of necessity do much good, but they do no evil. Sometimes they happen to be quite uneducated, simple people but they understand life very well, they have a right valuation of things and a right outlook. And they are of course perfecting themselves and evolving. Only their way can be very long with many unnecessary repetitions."

I had for a long time wanted to get G. to talk about repetition but he always avoided it. So it was on this occasion. Without answering my question about repetition he continued:

"It often seems to people of the 'way,' that is, of the subjective way, especially those who are just beginning, that other people, that is, people of the objective way, are not moving. But this is a great mistake. A simple obyvatel may sometimes do such work within him that he will overtake another, a monk or even a yogi.

"Obyvatel is a strange word in the Russian language. It is used in the sense of 'inhabitant,' without any particular shade. At the same time it is used to express contempt or derision—'obyvatel'—as though there could be nothing worse. But those who speak in this way do not understand that the obyvatel is the healthy kernel of life. And from the point of view of the possibility of evolution, a good obyvatel has many more chances than a 'lunatic' or a 'tramp.' Afterwards I will perhaps explain what I mean by these two words. In the meantime we will talk about the obyvatel. I do not at all wish to say that all obyvatels are people of the objective way. Nothing of the kind. Among them are thieves, rascals, and fools; but there are others. I merely wish to say that being a good obyvatel by itself does not hinder the 'way' And finally there are different types of obyvatel. Imagine, for example, the type of obyvatel who lives all his life just as the other people round him, conspicuous in nothing, perhaps a good master, who makes money, and is perhaps even close-fisted. At the same time he dreams all his life of monasteries, for instance, and dreams that some time or other he will leave everything and go into a monastery. And such things happen in the East and in Russia. A man lives and works, then, when his children or his grandchildren are grown up, he gives everything to them and goes into a monastery. This is the obyvatel of which I speak. Perhaps he does not go into a monastery, perhaps he does not need this. His own life as an obyvatel can be his way.

"People who are definitely thinking about ways, particularly people of intellectual ways, very often look down on the obyvatel and in general despise the virtues of the obyvatel. But they only show by this their own personal unsuitability for any way whatever. Because no way can begin from a level lower than the obyvatel. This is very often lost sight of on people who are unable to organize their own personal lives, who are too weak to struggle with and conquer life, dream of the ways, or what they consider are ways, because they think it will be easier for them than life and because this, so to speak. Justifies their weakness and their inadaptability. A man who can be a good obyvatel is much more helpful from the point of view of the way than a 'tramp' who thinks himself much higher than an obyvatel. I call 'tramps' all the so-called 'intelligentsia'— artists, poets, any kind of 'bohemian' in general, who despises the obyvatel and who at the same time would be unable to exist without him. Ability to orientate oneself in life is a very useful quality from the point of view of work. A good obyvatel should be able to support at least twenty persons by his own labor. What is a man worth who is unable to do this?"

"What does obyvatel actually mean?" asked somebody. "Can it be said that an obyvatel is a good citizen?"

"Ought an obyvatel to be patriotic?" someone else asked. "Let us suppose there is war. What attitude should an obyvatel have towards war?"

"There can be different wars and there can be different patriots," said G. "You all still believe in words. An obyvatel, if he is a good obyvatel, does not believe in words. He realizes how much idle talk is hidden behind them. People who shout about their patriotism are psychopaths for him and he looks upon them as such."

"And how would an obyvatel look upon pacifists or upon people who refuse to go to the war?"

"Equally as lunatics! They are probably still worse."

On another occasion in connection with the same question G. said:

"A good deal is incomprehensible to you because you do not take into account the meaning of some of the most simple words, for instance,

' you have never thought what to be serious means. Try to give yourselves an answer to the question what being serious means."

"To have a serious attitude towards things," someone said.

"That is exactly what everybody thinks, actually it is exactly the reverse," said G. "To have a serious attitude towards things does not at all mean being serious because the principal question is, towards what things? Very many people have a serious attitude towards trivial things. Can they be called serious? Of course not.

"The mistake is that the concept 'serious' is taken conditionally. One thing is serious for one man and another thing for another man. In reality seriousness is one of the concepts which can never and under no circumstances be taken conditionally. Only one thing is serious for all people at all times. A man may be more aware of it or less aware of it but the seriousness of things will not alter on this account.

"If a man could understand all the horror of the lives of ordinary people who are turning round in a circle of insignificant interests and insignificant aims, if he could understand what they are losing, he would understand that there can be only one thing that is serious for him—to escape from the general law, to be free. What can be serious for a man in prison who is condemned to death? Only one thing: How to save himself, how to escape: nothing else is serious.

"When I say that an obyvatel is more serious than a 'tramp' or a 'lunatic,' I mean by this that, accustomed to deal with real values, an obyvatel values the possibilities of the 'ways' and the possibilities of 'liberation' or 'salvation' better and quicker than a man who is accustomed all his life to a circle of imaginary values, imaginary interests, and imaginary possibilities.

"People who are not serious for the obyvatel are people who live by fantasies, chiefly by the fantasy that they are able to do something. The obyvatel knows that they only deceive people, promise them God knows what, and that actually they are simply arranging affairs for themselves—or they are lunatics, which is still worse, in other words they believe everything that people say."

"To what category do politicians belong who speak contemptuously about 'obyvatel,' 'obyvatels' opinions,' 'obyvatels' interests'?" someone asked.

"They are the worst kind of obyvatels," said G., "that is, obyvatels without any positive redeeming features, or they are charlatans, lunatics, or knaves."

"But may there not be honest and decent people among politicians?" someone asked.

"Certainly there may be," said G., "but in this case they are not prac­tical people, they are dreamers, and they will be used by other people as screens to cover their own obscure affairs.

"The obyvatel perhaps may not know it in a philosophical way, that is to say, he is not able to formulate it, but he knows that things 'do themselves' simply through his own practical shrewdness, therefore, in his heart, he laughs at people who think, or who want to assure him, that they signify anything, that anything depends on their decisions, that they can change or, in general, do anything. This for him is not being serious. And an understanding of what is not serious can help him to value that which is serious."

We often returned to questions on the difficulties of the way. Our own experience of communal life and work constantly threw us up against newer and newer difficulties that lay in ourselves.

"The whole thing is in being ready to sacrifice one's freedom," said G. "A man consciously and unconsciously struggles for freedom as he imagines it and this, more than anything else, prevents him from attaining real freedom. But a man who is capable of attaining anything comes sooner or later to the conclusion that his freedom is illusion and he agrees to sacrifice this illusion. He voluntarily becomes a slave. He does what he is told, says what he is told, and thinks what he is told. He is not afraid of losing anything because he knows that he has nothing. And in this way he acquires everything. Everything in him that was real in his understanding, in his sympathies, tastes, and desires, all comes back to him accompanied by new things which he did not have and could not have had before, together with a feeling of unity and will within him. But to arrive at this point, a man must pass through the hard way of slavery and obedience. And if he wants results he must obey not only outwardly but inwardly. This requires a great determination, and determination requires a great understanding of the fact that there is no other way, that a man can do nothing himself, but that at the same time, something has to be done.

"When a man comes to the conclusion that he cannot, and does not desire, to live any longer in the way he has lived till then; when he really sees everything that his life is made up of and decides to work, he must be truthful with himself in order not to fall into a still worse position. Because there is nothing worse than to begin work on oneself and then leave it and find oneself between two stools; it is much better not to begin. And in order not to begin in vain or risk being deceived on one's own account a man should test his decision many times. And principally he must know how far he is willing to go, what he is willing to sacrifice. There is nothing more easy to say than everything. A man can never sacrifice everything and this can never be required of him. But

he must define exactly what he is willing to sacrifice and not bargain about it afterwards. Or it will be the same with him as with the wolf in the Armenian fairy tale. "Do you know the Armenian fairy tale of the wolf and the sheep?

"Once there lived a wolf who slaughtered a great many sheep and reduced many people to tears.

"At length, I do not know why, he suddenly felt qualms of conscience and began to repent his life; so he decided to reform and to slaughter no more sheep.

"In order to do this seriously he went to a priest and asked him to hold a thanksgiving service.

"The priest began the service and the wolf stood weeping and praying in the church. The service was long. The wolf had slaughtered many of the priest's sheep, therefore the priest prayed earnestly that the wolf would indeed reform. Suddenly the wolf looked through a window and saw that sheep were being driven home. He began to fidget but the priest went on and on without end.

"At last the wolf could contain himself no longer and he shouted:

"'Finish it, priest! Or all the sheep will be driven home and I shall be left without supper!'

"This is a very good fairy tale because it describes man very well. He is ready to sacrifice everything, but after all today's dinner is a different matter.

"A man always wishes to begin with something big. But this is impossible; there can be no choice, we must begin with the things of today."

I quote one talk as being a very characteristic example of G.'s methods. We were walking in the park. There were five of us besides G. One of us asked him what his views on astrology were, whether there was anything of value in the more or less known theories of astrology.

"Yes," said G., "it depends upon how they are understood. They can be of value and they can be without value. Astrology deals with only one part of man, with his type, his essence—it does not deal with personality, with acquired qualities. If you understand this you understand what is of value in astrology."

There had been talks in our groups about types before and it seemed to us that the science of types was the most difficult thing in the study of man because G. gave us very little material and required of us our own observations of ourselves and others.

We continued to walk and G. continued to speak trying to explain what there was in man that could depend upon planetary influences and what could not.

As we left the park G. stopped talking and was going a few steps ahead of us. We five walked behind him talking together. In going round a tree G. dropped the stick— ebony with a Caucasian silver handle —he was carrying and one of us bent down, picked it up, and gave it to him. G. walked on for a few steps, then turned to us and said:

"That was astrology. Do you understand? You all saw me drop the stick. Why did one of you pick it up? Let each of you speak for himself."

One said he had not seen G. drop the stick as he was looking another way. The second said he had noticed that G. had not dropped the stick accidentally as happens when a stick gets caught in something, but that he had intentionally loosened his hand and let the stick fall. This had excited his curiosity and he had waited to see what would happen next. The third said he saw G. drop the stick, but was very absorbed in thinking of astrology, particularly trying to remember what G. said once before, and did not pay sufficient attention to the stick. The fourth saw the stick fall and thought of picking it up, but at that moment the other picked up the stick and gave it to G. The fifth said he saw the stick fall and then he saw himself picking it up and giving it to G.

G. smiled as he listened to us.

"This is astrology," he said. "In the same situation one man sees and does one thing, another—another thing, a third—a third thing, and so on. And each one acted according to his type. Observe people and yourselves in this way and then perhaps we will afterwards talk of a different astrology."

The time passed by very quickly. The short Essentuki summer was drawing to a close. We had begun to think of the winter and to make a variety of plans.

And suddenly everything changed. For a reason that seemed to me to be accidental and which was the result of friction between certain members of our small group G. announced that he was dispersing the whole group and stopping all work. At first we simply did not believe him, thinking he was putting us to a test. And when he said he was going to the Black Sea coast with Z. alone, all excepting a few of us who had to return to Moscow or Petersburg announced that they would follow him wherever he went. G. consented to this but he said that we must look after ourselves and that there would be no work no matter how much we counted on it.

All this surprised me very much. I considered the moment most inappropriate for "acting," and if what G. said was serious, then why had the whole business been started? During this period nothing new had appeared in us. And if G. had started work with us such as we were, then why was he stopping it now? This altered nothing for me materially. I had decided to pass the winter in the Caucasus in any case. But it

changed a good many things for some of the other members of our group who were still slightly uncertain and made the difficulty for them insuperable. And I have to confess that my confidence in G. began to waver from this moment. What the matter was and what particularly provoked me is difficult for me to define even now. But the fact is that from this moment there began to take place in me a separation between G. himself and his ideas. Until then I had not separated them.

At the end of August I at first followed G. to Tuapse and from there went to Petersburg with the intention of bringing back some things;

unfortunately I had to leave behind all my books. I thought at the time that it would be risking very much to take them to the Caucasus. But in Petersburg, of course, everything was lost.

Chapter Eighteen

I WAS kept in St. Petersburg longer than I had thought to be and I only left there on the 15th of October, a week before the bolshevik revolution. It was quite impossible to stay there any longer. Something disgusting and clammy was drawing near. A sickly tension and the expectation of something inevitable could be felt in everything. Rumors were creeping about, each one more absurd and stupid than the other. Nobody understood anything. Nobody could imagine what was coming later on. The "temporary government," having vanquished Kornilov, conducted the most correct negotiations with the bolsheviks who openly showed they did not care a hang for the "socialist ministers" and tried only to gain time. The Germans for some reason did not march upon St. Petersburg although the front was open. People now thought of them as saviors both from the "temporary government" and from the bolsheviks. I did not share the hopes based upon the Germans because, in my opinion, what was taking place in Russia had to a considerable extent got out of hand.

In Tuapse there was still comparative calm. Some kind of soviet was sitting in the country house of the Shah of Persia but plunderings had not yet begun. G. settled down at a fair distance from Tuapse to the south a little over fifteen miles from Sochi. He hired a country house there overlooking the sea, bought a pair of horses, and lived with a small company of people. Altogether about ten persons were gathered there.

I went there too. It was a wonderful place, full of roses, with a view of the sea on one side and a chain of mountains already covered with snow on the other. I was very sorry for those of our people who had stayed in Moscow and St. Petersburg.

But even on the day following my arrival I noticed that there was something wrong. There was not a trace of the Essentuki atmosphere. I was particularly astonished at Z.'s position. When I had left for St. Petersburg in the beginning of September Z. was full of enthusiasm; he continually urged me not to stay in St. Petersburg since it might become so difficult to get through.

"Do you never intend to be in St. Petersburg any more?" I asked him then.

"One who flees to the mountains does not turn back," Z. replied.

And now, on the day following my arrival in Uch Dere, I heard that Z. intended to return to St. Petersburg.

"What can he be going back there for? He has left his employment, what is he going to do there?"

"I do not know," said Dr. S., who had told me about it. "G. is not pleased with him and says that he had better go."

It was difficult for me to get Z. himself into a talk. He obviously did not desire to explain but he said that he really intended to leave.

Gradually, by questioning others, I found out that a strange thing had happened. A very absurd quarrel between G. and some Letts, our neighbors, had occurred. Z. was present at it. G. had not liked something Z. had said or something, and from that day he had completely changed towards him, stopped speaking to him, and, in general, put him into such a position that Z. was obliged to announce his decision to leave.

I considered this to be pure idiocy. To go to St. Petersburg at this time seemed to me the height of absurdity. There was a real famine there, unruly crowds, robbery, and nothing else. At that time of course one could not yet have imagined that we should never see St. Petersburg again. I counted upon going there in the spring. I thought that by the spring there would be something definite. But now, in the winter, this was quite unreasonable. I could have understood it if Z. was interested in politics and was studying the events of the period, but as this was not the case I saw no motives for it whatever. I began to persuade Z. to wait, to decide nothing at once, to talk to G., and to try somehow to clarify the position. Z. promised me not to be in a hurry. But I saw that he was indeed in a very strange position. G. completely ignored him and this produced on Z. a most depressing impression. Two weeks passed in this way. My arguments had worked on Z. and he said that he would stay if G. agreed to let him. He went to speak to G., but came back very soon with a disturbed face.

"Well, what did he say to you?"

"Nothing in particular; he said that once I had decided to go I had better go."

Z. went. I could not understand it. I would not have let a dog go to St. Petersburg at that time.

G. intended to pass the winter at Uch Dere. We lived in several houses spread over a large plot of land. There was no kind of "work" in the sense of what had been at Essentuki. We chopped up trees for winter firewood; we collected wild pears; G. often went to Sochi where one of our people was in hospital, having contracted typhoid before my arrival from St. Petersburg.

Unexpectedly G. decided to go to another place. He found that here we might easily be cut off from all communication with the rest of Russia and be left without provisions.

G. went away with half of our company and afterwards sent Dr. S. for the rest. We again forgathered in Tuapse and from there we began to make excursions along the seashore to the north where there was no railway. During one of these trips S. found some of his St. Petersburg acquaintances who had a country house twenty-four miles north of Tuapse. We stayed the night with them and the next morning G. hired a house half a mile away from them. Here our small company again forgathered. Four went to Essentuki.

Here we lived for two months. It was a very interesting time. G., Dr. S., and I went to Tuapse every week for provisions for ourselves and fodder for the horses. These trips will always remain in my memory. They were full of the most improbable adventures and very interesting talks. Our house stood overlooking the sea three miles from the big village of Olghniki. I had hoped that we would live there a longer time. But in the second half of December there came the rumors that a part of the Caucasian Army was moving towards Russia on foot along the shores of the Black Sea. G. said that we would again go to Essentuki and begin fresh work. I went first. I took part of our belongings to Pyatigorsk and returned. It was possible to get through although there were bolsheviks in Armavir.

The bolsheviks, in general, had increased in the north Caucasus and friction began between them and the Cossacks. At Mineralni Vodi, when we all passed through there, everything was outwardly quiet, although murders of many persons whom the bolsheviks disliked had already occurred.

G. hired a large house in Essentuki and sent out a circular letter, dated the 12th of February, over my signature, to all the members of our Moscow and St. Petersburg groups inviting them to come with those near to them to live and to work with him.

There was already famine in St. Petersburg and Moscow but there was still an abundance of everything in the Caucasus. To get through now was not easy and several failed in spite of their desire to do so. But many came. Altogether about forty people assembled. With them came Z. to whom also a letter had been sent. He arrived quite ill.

In February while we were still waiting, G. once said, when he was showing me the house and everything he had arranged:

"Now do you understand why we collected money in Moscow and St. Petersburg? You said then that a thousand roubles was too much. And will even this money be enough? One and a half persons paid. I have now already spent more than was collected then."

G. intended to hire or buy a plot of land, arrange kitchen gardens, and in general to organize a colony. But he was prevented by the events which had begun during the summer.

When our people assembled in March, 1918, very strict rules were established in our house: it was forbidden to leave the grounds, day and night orderlies were established, and so on. And work of the most varied kind began.

In the organization of the house and of our lives there was very much of interest.

Exercises on this occasion were much more difficult and varied than during the preceding summer. We began rhythmic exercises to music, dervish dances, different kinds of mental exercises, the study of different ways of breathing, and so on. Particularly intensive were the exercises for studying various imitations of psychic phenomena, thought-reading, clairvoyance, mediumistic displays, and so forth. Before these exercises began G. explained to us that the study of these "tricks," as he called them, was an obligatory subject in all Eastern schools, because without having studied all possible counterfeits and imitations it was not possible to begin the study of phenomena of a supernormal character. A man is in a position to distinguish the real from the sham in this sphere only when he knows all the shams and is able to reproduce them himself. Besides this G. said that a practical study of these "psychic tricks" was in itself an exercise which could be replaced by nothing else, which was the best of all for developing certain special characteristics: keenness of observation, shrewdness, and more particularly for the enlargement of other characteristics for which there are no words in ordinary psychological language but which must certainly be developed.

But the principal part of the work which began at that time were the rhythmics to music and similar strange dances which afterwards led to the reproduction of the exercises of various dervishes. G. did not explain his aims and intentions but according to things he had said before, it was possible to think that the result of these exercises would be to bring under control the physical body.

In addition to exercises, dances, gymnastics, talks, lectures, and housework, special work was organized for those without means.

I remember that, when we were leaving Alexandropol the year before, G. took with him a box of skein silk which he told me he had bought cheaply at a sale. This silk always traveled with him. When our people assembled in Essentuki G. gave this silk to the women and children to wind onto star-shaped cards which were also made in our house. Then some of our people who possessed commercial talents sold this silk to shops in Pyatigorsk, Kislovodsk, and Essentuki itself. One must remember that time. There were absolutely no goods whatever, shops were empty, and the silk was snapped up at once because such things as silk,

cotton, and so on were unbelievably difficult to obtain. This work continued for two months and gave a sure and regular income quite out of proportion with the original cost of the silk.

In normal times a colony like ours could not have existed in Essentuki nor probably anywhere else in Russia. We should have excited curiosity, we should have attracted attention, the police would have appeared, some kind of scandal would undoubtedly have arisen, all possible kinds of accusations would have made their appearance, political tendencies would certainly have been ascribed to us, or sectarian or anti- moral. People are made in such a way that they invariably make accusations against the things they fail to understand. But at that time, that is, in 1918, those who would have been curious about us were occupied in saving their own skins from the bolsheviks, and the bolsheviks were not yet strong enough to be interested in the lives of private people or private organizations having no direct political character. And, seeing that, among the intellectuals from the capital who found themselves by the will of fate at Mineralni Vodi at that time, a number of groups and working associations had Just been organized, nobody paid any attention to us.

On one occasion during general conversation in the evening G. said that we must think of a name for our colony and in general legalize ourselves. This was at the time of the Pyatigorsk bolshevik government.

"Think out something like Sodroojestvo¹ and 'earned by work' or 'international' at the same time," said G. "In any case they will not understand. But it is necessary for them to be able to give us some kind of name."

We began in turn to propose various designations.

Public lectures were arranged in our house twice a week to which a fair number of people came and once or twice we gave demonstrations of imitation psychic phenomena which were not very successful since our public submitted very poorly to instruction.

But my personal position in G.'s work began to change. For a whole year something had been accumulating and I gradually began to see that there were many things I could not understand and that I had to go.

This may appear strange and unexpected after all I have written so far, but it had accumulated gradually. I wrote that I had for some time begun to separate G. and the ideas. I had no doubts about the ideas. On the contrary, the more I thought of them, the deeper I entered into them, the more I began to value them and realize their significance. But I began very strongly to doubt that it was possible for me, or even for the majority of our company, to continue to work under G.'s leadership. I do not in the least mean that I found any of G.'s actions or methods wrong or that they failed to respond to what I expected. This would be

¹ Sodroojestvo: approximately "Union of friends for common aim." strange and completely out of place in connection with a leader in work, the esoteric nature of which I have admitted. The one excludes the other. In work of such a nature there can be no sort of criticism, no sort of "disagreement" with this or that person. On the contrary, all work consists in doing what the leader indicates, understanding in conformance with his opinions even those things that he does not say plainly, helping him in everything that he does. There can be no other attitude towards the work. And G. himself said several times that a most important thing in the work was to remember that one came to learn and to take no other role upon oneself.

At the same time this does not at all mean that a man has no choice or that he is obliged to follow something which does not respond to what he is seeking. G. himself said that there are no "general" schools, that each "guru" or leader of a school works at his own specialty, one is a sculptor, another is a musician, a third is again something else, and that all the pupils of such a guru have to study his specialty. And it stands to reason that here a choice is possible. A man has to wait until he meets a guru whose specialty he is able to study, a specialty which suits his tastes, his tendencies, and his abilities.

There is no doubt that there may be very interesting ways, like music and like sculpture. But it cannot be that every man should be required to learn music or sculpture. In school work there are undoubtedly obligatory subjects and there are, if it is possible to put it in this way, auxiliary subjects, the study of which is proposed merely as a means of studying the obligatory. Then the methods of the schools may differ very much. According to the three ways the methods of each guru may approximate either to the way of the fakir, the way of the monk, or the way of the yogi. And it is of course possible that a man who is beginning work will make a mistake, will follow a leader such as he cannot follow for any distance. It stands to reason that it is the task of the leader to see to it that people do not begin to work with him for whom his methods or his special subjects will always be alien, incomprehensible, and unattainable. But if this does happen and if a man had begun to work with a leader whom he cannot follow, then of course, having noticed and realized this, he ought to go and seek another leader or work independently, if he is able to do so.

In regard to my relations with G. I saw clearly at that time that I had been mistaken about many things that I had ascribed to G. and that by staying with him now I should not be going in the same direction I went at the beginning. And I thought that all the members of our small group, with very few exceptions, were in the same or in a similar situation.

This was a very strange "observation" but it was absolutely a right one. I had nothing to say against G.'s methods except that they did not suit me. A very clear example came to my mind then. I had never had a nega-

tive attitude towards the "way of the monk," to religious, mystical ways. At the same time I could never have thought for one moment that such a way was possible for me or suitable. And so, if after three years of work I perceived that G. was leading us in fact towards the way of religion, of the monastery, and required the observance of all religious forms and ceremonies, there would be of course a motive for disagreeing with this and for going away, even though at the risk of losing direct leadership. And certainly this would not, at the same time, mean that I considered the religious way a wrong way in general. It may even be a more correct way than my way but it is not my way.

The decision to leave G.'s work and leave him exacted from me a great inner struggle. I had built very much upon it and it was difficult for me now to reconstruct everything from the beginning. But there was nothing else to do. Of course, all that I had learned during those three years I retained. But a whole year passed by while I was going into all this and until I found it possible to continue to work in the same direction as G. but independently.

I went into a separate house and again began work abandoned in St. Petersburg, on my book which afterwards appeared under the title A New Model of the Universe.

In the "Home" lectures and demonstrations still continued for a certain time and then stopped.

Sometimes I met G. in the park or on the street, sometimes he came to my house. But I avoided going to the "Home."

At this time the position of affairs in the north Caucasus began to get very much worse. We were completely cut off from central Russia; what was going on there we did not know.

After the first Cossack raid on Essentuki the position quickly began to change for the worse and G. decided to leave Mineralni Vodi. Where he actually intended to go he did not say and it was difficult to say, having regard to the circumstances of the time.

The public who had left Mineralni Vodi at that time had tried to get through to Novorossiysk and I supposed that he would also go in that direction. I also decided to leave Essentuki. But I did not want to leave before he did. In this respect I had a strange kind of feeling. I wanted to wait until the end; to do everything that depended upon me so that afterwards I could tell myself that I had not let a single possibility escape me. It was very difficult for me to reject the idea of working with G.

In the beginning of August G. left Essentuki. Most of those living in the "Home" left with him. A few people had gone earlier. About ten persons were left in Essentuki.

I decided to go to Novorossiysk. But circumstances began to change swiftly. Within a week of G.'s departure communications even with places nearest to us came to a stop. Cossacks began to raid the branch line to

Mineralni Vodi and where we were, bolshevik robberies, "requisitions," and so on began. This was the time of the massacre of "hostages" in Pyatigorsk when General Russki, General Radko-Dimitriev, and Prince Ouroussov and many others perished.

I must confess that I felt very silly. I had not gone abroad when it was possible in order to work with G. and the final outcome was that I had parted from G. and stopped with the bolsheviks.

All of us who had stayed in Essentuki had to live through a very difficult time. For me and my family things turned out comparatively favorably. Only two people out of four got ill with typhoid. No one died. Not once were we robbed. And all the time I had work and earned money. Things were much worse for others. In January, 1919, we were set free by the Cossacks of Denikin's Army. But I was only able to leave Essentuki in the following summer of 1919.

The news we had of G. was very brief. He had traveled by railway to Maikop and from there the whole of the party with him went on foot by a very interesting but very difficult way, through the mountains to the sea at Sochi which had then been seized by the Georgians. Carrying with them the whole of their baggage they walked, with all possible kinds of adventures and dangers, over lofty passes where there were no roads and where hunters crossed but seldom. It was, apparently, only about a month after their departure from Essentuki that they reached Sochi.

But the inner situation had changed. In Sochi the greater part of the company, as I had foreseen, parted company with G. Among them were P. and Z. Only four people stayed with G. of whom Dr. S. alone belonged to the original St. Petersburg group. The others had only been in "young" groups.

In February P., who had established himself in Maikop after the rupture with G., came to Essentuki for his mother who had remained there, and from him we learned the details of everything that had taken place on the way to and on arrival at Sochi. Moscow people had gone to Kiev. G. with his four companions had gone to Tiflis. In the spring we learned that he was continuing work in Tiflis with new people and in a new direction, basing it principally on art, that is, on music, dances, and rhythmic exercises.

At the end of winter when conditions of living became slightly easier I began to look through my notes and drawings of G.'s diagrams which with G.'s permission I had preserved since St. Petersburg. My attention was particularly attracted by the enneagram. The explanation of the enneagram had clearly not been finished and I felt that there were in it hints at a possible continuation. I very soon saw that a continuation must be sought in connection with the wrong situation of the "shock"

which came into the enneagram at the interval sol-la. Then I turned my attention to what the Moscow notes, in connection with commentaries on the enneagram, said about the influences of the three octaves on one another in the "food diagram." I drew the enneagram as it had been given to us and I saw that it represented up to a certain point the "food diagram."

9 do 768

The point 3, or the "interval" mi-fa, was the place where the "shock" came in which gave do 192 of the second octave. When I added the beginning of this octave to the enneagram I saw that the point 6 came at the "interval" mi- fa of the second octave and the "shock" in the form of the third octave do 48 which begins at this point. The completed drawing of the octaves came out as follows:

This signified that there was no wrong place for a "shock" at all. Point 6 showed the entry of the "shock" in the second octave and the "shock" was the do which began the third octave. All three octaves reached Hi 2. In one it was si, in the second sol, and in the third mi. The second octave which ended at 12 in the enneagram ought to have gone on further. But si 12 and mi 12 required an "additional shock." I thought a great deal about the nature of these "shocks" at that time but I will speak of them later.

I felt that there was very much material in the enneagram. Points 1, 2, 4, 5, 7, 8 represented, according to the "food diagram," different "systems" of the organism, 1— the digestive system; 2—the breathing system;

4—the blood stream; 5—the brain; 7—the spinal cord; 8—the sympathetic system and the sex organs. According to this the direction of the inner lines 1428571, that is, the content of fraction 7, showed the direction of the flow or distribution of arterial blood in the organism and then its return in the form of venous blood. It was particularly interesting that the point of return was not the heart but the digestive system which indeed is the case since venous blood is first of all mixed with the products of digestion, it then goes to the right auricle, through the right ventricle, then to the lungs to absorb oxygen, and from there goes to the left auricle and then the left ventricle and then through the aorta into the arterial system.

Examining the enneagram further I saw that the seven points could represent the seven planets of the ancient world; in other words the enneagram could be an astronomical symbol. And when I took the order of the planets in the order of the days of the week I obtained the following picture:

SUN Dies Solis

I did not try to go any further as I did not have the necessary books to hand and there was very little time.

"Events" gave no time to go into philosophical speculations. One had to think about living, that is to say, simply and quite plainly to think about where one could live and work. The revolution and everything connected with it aroused in me deep physical disgust. At the same time, in spite of my sympathy with the "whites" I could not believe in their success. The bolsheviks did not hesitate to promise things that neither they nor anyone else could perform. In this was their principal strength. It was something in which nobody could compete with them. In addition to this they had the support of Germany, who saw in them a possibility of revenge in the future. The volunteer army, which had freed us from the bolsheviks, was able to fight them and conquer them. But it was not able to organize in a proper way the course of life in the liberated provinces. Its leaders had neither program, knowledge, nor experience in this direction. Of course this could not be demanded of them. But facts are facts. The situation was very unstable and the wave which was still rolling towards Moscow at the time could be rolled back again any day.

It was necessary to get abroad. I had marked down London as my final aim. First because I knew more people there and second because I thought that among the English I should find the greater response and a greater interest in the new ideas I now had, than anywhere else. Besides, when I was in London on my way to India before the war and on my return voyage at the beginning of the war I had decided to go there to write and publish my book, which had been begun in 1911, under the title of The Wisdom of the Cods, and which subsequently appeared under the title of A New Model of the Universe. As a matter of fact this book, in which I touched upon questions of religion and in particular upon methods for studying the New Testament, could not have been published in Russia.

So I decided to travel to London and to try to organize lectures and groups there like those at St. Petersburg. This only came to pass three and a half years later.

In the beginning of June, 1919, 1 at last succeeded in leaving Essentuki. At that time it had become quite calm there and life had been a little re-established. But I did not trust this calm. It was necessary to go abroad. At first I went to Rostov and then to Ekaterinodar and Novorossiysk and then returned again to Ekaterinodar. Ekaterinodar at that time was the capital of Russia. There I met some of our company who had left Essentuki before me as well as some friends and acquaintances from St. Petersburg.

There remains in my memory one of my first talks.

My friend from St. Petersburg asked me, when we had spoken of G.'s system and of work on oneself, whether I could indicate any practical results of this work.

Remembering all I had experienced during the preceding year, particularly after G.'s departure, I said that I had acquired a strange confidence, one which I could not define in one word but which I must describe.

"This is not self-confidence in the ordinary sense," I said, "quite the contrary, rather is it a confidence in the unimportance and the insignificance of self, that self which we usually know. But what I am confident about is that if something terrible happened to me like things that have happened to many of my friends during the past year, then it would be not I who would meet it, not this ordinary I, but another I within me who would be equal to the occasion. Two years ago G. asked me whether I felt a new I inside me and I had to answer that I felt no change whatever. Now I can speak otherwise. And I can explain how the change takes place. It does not take place at once, I mean that the change does not embrace every moment of life. All the ordinary life goes on in the ordinary way, all those very ordinary stupid small I's, excepting perhaps a few which have already become impossible. But if something big were to happen, something which would require the straining of every nerve, then I know that this big thing would be met not by the ordinary small I, which is now speaking, and which can be made afraid, nor by anything like it—but by another, a big I, which nothing can frighten and which would be equal to everything that happened. I cannot describe it better. But for me it is a fact. And this fact is definitely connected for me with this work. You know my life and you know that I was not afraid of many things, both inward and outward, that people are often afraid of. But this is something different, a different taste. Therefore I know, for myself, that this new confidence has not come simply as a result of a great experience of life. It is the result of that work on myself which I began four years ago."

In Ekaterinodar and afterwards in Rostov during the winter, I collected together a small group and, on a plan that I had worked out the preced ing winter, I gave them lectures expounding G.'s system as well as the things from ordinary life which lead up to it.

During the summer and autumn of 1919 I received two letters from G. in Ekaterinodar and Novorossiysk. ... He wrote that he had opened in Tiflis an "Institute for the Harmonious Development of Man" on a very broad program and enclosed a prospectus of this "Institute" which made me very thoughtful indeed. The prospectus began in this way:

With the permission of the Minister for National Education the Institute for the Harmonious Development of Man based on G. I. G.'s system is being opened in Tiflis. The Institute accepts children and adults of both sexes. Study will take place morning and evening. The subjects of study are:

gymnastics of all kinds (rhythmical, medicinal, and others). Exercises for the

development of will, memory, attention, hearing, thinking, emotion, instinct, and so on.

To this was added that G. I. G.'s system

was already in operation in a whole series of large cities such as Bombay, Alexandria, Cabul, New York, Chicago, Christiania, Stockholm, Moscow, Essentuki, and in all departments and homes of the true international and laboring fraternities.

At the end of the prospectus in a list of "specialist teachers" of the Institute for the Harmonious Development of Man I found my own name as well as the names of "Mechanical Engineer" P. and still another of our company,]., who was living at that time in Novorossiysk and had no intention whatever of going to Tiflis.

G. wrote in his letter that he was preparing his ballet "The Struggle of the Magicians" and without making any reference at all to past difficulties he invited me to go and work with him in Tiflis. This was very characteristic of him. But for various reasons I could not go there. In the first place there were very great material obstacles and secondly the difficulties which had arisen in Essentuki were for me very real ones. My decision to leave G. had cost me very dear and I could not give it up so easily, the more so as all his motives were to be seen. I must confess that I was not very enthusiastic about the program of the Institute for the Harmonious Development of Man. I realized, of course, that it meant that G. was obviously obliged to give some sort of outward form to his work having regard to outward conditions, as he had done at Essentuki, and that this outward form was somewhat in the nature of a caricature. But I also realized that behind this outward form stood the same thing as before and that this could not change. I was doubtful only of my own ability to adapt myself to this outward form. At the same time I was confident that I should soon have to meet G. again.

P. came to Ekaterinodar from Maikop and we spoke together a great deal about the system and G. P. was in a fairly negative frame of mind. But it seemed to me that my idea that it was imperative to make a distinction between the system and G. helped him to understand the position of affairs better.

I was beginning to get very interested in my groups. I saw a possibility of continuing the work. The ideas of the system found a response and obviously answered the needs of people who wanted to understand what was taking place both in them and around them. And around us was being concluded that brief little epilogue to Russian history which had frightened our friends and "allies" so much. Ahead of us everything was quite dark. I was in Rostov in the autumn and beginning of winter. There

I met another two or three of the St. Petersburg company as well as Z. who had arrived from Kiev. Z. like P. was in a very negative frame of mind in relation to all of the work. We settled down together in the same quarters and it seemed that talks with me made him revise many things and convince himself that the original valuations were right. He decided to try to get through to G. in Tiflis. But he was not fated to accomplish this. We left Rostov almost at the same time, Z. leaving one or two days after me, but he arrived in Novorossiysk already ill and in the first days of January, 1920, he died of the smallpox.

Soon afterwards I managed to leave for Constantinople.

At that time Constantinople was full of Russians. I met acquaintances from St. Petersburg and with their assistance I began to give lectures in the offices of the "Russki Miyak." I at once collected a fairly large audience mostly of young men. I continued to develop the ideas begun in Rostov and Ekaterinodar, connecting general ideas of psychology and philosophy with ideas of esotericism.

I got no further letters from G., but I was sure that he would come to Constantinople. He actually arrived in June with a fairly large company.

In former Russia, even in its distant outskirts, work had become impossible and we were gradually approaching the period which I had foreseen in St. Petersburg, that is, of working in Europe.

I was very glad to see G. and to me personally it seemed then that, in the interests of the work, all former difficulties could be set aside and that I could again work with him as in St. Petersburg. I brought G. to my lectures and handed over to him all the people who came to my lectures, particularly the small group of about thirty persons who met upstairs in the offices of the "Miyak."

G. gave to the ballet the central position of his work at that time. Besides this he wanted to organize a continuation of his Tiflis Institute in Constantinople, the principal place in which would be taken by dances and rhythmic exercises which would prepare people to take part in the ballet. According to his ideas the ballet should become a school. I worked out the scenario of the ballet for him and began to understand this idea better. The dances and all the other "numbers" of the ballet, or rather "revue," demanded a long and an entirely special preparation. The people who were being prepared for the ballet and who were taking part in it, would, in so doing, be obliged to study and to acquire control over themselves, in this way approaching the disclosure of the higher forms of consciousness. Into the ballet there entered, and as a necessary part of it, dances, exercises, and the ceremonies of various dervishes as well as many little known Eastern dances.

It was a very interesting time for me. G. often came to me in Prinkipo. We went together through the Constantinople bazaars. We went to the Mehlevi dervishes and he explained something to me that I had not been able to understand before. And this was that the whirling of the Mehlevi dervishes was an exercise for the brain based upon counting, like those exercises that he had shown to us in Essentuki. Sometimes I worked with him for entire days and nights. One such night in particular remains in my memory, when we "translated" a dervish song for "The Struggle of the Magicians." I saw G. the artist and G. the poet, whom he had so carefully hidden inside him, particularly the latter. This translation took the form of G. recalling the Persian verses, sometimes repeating them to himself in a quiet voice and then translating them for me into Russian. After a quarter of an hour, let us say, when I had completely disappeared beneath forms, symbols, and assimilations, he said: "There, now make one line out of that." I did not try to create any measure or to find a rhythm. This was quite impossible. G. continued and again after a quarter of an hour he said: "That is another line." We sat until the morning. This was in Koumbaradji Street a little below the former Russian consulate. At length the town began to wake. I had written, I think, five verses and had stopped at the last line of the fifth verse. No kind of effort could make my brain turn any more. G. laughed but he also was tired and could not go on. So the verse remained as it was, unfinished, because he never returned again to this song.

Two or three months passed by in this way. I helped G. all I could in organizing his Institute. But gradually the same difficulties arose before me as in Essentuki. So that, when the Institute was opened, I think in October, I was unable to join it. But in order not to hinder G. or to give rise to discord among those who came to my lectures, I put an end to my own lectures and ceased to visit Constantinople. A few of those who came to my lectures visited me in Prinkipo and there we continued the talks begun in Constantinople.

Two months later when G.'s work had already become consolidated I again started to give lectures at the "Miyak" in Constantinople and I continued them for another six months. I visited G.'s Institute from time to time and sometimes he 'came to me in Prinkipo. The inner relationship between us remained very good. In the spring he proposed that I should give lectures in his Institute and I began to give lectures there once a week in which G. himself took part, supplementing my explanations.

At the beginning of summer G. closed his Institute and went over to Prinkipo. Somewhere about this time I told him in detail of a plan I had drawn up for a book to expound his St. Petersburg lectures and talks with commentaries of my own. He agreed to this plan and authorized me to write and publish it. Up till then I had submitted to the general rule, obligatory for everyone, which concerned G.'s work. According to this rule nobody under any circumstances had the right to write even for his own

use anything connected with him or his ideas, or any other participants in the work, or to keep letters, notes, and so on, still less to publish anything. During the first years G. insisted strongly upon the obligatory nature of this rule and it was supposed that everyone accepted in the work would give his word to write nothing (and it goes without saying to publish nothing) referring to G. without special permission, even in the event of his leaving the work and G.

This was one of the fundamental rules. Every new person who joined us heard about it and it was considered to be fundamental and obligatory. But afterwards G. accepted in his work people who paid no attention to this rule or who did not wish to consider it. This explains the subsequent appearance of descriptions of various moments in G.'s work.

I passed the summer of 1921 in Constantinople and in August left for London. Before my departure G. proposed that I should go with him to Germany where he once more intended to open his Institute and prepare his ballet. But in the first place I did not believe it was possible to organize work in Germany and secondly I did not believe that I could work with G.

Soon after my arrival in London I began to give lectures in continuation of the work at Constantinople and Ekaterinodar. I learned that G. had gone to Germany with his Tiflis company and with those of my Constantinople people who had joined him. He tried to organize work in Berlin and Dresden and intended to purchase the apartments of the former Institut Dalcroze in Helleran near Dresden. But nothing came out of it all and in connection with the proposed purchase some strange events took place which ended in legal proceedings. In February, 1922, G. came to London. I at once invited him, as a matter of course, to my lectures and introduced him to all who were coming to them. This time my attitude towards him was much more definite. I still expected a very great deal more from his work and I decided to do everything I could to help him to organize his Institute and the preparation of his ballet. But I did not believe it was possible for me to work with him. I saw again all the former obstacles which had begun to appear in Essentuki. This time they had appeared even before he arrived. The outward situation was that G. had done very much towards the accomplishment of his plans. The chief thing was that a certain cadre of people, about twenty, had been prepared, with whom it was possible to begin. The music for the ballet had almost all been prepared (with the co-operation of a well-known musician). The organization of the Institute had been worked out. But there was no money to put all this into practice. Soon after his arrival G. said that he thought of opening his Institute in England. Many of those who came to my lectures became interested in this idea and arranged a subscription among themselves to cover the material side of the business. A certain sum of money was immediately given to G. to prepare for the passage of the whole of his group to England. I continued my lectures, connecting them with what G. had said during his stay in London. But I had decided for myself that if the Institute opened in London I would go either to Paris or to America. The Institute was finally opened in London but for various reasons it failed. But my London friends and those who came to my lectures collected a considerable sum of money for him and with this G. bought the historic Chateau Prieure in Avon near Fontainebleau, with an enormous neglected park, and in the autumn of 1922 he opened his Institute there. A very motley company assembled there. There were a certain number of people who remembered St. Petersburg. There were pupils of G.'s from Tiflis. There were people who had come to my lectures in Constantinople and London. The latter were divided into several groups. In my opinion some had been in far too great a hurry to give up their ordinary occupations in England in order to follow G. I could have said nothing to them because they had already made their decision when they spoke to me about it. I feared that they would meet with disappointment because G.'s work seemed to me not sufficiently rightly organized and therefore to be unstable. But at the same time I could not be sure of my own opinions and did not want to interfere with them because if everything went right and my fears proved to be false then they would undoubtedly have gained by their decision.

Others had tried to work with me but for some reason or other they had parted from me and now thought that it would be easier for them to work with G. They were particularly attracted by the idea of finding what they called a short cut. To this, when they asked my advice, I of course advised them to go to Fontainebleau and work with G. And there were others who came to G. temporarily, for two weeks, for a month. These were people who attended my lectures and who did not want to decide themselves, but on hearing about other people's decisions had come to me and asked whether they ought to "give up everything" and go to Fontainebleau and whether this was the only way to go on with the work. To this I said that they should wait until I was there.

I arrived at the Chateau Prieure for the first time at the end of October or the beginning of November, 1922. Very interesting and animated work was proceeding there. A pavilion had been built for dances and exercises, housekeeping had been organized, the house had been finished off, and so on. And the atmosphere on the whole was very right and left a strong impression. I remember one talk with Miss Katherine Mansfield who was then living there. This was not more than three weeks before her death. I had given her G.'s address myself. She had been to two or three of my lectures and had then come to me to say that she was going to Paris. A Russian doctor was curing tuberculosis by treating the spleen with X-rays. I could not of course tell her anything about it. She already seemed to me to be halfway to death. And I thought that she was fully aware of it.

But with all this, one was struck by the striving in her to make the best use even of these last days, to find the truth whose presence she clearly felt but which she was unable to touch. I did not think that I should see her again. But I could not refuse when she asked me for the address of my friends in Paris, for the address of people with whom she would be able to talk about the same things she had talked about with me. And so I had met her again at the Prieure. We sat in the evening in one of the salons and she spoke in a feeble voice which seemed to come from the void, but it was not unpleasant.

"I know that this is true and that there is no other truth. You know that I have long since looked upon all of us without exception as people who have suffered shipwreck and have been cast upon an uninhabited island, hut who do not yet know of it. But these people here know it. The others, there, in life, still think that a steamer will come for them tomorrow and that everything will go on in the old way. These already know that there will be no more of the old way. I am so glad that I can be here."

Soon after my return to London I heard of her death. G. was very good to her, he did not insist upon her going although it was clear that she could not live. For this in the course of time he received the due amount of lies and slanders.

During the year 1923 I went fairly often to Fontainebleau, that is, to the Prieure.

Soon after its opening the Institute attracted the attention of the press and for a month or two the French and English papers were active writing about it. G. and his pupils were called the "forest philosophers,"' they were interviewed, their photographs were published, and so on.

G.'s own work during this time, that is, from 1922, was dedicated chiefly to the development of methods of studying rhythm and plastics. He never stopped working the whole time on his ballet, bringing into it the dances of various dervishes and Sufis and recalling by memory the music he had listened to in Asia many years before. In this work was a very great deal that was new and interesting. Dervish dances and music were reproduced in Europe undoubtedly for the first time. And they produced a very great impression on all who were able to hear and see them.

In the Prieure also they carried on very intensive mental exercises for the development of the memory, of attention, and of the imagination, and further, in connection with these exercises, in "imitation of psychic phenomena." Then there was a lot of obligatory work for everyone in the house and connected with the housekeeping which required great strenuousness, thanks to the speed of working and various other conditions.

From among the talks of that time I particularly remember one which related to the methods of breathing and although this talk as well as many other things that were done then passed unnoticed, it showed the possibility of an entirely fresh point of view on the subject in question.

"Right exercises," G. said once, "which lead direct to the aim of mastering the organism and subjecting its conscious and unconscious functions to the will, begin with breathing exercises. Without mastering breathing nothing can be mastered. At the same time to master breathing is not so easy.

"You must realize that there are three kinds of breathing. One is normal breathing. The second is 'inflation.' The third is breathing assisted by movements. What does this mean? It means that normal breathing goes on unconsciously, it is managed and controlled by the moving center. 'Inflation' is artificial breathing. If for instance a man says to himself that he will count ten inhaling and ten exhaling, or that he will inhale through the right nostril and exhale through the left—this is done by the formatory apparatus. And the breathing itself is different because the moving center and the formatory apparatus act through different groups of muscles. The group of muscles through which the moving center acts are neither accessible nor subordinate to the formatory apparatus. But in the event of a temporary stoppage of the moving center the formatory apparatus has been given a group of muscles which it can influence and with whose help it can set the breathing mechanism in motion. But its work will of course be worse than the work of the moving center and it cannot go on for long. You have read the book about 'yogi breathing,' you have heard or have also read about the special breathing connected with the 'mental prayer' in Orthodox monasteries. It is all one and the same thing. Breathing proceeding from the formatory apparatus is not breathing but 'inflation.' The idea is that if a man carries out this kind of breathing long enough and often enough through the formatory apparatus, the moving center which remains idle during this period can get tired of doing nothing and start working in 'imitation' of the formatory apparatus. And indeed this sometimes happens. But so that this should happen many conditions are necessary, fasting and prayer are necessary and little sleep and all kinds of difficulties and burdens for the body. If the body is well treated this cannot happen. You think there are no physical exercises in Orthodox monasteries? Well, you try to carry out one hundred prostrations according to all the rules. You will have an aching back that no kind of gymnastics could ever give.

"This all has one aim: to bring breathing into the right muscles, to hand it over to the moving center. And as I said, sometimes this is successful. But there is always a big risk that the moving center will lose its habit of working properly, and since the formatory apparatus cannot work all the time, as for instance during sleep, and the moving center does not want to, then the machine can find itself in a very sorry situation. A man may even die from breathing having stopped. The disorganization

of the functions of the machine through breathing exercises is almost inevitable when people try to do 'breathing exercises' from books by themselves without proper instruction. Many people used to come to me in Moscow who had completely disorganized right functioning of their machines by so-called 'yogi breathing' which they had learned from books. Books which recommend such exercises represent a great danger.

"The transition of breathing from the control of the formatory apparatus into the control of the moving center can never be attained by amateurs. For this transition to take place the organism must be brought to the last stage of intensity, but a man himself can never do this.

"But as I have already said, there is a third way—breathing through movements. This third way needs a great knowledge of the human machine and it is employed in schools directed by very learned people. In comparison all other methods are 'home­made' and unreliable.

"The fundamental idea of this method consists in the fact that certain movements and postures can call forth any kind of breathing you like and it is also normal breathing, not 'inflation.' The difficulty is in knowing what movements and what postures will call forth certain kinds of breathing in what kind of people. This latter is particularly important because people from this point of view are divided into a certain number of definite types and each type should have its own definite movements to get one and the same breathing because the same movement produces different breathing with different types. A man who knows the movement which will produce in himself one or another kind of breathing is already able to control his organism and is able at any moment he likes to set in motion one or another center or cause that part which is working to stop. Of course the knowledge of these movements and the ability to control them like everything else in the world has its degrees. A man can know more or less and make a better or a worse use of it. In the meantime it is important only to understand the principle.

"And this is particularly important in connection with the study of the divisions of centers in oneself. Mention has been made of this several times before. You must understand that each center is divided into three parts in conformity with the primary division of centers into 'thinking,' 'emotional,' and 'moving.' On the same principle each of these parts in its turn is divided into three. In addition, from the very outset each center is divided into two parts: positive and negative. And in all parts there are groups of 'rolls* connected together, some in one direction and others in another direction. This explains the differences between people, what is called 'individuality.' Of course there is in this no individuality at all, but simply a difference of 'rolls' and associations."

The talk took place in the big studio in the garden, decorated by G. in the fashion of a dervish tekkeh.

Having explained the meaning of various kinds of breathing he began to divide those present into three groups according to type. About forty people were there. G.'s idea was to show how the same movements with different people produced different "moments of breathing," for instance, with some inhalation, with others exhalation, and how different movements and postures can produce one and the same moment of breathing—inhalation, exhalation, and holding the breath.

But this experiment was not completed. And, as far as I know, G. never afterwards returned to it again.

During this period G. invited me several times to go and live at the Prieure. There was a good deal of temptation in this. But in spite of all my interest in G.'s work I could find no place for myself in this work nor did I understand its direction. At the same time I could not fail to see, as I had seen in Essentuki in 1918, that there were many destructive elements in the organization of the affair itself and that it had to fall to pieces.

In December, 1923, G. arranged demonstrations of dervish dances, rhythmic movements, and various exercises in Paris in the Theatre des Champs Elysees.

Soon after these demonstrations in the beginning of January, 1924, G., together with a part of his pupils, went to America with the intention of arranging lectures and demonstrations there.

I was at the Prieure on the day of his departure. And this departure reminded me very much of his departure from Essentuki in 1918 and all that was connected with it.

On returning to London I announced to those who came to my lectures that my work in the future would proceed quite independently in the way it had been begun in London in 1921.

and after going round the universe, returns to its source in approximately 1, 000, 000,

000 light years. 1, 000, 000, 000 light years represent in this case the circumference of

the universe, although the opinions of various investigators differ widely and the

figures relating to the circumference of the universe can in no way be considered as

of matter in the universe be accepted.

In any case, if we take the average figure indicated relating to the supposed circum­

ference of the universe, then, by dividing 9.10²⁸ by 10⁸, we obtain a twenty-figure