conception of Creation, as an Instantaneous Thought, even clearer to
our finite senses. Imagine a Spectator endowed with the same sense of
vision that we have--namely, limited to six units of perception per
second, but able to look on, as it were, from outside the Universe,
without himself being affected by any alteration that takes place in
what may be called the flow of time. Consider some of the changes he
would witness if Time were gradually eliminated from phenomena. The
inhabitants, who at first were seen walking by slow, successive steps,
would soon be seen gliding from place to place, the movement of their
legs having passed beyond the sense of vision; the next stage would
see the inhabitants unrecognisable as human beings when walking,
although they would still be visible if they stood still, they would
be moving too fast for sight, they would be seen only as lines or
bands extended between their points of departure and destination; then
day and night would be following each other so quickly that soon the
day would only be a flicker of light, till, when the week became equal
to one second of the Spectator's time, day and night would disappear
as separate phenomena; then the week, the month, and the year would in
turn flicker, solidify, or become continuous, and disappear with all
the multitudinous events contained therein; human life would then be
affected, would flicker, and follow the same course; to the Spectator
the birth of each individual would become coincident with his death,
and Nations would be seen to rise and progress towards their
destination without any evidence of individual existence; the Human
Race itself would next succumb, then the whole of planetary life,
then the formation and destruction of Solar Systems, then the
gathering together and dissemination of firmaments, and, finally, the
beginning and end of the very Universe would coincide. Motion, or
Physical phenomena, and therefore Matter, would vanish, and the Great
instantaneous Thought be complete. We seem to have been able to
glimpse from our Watch Tower, though through a glass darkly, the whole
Truth, and to see that the Infinity of Time is a figment of our finite
senses and is comprised in the Now. The same treatment, followed by
the same result, may be applied to the Infinity of Space, and we again
see that all Space is comprised in the Here; it is only by the
conditions of our existence in this physical universe, _insisting_ on
our analysing everything in Time and Space that Motion or Change
become the very basis of our Consciousness.
We have seen that the Idea of Infinity is a necessary result of our
finite senses, that the only Reality is the Spiritual, the Here and
the Now; that the Riddle of the Universe is not to be solved by the
_Intellect_ but by that method which is employed by those who are
earnestly following the "Quest of the Grail"--namely, by realising
that our True Personality or Transcendental Ego is an emanation from
the Absolute; that we are one-with Him, and that it is by following
the old Hellenic command "[Greek: Gnothi seauton]" (Know
thyself)--namely, by _Introspection_, that we can hope to attain to
the understanding of what is the Reality of Being.
FINIS
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PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN BY NEILL AND CO., LTD., EDINBURGH.
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Transcriber's Notes
Page 27: Braces } on multiple lines represent one large brace
encompassing those lines.
Page 53: Huios or Hyios. The Rule doesn't seem to address the
possibility of upsilon coming first in a diphthong: upsilon iota
is not common, but "Hui" looks more plausible than "Hyi".
Page 176: The word amoeba had an oe ligature in the original book.
Page 184: Typo Gnothe changed to Gnothi.