Fragments, Chapter 9, pp.180-188 - Reading Club posting 33
This is the thirty-third of our weekly readings in Fragments Reading Club from P.D. Ouspensky’s In Search of the Miraculous, where we are gradually working our way through the whole book. Please post comments and questions.
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"Learn to separate the fine from the coarse." Production of fine hydrogens. Change of being. Growth of inner bodies. The human organism as a three-storied factory. Three kinds of food. Entrance of food, air and impressions into the organism. Transformation of substances is governed by the law of octaves. Food octave and air octave. Extracting "higher hydrogens." The octave of impressions does not develop. Possibility of creating an artificial shock at the moment of receiving an impression.
" 'Learn to separate the fine from the coarse'—this principle from the 'Emerald Tablets of Hermes Trismegistus' refers to the work of the human factory, and if a man learns to 'separate the fine from the coarse,' that is, if he brings the production of the fine 'hydrogens' to its possible maximum, he will by this very fact create for himself the possibility of an inner growth which can be brought about by no other means. Inner growth, the growth of the inner bodies of man, the astral, the mental, and so on, is a material process completely analogous to the growth of the physical body. In order to grow, a child must have good food, his organism must be in a healthy condition to prepare from this food the material necessary for the growth of the tissues. The same thing is necessary for the growth of the 'astral body'; out of the various kinds of food entering it, the organism must produce the substances necessary for the growth of the 'astral body.' Moreover, the 'astral body' requires for its growth the same substances as those necessary to maintain the physical body, only in much greater quantities. If the physical organism begins to produce a sufficient quantity of these fine substances and the 'astral body' within it becomes formed, this astral organism will require for its maintenance less of these substances than it required during its growth. The surplus from these substances can then be used for the formation and growth of the 'mental body' which will grow with the help of the same substances that feed the 'astral body,' but of course the growth of the 'mental body' will require more of these substances than the growth and feeding of the 'astral body.' The surplus of the substances left over from the feeding of the 'mental body' will go to the growth of the fourth body. But in all cases the surplus will have to be very large. All the fine substances necessary for the growth and feeding of the higher bodies must be produced within the physical organism, and the physical organism is able to produce them provided the human factory is working properly and economically.
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"All the substances necessary for the maintenance of the life of the organism, for psychic work, for the higher functions of consciousness and the growth of the higher bodies, are produced by the organism from the food which enters it from outside
"The human organism receives three kinds of food:
1. The ordinary food we eat
2. The air we breathe
3. Our impressions.
"It is not difficult to agree that air is a kind of food for the organism. But in what way impressions can be food may appear at first difficult to understand. We must however remember that, with every external impression, whether it takes the form of sound, or vision, or smell, we receive from outside a certain amount of energy, a certain number of vibrations, this energy which enters the organism from outside is food. Moreover, as has been said before, energy cannot be transmitted without matter. If an external impression brings external energy with it into the organism it means that external matter also enters which feeds the organism in the full meaning of the term.
"For its normal existence the organism must receive all three kinds of food, that is, physical food, air, and impressions. The organism cannot exist on one or even on two kinds of food, all three are required. But the relation of these foods to one another and their significance for the organism is not the same. The organism can exist for a comparatively long time without a supply of fresh physical food. Cases of starvation are known lasting for over sixty days, when the organism lost none of its vitality and recovered very quickly as soon as it began to take food. Of course starvation of this kind cannot be considered as complete, since in all cases of such artificial starvation people have taken water. Nevertheless, even without water a man can live without food for several days. Without air he can exist only for a few minutes, not more than two or three, as a rule a man dies after being four minutes without air. Without impressions a man cannot live a single moment. If the flow of impressions were to be stopped in some way or if the organism were deprived of its capacity for receiving impressions, it would immediately die. The flow of impressions coming to us from outside is like a driving belt communicating motion to us. The principal motor for us is nature, the surrounding world. Nature transmits to us through our impressions the energy by which we live and move and have our being. If the inflow of this energy is arrested, our machine will immediately stop working. Thus, of the three kinds of food the most important for us is impressions, although it stands to reason that a man cannot exist for long on impressions alone. Impressions and air enable a man to exist a little longer. Impressions, air, and physical food enable the organism to live to the end of its normal term of life and to produce the substances necessary
182
not only for the maintenance of life, but also for the creation and growth of higher bodies.
"The process of transforming the substances which enter the organism into finer ones is governed by the law of octaves.
"Let us take the human organism in the form of a three-story factory. The upper floor of this factory consists of a man's head; the middle floor, of the chest; and the lower, of the stomach, back, and the lower part of the body.
"Physical food is H768, or la, sol, fa of the third cosmic octave of radiations. This 'hydrogen' enters the lower story of the organism as 'oxygen' do 768.
183
" 'Oxygen' 768 meets with 'carbon' 192 which is present in the organism. From the union of O768 and C192 is obtained N384. N384 is the next note re.
'Re 384 which becomes 'oxygen' in the next triad meets with 'carbon' 96 in the organism and together with it produces a new 'nitrogen' 192 which is the note mi 192.
"As it is known from the law of octaves mi cannot pass independently into fa in an ascending octave; an 'additional shock' is necessary. If an 'additional shock' is not received the substance mi 192 cannot by itself pass into the full note fa.
184
"At the given place in the organism "where mi 192 ought, apparently, to come to a stop there enters the 'second food'—air, in the form of do 192, that is, mi, re, do of the second cosmic octave of radiations. The note do possesses all the necessary semitones, that is, all the energy necessary for the transition to the next note, and it gives as it were a part of its energy to the note mi which has the same density as itself. The energy of do gives mi 192 force enough, while uniting with 'carbon' 48 already in the organism, to pass into 'nitrogen' 96. 'Nitrogen' 96 will be the note fa.
"Fa 96 by uniting with 'carbon' 24 present in the organism passes into 'nitrogen' 48—the note sol.
185
"The note sol 48 by uniting with 'carbon' 12 present in the organism passes into 'nitrogen' 24—la 24.
"La 24 unites with 'carbon' 6 present in the organism and is transformed into 'nitrogen' 12, or si 12. Si 12 is the highest substance produced in the organism from physical food with the help of the 'additional shock' obtained from the air.
186
"Do 192 (air) entering the middle story of the factory in the character of 'oxygen' and giving part of its energy to mi 192 unites in its turn at a certain place with 'carbon' 48 present in the organism and passes into re 96.
"Re 96 passes into mi 48 with the help of 'carbon' 24 and with this the development of the second octave comes to a stop. For the transition of mi into fa, an 'additional shock' is necessary, but at this point nature has not prepared any 'additional shock' and the second octave, that is, the air octave, cannot develop further and in the ordinary conditions of life it does not develop further.
"The third octave begins with do 48. "Impressions enter the organism in the form of 'oxygen' 48, that is, la, sol, fa of the second cosmic octave Sun-Earth.
187
"Do 48 has sufficient energy to pass into the following note but at that place in the organism where do 48 enters, the 'carbon' 12 necessary for this is not present. At the same time do 48 does not come into contact with mi 48 so that it can neither itself pass into the next note nor give part of its energy to mi 48.
"Under normal conditions, that is, the conditions of normal existence, the production of the fine matters by the factory at this point comes to a stop and the third octave sounds as do only. The highest substance produced by the factory is si 12 and for all its higher functions the factory is able to use only this higher matter.
188
"There is, however, a possibility of increasing the output, that is, of enabling the air octave and the impression octave to develop further. For this purpose it is necessary to create a special kind of 'artificial shock' at the point where the beginning of the third octave is arrested. This means that the 'artificial shock' must be applied to the note do 48.
"But what is meant by an 'artificial shock'? It is connected with the moment of the reception of an impression. The note do 48 designates the moment when an impression enters our consciousness. An 'artificial shock' at this point means a certain kind of effort made at the moment of receiving an impression.
Interesting as it ever is... and I enjoyed re-reading this in the wake of my recent substack posts on the “purpose” of the astral body. Thanks.