"Into this Universe, and ‘Why' not knowing,
Nor ‘Whence,' like Water willy-nilly flowing;
And out of it, as Wind along the Waste,
I know not ‘Whither,' willy-nilly blowing.
"What, without asking, hither hurried ‘Whence'?
And, without asking, ‘Whither' hurried hence!
Oh, many a cup of this forbidden Wine
Must drown the memory of that insolence!
"A moment guessed—then back behind the Fold
Immerst of Darkness round the Drama rolled,
Which for the pastime of Eternity
He doth himself contrive, enact, behold.
"We are no other than a moving row
Of Magic Shadow-shapes that come and go
Round with the Sun-illumined Lantern held
In midnight by the Master of the Show.
"But helpless Pieces of the Game He plays
Upon His Chequer-board of Nights and Days;
Hither and Thither moves, and checks, and slays,
And one by one back in the Closet lays.
The Ball no question makes of Ayes and Noes,
But Here or There as strikes the Player goes;
And He that tossed you down into the Field,
He knows about it all—He knows—He knows."
Many daring thinkers who setting aside "the bribe of heaven and threat of hell" have dared to look Life in the face, have been overcome by a sense of impotent subjection to an arbitrary Being who, being able to remedy conditions, and knowing of the pains of mortal life in the universe, nevertheless has deliberately imposed such conditions upon living things. Such thinkers find it impossible to reconcile the claimed qualities of Love and Good in such a Being, with the manifestations of apparent injustice, inequity, pain and suffering which made pessimists of great souls like Buddha, Lao-tze, and the writer of the Koheleth or Ecclesiastes. Indeed, viewing Life from this viewpoint, one finds it hard to escape the conviction which inspired the bitter words of old Omar, when he cried:
"What! out of senseless Nothing to provoke
A conscious Something to resent the yoke
Of unpermitted Pleasure, under pain
Of everlasting Penalties, if broke!
"What! from his helpless Creature be repaid
Pure Gold for what he lent him dross-allay'd;
Sue for a debt we never did contract
And cannot answer—Oh, the sorry trade!
"O Thou who didst with pitfall and with gin
Beset the Road I was to wander in,
Thou wilt not with Predestined Evil round
Enmesh, and then impute my fall to Sin!
"O Thou who Man of baser Earth didst make,
And ev'n with Paradise devise the Snake:
For all the Sin wherewith the Face of Man
Is blackened—Man's forgiveness give—and take!"
But with the dawning knowledge that the One Life, or World-Spirit, is not The Absolute, but is under Law and Laws superimposed upon it, then we have a picture of an Universal Being which suffers with us and through us; rises with us and through us; strives with us and through us; attains with us and through us; rejoices with us and through us; conquers with us and through us—and whose Life is composed of our lives; whose consciousness is composed of our consciousness. Such a Being is seen to be, at the last, one with ourselves, instead of an outside power—and consequently, such a Being is seen to be eternally making for Good-making for our good, for we are one with itself. Such a Being is seen to be but the Composite Self of all the individual selves of the Cosmos—the Real Self. And in the recognition of all this, our bitterness must die away, and a great feeling of compassion, sympathy, understanding and love must be manifested by us—and felt by us. Then must come that sense of Oneness with the All which is the great reconciler—which harmonizes the Opposites, and establishes the Cosmic Balance.
This One Life is You—and You are it. Centres of Life, apparently separate are we now—but steadily growing toward that time, phase and state of Cosmic Consciousness, in which the All shall know itself as One—and the One know itself as All. As the Ego progresses through the stages of Spiritual Evolution, its consciousness enlarges and expands, including more and more of the Cosmos within it as the Self, until the stages of Cosmic Consciousness are reached in which the Ego finds itself blending into the Whole, and the All blending into the Self. This is what is meant by Cosmic Consciousness; Spiritual Consciousness; Transcendental Consciousness; the Higher Consciousness; the Moksha, of the Brahmans; the Nirvana, of the Buddhists; the Union with God, of the Mystics; the Divine Marriage, of the Sufis; the Brahmic Splendor, of the Oriental poets—of all those transcendental states of Consciousness, in which the Self blends into the All, in varying degrees according to the development of the soul. This is the Secret of the Mystics of all times and lands—this the Mystery of Buddha—this the Divine Bliss of the Brahmans—this the "Wine" of the Sufi symbology, Even old Omar, in his bitter complaint, was true to his Sufi instincts, and recognized the One:
"Whose secret Presence, through Creation's veins
Running Quicksilver-like eludes your pains;
Taking all shapes from Mah to Mahi; and
They change and perish all—but HE remains."
And this was the thought that inspired these striking lines from an unknown poet:
"Thou great Eternal Infinite! Thou great Unbounded Whole!
Thy body is the Universe! Thy spirit is its soul!
If Thou dost fill Immensity—If Thou art All-in-All—
Then I'm in Thee, and Thou in Me, or I'm not here at all!
How can I be outside of Thee, when Thou fill Earth and Air?
There surely is no place for Me outside of Everywhere!
If Thou art ALL, and Thou dost fill Immensity of Space,
Then in Thy Being do I dwell, or else I have no place.
And if I have no place at all—what am doing Here?
Beyond the All I cannot Be—outside of Everywhere!
Then truly in Thy Self am I—and Thou must be in Me;
Or else there is no All-in-All—no Me, nor Thee, to Be!"
This One is the great Cosmic Spirit—Cosmic Will—Life Principle—One Life of The Cosmos—in which the Arcane Teachers find the Real Self and Universal Being. This is the great Principle of Life and Being, in which "we live, and move, and have our being." This is the great Cosmic Life which awakens in the Dawn of the Cosmic Day, and thence proceeds gradually to evolve into the Cosmic Consciousness of High Noon; thence on to rest in the ecstatic state of transcendental Bliss, Consciousness, and Being— sat-chit-ananda, the Hindus call it—the Kingdom of Heaven, other mystics have called it—during