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The Third Lesson: The Expansion of the Self.521
teaching that all is Illusion or Maya, and that Life is but a dream—a false
thing—a lie—a nightmare; that the journey along the Path is but an illusion;
that everything is “nothing”; that there is no soul; that You are God in disguise,
and that He is fooling Himself in making believe that He is You; that Life is
but a Divine masquerade or sleight-of-hand performance; that You are God,
but that You (God) are fooling Yourself (God) in order to amuse Yourself
(God). Is not this horrible? And yet it shows to what lengths the human mind
will go before it will part with some pet theory of metaphysics with which
it has been hypnotized. Do you think that we have overdrawn the picture?
Then read some of the teachings of these schools of the Oriental Philosophy,
or listen to some of the more radical of the Western teachers preaching
this philosophy. The majority of the latter lack the courage of the Hindu
teachers in carrying their theories to a logical conclusion, and, consequently
they veil their teachings with metaphysical subtlety. But a few of them are
more courageous, and come out into the open and preach their doctrine
in full.
Some of the modern Western teachers of this philosophy explain matters
by saying that “God is masquerading as different forms of life, including Man,
in order that he may gain the experience resulting therefrom, for although He
has Infinite and Absolute Wisdom and Knowledge, he lacks the experience
that comes only from actually living the life of the lowly forms, and therefore
He descends thus in order to gain the needed experience.” Can you imagine
the Absolute, possessed of all possible Knowledge and Wisdom, feeling
the need of such petty “experience,” and living the life of the lowly forms
(including Man) in order “to gain experience?” To what depths do these
vain theories of Man drive us? Another leading Western teacher, who has
absorbed the teaching of certain branches of the Oriental Philosophy, and
who possesses the courage of his convictions, boldly announces that “You,
yourself, are the totality of being, and with your mind alone create, preserve
and destroy the universe, which is your own mental product.” And again the
last mentioned teacher states: “the entire universe is a bagatelle illustration