A Record of Meetings held by P.D. Ouspensky - HolyBooks.com

not the purely conventional evil, but such things as we have the rightto call evil, that have some substance. Our evil is worse than theordinary evil, it is condensed, distilled.MR. C. What is evil from the point of view of the system?MR. O. What keeps us mechanical. Sleep is evil. Why? Because everythingmay happen in sleep.MR. C. Mr. O. said that not all mechanical actions are evil. Are onlythose evil that are based on negative emotions, or that have the effectof increasing mechanicalness and negative reactions in other people?MR. O. Yes, maybe, but it is necessary to say more. We cannot enumerateall of them. It is sufficient to establish the principle—anything thatproduces evil must be mechanical.MR. C. Is there no higher consciousness that comes to people not in aschool? There is the example of Jacob Boehme. I don't think there isany hint that he was in a school. He was only a simple shoemaker.MR. O. How do you know he was not in a school? There is no proofthat he was not. Yes, consciousness may come without a school, just asone can find money in the street. But one cannot live on that.MR. C. After one has come into contact with a school, does it dependon one's essence or personality whether one will obtain higher consciousness?MR. O. It depends on work, on effort—both on essence and personality.MRS. W. Is it possible for one to possess a single aim before one is inpossession of a permanent 'I'?MR. O. Yes, certainly.