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

Does a destructive action start with the active force?MR. O. This does not enter here. If you do not see that, you must startwithout triads, just studying destructive action.MRS. S. You said last week that evil doing was always the result ofbeing mechanical. But did you not say in a very early lecture that aman may achieve consciousness and use it for evil ends? Otherwisewould not the temptation of Christ in the Wilderness lose its significance?MR. O. I never said that and do not see which of my words gave thepossibility of thinking it. And Christ does not enter into our conversation.I see no connection.MRS. S. But he was tempted to do evil. . . .MR. O. And he did not yield because he was conscious.MR. D. We have been told that we are born with essence and acquirepersonality, and that essence should dominate personality.Does heredity have any influence on essence?MR. O. Heredity we know only in relation to body. We do not know itin relation to essence. We have no material to answer this. Onlyphysical features are hereditary. Essence may be quite different. Observationshows this.MR. D. Are knowledge and being both limited to an equal degree byessence and personality?MR. O. No, this is wrong construction.MISS M . Are considering and identification attributes of false personality?MR. O. This has no practical meaning.MRS. N. What is attention?MR. O. That is a matter for observation. Lack of attention, biggerattention, smaller attention, and so on. Description won't help.MR. A . Are states of higher consciousness essentially accompanied byphysical alertness? I know, for instance, that one cannot self-rememberwhen physically asleep or anywhere near it.MR. O. In most cases, yes. One becomes more alert in all centres.MR. A . Is inner awareness a matter of mind or emotion or both?MR. O. Of more even than that. Instinctive feeling and moving feeling.In relation to the first question, about physical alertness, it is verydifficult to make a general statement about that, because in some caseshigher states of consciousness can produce trance states. That happens