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

Wednesday. February 8th 1939. (Colet Gardens.)MR. C. Is it of practical use to think of the events of one's past lifewhen trying to self-remember, with a view to fixing them for anyfuture recurrence?MR. O. No, this is not practical. First, as I said, it is necessary to besure about future recurrence, and second, it is necessary to be sure ofremembering yourself. If you put too much like that, it transforms intoimagination, nothing else. But if we first try to remember ourselveswithout adding anything to it, and then, when we can, also about ourpast life—you remember I spoke about trying to find cross-roads—then in combination it will be very useful. Only don't think you can doit, you cannot do it yet.MR. C. I see the Oxford dictionary gives two meanings for the word'transformism': (1) Any doctrine of the evolution of the species (2)Gradual evolution of morals and social relations.MR. O. Yes, but morals and social relations don't enter into this. Wespeak only about change of beings. Certainly transformation is used inmany senses—in the sense of evolution, metamorphosis (as in the caseof the butterfly), metamorphosis in the fairy tale sense—so there aremany meanings.MISS S I did not understand well enough what we were to look forabout transformism.MR. O. All that you can find. First of all it is necessary to establishgradation—in which sense the idea is used first, then how the meaningof the word went through a certain transformation, how it becameconnected with certain scientific theories which took a certain definiteshape during the nineteenth century. So it is necessary to knowtransformism in that sense Other meanings we must know only to putthem aside Only this idea of evolution, of the origin of species, thetransformation of species interests us We must not insist on anyparticular theory, that is not our business. We must know the existing