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"The
Perennial Philosophy teaches that it is desirable and indeed necessary
to know the spiritual Ground of things, not only within the soul, but
also outside in the world." |
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Aldous Huxley,
The Perennial Philosophy, Part 2
Based upon the direct experience of those who have fulfilled the
necessary conditions of such knowledge, this teaching is expressed most
succinctly in the Sanskrit formula, tat tvam asi ("That art
thou"); the Atman, or immanent eternal Self, is one with Brahman, the
Absolute Principle of all existence; and the last end of every human being
is to discover the fact for himself, to find out Who he really is.
The more God is in all things, the more He is outside them. The more
He is within, the more without. -- Eckhart
Only the transcendent, the completely other, can be immanent without
being modified by the becoming of that in which it dwells. The Perennial
Philosophy teaches that it is desirable and indeed necessary to know the
spiritual Ground of things, not only within the soul, but also outside in
the world and, beyond world and soul, in its transcendent otherness --
"in heaven."
Though GOD is everywhere present, yet He is only present to thee in
the deepest and most central part of thy soul. The natural senses cannot
possess God or unite thee to Him; nay, thy inward faculties of
understanding, will and memory can only reach after God, but cannot be
the place of his habitation in thee. But there is a root or depth of
thee from whence all these faculties come forth, as lines from a centre,
or as branches from the body of the tree. This depth is called the
centre, the fund or bottom of the soul. This depth is the unity, the
eternity -- I had almost said the infinity -- of thy soul; for it is so
infinite that nothing can satisfy it or give it rest but the infinity of
God. -- William Law
This extract seems to contradict what was said above; but the
contradiction is not a real one. God within and God without -- these are
two abstract notions, which can be entertained by the understanding and
expressed in words. But the facts to which these notions refer cannot be
realized and experienced except in "the deepest and most central part
of the soul." And this is true no less of God without than of God
within.
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