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Towards the Future
THE Buddhists consider being as a stream of consciousness, a ceaseless flow of sensations. An individual formation, a creature, a human person has no permanent self-identity. It is like the Heraclitean river where one does not bathe twice in the same water. Besides, .what is more interesting, it is not an uninterrupted continuous flow with no gap or hiatus, but a movement of disconnected units. It is an unending series of disparate moments of consciousness. The sense of continuity is a make-believe, an illusion. We know today, thanks to modern science, of the mystery of particles. The ultimate constituents of the material world consist of particles (or wave-particles), that is to say, packets of material energy strung together or merely juxtaposed, but held together somehow. Now the Buddhists added that these are particles of energy no doubt, but the energy is not mere material, i.e., electrical energy; they are desire-energy. Human being or consciousness is an aggregate of cells of desire-energy. The task man has before him - the alchemy or laboratory work man is to do is to empty the cells of desire and so annihilate "them; desire gone, cells crumble away - existence becomes Nihil - an inexpressible stillness or tranquillity. There is however another solution. The cells can be emptied -of desire, but a new element can be put in the place of desire .or desire itself can be transmuted. Science speaks of the transmutation of material particles, 'i.e., of material mass into energy-electric, kinetic or radiant energy. An inert mass thus becomes a light particle. And we may conceive of a material body becoming a luminous body, the human form a globe of light. Yoga
envisages precisely such a consummation. But the process is somewhat
different. The equation here is not E=mc²
Page - 303 but M=C?, M meaning transmuted Matter; the transformation of Matter not into mere energy but into Consciousness. Energy of the Spirit, this happens when the material particle is raised to the potency of infinite Consciousness. Pursuing the mathematical imagery we may describe the Buddhist equation as desire raised to the power of zero equals Nirvana: D°=Zero. Buddha thought like that. He thought annihilation of desire means annihilation of existence, for he equated desire with existence. But mathematics tells us that anything raised to the power of zero is not zero but one, that is, the unit, the pure existence-Sat (or Sachchidananda as the Vedantists say. Science and mathematics tell us today of a truth or just point to a truth which a spiritual realisation reveals. It is, as I have already said, the mystery of transformation, or transubstantiation as the Christian faith figures it. This world, this material existence is to be transmuted-the portion of earthly human existence at least, with which we are most concerned. It is at present made of ignorance and sorrow and incapacity-composed of the particles of these entities; poor and sorry as they are, these have to be replaced by entities of light and joy and love, of peace and strength and wideness. Well, it is a transmutation or transubstantiation of the kind which Nature has already attempted as an experiment; I am referring to the alchemy of fossilisation. The present human formation must be dipped and soaked-and held under high pressure in an environment of the desired material or materials that one has in view.
Such an environment does exist. It is pressing from
within or from above and is heading towards a resultant material
action. It is an awakened dynamic spiritual reality which awaits and
is working for its supreme and inevitable destiny. Page - 304
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