In search of the miraculous

by Ouspensky

  "A 'body' has an independent physical existence, that is, it possesses a number of different physical properties.

  "But when we say a thing 'exists,' we mean by this existence in time. But there is no time in three-dimensional space. Time lies outside the three-dimensional space. Time, as we feel it, is the fourth dimension. Existence is for us existence in time. Existence in time is movement or extension along the fourth dimension. If we take existence as an extension along the fourth dimension, if we think of life as a four- dimensional body, then a three-dimensional body will be its section, its projection, or its limit.

  "But existence in time does not embrace all the aspects of existence. Apart from existing in time, everything that exists, exists also in eternity.

  "Eternity is the infinite existence of every moment of time. If we conceive time as a line, then this line will be crossed at every point by the lines of eternity. Every point of the line of time will be a line in eternity. The line of time will be a plane of eternity. Eternity has one dimension more than time. Therefore, if time is the fourth dimension, eternity is the fifth dimension. If the space of time is four-dimensional, then the space of eternity is five-dimensional.

  "Further, in order to understand the idea of the fifth and the sixth dimensions, a certain view of time must be established.

  "Every moment of time contains a certain number of possibilities, at times a small number, at others a great number, but never an infinite number. It is necessary to realize that there are possibilities and there are impossibilities. I can take from this table and throw on the floor a piece of paper, a pencil, or an ash-tray, but I cannot take from the table and throw on the floor an orange which is not on the table. This clearly defines the difference between possibility and impossibility. There are several combinations of possibilities in relation to things which can be thrown on the floor from this table. I can throw a pencil, or a piece of paper, or an ash-tray, or else a pencil and a piece of paper, or a pencil and an ash-tray, or a piece of paper and an ash-tray, or all three together, or nothing at all. There are only these possibilities. If we take as a moment of time the moment when these possibilities exist, then the next moment will be a moment of the actualization of one of the possibilities. A pencil is thrown on the floor. This is the actualization of one of the possibilities. Then a new moment comes. This moment also has a certain number of possibilities in a certain definite sense. And the moment after it will again be a moment of the actualization of one of the possibilities. The consecutiveness of these moments of actualization of one possibility constitutes the line of time. But each moment of time has an infinite existence in eternity. The possibilities which have been actualized con­tinue to be endlessly actualized in eternity, while the non-actualized possibilities continue to remain non-actualized and non-actualizable.

  "But all the possibilities that have been created or have originated in the world must be actualized. The actualization of all the possibilities created or originated constitutes the world's being. At the same time there is no place for the actualization of these possibilities within the limits of eternity. In eternity everything that has been actualized continues to be actualized and everything non-actualized continues to remain non-actualized. Eternity, however, is only a plane crossed by the line of time. At every point of this line there remains a certain number of non-actualized possibilities. If we imagine the line of the actualization of these possibilities, they will proceed along radii issuing from one point at different angles to the line of time and the line of eternity. These lines will proceed outside eternity, outside the five- dimensional space, in 'higher eternity' or in six-dimensional space, in the sixth dimension.

  "The sixth dimension is the line of the actualization of all possibilities.

  "The fifth dimension is the line of the eternal existence or repetition of the actualized possibilities.

  "The fourth dimension is the sequence of the moments of the actualization of one possibility.

  "As I have said, seven dimensions, from zero-dimension to the sixth dimension, constitute the full period of dimensions. Beyond this period there is either nothing or the same period may repeat itself on another scale.

  "As I have already said, the system of cosmoses, the exposition of which we have just heard, strikes me above all by the fact that it fully corresponds to the 'period of dimension' which is the basis of my New Model of the Universe, only this system of cosmoses goes still further and explains many things which were not clear in my model of the universe.

  "Thus, if we take the Microcosmos, that is, the 'atom' or 'microbe,' as G. has defined it, then the Tritocosmos for it will be four-dimensional space, the Mesocosmos will be five-dimensional space, and the Deuterocosmos six-dimensional space.

  "This means that all the possibilities of the 'atom' or 'microbe' are realized within the limits of the solar system.

  "If we take man as the Tritocosmos, then, for him, the Mesocosmos will be four- dimensional space, the Deuterocosmos five-dimensional space, and the Macrocosmos six-dimensional space. This means that all the possibilities of the Tritocosmos are realized in the Macrocosmos.

  "Therefore parallel with this, all the possibilities of the Mesocosmos are realized in the Ayocosmos and all the possibilities of the Deuterocosmos, or the sun, are realized in the Protocosmos or the Absolute.

  "As every cosmos has a real physical existence, every cosmos therefore is three- dimensional for itself or in itself. In relation to a lower cosmos it is four-dimensional, in relation to a higher cosmos it is a point. To put it differently, it is, itself, three-dimensional, but the fourth dimension lies for it in the cosmos above and the cosmos below. This last point is perhaps the most paradoxical, but nevertheless it is exactly as it should be. For a three-dimensional body, such as is a cosmos, the fourth dimension lies as much in the realm of very large magnitudes as in the realm of very small magnitudes; as much in the realm of what is actually infinity as in the realm of what is actually zero.

  "Further we must understand that the three-dimensionality of even one and the same body can be different. Only a six-dimensional body can be completely real. A five- dimensional body is only an incomplete view of a six-dimensional body, a four- dimensional body is an incomplete view of a five-dimensional body, a three- dimensional body is an incomplete view of a four-dimensional body. And of course, a plane is an incomplete view of a three-dimensional body, that is to say, a view of one side of it. In the same way a line is an incomplete view of a plane and a point is an incomplete view of a line.

  "Moreover, though we do not know how, a six-dimensional body can see itself as three-dimensional. Somebody looking at it from outside may possibly also see it as a three-dimensional body, but in a completely different kind of three-dimensionality. For instance, we represent the earth to ourselves as three-dimensional. This three- dimensionality is only imaginary. As a three-dimensional body the earth is something quite different for itself from what it is for us. Our view of it is incomplete, we see it as a section of a section of a section of its complete being. The 'earthly globe' is an imaginary body. It is the section of a section of a section of the six-dimensional earth. But this six-dimensional earth can also be three-dimensional for itself, only we do not know and we can have no conception of the form in which the earth sees itself.

  "The possibilities of the earth are actualized in the Ayocosmos; this means that in the Ayocosmos the earth is a six-dimensional body. And actually we can to a certain extent see in what way the form of the earth must change. In the Deuterocosmos, that is, in relation to the sun, the earth is no longer a point (taking a point as a scale reduction of a three-dimensional body), but a line which we trace as the path of the earth around the sun. If we take the sun in the Macrocosmos, that is, if we visualize the line of the sun's motion, then the line of the motion of the earth will become a spiral encircling the line of the sun's motion. If we conceive a lateral motion of this spiral, then this motion will construct a figure which we cannot imagine
because we do not know the nature of its motion, but which, nevertheless, will be the six- dimensional figure of the earth, which the earth itself can see as a three-dimensional figure. It is necessary to establish and to understand this because otherwise the idea of the three-dimensionality of the cosmoses will become linked with

  our idea of three-dimensional bodies. The three-dimensionality even of one and the same body can be different.

  "And this last point seems to me to be connected with what G. calls the 'principle of relativity.' His principle of relativity has nothing in common with the principle of relativity in mechanics or with Einstein's principle of relativity. It is the same again as in the New Model of the Universe; it is the principle of the relativity of existence."

  At this point I ended my survey of the system of cosmoses from the point of view of the theory of many dimensions.

  "There is a great deal of material in what you have just said," said G., "but this material must be elaborated. If you can find out how to elaborate the material that you have now, you will understand a great deal that has not occurred to you till now. For example, take note that time is different in different cosmoses. And it can be calculated exactly, that is, it is possible to establish exactly how time in one cosmos is related to the time of another cosmos.

  "I will add only one thing more:

  "Time is breath—try to understand this."

  He said nothing further.

  Later on one of G.'s Moscow pupils added to this that, speaking with them once of cosmoses and of different time in different cosmoses, G. had said that the sleep and waking of living beings and plants, that is, twenty-four hours or a day and night, constitute the "breath of organic life."

  G.'s lecture on cosmoses and the talk following it greatly aroused my curiosity. This was a direct transition from the "three-dimensional universe" with which we had begun, to the problems which I had elaborated in the New Model of the Universe, that is, to the problems of space and time and higher dimensions, on which I had been working for several years.

  For over a year G. added nothing to what he had said about cosmoses.

  Several of us tried to approach these problems from many different sides and, although all of us felt a great deal of potential energy in the idea of cosmoses, for a long time we got no results. We were especially confused by the "Microcosmos."

  "If it were possible to take man as the Microcosmos and the Tritocosmos as the human race, or rather as organic life, it would be much easier to establish the relation of man to other cosmoses," one of us, Z., said in this connection, who with me had attempted to understand and to develop further the idea of the cosmoses.

  But on the one or two occasions that we began to speak to G. about it he persisted in his definitions.

  I remember once when he was leaving Petersburg, it was possibly even his final departure in 1917, one of us asked him at the station something relating to cosmoses.

  "Try to understand what the Microcosmos means," answered G. "If you succeed in understanding this, then all the rest about which you ask now will become clear to you."

  I remember that when we talked about it later the question was quite easy to solve when we took the "Microcosmos" as man.

  It was certainly conditional, but nevertheless it was in complete accord with the whole system which studied the world and man. Every individual living being—a dog, a cat, a tree—could be taken as a Microcosmos; the combination of all living beings constituted the Tritocosmos or organic life on earth. These definitions seemed to me the only ones that were logically possible. And I could not understand why G. objected to them.

  At any rate, some time later when I returned again to the problem of cosmoses I decided to take man as the Microcosmos, and to take the Tritocosmos as organic life on earth.

  With such a construction a great number of things began to be much more connected. And once, looking through a manuscript of "Glimpses of Truth" given me by G., that is, the beginning of the story that was read at the Moscow group the first time I went there, I found in it the expressions "Macrocosmos" and "Microcosmos"; moreover "Microcosmos" meant man.

  Now you have some idea of the laws governing the life of the Macrocosmos and have returned to the Earth. Recall to yourself: "As above, so below." I think that already, without any further explanation, you will not dispute the statement that the life of individual man—the Microcosmos—is governed by the same laws.

  —"Glimpses of Truth"

  This still further strengthened us in our decision to understand "Microcosmos" as applying to man. Later it became clear to us why G. wished to make us apply the concept "Microcosmos" to small magnitudes as compared with man, and to what he wished to direct our thought by this.

  I remember one conversation on this subject.

  "If we want to represent graphically the interrelation of the cosmoses," I said, "we must take the Microcosmos, that is, man, as a point, that is to say, we must take him on a very small scale and, as it were, at a very great distance from ourselves. Then his life in the Tritocosmos, that is, among other people and in the midst of nature, will be the line which he traces on the surface of the earthly globe in moving from place to place. In the Mesocosmos, that is, taken in connection with the twenty-four hours' motion of the earth around its axis, this line will become a plane, whereas taken in relation to the sun, that is, taking into consideration the motion of the earth around the sun, it will become a three-

  dimensional body, or, in other words, it will be something really existing, something realized. But as the fundamental point, that is, the man or the Microcosmos, was also a three-dimensional body, we have consequently two three-dimensionalities.

  "In this case all the possibilities of man are actualized in the sun. This corresponds to what has been said before, namely, that man number seven becomes immortal within the limits of the solar system.

  "Beyond the sun, that is, beyond the solar system, he has not and cannot have any existence, or in other words, from the point of view of the next cosmos he does not exist at all. A man does not exist at all in the Macrocosmos. The Macrocosmos is the cosmos in which the possibilities of the Tritocosmos are realized and man can exist in the Macrocosmos only as an atom of the Tritocosmos. The possibilities of the earth are actualized in the Megalocosmos and the possibilities of the sun are actualized in the Protocosmos.

  "If the Microcosmos, or man, is a three-dimensional body, then the Tritocosmos— organic life on earth—is a four-dimensional body. The earth has five dimensions and the sun—six.

  "The usual scientific view takes man as a three-dimensional body; it takes organic life on earth as a whole, more as a phenomenon than a three-dimensional body; it takes the earth as a three-dimensional body;

  the sun as a three-dimensional body; the solar system as a three-dimensional body; and the Milky Way as a three-dimensional body.

  "The inexactitude of this view becomes evident if we try to conceive the existence of one cosmos within the other, that is, of a lower cosmos in a higher, of a smaller cosmos in a greater, such as, for instance, the existence of man in organic life or in relation to organic life. In this case organic life must inevitably be taken in time. Existence in time is an extension along the fourth dimension.

  "Neither can the earth be regarded as a three-dimensional body. It would be three- dimensional if it were stationary. Its motion around its axis makes man a five- dimensional being, whereas its motion around the sun makes the earth itself four- dimensional. The earth is not a sphere but a spiral encircling the sun, and the sun is not a sphere but a kind of spindle inside this spiral. The spiral and the spindle, taken together, must have a lateral motion in the next cosmos, but what results from this motion we cannot know, for we know neither the nature nor the direction of the motion.

  "Further, seven cosmoses represent a 'period of dimensions,' but this does not mean that the chain of cosmoses comes to an end with the Microcosmos. If man is a Microcosmos, that is, a cosmos in himself, the
n the microscopic cells composing his body will stand towards him in about the same relation as he himself stands to organic life on earth. A microscopic cell which is on the boundary line of microscopic vision is com­posed of milliards of molecules comprising the next step, the next cosmos. Going still further, we can say that the next cosmos will be the electron. Thus we have obtained a second Microcosmos—the cell; a third Microcosmos—the molecule; and a fourth Microcosmos—the electron. These divisions and definitions, namely 'cells,' 'molecules,' and 'electrons,' are possibly very imperfect; it may be that with time science will establish others, but the principle will remain always the same and lower cosmoses will always be in precisely such relation to the Microcosmos."

  It is difficult to reconstruct all the conversations which we had at that time about cosmoses.

  I returned particularly often to G.'s words about the difference of time in different cosmoses. I felt that here was a riddle which I could and must solve.

  Finally having decided to try to put together everything I thought on the subject, I took man as the Microcosmos. The next cosmos in relation to man I took as "organic life on earth," which I called "Tritocosmos" although I did not understand this name, because I would have been unable to answer the question why organic life on earth was the "third" cosmos. But the name is immaterial. After that everything was in ac­cordance with G.'s system. Below man, that is, as the next smaller cosmos, was the "cell." Not any cell and not a cell under any conditions, but a fairly large cell, such as for instance the embryo-cell of the human organism. As the next cosmos one could take a small, ultramicroscopic cell. The idea of two cosmoses in the microscopic world, that is, the idea of two microscopic individuals differing one from the other as much as does "man" from a "large cell," is perfectly clear in bacteriology.

  The next cosmos was the molecule, and the next the electron. Neither "molecule" nor "electron" appeared to me to be very sound or reliable definitions, but for the lack of others these could be taken.