consciousness in the subtlest vehicle, the degree of Avidya and Asmita goes on increas-
ing as the association of consciousness with matter becomes more and more strength-
ened. As consciousness descends into one vehicle after another the veil of Avidya be-
comes, as it were, thicker and the tendency to identify oneself with the vehicle be-
comes stronger and grosser. On the other hand, when the reverse process takes place
and consciousness is released from its limitations in its evolutionary upward climb, the
veil of Avidya becomes thinner and the resulting Asmita weaker and subtler. This evo-
lution on the upward arc takes place in seven definite and clearly marked stages as is
indicated in II-27. These stages correspond to the transference of consciousness from
one vehicle to a subtler vehicle.
Let us now come down from the abstract principles and consider the problem In
relation to things with which we are familiar and which we can understand more eas-
ily. Let us consider the problem of the expression of consciousness through the physi-
cal body. We should remember, in considering this question that the consciousness
which is normally expressed through the physical body is not pure unmodified con-
sciousness being involved in a vehicle. It has already passed through several such in-
volutions and it is already heavily loaded, as it were, when it seeks expression through
the outermost or grossest vehicle. It is therefore consciousness conditioned by the
limitations of all the intervening vehicles which form a kind of bridge between it and
the physical body. But as the process of involution and consequent identification is in
essence the same at each stage of involution, we can get some idea of the underlying
principles even though the expression of consciousness through the physical body is
complicated by the factors referred to above.
Coming back to our problem we then see that the association of consciousness,
conditioned as mentioned above, with the physical body must lead to this identifica-
tion with the vehicle and the language which is used by all of us in common inter-
course reflects this fully. We always use such expressions as ‘I see’, ‘I hear’, ‘I go’, ‘I
sit’. In the case of the savage and the child this identification with the body is so com-
plete that there is not the slightest feeling of discrepancy in using such language. But
the educated and intelligent man, whose identification with the body is not quite com-
plete and who feels to a certain extent that he is different from the body, is aware at
least in a vague manner that it is not he who sees, hears, walks and sits. These activi-
ties belong to the physical body and he is merely witnessing them through his mind.
Still, from force of habit and disinclination to go deeper into the matter, or from fear
ben green
(Ben Green)
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