88 overcoming the worldboth as a view of the world and as an imperative of life. Its power results
from the directness and simplicity of its response to each of the irreme-
diable fl aws in our existence.
It responds to the troubles of mortality by assuring us that, with re-
gard to what matters most, we will not die at all. It teaches us not that
the individual self will survive death but rather that, properly consid-
ered, such a self never existed at all. Individual selfh ood is an epiphe-
nomenal illusion, destined to give way to the revelation of our original
and indestructible relation to universal being.
It answers the enigmas of groundlessness by telling us that the ex-
planation of the mystery of being and of life lies before our eyes if only
we could free ourselves from the distractions of the phenomena and the
illusions of time. Once freed, we shall be able to receive the world in all
its splendor; the world will be enough to itself. Th e eff ort to apply to all
of reality the habits and methods of thought developed to deal with
part of it will be exposed as misguided. Our highest science and art will
tend to confi rm the truth of these metaphysical propositions.
It counters the agonies of insatiable desire by proposing, on the basis
of this vision, a series of practices meant to help us escape the ordeal of
longing, satiation, and boredom. It promises to free us from the force by
which our empty and fi ckle desires chain us to our peers, whom we al-
low to fi ll this void with arbitrary content. To disentangle ourselves
from such coils, to recognize the vanity of these pursuits, to steel our-
selves against disappointment and disillusionment until we have learned
to combine a disillusioned indiff erence to the world with a disinterested,
distant benevolence toward other people— all this forms a path to salva-
tion that will forever exercise its attraction when higher hopes fail.
It responds to the experience of belittlement— the disparity between
the circumstances of our lives and the inner reality of our natures— by
proposing that we discount the signifi cance and even the reality of the
former the better to affi rm the latter. It urges us to place value where
nothing can corrupt it. Th e only freedom and greatness worth having
are those that circumstance is powerless to diminish.
Such a road to salvation will have adherents so long as there are hu-
man beings. Th e language and the arguments will change, to suit the
vocabulary and conditions of the time and place, but the spiritual pro-
gram will survive. It will continue to tempt those who are disappointed