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the depths and that layers of air can conceal a flock of eagles.
Not long ago We spoke about the defense of reality. Remember that it is not the illiterate
people who will be furious against reality, but these little literates" will violently defend their
short-sighted evidence. They will think that the world enclosed within their horizon is the actual
one, and that all else remaining invisible to them is a harmful fiction. What lies at the base of this
beggarly narrowness? In an altered aspect it is that very same idea of personal ownership. This is
my own pigpen and therefore everything outside of it is not necessary and pernicious. This is what
is apparent to me and therefore nothing outside of it exists. The well-known fable about the
elephant and the seven blind people is sufficient as an example.
Indeed, as We say, the Community battles for reality. You have another kind of ally; those
who strive for the truth, for whom evidence is nothing but an unclean glass. If chemical and
biological evidence is complicated, then still more complex is the evidence of the planes of
structure of life and actions. Without the development of consciousness we shall dwell in a
continuous mirage; as in catalepsies, we shall be twisted in frozen terror.
Begone, Maya! We wish and shall know reality!
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207. Do not encourage cosmogonic discussions until the consciousness is affirmed. Follow
goalfitness of instruction in schools. Provide the hastening ones with opportunity for speediest
advancement. If a lively ship must reduce sail in order to even up a formation, will this not be a
killing of possibilities? Do you know how the harmony in the ship's sailing effort has been created?
And has it not been constructed for resisting the utmost peril? How to make use of it for conveying
frozen vegetables? Always preserve a possibility of responsible advancement. From the first year
of school let not slow pace be a handicap for rapid pace. Let the teacher keenly discern those able
to proceed swiftly. It is not necessary to praise them, but one should clear the path for them. One
should create intermediate courses; the fleet ones can run up these steps. Do not conceal difficulties
from them. For a certain type of consciousness every movement leading to achievement is already
a light and a joy.
The teacher must also be depended upon to determine quickly the direction of thinking of a
pupil, because erroneous equipping is a heavy offense and by it the best workers may be lost. Each
inflexible program is a corpse which is intolerable under the sun of knowledge. It is necessary as
quickly as possible to stabilize the school by examining the consciousness of the teacher. Create for
him a better situation in order to repose in him a responsibility for the consciousness of the
community workers.
It will be inexcusable if schools of the future, like those in which recent generations have
been maimed, are reminiscent of the stockyards. Fanaticism and forbiddances are replaced by
possibilities.
Introduce the study of handicrafts, allow freedom of choice, and demand quality of work.
For this every teacher must understand the meaning of quality.
208. It is desirable to widely gather young coworkers. The Teacher would prefer to see an intense
searching rather than petty gossip. Darkness lies over those who are afraid; real harm is less
noticeable to them than one new hair on the head of a neighbor. Is it possible to think about the
community when occupied with gossip? But the difficulty is lessened when we know that the
soldiers of slander may be kept beyond the walls of the new cities.
Let slanderers look over the list of everything slandered by them. Will not this be a list of
human evolutionary discoveries? No slander has any influence on the effect of evolution. But
slander is a devourer of vital fuel, and from the standpoint of goalfitness must be destroyed. An
absurd abusive word is not often accompanied by clear-cut thought, but slander, by nature, is akin
to everything reared in darkness, and thought carries it inaudibly like an owl in flight.
Someone asks, Why pay so much attention to slander? The inquirer does not know about
economy of energy.
It is not necessary to grieve about the road's being littered, but woe to those who strew the
rubbish!
209. You have already seen how I put questions to a newcomer. From the replies it was possible to
form an opinion about the qualities of the newcomer. Each one of you will be obliged to teach
those who come to you. If they begin with a question, reply with a question of your own. You
know how the quality of a question gives direction to the next question. It is inadmissible to allow
inexactness to creep into the essence of the question. Often this first diffusiveness lies like a grease
spot on a coverlet and becomes indelible. The hour will approach when you will tenaciously insist
on questions on the part of the one with whom you speak. But the first questions must come from
you. And first of all ask what has drawn him to you. And then ask him to tell when for the first
time he felt the worthlessness of contemporary life; and then let him relate how the first conception
of the Teacher arose in his consciousness. Let him tell how he understands achievement. Does he
feel the difference between the evidence and the reality; and can he realize the community within
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