The point 3, or the "interval" mi-fa, was the place where the "shock" came in which gave do 192 of the second octave. When I added the beginning of this octave to the enneagram I saw that the point 6 came at the "interval" mi- fa of the second octave and the "shock" in the form of the third octave do 48 which begins at this point. The completed drawing of the octaves came out as follows:
This signified that there was no wrong place for a "shock" at all. Point 6 showed the entry of the "shock" in the second octave and the "shock" was the do which began the third octave. All three octaves reached Hi 2. In one it was si, in the second sol, and in the third mi. The second octave which ended at 12 in the enneagram ought to have gone on further. But si 12 and mi 12 required an "additional shock." I thought a great deal about the nature of these "shocks" at that time but I will speak of them later.
I felt that there was very much material in the enneagram. Points 1, 2, 4, 5, 7, 8 represented, according to the "food diagram," different "systems" of the organism, 1— the digestive system; 2—the breathing system;
4—the blood stream; 5—the brain; 7—the spinal cord; 8—the sympathetic system and the sex organs. According to this the direction of the inner lines 1428571, that is, the content of fraction 7, showed the direction of the flow or distribution of arterial blood in the organism and then its return in the form of venous blood. It was particularly interesting that the point of return was not the heart but the digestive system which indeed is the case since venous blood is first of all mixed with the products of digestion, it then goes to the right auricle, through the right ventricle, then to the lungs to absorb oxygen, and from there goes to the left auricle and then the left ventricle and then through the aorta into the arterial system.
| Fig. 6i |
| JUPITER Dies iovis Thursday |
| SATURN Su"day MOON |
| MARS Dies Martis Tuesday |
| MERCURY Dies Mercurii Wednesday |
| VENUS Dies Veneris Friday * |
Examining the enneagram further I saw that the seven points could represent the seven planets of the ancient world; in other words the enneagram could be an astronomical symbol. And when I took the order of the planets in the order of the days of the week I obtained the following picture:
SUN Dies Solis
I did not try to go any further as I did not have the necessary books to hand and there was very little time.
"Events" gave no time to go into philosophical speculations. One had to think about living, that is to say, simply and quite plainly to think about where one could live and work. The revolution and everything connected with it aroused in me deep physical disgust. At the same time, in spite of my sympathy with the "whites" I could not believe in their success. The bolsheviks did not hesitate to promise things that neither they nor anyone else could perform. In this was their principal strength. It was something in which nobody could compete with them. In addition to this they had the support of Germany, who saw in them a possibility of revenge in the future. The volunteer army, which had freed us from the bolsheviks, was able to fight them and conquer them. But it was not able to organize in a proper way the course of life in the liberated provinces. Its leaders had neither program, knowledge, nor experience in this direction. Of course this could not be demanded of them. But facts are facts. The situation was very unstable and the wave which was still rolling towards Moscow at the time could be rolled back again any day.
It was necessary to get abroad. I had marked down London as my final aim. First because I knew more people there and second because I thought that among the English I should find the greater response and a greater interest in the new ideas I now had, than anywhere else. Besides, when I was in London on my way to India before the war and on my return voyage at the beginning of the war I had decided to go there to write and publish my book, which had been begun in 1911, under the title of The Wisdom of the Cods, and which subsequently appeared under the title of A New Model of the Universe. As a matter of fact this book, in which I touched upon questions of religion and in particular upon methods for studying the New Testament, could not have been published in Russia.
So I decided to travel to London and to try to organize lectures and groups there like those at St. Petersburg. This only came to pass three and a half years later.
In the beginning of June, 1919, 1 at last succeeded in leaving Essentuki. At that time it had become quite calm there and life had been a little re-established. But I did not trust this calm. It was necessary to go abroad. At first I went to Rostov and then to Ekaterinodar and Novorossiysk and then returned again to Ekaterinodar. Ekaterinodar at that time was the capital of Russia. There I met some of our company who had left Essentuki before me as well as some friends and acquaintances from St. Petersburg.
There remains in my memory one of my first talks.
My friend from St. Petersburg asked me, when we had spoken of G.'s system and of work on oneself, whether I could indicate any practical results of this work.
Remembering all I had experienced during the preceding year, particularly after G.'s departure, I said that I had acquired a strange confidence, one which I could not define in one word but which I must describe.
"This is not self-confidence in the ordinary sense," I said, "quite the contrary, rather is it a confidence in the unimportance and the insignificance of self, that self which we usually know. But what I am confident about is that if something terrible happened to me like things that have happened to many of my friends during the past year, then it would be not I who would meet it, not this ordinary I, but another I within me who would be equal to the occasion. Two years ago G. asked me whether I felt a new I inside me and I had to answer that I felt no change whatever. Now I can speak otherwise. And I can explain how the change takes place. It does not take place at once, I mean that the change does not embrace every moment of life. All the ordinary life goes on in the ordinary way, all those very ordinary stupid small I's, excepting perhaps a few which have already become impossible. But if something big were to happen, something which would require the straining of every nerve, then I know that this big thing would be met not by the ordinary small I, which is now speaking, and which can be made afraid, nor by anything like it—but by another, a big I, which nothing can frighten and which would be equal to everything that happened. I cannot describe it better. But for me it is a fact. And this fact is definitely connected for me with this work. You know my life and you know that I was not afraid of many things, both inward and outward, that people are often afraid of. But this is something different, a different taste. Therefore I know, for myself, that this new confidence has not come simply as a result of a great experience of life. It is the result of that work on myself which I began four years ago."
In Ekaterinodar and afterwards in Rostov during the winter, I collected together a small group and, on a plan that I had worked out the preced ing winter, I gave them lectures expounding G.'s system as well as the things from ordinary life which lead up to it.