the Equinox - The Hermetic Library

140
THE EQUINOX
the second The Invocations of Adonai—the work of attainment.
Then he took another step forward. “Do as [sic] thou wilt!”
Not only is Animism absurd, but so also is Morality; not only
is Reincarnation absurd, but so also is Transmigration; not
only is the Ego absurd, but so also is the Non-Ego; not only
is Karma absurd, but so also is Nibbâna. For, all things and
no-things are absurd save “I,” who am Soul and Body, Good
and Evil, Sorrow and Joy, Change and Equilibrium; who in
the temple of Adonai, am beyond all these, and by the fire
side in my study—Mr. X, one with each and all.
Thus it came about that the study of Buddhism caused
Frater P. to abandon the tinsel of the Vedânta as well as its
own cherished baubles, and induced him, more than ever, to
rely on Work and Work alone and not on philosophizing,
moralizing and rationalizing. The more rational he became,
the less he reasoned outwardly; and the more he became
endowed with the Spirit of the Buddha in place of the vapourings
of Buddhism, the more he saw that personal endeavour
was the key; not the Scriptures, which at best could but indicate
the way.
It (the Dharma) is to be attained to by the wise, each
one for himself. Salvation rests on Work, and not on Faith,
not in reforming the so-called fallen, but in conquering oneself.
“If one man conquer in battle a thousand times a
thousand men: and another conquer but himself;—he is the
greatest of conquerors.”*
This is the whole of Buddhism, as it is of any and all
systems of self-control.
* Dhammapada, v, 103.