order of real existence. The conception of an
abstract ego seems to involve three assumptions, none
of which is true. The first is that there is
a sharp line separating subject from object and from
other subjects. The second is that the subject,
thus sundered from the object, remains identical through
time. The third is that this indiscerptible entity
is in some mysterious way both myself and my property.
In opposition to the first, I maintain that the foci
of consciousness flow freely into each other even
on the psychical plane, while in the eternal world
there are probably no barriers at all. In opposition
to the second, it is certain that the empirical self
is by no means identical throughout, and that the
spiritual life, in which we may be said to attain
real personality for the first time, is only ‘ours’
potentially. In opposition to the third, I repeat
that the question whether it is ‘my’ soul
that will live in the eternal world seems to have no
meaning at all. In philosophy as in religion,
we had better follow the advice of the Theologia Germanica
and banish, as far as possible, the words ’me
and mine’ from our vocabulary. For personality
is not something given to start with. It does
not belong to the world of claims and counter-claims
in which we chiefly live. We must be willing to
lose our soul on this level of experience, before
we can find it unto life eternal. Personality
is a teleological fact; it is here in the making, elsewhere
in fact and power. So in the case of our friends.
The man whom we love is not the changing psycho-physical
organism; it is the Christ in him that we love, the
perfect man who is struggling into existence in his
life and growth. If we ask what a man is, the
answer may be either, ’He is what he loves,’
or ‘He is what he is worth.’ The two
are not very different. Thus I cannot agree with
Keyserling, who in criticising this type of thought
(with which, none the less, he has great sympathy)
says that ’mysticism, whether it likes it or
not, ends in an impersonal immortality.’
For impersonality is a purely negative conception,
like timelessness. What is negated in ‘timelessness’
is not the reality of the present, but the unreality
of the past and future. So the ‘impersonality’
which is here (not without warrant from the mystics
themselves) said to belong to eternal life is really
the liberation of the idea of personality. Personality
is allowed to expand as far as it can, and only so
can it come into its own. When Keyserling adds,
’The instinct of immortality really affirms
that the individual is not ultimate,’ I entirely
agree with him.


