which we become aware of the not-myself, is merely a formula which deadens the Real for us till we are strong enough to bear it; and we must stay in the body, or return to it, till we have in some way mastered these conditions.
When limitation is broken, however, when every dim stratum and substratum of our being has become conscious, and the whole consciousness is gathered up into the single tremendous act of knowledge,—not the conventionalised, formulated awareness of the senses, but direct absolute knowledge,—what is it claimed that we perceive? That which came before as many, as seeing and hearing and the rest, is known now to be One, and that One—God.
And so it happens that the great goal of Eastern religion is known as Mukti or Nirvana, or Freedom. The man in whom this perception is perfected is liberated from conditions—he may subject himself to them at will, but he is not bound by them. He has left the sleep of
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