9.   The next Gurdjieff quote comes from vol.I of the Psychological Commentaries on the Teaching of Gurdjieff and Ouspensky: “We see others through our attitudes and buffers. In general we do not like other people. Instinctively we are hostile. I remember G. once saying that when we pass someone in a lane we tend to tense our muscles. You know that it has been said that we should not pretend we like other people, but try to work on dislike.” (261, 8 March 1943) If one took just the quoted words, it would still be a valuable lesson, to help us better observe ourselves and the way something in us reacts, causing the muscles to tense. But taken in its context, it is more. If we accept that there is some truth in it, then from where does this dislike come? And why does it sometimes become hostility? Note how Nicoll says that the reaction occurs “instinctively.” It is not inborn with our instinctive centre, but it has become so by a sort of second nature. Perhaps by working on the dislike and the tensing together, it is possible to free up the instinctive centre? Such work takes a long time. As I now understand it, such efforts always do and must take time to produce longlasting results – if they could be done at once, we would be like drunks in a tattoo shop – acting on impulse. We cannot be too plastic, and yet we have to retain some plasticity. So an intelligent and well-informed three-centred work is needed over a period of time.

10.   Then, from 17 July 1943: “… notice I’s that like to be ill and attract illness. The habit of illness can be formed early and that means that a group of I’s form themselves that wish to occupy the stage whenever possible. They wish to make you ill. It used to be taught (by G.) that 80% of our illnesses have a psychological cause of this kind – that is, are due to I’s, just as in the same way, if you form the habit of taking some drug, the I’s formed and nourished by it will seek to dominate and destroy you.” (315) I think that speaks for itself, but again, it means that a low state of being begins to adversely affect the instinctive centre. Likewise, 80%, (750, 28 July 1945)

Note also, “Gurdjieff once said: “About 70 per cent of people are ill from psychological reasons—for example, from wrong impressions.” (1175, 5 June 1948, 307^th commentary) “Most illnesses” appears at 1405, 1 July 1950, 401st commentary.

11.   I suspect that Gurdjieff was the source of the following” “We think we now what is right and wrong, or good and bad, and because of this we have no idea what it is to keep a balance in ourselves. I once heard it said in this Work that the devil is also necessary.” (323, 30 August 1943).

12.   Given what Nicoll wrote on p.341 (below), it may also have been Gurdjieff who used “a phrase that has not been used for a long time. Try to see what you are resting on …. Try to see the basis of your self-satisfaction. You will understand that unless this basis is completely broken up there can be no change of being.” (338, 10 October 1943) This is a most intriguing formulation. We rest on certain ideas of ourselves: our appearance, clothes, achievements, qualifications, histories, all sort of things. This comes into what we call “pride.” Pride on all sorts of things from patriotism to race, religion, and identity are things we rest on. This false pride feeds a self-satisfaction which makes any real inner work impossible.

13.   From the same meeting, he refers what I call “putting the day to bed,” a constellation of practices which came from Gurdjieff. Nicoll makes no reference to anyone at all, yet it is known that Gurdjieff taught such practices from an early date: “Now I will speak of the digestion of impressions at the end of the day. If we could work more consciously we would digest impressions at the moment of taking them in, but since we have not this power, since we are not conscious enough yet, we can digest impressions taken in during the day at night-time or even the next day. That is, we can re-arrange them them in our minds in terms of what the Work teaches as good and evil. You remember that it is said in the New Testament that we should not let the sun go down on our wrath. It is important how we go to sleep and it is equally important how we get up. Past moments of sleep, past moments of identifying with wrong I’s in ourselves, can be to a certain extent cancelled by consciously going over the whole situation in our minds afterwards. You must never think that you cannot work on a thing in your past. Never think that you cannot alter it. You can alter the present, you can alter the past, and you can alter the future.” (339,  10 October 1943)

14.   On 24 October 1943, Nicoll wrote: “I remember that G. once gave a talk in France about what could be taken away from us. You will understand that if we are based on ‘False Personality’ we are standing on a basis that will give us constant trouble as regards keeping our balance. G. said that a man could be compared with a flat containing three rooms. He spoke for some time about this 3-room flat and about everything that was in disorder in it and how the utensils were in the wrong place, etc. Then he went on to say how a man was always in debt, always insolvent, always liable to be summonsed, however much money he possessed. Of course you must understand that he was speaking of man’s insolvency in a particular way – in fact, in the way that Man is spoken of so often in some of the parables as, for instance, in the parables of the servant – that is, you – who owes his Lord millions of talents. G. said that the bailiffs may enter your flat at any moment and they have a ‘legal’ right to take away everything except your “bed” which is in the inner or third room. So please think what you rest on most internally. There is something which cannot be taken away from you. have you got to this place? Everything else can be taken away by these ‘bailiffs” that may come at any time and remove everything that is not your own.” (341) The question about what we “rest on internally” is further reason why I think that the saying about “resting” on p.338 is from Gurdjieff.

to be continued