THE EQUINOX
still there . . . . until we reach Kether of Atziluth and the
Infinite Light, and Space, and Nothing.
So then we retire up the path, fighting rear-guard actions ;
at every moment a soldier is slain by a hunchback; but as
we retire there is always a soldier just by us.
Until the end. The end? Buddha thought the supply of
hunchbacks infinite ; but why should not the soldiers them-
selves be infinite in number?
However that may be, here is the point; it takes a moment
for a hunchback to kill his man, and the farther we get from
our base the longer it takes. You may crumble to ashes the
dream-world of a boy, as it were, between your fingers; but
before you can bring the physical universe tumbling about a
man’s ears he requires to drill his hunchbacks so devilish well
that they are terribly like soldiers themselves. Anda question
capable of shaking the consciousness of Samadhi could, I
imagine, give long odds to one of Frederick’s grenadiers.
It is useless to attack the mystic by asking him if he is
quite sure Samadhi is good for his poor health; ’tis like asking
the huntsman to be very careful, please, not to hurt the fox.
The ultimate Question, the one that really knocks Samadhi
to pieces, is such a stupendous Idea that it is far more of a!
than all previous !’s whatever, for all its ? form.
And the name of that Question is Nibbana.
Take this matter of the soul.
When Mr. Judas McCabbage asks the Man in the Street
why he believes in a soul, the Man stammers out that he has
always heard so; naturally McCabbage has no difficulty in
proving to him by biological methods that he has no soul;
and with a sunny smile each passes on his way.
128