39b | CR Book XI, Chapter 7

this too. It is my fault, too. This should be rather
mine than theirs. This is mine, too. We are both one.
We are all one. There is suffering, caused by self-
deception and greed.

As these exercises progress, ill-will, harming, dislike
and greed, - the "distant enemies" of the "divine stat-
es", diminish. One almost imperceptibly learns to take
take others as seriously as oneself. Compassion, in
particular, reveals others as centres of self-manifest-
ation, self-importance, craving and suffering, in all
essentials like oneself, - cut off, threatened, and fi-
nally swallowed by what they left out of themselves.
Unregenerated, one pays attention to the point where
they cut across oneself, weighs them relatively to one-
self; then as to themselves; then as in themselves. When
one learns to have no more concern for oneself than for
anything else, and if one fixes one's self-concern in
proportion to one's size in the universe, one's self-
concern amounts to almost nothing. The distance of my
"I" to the meanest insect, and its distance to my body
etc are being equalised. As we shift it about, the
centre of our normal perspective loses its limited
range, and finally disappears. We learn to feel towards
all beings as if they were ourselves, thereby treating
as irrelevant those aspects in which different selves
differ.

After the practice of these three unlimited emoti-
ons has brought about the degree of self-effacement
which is attained in the 3rd jhāna (XII/5), one
may successfully aspire unlimited evenmindedness.
Unconcerned, unmoved, unpreoccupied, in no way anxious,
in a free stillness, one lets things follow their own
courses, resigned to let karma have its way, seeing that
beings are the property of their karma. Internally uni-
fied, one stands entirely in oneness, and impartially
"overlooks" differences. Transcending visible objects, one
is placed firmly in identity with Reality from which
all events are viewed. When I stand unformed in my own
original being , objects cease to obstruct. There is
no place where we cannot pass freely. The self is
emptied out. But this emptiness is no distinct from
form etc. even-mindedness, - large-hearted and not
cold-blooded, - is joyous from putting away attachment,
and loving from being re-fused with boundless compassi-
on.