This, from some opium experiences of mine, I can believe; I have indeed, seen the same thing asserted twice in modern books, and accompanied by a remark which I was convinced was true; viz that the dread book of account, which the Scriptures speak of, is, in fact, the mind itself of each individual.
Of this at least I feel assured, that there is no such thing as forgetting possible to the mind; a thousand accidents may, and will interpose a veil between our present consciousness and the secret inscriptions of the mind; accidents of the same sort will also rend away this veil; but alike, whether veiled or unveiled, the inscription remains for ever; just as the stars seem to withdraw before the common light of day, whereas, in fact, we all know that it is the light which is drawn over them as a veil - and that they are waiting to be revealed, when the obscuring daylight shall have withdrawn.
This passage describes the extraordinary faculty in which life's events are experienced not as a serial succession of events, but as single and simultaneous totality, feature often reported in many studies of recent Near-Death Experience (NDE) accounts.
Equally striking is de Quincey's assertion - repeatedly affirmed in the Tibetan Book of the Dead - that "the dread book of account which the Scriptures speak of, is, in fact, the mind itself of each individual," an astonishing conclusion for a 19th century Englishman to reach, I need hardly add.
Certainly my own experiences in Buddhist meditation have most categorically affirmed that absolutely nothing in one's lifetime is 'lost' to memory - including unremembered dreams of long ago - and that everything, but everything, is recorded with as much power and immediacy as that which attends the present moment of reality.
From this and related NDE matters I can only conclude that in the postmortem state this memory-record is 'cracked open', as it were, rather like a cartridge of microfilm and presented for self-review. I shall also affirm that in each of us a faculty exists which assesses each moment ethically and with inexorable and appalling clarity: it sees right through the pretensions and rationalisations which attend our own assessments of why we do what we do, and is never ever fooled as to the real reasons and motives:
And last, the rending pain of re-enactment
Of all that you have done, and been; the shame
Of motives late revealed, and the awareness
Of things ill done and done to others' harm
Which once you took for exercise of virtue.
Then fools' approval stings, and honour stains.
From wrong to wrong the exasperated spirit proceeds
Unless restored by the refining fire
Where you must move in measure, like a dancer.
T. S. Eliot, 'Little Gidding'
";
echo $mb_link;
echo "
";
if ( session_is_registered('navigation')) {
echo " Return to Message Board's last display of selected messages";
}
?>