From Souvenirs sur Georgii Ivanovitch by Tchesslav TCHECHOVITCH

Google translation from French partially edited by Plavan N. Go. English translation in the heavily censored official English version is not trustable.

In 1924, I was part of the group that followed Mr. Gurdjieff to America, who had come to organize Movements demonstrations and lectures in several cities. In each city, we gave a few demonstrations, first of our Movements exercises, then of psychic phenomena. The audience was invited to distinguish which of these phenomena were fake or dubious, and which were supernatural. After a few demonstrations of this kind, Mr. Gurdjieff gave his lecture.

The name of the city where what I am about to recount took place doesn't matter. The day Mr. Gurdjieff was to speak, the hall was truly packed. The audience was expecting something sensational, and one could feel the atmosphere of a grand theatrical evening. The curtain rose. The audience then found itself before a man promising nothing eccentric, surrounded by about thirty people sitting cross-legged and motionless. The audience seemed to take what they saw on stage as the preparation of a performance.

But when Mr. Gurdjieff began to speak about three brains, the chaotic state created in man's inner life by the imbalance and disharmony of his centers, and the need to find a way to subordinate the grosser to the finer, part of the audience showed impatience and discontent. Some people got up and left the room, disturbing others as they passed through the ranks. Mr. Gurdjieff continued speaking. Others stood up, and those who wanted to follow Mr. Gurdjieff's talk could no longer hear his voice, but he remained as patient as ever. Still others stood up, and little by little there was a general commotion in the room. Mr. Gurdjieff was still talking, gesticulating and making an impression as if everyone admired him. The failure of the conference was looming and seemed certain to us. For us, waiting for the moment when Mr. Gurdjieff would find himself before an empty room was becoming unbearable, but Mr. Gurdjieff was still speaking, modulating his intonations. From time to time, he addressed us, asking for the English word that eluded him. Then he stopped, coughed, scratched his chin, and this time, in a voice that carried far, began to blame the audience.

"This is the first time in your life that you are faced with something serious, and faced with this ordeal, you manifest your emptiness: it is the seriousness of the subject that expels you, like water rejects the cork. Those who still want to leave. Leave. Leave immediately. Leave immediately because I'm having the doors closed and no one will be able to leave the room."

He asked a few of us to go and close the doors or keep them closed to prevent this coming and going. A large part of the audience had risen and left the room. Mr. Gurdjieff lit a cigarette and smoked quietly. When silence was restored again, he stood up:

"Nobody else wants to leave? Are you all staying?"

Silence was the only response. Mr. Gurdjieff then completely changed his tone and, in a very pleasant voice, invited people to take seats near him in the stalls. Those who were in the galleries and at the back of the room approached the platform and gathered in close ranks.

Then, in a penetrating voice this time, Mr. Gurdjieff announced to the audience thus selected that the subject he wanted to talk about was not intended for everyone.

The fools are gone, now we can talk in depth, to the heart of the matter.

And the audience, now attentive, listened to Mr. Gurdjieff with great interest. His pronunciation flaws were no longer noticed: it was the meaning of his words that the audience absorbed. Mr. Gurdjieff spoke at length, sometimes interrupted by questions or by the exposition of opposing theories. I remember the answer Mr. Gurdjieff gave to a question from a person who had already attended our demonstrations of the Movements and some of the lectures given by Mr. Orage, who had come to America to prepare for Mr. Gurdjieff's arrival.

This person had sensed, through the efforts he had made, the collapse of his entire inner world, in which he had until then had had unshakeable faith. It was in an anguished voice that betrayed his inner turmoil that this gentleman spoke of his fear of finding himself deprived of the foundations on which his philosophical worldview, his beliefs, and his aspirations had been based until then. At Mr. Gurdjieff's invitation, he stood up and, almost trembling, continued speaking. The meaning of what he said was as follows:

"You, Mr. Gurdjieff, have disturbed my inner world. My opinions, my points of view are wavering. There is little chance that they will survive. Soon I will no longer believe in everything my previous life formed within me, and I am afraid. I am afraid of remaining in a void, I am afraid of not finding in your theory the elements that could form a new foundation, and I sense the misfortunes and sufferings of a lost man. Until now, I felt the ground beneath my feet; now the earth is giving way. What right do you have to deprive me and others of moral and psychological balance?"

Then he accused Mr. Gurdjieff for destructive actions he introduced to his inner world. The audience had calmed down, and a silence was established, reflecting everyone's concern about their own situation and everyone's interest in hearing the answer. Mr. Gurdjieff seemed to expect such an objection, and a slight satisfaction passed over his face.

"Your fear and your concern are known to me and I see that the penetration of these ideas into your consciousness has been rapid, but you still lack accurate knowledge about man's situation in this world. Everyone, up to a certain point, many even until their death, believes in the solidity of the ground on which they advance in their lives. But if you realized that no balance exists in you, that your moral and psychological stability is based on spiritual blindness, that no one, including you, can do anything . . . and if you were convinced that you are all walking towards a precipice where you will disappear into nothingness, then you might see the benefit of knowing where this path you are walking on leads to. I know this path [into nothingness] and wish you [stop following it so you may] avoid suffering and gnashing of teeth.

It is true that those who approach what I am talking about sense fear and even experience it, but it is not their real self that experiences it, it is something else within them, so this fear is not the fear of your essential being. Rather, all rubbish in you that you must abandon makes you afraid, as it want you to continue walking on the same old path. A group of parasites and slaves, that exist in man becomes alarmed by the danger of what awaits them when the man becomes awakened to reality. So, they create this fear, trying to give rise to the impulse of rejecting everything that come from me.

You also say that you sense misfortune and suffering, and you sense it rightly. Happy is he who knows nothing about his situation; also happy is he who has attained to the end of his evolution; but woe to him who has just recognized some fundamental truths, that is to say, who has a kind of conscience, but in whom conscience only exercises the functions of police punishing men after they have committed a crime.

It is comfortable enough to be seated on a bench, although it is much more comfortable to be seated in an armchair. Woe to him who has risen from a bench or a tree trunk, and has not reached the armchair to lounge there. Suffering overcomes him. It is all very well to be a crow, but the peacock is more admired and better cared for and woe to the crow if only two peacock feathers have appeared on its crow-like plumage. The crows chase him away because it annoys them; the peacocks also do not want to accept such a fake peacock runt among them and peck him too. No, in fact, they do not peck him, but the crow himself takes everything he hears from them as reproach, and he himself leaves the group.

It is possible that millions of men will one day be in this situation, but it will not stop. A million failures, failures of their own making, with all the suffering this can cause them, are compensated by a single man who will escape the sad fate that awaits all those who neglect to fulfill their duty before Nature."

At this moment, several people protested: "Then by what right? Then why? Then for what purpose?"

Mr. Gurdjieff smiled, and with compassion in his voice, he continued:

"One saved will save ten, the ten will save a hundred, the hundred thousands, the thousands millions; and you see. At the expense of millions of suffering, millions of sufferers and unhappy people, millions of people will feel happiness and hundreds of millions will rejoice in the presence among them of these new men.

As far as rights are concerned, this has its base in the objective conscience. If we are to compare the joys, balance, and organic well-being of people who are heading toward nothingness without knowing it, and the suffering and unhappiness experienced by those who know they are heading toward annihilation, the difference lies in the fact that the former know nothing, and the latter suffer from the remorse and reproaches from the awareness of what they have done.

But, objectively, there is no question of choice between the two. A gardener removes weed from the ground without any remorse because it is necessary to do so to support growth towards flowering. It is the failure to take advantage of such conditions for growth that that would result in real suffering."

Silence fell again, but this time it was a silence of approval that expressed the understanding those present had of Mr. Gurdjieff's mission. Everyone had lost track of time. It was Mr. Gurdjieff who reminded them with these words:

"Well! Tomorrow is a working day. We must rest a little after all."

That evening, those touched by Mr. Gurdjieff's ideas felt connected to each other and expressed a desire to continue meeting in order to deepen their understanding of the truth they had received.

Thus, the nucleus of Mr. Gurdjieff's students was born in this city.

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