Lo, the poor Indian, whose untutored mind
Clothes him in front, but leaves him bare behind.
"If you started in the wrong way," I said in answer to the
investigator's questions, "everything that happened would be a
proof of the conspiracy against you. It would all be
self-validating, You couldn't draw a breath without knowing it was
part of the plot."
"So you think you know where madness lies?"
My answer was a convinced and heartfelt, "Yes."
"And you couldn't control it?"
"No I couldn't control it. If one began with fear and hate as the
major premise, one would have to go on to the conclusion."
"Would you be able," my wife asked, "to fix your attention on what
The Tibetan Book of The Dead calls the Clear Light?"
I was doubtful.
"Would it keep the evil away, if you could hold it? Or would you
not be able to hold it?"
I considered the question for some time. "Perhaps," I answered at
last, "perhaps I couldbut only if there were somebody there to
tell me about the Clear Light. One couldn't do it by oneself.
That's the point, I suppose, of the Tibetan ritualsomeone sitting
there all the time and telling you what's what."
After listening to the record of this part of the experiment, I
took down my copy of Evans-Wentz's edition of The Tibetan Book of
the Dead, and opened at random. "O nobly born, let not thy mind be
distracted." That was the problemto remain undistracted.
Undistracted by the memory of past sins, by imagined pleasure, by
the bitter aftertaste of old wrongs and humiliations, by all the
fears and hates and cravings that ordinarily eclipse the Light.
What those Buddhist monks did for the dying and the dead, might not
the modern psychiatrist do for the insane? Let there be a voice to
assure them, by day and even while they are asleep, that in spite
of all the terror, all the bewilderment and confusion, the ultimate
Reality remains unshakably itself and is of the same substance as
the inner light of even the most cruelly tormented mind. By means
of such devices as recorders, clock-controlled switches, public
address systems and pillow speakers it should be very easy to keep
the inmates of even an understaffed institution constantly reminded
of this primordial fact. Perhaps a few of the lost souls might in
this way be helped to win some measure of control over the
universeat once beautiful and appalling, but always other than
human, always totally incomprehensible-in which they find
themselves condemned to live.
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