He is temporarily absolved from the Wheel of Chance. He has, as it were, cut out the “Circle of Transmigration.” He is taking a vacation.
And just here (as Alonzo afterward explained in Kankakee) should be made some explanation of the wide difference and distinction between the mystico-theosophic-scholastic courses of Illinois and India.
In the Eastern branch TIME is the essential.
In the Western school Hustle is the key.
In the East forty to fifty years are consumed in mere preparation in initiatory contemplation, abstraction, introspection and absorption. Oriental methods call for time without dates, and a hundred years in the achievement of Gnanum is considered excellent work.
The practice of doubling or “ponying,” which obtains not merely in Illinois, but which distinguished Western scholarship generally, is unknown in India.
These methods are, however, invaluable when the American seeks wisdom in the Indian schools. By thus doubling or doing extra time Alonzo Leffingwell broke the record.
At first the deprivation of soap, towels and other civilized accessories appeared important. At times he yearned for a fine-tooth comb and a safety razor. However, when he had sat for six months without a change of position, and after he had held up his hands for several weeks at a stretch, he ceased to feel the need of these things.
Thus he conquered the Material and attained to the first stages of Nothingness in five brief years.
These years of Mounting the Spiral were, however, very trying to the Occidental Man, who had been used to the Spirit of Chicago and the Push of Illinois. His Oriental education wholly lacked the stimuli of association and competition.