“The alternation of I’s, their continual obvious struggle for supremacy, is controlled by accidental external influences. Warmth, sunshine, fine weather, immediately call up a whole group of I’s. Cold, fog, rain, call up another group of I’s, other associations, other feelings, other actions. There is nothing in man able to control this change of I’s, chiefly because man does not notice, or know of it; he lives always in the last I. Some I’s, of course, are stronger than others. But it is not their own conscious strength; they have been created by the strength of accidents or mechanical external stimuli. Education, imitation, reading, the hypnotism of religion, caste, and traditions, or the glamour of new slogans, create very strong I’s in man’s personality, which dominate whole series of other, weaker, I’s. But their strength is the strength of the ‘ROLLS’ in the centers. And all I’s making up a man’s personality have the same origin as these ‘ROLLS’; they are the results of external influences; and both are set in motion and controlled by fresh external influences. Fragments: Three

“As has been said earlier, in the case of less cultured people essence is often more highly developed than it is in cultured man. It would seem that they ought to be nearer the possibility of growth, but in reality it is not so because their personality proves to be insufficiently developed. For inner growth, for work on oneself, a certain development of personality as well as a certain strength of essence are necessary. Personality consists of ‘ROLLS,’ and of ‘buffers’ resulting from a certain work of the centers. An insufficiently developed personality means a lack of ‘ROLLS,’ that is, a lack of knowledge, a lack of information, a lack of the material upon which work on oneself must be based. Without some store of knowledge, without a certain amount of material ‘not his own,’ a man cannot begin to work on himself, he cannot begin to study himself, he cannot begin to struggle with his mechanical habits, simply because there will be no reason or motive for undertaking such work. Fragments: Eight

“Accumulators work in the following way,” he said. “Let us suppose that a man is working or is reading a difficult book and trying to understand it, in which case several ‘ROLLS’ revolve in the thinking apparatus in his head. Or let us suppose that he is walking up a hill and is getting tired, in which case the ‘ROLLS’ revolve in the moving center. Fragments: Eleven

“This means that the center has become connected directly to the large accumulator. The large accumulator contains an enormous amount of energy. Connected with the large accumulator a man is literally able to perform miracles. But of course, if the ‘ROLLS’ continue to turn and energy which is made from air, food, and impressions continues to pour out of the large accumulator faster than it pours in, then there comes a moment when the large accumulator is drained of all energy and the organism dies. But this happens very seldom. Usually the organism automatically stops working long before this. Special conditions are necessary to cause the organism to die exhausted of all its energy. In ordinary conditions a man will fall asleep or he will faint or he will develop some internal complication which will stop the work a long time before the real danger. Fragments: Eleven

“A man, if he is hungry, has a chance to come into contact with the beginning of a way. But besides hunger still other ‘ROLLS’ are necessary. Otherwise a man will not see the way. Imagine that an educated European, that is, a man who knows nothing about religion, comes into touch with the possibility of a religious way. He will see ‘nothing and he will understand nothing. For him it will be stupidity and superstition. But at the same time he may have a great hunger though formulated intellectually. It is exactly the same thing for a man who has never heard of yoga methods, of the development of consciousness and so on. For him, if he comes into touch with a yoga way, everything he hears will be dead. The fourth way is still more difficult. In order to give the fourth way a right valuation a man must have thought and felt and been disappointed in many things beforehand. He ought, if not actually to have tried the way of the fakir, the way of the monk, and the way of the yogi previously, at least to have known and thought about them and to be convinced that they are no good for him. It is not necessary to understand what I say literally. This thinking process can be unknown to the man himself. But the results of this process must be in him and only they can help him to recognize the fourth way. Otherwise he can stand very near to it and not see it Fragments: Seventeen

“And this is particularly important in connection with the study of the divisions of centers in oneself. Mention has been made of this several times before. You must understand that each center is divided into three parts in conformity with the primary division of centers into ‘thinking,’ ’emotional,’ and ‘moving.’ On the same principle each of these parts in its turn is divided into three. In addition, from the very outset each center is divided into two parts: positive and negative. And in all parts there are groups of ‘ROLLS* connected together, some in one direction and others in another direction. This explains the differences between people, what is called ‘individuality.’ Of course there is in this no individuality at all, but simply a difference of ‘ROLLS’ and associations.” Fragments: Eighteen