In the olden Days all cattle, sheep, and goats lived in the forests. Then, one day, Tarikhes called all the animals before him at a place in the jungle, and he lighted a large fire there. And when the animals saw the fire they were frightened and fled away back into the forests. There remained only cattle, sheep, and goats who were not frightened. And Tarikhes was pleased with these animals and bless them, and he decreed the henceforth they should always live with man and woman who would eat their flesh and drink their milk.
The ego structure remains, of course. The responsibility of dealing with physical reality remains, but in some respects the nature of this manipulation changes. It becomes more direct. Physical properties are manipulated more and more at a mental level. The ego becomes more like the inner ego and less like its old self, comparatively speaking. It accepts large portions of reality that it previously denied. Structurally, it remains intact, yet it has changed chemically and electromagnetically. Now it is far more open to inner data. Once this freedom is achieved, the ego can never return to its old state.
I have told you that the ego is self-conscious action that attempts to set itself apart from action and to consider action as object. Now this altered ego retains its highly specialized self-consciousness, and yet it can now experience itself as an identity within and as a part of action.
This is a cornerstone for consciousness and for personality. It is only a first step, however. Without it, no further development of consciousness can occur. It is not attained by all within our system. We are at this point now.
The next step is taken when identity is able to include within itself the intimate knowledge of all incarnations. Yet in this state, the independence of the various reincarnated selves is not diminished. Each of these steps of consciousness involve identity with the inner recognition of its unity with All That Is.
As each separate identity then seeks to know and experience its other portions, then All That Is learns Who and What It Is. Action never ceases its exploration of itself. All That Is can never know itself completely, since action must always act and each action creates a new unknown. Action must travel through itself from every conceivable point, and yet the journey, being itself action, will create new paths.
Mr. Tortoise, who was married to Mrs. Tortoise, Had in Vulture a friend who was constant in visiting him. But, having no wings, Tortoise was unable to return the visits, and this upset him. One day he bethought himself of his cunning ands aid to his wife, “Wife!’
Mrs. Tortoise answered, “Hello, husband! What is it?”
Said he, “don’t you see, wife, that we are becoming despicable in Vulture’s eyes?”
“How despicable?”
“Despicable, because it is despicable for me not to visit Vulture. He is always coming here and I have never yet been to his house – and he is my friend.”
Mrs. Tortoise replied, “I don’t see how Vulture should think us despicable unless we could fly as he does and then did not pay him a visit.”
But Mr. Tortoise persisted: “Nevertheless, wife, it is despicable.”
Said his wife, “Very well, then, sprout some wings and fly and visit your friend Vulture.”
Mr. Tortoise answered, “No, I shan’t sprout any wings because I was not born that way.”
“Well,” said Mrs. Tortoise, “what will you do?”
“I shall find a way,” he replied.
“Find it then, ” said Mrs Tortoise, “and let us see what you will do.”
Later Tortoise said to his wife, “Come and tie me up in a parcel with a lump of tobacco and, when Vulture arrives, give it to him and say it is tobacco and, when Vulture arrives, give it to him and say that it is tobacco to buy grain for us.” So Mrs. Tortoise took some palm leaf and made him into a parcel and put him down in the corner.
At his usual time, Vulture came to pay his visit and said, “Where’s your husband gone, Mrs. Tortoise?”
“My husband has gone some distance to visit some people, and he left hunger here. We have not a bit of grain in the house.”
Vulture said, “you are in trouble indeed, not having grain in the house.”
Vulture said, “you are in such trouble as human beings never knew.” And she went on: “Vulture, at your place is there no grain to be bought?”
“Yes,” said he, “any amount, Mrs. Tortoise.”
She brought the bundle and said, “My husband left this lump of tobacco thinking you would buy some grain with it for us and bring it here.”
Vulture willingly took it returned to his home in the heights. As he was nearing his native town he was surprised to here a voice saying, “Untie me, I am your friend Tortoise. I said I would pay a visit to you.”
But Vulture, in his surprise, let go his hold of the bundle and down crashed Tortoise to the earth, Pididi-pididi, his shell smashed to bits, and he died. And so the friendship between Tortoise and culture was broken: and you can still see the cracks in Tortoise’s shell.
They say that once a great hunger came, and that Kwaku Ananse, the spider, said he would go and search for meat and vegetable food and bring it that his wife Aso might eat. He went into a certain stream and there he met certain people. Now these people whom he met, excuse my saying so, were spirits. When Ananse met the spirits, they were standing in the water and splashing the stream-bed dry to catch the fish. Kwaku Ananse said, “Brothers, may I come and splash a little too?”
The spirits said “Come.”
Ananse went, and he saw that they were using their skulls to splash the stream dry. The spirits said to Ananse, “You have seen that which we take to splash the stream dry. Will you allow us to remove your skull in order that you may splash too?” Ananse said, “I will permit you, take it off for me.”
Of a truth, the spirits removed it and gave it to him. Kwaku Ananse and the spirits joined together in splashing the bed of the stream dry. As they splashed, the spirits raised a song:
“We, the spider, when we splash the river-bed
dry to catch fish, we use our heads to splash the water.
O spirits, we are splashing the water.”
Since the Creator made things,
do we take our heads to splash the water?
O the spirits, we are splashing the water.
I take my head to splash the water dry today O,
O the spirits, we are splashing the water.”
Ananse finished singing, and the spirits told him, saying, “We have splashed, we have got fish, your share is a basketful. Take it and go and eat. Take your skull, join it on your body, and go off. But what we have to say most particularly is this – the very day you sing any of that song, your skull will open and fall off.”
The spider said, “Fish in abundance, which you have given to me, is all that I desire, and as for a song – for what reason should I sing it?”
The spirits said, “That is well, go off.”
So the spider set off. The spirits, too, got everything together and they, also, went away. When the spirits had reached yonder, as it were, then they raised their song:
“We, the spirits, when we splash the river-bed dry
to catch fish, we use our heads to splash the water.
O the spirits, we are splashing the water.”
And the spider heard the song and he, too, took it up:
“Since the Creator made things
Have we taken our heads to splash the water?
O the spirits, we are splashing the water.”
No sooner had he finished than his skull opened and dropped off. Ananse lifted it up and held it against his chest. He said, “spirits, spirits, my head has fallen off.”
The spirits heard, and they said “That’s the spider. He hasn’t listened to what we told him, and he is calling us. Let us all go back and hear him.”
Almost immediately, Spider came hastening along. He said, “Puo! Children of my father! My head has opened and fallen off, so I beg of you, if I have done you any harm, forgive it. You are in the right, but take my head and put it in its place for me.”
The spirits took it, and replaced it. They said to him, “Now, if you sing this song again and your head falls off again, we shall not answer when you call us. So get along with you!” The spirits set off again.
As they were going they sang their song. Then Ananse began to sing again, and his head became detached and fell off, kutukum! And he lifted it and, excuse my vulgarity, clapped it against his anus, and leaped to the side of the path. Sora! was the sound of the grass parting as he entered it. He said, “Path, save me! When the day dawns that I am rich, I shall give you some.”
That is why you will see Ananse with a small head and a very big bottom. It all comes from the hardness of his ears.
