Pilgrimage of Spiritual Reading by the Alexandria Foundation

Maurice Nicoll : Forgotten Teacher of the Fourth Way by Gary Lachman

£25.00

A biography of the influential teacher of the Fourth Way In 1922, Maurice Nicoll (1884-1953) abandoned his successful London psychiatry practice and his direct studies with Carl Jung to move his family just outside of Paris to the Institute for the Harmonious Development of Man, a center recently opened by philosopher, mystic, and spiritual guru G.I. Gurdjieff, the founder of the esoteric system that became known as the “Fourth Way.” Nicoll went on to become one of the most passionate teachers of the Fourth Way, committing the final three decades of his life to teaching “The Work” in his own unorthodox style. In this revealing biography, Gary Lachman draws on recently uncovered diaries to explore the unusual, syncretic approach Nicoll brought to his teaching of the Fourth Way.

He shows how Nicoll is unique in having Jung, Gurdjieff, and Ouspensky as teachers and to have known each of these important figures in esoteric history personally, yet—as Lachman reveals—Nicoll was not a blind devotee by any stretch. The author shows how he incorporated elements of Jungian psychology and Emanuel Swedenborg-inspired mysticism into his exploration and teaching of both Gurdjieff’s and Ouspensky’s ideas, as well as into his best-known work, Psychological Commentaries on the Teaching of Gurdjieff and Ouspensky. Lachman reveals the unorthodox side of Nicoll in fuller detail than ever before through excerpts from recently shared diaries, in which Nicoll included detailed accounts of his own solitary “self-sex” erotic experimentations to reach visionary states, along with recordings of his dreams and other personal and mystical reflections.

The social details of Nicoll’s life are also examined, including vivid portraits of the occult scene in the early-to-mid-20th century and the communal living situations in which Nicoll sometimes resided. Drawing on his familiarity with hermetic practices and his own experiences with “The Work,” Lachman comprehensively explores the significance of Nicoll and the novelty of his thought, offering a profound, needed, and sympathetic but critical study of this man so instrumental to the development and legacy of the Fourth Way.

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Gurdjieff and the Fourth Way by Stephen A. Grant

£24.30 £27.00

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Deeper Man by J.G. Bennett

£45.00

Antiquarian / Second Hand

Compiled and edited by A.G.E. Blake
Published: Turnstone Books, London 1978
Condition: Very good. Dust jacket unclipped. Pages clean and unmarked

"For 40 years, since Deeper Man was first published, it has been widely recognised as one of the most reliable and cogent presentations of the ‘work ideas’ associated with Gurdjieff and the ‘fourth way’. Bennett devoted himself to making the ideas accessible to as wide a range of people as possible. He was always finding new ways of communicating what he saw as critically important: that people should become convinced of the reality of higher worlds but not regard them as far away, only of concern for rare, exceptional people. Based on some of the last lectures Bennett gave before his death in 1974, Deeper Man represents only half of what he hoped to include in a book he envisaged (‘Dig Deeper, Man!’). Even so, it ranges far and wide and includes a radical, new understanding of what Gurdjieff meant by the ‘centres’ in man. The book we have here, hopefully, expresses something of the great generosity of spirit which was a feature of this extraordinary man."

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