There are four known ele­ments of know­ledge.

  • 1) Empir­i­cism is the ana­lyt­ic­al study of mater­i­al states. The sci­entif­ic world view relies above all on empir­ic­al means, and, inter­est­ingly, these meth­ods have led right up to the limit at which the means used so far no longer hold. Sci­ent­ists are search­ing for the God particle, for what the first nano­seconds of the uni­verse con­tained, or invest­ig­at­ing empir­ic­al facts that depend on the sub­ject. The ancients, too, used the meth­od of obser­va­tion and of the con­clu­sions dis­tilled from it, but that school had a neces­sary com­ple­ment in the intu­it­ive vis­ion of the world, that is, the com­ple­ment of ana­lyt­ic­al empir­i­cism,
  • 2) intu­it­ive mys­ti­cism. The aim of the lat­ter is to free the pure soul from the pris­on of mat­ter. The aim of mys­ti­cism is an organ­ic vis­ion of the world, the recog­ni­tion of the hid­den, inner laws of the uni­verse, and the map­ping of inner real­ity. As soon as the sys­tem can be seen through, it can almost at once be passed through as well. This points to the third great com­pon­ent of know­ledge,
  • 3) autonomy. We could also call it free­dom, but it means rather an inner free­dom, when one is free of one's attach­ments, and so, though the body is still on earth, the soul already walks in heav­en. Shak­ing off worldly ties, and in par­tic­u­lar going bey­ond mater­i­al pleas­ures, leads to the highest degree of spir­itu­al under­stand­ing. This spir­itu­al autonomy is not mere neg­a­tion but the power of self-con­quest. Free­dom is an appeal­ing out­come, but few are will­ing to pay its heavy price. Free­dom is for autonom­ous people who do not mis­use its oppor­tun­it­ies. That is pre­cisely why the next ele­ment of know­ledge is
  • 4) self-dis­cip­line, a dis­cip­lined way of life freely under­taken for the sake of spir­itu­al per­fec­tion. It fol­lows that spir­itu­al autonomy is not fickle­ness or licence, but a sys­tem of very strict laws. Free­dom is gov­erned by prin­ciples that must be observed. Free­dom con­strued as whim is the mark of the ignor­ant man, where­as for one who has attained spir­itu­al know­ledge and recog­nised the laws of the uni­verse, free­dom lies in tak­ing on respons­ib­il­ity. Self-dis­cip­line under­taken for the sake of the spir­it's autonomy can release extraordin­ary power, which is indeed needed to per­form spir­itu­al prac­tices suc­cess­fully.

In cul­tiv­at­ing the spir­itu­al sci­ences, it is not know­ing everything that makes one cred­ible, but know­ing one's lim­its. With­draw­al and stead­fast prac­tice lead to suc­cess, and the res­ult is enti­cing. Accord­ing to the secret teach­ings, by know­ledge one gains immor­tal­ity, and by wis­dom etern­al life. The two are not the same: the former is still only the neg­a­tion of tran­si­ence, without any par­tic­u­lar sub­stance, while the lat­ter reveals the pos­it­ive con­tent, the very nature, of conquered tran­si­ence. Here belongs Con­fucius's own con­fes­sion:

I was fif­teen years of age when the desire for learn­ing filled my soul, my will. In my thirties I stood firm in the field of know­ledge, in my forties I no longer had doubts, at fifty I began to recog­nise the pro­found laws of the heav­enly yang-yin prin­ciples, by sixty my ears, too, had opened, and by sev­enty I had become able to fol­low the true desires of my heart, and that without over­step­ping the per­mit­ted meas­ure.

Spir­itu­al know­ledge – as a sac­ri­fice – is super­i­or to every other kind of sac­ri­fice, because it dis­pels illu­sion and leads to lib­er­a­tion. Such know­ledge grants a spir­itu­al self-know­ledge that is etern­al, joy­ful and true. Authen­t­ic spir­itu­al know­ledge is there­fore not merely a the­or­et­ic­al insight but a prac­tic­al exper­i­ence. And the exper­i­ence of God is worth far more than mere theo­lo­gic­al know­ledge.