Man in Search of Himself

My attention was drawn to the book in 1988, by which time it was already out of print. Fortunately, my daughter, Isobel, found a second-hand copy in Watkins London bookshop, and it has gradually become a most treasured possession.

The attentive reader will probably agree that when it first appeared, and despite the clarity of its exposition, this book was (and probably still is) far ahead of the prevailing intellectual and spiritual climate. I confess that I myself was not ready for it at first sight, and it is only after twenty years of diligent study and expansion of consciousness that I find myself completely "comfortable" with its contents. I assure the new reader that patient concentration will be well rewarded and I have tried through the medium of this site to share with readers some of the other influences I have found helpful in my attempts at self-improvement.

One of the most beneficial influences of this book on myself has been increased sensitivity to the vast range of meanings that may be attributed to any particular form of words. For example, in The World, the author writes: "Let us then agree as a matter of definition to give the name 'Universe' to the sum-total of all that exists". I have elsewhere expressed my personal prejudice for the use of a capital 'U' when referring to the Universe in this sense, in which it is virtually a synonym for what is elsewhere referred to as "Being". When, e.g., in What Evolves?, Charon says that universe is "the expression of Being through language", he means that for each of us the "universe" is what we "picture" for ourselves and express to one another in words. Thus each individual "being" creates his or her own "universe". I hope readers will correct me whenever they detect that I have inadvertently written "Universe" when I should have written "universe", and vice versa.

Jean Charon wrote several books exploring and attempting to explain the mutual interdependence of physics and spirituality. What I think may have been his last book, The Unknown Spirit (The unity of matter and spirit in space and time), was published in French in 1977 and (in an English translation by Chantal Coedic and Ian Fenton) by Coventure Ltd in 1983. I believe it is still fairly easily available. Any reader who is familiar with this later work is cordially invited to express his or her thoughts about it through the Ardue Mailing List.