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See this link. http://www.ardue.org.uk/university/system/lect07.html. I shan't paste the text.

No one has responded to this, but then I never passed any comment, nor asked any question.

What was this certain substance Gurdjieff was referring too.

What, if anything,can you say about his 'sly man.'

Interestingly enough I feel as if I personally know where the authors coming from. I feel as if, despite having just read his work for the first time, I know exactly what the fourth way is and may have even started on it subconsciously (which would tie into the authors description about it). Especially considering that I match most of the criteria he lists.

If I'm right in my interpretation than it may be somewhat difficult to explain. The "sly man" he's talking about is someone who possesses something the other pursuers do not. For lack of a better term I'll call this possession "intuition" (or as Gurdjieff refers to it: "consciousness") which in my case was inherited. Whether you discover the fourth way or not is predetermined by genetics and the conditions of your life. It's not like the other three where you can "force" the process to occur. If it doesn't come to you naturally than you're not going to be able to enact it.

The fourth way is all about using your life's experiences to pursue the "truth" of reality and try and gain understanding about it. Through this process you'll slowly gain an understanding of two of the other ways as well, just as I've come to understand the limits our body (fakir) and intellect (yogi) can be pushed to. Yet the way of the monk is NOT included in this understanding. Why is this? Because the monk requires faith to achieve immortality and the fourth way is all about questioning things and not accepting them as they are; the exact opposite of faith.

The other three ways focus on obtaining emotional, physical, and intellectual mastery over yourself. The fourth way does all of this naturally and so instead focuses on the devolopment of something else even more important: willpower. Once the "sly man" has achieved both the truth and willpower he can then do what all other ways strived to do from the very beggining: create the mysterious substance whatever it may be all at once rather than in increments because he knows how to having reached understanding of all things.

The last paragraph struck me the most powerfully.

A couple of observations leading to one conclusion. First observation being that this is an essay about immortality written by a deceased author. Next observation: he describes paths to immortality that all end in the grave. There are no examples of yogis, fakirs or monks living more than long yet still natural mortal lives. Now, looking at those observations in the light of what I know of Gurdjieff (he was brilliant, and he had real understanding and was described by insightful contemporaries as 'powerful' and his writing is often enigmatic) leads me to my conclusion. I believe he was not speaking of physical immortality in the way we typically use the words "physical immortality"

I will re read it with fresh eyes after sleeping on my first reading. My first impression is that he meant something more than I understood.

The Sly Man obviously knows what the other three have been up to, and uses their attributes to his advantage.

Interesting read though., I quite like it.

A couple of observations leading to one conclusion. First observation being that this is an essay about immortality written by a deceased author.

Good point.

Next observation: he describes paths to immortality that all end in the grave. There are no examples of yogis, fakirs or monks living more than long yet still natural mortal lives.


There are a few examples of them living very long times. can't provide links though.

How can you say there are NO examples? I've heard plenty of stories. If someone out there was 3000 years old, how would you really know? If I said "here's an example" and it really was a guy that was 3000 years old, would you be satisfied with my example? Probably not! Tons of celebs and famous people and people in mafias, gangs, and other situations have faked their own deaths. Meaning assuming a new identity is not difficult. Devils advocate

Horny Goat wrote: Next observation: he describes paths to immortality that all end in the grave. There are no examples of yogis, fakirs or monks living more than long yet still natural mortal lives.

For this, youll have to look to the alchemists. Or the bible, in which the earlier humans live for hundreds of years.

Biblical antedeluvian lives and alchemical life extension are not the topic of Gurdjieff's article. My statement was that he wrote about paths to immortality; the paths of the yogis, the fakir and the monk and lastly of the "sly man" who he seems to favor in the piece. He writes of those paths, none of which can we say with anything more than speculation or devils advocate style rhetoric has a track record of producing anything more or less than long but mortal life. No, we can't say no one has ever achieved immortality, and I didn't say that. We can't say no alchemists used the stone successfully, nor can we say that early biblical characters lived less than the (give or take)thousand years the bible says they did. Never said that. I said that the dead guy who wrote this article about immortality described three paths and alluded to a fourth, and none of those paths seems effective. Thus Gurdjieff's current deadness.