A New Model of the Universe

A collection of essays written by Ouspensky between 1907 and 1914, before his encounter with Gurdjieff, revised and expanded in later editions. The book covers a wide range of cosmological and esoteric themes: the fourth dimension, the model of the universe implied by higher geometries, eternal recurrence and the possibility of escaping mechanical time, esoteric Christianity, the nature of the superman, yoga, sex as a cosmological force, and the relationship between esotericism and contemporary science and art. Ouspensky's preface frames the entire collection around the distinction between the psychological method and the logical mind — his conviction that higher understanding cannot be reached through ordinary logical thought alone, and that the psychological approach (transforming the quality of one's perception rather than accumulating concepts) is the necessary entry point to esoteric knowledge. Though written independently of the Fourth Way system he would later transmit, A New Model of the Universe prefigures many of its central concerns and reveals the intellectual range and philosophical restlessness that made Ouspensky so effective as a transmitter of Gurdjieff's ideas.