Page 142 - The Buddha‘s Noble Eightfold Path

this stage is a long way ahead, and until we reach it we have to

be constantly on our guard in order that what we have
developed may be maintained.

The Background of Perfect Effort
From Perfect Effort itself we now turn to the context or

background of Perfect Effort. Just as the ramifications of Perfect
Livelihood extend to the entire community, so do the

ramifications or the implications — of Perfect Effort extend to
the whole evolutionary process. Perfect Effort makes it clear, in
fact, that the spiritual life is a special phase of the evolutionary

process and that it constitutes what I have elsewhere called the
Higher Evolution.

The concept of evolution is in many ways the dominant modern
concept. Emerging in the sphere of biology, it was rapidly

extended to all other departments of knowledge, so that
nowadays we talk about the evolution of the solar system, the

evolution of the arts, the evolution of religion, and so on. As
Julian Huxley says, 'The different branches of science combine to
demonstrate that the universe in its entirety must be regarded as

one gigantic process, a process of becoming, of attaining new
levels of existence and organization, which can properly be called

a genesis or an evolution. Since man is part of the universe, or
part of nature, man too is in process of becoming, man too is
constantly attaining new levels — not just new forms — of

existence and organization. Far from being created at a stroke, as
people used to think, man has evolved — and is evolving still.

Now any evolving phenomenon can be studied in two ways:

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