And since this becomes his occupation, and this becomes his nourishment, this outer world, then he becomes mortal. In other words: the immortal being becomes mortal by borrowing all that he needs from the mortal world. The more he depends upon the external life, the more he forgets the inner life, and there comes a time when he entirely forgets that there can exist a life which is above, which is beyond this external life. We do not need to go to see the example of this very far, when we see just now the condition of the world. We see that, with all this progress, there is materialism every day on the increase, and all the suffering that humanity has gone through, and just now humanity is going through, has been caused by this ever-increasing materialism.