Balance of Consciousness

Contextual Quote

"The balance of consciousness is what might be called the primary virtue of differentiated consciousness. It consists in not letting the discovery, or the suspicion of the existence, of transcendent being disorient and frighten one in such a way that it lead one to devalue or reject either the immanent or the transcendent pole of being. In other words, one does not let the world as it is be degraded into 'an untruth to be overcome by the truth of transfigured reality'; but neither is the fact and the perfection of transcendent being denied. Rather, one accepts that the meaning of the finite cosmos is incomplete, but fittingly so, as well as that a transcendent fulfillment of that meaning is really discerned in human consciousness. And one accepts, therefore, the life of reason and spirit as that of mediating, of being intermediate between, the truths of finite and of transcendent being, and consequently one accepts also the task of understanding and sanctifying the conditions of finite existence that make it possible to fulfill this function."

- Eric Voegelin [1]