The Notebooks of Paul Brunton is a rare individual contribution that sets the standard for a whole generation in its field. Its clarity, comprehensiveness, beauty, and thoroughly modern no-nonsense perspective establish a new high-water mark for writings that promote independent, individualized spiritual self-discovery and development.

Meticulously compiled from more than seven thousand pages Paul Brunton (1898-1981) wrote in his most mature years and reserved for posthumous publication, the Notebooks series was originally published as a set of sixteen printed volumes. Each volume in the printed edition covers one or more of the twenty-eight major themes ("categories") into which Paul Brunton organized the most important section of his unpublished writing. Taken individually, each category in the series is remarkable; each explores a unique dimension of human character and spiritual potential. Taken as a whole, the Notebooks series is unmatched for its combination of depth, simplicity, practical detail, inspirational power, and consistent sensibleness.

This electronic edition of The Notebooks abandons the sixteen-volume format but maintains the essential twenty-eightfold structure Paul Brunton himself developed. Many readers will find that this simpler format makes these invigorating writings even easier to approach as an integrated whole.

For editorial conventions we applied in preparing these writings, see the introductions to Perspectives and The Quest. One convention merits explanation here: how we have handled what may appear as outmoded literary form with respect to gender inclusiveness.

Like most writers of his generation. P.B. often employed the literary convention of using masculine gender (for example, he, his, man, mankind) to refer to men and women alike. It is clear from his life and teachings that he valued both genders equally. On the basis of literary convention alone, we could easily update his style to reflect current usage--something he did often through the years himself. But there is an additional complication.

P.B. often used "he" where most of us would use "I" or the editorial "we." It is often not clear if P.B. is using "he" or "his" as a third-person reference to himself or to a specific individual. Many of his writings take on quite different meaning when "he" or "his" is read as "I" or "my." This variable has become even more significant through the years to those of us who knew him and continue to work with his writings.

Finally, P.B. was sensitive to the problems of the old form, but he saw none of the experiments with gender pronouns in use prior to 1981 as a sufficiently stable and suitable alternative for use in philosophic writings meant to withstand the test of time through many generations. For all these reasons, we have not here taken the liberty of substantially modifying his writings in this regard.

We do however, encourage readers to do in their own minds what we often do as we read or memorize the material for our own use: substitute "I" or "we" or "you" wherever the masculine gender offends.

We are grateful to many special individuals, associated with Wisdom's Goldenrod Center for Philosophic Studies, whose stamina and dedication made possible the publishing The Notebooks. We would like to acknowledge the unique contribution of our teacher, Anthony Damiani: He created the community of friends that Wisdom's Goldenrod has become, and provided us with the education needed to recognize P.B. for what he is and what his writings are. In the end, we thank P.B. for his willingness to share his universal wisdom with us all, through his writings, his life, and his presence.