"Simplicity" meaning the unification of all the being’s powers, is a feature of the return to the "primordial state"; and here is seen the whole difference that separates the transcendent knowledge of the sage from ordinary and "profane" knowledge. This "simplicity" is also what is called elsewhere the state of "childhood" (in Sanskrit baalya), to be understood of course in the spiritual sense, and this "childhood" is considered in the Hindu doctrine as an indispensable condition for attaining to true knowledge. Studies in Comparative Religion Winter Issue (1973) AL-FAQR (’SPIRITUAL POVERTY’)

The "simplicity" referred to above corresponds to the unity "without dimensions" of the primordial point, which marks the end of the movement back to the origin. "The man who is absolutely simple sways by his simplicity all beings, so effectively that nothing sets itself against him in the six regions of space, nothing is hostile to him, and fire and water do not injure him"(Lie-Tseu). In fact, he remains at the center, which the six directions have issued from by radiation, and where, in the movement that takes them back, they come to be neutralized two by two, so that, in this single point their threefold opposition ceases entirely, and nothing that results from them or that is situated in them can reach the being who dwells in immutable unity. Studies in Comparative Religion Winter Issue (1973) AL-FAQR (’SPIRITUAL POVERTY’)

"Poverty", "simplicity" and "childhood", are no more than one same thing, and the process of being stripped which all these words express (footnote: It is the "being stripped of metals" in the Masonic symbolism.) culminates in an extinction" which is, in reality , the fullness of the being, just as "inaction" (wu-wei) is the fullness of activity , because it is from it that all the particular activities are derived; "The Principle is always inactive, and yet everything is done by it"(Tao-Te-Ching). Studies in Comparative Religion Winter Issue (1973) AL-FAQR (’SPIRITUAL POVERTY’)

This recalls the corresponding words in the Gospels; "Whosoever shall not receive the Kingdom of God as a little child shall in no wise enter therein" (St. Luke, XVIII 17.), "Thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent and hast revealed them unto babes. (St. Matthew  , XI. 25; St. Luke, X. 21.) "Simplicity" and "smallness" are here equivalents, in reality, of the "poverty" which is so often mentioned also in the Gospels, and which is generally very much misunderstood: "Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven" (5t. Matthew, V. 2.) Studies in Comparative Religion Winter Issue (1973) AL-FAQR (’SPIRITUAL POVERTY’)