The Study Society

General information

A brief history of the Study Society.
The Study Society was registered in 1951 by the late Dr. F.C. Roles and his friends who had been associates of the Russian philosopher and author P.D. Ouspensky (1878-1947). Ouspensky was particularly interested in the inner life of civilisations and in the convergence of science, philosophy, art and religion in the service of truth. He was also very much concerned with the inner transformation of humanity as a matter of practical experience.

The Society was founded to carry on his aims and researches. He had also asked Dr Roles to look for a simple method of finding inner stillness that was suitable for people living ordinary active lives. Dr Roles fulfilled this aim in the early 1960s when he discovered a method of meditation and the knowledge associated with it, which is part of the Advaita or non-dualist school of philosophy, as taught by His Holiness, the late Shantanand Saraswati, Shankaracharya of Northern India.

The meditation and the knowledge associated with it are intended for people from all backgrounds religions and races. Membership of the Society, and of societies related to it abroad, ranges over all kinds of professions and ages, from those of student years upwards.

The full name of the Society is The Society for the Study of Normal Psychology. It is more usually and conveniently known as The Study Society. The Society is registered as a Friendly Society (No. 60SA).