Thomas Merton's "illusary, fictional I"

The illusary, fictional I sounds like the ego to me.  Don't ask me the route I took but somehow in my web travels today, I came upon some quotes by Thomas Merton that captured my attention.  They captured my attention, in part, because they say things very similar to what Tolle says about the egoic mind. 

• "All sin starts with the assumption that my false self, the self that exists only in my egocentric desires, is the fundamental reality of life to which everything else in the universe is ordered."
• “There is only an illusory, fictional ‘I’ which seeks itself, struggles to create itself out of nothing, maintained in being by its own compulsion and the prisoner of his private illusion.”
• "We must make the choices that enable us to fulfill the deepest capacities of our real selves."

I've spent the past hour or so...via google...exploring Thomas Merton sites on the internet.  I found a a fairly new blog called Merton and Friends Weblog.  It takes quotes from Merton's writings and then adds a short commentary.  At a site called  The Words of Thomas Merton..there is quite a stash of quotes, some displayed against a photo background.  Resources abound on the web about Merton...although there is very little of his writings for free.  Most of his books (and there are a lot of them) can be purchased all over the place.  I found the "Seeds of Contemplation" at google for 34 cents (plus 3.99 for shipping).