Yoga Sutras
{"WorkMasterId":6968,"WpPageId":285877,"ParentWpPageId":193880,"Slug":"yoga-sutras","Url":"https://chrisdeasy.com/theos/humanities/philosophy/philosophers/patanjali/yoga-sutras/","RelativeUrl":"theos/humanities/philosophy/philosophers/patanjali/yoga-sutras/","HasFullText":true,"RawHtmlLength":260383,"CleanHtmlLength":203199,"Kicker":"Philosophy Work","Title":"Yoga Sutras","Deck":"The Yoga Sutras present classical Yoga as disciplined restraint of mental fluctuations, analysis of affliction and karma, meditative absorption, and liberation as kaivalya","BackLink":{"Text":"Back to Patanjali","Url":"https://chrisdeasy.com/theos/humanities/philosophy/philosophers/patanjali/"},"AuthorCard":{"Label":"Author","Title":"Patanjali","Url":"https://chrisdeasy.com/theos/humanities/philosophy/philosophers/patanjali/","MediaHref":"","ImageSrc":"https://chrisdeasy.com/wp-content/uploads/patanjali-01-a-garlanded-patanjali-statue.jpg","ImageAlt":"Garlanded statue of Patanjali","FilterTerra":"India and Central Asia","ClickText":"Patanjali","ClickHref":"https://chrisdeasy.com/theos/humanities/philosophy/philosophers/patanjali/","Copies":["350 CE – 450 CE","India","Classical Yoga philosopher of the Yoga Sutras, citta-vritti-nirodha, purusha, prakriti, kleshas, karma, samadhi, kaivalya, Ishvara, and eight-limbed practice."]},"ContextCards":[{"Label":"Period","Key":"Period:1","Title":"Ancient History","DateText":"3000 BCE – 499 CE","Url":"https://chrisdeasy.com/theos/humanities/philosophy/eras-of-thought/philosophers-of-ancient-history/"},{"Label":"Era","Key":"Era:3","Title":"Classical Antiquity","DateText":"500 BCE – 499 CE","Url":"https://chrisdeasy.com/theos/humanities/philosophy/eras-of-thought/philosophers-of-ancient-history/philosophers-of-classical-antiquity/"},{"Label":"Composition","Title":"400 CE","Url":"","DateText":""}],"DateNote":"Displayed year follows the available source evidence; uncertainty is preserved in the evidence notes","GeoCards":[{"Label":"Region","Key":"Region:2"},{"Label":"Terra Avita","Key":"TerraAvita:9"},{"Label":"Terra Avita Region","Key":"TerraAvitaRegion:37"},{"Label":"Modern Country","Key":"Country:IND:9"}],"OriginalTitle":"Yoga Sutra","Language":"Sanskrit","DisciplineCards":[{"Label":"Primary Discipline","Key":"Discipline:philosophy-of-mind"},{"Label":"Secondary Discipline","Key":"Discipline:ethics"}],"Tradition":"Classical Yoga","FullText":{"Title":"Full Text","Copy":"Public-domain full text from Project Gutenberg eBook #2526 .","Url":"","Label":"","Kicker":"","Cards":[]},"CoreThesis":["The Yoga Sutras present classical Yoga as disciplined restraint of mental fluctuations, analysis of affliction and karma, meditative absorption, and liberation as kaivalya"],"Classification":{"AlternateTitles":"Patanjala Yoga Sutra; Yoga Sutras of Patanjali","KeyConcepts":"Patanjala Yoga Sutra; Yoga Sutras of Patanjali","Methodology":"Bibliographic comparison and source-context review","Structure":"Documented work entry with debated date and authorship"},"Arguments":["The Yoga Sutras present classical Yoga as disciplined restraint of mental fluctuations, analysis of affliction and karma, meditative absorption, and liberation as kaivalya"],"Influence":{"InfluencedBy":"","InfluenceOn":""},"Significance":["Register only the Yoga Sutras for this profile. The four padas and eight limbs are themes, not separate work rows; Mahabhashya and medical attributions are not registered here","Yoga Sutras is included as the foundational aphoristic work of classical Yoga. Date and authorship are debated."],"EvidenceNote":["Register only the Yoga Sutras for this profile. The four padas and eight limbs are themes, not separate work rows; Mahabhashya and medical attributions are not registered here"],"MainSections":[{"Kind":"RawSection","Title":"Full Versions","BodyHtml":"\u003cdiv class=\"dz-philo__full-version-grid\"\u003e\n \u003carticle class=\"dz-philo__full-version-card\"\u003e\n \u003cp class=\"dz-philo__full-version-provider\"\u003eProject Gutenberg\u003c/p\u003e\n \u003ch3 class=\"dz-philo__full-version-title\"\u003eProject Gutenberg eBook #2526\u003c/h3\u003e\n \u003cp class=\"dz-philo__full-version-meta\"\u003eHtmlText · Imported\u003c/p\u003e\n \u003ca class=\"dz-philo__full-version-link\" href=\"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/2526\"\u003eOpen full version\u003c/a\u003e\n \u003c/article\u003e\n \u003c/div\u003e"},{"Kind":"TextSection","Title":"Core Thesis","Paragraphs":["The Yoga Sutras present classical Yoga as disciplined restraint of mental fluctuations, analysis of affliction and karma, meditative absorption, and liberation as kaivalya"]},{"Kind":"FieldSection","Title":"Classification","Fields":[{"Label":"Alternate Titles","Value":"Patanjala Yoga Sutra; Yoga Sutras of Patanjali"},{"Label":"Key Concepts","Value":"Patanjala Yoga Sutra; Yoga Sutras of Patanjali"},{"Label":"Methodology","Value":"Bibliographic comparison and source-context review"},{"Label":"Structure","Value":"Documented work entry with debated date and authorship"}]},{"Kind":"TextSection","Title":"Arguments","Paragraphs":["The Yoga Sutras present classical Yoga as disciplined restraint of mental fluctuations, analysis of affliction and karma, meditative absorption, and liberation as kaivalya"]},{"Kind":"FieldSection","Title":"Influence","Fields":[{"Label":"Influenced By","Value":""},{"Label":"Influence On","Value":""}]},{"Kind":"TextSection","Title":"Significance","Paragraphs":["Register only the Yoga Sutras for this profile. The four padas and eight limbs are themes, not separate work rows; Mahabhashya and medical attributions are not registered here","Yoga Sutras is included as the foundational aphoristic work of classical Yoga. Date and authorship are debated."]},{"Kind":"TextSection","Title":"Evidence Note","Paragraphs":["Register only the Yoga Sutras for this profile. The four padas and eight limbs are themes, not separate work rows; Mahabhashya and medical attributions are not registered here"]},{"Kind":"RawSection","Title":"Full Text","BodyHtml":"\u003cp class=\"dz-philo__section-copy dz-philo__full-text-source\"\u003ePublic-domain full text from \u003ca href=\"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/2526\"\u003eProject Gutenberg eBook #2526\u003c/a\u003e.\u003c/p\u003e\n \u003carticle class=\"dz-philo__full-text-body\"\u003e\r\n\u003c\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\r\n\u003ch1\u003eTHE YOGA SUTRAS OF PATANJALI\u003c/h1\u003e\r\n\u003ch3\u003e“The Book of the Spiritual Man”\u003c/h3\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"center\"\u003e\r\nAn Interpretation By\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003ch2 class=\"no-break\"\u003eCharles Johnston\u003c/h2\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"center\"\u003e\r\nBengal Civil Service, Retired;\u003cbr\u003e\r\nIndian Civil Service, Sanskrit Prizeman;\u003cbr\u003e\r\nDublin University, Sanskrit Prizeman\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003chr\u003e\r\n\u003ch2\u003eContents\u003c/h2\u003e\r\n\u003ctable style=\"\"\u003e\r\n\u003ctbody\u003e\u003ctr\u003e\r\n\u003ctd\u003e \u003ca href=\"#chap01\" class=\"pginternal\"\u003eINTRODUCTION TO BOOK I\u003c/a\u003e\u003c/td\u003e\r\n\u003c/tr\u003e\r\n\u003ctr\u003e\r\n\u003ctd\u003e \u003ca href=\"#chap02\" class=\"pginternal\"\u003eBOOK I\u003c/a\u003e\u003c/td\u003e\r\n\u003c/tr\u003e\r\n\u003ctr\u003e\r\n\u003ctd\u003e \u003ca href=\"#chap03\" class=\"pginternal\"\u003eINTRODUCTION TO BOOK II\u003c/a\u003e\u003c/td\u003e\r\n\u003c/tr\u003e\r\n\u003ctr\u003e\r\n\u003ctd\u003e \u003ca href=\"#chap04\" class=\"pginternal\"\u003eBOOK II\u003c/a\u003e\u003c/td\u003e\r\n\u003c/tr\u003e\r\n\u003ctr\u003e\r\n\u003ctd\u003e \u003ca href=\"#chap05\" class=\"pginternal\"\u003eINTRODUCTION TO BOOK III\u003c/a\u003e\u003c/td\u003e\r\n\u003c/tr\u003e\r\n\u003ctr\u003e\r\n\u003ctd\u003e \u003ca href=\"#chap06\" class=\"pginternal\"\u003eBOOK III\u003c/a\u003e\u003c/td\u003e\r\n\u003c/tr\u003e\r\n\u003ctr\u003e\r\n\u003ctd\u003e \u003ca href=\"#chap07\" class=\"pginternal\"\u003eINTRODUCTION TO BOOK IV\u003c/a\u003e\u003c/td\u003e\r\n\u003c/tr\u003e\r\n\u003ctr\u003e\r\n\u003ctd\u003e \u003ca href=\"#chap08\" class=\"pginternal\"\u003eBOOK IV\u003c/a\u003e\u003c/td\u003e\r\n\u003c/tr\u003e\r\n\u003c/tbody\u003e\u003c/table\u003e\r\n\u003cdiv class=\"chapter\"\u003e\r\n\u003ch2\u003e\u003ca id=\"chap01\"\u003e\u003c/a\u003eINTRODUCTION TO BOOK I\u003c/h2\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe Yoga Sutras of Patanjali are in themselves exceedingly brief, less than ten\r\npages of large type in the original. Yet they contain the essence of practical\r\nwisdom, set forth in admirable order and detail. The theme, if the present\r\ninterpreter be right, is the great regeneration, the birth of the spiritual\r\nfrom the psychical man: the same theme which Paul so wisely and eloquently set\r\nforth in writing to his disciples in Corinth, the theme of all mystics in all\r\nlands.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nWe think of ourselves as living a purely physical life, in these material\r\nbodies of ours. In reality, we have gone far indeed from pure physical life;\r\nfor ages, our life has been psychical, we have been centred and immersed in the\r\npsychic nature. Some of the schools of India say that the psychic nature is, as\r\nit were, a looking-glass, wherein are mirrored the things seen by the physical\r\neyes, and heard by the physical ears. But this is a magic mirror; the images\r\nremain, and take a certain life of their own. Thus within the psychic realm of\r\nour life there grows up an imaged world wherein we dwell; a world of the images\r\nof things seen and heard, and therefore a world of memories; a world also of\r\nhopes and desires, of fears and regrets. Mental life grows up among these\r\nimages, built on a measuring and comparing, on the massing of images together\r\ninto general ideas; on the abstraction of new notions and images from these;\r\ntill a new world is built up within, full of desires and hates, ambition, envy,\r\nlonging, speculation, curiosity, self-will, self-interest.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe teaching of the East is, that all these are true powers overlaid by false\r\ndesires; that though in manifestation psychical, they are in essence spiritual;\r\nthat the psychical man is the veil and prophecy of the spiritual man.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe purpose of life, therefore, is the realizing of that prophecy; the\r\nunveiling of the immortal man; the birth of the spiritual from the psychical,\r\nwhereby we enter our divine inheritance and come to inhabit Eternity. This is,\r\nindeed, salvation, the purpose of all true religion, in all times.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nPatanjali has in mind the spiritual man, to be born from the psychical. His\r\npurpose is, to set in order the practical means for the unveiling and\r\nregeneration, and to indicate the fruit, the glory and the power, of that new\r\nbirth.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThrough the Sutras of the first book, Patanjali is concerned with the first\r\ngreat problem, the emergence of the spiritual man from the veils and meshes of\r\nthe psychic nature, the moods and vestures of the mental and emotional man.\r\nLater will come the consideration of the nature and powers of the spiritual\r\nman, once he stands clear of the psychic veils and trammels, and a view of the\r\nrealms in which these new spiritual powers are to be revealed.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nAt this point may come a word of explanation. I have been asked why I use the\r\nword Sutras, for these rules of Patanjali’s system, when the word\r\nAphorism has been connected with them in our minds for a generation. The reason\r\nis this: the name Aphorism suggests, to me at least, a pithy sentence of very\r\ngeneral application; a piece of proverbial wisdom that may be quoted in a good\r\nmany sets of circumstance, and which will almost bear on its face the evidence\r\nof its truth. But with a Sutra the case is different. It comes from the same\r\nroot as the word “sew,” and means, indeed, a thread, suggesting,\r\ntherefore, a close knit, consecutive chain of argument. Not only has each Sutra\r\na definite place in the system, but further, taken out of this place, it will\r\nbe almost meaningless, and will by no means be self-evident. So I have thought\r\nbest to adhere to the original word. The Sutras of Patanjali are as closely\r\nknit together, as dependent on each other, as the propositions of Euclid, and\r\ncan no more be taken out of their proper setting.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nIn the second part of the first book, the problem of the emergence of the\r\nspiritual man is further dealt with. We are led to the consideration of the\r\nbarriers to his emergence, of the overcoming of the barriers, and of certain\r\nsteps and stages in the ascent from the ordinary consciousness of practical\r\nlife, to the finer, deeper, radiant consciousness of the spiritual man.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003c/div\u003e\u003c!–end chapter–\u003e\r\n\u003cdiv class=\"chapter\"\u003e\r\n\u003ch2\u003e\u003ca id=\"chap02\"\u003e\u003c/a\u003eBOOK I\u003c/h2\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n1. OM: Here follows Instruction in Union.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nUnion, here as always in the Scriptures of India, means union of the individual\r\nsoul with the Oversoul; of the personal consciousness with the Divine\r\nConsciousness, whereby the mortal becomes immortal, and enters the Eternal.\r\nTherefore, salvation is, first, freedom from sin and the sorrow which comes\r\nfrom sin, and then a divine and eternal well-being, wherein the soul partakes\r\nof the being, the wisdom and glory of God.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n2. Union, spiritual consciousness, is gained through control of the versatile\r\npsychic nature.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe goal is the full consciousness of the spiritual man, illumined by the\r\nDivine Light. Nothing except the obdurate resistance of the psychic nature\r\nkeeps us back from the goal. The psychical powers are spiritual powers run\r\nwild, perverted, drawn from their proper channel. Therefore our first task is,\r\nto regain control of this perverted nature, to chasten, purify and restore the\r\nmisplaced powers.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n3. Then the Seer comes to consciousness in his proper nature.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nEgotism is but the perversion of spiritual being. Ambition is the inversion of\r\nspiritual power. Passion is the distortion of love. The mortal is the\r\nlimitation of the immortal. When these false images give place to true, then\r\nthe spiritual man stands forth luminous, as the sun, when the clouds disperse.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n4. Heretofore the Seer has been enmeshed in the activities of the psychic\r\nnature.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe power and life which are the heritage of the spiritual man have been caught\r\nand enmeshed in psychical activities. Instead of pure being in the Divine,\r\nthere has been fretful, combative, egotism, its hand against every man. Instead\r\nof the light of pure vision, there have been restless senses nave been re and\r\nimaginings. Instead of spiritual joy, the undivided joy of pure being, there\r\nhas been self-indulgence of body and mind. These are all real forces, but\r\ndistorted from their true nature and goal. They must be extricated, like gems\r\nfrom the matrix, like the pith from the reed, steadily, without destructive\r\nviolence. Spiritual powers are to be drawn forth from the psychic meshes.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n5. The psychic activities are five; they are either subject or not subject to\r\nthe five hindrances (Book II, 3).\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe psychic nature is built up through the image-making power, the power which\r\nlies behind and dwells in mind-pictures. These pictures do not remain quiescent\r\nin the mind; they are kinetic, restless, stimulating to new acts. Thus the\r\nmind-image of an indulgence suggests and invites to a new indulgence; the\r\npicture of past joy is framed in regrets or hopes. And there is the ceaseless\r\nplay of the desire to know, to penetrate to the essence of things, to classify.\r\nThis, too, busies itself ceaselessly with the mind-images. So that we may\r\nclassify the activities of the psychic nature thus:\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n6. These activities are: Sound intellection, unsound intellection, predication,\r\nsleep, memory.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nWe have here a list of mental and emotional powers; of powers that picture and\r\nobserve, and of powers that picture and feel. But the power to know and feel is\r\nspiritual and immortal. What is needed is, not to destroy it, but to raise it\r\nfrom the psychical to the spiritual realm.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n7. The elements of sound intellection are: direct observation, inductive\r\nreason, and trustworthy testimony.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nEach of these is a spiritual power, thinly veiled. Direct observation is the\r\noutermost form of the Soul’s pure vision. Inductive reason rests on the\r\ngreat principles of continuity and correspondence; and these, on the supreme\r\ntruth that all life is of the One. Trustworthy testimony, the sharing of one\r\nsoul in the wisdom of another, rests on the ultimate oneness of all souls.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n8. Unsound intellection is false understanding, not resting on a perception of\r\nthe true nature of things.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nWhen the object is not truly perceived, when the observation is inaccurate and\r\nfaulty, thought or reasoning based on that mistaken perception is of necessity\r\nfalse and unsound.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n9. Predication is carried on through words or thoughts not resting on an object\r\nperceived.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe purpose of this Sutra is, to distinguish between the mental process of\r\npredication, and observation, induction or testimony. Predication is the\r\nattribution of a quality or action to a subject, by adding to it a predicate.\r\nIn the sentence, “the man is wise,” “the man” is the\r\nsubject; “is wise” is the predicate. This may be simply an\r\ninterplay of thoughts, without the presence of the object thought of; or the\r\nthings thought of may be imaginary or unreal; while observation, induction and\r\ntestimony always go back to an object.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n10. Sleep is the psychic condition which rests on mind states, all material\r\nthings being absent.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nIn waking life, we have two currents of perception; an outer current of\r\nphysical things seen and heard and perceived; an inner current of mind-images\r\nand thoughts. The outer current ceases in sleep; the inner current continues,\r\nand watching the mind-images float before the field of consciousness, we\r\n“dream.” Even when there are no dreams, there is still a certain\r\nconsciousness in sleep, so that, on waking, one says, “I have slept\r\nwell,” or “I have slept badly.”\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n11. Memory is holding to mind-images of things perceived, without modifying\r\nthem.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nHere, as before, the mental power is explained in terms of mind-images, which\r\nare the material of which the psychic world is built, Therefore the sages teach\r\nthat the world of our perception, which is indeed a world of mind-images, is\r\nbut the wraith or shadow of the real and everlasting world. In this sense,\r\nmemory is but the psychical inversion of the spiritual, ever-present vision.\r\nThat which is ever before the spiritual eye of the Seer needs not to be\r\nremembered.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n12. The control of these psychic activities comes through the right use of the\r\nwill, and through ceasing from self-indulgence.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nIf these psychical powers and energies, even such evil things as passion and\r\nhate and fear, are but spiritual powers fallen and perverted, how are we to\r\nbring about their release and restoration? Two means are presented to us: the\r\nawakening of the spiritual will, and the purification of mind and thought.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n13. The right use of the will is the steady, effort to stand in spiritual\r\nbeing.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nWe have thought of ourselves, perhaps, as creatures moving upon this earth,\r\nrather helpless, at the mercy of storm and hunger and our enemies. We are to\r\nthink of ourselves as immortals, dwelling in the Light, encompassed and\r\nsustained by spiritual powers. The steady effort to hold this thought will\r\nawaken dormant and unrealized powers, which will unveil to us the nearness of\r\nthe Eternal.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n14. This becomes a firm resting-place, when followed long, persistently, with\r\nearnestness.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nWe must seek spiritual life in conformity with the laws of spiritual life, with\r\nearnestness, humility, gentle charity, which is an acknowledgment of the One\r\nSoul within us all. Only through obedience to that shared Life, through\r\nperpetual remembrance of our oneness with all Divine Being, our nothingness\r\napart from Divine Being, can we enter our inheritance.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n15. Ceasing from self-indulgence is conscious mastery over the thirst for\r\nsensuous pleasure here or hereafter.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nRightly understood, the desire for sensation is the desire of being, the\r\ndistortion of the soul’s eternal life. The lust of sensual stimulus and\r\nexcitation rests on the longing to feel one’s life keenly, to gain the\r\nsense of being really alive. This sense of true life comes only with the coming\r\nof the soul, and the soul comes only in silence, after self-indulgence has been\r\ncourageously and loyally stilled, through reverence before the coming soul.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n16. The consummation of this is freedom from thirst for any mode of psychical\r\nactivity, through the establishment of the spiritual man.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nIn order to gain a true understanding of this teaching, study must be\r\nsupplemented by devoted practice, faith by works. The reading of the words will\r\nnot avail. There must be a real effort to stand as the Soul, a real ceasing\r\nfrom self-indulgence. With this awakening of the spiritual will, and\r\npurification, will come at once the growth of the spiritual man and our\r\nawakening consciousness as the spiritual man; and this, attained in even a\r\nsmall degree, will help us notably in our contest. To him that hath, shall be\r\ngiven.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n17. Meditation with an object follows these stages: first, exterior examining,\r\nthen interior judicial action, then joy, then realization of individual being.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nIn the practice of meditation, a beginning may be made by fixing the attention\r\nupon some external object, such as a sacred image or picture, or a part of a\r\nbook of devotion. In the second stage, one passes from the outer object to an\r\ninner pondering upon its lessons. The third stage is the inspiration, the\r\nheightening of the spiritual will, which results from this pondering. The\r\nfourth stage is the realization of one’s spiritual being, as enkindled by\r\nthis meditation.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n18. After the exercise of the will has stilled the psychic activities,\r\nmeditation rests only on the fruit of former meditations.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nIn virtue of continued practice and effort, the need of an external object on\r\nwhich to rest the meditation is outgrown. An interior state of spiritual\r\nconsciousness is reached, which is called “the cloud of things\r\nknowable” (Book IV, 29).\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n19. Subjective consciousness arising from a natural cause is possessed by those\r\nwho have laid aside their bodies and been absorbed into subjective nature.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThose who have died, entered the paradise between births, are in a condition\r\nresembling meditation without an external object. But in the fullness of time,\r\nthe seeds of desire in them will spring up, and they will be born again into\r\nthis world.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n20. For the others, there is spiritual consciousness, led up to by faith,\r\nvalour, right mindfulness, one-pointedness, perception.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nIt is well to keep in mind these steps on the path to illumination: faith,\r\nvalour, right mindfulness, one-pointedness, perception. Not one can be\r\ndispensed with; all must be won. First faith; and then from faith, valour; from\r\nvalour, right mindfulness; from right mindfulness, a one-pointed aspiration\r\ntoward the soul; from this, perception; and finally, full vision as the soul.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n21. Spiritual consciousness is nearest to those of keen, intense will.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe image used is the swift impetus of the torrent; the kingdom must be taken\r\nby force. Firm will comes only through effort; effort is inspired by faith. The\r\ngreat secret is this: it is not enough to have intuitions; we must act on them;\r\nwe must live them.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n22. The will may be weak, or of middle strength, or intense.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nTherefore there is a spiritual consciousness higher than this. For those of\r\nweak will, there is this counsel: to be faithful in obedience, to live the\r\nlife, and thus to strengthen the will to more perfect obedience. The will is\r\nnot ours, but God’s, and we come into it only through obedience. As we\r\nenter into the spirit of God, we are permitted to share the power of God.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\n Higher than the three stages of the way is the goal, the end of the way.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n23. Or spiritual consciousness may be gained by ardent service of the Master.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nIf we think of our lives as tasks laid on us by the Master of Life, if we look\r\non all duties as parts of that Master’s work, entrusted to us, and\r\nforming our life-work; then, if we obey, promptly, loyally, sincerely, we shall\r\nenter by degrees into the Master’s life and share the Master’s\r\npower. Thus we shall be initiated into the spiritual will.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n24. The Master is the spiritual man, who is free from hindrances, bondage to\r\nworks, and the fruition and seed of works.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe Soul of the Master, the Lord, is of the same nature as the soul in us; but\r\nwe still bear the burden of many evils, we are in bondage through our former\r\nworks, we are under the dominance of sorrow. The Soul of the Master is free\r\nfrom sin and servitude and sorrow.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n25. In the Master is the perfect seed of Omniscience.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe Soul of the Master is in essence one with the Oversoul, and therefore\r\npartaker of the Oversoul’s all-wisdom and all-power. All spiritual\r\nattainment rests on this, and is possible because the soul and the Oversoul are\r\nOne.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n26. He is the Teacher of all who have gone before, since he is not limited by\r\nTime.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nFrom the beginning, the Oversoul has been the Teacher of all souls, which, by\r\ntheir entrance into the Oversoul, by realizing their oneness with the Oversoul,\r\nhave inherited the kingdom of the Light. For the Oversoul is before Time, and\r\nTime, father of all else, is one of His children.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n27. His word is OM.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nOM: the symbol of the Three in One, the three worlds in the Soul; the three\r\ntimes, past, present, future, in Eternity; the three Divine Powers, Creation,\r\nPreservation, Transformation, in the one Being; the three essences,\r\nimmortality, omniscience, joy, in the one Spirit. This is the Word, the Symbol,\r\nof the Master and Lord, the perfected Spiritual Man.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n28. Let there be soundless repetition of OM and meditation thereon.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThis has many meanings, in ascending degrees. There is, first, the potency of\r\nthe word itself, as of all words. Then there is the manifold significance of\r\nthe symbol, as suggested above. Lastly, there is the spiritual realization of\r\nthe high essences thus symbolized. Thus we rise step by step to the Eternal.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n29. Thence come the awakening of interior consciousness, and the removal of\r\nbarriers.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nHere again faith must be supplemented by works, the life must be led as well as\r\nstudied, before the full meaning can be understood. The awakening of spiritual\r\nconsciousness can only be understood in measure as it is entered. It can only\r\nbe entered where the conditions are present: purity of heart, and strong\r\naspiration, and the resolute conquest of each sin.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThis, however, may easily be understood: that the recognition of the three\r\nworlds as resting in the Soul leads us to realize ourselves and all life as of\r\nthe Soul; that, as we dwell, not in past, present or future, but in the\r\nEternal, we become more at one with the Eternal; that, as we view all\r\norganization, preservation, mutation as the work of the Divine One, we shall\r\ncome more into harmony with the One, and thus remove the barrier’ in our\r\npath toward the Light.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nIn the second part of the first book, the problem of the emergence of the\r\nspiritual man is further dealt with. We are led to the consideration of the\r\nbarriers to his emergence, of the overcoming of the barriers, and of certain\r\nsteps and stages in the ascent from the ordinary consciousness of practical\r\nlife, to the finer, deeper, radiant consciousness of the spiritual man.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n30. The barriers to interior consciousness, which drive the psychic nature this\r\nway and that, are these: sickness, inertia, doubt, lightmindedness, laziness,\r\nintemperance, false notions, inability to reach a stage of meditation, or to\r\nhold it when reached.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nWe must remember that we are considering the spiritual man as enwrapped and\r\nenmeshed by the psychic nature, the emotional and mental powers; and as unable\r\nto come to clear consciousness, unable to stand and see clearly, because of the\r\npsychic veils of the personality. Nine of these are enumerated, and they go\r\npretty thoroughly into the brute toughness of the psychic nature.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nSickness is included rather for its effect on the emotions and mind, since\r\nbodily infirmity, such as blindness or deafness, is no insuperable barrier to\r\nspiritual life, and may sometimes be a help, as cutting off distractions. It\r\nwill be well for us to ponder over each of these nine activities, thinking of\r\neach as a psychic state, a barrier to the interior consciousness of the\r\nspiritual man.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n31. Grieving, despondency, bodily restlessness, the drawing in and sending\r\nforth of the life-breath also contribute to drive the psychic nature to and\r\nfro.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe first two moods are easily understood. We can well see bow a sodden psychic\r\ncondition, flagrantly opposed to the pure and positive joy of spiritual life,\r\nwould be a barrier. The next, bodily restlessness, is in a special way the\r\nfault of our day and generation. When it is conquered, mental restlessness will\r\nbe half conquered, too.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe next two terms, concerning the life breath, offer some difficulty. The\r\nsurface meaning is harsh and irregular breathing; the deeper meaning is a life\r\nof harsh and irregular impulses.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n32. Steady application to a principle is the way to put a stop to these.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe will, which, in its pristine state, was full of vigour, has been steadily\r\ncorrupted by self-indulgence, the seeking of moods and sensations for\r\nsensation’s sake. Hence come all the morbid and sickly moods of the mind.\r\nThe remedy is a return to the pristine state of the will, by vigorous, positive\r\neffort; or, as we are here told, by steady application to a principle. The\r\nprinciple to which we should thus steadily apply ourselves should be one\r\narising from the reality of spiritual life; valorous work for the soul, in\r\nothers as in ourselves.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n33. By sympathy with the happy, compassion for the sorrowful, delight in the\r\nholy, disregard of the unholy, the psychic nature moves to gracious peace.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nWhen we are wrapped up in ourselves, shrouded with the cloak of our egotism,\r\nabsorbed in our pains and bitter thoughts, we are not willing to disturb or\r\nstrain our own sickly mood by giving kindly sympathy to the happy, thus\r\ndoubling their joy, or by showing compassion for the sad, thus halving their\r\nsorrow. We refuse to find delight in holy things, and let the mind brood in sad\r\npessimism on unholy things. All these evil psychic moods must be conquered by\r\nstrong effort of will. This rending of the veils will reveal to us something of\r\nthe grace and peace which are of the interior consciousness of the spiritual\r\nman.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n34. Or peace may be reached by the even sending forth and control of the\r\nlife-breath.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nHere again we may look for a double meaning: first, that even and quiet\r\nbreathing which is a part of the victory over bodily restlessness; then the\r\neven and quiet tenor of life, without harsh or dissonant impulses, which brings\r\nstillness to the heart.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n35. Faithful, persistent application to any object, if completely attained,\r\nwill bind the mind to steadiness.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nWe are still considering how to overcome the wavering and perturbation of the\r\npsychic nature, which make it quite unfit to transmit the inward consciousness\r\nand stillness. We are once more told to use the will, and to train it by steady\r\nand persistent work: by “sitting close” to our work, in the phrase\r\nof the original.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n36. As also will a joyful, radiant spirit.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThere is no such illusion as gloomy pessimism, and it has been truly said that\r\na man’s cheerfulness is the measure of his faith. Gloom, despondency, the\r\npale cast of thought, are very amenable to the will. Sturdy and courageous\r\neffort will bring a clear and valorous mind. But it must always be remembered\r\nthat this is not for solace to the personal man, but is rather an offering to\r\nthe ideal of spiritual life, a contribution to the universal and universally\r\nshared treasure in heaven.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n37. Or the purging of self-indulgence from the psychic nature.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nWe must recognize that the fall of man is a reality, exemplified in our own\r\npersons. We have quite other sins than the animals, and far more deleterious;\r\nand they have all come through self-indulgence, with which our psychic natures\r\nare soaked through and through. As we climbed down hill for our pleasure, so\r\nmust we climb up again for our purification and restoration to our former high\r\nestate. The process is painful, perhaps, yet indispensable.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n38. Or a pondering on the perceptions gained in dreams and dreamless sleep.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nFor the Eastern sages, dreams are, it is true, made up of images of waking\r\nlife, reflections of what the eyes have seen and the ears heard. But dreams are\r\nsomething more, for the images are in a sense real, objective on their own\r\nplane; and the knowledge that there is another world, even a dream-world,\r\nlightens the tyranny of material life. Much of poetry and art is such a solace\r\nfrom dreamland. But there is more in dream, for it may image what is above, as\r\nwell as what is below; not only the children of men, but also the children by\r\nthe shore of the immortal sea that brought us hither, may throw their images on\r\nthis magic mirror: so, too, of the secrets of dreamless sleep with its pure\r\nvision, in even greater degree.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n39. Or meditative brooding on what is dearest to the heart.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nHere is a thought which our own day is beginning to grasp: that love is a form\r\nof knowledge; that we truly know any thing or any person, by becoming one\r\ntherewith, in love. Thus love has a wisdom that the mind cannot claim, and by\r\nthis hearty love, this becoming one with what is beyond our personal borders,\r\nwe may take a long step toward freedom. Two directions for this may be\r\nsuggested: the pure love of the artist for his work, and the earnest,\r\ncompassionate search into the hearts of others.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n40. Thus he masters all, from the atom to the Infinite.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nNewton was asked how he made his discoveries. By intending my mind on them, he\r\nreplied. This steady pressure, this becoming one with what we seek to\r\nunderstand, whether it be atom or soul, is the one means to know. When we\r\nbecome a thing, we really know it, not otherwise. Therefore live the life, to\r\nknow the doctrine; do the will of the Father, if you would know the Father.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n41. When the perturbations of the psychic nature have all been stilled, then\r\nthe consciousness, like a pure crystal, takes the colour of what it rests on,\r\nwhether that be the perceiver, perceiving, or the thing perceived.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThis is a fuller expression of the last Sutra, and is so lucid that comment can\r\nhardly add to it. Everything is either perceiver, perceiving, or the thing\r\nperceived; or, as we might say, consciousness, force, or matter. The sage tells\r\nus that the one key will unlock the secrets of all three, the secrets of\r\nconsciousness, force and matter alike. The thought is, that the cordial\r\nsympathy of a gentle heart, intuitively understanding the hearts of others, is\r\nreally a manifestation of the same power as that penetrating perception whereby\r\none divines the secrets of planetary motions or atomic structure.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n42. When the consciousness, poised in perceiving, blends together the name, the\r\nobject dwelt on and the idea, this is perception with exterior consideration.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nIn the first stage of the consideration of an external object, the perceiving\r\nmind comes to it, preoccupied by the name and idea conventionally associated\r\nwith that object. For example, in coming to the study of a book, we think of\r\nthe author, his period, the school to which he belongs. The second stage, set\r\nforth in the next Sutra, goes directly to the spiritual meaning of the book,\r\nsetting its traditional trappings aside and finding its application to our own\r\nexperience and problems.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe commentator takes a very simple illustration: a cow, where one considers,\r\nin the first stage, the name of the cow, the animal itself and the idea of a\r\ncow in the mind. In the second stage, one pushes these trappings aside and,\r\nentering into the inmost being of the cow, shares its consciousness, as do some\r\nof the artists who paint cows. They get at the very life of what they study and\r\npaint.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n43. When the object dwells in the mind, clear of memory-pictures, uncoloured by\r\nthe mind, as a pure luminous idea, this is perception without exterior or\r\nconsideration.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nWe are still considering external, visible objects. Such perception as is here\r\ndescribed is of the nature of that penetrating vision whereby Newton, intending\r\nhis mind on things, made his discoveries, or that whereby a really great\r\nportrait painter pierces to the soul of him whom he paints, and makes that soul\r\nlive on canvas. These stages of perception are described in this way, to lead\r\nthe mind up to an understanding of the piercing soul-vision of the spiritual\r\nman, the immortal.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n44. The same two steps, when referring to things of finer substance, are said\r\nto be with, or without, judicial action of the mind.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nWe now come to mental or psychical objects: to images in the mind. It is\r\nprecisely by comparing, arranging and superposing these mind-images that we get\r\nour general notions or concepts. This process of analysis and synthesis,\r\nwhereby we select certain qualities in a group of mind-images, and then range\r\ntogether those of like quality, is the judicial action of the mind spoken of.\r\nBut when we exercise swift divination upon the mind images, as does a poet or a\r\nman of genius, then we use a power higher than the judicial, and one nearer to\r\nthe keen vision of the spiritual man.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n45. Subtle substance rises in ascending degrees, to that pure nature which has\r\nno distinguishing mark.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nAs we ascend from outer material things which are permeated by separateness,\r\nand whose chief characteristic is to be separate, just as so many pebbles are\r\nseparate from each other; as we ascend, first, to mind-images, which overlap\r\nand coalesce in both space and time, and then to ideas and principles, we\r\nfinally come to purer essences, drawing ever nearer and nearer to unity.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nOr we may illustrate this principle thus. Our bodily, external selves are quite\r\ndistinct and separate, in form, name, place, substance; our mental selves, of\r\nfiner substance, meet and part, meet and part again, in perpetual concussion\r\nand interchange; our spiritual selves attain true consciousness through unity,\r\nwhere the partition wall between us and the Highest, between us and others, is\r\nbroken down and we are all made perfect in the One. The highest riches are\r\npossessed by all pure souls, only when united. Thus we rise from separation to\r\ntrue individuality in unity.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n46. The above are the degrees of limited and conditioned spiritual\r\nconsciousness, still containing the seed of separateness.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nIn the four stages of perception above described, the spiritual vision is still\r\nworking through the mental and psychical, the inner genius is still expressed\r\nthrough the outer, personal man. The spiritual man has yet to come completely\r\nto consciousness as himself, in his own realm, the psychical veils laid aside.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n47. When pure perception without judicial action of the mind is reached, there\r\nfollows the gracious peace of the inner self.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nWe have instanced certain types of this pure perception: the poet’s\r\ndivination, whereby he sees the spirit within the symbol, likeness in things\r\nunlike, and beauty in all things; the pure insight of the true philosopher,\r\nwhose vision rests not on the appearances of life, but on its realities; or the\r\nsaint’s firm perception of spiritual life and being. All these are far\r\nadvanced on the way; they have drawn near to the secret dwelling of peace.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n48. In that peace, perception is unfailingly true.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe poet, the wise philosopher and the saint not only reach a wide and luminous\r\nconsciousness, but they gain certain knowledge of substantial reality. When we\r\nknow, we know that we know. For we have come to the stage where we know things\r\nby being them, and nothing can be more true than being. We rest on the rock,\r\nand know it to be rock, rooted in the very heart of the world.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n49. The object of this perception is other than what is learned from the sacred\r\nbooks, or by sound inference, since this perception is particular.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe distinction is a luminous and inspiring one. The Scriptures teach general\r\ntruths, concerning universal spiritual life and broad laws, and inference from\r\ntheir teaching is not less general. But the spiritual perception of the\r\nawakened Seer brings particular truth concerning his own particular life and\r\nneeds, whether these be for himself or others. He receives defined, precise\r\nknowledge, exactly applying to what he has at heart.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n50. The impress on the consciousness springing from this perception supersedes\r\nall previous impressions.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nEach state or field of the mind, each field of knowledge, so to speak, which is\r\nreached by mental and emotional energies, is a psychical state, just as the\r\nmind picture of a stage with the actors on it, is a psychical state or field.\r\nWhen the pure vision, as of the poet, the philosopher, the saint, fills the\r\nwhole field, all lesser views and visions are crowded out. This high\r\nconsciousness displaces all lesser consciousness. Yet, in a certain sense, that\r\nwhich is viewed as part, even by the vision of a sage, has still an element of\r\nillusion, a thin psychical veil, however pure and luminous that veil may be. It\r\nis the last and highest psychic state.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n51. When this impression ceases, then, since all impressions have ceased, there\r\narises pure spiritual consciousness, with no seed of separateness left.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe last psychic veil is drawn aside, and the spiritual man stands with\r\nunveiled vision, pure serene.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003c/div\u003e\u003c!–end chapter–\u003e\r\n\u003cdiv class=\"chapter\"\u003e\r\n\u003ch2\u003e\u003ca id=\"chap03\"\u003e\u003c/a\u003eINTRODUCTION TO BOOK II\u003c/h2\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe first book of Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras is called the Book of Spiritual\r\nConsciousness. The second book, which we now begin, is the Book of the Means of\r\nSoul Growth. And we must remember that soul growth here means the growth of the\r\nrealization of the spiritual man, or, to put the matter more briefly, the\r\ngrowth of the spiritual man, and the disentangling of the spiritual man from\r\nthe wrappings, the veils, the disguises laid upon him by the mind and the\r\npsychical nature, wherein he is enmeshed, like a bird caught in a net.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe question arises: By what means may the spiritual man be freed from these\r\npsychical meshes and disguises, so that he may stand forth above death, in his\r\nradiant eternalness and divine power? And the second book sets itself to answer\r\nthis very question, and to detail the means in a way entirely practical and\r\nvery lucid, so that he who runs may read, and he who reads may understand and\r\npractise.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe second part of the second book is concerned with practical spiritual\r\ntraining, that is, with the earlier practical training of the spiritual man.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe most striking thing in it is the emphasis laid on the Commandments, which\r\nare precisely those of the latter part of the Decalogue, together with\r\nobedience to the Master. Our day and generation is far too prone to fancy that\r\nthere can be mystical life and growth on some other foundation, on the\r\nfoundation, for example, of intellectual curiosity or psychical selfishness. In\r\nreality, on this latter foundation the life of the spiritual man can never be\r\nbuilt; nor, indeed, anything but a psychic counterfeit, a dangerous delusion.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nTherefore Patanjali, like every great spiritual teacher, meets the question:\r\nWhat must I do to be saved? with the age-old answer: Keep the Commandments.\r\nOnly after the disciple can say, These have I kept, can there be the further\r\nand finer teaching of the spiritual Rules.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nIt is, therefore, vital for us to realize that the Yoga system, like every true\r\nsystem of spiritual teaching, rests on this broad and firm foundation of\r\nhonesty, truth, cleanness, obedience. Without these, there is no salvation; and\r\nhe who practices these, even though ignorant of spiritual things, is laying up\r\ntreasure against the time to come.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003c/div\u003e\u003c!–end chapter–\u003e\r\n\u003cdiv class=\"chapter\"\u003e\r\n\u003ch2\u003e\u003ca id=\"chap04\"\u003e\u003c/a\u003eBOOK II\u003c/h2\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n1. The practices which make for union with the Soul are: fervent aspiration,\r\nspiritual reading, and complete obedience to the Master.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe word which I have rendered “fervent aspiration” means primarily\r\n“fire”; and, in the Eastern teaching, it means the fire which gives\r\nlife and light, and at the same time the fire which purifies. We have,\r\ntherefore, as our first practice, as the first of the means of spiritual\r\ngrowth, that fiery quality of the will which enkindles and illumines, and, at\r\nthe same time, the steady practice of purification, the burning away of all\r\nknown impurities. Spiritual reading is so universally accepted and understood,\r\nthat it needs no comment. The very study of Patanjali’s Sutras is an\r\nexercise in spiritual reading, and a very effective one. And so with all other\r\nbooks of the Soul. Obedience to the Master means, that we shall make the will\r\nof the Master our will, and shall confirm in all wave to the will of the\r\nDivine, setting aside the wills of self, which are but psychic distortions of\r\nthe one Divine Will. The constant effort to obey in all the ways we know and\r\nunderstand, will reveal new ways and new tasks, the evidence of new growth of\r\nthe Soul. Nothing will do more for the spiritual man in us than this, for there\r\nis no such regenerating power as the awakening spiritual will.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n2. Their aim is, to bring soul-vision, and to wear away hindrances.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe aim of fervour, spiritual reading and obedience to the Master, is, to bring\r\nsoulvision, and to wear away hindrances. Or, to use the phrase we have already\r\nadopted, the aim of these practices is, to help the spiritual man to open his\r\neyes; to help him also to throw aside the veils and disguises, the enmeshing\r\npsychic nets which surround him, tying his hands, as it were, and bandaging his\r\neyes. And this, as all teachers testify, is a long and arduous task, a steady\r\nup-hill fight, demanding fine courage and persistent toil. Fervour, the fire of\r\nthe spiritual will, is, as we said, two-fold: it illumines, and so helps the\r\nspiritual man to see; and it also burns up the nets and meshes which ensnare\r\nthe spiritual man. So with the other means, spiritual reading and obedience.\r\nEach, in its action, is two-fold, wearing away the psychical, and upbuilding\r\nthe spiritual man.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n3. These are the hindrances: the darkness of unwisdom, self-assertion, lust\r\nhate, attachment.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nLet us try to translate this into terms of the psychical and spiritual man. The\r\ndarkness of unwisdom is, primarily, the self-absorption of the psychical man,\r\nhis complete preoccupation with his own hopes and fears, plans and purposes,\r\nsensations and desires; so that he fails to see, or refuses to see, that there\r\nis a spiritual man; and so doggedly resists all efforts of the spiritual man to\r\ncast off his psychic tyrant and set himself free. This is the real darkness;\r\nand all those who deny the immortality of the soul, or deny the soul’s\r\nexistence, and so lay out their lives wholly for the psychical, mortal man and\r\nhis ambitions, are under this power of darkness. Born of this darkness, this\r\npsychic self-absorption, is the dogged conviction that the psychic, personal\r\nman has separate, exclusive interests, which he can follow for himself alone;\r\nand this conviction, when put into practice in our life, leads to contest with\r\nother personalities, and so to hate. This hate, again, makes against the\r\nspiritual man, since it hinders the revelation of the high harmony between the\r\nspiritual man and his other selves, a harmony to be revealed only through the\r\npractice of love, that perfect love which casts out fear.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nIn like manner, lust is the psychic man’s craving for the stimulus of\r\nsensation, the din of which smothers the voice of the spiritual man, as, in\r\nShakespeare’s phrase, the cackling geese would drown the song of the\r\nnightingale. And this craving for stimulus is the fruit of weakness, coming\r\nfrom the failure to find strength in the primal life of the spiritual man.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nAttachment is but another name for psychic self-absorption; for we are\r\nabsorbed, not in outward things, but rather in their images within our minds;\r\nour inner eyes are fixed on them; our inner desires brood over them; and em we\r\nblind ourselves to the presence of the prisoner’ the enmeshed and\r\nfettered spiritual man.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n4. The darkness of unwisdom is the field of the others. These hindrances may be\r\ndormant, or worn thin, or suspended, or expanded.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nHere we have really two Sutras in one. The first has been explained already: in\r\nthe darkness of unwisdom grow the parasites, hate, lust, attachment. They are\r\nall outgrowths of the self-absorption of the psychical self.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nNext, we are told that these barriers may be either dormant, or suspended, or\r\nexpanded, or worn thin. Faults which are dormant will be brought out through\r\nthe pressure of life, or through the pressure of strong aspiration. Thus\r\nexpanded, they must be fought and conquered, or, as Patanjali quaintly says,\r\nthey must be worn thin,-as a veil might, or the links of manacles.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n5 The darkness of ignorance is: holding that which is unenduring, impure, full\r\nof pain, not the Soul, to be eternal, pure, full of joy, the Soul.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThis we have really considered already. The psychic man is unenduring, impure,\r\nfull of pain, not the Soul, not the real Self. The spiritual man is enduring,\r\npure, full of joy, the real Self. The darkness of unwisdom is, therefore, the\r\nself-absorption of the psychical, personal man, to the exclusion of the\r\nspiritual man. It is the belief, carried into action, that the personal man is\r\nthe real man, the man for whom we should toil, for whom we should build, for\r\nwhom we should live. This is that psychical man of whom it is said: he that\r\nsoweth to the flesh, shall of the flesh reap corruption.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n6. Self-assertion comes from thinking of the Seer and the instrument of vision\r\nas forming one self.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThis is the fundamental idea of the Sankhya philosophy, of which the Yoga is\r\navowedly the practical side. To translate this into our terms, we may say that\r\nthe Seer is the spiritual man; the instrument of vision is the psychical man,\r\nthrough which the spiritual man gains experience of the outer world. But we\r\nturn the servant into the master. We attribute to the psychical man, the\r\npersonal self, a reality which really belongs to the spiritual man alone; and\r\nso, thinking of the quality of the spiritual man as belonging to the psychical,\r\nwe merge the spiritual man in the psychical; or, as the text says, we think of\r\nthe two as forming one self.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n7. Lust is the resting in the sense of enjoyment.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThis has been explained again and again. Sensation, as, for example, the sense\r\nof taste, is meant to be the guide to action; in this case, the choice of\r\nwholesome food, and the avoidance of poisonous and hurtful things. But if we\r\nrest in the sense of taste, as a pleasure in itself; rest, that is, in the\r\npsychical side of taste, we fall into gluttony, and live to eat, instead of\r\neating to live. So with the other great organic power, the power of\r\nreproduction. This lust comes into being, through resting in the sensation, and\r\nlooking for pleasure from that.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n8. Hate is the resting in the sense of pain.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nPain comes, for the most part, from the strife of personalities, the jarring\r\ndiscords between psychic selves, each of which deems itself supreme. A dwelling\r\non this pain breeds hate, which tears the warring selves yet further asunder,\r\nand puts new enmity between them, thus hindering the harmony of the Real, the\r\nreconciliation through the Soul.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n9. Attachment is the desire toward life, even in the wise, carried forward by\r\nits own energy.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe life here desired is the psychic life, the intensely vibrating life of the\r\npsychical self. This prevails even in those who have attained much wisdom, so\r\nlong as it falls short of the wisdom of complete renunciation, complete\r\nobedience to each least behest of the spiritual man, and of the Master who\r\nguards and aids the spiritual man.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe desire of sensation, the desire of psychic life, reproduces itself, carried\r\non by its own energy and momentum; and hence comes the circle of death and\r\nrebirth, death and rebirth, instead of the liberation of the spiritual man.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n10. These hindrances, when they have become subtle, are to be removed by a\r\ncountercurrent.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe darkness of unwisdom is to be removed by the light of wisdom, pursued\r\nthrough fervour, spiritual reading of holy teachings and of life itself, and by\r\nobedience to the Master.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nLust is to be removed by pure aspiration of spiritual life, which, bringing\r\ntrue strength and stability, takes away the void of weakness which we try to\r\nfill by the stimulus of sensations.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nHate is to be overcome by love. The fear that arises through the sense of\r\nseparate, warring selves is to be stilled by the realization of the One Self,\r\nthe one soul in all. This realization is the perfect love that casts out fear.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe hindrances are said to have become subtle when, by initial efforts, they\r\nhave been located and recognized in the psychic nature.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n11. Their active turnings are to be removed by meditation.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nHere is, in truth, the whole secret of Yoga, the science of the soul. The\r\nactive turnings, the strident vibrations, of selfishness, lust and hate are to\r\nbe stilled by meditation, by letting heart and mind dwell in spiritual life, by\r\nlifting up the heart to the strong, silent life above, which rests in the\r\nstillness of eternal love, and needs no harsh vibration to convince it of true\r\nbeing.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n12. The burden of bondage to sorrow has its root in these hindrances. It will\r\nbe felt in this life, or in a life not yet manifested.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe burden of bondage to sorrow has its root in the darkness of unwisdom, in\r\nselfishness, in lust, in hate, in attachment to sensation. All these are, in\r\nthe last analysis, absorption in the psychical self; and this means sorrow,\r\nbecause it means the sense of separateness, and this means jarring discord and\r\ninevitable death. But the psychical self will breed a new psychical self, in a\r\nnew birth, and so new sorrows in a life not yet manifest.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n13. From this root there grow and ripen the fruits of birth, of the life-span,\r\nof all that is tasted in life.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nFully to comment on this, would be to write a treatise on Karma and its\r\npractical working in detail, whereby the place and time of the next birth, its\r\ncontent and duration, are determined; and to do this the present commentator is\r\nin no wise fitted. But this much is clearly understood: that, through a kind of\r\nspiritual gravitation, the incarnating self is drawn to a home and life-circle\r\nwhich will give it scope and discipline; and its need of discipline is clearly\r\nconditioned by its character, its standing, its accomplishment.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n14. These bear fruits of rejoicing, or of affliction, as they are sprung from\r\nholy or unholy works.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nSince holiness is obedience to divine law, to the law of divine harmony, and\r\nobedience to harmony strengthens that harmony in the soul, which is the one\r\ntrue joy, therefore joy comes of holiness: comes, indeed, in no other way. And\r\nas unholiness is disobedience, and therefore discord, therefore unholiness\r\nmakes for pain; and this two-fold law is true, whether the cause take effect in\r\nthis, or in a yet unmanifested birth.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n15. To him who possesses discernment, all personal life is misery, because it\r\never waxes and wanes, is ever afflicted with restlessness, makes ever new\r\ndynamic impresses in the mind; and because all its activities war with each\r\nother.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe whole life of the psychic self is misery, because it ever waxes and wanes;\r\nbecause birth brings inevitable death; because there is no expectation without\r\nits shadow, fear. The life of the psychic self is misery, because it is\r\nafflicted with restlessness; so that he who has much, finds not satisfaction,\r\nbut rather the whetted hunger for more. The fire is not quenched by pouring oil\r\non it; so desire is not quenched by the satisfaction of desire. Again, the life\r\nof the psychic self is misery, because it makes ever new dynamic impresses in\r\nthe mind; because a desire satisfied is but the seed from which springs the\r\ndesire to find like satisfaction again. The appetite comes in eating, as the\r\nproverb says, and grows by what it feeds on. And the psychic self, torn with\r\nconflicting desires, is ever the house divided against itself, which must\r\nsurely fall.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n16. This pain is to be warded off, before it has come.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nIn other words, we cannot cure the pains of life by laying on them any balm. We\r\nmust cut the root, absorption in the psychical self. So it is said, there is no\r\ncure for the misery of longing, but to fix the heart upon the eternal.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n17. The cause of what is to be warded off, is the absorption of the Seer in\r\nthings seen.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nHere again we have the fundamental idea of the Sankhya, which is the\r\nintellectual counterpart of the Yoga system. The cause of what is to be warded\r\noff, the root of misery, is the absorption of consciousness in the psychical\r\nman and the things which beguile the psychical man. The cure is liberation.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n18. Things seen have as their property manifestation, action, inertia. They\r\nform the basis of the elements and the sense-powers. They make for experience\r\nand for liberation.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nHere is a whole philosophy of life. Things seen, the total of the phenomena,\r\npossess as their property, manifestation, action, inertia: the qualities of\r\nforce and matter in combination. These, in their grosser form, make the\r\nmaterial world; in their finer, more subjective form, they make the psychical\r\nworld, the world of sense-impressions and mind-images. And through this\r\ntotality of the phenomenal, the soul gains experience, and is prepared for\r\nliberation. In other words, the whole outer world exists for the purposes of\r\nthe soul, and finds in this its true reason for being.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n19. The grades or layers of the Three Potencies are the defined, the undefined,\r\nthat with distinctive mark, that without distinctive mark.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nOr, as we might say, there are two strata of the physical, and two strata of\r\nthe psychical realms. In each, there is the side of form, and the side of\r\nforce. The form side of the physical is here called the defined. The force side\r\nof the physical is the undefined, that which has no boundaries. So in the\r\npsychical; there is the form side; that with distinctive marks, such as the\r\ncharacteristic features of mind-images; and there is the force side, without\r\ndistinctive marks, such as the forces of desire or fear, which may flow now to\r\nthis mind-image, now to that.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n20. The Seer is pure vision. Though pure, he looks out through the vesture of\r\nthe mind.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe Seer, as always, is the spiritual man whose deepest consciousness is pure\r\nvision, the pure life of the eternal. But the spiritual man, as yet unseeing in\r\nhis proper person, looks out on the world through the eyes of the psychical\r\nman, by whom he is enfolded and enmeshed. The task is, to set this prisoner\r\nfree, to clear the dust of ages from this buried temple.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n21. The very essence of things seen is, that they exist for the Seer.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe things of outer life, not only material things, but the psychic man also,\r\nexist in very deed for the purposes of the Seer, the Soul, the spiritual man\r\nDisaster comes, when the psychical man sets up, so to speak, on his own\r\naccount, trying to live for himself alone, and taking material things to solace\r\nhis loneliness.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n22. Though fallen away from him who has reached the goal, things seen have not\r\nalto fallen away, since they still exist for others.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nWhen one of us conquers hate, hate does not thereby cease out of the world,\r\nsince others still hate and suffer hatred. So with other delusions, which hold\r\nus in bondage to material things, and through which we look at all material\r\nthings. When the coloured veil of illusion is gone, the world which we saw\r\nthrough it is also gone, for now we see life as it is, in the white radiance of\r\neternity. But for others the coloured veil remains, and therefore the world\r\nthus coloured by it remains for them, and will remain till they, too, conquer\r\ndelusion.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n23. The association of the Seer with things seen is the cause of the realizing\r\nof the nature of things seen, and also of the realizing of the nature of the\r\nSeer.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nLife is educative. All life’s infinite variety is for discipline, for the\r\ndevelopment of the soul. So passing through many lives, the Soul learns the\r\nsecrets of the world, the august laws that are written in the form of the\r\nsnow-crystal or the majestic order of the stars. Yet all these laws are but\r\nreflections, but projections outward, of the laws of the soul; therefore in\r\nlearning these, the soul learns to know itself. All life is but the mirror\r\nwherein the Soul learns to know its own face.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n24. The cause of this association is the darkness of unwisdom.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe darkness of unwisdom is the absorption of consciousness in the personal\r\nlife, and in the things seen by the personal life. This is the fall, through\r\nwhich comes experience, the learning of the lessons of life. When they are\r\nlearned, the day of redemption is at hand.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n25. The bringing of this association to an end, by bringing the darkness of\r\nunwisdom to an end, is the great liberation; this is the Seer’s\r\nattainment of his own pure being.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nWhen the spiritual man has, through the psychical, learned all life’s\r\nlessons, the time has come for him to put off the veil and disguise of the\r\npsychical and to stand revealed a King, in the house of the Father. So shall he\r\nenter into his kingdom, and go no more out.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n26. A discerning which is carried on without wavering is the means of\r\nliberation.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nHere we come close to the pure Vedanta, with its discernment between the\r\neternal and the temporal. St. Paul, following after Philo and Plato, lays down\r\nthe same fundamental principle: the things seen are temporal, the things unseen\r\nare eternal.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nPatanjali means something more than an intellectual assent, though this too is\r\nvital. He has in view a constant discriminating in act as well as thought; of\r\nthe two ways which present themselves for every deed or choice, always to\r\nchoose the higher way, that which makes for the things eternal: honesty rather\r\nthan roguery, courage and not cowardice, the things of another rather than\r\none’s own, sacrifice and not indulgence. This true discernment, carried\r\nout constantly, makes for liberation.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n27. His illuminations is sevenfold, rising In successive stages.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nPatanjali’s text does not tell us what the seven stages of this\r\nillumination are. The commentator thus describes them:\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nFirst, the danger to be escaped is recognized; it need not be recognized a\r\nsecond time. Second, the causes of the danger to be escaped are worn away; they\r\nneed not be worn away a second time. Third, the way of escape is clearly\r\nperceived, by the contemplation which checks psychic perturbation. Fourth, the\r\nmeans of escape, clear discernment, has been developed. This is the fourfold\r\nrelease belonging to insight. The final release from the psychic is three-fold:\r\nAs fifth of the seven degrees, the dominance of its thinking is ended; as\r\nsixth, its potencies, like rocks from a precipice, fall of themselves; once\r\ndissolved, they do not grow again. Then, as seventh, freed from these\r\npotencies, the spiritual man stands forth in his own nature as purity and\r\nlight. Happy is the spiritual man who beholds this seven-fold illumination in\r\nits ascending stages.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n28. From steadfastly following after the means of Yoga, until impurity is worn\r\naway, there comes the illumination of thought up to full discernment.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nHere, we enter on the more detailed practical teaching of Patanjali, with its\r\nsound and luminous good sense. And when we come to detail the means of Yoga, we\r\nmay well be astonished at their simplicity. There is little in them that is\r\nmysterious. They are very familiar. The essence of the matter lies in carrying\r\nthem out.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n29. The eight means of Yoga are: the Commandments, the Rules, right Poise,\r\nright Control of the life-force, Withdrawal, Attention, Meditation,\r\nContemplation.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThese eight means are to be followed in their order, in the sense which will\r\nimmediately be made clear. We can get a ready understanding of the first two by\r\ncomparing them with the Commandments which must be obeyed by all good citizens,\r\nand the Rules which are laid on the members of religious orders. Until one has\r\nfulfilled the first, it is futile to concern oneself with the second. And so\r\nwith all the means of Yoga. They must be taken in their order.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n30. The Commandments are these: nom injury, truthfulness, abstaining from\r\nstealing, from impurity, from covetousness.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThese five precepts are almost exactly the same as the Buddhist Commandments:\r\nnot to kill, not to steal, not to be guilty of incontinence, not to drink\r\nintoxicants, to speak the truth. Almost identical is St. Paul’s list:\r\nThou shalt not commit adultery, thou shalt not kill, thou shalt not steal, thou\r\nshalt not covet. And in the same spirit is the answer made to the young map\r\nhaving great possessions, who asked, What shall I do to be saved? and received\r\nthe reply: Keep the Commandments.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThis broad, general training, which forms and develops human character, must be\r\naccomplished to a very considerable degree, before there can be much hope of\r\nsuccess in the further stages of spiritual life. First the psychical, and then\r\nthe spiritual. First the man, then the angel. On this broad, humane and wise\r\nfoundation does the system of Patanjali rest.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n31. The Commandments, not limited to any race, place, time or occasion,\r\nuniversal, are the great obligation.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe Commandments form the broad general training of humanity. Each one of them\r\nrests on a universal, spiritual law. Each one of them expresses an attribute or\r\naspect of the Self, the Eternal; when we violate one of the Commandments, we\r\nset ourselves against the law and being of the Eternal, thereby bringing\r\nourselves to inevitable con fusion. So the first steps in spiritual life must\r\nbe taken by bringing ourselves into voluntary obedience to these spiritual laws\r\nand thus making ourselves partakers of the spiritual powers, the being of the\r\nEternal Like the law of gravity, the need of air to breathe, these great laws\r\nknow no exceptions They are in force in all lands, throughout al times, for all\r\nmankind.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n32. The Rules are these: purity, serenity fervent aspiration, spiritual\r\nreading, and per feet obedience to the Master.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nHere we have a finer law, one which humanity as a whole is less ready for, less\r\nfit to obey. Yet we can see that these Rules are the same in essence as the\r\nCommandments, but on a higher, more spiritual plane. The Commandments may be\r\nobeyed in outer acts and abstinences; the Rules demand obedience of the heart\r\nand spirit, a far more awakened and more positive consciousness. The Rules are\r\nthe spiritual counterpart of the Commandments, and they have finer degrees, for\r\nmore advanced spiritual growth.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n33. When transgressions hinder, the weight of the imagination should be\r\nthrown’ on the opposite side.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nLet us take a simple case, that of a thief, a habitual criminal, who has\r\ndrifted into stealing in childhood, before the moral consciousness has\r\nawakened. We may imprison such a thief, and deprive him of all possibility of\r\nfurther theft, or of using the divine gift of will. Or we may recognize his\r\ndisadvantages, and help him gradually to build up possessions which express his\r\nwill, and draw forth his self-respect. If we imagine that, after he has built\r\nwell, and his possessions have become dear to him, he himself is robbed, then\r\nwe can see how he would come vividly to realize the essence of theft and of\r\nhonesty, and would cleave to honest dealings with firm conviction. In some such\r\nway does the great Law teach us. Our sorrows and losses teach us the pain of\r\nthe sorrow and loss we inflict on others, and so we cease to inflict them.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nNow as to the more direct application. To conquer a sin, let heart and mind\r\nrest, not on the sin, but on the contrary virtue. Let the sin be forced out by\r\npositive growth in the true direction, not by direct opposition. Turn away from\r\nthe sin and go forward courageously, constructively, creatively, in well-doing.\r\nIn this way the whole nature will gradually be drawn up to the higher level, on\r\nwhich the sin does not even exist. The conquest of a sin is a matter of growth\r\nand evolution, rather than of opposition.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n34. Transgressions are injury, falsehood, theft, incontinence, envy; whether\r\ncommitted, or caused, or assented to, through greed, wrath, or infatuation;\r\nwhether faint, or middling, or excessive; bearing endless, fruit of ignorance\r\nand pain. Therefore must the weight be cast on the other side.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nHere are the causes of sin: greed, wrath, infatuation, with their effects,\r\nignorance and pain. The causes are to be cured by better wisdom, by a truer\r\nunderstanding of the Self, of Life. For greed cannot endure before the\r\nrealization that the whole world belongs to the Self, which Self we are; nor\r\ncan we hold wrath against one who is one with the Self, and therefore with\r\nourselves; nor can infatuation, which is the seeking for the happiness of the\r\nAll in some limited part of it, survive the knowledge that we are heirs of the\r\nAll. Therefore let thought and imagination, mind and heart, throw their weight\r\non the other side; the side, not of the world, but of the Self.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n35. Where non-injury is perfected, all enmity ceases in the presence of him who\r\npossesses it.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nWe come now to the spiritual powers which result from keeping the Commandments;\r\nfrom the obedience to spiritual law which is the keeping of the Commandments.\r\nWhere the heart is full of kindness which seeks no injury to another, either in\r\nact or thought or wish, this full love creates an atmosphere of harmony, whose\r\nbenign power touches with healing all who come within its influence. Peace in\r\nthe heart radiates peace to other hearts, even more surely than contention\r\nbreeds contention.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n36. When he is perfected in truth, all acts and their fruits depend on him.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe commentator thus explains: If he who has attained should say to a man,\r\nBecome righteous! the man becomes righteous. If he should say, Gain heaven! the\r\nman gains heaven. His word is not in vain.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nExactly the same doctrine was taught by the Master who said to his disciples:\r\nReceive ye the Holy Ghost: whose soever sins ye remit they are remitted unto\r\nthem; and whose soever sins ye retain, they are retained.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n37. Where cessation from theft is perfected, all treasures present themselves\r\nto him who possesses it.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nHere is a sentence which may warn us that, beside the outer and apparent\r\nmeaning, there is in many of these sentences a second and finer significance.\r\nThe obvious meaning is, that he who has wholly ceased from theft, in act,\r\nthought and wish, finds buried treasures in his path, treasures of jewels and\r\ngold and pearls. The deeper truth is, that he who in every least thing is\r\nwholly honest with the spirit of Life, finds Life supporting him in all things,\r\nand gains admittance to the treasure house of Life, the spiritual universe.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n38. For him who is perfect in continence, the reward is valour and virility.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe creative power, strong and full of vigour, is no longer dissipated, but\r\nturned to spiritual uses. It upholds and endows the spiritual man, conferring\r\non him the creative will, the power to engender spiritual children instead of\r\nbodily progeny. An epoch of life, that of man the animal, has come to an end; a\r\nnew epoch, that of the spiritual man, is opened. The old creative power is\r\nsuperseded and transcended; a new creative power, that of the spiritual man,\r\ntakes its place, carrying with it the power to work creatively in others for\r\nrighteousness and eternal life.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nOne of the commentaries says that he who has attained is able to transfer to\r\nthe minds of his disciples what he knows concerning divine union, and the means\r\nof gaining it. This is one of the powers of purity.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n39. Where there is firm conquest of covetousness, he who has conquered it\r\nawakes to the how and why of life.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nSo it is said that, before we can understand the laws of Karma, we must free\r\nourselves from Karma. The conquest of covetousness brings this rich fruit,\r\nbecause the root of covetousness is the desire of the individual soul, the will\r\ntoward manifested life. And where the desire of the individual soul is overcome\r\nby the superb, still life of the universal Soul welling up in the heart within,\r\nthe great secret is discerned, the secret that the individual soul is not an\r\nisolated reality, but the ray, the manifest instrument of the Life, which turns\r\nit this way and that until the great work is accomplished, the age-long lesson\r\nlearned. Thus is the how and why of life disclosed by ceasing from\r\ncovetousness. The Commentator says that this includes a knowledge of\r\none’s former births.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n40. Through purity a withdrawal from one’s own bodily life, a ceasing\r\nfrom infatuation with the bodily life of others.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nAs the spiritual light grows in the heart within, as the taste for pure Life\r\ngrows stronger, the consciousness opens toward the great, secret places within,\r\nwhere all life is one, where all lives are one. Thereafter, this outer,\r\nmanifested, fugitive life, whether of ourselves or of others, loses something\r\nof its charm and glamour, and we seek rather the deep infinitudes. Instead of\r\nthe outer form and surroundings of our lives, we long for their inner and\r\neverlasting essence. We desire not so much outer converse and closeness to our\r\nfriends, but rather that quiet communion with them in the inner chamber of the\r\nsoul, where spirit speaks to spirit, and spirit answers; where alienation and\r\nseparation never enter; where sickness and sorrow and death cannot come.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n41. To the pure of heart come also a quiet spirit, one-pointed thought, the\r\nvictory over sensuality, and fitness to behold the Soul.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nBlessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God, who is the supreme Soul;\r\nthe ultimate Self of all beings. In the deepest sense, purity means fitness for\r\nthis vision, and also a heart cleansed from all disquiet, from all wandering\r\nand unbridled thought, from the torment of sensuous imaginings; and when the\r\nspirit is thus cleansed and pure, it becomes at one in essence with its source,\r\nthe great Spirit, the primal Life. One consciousness now thrills through both,\r\nfor the psychic partition wall is broken down. Then shall the pure in heart see\r\nGod, because they become God.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n42. From acceptance, the disciple gains happiness supreme.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nOne of the wise has said: accept conditions, accept others, accept yourself.\r\nThis is the true acceptance, for all these things are what they are through the\r\nwill of the higher Self, except their deficiencies, which come through\r\nthwarting the will of the higher Self, and can be conquered only through\r\ncompliance with that will. By the true acceptance, the disciple comes into\r\noneness of spirit with the overruling Soul; and, since the own nature of the\r\nSoul is being, happiness, bliss, he comes thereby into happiness supreme.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n43. The perfection of the powers of the bodily vesture comes through the\r\nwearing away of impurities, and through fervent aspiration.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThis is true of the physical powers, and of those which dwell in the higher\r\nvestures. There must be, first, purity; as the blood must be pure, before one\r\ncan attain to physical health. But absence of impurity is not in itself enough,\r\nelse would many nerveless ascetics of the cloisters rank as high saints. There\r\nis needed, further, a positive fire of the will; a keen vital vigour for the\r\nphysical powers, and something finer, purer, stronger, but of kindred essence,\r\nfor the higher powers. The fire of genius is something more than a phrase, for\r\nthere can be no genius without the celestial fire of the awakened spiritual\r\nwill.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n44. Through spiritual reading, the disciple gains communion with the divine\r\nPower on which his heart is set.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nSpiritual reading meant, for ancient India, something more than it does with\r\nus. It meant, first, the recital of sacred texts, which, in their very sounds,\r\nhad mystical potencies; and it meant a recital of texts which were divinely\r\nemanated, and held in themselves the living, potent essence of the divine.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nFor us, spiritual reading means a communing with the recorded teachings of the\r\nMasters of wisdom, whereby we read ourselves into the Master’s mind, just\r\nas through his music one can enter into the mind and soul of the master\r\nmusician. It has been well said that all true art is contagion of feeling; so\r\nthat through the true reading of true books we do indeed read ourselves into\r\nthe spirit of the Masters, share in the atmosphere of their wisdom and power,\r\nand come at last into their very presence.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n45. Soul-vision is perfected through perfect obedience to the Master.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe sorrow and darkness of life come of the erring personal will which sets\r\nitself against the will of the Soul, the one great Life. The error of the\r\npersonal will is inevitable, since each will must be free to choose, to try and\r\nfail, and so to find the path. And sorrow and darkness are inevitable, until\r\nthe path be found, and the personal will made once more one with the greater\r\nWill, wherein it finds rest and power, without losing freedom. In His will is\r\nour peace. And with that peace comes light. Soul-vision is perfected through\r\nobedience.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n46. Right poise must be firm and without strain.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nHere we approach a section of the teaching which has manifestly a two-fold\r\nmeaning. The first is physical, and concerns the bodily position of the\r\nstudent, and the regulation of breathing. These things have their direct\r\ninfluence upon soul-life, the life of the spiritual man, since it is always and\r\neverywhere true that our study demands a sound mind in a sound body. The\r\npresent sentence declares that, for work and for meditation, the position of\r\nthe body must be steady and without strain, in order that the finer currents of\r\nlife may run their course.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nIt applies further to the poise of the soul, that fine balance and stability\r\nwhich nothing can shake, where the consciousness rests on the firm foundation\r\nof spiritual being. This is indeed the house set upon a rock, which the winds\r\nand waves beat upon in vain.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n47. Right poise is to be gained by steady and temperate effort, and by setting\r\nthe heart upon the everlasting.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nHere again, there is the two-fold meaning, for physical poise is to be gained\r\nby steady effort of the muscles, by gradual and wise training, linked with a\r\nright understanding of, and relation with, the universal force of gravity.\r\nUprightness of body demands that both these conditions shall be fulfilled.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nIn like manner the firm and upright poise of the spiritual man is to be gained\r\nby steady and continued effort, always guided by wisdom, and by setting the\r\nheart on the Eternal, filling the soul with the atmosphere of the spiritual\r\nworld. Neither is effective without the other. Aspiration without effort brings\r\nweakness; effort without aspiration brings a false strength, not resting on\r\nenduring things. The two together make for the right poise which sets the\r\nspiritual man firmly and steadfastly on his feet.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n48. The fruit of right poise is the strength to resist the shocks of infatuation\r\nor sorrow.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nIn the simpler physical sense, which is also coveted by the wording of the\r\noriginal, this sentence means that wise effort establishes such bodily poise\r\nthat the accidents of life cannot disturb it, as the captain remains steady,\r\nthough disaster overtake his ship.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nBut the deeper sense is far more important. The spiritual man, too, must learn\r\nto withstand all shocks, to remain steadfast through the perturbations of\r\nexternal things and the storms and whirlwinds of the psychical world. This is\r\nthe power which is gained by wise, continuous effort, and by filling the spirit\r\nwith the atmosphere of the Eternal.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n49. When this is gained, there follows the right guidance of the life-currents,\r\nthe control of the incoming and outgoing breath.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nIt is well understood to-day that most of our maladies come from impure\r\nconditions of the blood. It is coming to be understood that right breathing,\r\nright oxygenation, will do very much to keep the blood clean and pure.\r\nTherefore a right knowledge of breathing is a part of the science of life.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nBut the deeper meaning is, that the spiritual man, when he has gained poise\r\nthrough right effort and aspiration, can stand firm, and guide the currents of\r\nhis life, both the incoming current of events, and the outgoing current of his\r\nacts.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nExactly the same symbolism is used in the saying: Not that which goeth into the\r\nmouth defileth a man; but that which cometh out of the mouth, this defileth a\r\nman…. Those things which proceed out of the mouth come forth from the heart …\r\nout of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, uncleanness, thefts, false\r\nwitness, blasphemies. Therefore the first step in purification is to keep the\r\nCommandments.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n50. The life-current is either outward, or inward, or balanced; it is regulated\r\naccording to place, time, number; it is prolonged and subtle.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe technical, physical side of this has its value. In the breath, there should\r\nbe right inbreathing, followed by the period of pause, when the air comes into\r\ncontact with the blood, and this again followed by right outbreathing, even,\r\nsteady, silent. Further, the lungs should be evenly filled; many maladies may\r\narise from the neglect and consequent weakening of some region of the lungs.\r\nAnd the number of breaths is so important, so closely related to health, that\r\nevery nurse’s chart records it.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nBut the deeper meaning is concerned with the currents of life; with that which\r\ngoeth into and cometh out of the heart.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n51. The fourth degree transcends external and internal objects.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe inner meaning seems to be that, in addition to the three degrees of control\r\nalready described, control, that is, over the incoming current of life, over\r\nthe outgoing current, and over the condition of pause or quiesence, there is a\r\nfourth degree of control, which holds in complete mastery both the outer\r\npassage of events and the inner currents of thoughts and emotions; a condition\r\nof perfect poise and stability in the midst of the flux of things outward and\r\ninward.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n52. Thereby is worn away the veil which covers up the light.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe veil is the psychic nature, the web of emotions, desires, argumentative\r\ntrains of thought, which cover up and obscure the truth by absorbing the entire\r\nattention and keeping the consciousness in the psychic realm. When hopes and\r\nfears are reckoned at their true worth, in comparison with lasting possessions\r\nof the Soul; when the outer reflections of things have ceased to distract us\r\nfrom inner realities; when argumentative-thought no longer entangles us, but\r\nyields its place to flashing intuition, the certainty which springs from\r\nwithin; then is the veil worn away, the consciousness is drawn from the\r\npsychical to the spiritual, from the temporal to the Eternal. Then is the light\r\nunveiled.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n53. Thence comes the mind’s power to hold itself in the light.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nIt has been well said, that what we most need is the faculty of spiritual\r\nattention; and in the same direction of thought it has been eloquently declared\r\nthat prayer does not consist in our catching God’s attention, but rather\r\nin our allowing God to hold our attention.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe vital matter is, that we need to disentangle our consciousness from the\r\nnoisy and perturbed thraldom of the psychical, and to come to consciousness as\r\nthe spiritual man. This we must do, first, by purification, through the\r\nCommandments and the Rules; and, second, through the faculty of spiritual\r\nattention, by steadily heeding endless fine intimations of the spiritual power\r\nwithin us, and by intending our consciousness thereto; thus by degrees\r\ntransferring the centre of consciousness from the psychical to the spiritual.\r\nIt is a question, first, of love, and then of attention.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n54. The right Withdrawal is the disengaging of the powers from entanglement in\r\nouter things, as the psychic nature has been withdrawn and stilled.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nTo understand this, let us reverse the process, and think of the one\r\nconsciousness, centred in the Soul, gradually expanding and taking on the form\r\nof the different perceptive powers; the one will, at the same time,\r\ndifferentiating itself into the varied powers of action.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nNow let us imagine this to be reversed, so that the spiritual force, which has\r\ngone into the differentiated powers, is once more gathered together into the\r\ninner power of intuition and spiritual will, taking on that unity which is the\r\nhall-mark of spiritual things, as diversity is the seal of material things.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nIt is all a matter of love for the quality of spiritual consciousness, as\r\nagainst psychical consciousness, of love and attention. For where the heart is,\r\nthere will the treasure be also; where the consciousness is, there will the\r\nvesture with its powers be developed.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n55. Thereupon follows perfect mastery over the powers.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nWhen the spiritual condition which we have described is reached, with its\r\npurity, poise, and illuminated vision, the spiritual man is coming into his\r\ninheritance, and gaining complete mastery of his powers.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nIndeed, much of the struggle to keep the Commandments and the Rules has been\r\npaving the way for this mastery; through this very struggle and sacrifice the\r\nmastery has become possible; just as, to use St. Paul’s simile, the\r\nathlete gains the mastery in the contest and the race through the sacrifice of\r\nhis long and arduous training. Thus he gains the crown.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003c/div\u003e\u003c!–end chapter–\u003e\r\n\u003cdiv class=\"chapter\"\u003e\r\n\u003ch2\u003e\u003ca id=\"chap05\"\u003e\u003c/a\u003eINTRODUCTION TO BOOK III\u003c/h2\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe third book of the Sutras is the Book of Spiritual Powers. In considering\r\nthese spiritual powers, two things must be understood and kept in memory. The\r\nfirst of these is this: These spiritual powers can only be gained when the\r\ndevelopment described in the first and second books has been measurably\r\nattained; when the Commandments have been kept, the Rules faithfully followed,\r\nand the experiences which are described have been passed through. For only\r\nafter this is the spiritual man so far grown, so far disentangled from the\r\npsychical bandages and veils which have confined and blinded him, that he can\r\nuse his proper powers and faculties. For this is the secret of all spiritual\r\npowers: they are in no sense an abnormal or supernatural overgrowth upon the\r\nmaterial man, but are rather the powers and faculties inherent in the spiritual\r\nman, entirely natural to him, and coming naturally into activity, as the\r\nspiritual man is disentangled and liberated from psychical bondage, through\r\nkeeping the Commandments and Rules already set forth.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nAs the personal man is the limitation and inversion of the spiritual man, all\r\nhis faculties and powers are inversions of the powers of the spiritual man. In\r\na single phrase, his self seeking is the inversion of the Self-seeking which is\r\nthe very being of the spiritual man: the ceaseless search after the divine and\r\naugust Self of all beings. This inversion is corrected by keeping the\r\nCommandments and Rules, and gradually, as the inversion is overcome, the\r\nspiritual man is extricated, and comes into possession and free exercise of his\r\npowers. The spiritual powers, therefore, are the powers of the grown and\r\nliberated spiritual man. They can only be developed and used as the spiritual\r\nman grows and attains liberation through obedience. This is the first thing to\r\nbe kept in mind, in all that is said of spiritual powers in the third and\r\nfourth books of the Sutras. The second thing to be understood and kept in mind\r\nis this:\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nJust as our modern sages have discerned and taught that all matter is\r\nultimately one and eternal, definitely related throughout the whole wide\r\nuniverse; just as they have discerned and taught that all force is one and\r\neternal, so coordinated throughout the whole universe that whatever affects any\r\natom measurably affects the whole boundless realm of matter and force, to the\r\nmost distant star or nebula on the dim confines of space; so the ancient sages\r\nhad discerned and taught that all consciousness is one, immortal, indivisible,\r\ninfinite; so finely correlated and continuous that whatever is perceived by any\r\nconsciousness is, whether actually or potentially, within the reach of all\r\nconsciousness, and therefore within the reach of any consciousness. This has\r\nbeen well expressed by saying that all souls are fundamentally one with the\r\nOversoul; that the Son of God, and all Sons of God, are fundamentally one with\r\nthe Father. When the consciousness is cleared of psychic bonds and veils, when\r\nthe spiritual man is able to stand, to see, then this superb law comes into\r\neffect: whatever is within the knowledge of any consciousness, and this\r\nincludes the whole infinite universe, is within his reach, and may, if he\r\nwills, be made a part of his consciousness. This he may attain through his\r\nfundamental unity with the Oversoul, by raising himself toward the\r\nconsciousness above him, and drawing on its resources. The Son, if he would\r\nwork miracles, whether of perception or of action, must come often into the\r\npresence of the Father. This is the birthright of the spiritual man; through it\r\nhe comes into possession of his splendid and immortal powers. Let it be clearly\r\nkept in mind that what is here to be related of the spiritual man, and his\r\nexalted powers, must in no wise be detached from what has gone before. The\r\nbeing, the very inception, of the spiritual man depends on the purification and\r\nmoral attainment already detailed, and can in no wise dispense with these or\r\ncurtail them.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nLet no one imagine that the true life, the true powers of the spiritual man,\r\ncan be attained by any way except the hard way of sacrifice, of trial, of\r\nrenunciation, of selfless self-conquest and genuine devotion to the weal of all\r\nothers. Only thus can the golden gates be reached and entered. Only thus can we\r\nattain to that pure world wherein the spiritual man lives, and moves, and has\r\nhis being. Nothing impure, nothing unholy can ever cross that threshold, least\r\nof all impure motives or self seeking desires. These must be burnt away before\r\nan entrance to that world can be gained.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nBut where there is light, there is shadow; and the lofty light of the soul\r\ncasts upon the clouds of the mid-world the shadow of the spiritual man and of\r\nhis powers; the bastard vesture and the bastard powers of psychism are easily\r\nattained; yet, even when attained, they are a delusion, the very essence of\r\nunreality.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nTherefore ponder well the earlier rules, and lay a firm foundation of courage,\r\nsacrifice, selflessness, holiness.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003c/div\u003e\u003c!–end chapter–\u003e\r\n\u003cdiv class=\"chapter\"\u003e\r\n\u003ch2\u003e\u003ca id=\"chap06\"\u003e\u003c/a\u003eBOOK III\u003c/h2\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n1. The binding of the perceiving consciousness to a certain region is attention\r\n(dharana).\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nEmerson quotes Sir Isaac Newton as saying that he made his great discoveries by\r\nintending his mind on them. That is what is meant here. I read the page of a\r\nbook while inking of something else. At the end of he page, I have no idea of\r\nwhat it is about, and read it again, still thinking of something else, with the\r\nsame result. Then I wake up, so to speak, make an effort of attention, fix my\r\nthought on what I am reading, and easily take in its meaning. The act of will,\r\nthe effort of attention, the intending of the mind on each word and line of the\r\npage, just as the eyes are focussed on each word and line, is the power here\r\ncontemplated. It is the power to focus the consciousness on a given spot, and\r\nhold it there Attention is the first and indispensable step in all knowledge.\r\nAttention to spiritual things is the first step to spiritual knowledge.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n2. A prolonged holding of the perceiving consciousness in that region is\r\nmeditation (dhyana).\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThis will apply equally to outer and inner things. I may for a moment fix my\r\nattention on some visible object, in a single penetrating glance, or I may hold\r\nthe attention fixedly on it until it reveals far more of its nature than a\r\nsingle glance could perceive. The first is the focussing of the searchlight of\r\nconsciousness upon the object. The other is the holding of the white beam of\r\nlight steadily and persistently on the object, until it yields up the secret of\r\nits details. So for things within; one may fix the inner glance for a moment on\r\nspiritual things, or one may hold the consciousness steadily upon them, until\r\nwhat was in the dark slowly comes forth into the light, and yields up its\r\nimmortal secret. But this is possible only for the spiritual man, after the\r\nCommandments and the Rules have been kept; for until this is done, the\r\nthronging storms of psychical thoughts dissipate and distract the attention, so\r\nthat it will not remain fixed on spiritual things. The cares of this world, the\r\ndeceitfulness of riches, choke the word of the spiritual message.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n3. When the perceiving consciousness in this meditative is wholly given to\r\nilluminating the essential meaning of the object contemplated, and is freed\r\nfrom the sense of separateness and personality, this is contemplation\r\n(samadhi).\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nLet us review the steps so far taken. First, the beam of perceiving\r\nconsciousness is focussed on a certain region or subject, through the effort of\r\nattention. Then this attending consciousness is held on its object. Third,\r\nthere is the ardent will to know its meaning, to illumine it with comprehending\r\nthought. Fourth, all personal bias—all desire merely to indorse a\r\nprevious opinion and so prove oneself right, and all desire for personal profit\r\nor gratification must be quite put away. There must be a purely disinterested\r\nlove of truth for its own sake. Thus is the perceiving consciousness made void,\r\nas it were, of all personality or sense of separateness. The personal\r\nlimitation stands aside and lets the All-consciousness come to bear upon the\r\nproblem. The Oversoul bends its ray upon the object, and illumines it with pure\r\nlight.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n4. When these three, Attention, Meditation Contemplation, are exercised at\r\nonce, this is perfectly concentrated Meditation (sanyama).\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nWhen the personal limitation of the perceiving consciousness stands aside, and\r\nallows the All-conscious to come to bear upon the problem, then arises that\r\nreal knowledge which is called a flash of genius; that real knowledge which\r\nmakes discoveries, and without which no discovery can be made, however\r\npainstaking the effort. For genius is the vision of the spiritual man, and that\r\nvision is a question of growth rather than present effort; though right effort,\r\nrightly continued, will in time infallibly lead to growth and vision. Through\r\nthe power thus to set aside personal limitation, to push aside petty concerns\r\nand cares, and steady the whole nature and will in an ardent love of truth and\r\ndesire to know it; through the power thus to make way for the\r\nAll-consciousness, all great men make their discoveries. Newton, watching the\r\napple fall to the earth, was able to look beyond, to see the subtle waves of\r\nforce pulsating through apples and worlds and suns and galaxies, and thus to\r\nperceive universal gravitation. The Oversoul, looking through his eyes,\r\nrecognized the universal force, one of its own children. Darwin, watching the\r\nforms and motions of plants and animals, let the same august consciousness come\r\nto bear on them, and saw infinite growth perfected through ceaseless struggle.\r\nHe perceived the superb process of evolution, the Oversoul once more\r\nrecognizing its own. Fraunhofer, noting the dark lines in the band of sunlight\r\nin his spectroscope, divined their identity with the bright lines in the\r\nspectra of incandescent iron, sodium and the rest, and so saw the oneness of\r\nsubstance in the worlds and suns, the unity of the materials of the universe.\r\nOnce again the Oversoul, looking with his eyes, recognized its own. So it is\r\nwith all true knowledge. But the mind must transcend its limitations, its\r\nidiosyncrasies; there must be purity, for to the pure in heart is the promise,\r\nthat they shall see God.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n5. By mastering this perfectly concentrated Meditation, there comes the\r\nillumination of perception.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe meaning of this is illustrated by what has been said before. When the\r\nspiritual man is able to throw aside the trammels of emotional and mental\r\nlimitation, and to open his eyes, he sees clearly, he attains to illuminated\r\nperception. A poet once said that Occultism is the conscious cultivation of\r\ngenius; and it is certain that the awakened spiritual man attains to the\r\nperceptions of genius. Genius is the vision, the power, of the spiritual man,\r\nwhether its possessor recognizes this or not. All true knowledge is of the\r\nspiritual man. The greatest in all ages have recognized this and put their\r\ntestimony on record. The great in wisdom who have not consciously recognized\r\nit, have ever been full of the spirit of reverence, of selfless devotion to\r\ntruth, of humility, as was Darwin; and reverence and humility are the\r\nunconscious recognition of the nearness of the Spirit, that Divinity which\r\nbroods over us, a Master o’er a slave.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n6. This power is distributed in ascending degrees.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nIt is to be attained step by step. It is a question, not of miracle, but of\r\nevolution, of growth. Newton had to master the multiplication table, then the\r\nfour rules of arithmetic, then the rudiments of algebra, before he came to the\r\nbinomial theorem. At each point, there was attention, concentration, insight;\r\nuntil these were attained, no progress to the next point was possible. So with\r\nDarwin. He had to learn the form and use of leaf and flower, of bone and\r\nmuscle; the characteristics of genera and species; the distribution of plants\r\nand animals, before he had in mind that nexus of knowledge on which the light\r\nof his great idea was at last able to shine. So is it with all knowledge. So is\r\nit with spiritual knowledge. Take the matter this way: The first subject for\r\nthe exercise of my spiritual insight is my day, with its circumstances, its\r\nhindrances, its opportunities, its duties. I do what I can to solve it, to\r\nfulfil its duties, to learn its lessons. I try to live my day with aspiration\r\nand faith. That is the first step. By doing this, I gather a harvest for the\r\nevening, I gain a deeper insight into life, in virtue of which I begin the next\r\nday with a certain advantage, a certain spiritual advance and attainment. So\r\nwith all successive days. In faith and aspiration, we pass from day to day, in\r\ngrowing knowledge and power, with never more than one day to solve at a time,\r\nuntil all life becomes radiant and transparent.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n7. This threefold power, of Attention, Meditation, Contemplation, is more\r\ninterior than the means of growth previously described.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nVery naturally so; because the means of growth previously described were\r\nconcerned with the extrication of the spiritual man from psychic bondages and\r\nveils; while this threefold power is to be exercised by the spiritual man thus\r\nextricated and standing on his feet, viewing life with open eyes.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n8. But this triad is still exterior to the soul vision which is unconditioned,\r\nfree from the seed of mental analyses.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe reason is this: The threefold power we have been considering, the triad of\r\nAttention, Contemplation, Meditation is, so far as we have yet considered it,\r\nthe focussing of the beam of perceiving consciousness upon some form of\r\nmanifesting being, with a view of understanding it completely. There is a\r\nhigher stage, where the beam of consciousness is turned back upon itself, and\r\nthe individual consciousness enters into, and knows, the All consciousness.\r\nThis is a being, a being in immortality, rather than a knowing; it is free from\r\nmental analysis or mental forms. It is not an activity of the higher mind, even\r\nthe mind of the spiritual man. It is an activity of the soul. Had Newton risen\r\nto this higher stage, he would have known, not the laws of motion, but that\r\nhigh Being, from whose Life comes eternal motion. Had Darwin risen to this, he\r\nwould have seen the Soul, whose graduated thought and being all evolution\r\nexpresses. There are, therefore, these two perceptions: that of living things,\r\nand that of the Life; that of the Soul’s works, and that of the Soul\r\nitself.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n9. One of the ascending degrees is the development of Control. First there is\r\nthe overcoming of the mind-impress of excitation. Then comes the manifestation\r\nof the mind-impress of Control. Then the perceiving consciousness follows after\r\nthe moment of Control.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThis is the development of Control. The meaning seems to be this: Some object\r\nenters the field of observation, and at first violently excites the mind,\r\nstirring up curiosity, fear, wonder; then the consciousness returns upon\r\nitself, as it were, and takes the perception firmly in hand, steadying itself,\r\nand viewing the matter calmly from above. This steadying effort of the will\r\nupon the perceiving consciousness is Control, and immediately upon it follows\r\nperception, understanding, insight.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nTake a trite example. Supposing one is walking in an Indian forest. A charging\r\nelephant suddenly appears. The man is excited by astonishment, and, perhaps,\r\nterror. But he exercises an effort of will, perceives the situation in its true\r\nbearings, and recognizes that a certain thing must be done; in this case,\r\nprobably, that he must get out of the way as quickly as possible.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nOr a comet, unheralded, appears in the sky like a flaming sword. The beholder\r\nis at first astonished, perhaps terror-stricken; but he takes himself in hand,\r\ncontrols his thoughts, views the apparition calmly, and finally calculates its\r\norbit and its relation to meteor showers.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThese are extreme illustrations; but with all knowledge the order of perception\r\nis the same: first, the excitation of the mind by the new object impressed on\r\nit; then the control of the mind from within; upon which follows the perception\r\nof the nature of the object. Where the eyes of the spiritual man are open, this\r\nwill be a true and penetrating spiritual perception. In some such way do our\r\nliving experiences come to us; first, with a shock of pain; then the Soul\r\nsteadies itself and controls the pain; then the spirit perceives the lesson of\r\nthe event, and its bearing upon the progressive revelation of life.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n10. Through frequent repetition of this process, the mind becomes habituated to\r\nit, and there arises an equable flow of perceiving consciousness.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nControl of the mind by the Soul, like control of the muscles by the mind, comes\r\nby practice, and constant voluntary repetition.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nAs an example of control of the muscles by the mind, take the ceaseless\r\npractice by which a musician gains mastery over his instrument, or a fencer\r\ngains skill with a rapier. Innumerable small efforts of attention will make a\r\nresult which seems well-nigh miraculous; which, for the novice, is really\r\nmiraculous. Then consider that far more wonderful instrument, the perceiving\r\nmind, played on by that fine musician, the Soul. Here again, innumerable small\r\nefforts of attention will accumulate into mastery, and a mastery worth winning.\r\nFor a concrete example, take the gradual conquest of each day, the effort to\r\nlive that day for the Soul. To him that is faithful unto death, the Master\r\ngives the crown of life.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n11. The gradual conquest of the mind’s tendency to flit from one object\r\nto another, and the power of one-pointedness, make the development of\r\nContemplation.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nAs an illustration of the mind’s tendency to flit from one object to\r\nanother, take a small boy, learning arithmetic. He begins: two ones are two;\r\nthree ones are three-and then he thinks of three coins in his pocket, which\r\nwill purchase so much candy, in the store down the street, next to the\r\ntoy-shop, where are base-balls, marbles and so on,—and then he comes back\r\nwith a jerk, to four ones are four. So with us also. We are seeking the meaning\r\nof our task, but the mind takes advantage of a moment of slackened attention,\r\nand flits off from one frivolous detail to another, till we suddenly come back\r\nto consciousness after traversing leagues of space. We must learn to conquer\r\nthis, and to go back within ourselves into the beam of perceiving consciousness\r\nitself, which is a beam of the Oversoul. This is the true onepointedness, the\r\nbringing of our consciousness to a focus in the Soul.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n12. When, following this, the controlled manifold tendency and the aroused\r\none-pointedness are equally balanced parts of the perceiving consciousness, his\r\nthe development of one-pointedness.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThis would seem to mean that the insight which is called one-pointedness has\r\ntwo sides, equally balanced. There is, first, the manifold aspect of any\r\nobject, the sum of all its characteristics and properties. This is to be held\r\nfirmly in the mind. Then there is the perception of the object as a unity, as a\r\nwhole, the perception of its essence. First, the details must be clearly\r\nperceived; then the essence must be comprehended. When the two processes are\r\nequally balanced, the true onepointedness is attained. Everything has these two\r\nsides, the side of difference and the side of unity; there is the individual\r\nand there is the genus; the pole of matter and diversity, and the pole of\r\noneness and spirit. To see the object truly, we must see both.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n13. Through this, the inherent character, distinctive marks and conditions of\r\nbeing and powers, according to their development, are made clear.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nBy the power defined in the preceding sutra, the inherent character,\r\ndistinctive marks and conditions of beings and powers are made clear. For\r\nthrough this power, as defined, we get a twofold view of each object, seeing at\r\nonce all its individual characteristics and its essential character, species\r\nand genus; we see it in relation to itself, and in relation to the Eternal.\r\nThus we see a rose as that particular flower, with its colour and scent, its\r\npeculiar fold of each petal; but we also see in it the species, the family to\r\nwhich it belongs, with its relation to all plants, to all life, to Life itself.\r\nSo in any day, we see events and circumstances; we also see in it the lesson\r\nset for the soul by the Eternal.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n14. Every object has its characteristics which are already quiescent, those\r\nwhich are active, and those which are not yet definable.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nEvery object has characteristics belonging to its past, its present and its\r\nfuture. In a fir tree, for example, there are the stumps or scars of dead\r\nbranches, which once represented its foremost growth; there are the branches\r\nwith their needles spread out to the air; there are the buds at the end of each\r\nbranch and twig, which carry the still closely packed needles which are the\r\npromise of the future. In like manner, the chrysalis has, as its past, the\r\ncaterpillar; as its future, the butterfly. The man has, in his past, the\r\nanimal; in his future, the angel. Both are visible even now in his face. So\r\nwith all things, for all things change and grow.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n15. Difference in stage is the cause of difference in development.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThis but amplifies what has just been said. The first stage is the sapling, the\r\ncaterpillar, the animal. The second stage is the growing tree, the chrysalis,\r\nthe man. The third is the splendid pine, the butterfly, the angel. Difference\r\nof stage is the cause of difference of development. So it is among men, and\r\namong the races of men.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n16. Through perfectly concentrated Meditation on the three stages of\r\ndevelopment comes a knowledge of past and future.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nWe have taken our illustrations from natural science, because, since every true\r\ndiscovery in natural science is a divination of a law in nature, attained\r\nthrough a flash of genius, such discoveries really represent acts of spiritual\r\nperception, acts of perception by the spiritual man, even though they are\r\ngenerally not so recognized. So we may once more use the same illustration.\r\nPerfectly concentrated Meditation, perfect insight into the chrysalis, reveals\r\nthe caterpillar that it has been, the butterfly that it is destined to be. He\r\nwho knows the seed, knows the seed-pod or ear it has come from, and the plant\r\nthat is to come from it. So in like manner he who really knows today, and the\r\nheart of to-day, knows its parent yesterday and its child tomorrow. Past,\r\npresent and future are all in the Eternal. He who dwells in the Eternal knows\r\nall three.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n17. The sound and the object and the thought called up by a word are confounded\r\nbecause they are all blurred together in the mind. By perfectly concentrated\r\nMeditation on the distinction between them, there comes an understanding of the\r\nsounds uttered by all beings.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nIt must be remembered that we are speaking of perception by the spiritual man.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nSound, like every force, is the expression of a power of the Eternal. Infinite\r\nshades of this power are expressed in the infinitely varied tones of sound. He\r\nwho, having entry to the consciousness of the Eternal knows the essence of this\r\npower, can divine the meanings of all sounds, from the voice of the insect to\r\nthe music of the spheres.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nIn like manner, he who has attained to spiritual vision can perceive the\r\nmind-images in the thoughts of others, with the shade of feeling which goes\r\nwith them, thus reading their thoughts as easily as he hears their words. Every\r\none has the germ of this power, since difference of tone will give widely\r\ndiffering meanings to the same words, meanings which are intuitively perceived\r\nby everyone.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n18. When the mind-impressions become visible, there comes an understanding of\r\nprevious births.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThis is simple enough if we grasp the truth of rebirth. The fine harvest of\r\npast experiences is drawn into the spiritual nature, forming, indeed, the basis\r\nof its development. When the consciousness has been raised to a point above\r\nthese fine subjective impressions, and can look down upon them from above, this\r\nwill in itself be a remembering of past births.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n19. By perfectly concentrated Meditation on mind-images is gained the\r\nunderstanding of the thoughts of others.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nHere, for those who can profit by it, is the secret of thought-reading. Take\r\nthe simplest case of intentional thought transference. It is the testimony of\r\nthose who have done this, that the perceiving mind must be stilled, before the\r\nmind-image projected by the other mind can be seen. With it comes a sense of\r\nthe feeling and temper of the other mind and so on, in higher degrees.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n20. But since that on which the thought in the mind of another rests is not\r\nobjective to the thought-reader’s consciousness, he perceives the thought\r\nonly, and not also that on which the thought rests.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe meaning appears to be simple: One may be able to perceive the thoughts of\r\nsome one at a distance; one cannot, by that means alone, also perceive the\r\nexternal surroundings of that person, which arouse these thoughts.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n21. By perfectly concentrated Meditation on the form of the body, by arresting\r\nthe body’s perceptibility, and by inhibiting the eye’s power of\r\nsight, there comes the power to make the body invisible.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThere are many instances of the exercise of this power, by mesmerists,\r\nhypnotists and the like; and we may simply call it an instance of the power of\r\nsuggestion. Shankara tells us that by this power the popular magicians of the\r\nEast perform their wonders, working on the mind-images of others, while\r\nremaining invisible themselves. It is all a question of being able to see and\r\ncontrol the mind-images.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n22. The works which fill out the life-span may be either immediately or\r\ngradually operative. By perfectly concentrated Meditation on these comes a\r\nknowledge of the time of the end, as also through signs.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nA garment which is wet, says the commentator, may be hung up to dry, and so dry\r\nrapidly, or it may be rolled in a ball and dry slowly; so a fire may blaze or\r\nsmoulder. Thus it is with Karma, the works that fill out the life-span. By an\r\ninsight into the mental forms and forces which make up Karma, there comes a\r\nknowledge of the rapidity or slowness of their development, and of the time\r\nwhen the debt will be paid.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n23. By perfectly concentrated Meditation on sympathy, compassion and kindness,\r\nis gained the power of interior union with others.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nUnity is the reality; separateness the illusion. The nearer we come to reality,\r\nthe nearer we come to unity of heart. Sympathy, compassion, kindness are modes\r\nof this unity of heart, whereby we rejoice with those who rejoice, and weep\r\nwith those who weep. These things are learned by desiring to learn them.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n24. By perfectly concentrated Meditation on power, even such power as that of\r\nthe elephant may be gained.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThis is a pretty image. Elephants possess not only force, but poise and\r\nfineness of control. They can lift a straw, a child, a tree with perfectly\r\njudged control and effort. So the simile is a good one. By detachment, by\r\nwithdrawing into the soul’s reservoir of power, we can gain all these,\r\nforce and fineness and poise; the ability to handle with equal mastery things\r\nsmall and great, concrete and abstract alike.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n25. By bending upon them the awakened inner light, there comes a knowledge of\r\nthings subtle, or concealed, or obscure.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nAs was said at the outset, each consciousness is related to all consciousness;\r\nand, through it, has a potential consciousness of all things; whether subtle or\r\nconcealed or obscure. An understanding of this great truth will come with\r\npractice. As one of the wise has said, we have no conception of the power of\r\nMeditation.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n26. By perfectly concentrated Meditation on the sun comes a knowledge of the\r\nworlds.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThis has several meanings: First, by a knowledge of the constitution of the\r\nsun, astronomers can understand the kindred nature of the stars. And it is said\r\nthat there is a finer astronomy, where the spiritual man is the astronomer. But\r\nthe sun also means the Soul, and through knowledge of the Soul comes a\r\nknowledge of the realms of life.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n27. By perfectly concentrated Meditation on the moon comes a knowledge of the\r\nlunar mansions.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nHere again are different meanings. The moon is, first, the companion planet,\r\nwhich, each day, passes backward through one mansion of the stars. By watching\r\nthe moon, the boundaries of the mansion are learned, with their succession in\r\nthe great time-dial of the sky. But the moon also symbolizes the analytic mind,\r\nwith its divided realms; and these, too, may be understood through perfectly\r\nconcentrated Meditation.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n28. By perfectly concentrated Meditation on the fixed pole-star comes a\r\nknowledge of the motions of the stars.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nAddressing Duty, stern daughter of the Voice of God, Wordsworth finely said:\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"poem\"\u003e\r\n Thou cost preserve the stars from wrong,\u003cbr\u003e\r\n And the most ancient heavens through thee are fresh and strong—\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"noindent\"\u003e\r\nthus suggesting a profound relation between the moral powers and the powers\r\nthat rule the worlds. So in this Sutra the fixed polestar is the eternal spirit\r\nabout which all things move, as well as the star toward which points the axis\r\nof the earth. Deep mysteries attend both, and the veil of mystery is only to be\r\nraised by Meditation, by open-eyed vision of the awakened spiritual man.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n29. Perfectly concentrated Meditation on the centre of force in the lower trunk\r\nbrings an understanding of the order of the bodily powers.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nWe are coming to a vitally important part of the teaching of Yoga: namely, the\r\nspiritual man’s attainment of full self-consciousness, the awakening of\r\nthe spiritual man as a self-conscious individual, behind and above the natural\r\nman. In this awakening, and in the process of gestation which precedes it,\r\nthere is a close relation with the powers of the natural man, which are, in a\r\ncertain sense, the projection, outward and downward, of the powers of the\r\nspiritual man. This is notably true of that creative power of the spiritual man\r\nwhich, when embodied in the natural man, becomes the power of generation. Not\r\nonly is this power the cause of the continuance of the bodily race of mankind,\r\nbut further, in the individual, it is the key to the dominance of the personal\r\nlife. Rising, as it were, through the life-channels of the body, it flushes the\r\npersonality with physical force, and maintains and colours the illusion that\r\nthe physical life is the dominant and all-important expression of life. In due\r\ntime, when the spiritual man has begun to take form, the creative force will be\r\ndrawn off, and become operative in building the body of the spiritual man, just\r\nas it has been operative in the building of physical bodies, through generation\r\nin the natural world.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nPerfectly concentrated Meditation on the nature of this force means, first,\r\nthat rising of the consciousness into the spiritual world, already described,\r\nwhich gives the one sure foothold for Meditation; and then, from that spiritual\r\npoint of vantage, not only an insight into the creative force, in its spiritual\r\nand physical aspects, but also a gradually attained control of this wonderful\r\nforce, which will mean its direction to the body of the spiritual man, and its\r\ngradual withdrawal from the body of the natural man, until the over-pressure,\r\nso general and such a fruitful source of misery in our day, is abated, and\r\npurity takes the place of passion. This over pressure, which is the cause of so\r\nmany evils and so much of human shame, is an abnormal, not a natural,\r\ncondition. It is primarily due to spiritual blindness, to blindness regarding\r\nthe spiritual man, and ignorance even of his existence; for by this blind\r\nignorance are closed the channels through which, were they open, the creative\r\nforce could flow into the body of the spiritual man, there building up an\r\nimmortal vesture. There is no cure for blindness, with its consequent\r\nover-pressure and attendant misery and shame, but spiritual vision, spiritual\r\naspiration, sacrifice, the new birth from above. There is no other way to\r\nlighten the burden, to lift the misery and shame from human life. Therefore,\r\nlet us follow after sacrifice and aspiration, let us seek the light. In this\r\nway only shall we gain that insight into the order of the bodily powers, and\r\nthat mastery of them, which this Sutra implies.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n30. By perfectly concentrated Meditation on the centre of force in the well of\r\nthe throat, there comes the cessation of hunger and thirst.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nWe are continuing the study of the bodily powers and centres of force in their\r\nrelation to the powers and forces of the spiritual man. We have already\r\nconsidered the dominant power of physical life, the creative power which\r\nsecures the continuance of physical life; and, further, the manner in which,\r\nthrough aspiration and sacrifice, it is gradually raised and set to the work of\r\nupbuilding the body of the spiritual man. We come now to the dominant psychic\r\nforce, the power which manifests itself in speech, and in virtue of which the\r\nvoice may carry so much of the personal magnetism, endowing the orator with a\r\ntongue of fire, magical in its power to arouse and rule the emotions of his\r\nhearers. This emotional power, this distinctively psychical force, is the cause\r\nof “hunger and thirst,” the psychical hunger and thirst for\r\nsensations, which is the source of our two-sided life of emotionalism, with its\r\nhopes and fears, its expectations and memories, its desires and hates. The\r\nsource of this psychical power, or, perhaps we should say, its centre of\r\nactivity in the physical body is said to be in the cavity of the throat. Thus,\r\nin the Taittiriya Upanishad it is written: “There is this shining ether\r\nin the inner being. Therein is the spiritual man, formed through thought,\r\nimmortal, golden. Inward, in the palate, the organ that hangs down like a\r\nnipple,-this is the womb of Indra. And there, where the dividing of the hair\r\nturns, extending upward to the crown of the head.”\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nIndra is the name given to the creative power of which we have spoken, and\r\nwhich, we are told, resides in “the organ which hangs down like a nipple,\r\ninward, in the palate.”\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n31. By perfectly concentrated Meditation on the centre of force in the channel\r\ncalled the “tortoise-formed,” comes steadfastness.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nWe are concerned now with the centre of nervous or psychical force below the\r\ncavity of the throat, in the chest, in which is felt the sensation of fear; the\r\ncentre, the disturbance of which sets the heart beating miserably with dread,\r\nor which produces that sense of terror through which the heart is said to stand\r\nstill.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nWhen the truth concerning fear is thoroughly mastered, through spiritual\r\ninsight into the immortal, fearless life, then this force is perfectly\r\ncontrolled; there is no more fear, just as, through the control of the psychic\r\npower which works through the nerve-centre in the throat, there comes a\r\ncessation of “hunger and thirst.” Thereafter, these forces, or\r\ntheir spiritual prototypes, are turned to the building of the spiritual man.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nAlways, it must be remembered, the victory is first a spiritual one; only later\r\ndoes it bring control of the bodily powers.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n32. Through perfectly concentrated Meditation on the light in the head comes\r\nthe vision of the Masters who have attained.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe tradition is, that there is a certain centre of force in the head, perhaps\r\nthe “pineal gland,” which some of our Western philosophers have\r\nsupposed to be the dwelling of the soul, a centre which is, as it were, the\r\ndoor way between the natural and the spiritual man. It is the seat of that\r\nbetter and wiser consciousness behind the outward looking consciousness in the\r\nforward part of the head; that better and wiser consciousness of “the\r\nback of the mind,” which views spiritual things, and seeks to impress the\r\nspiritual view on the outward looking consciousness in the forward part of the\r\nhead. It is the spiritual man seeking to guide the natural man, seeking to\r\nbring the natural man to concern himself with the things of his immortality.\r\nThis is suggested in the words of the Upanishad already quoted: “There,\r\nwhere the dividing of the hair turns, extending upward to the crown of the\r\nhead”; all of which may sound very fantastical, until one comes to\r\nunderstand it.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nIt is said that when this power is fully awakened, it brings a vision of the\r\ngreat Companions of the spiritual man, those who have already attained,\r\ncrossing over to the further shore of the sea of death and rebirth. Perhaps it\r\nis to this divine sight that the Master alluded, who is reported to have said:\r\n“I counsel you to buy of me eye-salve, that you may see.” It is of\r\nthis same vision of the great Companions, the children of light, that a seer\r\nwrote:\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"poem\"\u003e\r\n“Though inland far we be,\u003cbr\u003e\r\nOur souls have sight of that immortal sea\u003cbr\u003e\r\nWhich brought us hither,\u003cbr\u003e\r\nCan in a moment travel thither,\u003cbr\u003e\r\nAnd see the Children sport upon the shore\u003cbr\u003e\r\nAnd hear the mighty waters rolling evermore.”\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n33. Or through the divining power of tuition he knows all things.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThis is really the supplement, the spiritual side, of the Sutra just\r\ntranslated. Step by step, as the better consciousness, the spiritual view,\r\ngains force in the back of the mind, so, in the same measure, the spiritual man\r\nis gaining the power to see: learning to open the spiritual eyes. When the eyes\r\nare fully opened, the spiritual man beholds the great Companions standing about\r\nhim; he has begun to “know all things.”\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThis divining power of intuition is the power which lies above and behind the\r\nso-called rational mind; the rational mind formulates a question and lays it\r\nbefore the intuition, which gives a real answer, often immediately distorted by\r\nthe rational mind, yet always embodying a kernel of truth. It is by this\r\nprocess, through which the rational mind brings questions to the intuition for\r\nsolution, that the truths of science are reached, the flashes of discovery and\r\ngenius. But this higher power need not work in subordination to the so-called\r\nrational mind, it may act directly, as full illumination, “the vision and\r\nthe faculty divine.”\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n34 By perfectly concentrated Meditation on the heart, the interior being, comes\r\nthe knowledge of consciousness.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe heart here seems to mean, as it so often does in the Upanishads, the\r\ninterior, spiritual nature, the consciousness of the spiritual man, which is\r\nrelated to the heart, and to the wisdom of the heart. By steadily seeking\r\nafter, and finding, the consciousness of the spiritual man, by coming to\r\nconsciousness as the spiritual man, a perfect knowledge of consciousness will\r\nbe attained. For the consciousness of the spiritual man has this divine\r\nquality: while being and remaining a truly individual consciousness, it at the\r\nsame time flows over, as it were, and blends with the Divine Consciousness\r\nabove and about it, the consciousness of the great Companions; and by showing\r\nitself to be one with the Divine Consciousness, it reveals the nature of all\r\nconsciousness, the secret that all consciousness is One and Divine.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n35. The personal self seeks to feast on life, through a failure to perceive the\r\ndistinction between the personal self and the spiritual man. All personal\r\nexperience really exists for the sake of another: namely, the spiritual man. By\r\nperfectly concentrated Meditation on experience for the sake of the Self, comes\r\na knowledge of the spiritual man.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe divine ray of the Higher Self, which is eternal, impersonal and abstract,\r\ndescends into life, and forms a personality, which, through the stress and\r\nstorm of life, is hammered into a definite and concrete self-conscious\r\nindividuality. The problem is, to blend these two powers, taking the eternal\r\nand spiritual being of the first, and blending with it, transferring into it,\r\nthe self-conscious individuality of the second; and thus bringing to life a\r\nthird being, the spiritual man, who is heir to the immortality of his father,\r\nthe Higher Self, and yet has the self-conscious, concrete individuality of his\r\nother parent, the personal self. This is the true immaculate conception, the\r\nnew birth from above, “conceived of the Holy Spirit.” Of this new\r\nbirth it is said: “that which is born of the Spirit is spirit: ye must be\r\nborn again.”\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nRightly understood, therefore, the whole life of the personal man is for\r\nanother, not for himself. He exists only to render his very life and all his\r\nexperience for the building up of the spiritual man. Only through failure to\r\nsee this, does he seek enjoyment for himself, seek to secure the feasts of life\r\nfor himself; not understanding that he must live for the other, live\r\nsacrificially, offering both feasts and his very being on the altar; giving\r\nhimself as a contribution for the building of the spiritual man. When he does\r\nunderstand this, and lives for the Higher Self, setting his heart and thought\r\non the Higher Self, then his sacrifice bears divine fruit, the spiritual man is\r\nbuilt up, consciousness awakes in him, and he comes fully into being as a\r\ndivine and immortal individuality.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n36. Thereupon are born the divine power of intuition, and the hearing, the\r\ntouch, the vision, the taste and the power of smell of the spiritual man.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nWhen, in virtue of the perpetual sacrifice of the personal man, daily and\r\nhourly giving his life for his divine brother the spiritual man, and through\r\nthe radiance ever pouring down from the Higher Self, eternal in the Heavens,\r\nthe spiritual man comes to birth,-there awake in him those powers whose\r\nphysical counterparts we know in the personal man. The spiritual man begins to\r\nsee, to hear, to touch, to taste. And, besides the senses of the spiritual man,\r\nthere awakes his mind, that divine counterpart of the mind of the physical man,\r\nthe power of direct and immediate knowledge, the power of spiritual intuition,\r\nof divination. This power, as we have seen, owes its virtue to the unity, the\r\ncontinuity, of consciousness, whereby whatever is known to any consciousness,\r\nis knowable by any other consciousness. Thus the consciousness of the spiritual\r\nman, who lives above our narrow barriers of separateness, is in intimate touch\r\nwith the consciousness of the great Companions, and can draw on that vast\r\nreservoir for all real needs. Thus arises within the spiritual man that certain\r\nknowledge which is called intuition, divination, illumination.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n37. These powers stand in contradistinction to the highest spiritual vision. In\r\nmanifestation they are called magical powers.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe divine man is destined to supersede the spiritual man, as the spiritual man\r\nsupersedes the natural man. Then the disciple becomes a Master. The opened\r\npowers of tile spiritual man, spiritual vision, hearing, and touch, stand,\r\ntherefore, in contradistinction to the higher divine power above them, and must\r\nin no wise be regarded as the end of the way, for the path has no end, but\r\nrises ever to higher and higher glories; the soul’s growth and splendour\r\nhave no limit. So that, if the spiritual powers we have been considering are\r\nregarded as in any sense final, they are a hindrance, a barrier to the far\r\nhigher powers of the divine man. But viewed from below, from the standpoint of\r\nnormal physical experience, they are powers truly magical; as the powers\r\nnatural to a four-dimensional being will appear magical to a three-dimensional\r\nbeing.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n38. Through the weakening of the causes of bondage, and by learning the method\r\nof sassing, the consciousness is transferred to the other body.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nIn due time, after the spiritual man has been formed and grown stable through\r\nthe forces and virtues already enumerated, and after the senses of the\r\nspiritual man have awaked, there comes the transfer of the dominant\r\nconsciousness, the sense of individuality, from the physical to the spiritual\r\nman. Thereafter the physical man is felt to be a secondary, a subordinate, an\r\ninstrument through whom the spiritual man works; and the spiritual man is felt\r\nto be the real individuality. This is, in a sense, the attainment to full\r\nsalvation and immortal life; yet it is not the final goal or resting place, but\r\nonly the beginning of the greater way.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe means for this transfer are described as the weakening of the causes of\r\nbondage, and an understanding of the method of passing from the one\r\nconsciousness to the other. The first may also be described as detach meet, and\r\ncomes from the conquest of the delusion that the personal self is the real man.\r\nWhen that delusion abates and is held in check, the finer consciousness of the\r\nspiritual man begins to shine in the background of the mind. The transfer of\r\nthe sense of individuality to this finer consciousness, and thus to the\r\nspiritual man, then becomes a matter of recollection, of attention; primarily,\r\na matter of taking a deeper interest in the life and doings of the spiritual\r\nman, than in the pleasures or occupations of the personality. Therefore it is\r\nsaid: “Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and\r\nrust cloth corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal: but lay up for\r\nyourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust cloth corrupt, and\r\nwhere thieves do not break through nor steal: for where your treasure is, there\r\nwill your heart be also.”\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n39. Through mastery of the upward-life comes freedom from the dangers of water,\r\nmorass, and thorny places, and the power of ascension is gained.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nHere is one of the sentences, so characteristic of this author, and, indeed, of\r\nthe Eastern spirit, in which there is an obvious exterior meaning, and, within\r\nthis, a clear interior meaning, not quite so obvious, but far more vital.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe surface meaning is, that by mastery of a certain power, called here the\r\nupward-life, and akin to levitation, there comes the ability to walk on water,\r\nor to pass over thorny places without wounding the feet.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nBut there is a deeper meaning. When we speak of the disciple’s path as a\r\npath of thorns, we use a symbol; and the same symbol is used here. The\r\nupward-life means something more than the power, often manifested in abnormal\r\npsychical experiences, of levitating the physical body, or near-by physical\r\nobjects. It means the strong power of aspiration, of upward will, which first\r\nbuilds, and then awakes the spiritual man, and finally transfers the conscious\r\nindividuality to him; for it is he who passes safely over the waters of death\r\nand rebirth, and is not pierced by the thorns in the path. Therefore it is said\r\nthat he who would tread the path of power must look for a home in the air, and\r\nafterwards in the ether.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nOf the upward-life, this is written in the Katha Upanishad: “A hundred\r\nand one are the heart’s channels; of these one passes to the crown. Going\r\nup this, he comes to the immortal.” This is the power of ascension spoken\r\nof in the Sutra.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n40. By mastery of the binding-life comes radiance.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nIn the Upanishads, it is said that this binding-life unites the upward-life to\r\nthe downward-life, and these lives have their analogies in the “vital\r\nbreaths” in the body. The thought in the text seems to be, that, when the\r\npersonality is brought thoroughly under control of the spiritual man, through\r\nthe life-currents which bind them together, the personality is endowed with a\r\nnew force, a strong personal magnetism, one might call it, such as is often an\r\nappanage of genius.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nBut the text seems to mean more than this and to have in view the\r\n“vesture of the colour of the sun” attributed by the Upanishads to\r\nthe spiritual man; that vesture which a disciple has thus described: “The\r\nLord shall change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto his\r\nglorious body”; perhaps “body of radiance” would better\r\ntranslate the Greek.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nIn both these passages, the teaching seems to be, that the body of the\r\nfull-grown spiritual man is radiant or luminous,-for those at least, who have\r\nanointed their eyes wit! eye-salve, so that they see.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n41. From perfectly concentrated Meditation on the correlation of hearing and\r\nthe ether, comes the power of spiritual hearing.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nPhysical sound, we are told, is carried by the air, or by water, iron, or some\r\nmedium on the same plane of substance. But then is a finer hearing, whose\r\nmedium of transmission would seem to be the ether; perhaps no that ether which\r\ncarries light, heat and magnetic waves, but, it may be, the far finer ether\r\nthrough which the power of gravity works. For, while light or heat or magnetic\r\nwaves, travelling from the sun to the earth, take eight minutes for the\r\njourney, it is mathematically certain that the pull of gravitation does not\r\ntake as much as eight seconds, or even the eighth of a second. The pull of\r\ngravitation travels, it would seem “as quick as thought”; so it may\r\nwell be that, in thought transference or telepathy, the thoughts travel by the\r\nsame way, carried by the same “thought-swift” medium.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe transfer of a word by telepathy is the simplest and earliest form of the\r\n“divine hearing” of the spiritual man; as that power grows, and as,\r\nthrough perfectly concentrated Meditation, the spiritual man comes into more\r\ncomplete mastery of it, he grows able to hear and clearly distinguish the\r\nspeech of the great Companions, who counsel and comfort him on his way. They\r\nmay speak to him either in wordless thoughts, or in perfectly definite words\r\nand sentences.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n42. By perfectly concentrated Meditation em the correlation of the body with\r\nthe ether, and by thinking of it as light as thistle-down, will come the power\r\nto traverse the ether.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nIt has been said that he who would tread the path of power must look for a home\r\nin the air, and afterwards in the ether. This would seem to mean, besides the\r\nconstant injunction to detachment, that he must be prepared to inhabit first a\r\npsychic, and then an etheric body; the former being the body of dreams; the\r\nlatter, the body of the spiritual man, when he wakes up on the other side of\r\ndreamland. The gradual accustoming of the consciousness to its new etheric\r\nvesture, its gradual acclimatization, so to speak, in the etheric body of the\r\nspiritual man, is what our text seems to contemplate.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n43. When that condition of consciousness is reached, which is far-reaching and\r\nnot confined to the body, which is outside the body and not conditioned by it,\r\nthen the veil which conceals the light is worn away.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nPerhaps the best comment on this is afforded by the words of Paul: “I\r\nknew a man in Christ above fourteen years ago, (whether in the body, I cannot\r\ntell; or whether out of the body, I cannot tell: God knoweth;) such a one\r\ncaught up to the third heaven. And I knew such a man, (whether in the body, or\r\nout of the body, I cannot tell: God knoweth;) how that he was caught up into\r\nparadise, and heard unspeakable [or, unspoken] words, which it is not lawful\r\nfor a man to utter.”\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe condition is, briefly, that of the awakened spiritual man, who sees and\r\nhears beyond the veil.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n44. Mastery of the elements comes from perfectly concentrated Meditation on\r\ntheir five forms: the gross, the elemental, the subtle, the inherent, the\r\npurposive.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThese five forms are analogous to those recognized by modern physics: solid,\r\nliquid, gaseous, radiant and ionic. When the piercing vision of the awakened\r\nspiritual man is directed to the forms of matter, from within, as it were, from\r\nbehind the scenes, then perfect mastery over the “beggarly\r\nelements” is attained. This is, perhaps, equivalent to the injunction:\r\n“Inquire of the earth, the air, and the water, of the secrets they hold\r\nfor you. The development of your inner senses will enable you to do\r\nthis.”\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n45. Thereupon will come the manifestation of the atomic and other powers, which\r\nare the endowment of the body, together with its unassailable force.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe body in question is, of course, the etheric body of the spiritual man. He\r\nis said to possess eight powers: the atomic, the power of assimilating himself\r\nwith the nature of the atom, which will, perhaps, involve the power to\r\ndisintegrate material forms; the power of levitation; the power of limitless\r\nextension; the power of boundless reach, so that, as the commentator says,\r\n“he can touch the moon with the tip of his finger”; the power to\r\naccomplish his will; the power of gravitation, the correlative of levitation;\r\nthe power of command; the power of creative will. These are the endowments of\r\nthe spiritual man. Further, the spiritual body is unassailable. Fire burns it\r\nnot, water wets it not, the sword cleaves it not, dry winds parch it not. And,\r\nit is said, the spiritual man can impart something of this quality and temper\r\nto his bodily vesture.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n46. Shapeliness, beauty, force, the temper of the diamond: these are the\r\nendowments of that body.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe spiritual man is shapely, beautiful strong, firm as the diamond. Therefore\r\nit is written: “These things saith the Son of God, who hath his eyes like\r\nunto a flame of fire, and his feet are like fine brass: He that overcometh and\r\nkeepeth my works unto the end, to him will I give power over the nations: and\r\nhe shall rule them with a rod of iron; and I will give him the morning\r\nstar.”\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n47. Mastery over the powers of perception and action comes through perfectly\r\nconcentrated Meditation on their fivefold forms; namely, their power to grasp\r\ntheir distinctive nature, the element of self-consciousness in them, their\r\ninherence, and their purposiveness.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nTake, for example, sight. This possesses, first, the power to grasp, apprehend,\r\nperceive; second, it has its distinctive form of perception; that is, visual\r\nperception; third, it always carries with its operations self-consciousness,\r\nthe thought: “I perceive”; fourth sight has the power of extension\r\nthrough the whole field of vision, even to the utmost star; fifth, it is used\r\nfor the purposes of the Seer. So with the other senses. Perfectly concentrated\r\nMeditation on each sense, a viewing it from behind and within, as is possible\r\nfor the spiritual man, brings a mastery of the scope and true character of each\r\nsense, and of the world on which they report collectively.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n48. Thence comes the power swift as thought, independent of instruments, and\r\nthe mastery over matter.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nWe are further enumerating the endowments of the spiritual man. Among these is\r\nthe power to traverse space with the swiftness of thought, so that whatever\r\nplace the spiritual man thinks of, to that he goes, in that place he already\r\nis. Thought has now become his means of locomotion. He is, therefore,\r\nindependent of instruments, and can bring his force to bear directly, wherever\r\nhe wills.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n49. When the spiritual man is perfectly disentangled from the psychic body, he\r\nattains to mastery over all things and to a knowledge of all.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe spiritual man is enmeshed in the web of the emotions; desire, fear,\r\nambition, passion; and impeded by the mental forms of separateness and\r\nmaterialism. When these meshes are sundered, these obstacles completely\r\novercome, then the spiritual man stands forth in his own wide world, strong,\r\nmighty, wise. He uses divine powers, with a divine scope and energy, working\r\ntogether with divine Companions. To such a one it is said: “Thou art now\r\na disciple, able to stand, able to hear, able to see, able to speak, thou hast\r\nconquered desire and attained to self-knowledge, thou hast seen thy soul in its\r\nbloom and recognized it, and heard the voice of the silence.”\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n50. By absence of all self-indulgence at this point, when the seeds of bondage\r\nto sorrow are destroyed, pure spiritual being is attained.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe seeking of indulgence for the personal self, whether through passion or\r\nambition, sows the seed of future sorrow. For this self indulgence of the\r\npersonality is a double sin against the real; a sin against the cleanness of\r\nlife, and a sin against the universal being, which permits no exclusive\r\nparticular good, since, in the real, all spiritual possessions are held in\r\ncommon. This twofold sin brings its reacting punishment, its confining bondage\r\nto sorrow. But ceasing from self-indulgence brings purity, liberation,\r\nspiritual life.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n51. There should be complete overcoming of allurement or pride in the\r\ninvitations of the different realms of life, lest attachment to things evil\r\narise once more.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe commentator tells us that disciples, seekers for union, are of four\r\ndegrees: first, those who are entering the path; second, those who are in the\r\nrealm of allurements; third, those who have won the victory over matter and the\r\nsenses; fourth, those who stand firm in pure spiritual life. To the second,\r\nespecially, the caution in the text is addressed. More modern teachers would\r\nexpress the same truth by a warning against the delusions and fascinations of\r\nthe psychic realm, which open around the disciple, as he breaks through into\r\nthe unseen worlds. These are the dangers of the anteroom. Safety lies in\r\npassing on swiftly into the inner chamber. “Him that overcometh will I\r\nmake a pillar in the temple of my God, and he shall go no more out.”\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n52. From perfectly concentrated Meditation on the divisions of time and their\r\nsuccession comes that wisdom which is born of discernment.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe Upanishads say of the liberated that “he has passed beyond the triad\r\nof time”; he no longer sees life as projected into past, present and\r\nfuture, since these are forms of the mind; but beholds all things spread out in\r\nthe quiet light of the Eternal. This would seem to be the same thought, and to\r\npoint to that clear-eyed spiritual perception which is above time; that wisdom\r\nborn of the unveiling of Time’s delusion. Then shall the disciple live\r\nneither in the present nor the future, but in the Eternal.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n53. Hence comes discernment between things which are of like nature, not\r\ndistinguished by difference of kind, character or position.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nHere, as also in the preceding Sutra, we are close to the doctrine that\r\ndistinctions of order, time and space are creations of the mind; the threefold\r\nprism through which the real object appears to us distorted and refracted. When\r\nthe prism is withdrawn, the object returns to its primal unity, no longer\r\ndistinguishable by the mind, yet clearly knowable by that high power of\r\nspiritual discernment, of illumination, which is above the mind.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n54. The wisdom which is born of discernment is starlike; it discerns all\r\nthings, and all conditions of things, it discerns without succession:\r\nsimultaneously.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThat wisdom, that intuitive, divining power is starlike, says the commentator,\r\nbecause it shines with its own light, because it rises on high, and illumines\r\nall things. Nought is hid from it, whether things past, things present, or\r\nthings to come; for it is beyond the threefold form of time, so that all things\r\nare spread before it together, in the single light of the divine. This power\r\nhas been beautifully described by Columba: “Some there are, though very\r\nfew, to whom Divine grace has granted this: that they can clearly and most\r\ndistinctly see, at one and the same moment, as though under one ray of the sun,\r\neven the entire circuit of the whole world with its surroundings of ocean and\r\nsky, the inmost part of their mind being marvellously enlarged.”\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n55. When the vesture and the spiritual man are alike pure, then perfect\r\nspiritual life is attained.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe vesture, says the commentator, must first be washed pure of all stains of\r\npassion and darkness, and the seeds of future sorrow must be burned up utterly.\r\nThen, both the vesture and the wearer of the vesture being alike pure, the\r\nspiritual man enters into perfect spiritual life.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003c/div\u003e\u003c!–end chapter–\u003e\r\n\u003cdiv class=\"chapter\"\u003e\r\n\u003ch2\u003e\u003ca id=\"chap07\"\u003e\u003c/a\u003eINTRODUCTION TO BOOK IV\u003c/h2\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe third book of the Sutras has fairly completed the history of the birth and\r\ngrowth of the spiritual man, and the enumeration of his powers; at least so far\r\nas concerns that first epoch in his immortal life, which immediately succeeds,\r\nand supersedes, the life of the natural man.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nIn the fourth book, we are to consider what one might call the mechanism of\r\nsalvation, the ideally simple working of cosmic law which brings the spiritual\r\nman to birth, growth, and fulness of power, and prepares him for the splendid,\r\ntoilsome further stages of his great journey home.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe Sutras are here brief to obscurity; only a few words, for example, are\r\ngiven to the great triune mystery and illusion of Time; a phrase or two\r\nindicates the sweep of some universal law. Yet it is hoped that, by keeping our\r\neyes fixed on the spiritual man, remembering that he is the hero of the story,\r\nand that all that is written concerns him and his adventures, we may be able to\r\nfind our way through this thicket of tangled words, and keep in our hands the\r\nclue to the mystery.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe last part of the last book needs little introduction. In a sense, it is the\r\nmost important part of the whole treatise, since it unmasks the nature of the\r\npersonality, that psychical “mind,” which is the wakeful enemy of\r\nall who seek to tread the path. Even now, we can hear it whispering the doubt\r\nwhether that can be a good path, which thus sets “mind” at\r\ndefiance.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nIf this, then, be the most vital and fundamental part of the teaching, should\r\nit not stand at the very beginning? It may seem so at first; but had it stood\r\nthere, we should not have comprehended it. For he who would know the doctrine\r\nmust lead the life, doing the will of his Father which is in Heaven.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003c/div\u003e\u003c!–end chapter–\u003e\r\n\u003cdiv class=\"chapter\"\u003e\r\n\u003ch2\u003e\u003ca id=\"chap08\"\u003e\u003c/a\u003eBOOK IV\u003c/h2\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n1. Psychic and spiritual powers may be inborn, or they may be gained by the use\r\nof drugs, or by incantations, or by fervour, or by Meditation.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nSpiritual powers have been enumerated and described in the preceding sections.\r\nThey are the normal powers of the spiritual man, the antetype, the divine\r\nedition, of the powers of the natural man. Through these powers, the spiritual\r\nman stands, sees, hears, speaks, in the spiritual world, as the physical man\r\nstands, sees, hears, speaks in the natural world.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThere is a counterfeit presentment of the spiritual man, in the world of\r\ndreams, a shadow lord of shadows, who has his own dreamy powers of vision, of\r\nhearing, of movement; he has left the natural without reaching the spiritual.\r\nHe has set forth from the shore, but has not gained the further verge of the\r\nriver. He is borne along by the stream, with no foothold on either shore.\r\nLeaving the actual, he has fallen short of the real, caught in the limbo of\r\nvanities and delusions. The cause of this aberrant phantasm is always the\r\nworship of a false, vain self, the lord of dreams, within one’s own\r\nbreast. This is the psychic man, lord of delusive and bewildering psychic\r\npowers.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nSpiritual powers, like intellectual or artistic gifts, may be inborn: the\r\nfruit, that is, of seeds planted and reared with toil in a former birth. So\r\nalso the powers of the psychic man may be inborn, a delusive harvest from seeds\r\nof delusion.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nPsychical powers may be gained by drugs, as poverty, shame, debasement may be\r\ngained by the self-same drugs. In their action, they are baneful, cutting the\r\nman off from consciousness of the restraining power of his divine nature, so\r\nthat his forces break forth exuberant, like the laughter of drunkards, and he\r\nsees and hears things delusive. While sinking, he believes that he has risen;\r\ngrowing weaker, he thinks himself full of strength; beholding illusions, he\r\ntakes them to be true. Such are the powers gained by drugs; they are wholly\r\npsychic, since the real powers, the spiritual, can never be so gained.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nIncantations are affirmations of half-truths concerning spirit and matter, what\r\nis and what is not, which work upon the mind and slowly build up a wraith of\r\npowers and a delusive well-being. These, too, are of the psychic realm of\r\ndreams.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nLastly, there are the true powers of the spiritual man, built up and realized\r\nin Meditation, through reverent obedience to spiritual law, to the pure\r\nconditions of being, in the divine realm.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n2. The transfer of powers from one venture to another comes through the flow of\r\nthe natural creative forces.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nHere, if we can perceive it, is the whole secret of spiritual birth, growth and\r\nlife Spiritual being, like all being, is but an expression of the Self, of the\r\ninherent power and being of Atma. Inherent in the Self are consciousness and\r\nwill, which have, as their lordly heritage, the wide sweep of the universe\r\nthroughout eternity, for the Self is one with the Eternal. And the\r\nconsciousness of the Self may make itself manifest as seeing, hearing, tasting,\r\nfeeling, or whatsoever perceptive powers there may be, just as the white\r\nsunlight may divide into many-coloured rays. So may the will of the Self\r\nmanifest itself in the uttering of words, or in handling, or in moving, and\r\nwhatever powers of action there are throughout the seven worlds. Where the Self\r\nis, there will its powers be. It is but a question of the vesture through which\r\nthese powers shall shine forth. And wherever the consciousness and desire of\r\nthe ever-creative Self are fixed, there will a vesture be built up; where the\r\nheart is, there will the treasure be also.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nSince through ages the desire of the Self has been toward the natural world,\r\nwherein the Self sought to mirror himself that he might know himself, therefore\r\na vesture of natural elements came into being, through which blossomed forth\r\nthe Self’s powers of perceiving and of will: the power to see, to hear,\r\nto speak, to walk, to handle; and when the Self, thus come to\r\nself-consciousness, and, with it, to a knowledge of his imprisonment, shall set\r\nhis desire on the divine and real world, and raise his consciousness thereto,\r\nthe spiritual vesture shall be built up for him there, with its expression of\r\nhis inherent powers. Nor will migration thither be difficult for the Self,\r\nsince the divine is no strange or foreign land for him, but the house of his\r\nhome, where he dwells from everlasting.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n3. The apparent, immediate cause is not the true cause of the creative\r\nnature-powers; but, like the husbandman in his field, it takes obstacles away.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe husbandman tills his field, breaking up the clods of earth into fine mould,\r\npenetrable to air and rain; he sows his seed, carefully covering it, for fear\r\nof birds and the wind; he waters the seed-laden earth, turning the little rills\r\nfrom the irrigation tank now this way and that, removing obstacles from the\r\nchannels, until the even How of water vitalizes the whole field. And so the\r\nplants germinate and grow, first the blade, then the ear, then the full corn in\r\nthe ear. But it is not the husbandman who makes them grow. It is, first, the\r\nmiraculous plasmic power in the grain of seed, which brings forth after its\r\nkind; then the alchemy of sunlight which, in presence of the green colouring\r\nmatter of the leaves, gathers hydrogen from the water and carbon from the gases\r\nin the air, and mingles them in the hydro-carbons of plant growth; and,\r\nfinally, the wholly occult vital powers of the plant itself, stored up through\r\nages, and flowing down from the primal sources of life. The husbandman but\r\nremoves the obstacles. He plants and waters, but God gives the increase.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nSo with the finer husbandman of diviner fields. He tills and sows, but the\r\ngrowth of the spiritual man comes through the surge and flow of divine,\r\ncreative forces and powers. Here, again, God gives the increase. The divine\r\nSelf puts forth, for the manifestation of its powers, a new and finer vesture,\r\nthe body of the spiritual man.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n4. Vestures of consciousness are built up in conformity with the Boston of the\r\nfeeling of selfhood.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe Self, says a great Teacher, in turn attaches itself to three vestures:\r\nfirst, to the physical body, then to the finer body, and thirdly to the causal\r\nbody. Finally it stands forth radiant, luminous, joyous, as the Self.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nWhen the Self attributes itself to the physical body, there arise the states of\r\nbodily consciousness, built up about the physical self.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nWhen the Self, breaking through this first illusion, begins to see and feel\r\nitself in the finer body, to find selfhood there, then the states of\r\nconsciousness of the finer body come into being; or, to speak exactly, the\r\nfiner body and its states of consciousness arise and grow together.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nBut the Self must not dwell permanently there. It must learn to find itself in\r\nthe causal body, to build up the wide and luminous fields of consciousness that\r\nbelong to that.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nNor must it dwell forever there, for there remains the fourth state, the\r\ndivine, with its own splendour and everlastingness.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nIt is all a question of the states of consciousness; all a question of raising\r\nthe sense of selfhood, until it dwells forever in the Eternal.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n5. In the different fields of manifestation, the Consciousness, though one, is\r\nthe elective cause of many states of consciousness.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nHere is the splendid teaching of oneness that lies at the heart of the Eastern\r\nwisdom. Consciousness is ultimately One, everywhere and forever. The Eternal,\r\nthe Father, is the One Self of All Beings. And so, in each individual who is\r\nbut a facet of that Self, Consciousness is One. Whether it breaks through as\r\nthe dull fire of physical life, or the murky flame of the psychic and\r\npassional, or the radiance of the spiritual man, or the full glory of the\r\nDivine, it is ever the Light, naught but the Light. The one Consciousness is\r\nthe effective cause of all states of consciousness, on every plane.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n6. Among states of consciousness, that which is born of Contemplation is free\r\nfrom the seed of future sorrow.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nWhere the consciousness breaks forth in the physical body, and the full play of\r\nbodily life begins, its progression carries with it inevitable limitations.\r\nBirth involves death. Meetings have their partings. Hunger alternates with\r\nsatiety. Age follows on the heels of youth. So do the states of consciousness\r\nrun along the circle of birth and death.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nWith the psychic, the alternation between prize and penalty is swifter. Hope\r\nhas its shadow of fear, or it is no hope. Exclusive love is tortured by\r\njealousy. Pleasure passes through deadness into pain. Pain’s surcease\r\nbrings pleasure back again. So here, too, the states of consciousness run their\r\ncircle. In all psychic states there is egotism, which, indeed, is the very\r\nessence of the psychic; and where there is egotism there is ever the seed of\r\nfuture sorrow. Desire carries bondage in its womb.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nBut where the pure spiritual consciousness begins, free from self and stain,\r\nthe ancient law of retaliation ceases; the penalty of sorrow lapses and is no\r\nmore imposed. The soul now passes, no longer from sorrow to sorrow, but from\r\nglory to glory. Its growth and splendour have no limit. The good passes to\r\nbetter, best.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n7. The works of followers after Union make neither for bright pleasure nor for\r\ndark pain The works of others make for pleasure or pain, or a mingling of\r\nthese.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe man of desire wins from his works the reward of pleasure, or incurs the\r\npenalty of pain; or, as so often happens in life, his guerdon, like the\r\npassionate mood of the lover, is part pleasure and part pain. Works done with\r\nself-seeking bear within them the seeds of future sorrow; conversely, according\r\nto the proverb, present pain is future gain.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nBut, for him who has gone beyond desire, whose desire is set on the Eternal,\r\nneither pain to be avoided nor pleasure to be gained inspires his work. He\r\nfears no hell and desires no heaven. His one desire is, to know the will of the\r\nFather and finish His work. He comes directly in line with the divine Will, and\r\nworks cleanly and immediately, without longing or fear. His heart dwells in the\r\nEternal; all his desires are set on the Eternal.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n8. From the force inherent in works comes the manifestation of those dynamic\r\nmind images which are conformable to the ripening out of each of these works.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nWe are now to consider the general mechanism of Karma, in order that we may\r\npass on to the consideration of him who is free from Karma. Karma, indeed, is\r\nthe concern of the personal man, of his bondage or freedom. It is the\r\nsuccession of the forces which built up the personal man, reproducing\r\nthemselves in one personality after another.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nNow let us take an imaginary case, to see how these forces may work out. Let us\r\nthink of a man, with murderous intent in his heart, striking with a dagger at\r\nhis enemy. He makes a red wound in his victim’s breast; at the same\r\ninstant he paints, in his own mind, a picture of that wound: a picture dynamic\r\nwith all the fierce will-power he has put into his murderous blow. In other\r\nwords he has made a deep wound in his own psychic body; and, when he comes to\r\nbe born again, that body will become his outermost vesture, upon which, with\r\nits wound still there, bodily tissue will be built up. So the man will be born\r\nmaimed, or with the predisposition to some mortal injury; he is unguarded at\r\nthat point, and any trifling accidental blow will pierce the broken Joints of\r\nhis psychic armour. Thus do the dynamic mind-images manifest themselves, coming\r\nto the surface, so that works done in the past may ripen and come to fruition.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n9. Works separated by different nature, or place, or time, are brought together\r\nby the correspondence between memory and dynamic impression.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nJust as, in the ripening out of mind-images into bodily conditions, the effect\r\nis brought about by the ray of creative force sent down by the Self, somewhat\r\nas the light of the magic lantern projects the details of a picture on the\r\nscreen, revealing the hidden, and making secret things palpable and visible, so\r\ndoes this divine ray exercise a selective power on the dynamic mind-images,\r\nbringing together into one day of life the seeds gathered from many days. The\r\nmemory constantly exemplifies this power; a passage of poetry will call up in\r\nthe mind like passages of many poets, read at different times. So a prayer may\r\ncall up many prayers.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nIn like manner, the same over-ruling selective power, which is a ray of the\r\nHigher Self, gathers together from different births and times and places those\r\nmind-images which are conformable, and may be grouped in the frame of a single\r\nlife or a single event. Through this grouping, visible bodily conditions or\r\noutward circumstances are brought about, and by these the soul is taught and\r\ntrained.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nJust as the dynamic mind-images of desire ripen out in bodily conditions and\r\ncircumstances, so the far more dynamic powers of aspiration, wherein the soul\r\nreaches toward the Eternal, have their fruition in a finer world, building the\r\nvesture of the spiritual man.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n10. The series of dynamic mind-images is beginningless, because Desire is\r\neverlasting.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe whole series of dynamic mind-images, which make up the entire history of\r\nthe personal man, is a part of the mechanism which the Self employs, to mirror\r\nitself in a reflection, to embody its powers in an outward form, to the end of\r\nself-expression, selfrealization, self-knowledge. Therefore the initial impulse\r\nbehind these dynamic mind-images comes from the Self and is the descending ray\r\nof the Self; so that it cannot be said that there is any first member of the\r\nseries of images, from which the rest arose. The impulse is beginningless,\r\nsince it comes from the Self, which is from everlasting. Desire is not to\r\ncease; it is to turn to the Eternal, and so become aspiration.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n11. Since the dynamic mind-images are held together by impulses of desire, by\r\nthe wish for personal reward, by the substratum of mental habit, by the support\r\nof outer things desired; therefore, when these cease, the self reproduction of\r\ndynamic mind-images ceases.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nWe are still concerned with the personal life in its bodily vesture, and with\r\nthe process whereby the forces which have upheld it are gradually transferred\r\nto the life of the spiritual man, and build up for him his finer vesture in a\r\nfiner world.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nHow is the current to be changed? How is the flow of self-reproductive\r\nmind-images, which have built the conditions of life after life in this world\r\nof bondage, to be checked, that the time of imprisonment may come to an end,\r\nthe day of liberation dawn?\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe answer is given in the Sutra just translated. The driving-force is\r\nwithdrawn and directed to the upbuilding of the spiritual body.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nWhen the building impulses and forces are withdrawn, the tendency to manifest a\r\nnew psychical body, a new body of bondage, ceases with them.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n12. The difference between that which is past and that which is not yet come,\r\naccording to their natures, depends on the difference of phase of their\r\nproperties.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nHere we come to a high and difficult matter, which has always been held to be\r\nof great moment in the Eastern wisdom: the thought that the division of time\r\ninto past, present and future is, in great measure, an illusion; that past,\r\npresent, future all dwell together in the eternal Now.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe discernment of this truth has been held to be so necessarily a part of\r\nwisdom, that one of the names of the Enlightened is: “he who has passed\r\nbeyond the three times: past, present, future.”\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nSo the Western Master said: “Before Abraham was, I am”; and again,\r\n“I am with you always, unto the end of the world”; using the\r\neternal present for past and future alike. With the same purpose, the Master\r\nspeaks of himself as “the alpha and the omega, the beginning and the end,\r\nthe first and the last.”\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nAnd a Master of our own days writes: “I feel even irritated at having to\r\nuse these three clumsy words—past, present, and future. Miserable\r\nconcepts of the objective phases of the subjective whole, they are about as ill\r\nadapted for the purpose, as an axe for fine carving.”\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nIn the eternal Now, both past and future are consummated.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nBjorklund, the Swedish philosopher, has well stated the same truth:\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\n“Neither past nor future can exist to God; He lives undividedly, without\r\nlimitations, and needs not, as man, to plot out his existence in a series of\r\nmoments. Eternity then is not identical with unending time; it is a different\r\nform of existence, related to time as the perfect to the imperfect … Man as an\r\nentity for himself must have the natural limitations for the part. Conceived by\r\nGod, man is eternal in the divine sense, but conceived, by himself, man’s\r\neternal life is clothed in the limitations we call time. The eternal is a\r\nconstant present without beginning or end, without past or future.”\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n13. These properties, whether manifest or latent, are of the nature of the\r\nThree Potencies.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe Three Potencies are the three manifested modifications of the one primal\r\nmaterial, which stands opposite to perceiving consciousness. These Three\r\nPotencies are called Substance, Force, Darkness; or viewed rather for their\r\nmoral colouring, Goodness, Passion, Inertness. Every material manifestation is\r\na projection of substance into the empty space of darkness. Every mental state\r\nis either good, or passional, or inert. So, whether subjective or objective,\r\nlatent or manifest, all things that present themselves to the perceiving\r\nconsciousness are compounded of these three. This is a fundamental doctrine of\r\nthe Sankhya system.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n14. The external manifestation of an object takes place when the\r\ntransformations ore in the same phase.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nWe should be inclined to express the same law by saying, for example, that a\r\nsound is audible, when it consists of vibrations within the compass of the\r\nauditory nerve; that an object is visible, when either directly or by\r\nreflection, it sends forth luminiferous vibrations within the compass of the\r\nretina and the optic nerve. Vibrations below or above that compass make no\r\nimpression at all, and the object remains invisible; as, for example, a kettle\r\nof boiling water in a dark room, though the kettle is sending forth heat\r\nvibrations closely akin to light.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nSo, when the vibrations of the object and those of the perceptive power are in\r\nthe same phase, the external manifestation of the object takes place.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThere seems to be a further suggestion that the appearance of an object in the\r\n“present,” or its remaining hid in the “past,” or\r\n“future,” is likewise a question of phase, and, just as the range\r\nof vibrations perceived might be increased by the development of finer senses,\r\nso the perception of things past, and things to come, may be easy from a higher\r\npoint of view.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n15. The paths of material things and of states of consciousness are distinct,\r\nas is manifest from the fact that the same object may produce different\r\nimpressions in different minds.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nHaving shown that our bodily condition and circumstances depend on Karma, while\r\nKarma depends on perception and will, the sage recognizes the fact that from\r\nthis may be drawn the false deduction that material things are in no wise\r\ndifferent from states of mind. The same thought has occurred, and still occurs,\r\nto all philosophers; and, by various reasonings, they all come to the same wise\r\nconclusion; that the material world is not made by the mood of any human mind,\r\nbut is rather the manifestation of the totality of invisible Being, whether we\r\ncall this Mahat, with the ancients, or Ether, with the moderns.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n16. Nor do material objects depend upon a single mind, for how could they\r\nremain objective to others, if that mind ceased to think of them?\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThis is but a further development of the thought of the preceding Sutra,\r\ncarrying on the thought that, while the universe is spiritual, yet its material\r\nexpression is ordered, consistent, ruled by law, not subject to the whims or\r\naffirmations of a single mind. Unwelcome material things may be escaped by\r\nspiritual growth, by rising to a realm above them, and not by denying their\r\nexistence on their own plane. So that our system is neither materialistic, nor\r\nidealistic in the extreme sense, but rather intuitional and spiritual, holding\r\nthat matter is the manifestation of spirit as a whole, a reflection or\r\nexternalization of spirit, and, like spirit, everywhere obedient to law. The\r\npath of liberation is not through denial of matter but through denial of the\r\nwills of self, through obedience, and that aspiration which builds the vesture\r\nof the spiritual man.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n17. An object is perceived, or not perceived, according as the mind is, or is\r\nnot, tinged with the colour of the object.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe simplest manifestation of this is the matter of attention. Our minds\r\napprehend what they wish to apprehend; all else passes unnoticed, or, on the\r\nother hand, we perceive what we resent, as, for example, the noise of a passing\r\ntrain; while others, used to the sound, do not notice it at all.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nBut the deeper meaning is, that out of the vast totality of objects ever\r\npresent in the universe, the mind perceives only those which conform to the hue\r\nof its Karma. The rest remain unseen, even though close at hand.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThis spiritual law has been well expressed by Emerson:\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\n“Through solidest eternal things the man finds his road as if they did\r\nnot subsist, and does not once suspect their being. As soon as he needs a new\r\nobject, suddenly he beholds it, and no longer attempts to pass through it, but\r\ntakes another way. When he has exhausted for the time the nourishment to be\r\ndrawn from any one person or thing, that object is withdrawn from his\r\nobservation, and though still in his immediate neighbourhood, he does not\r\nsuspect its presence. Nothing is dead. Men feign themselves dead, and endure\r\nmock funerals and mournful obituaries, and there they stand looking out of the\r\nwindow, sound and well, in some new and strange disguise. Jesus is not dead, he\r\nis very well alive: nor John, nor Paul, nor Mahomet, nor Aristotle; at times we\r\nbelieve we have seen them all, and could easily tell the names under which they\r\ngo.”\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n18. The movements of the psychic nature are perpetually objects of perception,\r\nsince the Spiritual Man, who is the lord of them, remains unchanging.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nHere is teaching of the utmost import, both for understanding and for practice.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nTo the psychic nature belong all the ebb and flow of emotion, all hoping and\r\nfearing, desire and hate: the things that make the multitude of men and women\r\ndeem themselves happy or miserable. To it also belong the measuring and\r\ncomparing, the doubt and questioning, which, for the same multitude, make up\r\nmental life. So that there results the emotion-soaked personality, with its\r\ndark and narrow view of life: the shivering, terror driven personality that is\r\nlife itself for all but all of mankind.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nYet the personality is not the true man, not the living soul at all, but only a\r\nspectacle which the true man observes. Let us under stand this, therefore, and\r\ndraw ourselves up inwardly to the height of the Spiritual Man, who, standing in\r\nthe quiet light of the Eternal, looks down serene upon this turmoil of the\r\nouter life.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nOne first masters the personality, the “mind,” by thus looking down\r\non it from above, from within; by steadily watching its ebb and flow, as\r\nobjective, outward, and therefore not the real Self. This standing back is the\r\nfirst step, detachment. The second, to maintain the vantage-ground thus gained,\r\nis recollection.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n19. The Mind is not self-luminous, since it can be seen as an object.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThis is a further step toward overthrowing the tyranny of the\r\n“mind”: the psychic nature of emotion and mental measuring. This\r\npsychic self, the personality, claims to be absolute, asserting that life is\r\nfor it and through it; it seeks to impose on the whole being of man its narrow,\r\nmaterialistic, faithless view of life and the universe; it would clip the wings\r\nof the soaring Soul. But the Soul dethrones the tyrant, by perceiving and\r\nsteadily affirming that the psychic self is no true self at all, not\r\nself-luminous, but only an object of observation, watched by the serene eyes of\r\nthe Spiritual Man.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n20. Nor could the Mind at the same time know itself and things external to it.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe truth is that the “mind” knows neither external things nor\r\nitself. Its measuring and analyzing, its hoping and fearing, hating and\r\ndesiring, never give it a true measure of life, nor any sense of real values.\r\nCeaselessly active, it never really attains to knowledge; or, if we admit its\r\nknowledge, it ever falls short of wisdom, which comes only through intuition,\r\nthe vision of the Spiritual Man.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nLife cannot be known by the “mind,” its secrets cannot be learned\r\nthrough the “mind.” The proof is, the ceaseless strife and\r\ncontradiction of opinion among those who trust in the mind. Much less can the\r\n“mind” know itself, the more so, because it is pervaded by the\r\nillusion that it truly knows, truly is.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nTrue knowledge of the “mind” comes, first, when the Spiritual Man,\r\narising, stands detached, regarding the “mind” from above, with\r\nquiet eyes, and seeing it for the tangled web of psychic forces that it truly\r\nis. But the truth is divined long before it is clearly seen, and then begins\r\nthe long battle of the “mind,” against the Real, the\r\n“mind” fighting doggedly, craftily, for its supremacy.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n21. If the Mind be thought of as seen by another more inward Mind, then there\r\nwould be an endless series of perceiving Minds, and a confusion of memories.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nOne of the expedients by which the “mind” seeks to deny and thwart\r\nthe Soul, when it feels that it is beginning to be circumvented and seen\r\nthrough, is to assert that this seeing is the work of a part of itself, one\r\npart observing the other, and thus leaving no need nor place for the Spiritual\r\nMan.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nTo this strategy the argument is opposed by our philosopher, that this would be\r\nno true solution, but only a postponement of the solution. For we should have\r\nto find yet another part of the mind to view the first observing part, and then\r\nanother to observe this, and so on, endlessly.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe true solution is, that the Spiritual Man looks down upon the psychic\r\nnature, and observes it; when he views the psychic pictures gallery, this is\r\n“memory,” which would be a hopeless, inextricable confusion, if we\r\nthought of one part of the “mind,” with its memories, viewing\r\nanother part, with memories of its own.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe solution of the mystery lies not in the “mind” but beyond it,\r\nin the luminous life of the risen Lord, the Spiritual Man.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n22. When the psychical nature takes on the form of the spiritual intelligence,\r\nby reflecting it, then the Self becomes conscious of its own spiritual\r\nintelligence.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nWe are considering a stage of spiritual life at which the psychical nature has\r\nbeen cleansed and purified. Formerly, it reflected in its plastic substance the\r\nimages of the earthy; purified now, it reflects the image of the heavenly,\r\ngiving the spiritual intelligence a visible form. The Self, beholding that\r\nvisible form, in which its spiritual intelligence has, as it were, taken\r\npalpable shape, thereby reaches self-recognition, self-comprehension. The Self\r\nsees itself in this mirror, and thus becomes not only conscious, but\r\nself-conscious. This is, from one point of view, the purpose of the whole\r\nevolutionary process.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n23. The psychic nature, taking on the colour of the Seer and of things seen,\r\nleads to the perception of all objects.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nIn the unregenerate man, the psychic nature is saturated with images of\r\nmaterial things, of things seen, or heard, or tasted, or felt; and this web of\r\ndynamic images forms the ordinary material and driving power of life. The\r\nsensation of sweet things tasted clamours to be renewed, and drives the man\r\ninto effort to obtain its renewal; so he adds image to image, each dynamic and\r\nimportunate, piling up sin’s intolerable burden.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThen comes regeneration, and the washing away of sin, through the fiery,\r\ncreative power of the Soul, which burns out the stains of the psychic vesture,\r\npurifying it as gold is refined in the furnace. The suffering of regeneration\r\nsprings from this indispensable purifying.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThen the psychic vesture begins to take on the colour of the Soul, no longer\r\nstained, but suffused with golden light; and the man red generate gleams with\r\nthe radiance of eternity. Thus the Spiritual Man puts on fair raiment; for of\r\nthis cleansing it is said: Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be white\r\nas snow; though they be as crimson, they shall be as wool.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n24. The psychic nature, which has been printed with mind-images of innumerable\r\nmaterial things, exists now for the Spiritual Man, building for him.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe “mind,” once the tyrant, is now the slave, recognized as\r\noutward, separate, not Self, a well-trained instrument of the Spiritual Man.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nFor it is not ordained for the Spiritual Man that, finding his high realm, he\r\nshall enter altogether there, and pass out of the vision of mankind. It is true\r\nthat he dwells in heaven, but he also dwells on earth. He has angels and\r\narchangels, the hosts of the just made perfect, for his familiar friends, but\r\nhe has at the same time found a new kinship with the prone children of men, who\r\nstumble and sin in the dark. Finding sinlessness, he finds also that the\r\nworld’s sin and shame are his, not to share, but to atone; finding\r\nkinship with angels, he likewise finds his part in the toil of angels, the toil\r\nfor the redemption of the world.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nFor this work, he, who now stands in the heavenly realm, needs his instrument\r\non earth; and this instrument he finds, ready to his hand, and fitted and\r\nperfected by the very struggles he has waged against it, in the personality,\r\nthe “mind,” of the personal man. This once tyrant is now his\r\nservant and perfect ambassador, bearing witness, before men, of heavenly things\r\nand even in this present world doing the will and working the works of the\r\nFather.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n25. For him who discerns between the Mind and the Spiritual Man, there comes\r\nperfect fruition of the longing after the real being of the Self.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nHow many times in the long struggle have the Soul’s aspirations seemed\r\nbut a hopeless, impossible dream, a madman’s counsel of perfection. Yet\r\nevery finest, most impossible aspiration shall be realized, and ten times more\r\nthan realized, once the long, arduous fight against the “mind,” and\r\nthe mind’s worldview is won. And then it will be seen that unfaith and\r\ndespair were but weapons of the “mind,” to daunt the Soul, and put\r\noff the day when the neck of the “mind” shall be put under the foot\r\nof the Soul.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nHave you aspired, well-nigh hopeless, after immortality? You shall be paid by\r\nentering the immortality of God.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nHave you aspired, in misery and pain, after consoling, healing love? You shall\r\nbe made a dispenser of the divine love of God Himself to weary souls.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nHave you sought ardently, in your day of feebleness, after power? You shall\r\nwield power immortal, infinite, with God working the works of God.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nHave you, in lonely darkness, longed for companionship and consolation? You\r\nshall have angels and archangels for your friends, and all the immortal hosts\r\nof the Dawn.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThese are the fruits of victory. Therefore overcome. These are the prizes of\r\nregeneration. Therefore die to self, that you may rise again to God.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n26. Thereafter, the whole personal being bends toward illumination, toward\r\nEternal Life.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThis is part of the secret of the Soul, that salvation means, not merely that a\r\nsoul shall be cleansed and raised to heaven, but that the whole realm of the\r\nnatural powers shall be redeemed, building up, even in this present world, the\r\nkingly figure of the Spiritual Man.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe traditions of the ages are full of his footsteps; majestic, uncomprehended\r\nshadows, myths, demi-gods, fill the memories of all the nobler peoples. But the\r\ntime cometh, when he shall be known, no longer demi-god, nor myth, nor shadow,\r\nbut the ever-present Redeemer, working amid men for the life and cleansing of\r\nall souls.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n27. In the internals of the batik, other thoughts will arise, through the\r\nimpressions of the dynamic mind-images.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe battle is long and arduous. Let there be no mistake as to that. Go not\r\nforth to this battle without counting the cost. Ages have gone to the\r\nstrengthening of the foe. Ages of conflict must be spent, ere the foe, wholly\r\nconquered, becomes the servant, the Soul’s minister to mankind.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nAnd from these long past ages, in hours when the contest flags, will come new\r\nfoes, mind-born children springing up to fight for mind, reinforcements coming\r\nfrom forgotten years, forgotten lives. For once this conflict is begun, it can\r\nbe ended only by sweeping victory, and unconditional, unreserved surrender of\r\nthe vanquished.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n28. These are to be overcome as it was taught that hindrances should be\r\novercome.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThese new enemies and fears are to be overcome by ceaselessly renewing the\r\nfight, by a steadfast, dogged persistence, whether in victory or defeat, which\r\nshall put the stubbornness of the rocks to shame. For the Soul is older than\r\nall things, and invincible; it is of the very nature of the Soul to be\r\nunconquerable.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nTherefore fight on, undaunted; knowing that the spiritual will, once awakened,\r\nshall, through the effort of the contest, come to its full strength; that\r\nground gained can be held permanently; that great as is the dead-weight of the\r\nadversary, it is yet measurable, while the Warrior who fights for you, for whom\r\nyou fight, is, in might, immeasurable, invincible, everlasting.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n29. He who, after he has attained, is wholly free from self, reaches the\r\nessence of all that can be known, gathered together like a cloud. This is the\r\ntrue spiritual consciousness.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nIt has been said that, at the beginning of the way, we must kill out ambition,\r\nthe great curse, the giant weed which grows as strongly in the heart of the\r\ndevoted disciple as in the man of desire. The remedy is sacrifice of self,\r\nobedience, humility; that purity of heart which gives the vision of God.\r\nThereafter, he who has attained is wrapt about with the essence of all that can\r\nbe known, as with a cloud; he has that perfect illumination which is the true\r\nspiritual consciousness. Through obedience to the will of God, he comes into\r\noneness of being with God; he is initiated into God’s view of the\r\nuniverse, seeing all life as God sees it.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n30. Thereon comes surcease from sorrow and the burden of toil.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nSuch a one, it is said, is free from the bond of Karma, from the burden of\r\ntoil, from that debt to works which comes from works done in self-love and\r\ndesire. Free from self-will, he is free from sorrow, too, for sorrow comes from\r\nthe fight of self-will against the divine will, through the correcting stress\r\nof the divine will, which seeks to counteract the evil wrought by disobedience.\r\nWhen the conflict with the divine will ceases, then sorrow ceases, and he who\r\nhas grown into obedience, thereby enters into joy.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n31. When all veils are rent, all stains washed away, his knowledge becomes\r\ninfinite; little remains for him to know.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe first veil is the delusion that thy soul is in some permanent way separate\r\nfrom the great Soul, the divine Eternal. When that veil is rent, thou shalt\r\ndiscern thy oneness with everlasting Life. The second veil is the delusion of\r\nenduring separateness from thy other selves, whereas in truth the soul that is\r\nin them is one with the soul that is in thee. The world’s sin and shame\r\nare thy sin and shame: its joy also.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThese veils rent, thou shalt enter into knowledge of divine things and human\r\nthings. Little will remain unknown to thee.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n32. Thereafter comes the completion of the series of transformations of the\r\nthree nature potencies, since their purpose is attained.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nIt is a part of the beauty and wisdom of the great Indian teachings, the\r\nVedanta and the Yoga alike, to hold that all life exists for the purposes of\r\nSoul, for the making of the spiritual man. They teach that all nature is an\r\norderly process of evolution, leading up to this, designed for this end,\r\nexisting only for this: to bring forth and perfect the Spiritual Man. He is the\r\ncrown of evolution: at his coming, the goal of all development is attained.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n33. The series of transformations is divided into moments. When the series is\r\ncompleted, time gives place to duration.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThere are two kinds of eternity, says the commentary: the eternity of immortal\r\nlife, which belongs to the Spirit, and the eternity of change, which inheres in\r\nNature, in all that is not Spirit. While we are content to live in and for\r\nNature, in the Circle of Necessity, Sansara, we doom ourselves to perpetual\r\nchange. That which is born must die, and that which dies must be reborn. It is\r\nchange evermore, a ceaseless series of transformations.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nBut the Spiritual Man enters a new order; for him, there is no longer eternal\r\nchange, but eternal Being. He has entered into the joy of his Lord. This\r\nspiritual birth, which makes him heir of the Everlasting, sets a term to\r\nchange; it is the culmination, the crowning transformation, of the whole realm\r\nof change.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp class=\"p1\"\u003e\r\n34. Pure spiritual life is, therefore, the inverse resolution of the potencies\r\nof Nature, which have emptied themselves of their value for the Spiritual man;\r\nor it is the return of the power of pure Consciousness to its essential form.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nHere we have a splendid generalization, in which our wise philosopher finally\r\nreconciles the naturalists and the idealists, expressing the crown and end of\r\nhis teaching, first in the terms of the naturalist, and then in the terms of\r\nthe idealist.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\r\nThe birth and growth of the Spiritual Man, and his entry into his immortal\r\nheritage, may be regarded, says our philosopher, either as the culmination of\r\nthe whole process of natural evolution and involution, where “that which\r\nflowed from out the boundless deep, turns again home”; or it may be\r\nlooked at, as the Vedantins look at it, as the restoration of pure spiritual\r\nConsciousness to its pristine and essential form. There is no discrepancy or\r\nconflict between these two views, which are but two accounts of the same thing.\r\nTherefore those who study the wise philosopher, be they naturalist or idealist,\r\nhave no excuse to linger over dialectic subtleties or disputes. These things\r\nare lifted from their path, lest they should be tempted to delay over them, and\r\nthey are left facing the path itself, stretching upward and onward from their\r\nfeet to the everlasting hills, radiant with infinite Light.\r\n\u003c/p\u003e\r\n\u003c/div\u003e\u003c!–end chapter–\u003e\r\n\u003cdiv style=\"display:block; margin-top:4em\"\u003e\u003c/div\u003e\r\n\u003c/article\u003e"}],"SectionSequence":["Back Link","Work Title","Deck","Author","Period","Era","Composition","Date Note","Region","Terra Avita","Terra Avita Region","Modern Country","Original Title","Language","Primary Discipline","Secondary Discipline","Tradition","Full Versions","Core Thesis","Classification","Arguments","Influence","Significance","Evidence Note","Full Text"],"Counts":{"ContextCards":3,"GeoCards":4,"DisciplineCards":2,"Links":11,"Sections":25,"Styles":3,"Scripts":1}}