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A Series of Lessons on the Inner Teachings of the Philosophies and Religions of India1210
nervous energies are nearer to the “I” than are the bodily forces, the student
is taught to begin at this point in his Pranayama. And here is the method
prescribed.
The Yogins teach that there are two currents of Prana (called Pingala and
Ida) travelling along the spinal column, moving on either side of a canal or
tube in the spinal column which the Hindus call Shusumna, and which is
at the centre of the substance of the spinal cord. At the lower end of the
Shusumna is a triangular form of subtle substance called by the Hindus “The
Lotus Chamber of the Kundalini,” which contains a stowed-up and latent
force called Kundalini. This Kundalini is held to be a wonderfully potent
occult force, which, if it is aroused and induced to ascend the Shusumna,
will produce wonderful psychic effects, opening up many planes of psychic
activity undreamed of by the ordinary person, and which, when it finally
reaches the brain, tends to free the soul from the bondage of matter, and
causes the Yogin to become a Super-man.
The Pingala is the nerve-current running along the right side of Shusumna—
the Ida is the left-side current. Along the Shusumna are several “lotuses” or
centres of psychic activity, beginning with one at the base, called Muladhara,
and ending in the brain is the chief lotus, called the Sahasrara, or thousandpetalled
lotus in the brain. This Shusumna with, its storage-batteries of lotuses,
is regarded as a great psychic battery of force, which may be set into motion
by and regulated by certain Yoga systems of Breathing, particularly along the
lines of Rhythmic Breathing. And this Rhythmic Breathing is held to arouse
the latent forces of the Kundalini. And from the arousing of the Kundalini
and its controlled action and direction is said to rise the Supernatural (socalled)
Powers claimed by the Yogins, of which we have spoken in another
part of this lesson. And the science of arousing this Kundalini is known as
Pranayama, the Fourth Step of Attainment of Patanjali.
The primal point in the exercises of Pranayama is the arousing of rhythmic
vibration by means of controlled breathing, thus setting into motion the
vibrations which arouse the Kundalini, by which certain psychic phenomena