7rcTIX1xP

A Series of Lessons in Gnani Yoga746
for water, it shows a great sensitiveness and rapidly coils itself up. Now what
causes this life action? The plant has no brains, and cannot have reasoned
out this process, nor even have acted upon them by reasoning processes.
It has nothing to think with to such a high degree. It is the Will behind the
curtain, moving this way and that way, and doing things.
There was once a French scientist named Duhamel. He planted some
beans in a cylinder—something like a long tomato can lying on its side. He
waited until the beans began to sprout, and send forth roots downward,
and shoots upward, according to nature’s invariable rule. Then he moved
the cylinder a little—rolled it over an inch or two. The next day he rolled it
over a little more. And so on each day, rolling it over a little each time. Well,
after a time Duhamel shook the dirt and growing beans out of the cylinder,
and what did he find? This, that the beans in their endeavor to grow their
roots downward had kept on bending each day downward; and in their
endeavor to send shoots upward, had kept on bending upward a little each
day, until at last there had been formed two complete spirals—the one
spiral being the roots ever turning downward, and the other the shoots ever
bending upward. How did the plant know direction? What was the moving
power. The Creative Will behind the curtain again, you see!
Potatoes in dark cellars have sent out roots or sprouts twenty and thirty
feet to reach light. Plants will send out roots many feet to reach water. They
know where the water and light are, and where to reach them. The tendrils
of a plant know where the stake or cord is, and they reach out for it and
twine themselves around it. Unwind them, and the next day they are found
again twined around it. Move the stake or cord, and the tendril moves after
it. The insect-eating plants are able to distinguish between nitrogenous and
non-nitrogenous food, accepting the one and rejecting the other. They
recognize that cheese has the same nourishing properties as the insect, and
they accept it, although it is far different in feeling, taste, appearance and
every other characteristic from their accustomed food.