Raja-Yoga

YOGA APHORISMS.
II?
variety is called the Savitarka, when the mind medi
tates upon an object again and again, by isolating it
from other objects. There are two sorts of objects
for meditation, the categories of nature, and the
Purufa. Again, the categories are of two varieties;
the twenty-four categories are insentient, and the one
sentient is the Purufa. When the mind thinks of the
elements of nature by thinking of their beginning and
their end, this is one sort of Savitarka. The words
require explanation. This part of Yoga is based
entirely on Sdnkhya Philosophy, about which I have
already told you. As you will remember, egoism and
will, and mind, have a common basis, and that com
mon basis is called the Chitta, the mind-stuff, out of
which they are all manufactured. This mind-stuff
takes in the forces of nature, and projects them as
thought. There must be something, again, where both
force and matter are one. This is called Avyaktam,
the unmanifested state of nature, before creation, and
to which, after the end of a cycle, the whole of nature
returns, to again come out after another period. Be
yond that is the PuruSa, the essence of intelligence.
There is no liberation in getting powers. It is a
worldly search after enjoyments, and there is no enjoy
ment in this life; all search for enjoyment is vain; this
is the old, old lesson which man finds it so hard to
learn. When he does learn it,
he gets out of the uni
verse and becomes free. The possession of what are
called occult powers is only intensifying the world,
and in the end, intensifying suffering. Though, as a