Raja-Yoga

2IO
RAJA YOGA.
2. The change into another species is by the filling in
of nature.
Patanjali has advanced the proposition that these
powers come by birth, sometimes by chemical means,
or they may be got by mortification and he has
admitted that this body can be kept for
any length of
time. Now he goes on to state what is the cause of
the change of
the body into another species, which he
says is by the filling in of nature. In the next aphor
ism he will explain this.
3. Good deeds, etc., are not the direct causes in the
transformations of nature, but they act as
breakers of obstacles to the evolutions of nature,
as a farmer breaks the obstacles to the course of
water, which then runs down by its own nature.
When a farmer is irrigating his field the water is
already in the canals, only there are gates which keep
the water in. The farmer opens these gates, and the
water flows in by itself, by the law of gravitation.
So, all human progress and power are already in every
thing; this perfection is every man s nature, only
it is
barred in and prevented from taking its proper course.
If anyone can take the bar off in rushes nature.
Then the man attains the powers which are his already.
Those we called wicked become saints, as soon as the
bar is broken and nature rushes in. It is nature that
is
driving us towards perfection, and eventually she
will bring everyone there. All these practices and