Page 441 - Complete Works of Dr. KCV Volume 1

bound and those who are released from the bodily encasement are free and boundless.
That in trance the body assumes a state of absolute unconsciousness for days together sometimes is not due to the fact that trance constitutes the prime factor in freedom; it is rather the absolute domination of the self within which is able to deplete or withdraw consciousness from the physical body and its organs and functions. This is the Turiya consciousness - the self itself as it ever is and sees itself to be. In the Upanishad there is a passage which goes to show in the form of a parable how the several organs of the body claimed supremacy and how prana getting out made all of them impotent. Then did they realize that prana was Brahman the real self. Prana is the physical manifestation of active self, the saman as Brihadaranyaka says. Morality being an essential harmonizing principle of life makes for the lucid functions of consciousness or the self, since it would not lead to internal conflicts or external conflicts with either truth or the society. The progress of the Yogi in actual existence is difficult and in the avoidance of all conflict which may make for disharmony with oneself and truth, in harmonizing the self and its movements with the best and the Good, one becomes less and less obsessed by the disharmonious elements of one's life. On the one hand, there is demand for a strict discipline over the external environment and, that is moral action and friendliness and others mentioned under Yama and Niyama, on the other hand, there is complete mastery of the mind which leads to the state of amanaska (Mindlessness) or unmani (above mind) when the mind (manas) does not function with fluctuating movement. Anyone who misunderstands the moral or ethical preparation of the Yogic path has not understood the broader motive and higher altitude of the Yogin's mind.
Mr. Leuba thinks that the entire scheme of Yoga is based on the creation of automatisms and hopes that concentration and relaxation of effort play a capital role in the productions of various automatisms. Such a statement is truly a misunderstanding of the motive underlying the yogic practice. That those who undertake the Yogic practice out of superficial motives may make use of very many automatisms is possible. But neither concentration nor relaxation is out to create automatisms. The relaxation of all effort is undertaken for the sake of transforming the lower levels and making them