(Part 5 of 8)
YOGA FOR YELLOWBELLIES
First Lecture
Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law.
Let us begin this evening by going briefly over the ground covered
by my first four lectures. I told you that Yoga meant union,
and that this union was the cause of all phenomena. Consciousness
results from the conjunction of a mysterious stimulus with a mysterious
sensorium. The kind of Yoga which is the subject of these remarks
is merely an expansion of this, the union of self-consciousness
with the universe.
We spoke of the eight limbs of Yoga, and dealt with the four which
refer to physical training and experiences.
The remaining four deal with mental training and experiences,
and these form the subject of the ensuing remarks.
2. Before we deal with these in detail, I think it would be
helpful to consider the formula of Yoga from what may be called
the mathematical, or magical standpoint. This formula has been
described in my text-book on Magick, Chapter III., the formula
of Tetragrammaton. This formula covers the entire universe of
magical operations. The word usually pronounced Jehovah is called
the Ineffable Name; it is alleged that when pronounced accurately
its vibrations would destroy the universe; and this is indeed
quite true, when we take the deeper interpretation.
Tetragrammaton is so called from the four letters in the word:
Yod, He, Vau, and He'. This is compared with the relations of
a family-Yod, the Father, He, the Mother; Vau, the Son; and the
final He', the Daughter. (In writing she is sometimes distinguished
from her mother by inserting a small point in the letter.) This
is also a reference to the elements, fire, water, air, earth.
I may go further, and say that all possible existing things are
to be classed as related to one or more of these elements for
convenience in certain operations. But these four letters, though
in one sense they represent the eternal framework, are not, so
to speak, original. For instance, when we place Tetragrammaton
on the Tree of Life, the Ten Sephiroth or numbers, we do not include
the first Sephira. Yod is referred to the second, He to the third,
Vau to the group from 4 to 9, and He' final to the tenth. No.
1 is said to be symbolised by the top point of the Yod.
It is only in No. 10 that we get the manifested universe, which
is thus shown as the result of the Yoga of the other forces, the
first three letters of the name, the active elements, fire, water
and air. (These are the three 'mother letters' in the Hebrew
alphabet.) The last element, earth, is usually considered a sort
of consolidation of the three; but that is rather an unsatisfactory
way of regarding it, because if we admit the reality of the universe
at all we are in philosophical chaos. However, this does not
concern us for the moment.
3. When we apply these symbols to Yoga, we find that fire
represents the Yogi, and water the object of his meditation.
((You can, if you like, reverse these attributions. It makes
no difference except to the metaphysician. And precious little
to him!)
The Yod and the He combine, the Father and Mother unite, to
produce a son, Vau. This son is the exalted state of mind produced
by the union of the subject and the object. This state of mind
is called Samadhi in the Hindu terminology. It has many varieties,
of constantly increasing sublimity; but it is the generic term
which implies this union which is the subject of Yoga. At this
point we ought to remember poor little He' final, who represents
the ecstasy -- shall I say the orgasm? -- and the absorption thereof:
the compensation which cancels it. I find it excessively difficult
to express myself. It is one of these ideas which is very deeply
seated in my mind as a result of constant meditation, and I feel
that I am being entirely feeble when I say that the best translation
of the letter He' final would be 'ecstasy rising into Silence.'
Moral: meditate yourselves, and work it out! Finally, there
is no other way.
4. I think it is very important, since we are studying Yoga
from a strictly scientific point of view, to emphasise the exactness
of the analogy that exists between the Yogic and the sexual process.
If you look at the Tree of Life, you see that the Number One
at the top divides itself into Numbers Two and Three, the equal
and opposite Father and Mother, and their union results in the
complexity of the Son, the Vau Group, while the whole figure recovers
its simplicity in the single Sephira of He' final, of the Daughter.
It is exactly the same in biology. The spermatozoon and the
ovum are biologically the separation of an unmanifested single
cell, which is in its function simple, though it contains in itself,
in a latent form, all the possibilitiies of the original single
cell. Their union results in the manifestatiion of these qualities
in the child. Their potentialities are expressed and developed
in terms of time and space, while also, accompanying the act of
union, is the ecstasy which is the natural result of the consciousness
of their annihilation, the necessary condition of the production
of their offspring.
5. It would be easy to develop this thesis by analogies drawn
from ordinary human experiences of the growth of passion, the
hunger accompanying it, the intense relief and joy afforded by
satisfaction. I like rather to think of the fact that all true
religion has been the artistic, the dramatic, representation of
the sexual process, not merely because of the usefulness of this
cult in tribal life, but as the veil of this truer meaning which
I am explaining to you tonight. I think that every experience
in life should be regarded as a symbol of the truer experience
of the deeper life. In the Oath of a Master of the Temple occurs
the clause: 'I will interpret every phenomenon as a particular
dealing of God with my soul.'
It is not for us to criticise the Great Order for expressing
its idea in terms readily understandable by the ordinary intelligent
person. We are to wave aside the metaphysical implications of
the phrase, and grasp its obvious meaning. So every act should
be an act of Yoga. And this leads us directly to the question
which we have postponed until now-Concentration.
6. Concentration! The sexual analogy still serves us. Do
you remember the Abbe in Browning? Asked to preside at the Court
of Love, he gave the prize to the woman the object of whose passion
was utterly worthless, in this admirable judgment:
It is a commonplace, and in some circumstances (such as constantly
are found among foul-minded Anglo-Saxons) a sort of joke,
that lovers are lunatics. Everything at their command is pressed
into the service of their passion; every kind of sacrifice, every
kind of humiliation, every kind of discomfort-these all count
for nothing. Every energy is strained and twisted, every energy
is directed to the single object of its end. The pain of a momentary
separation seems intolerable; the joy of consummation impossible
to describe: indeed, almost impossible to bear!
7. Now this is exactly what the Yogi has to do. All the books
they disagree on every other point, but they agree on this
stupidity-tell him that he has to give up this and give up that,
sometimes on sensible grounds, more often on grounds of prejudice
and superstition. In the advanced stages one has to give up the
very virtues which have brought one to that state! Every idea,
considered as an idea, is lumber, dead weight, poison; but it
is all wrong to represent these acts as acts of sacrifice. There
is no question of depriving oneself of anything one wants. The
process is rather that of learning to discard what one thought
one wanted in the darkness before the dawn of the discovery of
the real object of one's passion. Hence, note well! Concentration
has reduced our moral obligations to their simplest terms: there
is a single standard to which everything is to be referred. To
hell with the Pope! If Lobster Newburg upsets your digestion-and
good digestion is necessary to your practice- then you do not
eat Lobster Newburg. Unless this is clearly understood, the
Yogi will constantly be sidetracked by the sophistications of
religious and moral fanatics. To hell with the Archbishops!
8. You will readily appreciate that to undertake a course
of this kind requires careful planning. You have got to map out
your life in advance for a considerable period so far as it is
humanly possible to do so. If you have failed in this original
strategical disposition, you are simply not going to carry through
the campaign. Unforeseen contingencies are certain to arise,
and therefore one of our precautions is to have some sort of reserve
of resource to fling against unexpected attacks.
This is, of course, merely concentration in daily life, and
it is the habit of such concentration that prepares one for the
much severer task of the deeper concentration of the Yoga practices.
For those who are undertaking a preliminary course there is nothing
better, while they are still living more or less ordinary lives,
than the practices recommended in 'The Equinox'. There should
be-there must be-a definite routine of acts calculated to remind
the student of the Great Work.
9. The classic of the subject is 'Liber Astarte vel Berylli',
the Book of Devotion to a Particular Deity. This book is admirable
beyond praise, reviewing the whole subject in every detail with
flawless brilliancy of phrase. Its practice is enough in itself
to bring the devotee to high attainment. This is only for the
few. But every student should make a point of saluting the Sun
(in the manner recommended in Liber Resh) four times daily, and
he shall salute the Moon on her appearance with the Mantra Gayatri.
The best way is to say the Mantra instantly one sees the Moon,
to note whether the attention wavers, and to repeat the Mantra
until it does not waver at all.
He should also practise assiduously Liber III. vel Jugorum.
The essence of this practice is that you select a familiar thought,
word or gesture, one which automatically recurs fairly often during
the day, and every time you are betrayed into using it, cut yourself
sharply upon the wrist or forearm with a convenient instrument.
There is also a practice which I find very useful when walking
in a christian city-that of exorcising (with the prescribed outward
and downward sweep of the arm and the words 'Apo pantos kakodaimonos')
any person in religious garb.
All these practices assist concentration, and also serve to
keep one on the alert. They form an invaluable preliminary training
for the colossal Work of genuine concentration when it comes to
be a question of the fine, growing constantly finer, movements
of the mind.
10. We may now turn to the consideration of Yoga practices
themselves. I assume that in the fortnight which has elapsed
since my last lecture you have all perfected yourselves in Asana
and Pranayama; that you daily balance a saucer brimming with sulphuric
acid on your heads for twelve hours without accident, that you
all jump about busily like frogs when not seriously levitated;
and that your Mantra is as regular as the beating of your heart.
The remaining four limbs of Yoga are Pratyahara, Dharana,
Dhyana and Samadhi.
I will give you the definition of all four at a single stroke,
as each one to some extent explains the one following. Pratyahara
may be roughly described as introspection, but it also means a
certain type of psychological experience. For instance, you may
suddenly acquire a conviction, as did Sir Humphry Davy, that the
universe is composed exclusively of ideas; or you may have the
direct experience that you do not possess a nose, as may happen
to the best of us, if we concentrate upon the tip of it.
11. Dharana is meditation proper, not the kind of meditation
which consists of profound consideration of the subject with the
idea of clarifying it or gaining a more comprehensive grasp of
it, but the actual restraint of the consciousness to a single
imaginery object chosen for the purpose.
These two limbs of Yoga are therefore in a sense the two methods
employed mentally by the Yogi. For, long after success in Samadhi
has been attained, one has to conduct the most extensive explorations
into the recesses of the mind.
12. The word Dhyana is difficult to define; it is used by
many writers in quite contrary senses. The question is discussed
at some length in Part I. of my Book IV. I will quote what I
have written about it in conclusion:
'Let us try a final definition. Dhyana resembles Samadhi
in many respects. There is a union of the ego and the non-ego,
and a loss of the sense of time and space and causality. Duality
in any form is abolished. The idea of time involves that of two
consecutive things, that of space two non-coincident things, that
of causality two connected things.'
13. Samadhi, on the contrary, is in a way very easy to define.
Etymology, aided by the persistence of the religious tradition,
helps us here. "Sam is a prefix in Sanskrit which developed
into the prefix 'syn' in Greek without changing the meaning-'syn'
in 'synopsis,' 'synthesis,' 'syndrome.' It means 'together with.'
'Adhi' has also come down through many centuries and many tongues.
It is one of the oldest words in human language; it dates from
the time when each sound had a definite meaning proper to it,
a meaning suggested by the muscular movement made in producing
the sound. Thus, the letter D originally means 'father'; so the
original father, dead and made into a 'God,' was called Ad. This
name came down unchanged to Egypt, as you see in the Book of the
Law. The word 'Adhi' in Sanskrit was usually translated 'Lord.'
In the Syrian form we get it duplicated Hadad. You remember
Ben Hadad, King of Syria. The Hebrew word for 'Lord' is Adon
or Adonai. Adonai, my Lord, is constantly used in the Bible
to replace the name Jehovah where that was too sacred to be mentioned,
or for other reasons improper to write down. Adonai has also
come to mean, through the Rosicrucian tradition, the Holy Guardian
Angel, and thus the object of worship or concentration. It is
the same thing; worship is worth-ship, means worthiness; and anything
but the chosen object is necessarily an unworthy object.
14. As Dhyana also represents the condition of annihilation
of dividuality, it is a little difficult to distinguish between
it and Samadhi. I wrote in Part I., Book IV.-
'These Dhyanic conditions contradict those of normal thought,
but in Samadhi they are very much more marked than in Dhyana.
And while in the latter it seems like a simple union of two things,
in the former it appears as if all things rush together and unite.
One might say this, that in Dhyana there was still this quality
latent, that the one existing was opposed to the many non-existing;
in Samadhi the many and the one are united in a union of existence
with non-existence. This definition is not made from reflection,
but from memory.'
15. But that was written in 1911, and since then I have had
an immense harvest of experience. I am inclined to say at this
moment that Dhyana stands to Samadhi rather as the jumping about
like a frog, described in a previous lecture, does to Levitation.
In other words, Dhyana is an unbalanced or an impure approximation
to Samadhi. Subject and object unite and disappear with ecstasy
mounting to indifference, and so forth, but there is still a presentation
of some kind in the new genus of consciousness. In this view
Dhyana would be rather like an explosion of gunpowder carelessly
mixed; most of it goes off with a bang, but there is some debris
of the original components.
These discussions are not of very great importance in themselves,
because the entire series of the three states of meditation proper
is summed up in the word Samyama; you can translate it quite well
for yourselves, since you already know that 'sam' means 'together,'
and that 'Yama' means 'control.' It represents the merging of
minor individual acts of control into a single gesture, very much
as all the separate cells, bones, veins, arteries, nerves, muscles
and so forth, of the arm combine in unconscious unanimity to make
a single stroke.
16. Now the practice of Pratyahara, properly speaking, is
introspection, and the practice of Dharana, properly speaking,
is the restraint of the thought to a single imaginary object.
The former is a movement of the mind, the latter a cessation
of all movement. And you are not likely to get much success in
Pratyahara until you have made considerable advance in Dhyana,
because by introspection we mean the exploration of the sub-strata
of the consciousness which are only revealed when we have progressed
a certain distance, and become aware of conditions which are utterly
foreign to normal intellectual conception. The first law of normal
thought is A is A: the law of identity, it is called. So we
can divide the universe into A and not-A; there is no third thing
possible.
Now, quite early in the meditation practices, the Yogi is
likely to get as a direct experience the consciousness that these
laws are not true in any ultimate way. He has reached a world
where intellectual conceptions are no longer valid; they remain
true for the ordinary affairs of life, but the normal laws of
thought are seen to be no more than a mere mechanism. A code
of conventions.
The students of higher mathematics and metaphysics have often
a certain glimmering of these facts. They are compelled to use
irrational conceptions for greater convenience in conducting
their rational investigations. for example, the square root of
2, or the square root of minus 1, is not in itself capable of
comprehension as such; it pertains to an order of thinking beyond
the primitive man's invention of counting on his fingers.
17. It will be just as well then for the student to begin
with the practices of Dharana. If he does so he will obtain as
a by-product some of the results of Pratyahara, and he will also
acquire considerable insight into the methods of practising Pratyahara.
It sounds perhaps, at first, as if Pratyahara were off the main
line of attainment in Yoga. This is not so, because it enables
one to deal with the new conditions which are established in the
mind by realisation of Dhyana and Samadhi.
I can now describe the elementary practices.
You should begin with very short periods; it is most important
not to overstrain the apparatus which you are using; the mind
must be trained very slowly. In my early days I was often satisfied
with a minute or two at a time; three or four such periods twice
or three times a day. In the earliest stages of all it is not
necessary to have got very far with Asana, because all you can
get out of the early practices is really a foreshadowing of the
difficulties of doing it.
18. I began by taking a simple geometrical object in one colour,
such as a yellow square. I will quote the official instructions
in 'The Equinox'.
'Dharana-Control of thought.'
- Constrain the mind to concentrate itself upon a single
simple object imagined. The five tatwas are useful for this purpose;
they are: a black oval; a blue disk; a silver crescent; a yellow
square; a red triangle.
- Proceed to combinations of single objects; e.g., a black
oval within a yellow square, and so on.
- Proceed to simple moving objects, such as a pendulum swinging;
a wheel revolving, etc. Avoid living objects.
- Proceed to combinations of moving objects, e.g., a piston
rising and falling while a pendulum is swinging. The relation
between the two movements should be varied in different experiements.
(Or even a system of flywheels, eccentrics and governor.)
- During these practices the mind must be absolutely confined
to the object determined on; no other thought must be allowed
to intrude upon the consciousness. The moving systems must be
regular and harmonious.
- Note carefully the duration of the experiment, the number
and nature of the intruding thoughts; the tendency of the object
itself to depart from the course laid out for it, and any other
phenomena which may present themselves. Avoid overstrain; this
is very important.
- Proceed to imagine living objects; as a man, preferably some
man known to, and respected by, you.
- In the intervals of these experiments you might try to imagine
the objects of the other senses, and to concentrate upon them.
For example, try to imagine the taste of chocolate, the smell
or roses, the feeling of velvet, the sound of a waterfall, or
the ticking of a watch.
- Endeavour finally to shut out all objects of any of the senses,
and prevent all thoughts arising in your mind. When you feel
you have attained some success in these practices, apply for examination,
and should you pass, more complex and difficult practices will
be prescribed for you.'
19. Now one of the most interesting and irritating features
of your early experiments is: interfering thoughts. There is,
first of all, the misbehaviour of the object which you are contemplating;
it changes its colour and size; moves its position; gets out of
shape. And one of the essential difficulties in practice is that
it takes a great deal of skill and experience to become really
alert to what is happening. You can go on day-dreaming for quite
long periods before realising that your thoughts have wandered
at all. This is why I insist so strongly on the practices described
above as producing alertness and watchfulness, and you will obviously
realise that it is quite evident that one has to be in the pink
of condition and in the most favourable mental state in order
to make any headway at all. But when you have had a little practice
in detecting and counting the breaks in your concentration, you
will find that they themselves are useful, because their character
is symptomatic of your state of progress.
20. Breaks are classed as follows:
- Firstly, physical sensations; these should have been overcome
by Asana.
-
Secondly, breaks that seem to be indicated by events immediately
preceding the meditation: their activity becomes tremendous.
Only by this practice does one understand how much is really
observed by the senses without the mind becoming conscious of
it.
-
Thirdly, there is a class of break partaking of the nature of
reverie or 'day-dreaming.' These are very insidious-one may go
on for a long time without realising that one has wandered at
all.
-
Fourthly, we get a very high class of break, which is a sort of
abberation of the control itself. You think, 'How well I am doing
it!' or perhaps that it would be rather a good idea if you were
on a desert island, or if you were in a sound-proof house, or
if you were sitting by a waterfall. But these are only trifling
variations from the vigilance itself.
-
A fifth class of break seems to have no discoverable source in
the mind-such might even take the form of actual hallucination,
usually auditory. Of course, such hallucinations are infrequent,
and are recognised for what they are. Otherwise the student had
better see a doctor. The usual kind consists of odd sentences,
or fragments of sentences, which are quite distinctly heard in
a recognisable human voice, not the student's own voice, or that
of anyone he knows. A similar phenomenon is observed by wireless
operators, who call such messages 'atmospherics.'
-
There is a further kind of break, which is the desired result
itself.
21. I have already indicated how tedious these practices become;
how great the bewilderment; how constant the disappointment.
Long before the occurrence of Dhyana, there are quite a number
of minor results which indicate the breaking up of intellectual
limitation. You must not be disturbed if these results make
you feel that the very foundations of your mind are being knocked
from under you. The real lesson is that, just as you learn in
Asana, the normal body is in itself nothing but a vehicle of pain,
so is the normal itself insane; by its own standards it is insane.
You have only got to read a quite simple and elementary work
like Professor Joad's 'Guide to Philosophy' to find that any argument
carried far enough leads to a contradiction in terms. There are
dozens of ways of showing that if you begin 'A is A,' you end
'A is not A.' The mind reacts against this conclusion; it anaesthetises
itself against the self-inflicted wound, and it regulates philosophy
to the category of paradoxial tricks. But that is a cowardly
and disgraceful attitude. The Yogi has got to face the fact that
we are all raving lunatics; that sanity exists-if it exists at
all-in a mental state free from dame's school rules of intellect.
With an earnest personal appeal, therefore, to come up frankly
to the mourners' bench and gibber, I will take my leave of you
for this evening.
Love is the law, love under will.
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