Yoga Sastra

Book excerpt: Excerpt from Yoga Sastra: The Yoga Sutras of Patenjali Examined; With a Notice of Swami Vivekananda's Yoga Philosophy It has been the unhappy lot of India to have had for thousands of years a succession of teachers who palmed off their crude ideas as inspired. The result has been, in the words of Sir H. S. Maine, "false morality, false history, false philosophy, false physics." All educated Hindus will admit that the history, geography, and astronomy of the Hindu sacred books are egregiously wrong. In the following pages it is shown that belief in Yoga powers and charms is equally mistaken. Marvellous power may indeed be acquired, but not by Yoga. The reader is advised to follow the course pointed out at page 58. "Awakened India," instead of adopting the Fowl or Tortoise Upset Posture, with his eye fixed on the tip of his nose and seeking "the suppression of the transformations of the thinking principle," should rather endeavour to have his muscles braced like those of Prince Ranjitsinhji, his faculties of observation cultivated like those of Professor Bose, his ability to weigh evidence developed like that of Dr. Bhandarkar. Instead of a dreamy pessimism, let there be active benevolence. Thus would India advance in civilization with a speed before unknown. "Above all, let the deep religious feeling of the Hindu mind be wisely directed. Let the Bhakti Yoga have for its object the loftiest ideal of majesty, wisdom, goodness and purity. Such is the great Creator and Lord of the Universe." About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.