Lecturing in New York in the winter of 1895 to 1896, Vivekananda explains by annexation. "In this country there are Mind-healers," he says, and adds faith-healers, Spiritualists, Christian Scientists and hypnotists; all of them are manipulating Prana "whether they know it or not." The habit runs through the lectures. Hatha postures are compared to Delsarte, the system of expressive physical culture then fashionable in America, and Christian Science is recommended as a mental effort for keeping the body strong. Placing the audience's own movements inside the Yoga scheme made the teaching legible to them. A reader now should take the list as a portrait of 1890s America, not of India.
Raja Yoga (the Yoga Sūtras with commentary) — trans. Swami Vivekananda (1896)
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The translator’s English as printed (Swami Vivekananda). The original-language text is not held; names are romanised as the translator printed them.
This opens to us the door to almost unlimited power. Suppose, for instance, one understood the Prana perfectly, and could control it, what power on earth could there he that would not be his ? He would be able to move the sun and stars out of their places, to control everything in the universe, from the atoms to the biggest suns, because he would control the Prana. This is the end and aim of Pranay&ma. When the Yogi becomes perfect there will be nothing in nature not under his control. If he orders the gods to come, they will come .»t his bidding; if he asks the departed to come, they will come at his bidding. All the forces of nature will obey him as his slaves, and when the ignorant see these lX)wers of the Yogi they call them miracles. One peculiarity of the Hindu mind is that it always inquires for the last possible generalisation, leaving the details to be worked out afterwards. The (juestion is raised in the Vedas, " What is that, knowing which we shall know everything ? '" Thus, all books, and all philosophies that ha\e been written, have been only to prove that b) knowing which e\erything is known. If a man wants to know this universe bit by bit he must know every indi- \ idual grain of sand, and that means infinite time for him ; he cannot know all of them. Then how can knowledge be? How is it possible for a man to be all-knowing through particulars ? The Yogis say that behind this particular manifestation there is a generalisation. Behind all particular ideas stands a generalised, an abstract principle ; grasp it, and you have grasped everything. Just as this whole universe has been generalised, in the Vedas, into that One Absolute Existence. He who has grasped that Existence has grasped the whole universe. So all forces have been generalised into this Prana, and he who has grasped the Prana has grasped all the forces of the universe, mental or physical. He who has controlled the Prana has controlled his own mind, and all the minds that exist. He who has controlled the Prana has controlled his body, and all the bodies that exist, because the Prana is the generalised manifestation of force.
How to control the Prana is the one idea of Pranayama. All these trainings and exercises are for that one end, and each man must begin where he stands, must learn how to control the things that are nearest to him. . This body is the nearest thing to us, nearer than anything in the universe, and this mind is the nearest of all. The Prana which is working this mind and body is the nearest to us of all the Prana in the universe. This little wave of the Prana w^hich represents our own energies, mental and physical, is the nearest wave to us of all that infinite ocean of Prana, and if we can succeed in controlling that little wave, then alone we can hope to control the w^hole of Prana. Perfection is to be gained by the Yogi who has done this, and no power is any more his master.
He has become almost almighty, almost all-knowing. We see sects in every country who have attempted this control of Prana. In this country there are Mind-healers, Faith-healers, Spiritualists, Christian Scientists, Hypnotists, etc., and if we analyse these different groups we shall find that the background of each is this control of the Prana, whether they know it or not. If you boil all their theories down the residuum will be the .same. It is the one and same force they are manipulating, only unknowingly. They have stumbled on the discovery of a force, and do not know its nature, but they are unconsciously using the same p)owers which the Yogi uses, and which come from Pr&na.