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.
feel ; they can be more easily controlled, but what about these finer instincts ? How can they be controlled ? When I am angry my whole mind has become a huge wave of anger. I feel it, see it, handle it, can easily manipulate it, can fight with it, but I shall not succeed perfectly in the fight until I can get down below. A man says something very harsh to me, and I begin to feel that I am getting heated, and he goes on till I am perfectly angry, and forget myself, identify myself with anger. When he first began to abuse me I still thought " I am going to be angry." Anger was one thing and I was another, but when I became angry, I was anger. These feelings have to be controlled in the germ, the root, in their fine forms, before even we have become conscious that they are acting on us. With the vast majority of mankind the fine states of these passions are not even known, the state when they are slowly coming from beneath consciousness. When a bubble is rising from the bottom of the lake we do not see it, or even when it is nearly come to the surface ; it is only when it bursts and makes a ripple that we know it is there. We shall only be successful in grappling with the waves when we can get hold of them in their fine causes, and until you can get hold of them, and subdue them before they become gross, there is no hope of conquering any passion perfectly. To control our passions we have to control them at their very roots ; then alone shall we be able to burn out their very seeds. As fried seeds thrown into the ground will never come up, so these passions will ne\er arise.
j^A RAJA YOGA.
10. They, to-be-rejected-by-opposite-modificationa, are fine.
How are these fine Samskaras to be controlled ? We have to begin with the big waves, and come down and down. For instance, when a big wave of anger has come into the mind, how are we to control that ? Just by raising a big opposing wave. Think of love. Sometimes a mother is very angry with her husband, and while in that state the baby comes in, and she kisses the baby ; the old wave dies out, and a new wave arises, love for tlie child. That suppresses the other one. Love is opposite to anger. So we find that by raising the opposite waves we can conquer those which we want to reject. Then, if we can raise in our fine nature these fine opposing waves, they will check the fine workings of anger beneath the conscious surface. We have seen now that all these instinctive actions first began as conscious actions, and became finer and finer. So, if good waves in the conscious Chitta be constantly raised, they will go down, become subtle, and oppose the Samskara forms of e\il thoughts.
11. By meditation, their modifications are to be rejected.
Meditation is one of the great means of controlling the rising of these big waves. By meditation you can make the mind subdue these waves, and, if you go on practising meditation for days, and months, and years, until it has become a habit, until it will come in spite of yourself, anger and hatred will be controlled and checked,
12. The receptacle of works has its root in these pain-bearing obstructions, and their experience in this visible life, or in the unseen life.
By the receptacle of works is meant the sum-total of these Samskaras. Whatever work we do, the mind is thrown into a wave, and, after the work is finished, we think the wave is gone. No. It has only become fine, but it is still there. When we try to remember the thing, it comes up again and becomes a wave. So it was there ; if it had not been there, there would not have been memory. So, every action, every thought, good or bad, just goes down and becomes fine, and is there stored up. They are called pain-bearing obstructions, both happy and unhappy thoughts, because according to the Yogis, both, in the long run, bring pain. All happiness which comes from the senses will, eventually, bring pain. All enjoyment will make us thirst for more, and that brings pain as its result. There is no limit to man's desires ; he goes on desiring, and when he comes to a point where desire cannot be fulfilled, the result is pain. Therefore the Yogis regard the sum-total of the impressions, good or evil, as pain-bearing obstructions ; they obstruct the way to freedom of the Soul. It is the same with the Samskaras, the fine roots of all our works ; they are the causes which will again bring effects, either in this life, or in the lives to come. In exceptional ic6 RAJA YOGA.