THE BODY HUMAN The human frame is a miracle of creation. It would not be far wrong to say that the whole trend of physical evolution has been to bring out this morphological marvel. It has not been a very easy task for Nature to raise a living creature from its original crawling "crouching slouching" horizontal position to the standing vertical position which is so normal and natural to the human body. Man has proportionately a larger cranium with a greater and heavier content of the grey substance in comparison with the (vertebral) column upon which it is set; his legs too have to carry a heavier burden. And yet how easy and graceful his erect posture! It is a balancing f

XI THE TRAGIC SPIRIT IN NATURE The wages of sin, it is said, is death. Well, it can, with equal if not greater truth, be said that the wages of virtue too is death! It seems as though on this mortal earth nothing great or glorious can be achieved which is not marred somehow or other, sometime or other. The blazon of virtue goes very rarely without a bar sinister branded across. Some kind of degradation, ignominy or frustration always attends or rounds off the spectacle of wonder. In the moral world too there seems to exist an inexorable law that action and reaction are equal in degree and opposite in kind. The glorious First Consul and Emperor d

II THE SUNLIT PATH Sri Aurobindo speaks of the sunlit path in Yoga. It is the path of happy progress where dangers and difficulties, violent ups and downs are reduced to a minimum, if not altogether obviated. In ideal conditions it is as it were a smooth and fair-weather sailing, as much of course as it is humanly possible. What are then these conditions? It is when the sadhaka keeps touch with his inmost being, his psychic consciousness, when this inner Guide and Helmsman is given the charge; for then he will be able to pass sovereignly by all shoals and rocks and storm-racks, through all vicissitudes gliding on—slow or swift as needed— inevitably towards the go

VI TRUE HUMILITY It is not by repeating mea culpa ad infinitum that one can show one's true humility. In owning too much and too often one's sins, one may be just on the wrong side of virtue. There lurks a strain of vanity in self-maceration: the sinner in an over-dose of self-pity almost feels himself saintly. Certainly, one must stand before oneself face to face, not hide or minimise or explain away one's errors and lapses, all one's omissions and commissions. But one need not brood over them, merely repenting and repining. One sees steadily, without flinching, what one actually is and then resolutely and sincerely takes to the ways and means of changing it, be

VII THE SPIRIT OF TAPASYA TAPASYA (Asceticism) is usually understood to mean the capacity to undergo physical discomfort and suffering. We are familiar with various types of Tapasya: sitting in summer with blazing fire all around and the fiery noondaysun overhead (Panchagnivrata), exposing one's bare limbs to the cold biting blasts among the eternal snows, lying down on a bed of sharp nails, betaking oneself to sack-cloth and ashes, fasting even to the point of death: there is no end to the variety of ways and means which man's ingenuity has invented to torture himself. Somehow the feeling has grown among spiritual, religious and even

III THE SPIRITUAL OUTLOOK The spiritual outlook is a global view, unlike the mental which is very often the view from a single angle or in rare cases, at the most, from a few angles. The ordinary man, even the most cultured and enlightened, has always a definite standpoint from which he surveys and judges; indeed without such a standpoint he would not be considered educated and worthy of consideration. In other words, he aspects one side of his object and thus perceives only a partial truth. That there are other standpoints, that other people may view the same thing from other grounds does not trouble him or troubles him to the extent that he considers them

ARJUNA OR THE IDEAL DISCIPLE What makes a true disciple? For it is not everyone that can claim or be worthy of or meet the demands of the title. Disciplehood, like all great qualities, that is to say, qualities taken at their source and origin, is a function of the soul. Indeed, it is the soul itself coming up and asking for its native divine status; it is the call of the immortal in the mortal, the voice of the inmost being rising above the clamours and lures of the world, above the hungers and ties of one's own nature. When that rings out clear and unmistakable, the Divine reveals Himself as the Guru, the Path is shown and the initiation given. Even

NOTES AND COMMENTS I HERE OR OTHERWHERE A question is often asked of us whether it is possible to do Yoga while remaining in the world. Some declare outright that it is not possible: world and Yoga are, like oil and water, absolutely different things, they do not go together. World means, to put it plainly, earning money and raising family. Well, these two are the very opposite of Yoga, for they involve, at their best, desire and attachment and, at their worst, dishonesty and deceit, lust and libertinage. There is the other school, on the contrary, that pronounces that a Yogic life must be lived in the world if it is not our intention to leave the world

YOGIC INITIATION AND APTITUDE In the practice of Yoga a condition precedent is usually laid down: it is called adhikara, aptitude, fitness or capacity. Everybody does not possess this aptitude, it is urged, and cannot take to a life of Yoga at one's sweet will. There must be a preparation, certain rules and regulations must be observed, some discipline must be followed and one must acquire certain qualities or qualifications, must reach a particular stage and degree, rise to a particular level of life and consciousness before one can successfully face the spiritual problem. It is not everyone that has a laisser-passer, a free pass to enter the city or citade