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THE SECRET OF YOGA
random or erratic phenomenon, possible only for some people purely by divine favour or as a peculiarity present in their minds, without any relation whatsoever to the biological construction of their bodies, a by-product of the human psyche, active as a matter of accident, and not as an inherent tendency of every mind. It is as correct to say that religious striving and occult practices somehow create a particular condition of the mind in which mystical experiences become possible without affecting the body, as it would be to hold that self-mortification helps in causing visionary states in ascetics as it is pleasing to God. These explanations do not help to solve the riddle but, on the other hand, make it more complicated and difficult. How can spiritual exercises change the normal behaviour of the mind and make it capable of exhibiting entirely inexplicable paranormal phenomena, and, at the same time, why should asceticism be a feature of the religious impulse, effective to such a degree as to create sometimes an awful thirst for self-torture and self-denial? It is the height of folly in such an important issue to explain one enigma in terms of another, thus creating a vicious circle that can never lead to the heart of the problem. It is because we are often accustomed to regard the religion in which we are brought up merely as a legacy of a prophet or a sage or a line of prophets or sages, rather than as an inherent thirst of the human mind, dependent for its existence on the biological makeup of the organism in the same way as other basic urges exist that we deplorably fail in tracing the origin of all phenomena connected with religion to their real source, and leap from one wrong supposition to the other without arriving at the right solution of the problem. If we believe in the efficacy of Yoga or other systems of discipline designed to lead to transcendent conditions of consciousness and psychic insights, we will have to accept the existence of a responsive element in the body which is affected by these exercises in such a way as to lead to the development or emergence of new faculties and extraordinary mental states in the organism.