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itself into objective and subjective phenomena, the Purusha-soul is for the time obcured by it or which is the same thing assimilated into it. It is only when the state of Yoga is reached that the consciousness becomes quite pure and ready to receive all knowledge and all impressions from any source whatever. If this state is to be acquired, by suppressing the transformations of the thinking principle, let us see what these transformations are.
MYSTICISM IN INDIA
In Yoga philosophy the thinking principle is transformed into five ways. First when there comes to it the right knowledge; second, when there comes to it false knowledge; third, when it is simply put into complex imagination or fancy; fourth, when we are sleeping; fifth, when we are exercising the faculty of memory. Let us examine each condition. The theory as to how the external world is cognized is a complicated one, but in order to explain it in the simplest way, I would say that when organs of sense are put in contact with external objects they are put in a state of vibration and cause a similar vibration on the mind-substance. This change in the mind-substance is called direct cognition. The mind is also modified when it receives false knowledge, i.e., when a false conception is entertained of a thing whose real form does not correspond to that conception; for instance, when a mother-of-pearl is mistaken for silver, or a post in dark mistaken for a man. It is also modified by having fancied notions, i.e., notions called into being by mere words having nothing to answer to
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