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THE PRACTICAL PATH.
karmas. The reason for this is that our nervous system consists of nervous 'threads' which under the influence of the customary forms of activity have become arranged in certain forms, so that when we check the activity of the senses and prevent the mind from wandering in its usual haunts, holding it to a particular point, a kind of strain is produced which tends to unloosen the very structure of nerves and the knots formed by them. If we now persevere in the attitude of concentration for a sufficiently long period of time, these nervous "threads' would become completely detached from their old groupings, and fall apart. The ascetic, who knows that the natural 'light' of his soul is obscured by the 'bushel' of matter, and knows how to remove the cover, concentrates his mind on those centres of his nervous system which are the least obscured and affected by matter. As he perseveres in concentration on these centres, the nervous 'threads' which enter into the warp and woof' of the bushel' are loosened and detached from one another, and dispersed in all directions, leaving the effulgence of pure 'Light' free to manifest itself. For this very reason, the liability to sleep, which arises from the preponderance of matter in certain centres of the brain, is also destroyed prior to the attainment of kevala jñāna.
Dhyâna, or concentration of mind, thus, is the direct means of the attainment of moksha. It not only enables one to purge one's consciousness of all kinds of evil passions and inclinations by preventing the uncontrolled wandering of mind, but also destroys the veil of matter which bars the manifestation of one's
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