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PATANJALI YOGA SUTRAS
been told, an invaluable aid to spiritual progress. There are also special mantrams which produce psychic powers.
The practice of austerities enormously strengthens the aspirant's will power. Hence also the psychic powers may be obtained.
But concentration is the surest of all the means of obtaining the psychic powers. This has been thoroughly discussed in the previous chapter.
2.
जात्यन्तरपरिणामः प्रकृत्यापूरात् ॥२॥ The transformation of one species into another is caused by the inflowing of nature.
निमित्तमप्रयोजकं प्रकृतीनां वरणभेदस्तु ततः
frenant 11311 3. Good or bad deeds are not the direct causes of the
transformation. They only act as breakers of the obstacles to natural evolution; just as a farmer breaks down the obstacles in a water course, so that water flows
through by its own nature. Here, Patanjali explains the Hindu theory of evolution of species by means of an illustration from agriculture. The farmer who irrigates one of his fields from a reservoir does not have to fetch the water. The water is there already. All the farmer has to do is to open a sluice gate or break down a dam, and the water flows into the field by the natural force of gravity.
The "water" is the force of evolution which, according to Patanjali, each one of us carries within him, only waiting to be released from the "reservoir.” By our acts we "open the sluice gate," the water runs down into the field; the field bears its
