SECTION
SEVEN
Opposition of the Hostile Forces
IT IS a fact always known to
all yogis and occultists since the beginning of time, in Europe
and Africa as in India,
that wherever yoga or Yajna is done, there the hostile Forces gather together
to stop it by any means. It is known that there is a lower nature and a higher
spiritual nature − it is known that they pull different ways and the
lower is strongest at first and the higher afterwards. It is known that the
hostile Forces take advantage of the movements of the lower nature and try to spoil
through them, smash or retard the siddhi. It has been said as long ago as the
Upanishads (hard is the path to tread, sharp like a razor's edge); it was said
later by Christ `hard is the way and narrow the gate by which one enters into
the kingdom of heaven' and also `many are called, few chosen' − because of these
difficulties. But it has also always been known that those who are sincere and
faithful in heart and remain so and those who rely on the Divine will arrive in
spite of all difficulties, stumbles or falls.
Normal human defects are one
thing − they are the working of the lower nature of the Ignorance. The
action of the hostile forces is a special intervention creating violent inner
conflicts, abnormal depressions, thoughts and impulses of a kind which can be
easily recognised as suggestions e.g. leaving the Ashram, abandoning the yoga,
revolt against the Divine, suggestions of calamity and catastrophe apparently
irresistible, irrational impulses and so on. It is a different order from the
usual human weaknesses.
The normal resistance of the
lower Nature in human beings and the action of the Hostiles are two quite
different things. The former is natural and occurs in everybody; the latter is
an
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intervention from the non-human
world. But this intervention can come in two forms. (1) They use and press on
the lower Nature forces making them resist where they would otherwise be
quiescent, making the resistance strong or violent where it would be otherwise
slight or moderate, exaggerating its violence when it is violent. There is
besides a malignant cleverness, a conscious plan and combination when the
Hostiles act on these forces which is not evident in the normal resistance of
the forces. (2) They sometimes invade with their own forces. When this happens
there is often a temporary possession or at least an irresistible influence
which makes the thoughts, feelings, actions of the person abnormal—a black
clouding of the brain, a whirl in the vital, all acts as if the person could
not help himself and were drawn by an overmastering force. On the other hand
instead of a possession there may be only a strong Influence; then the symptoms
are less marked, but it is easy for any one acquainted with the ways of these
forces to see what has happened. Finally it may be only an attack, not possession
or influence; the person then is separate, is not overcome, resists.
There are some
who are never touched by the hostile forces.
There is a natural movement of
the ordinary human nature in the material consciousness which takes time to get
rid of. Of course we call them forces of the lower nature but one must not
regard them as hostile, only ordinary. They have to be changed but it usually
takes time and it can be done quietly. One must be more occupied with the
positive side of the sadhana than with them. If one is always thinking of them
as hostile things, getting disturbed when they come, considering them as
hostile possessions, then it is not good.
The things that
are really hostile are few and must be distinguished from the ordinary
movements of the nature. The first must be repelled, the second dealt with
quietly and without getting troubled or discouraged by their appearance.
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The defects of the nature are
nothing, they can be dealt with progressively. It is these outward attacks,
these suggestions and throwing in of wrong forces to which the sadhak must shut
himself altogether.
The lower nature is ignorant and
undivine, not in itself hostile but shut to the Light and Truth. The hostile
forces are anti-divine, not merely undivine; they make use of the lower nature,
pervert it, fill it with distorted movements and by that means influence man
and even try to enter and possess or at least entirely control him.
Free yourself
from all exaggerated self-depreciation and the habit of getting depressed by
the sense of sin, difficulty or failure. These feelings do not really help, on
the contrary, they are an immense obstacle and hamper the progress. They belong
to the religious, not to the yogic mentality. The yogin should look on all the
defects of the nature as movements of the lower Prakriti common to all and
reject them calmly, firmly and persistently with full confidence in the Divine Power—without
weakness or depression or negligence and without excitement, impatience or
violence.
It [the vital ego] is part of the
ordinary human nature, everybody has it. It has to be purified and transformed,
the ego being replaced by the true vital being of which it is a distorted
shadow. The forces of the lower nature are often rebellious and resist
transformation out of attachment to the familiar movements of the Ignorance,
desire, vanity, pride, lust, self-will etc., but they are not in their nature
hostile. The hostile forces are those whose very raison d'être is revolt against the Divine, against the Light and Truth
and enmity to the Divine Work.
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The forces of the Ignorance are a
perversion of the earth-nature and the adverse Powers make use of them. They do
not give up their control of men without a struggle.
The hostile forces have a certain
self-chosen function: it is to test the condition of the individual, of the
work, of the earth itself and their readiness for the spiritual descent and
fulfilment. At every step of the journey, they are there attacking furiously,
criticising, suggesting, imposing despondency or inciting to revolt, raising
unbelief, amassing difficulties. No doubt, they put a very exaggerated
interpretation on the rights given them by their function, making mountains
even out of what seems to us a mole-hill. A little trifling false step or
mistake and they appear on the road and clap a whole Himalaya
as a barrier across it. But this opposition has been permitted from of old not
merely as a test or ordeal, but as a compulsion on us to seek a greater
strength, a more perfect self- knowledge,
an intenser purity and force of aspiration, a faith that nothing can crush, a
more powerful descent of the Divine Grace.
About the contact with the world
and the hostile forces, that is of course always one of the sadhak's chief
difficulties, but to transform the world and the hostile forces is too big a
task and the personal transformation cannot wait for it. What has to be done is
to come to live in the Power that these things, these disturbing elements
cannot penetrate, or, if they penetrate, cannot disturb, and to be so purified
and strengthened by it that there is in oneself no response to anything
hostile. If there is a protecting envelopment, an inner purifying descent and,
as a result, a settling of the higher consciousness in the inner being and
finally, its substitution even in the most external outwardly active parts in
place of the old ignorant consciousness, then the world and the hostile forces
will no longer matter − for one's
own soul at least; for there is a larger work not personal in which of course
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they will have to be dealt with;
but that need not be a main preoccupation at the present stage.
There is always a pressure on the
forces of the lower nature to change − through that the pressure is felt
by the hostiles; but whether they change or are destroyed seems to be left very
much for them to choose.
That is true. As things are the
vital falsehood seems to take a temporary advantage over the superior sattwic
nature.
It is quite true that falsehood
reigns in this world, that is the reason why these difficulties manifest. But
you have not to allow yourself to be shaken. You must remain calm and strong
and go straight, using the power of Truth and the Divine Force supporting you
to overcome the difficulties and set straight what has been made crooked by the
falsehood.
I suppose so. Whenever anything
has to be done, there are always forces that want to interfere. I suppose they
want to show that smooth walking and the “wide unbarred and thornless path”
belong only to the Vedic rtam satyam brhat and we must get up there − if we can.
Whatever point the adverse forces
choose for attack, however small it may seem to the external human mind,
becomes a crucial point and to yield it up may be to yield to them one of the
keys of the fortress. Even if it is a small postern door, it is enough for them
if they can enter. Nothing is really small and unimportant in the Great Path.
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Especially, when the struggle has
come down to the physical level, these distinctions cease to have any value;
for there “small” things have a not easily calculable index value and are of
great importance. On that level to lose a small post may be to make certain the
loss of the big battle.
All have had to
pass through the ordeal and test through which you are passing. We would have
avoided it for you if it had been possible, but since it has come we look to
you to persist and conquer. Patience, quiet endurance, calm resolution to go
through to the end and triumph, these are the qualities now required of you −
the less spectacular but more substantial of the warrior virtues.
Also,
perspicacity and vigilance. Do not shut your eyes to the difficulty in you or
turn away from it, but also let it not discourage you. Victory is certain if we
persevere, and what price of difficulty and endeavour can be too great for such
a conquest?
Yes, certainly. Men are being
constantly invaded by the hostiles and there are great numbers of men who are
partly or entirely under their influence. Some are possessed by them, others (a
few) are incarnations of hostile beings. At the present moment they are very
active all over the earth. Of course in the outside world there is no
consciousness, such as is developed in yoga, by which they can either become
aware of or consciously repel the attacks − the struggle in them between
the psychic and the hostile force goes on mostly behind the veil or so far as
it is on the surface is not understood by the mind.
The first attempt of the
possessing entity is to separate the person from his psychic, and it is that
that creates the struggle. All depends on the extent and persistence of the
possession − how much of the being it occupies and whether it is constant
or not.
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Do you not know the story of the
Elephant Brahman? All is Brahman, but in action you have to treat the elephant
as the Elephant Brahman and the Asura as the Asura Brahman and neither as
merely Brahman pure and simple. One has either to avoid the Rakshasa or
overcome him; otherwise the Rakshasa may eat up the man, all Brahman though
both be. The Brahman realisation is an inner static realisation, until one has
become the dynamic instrument of the Divine Consciousness and Force − then
the problem of the elephant and the Rakshasa won't arise, for the Divine
Consciousness will know and the Divine Force will execute what is to be done in
each case. There is no need to have vaira
inside, but to be friendly with the Rakshasa is not prudent, as the Rakshasa is
impervious to that kind of thing − he will take advantage of it to
farther his own purpose.
It is one thing to see things and
quite another to let them enter into you. One has to experience many things, to
see and observe, to bring them into the field of the consciousness and know
what they are. But there is no reason why you should allow them to enter into
you and possess you. It is only the Divine or what comes from the Divine that
can be admitted to enter you.
To say that all
light is good is as if you said that all water is good − or even that all
clear or transparent water is good: it would not be true. One must see what is
the nature of the light or where it comes from or what is in it, before one can
say that it is the true Light. False lights exist and misleading lustres, lower
lights too that belong to the being's inferior reaches. One must therefore be
on one's guard and distinguish; the true discrimination has to come by growth
of the psychic feeling and a purified mind and experience.
The mere intensity of the force
does not show that it is a bad power; the Divine Force often works with a great
intensity. Everything depends on the nature of the force and its working:
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what does it do, what seems to be
its purpose? If it works to purify or open the system, or brings with it light
or peace, or prepares the change of the thought, ideas, feelings, character in
the sense of a turning towards a higher consciousness, then it is the right
force. If it is dark or obscure or perturbs the being with rajasic or egoistic
suggestions or excites the lower nature, then it is an adverse force.
II
I do not see how I could say that
you were not for this yoga when you had and still get the experiences that are characteristic
of the yoga. The obstacles in the consciousness and the attacks are no proof
that a man is not fit for yoga. There is no one practising yoga who does not
get them. Even those who have become great siddha yogis had them during their
time of sadhana.
It is not a fact that the
Rajayogin or others are not attacked by environmental forces. Whether Moksha or
transformation be the aim, all are attacked − because the vital forces
want neither liberation nor transformation. Only the yogins speak of it in general
terms as Rakshasi Maya or the attacks of kāma,
krodha, lobha, − they don't care to trace these things to their sources
or watch how they come in, − but the thing itself is known to all.
Hostile forces attack every
sadhak; some are conscious of it, others are not. Their object is either to
influence the person or to use him or to spoil his sadhana or the work or any
other motive of the kind. Their object is not to test, but their attack may be used
by the guiding power as a test.
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There is always this critical
hostile voice in everybody's nature, questioning, reasoning, denying the
experience itself, suggesting doubt of oneself and doubt of the Divine. One has
to recognise it as the voice of the Adversary trying to prevent the progress
and refuse credence to it altogether.
There are no sadhaks who are
never attacked by wrong forces − but if one has a complete faith and
self-consecration, one can throw off the attack without too much difficulty.
If the faith and surrender are
complete in all parts of the being then there can be no attack. If there is a
strong central faith and surrender at all times, there can be attacks but the
attacks will have no chance of success.
There are two things that make it
impossible for them [the hostile forces] to succeed even temporarily in any
attack on the mind or the vital − first, an entire love, devotion and
confidence that nothing can shake, secondly, a calm and equality in the vital
as well as in the mind which has become the fundamental character of the inner
nature. Suggestions then may still come, things go wrong outside, but the being
remains invulnerable. Either of these two things is sufficient in itself
− and in proportion as they grow, even the existence of the hostile
forces becomes less and less of a phenomenon of the inner life − though
they may still be there in the outer atmosphere.
It is those who are of a highly
sattwic nature, especially if strongly surrendered to the Mother, who escape
the invasion or attacks of the hostile Forces in the mind and vital. That does
not mean
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that they escape the difficulties
of the lower human nature or of the sadhana, but these are not complicated by
the effective support given to them by the hostiles. It is not that there is no
point in them that might be pressed upon by the hostiles but in actual fact
they cannot get at these points because of the build of the nature which is
fortified against them owing to the large proportion of prakāśa and sukha
(see Gita) which the sattwic brings with it. But otherwise there is an internal
clarity, a balance, a happy composition in the being reflecting sunlight
easily, less amenable to the touch of cloud and tempest, which gives no handle
to the hostile forces. The nature refuses to be violently agitated or disturbed
or upset. At most it is the body that the hostiles can attack and there too
because the nervous being is calm and, it is only through the most material
that it can be done.
Vital purity is very necessary,
but it is not easy to make it immune from attack unless the wideness is there
along with a solid spiritual purity
and peace descending in the wideness. Of course, wideness by itself is not
sufficient.
They [the hostile forces] come
because they were freely permitted in the past − so they want to renew
and continue their action. An entire rejection and a complete turning to the
Divine are the way to meet them.
Evil forces can always attack in
moments of unconsciousness or half-consciousness or through the subconscient or
external physical − so long as all is not supramentally transformed. Only
if the force is there, they can at once be pushed back.
The hostile forces do not need a
cause for attacking − they
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attack whenever and whoever they
can. What one has to see is that nothing responds or admits them.
You ask whether the adverse Force
is stronger than the Divine Force. The implication is that man has no
responsibility for his action and whatever he does or however he errs and falls
in consequence, the Divine Force is to blame. It may be so, but in that case
there is no need or utility in doing sadhana. One has only to sit still and let
the adverse Force or the Divine Force do what they like! According to that
theory the Devil was quite right in telling Christ, “Cast thyself down from
this mountain and let His angels come and upbear thee,” and Christ was quite
wrong in rejecting the suggestion and saying, “It is written `Thou shalt not
tempt (put to a test) the Lord thy God!' ” He ought to have jumped and if he
got smashed, it would only have proved that the adverse forces were greater
than the Divine Force!
If an adverse
Force comes, one has not to accept and welcome its suggestions, but to turn to
the Mother and refuse to turn away from her. Whether one can open or not, one
has to be loyal and faithful. Loyalty and fidelity are not qualities for which
one has to do yoga. They are very simple things which any man or woman who aspires
to the Truth ought to be able to accomplish.
It is what
everybody should realise. It is the psychic fidelity that brings the power to
stand against the Asuras and enables the Protection to work.
III
About the attacks and the action
of the cosmic forces − these attacks very ordinarily become violent when
the progress is becoming rapid and on the way to be definite − especially
if they find they cannot carry out an effective aggression into the inner
being, they try to shake by outside assaults. One must take it as a trial of
strength, a call for gathering all one's capacities of calm and openness to the
Light and Power, so as to make oneself an
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instrument for the victory of the
Divine over the undivine, of the Light over the darkness in the world-tangle.
It is in this spirit that you must face these difficulties till the higher
things are so confirmed in you that these forces can attack no longer.
He is quite right in saying that
the heaviness of these attacks was due to the fact that you had taken up the
sadhana in earnest and were approaching, as one might say, the gates of the
Kingdom
of Light. That always makes these
forces rage and they strain every nerve and use or create every opportunity to
turn the sadhak back or, if possible, drive him out of the path altogether by
their suggestions, their violent influences and their exploitation of all kinds
of incidents that always crop up more and more when these conditions prevail,
so that he may not reach the gates. I have written to you more than once alluding
to these forces, but I did not press the point because I saw that like most
people whose minds have been rationalised by a modern European education you
were not inclined to believe in or at least to attach any importance to this knowledge.
People nowadays seek the explanation for everything in their ignorant reason,
their surface experience and in outside happenings. They do not see the hidden
forces and inner causes which were well-known and visualised in the traditional
Indian and yogic knowledge. Of course, these forces find their point d'appui in the sadhak himself, in the ignorant parts of his
consciousness and its assent to their suggestions and influences; otherwise
they could not act or at least could not act with any success. In your case the
chief points d'appui have been the extreme sensitiveness of the lower vital ego
and now also the physical consciousness with all its fixed or standing
opinions, prejudices, prejudgments, habitual reactions, personal preferences,
clinging to old ideas and associations, its obstinate doubts and its
maintaining these things as a wall of obstruction and opposition to the larger
light. This activity of the physical mind is what people call intellect and reason,
although it is only the turning of a machine in a circle of mental habits and
is very different from the true and free reason,
Page ─ 1742
the higher Buddhi, which is
capable of enlightenment and still more from the higher spiritual light or that
insight and tact of the psychic consciousness which sees at once what is true
and right and distinguishes it from what is wrong and false. This insight you
had very constantly whenever you were in a good condition and especially
whenever Bhakti became strong in you. When the sadhak comes down into the
physical consciousness, leaving the mental and higher vital ranges on which he had
first turned towards the Divine, these opposite things become very strong and
sticky and, as one's more helpful states and experiences draw back behind the veil
and one can hardly realise that one ever had them, it becomes difficult to get
out of this condition. The only thing then, as X has told you and I also have
insisted, is to stick it out. If once one can get and keep the resolution to
refuse to accept the suggestions of these forces, however plausible they may
seem, then either quickly or gradually this condition can diminish and will be
overpassed and cease. To give up yoga is no solution.
You are right. The hostile
forces, their attacks, their suggestions ought now to be superannuated, out of
date, out of place here in this sadhana. If somebody would realise that and
fulfil it in his sadhana, the others might perhaps get strength to follow. At
present these things are still here because the sadhaks open themselves to them
out of habit, out of desire, out of attraction for the drama of the vital, out
of fear, out of passive response and unresisting inertia. But there is no real
necessity for them any longer or true justification for their presence here,
− the outer world is a different matter. The sadhana could very well go
on and should go on as an unfolding, a natural falling away of defects and
difficulties, a coming of greater and greater light and power and
transformation.
When I said “no more necessary”,
I did not mean that their action could not go on - I think I expressly said
that if the
Page ─ 1743
sadhaks persisted in opening
themselves to it, it would continue. There is a difference between the action
of the hostile powers and the ordinary action of the lower nature. The latter
of course goes on until it is changed but there is no necessity for it to take
the form of hostile attacks and upsettings; it can be treated as a machinery
that has to be set right and with the aid of the higher Light and Power can be
set right. There are several who were once taken by hostile attacks who have now
reached the point where they can follow this method, others are approaching it −
some of course have always followed and never were attacked, at least in their
mind and vital. But there are still many who are very far from it and so the
action of the Hostiles continues.
I wrote because now there is a
sufficient descent of Light and Power, for one not to be subject to the ordeals
and tests which the Hostile Powers are permitted to put when one has only the
mental, or ordinary spiritual forces on the plane of mind to support one's
progress. If you look closely, you will see that when these Forces work now it
is in a perfectly irrational instinctive way, repeating always the same
movements without any intellectual or higher vital power behind them. Theirs is
now an irrational mechanical method which obscures more in the lowest physical
and subconscient than anything else. That means that their true justification
for being there is gone.
The things enumerated are not
causes of the attacks, but they are the occasion, the weakness in the sadhaks
that allows them when they could very well be dismissed. The hostile forces are
there in the world to maintain the Ignorance − they were there in the
sadhana, because they had the right to test the sincerity of the sadhaks in
their power and will to cleave to the Divine and overcome all difficulties. But
this is only so long as the higher Light has not descended into the physical;
now it is descending, it is sufficiently there for anyone to receive it more
and more fully,
Page − 1744
so that the way becomes smooth
and open, a progressive development and not a struggle.
It is not the pressure from above
that creates difficulties. There is a strong resistance to change in the lower
planes and certain Forces take advantage of it to throw in vortices of
disturbance and try to upset as many people as possible. The only action of the
Pressure from above on these is to push them out from the atmosphere of the
person touched or from the atmosphere generally. After a time they are pushed
out of the atmosphere of the person and can no longer work on him except from a
distance with very slight effect. When that can be done generally—so as to push
them to a distance from the atmosphere of the Ashram, then all this trouble
will cease.
That [going away from the Ashram]
is not due to the pressure of yoga but to the pressure of something in them
that negates the yoga. If one follows one's psychic being and higher mental
call, no amount of pressure of yoga can produce such results. People talk as if
the yoga had some maleficent force in it which produces these results. It is on
the contrary the resistance to yoga that does it.
IV
A progress made often stirs the
adverse forces to activity, they want to diminish its effect as much as
possible. When you get a decisive experience of this kind, you should remain
concentrated and assimilate it − avoiding self-dispersion and all externalising
of the consciousness.
It is very often after a good
experience or a decisive progress
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that the beings of the vital
world try to attack and threaten....
They have always the hope that they can turn back the sadhak from his
path by attacks and menaces.
It often happens like that. When
a progress has been made (here it is the opening of the inner vision) the
hostiles attack in a fury. You must be especially on your guard when you are
making a progress − so as to check the attack before it can get in.
That is right. The rest is the
remnant of the attack − such an attack, sudden and violent, as sometimes
indeed often comes when one is making full progress to the straight and open
way. It cannot permanently deflect the progress and, when it disappears, there
is usually a chance of going on more firmly and swiftly towards the goal. That
is what we must do now.
Naturally, the hostile forces are
always on the watch to rob what they can of the things received by the sadhak, −
not that they profit by them but they prevent them from being used to build up
the Divine in life.
There is always a struggle going
on between the forces of Light and the opposing forces − when there is a
true movement and progress the latter try to throw a wrong movement across to
stop or delay the progress. Sometimes they do this by raising up old movements
in yourself that have still the power to recur; sometimes they use movements or
thoughts in the atmosphere, things said by others to disturb the consciousness.
When a settled peace and working of the Power and self-giving of the being can
be fixed in the physical, then there comes a secure basis − there
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are no more fluctuations of this
kind, though superficial difficulties may continue.
Either the higher consciousness
has to descend into the vital and physical or else by the psychic consciousness
coming forward one has to detect whatever imperfection is in the vital and
reject it.
There are
always hostile forces that try to stop or break the experience. If they come
in, it is a sign that there is something in the being − vital or physical
− that either responds or is too inert to oppose.
Your description is too vague.
From what you write it may just as well be the reaction that frequently follows
an experience; the adverse force coming in with a contrary movement. Tests come
sometimes from the hostile forces, sometimes in the course of Nature. I suppose
they must be necessary, since they always come in sadhana.
There is no use of testing at all
− whatever test is needed, comes of itself in the ordinary way in the
very use of the capacity and in the very steps of the progress − no other
is needed. Beyond that the tests that come are from the hostile forces − but
their way of testing is to take advantage of any point of weakness and push
with all their force at that point to break down the sadhana or else to hurl
all the adverse forces on the consciousness while it is still in process of
transition and not yet mature so as to shatter all that has been done. It is
not a true test but mere destruction replacing the constructive method. By
unnecessary “testing” one dangerously invites this hostile pressure and raises
up things which one has to banish. To be conscious is necessary, but quiet
self-examination is sufficient for that − raising up difficulties under
plan of testing is quite the wrong method.
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The method of the Divine
Manifestation is through calm and harmony, not through a catastrophic upheaval.
The latter is the sign of a struggle, generally of conflicting vital forces,
but at any rate a struggle on the inferior plane.
You think too
much of the adverse forces. That kind of preoccupation causes much unnecessary
struggle. Fix your mind on the positive side. Open to the Mother's power,
concentrate on her protection, call for light, calm and peace and purity and
growth into the divine consciousness and knowledge.
The idea of
tests also is not a healthy idea and ought not to be pushed too far. Tests are
applied not by the Divine but by the forces of the lower planes − mental,
vital, physical − and allowed by the Divine because that is part of the
soul's training and helps it to know itself, its powers and the limitations it
has to outgrow. The Mother is not testing you at every moment, but rather
helping you at every moment to rise beyond the necessity of tests and
difficulties which belong to the inferior consciousness. To be always conscious
of that help will be your best safeguard against all attacks whether of adverse
powers or of your own lower nature.
If one knows how to profit by
experience, even the Hostile Forces and their attacks can be useful; − although
of course that does not mean that the attacks should be invited. What they do
is to press with all their force upon some weak point of our nature and if we
are vigilant, we can see and throw away that weakness. Only the attack method
of these Forces is too violent and upheaving and endangers the good things in
one also, faith and peace etc. − so one has to be careful to keep these
against all attacks.
The hostiles when they cannot
break the yoga by positive means, by positive temptations or vital outbreaks,
are quite willing to do it negatively; first by depression, then by refusal at
once of ordinary life and of sadhana.
Page ─ 1748
Indirect attacks are not of this
kind, a violent rush and covering by hostile forces − they are done through covert suggestions, half-truth,
half-falsehood, attempts to represent the falsehood in the garb of the Divine
Truth or to mix the lower consciousness cleverly with the higher. Their attempt
is to mislead by guile rather than to conquer by force.
When the vital forces or beings
throw an influence, they give it certain forms of thought, action and put them
in the minds and vital of people so that they feel, think, act and speak in a
particular way. Whoever opens to their influence acts according to this
formation, perhaps with variations due to his own vital temperament.
There is no particular number
− but sometimes there are particular vital beings that attach themselves
to a man if he accepts them.
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