Some are born with psychic powers as the result of their struggles in previous lives. And not psychic powers merely, but real spiritual genius. Such are those most mysterious of all human beings, the "natural" saints, who are filled with the knowledge and love of God even in early childhood and grow up seemingly untouched by the temptations of worldliness.

The idea is that the yogi might wish to have several minds and bodies in order to exhaust all of his karma more quickly. But the wisdom of this plan would seem to be doubtful. There is a story of a king who made himself many bodies, hoping in this way to exhaust his craving for sexual enjoyment. But finally

In any particular, incarnation, a man's condition is determined by the balance of his karmas. Suppose that balance is very favourable, and he is born to become a monk and a spiritual teacher. He will still have some bad karmas which, under less favourable conditions, would produce bad tendencies. But he has to live up to his vocation and set

The Gita teaches: "That which is non-existent can never come into being, and that which is can never cease to be." The forms and expressions of an object may change, but all these changes of form and expression have existed, and will continue to exist, potentially, within the object. The past and future exist within the object in an unmanifested,

Patañjali refutes the philosophy of subjective idealism. Following Sānkhya philosophy, he admits the reality of an objective world which is independent of our mental perception. Furthermore, he points out that the perceptions of one individual vary from those of another. The example given by the commentators is that of a young and beautiful married woman. She brings joy to her

Every combination of individuals or forces in this world has to have a purpose for its action or existence; otherwise it would be just a meaningless, functionless collection of objects, brought together haphazardly. And this purpose must be external to itself. A congress or parliament would be just a collection of noisy individuals in a room, if it did not

To man in his ordinary sense-consciousness, the universe seems full of secrets. There seems so infinitely much to be discovered and known. Every object is an invitation to study. He is overcome by a sense of his own ignorance. But to illumined yogi, universe does not seem at all mysterious. If you know clay, you know the nature of everything