Practice of Yoga
They practice two postures, termed Padmasana, and Siddhiisana, with a view to respire with the least possible frequency. They also dread the rapid changes and uncertainties of the weather. When the yogis are able to practice the above quiescent postures for the period of two hours, they commence to practice Pranayama, a stage of self-trance which is characterised by profuse perspiration, trembling of the system, and a sense of lightness of the body and soul.
They next practice Pratyhara, a stage of self-trance in which they have the functions of the senses are suspended. They then practice Dharana, a stage of self-trance in which sensibility and voluntary motion are suspended, and the body is capable of retaining any given posture, the mind being said to be quiescent in this stage of self-trance. The Yogis, after attaining the stage of Dharana (cataleptic condition), aspire to what is termed Dhyana, a stage of self, trance in which they pretend to be surrounded by flashes of eternal light or electricity, termed Ananta-jyoti, (from tow Sanskrit words signifying endless or all pervading light), which is the universal soul. The Yogis in a state of Dhyana are said to be clairvoyant. The Dhyana of the Yogis is the Turya avastha of the Vedantists, the ecstasy of the Physicians, the self-contemplation of the German mesmerisers, and the clairvoyance of the French philosophers. Samadhi is the last stage of self-trance. In this state the yogis, like the bat, the hedgehog, the marmot, the hamster, and the dormouse, acquire the power of supporting the abstraction of atmospheric air, and the privation of food and drink.
A Yogi analyses the various corporeal intellectual moral sensual and religious principles of which man is composed and by which he segregates or awakens the soul to the contemplation of and absorption into the Supreme soul the Creator, Preserver and Destroyer of the world.
