The Need of Yoga—Before going into the sugject of Yoga I shall try to discuss one great question, upon which rests the whole theory of religion for the Yogis. It seems the consensus of opinion of the great minds of the world, & it has been nesrly demonstrated by researches into physical nature, that we are the outcome & manifestation of an absolute condition, back of our present relative condition, & are going forward, to return to that absolute. This being granted, the question is: Which is better, the absolute or this state? There are not wanting people who think that this manifested state is the highest state of man. Thinkers of great calibre are of the opinion that we are manifestations of undifferentiated being & the differentiated state is higher than the absolute. They imagine that in the absolute there cannot be any quality; that it must be insensate, dull, & lifeless; that only this life can be enjoyed &, therefore, we must cling to it. KARMA – YOGA :- THE YOGA OF ACTION:- Karma in Its Effect on character………………………. The word Karma is derived from the Sankrit Kri, to do; all action is Karma. Technically, this word also means the effects of actions. In connection with metaphysics, it sometime means the effects, of which our past actions were the causes. But in Karma-Yoga we have simply to do with word karma as meaning work. The goal of manking is knowledge. That is the one ideal placed before us by Eastern philosophy. Pleasure is not the goal of man, but knowledge. Pleasure & happiness come to an end. It is a mistake to suppose that pleasure is the goal. The cause of all the miseries we have in the world is that men foolishly think pleasure to be the ideal to strive for. After a time man finds that it is not happiness, but knowledge, towards which he is going, & that both pleasure & pain are great teachers; & that he learns as much from evil as from good. BHAKTI-YOGA THE YOGA OF LOVE AND DEVOTION Definition of Bhakti:- Bhakti-Yoga is a real, genuine search after the Lord, a search beginning, continuing, & ending in Love. One single moment of the madness of extreme love to God brings us eternal freedom. “Bhakti,” say Narada in his explanation of the Bhakti-aphorisms, “is intense love to God.”—“When a man gets it, he loves all hates none; he becomes satisfied for ever.”—“This love cannot be reduced to any earthly benefit,” because so long as worldly desires last, that kind of love does not come. “Bhakti is greater than Karma, greater than Yoga, because these are intended for an object in view, while Bhakti is its own fruition, its own means & its own end.” RAJA-YOGA:- CONQERING THE INTERNAL NATURE… A Scientifically Worked Out Method All our knowleclge is based upon experience. What we call inferential knowledge, in which we go from the general to the particular, has experience as its basis. In what are called the exact sciences, people easily find the truth, because it poeples to the particular experiences of every human being. The scientist does not tell you to believe in anything, but he has certain results which come from his own experiences, & reasoning on them when he aske us to believe in his conclusions, he appeals to some universal experience of humnaity. In every exact science there is a basis which is common to all humanity, so that we can at once see the truth or the fallacy of the conclusions drawn therefrom. Now, the question is: Has religion any such basis or not? I shall have to answer the question both in the affirmative & in the negative.