40 The Law of the Rhythmic Breath 



is not only misleading but unnecessarily confusing; 

 and in great part the ultimate analyses reached by 

 all these quibblings are distinctions without a dif- 

 ference, a splitting of hairs as it were; for a breath 

 without Prdna is unthinkable, since it pervades all 

 space, and has within it the force that moves the 

 Universe and holds the planets in their spheres. 

 Wanting Prdna we should not breath at all, and 

 its withdrawal brings physical life to its close. 



Prdna is the terrestrial manifestation of solar 

 energy, and its perpetual cycling motion from 

 within outward and back again, supplies the lever 

 that controls the automatic contraction and expan- 

 sion of the lungs. It is, moreover, the vehicle 

 and stimulator of that thinking principle within 

 us which superintends all the automatic functions 

 of internal organs. The importance of never for- 

 getting the imperative need that the positive and 

 negative currents of Prdna be equally balanced 

 should now be clear to all students. 



The control of this all-pervading energy, the 

 vital or creative force in every atom is called 

 Prdndydma; and it is in the Held-breath exercise 

 that we generate the will-power to gain this mas- 

 tery. The philosophy of this is that the force of 

 the vibrations thus concentrated upon given cen- 

 ters, or nerve-plexuses, strikes with such an impact 

 upon the myriad of molecules and atoms as to im- 

 part a sympathetic, rhythmical, direction and mo- 



