mind, or which is its motive—just as an artist has a particular pattern present in his
mind before he paints a picture with ink on a canvas. The ink can take any shape. He
can paint a cow, or a horse, or a human being with the same ink. The substance is the
same. Three colours are given to a painter, and the painter can paint anything. Any
shape can be taken by the same substance. Likewise, the painter is only prakriti who
painted these pictures of varieties out of a basic substance which is common to all
forms, and the mind is not to be deluded into the belief that this variety is really
there. There are only three inks—sattva, rajas and tamas—out of which all this
wonderful painting has been presented before the senses. The master genius, who is
prakriti, is the artist.
Now we come to the point of practice of yoga, which is the intention in this sutra:
etena bhūtendriyeṣu dharma lakṣaṇa avasthā pariṇāmāḥ vyākhyātāḥ (III.13). Just as there
are the parinamas, or transformations, of the mind known as nirodha parinama,
samadhi parinama and ekagrata parinama, there are the dharma, laksana and
avastha parinamas of everything. In fact, dharma, laksana and avastha are only
other names for these three parinamas mentioned already—namely, nirodha,
samadhi and ekagrata.
Hence, we have to establish a connection between the mind and the object by means
of understanding these laksanas, avasthas, etc., which are the powers operating
behind the form. It was also said that these properties inhere in the substance,
prakriti, and because of the inherence of these properties which are dharmas, they
are called dharmi. What is dharma and what is dharmi? It is mentioned in the next
sutra: śānta udita avyapadeśya dharma anupātī dharmī (III.14). A dharmi is a substance
in which dharmas inhere, exist. How do they exist? They exist in three ways: as the
past, as the present and as the future. Santa, udita and avyapadesa, the three terms
used in this sutra, mean respectively, the past, the present and the future. A
particular character of an object that is cognisable or perceptible is the present
condition of that object; it is not the whole condition.
We are all present here as human beings with different personalities. We have a
body; we have a mind; we have our own individuality. Each individuality of each
person sitting here is a present condition assumed by the characters of a substance of
which we are made. It is not the entirety of our nature that is manifest here, because
we have a past, and we also have a future. The past has been submerged by the
preponderance of the forces that have become present, and similarly, the characters
that are going to be manifest in the future are also put down, for the time being, by
the force of the characters that are manifest in the present. There are potentialities,
latent powers, potencies present in each form—in you, in me, in everything—which
have the peculiarity in them of releasing only certain particular features at a
particular time, and pressing down, not allowing to manifest, other features which
are not required to manifest at that time. These features which are not manifest may
be either past or future. This is a very strange thing, and is also something very
terrible.
What the sutra intends to tell us is that it is stupid on the part of any person to
imagine that he is this personality which is manifest now at the present moment. He
or she, as appearing now at the present moment, is only one feature that is manifest
by the potentialities that are inside. There are so many potentialities which are yet to
be manifested in the future. We will become another person altogether after some