GENTLY WITH PSYCHO-ANALYSIS.—I am doubtful whether we have sufficiently developed the ideas of psycho-analysis to make a fruitful parallel possible between them and the ideas contained in Patanjali. Psycho-analysis, as the name indicates, is more concerned with analysis than with synthesis, and “Yoga,” whose dominant idea is re-union or synthesis, appears to be rather a complement than an analogue of psycho-analysis in the broad sense. Take, for example, the idea of Yoga as a means to the re-union of the individual with the world-soul: “Thou art That; Thou shalt become That.” According to Jung, this attempt at re-union may be nothing more than a megalomaniac regressive introversion, representing on a grand scale a return to the mother and infantilism. Since it is separation from the mother (actual and metaphorical), that, in Jung’s view, creates the basis of consciousness, any attempt to become re-united with the “mother” is an act of regression. It is obvious from this dissonance of doctrine that Yoga and psycho-analysis have not as yet discovered any profound common ground; in fact, in some respects they appear to be opposed. I count myself among the increasing number of enthusiastic students of psycho-analysis. It is the hopeful science of the dawning era. No new era appears to me to be possible without it, and such a work as Dr. Ernest Jones’s _Psycho-Analysis_ is one of the books most worth buying at the present time. But it is elsewhere that I find the best justification for my enthusiasm, in these words from an old Hermetic text: “The beginning of perfection is gnosis of man; but gnosis of God is perfected perfection.” Psycho-analysis thus appears to be the beginning of the gnosis of man, and, in this sense, the beginning of perfection. But it is only the beginning. Mere morality, however psychological, is no substitute for religion; and the most profoundly and sincerely moral of men—Ibsen, for example—end in a state of despair unless at the point at which their morality gives out, religion of some kind comes to their aid. Psycho-analysis, I think it will be found, is doomed, while it remains analysis, to end in the same state of despair. It will teach us all there is to be known about the nature of man; but the gnosis of man is not satisfying. For it is only thereafter and when man is transcended as an object of gnosis that perfected perfection is possible. I would not, however, hasten by a single impatient step this second and completing phase of the process of our learning. The gnosis of man is necessary to the gnosis of God, and God can well look after Himself and bide our time. Furthermore, a premature attempt to know God before we are initiated into the mysteries of the gnosis of man must be heavily paid for. Religion without humanity is more dangerous than humanity without religion. Let us then settle down with concentrated attention to the problem before us, the material and method of which are to be found in psycho-analysis.