(by a modification of the well-known Darwinian law of atrophy by
non-usage) to diminish what we may call the "relative" density and
coherence of the outer shell (as a result of its less-used molecules);
while the diminution in the quantity of its actual constituents will he
"made up" (if tried by scales and weights) by the increased admission of
more ethereal particles.

What physical desires are to be abandoned and in what order? First and
foremost, he must give up alcohol in all forms; for while it supplies
no nourishment, nor any direct pleasure (beyond such sweetness or
fragrance as may be gained in the taste of wine, &c., to which alcohol,
in itself, is non-essential) to even the grossest elements of the
"physical" frame, it induces a violence of action, a rush so to speak,
of life, the stress of which can only be sustained by very dull, gross,
and dense elements, and which, by the operation of the well-known law of
Re-action (in commercial phrase, "supply and demand") tends to summon
them from the surrounding universe, and therefore directly counteracts
the object we have in view.

Next comes meat-eating, and for the very same reason, in a minor degree.
It increases the rapidity of life, the energy of action, the violence of
passions. It may be good for a hero who has to fight and die, but not
for a would-be sage who has to exist and....

Next in order come the sexual desires; for these, in addition to the
great diversion of energy (vital force) into other channels, in many
different ways, beyond the primary one (as, for instance, the waste of
energy in expectation, jealousy, &c.), are direct attractions to a
certain gross quality of the original matter of the Universe, simply
because the most pleasurable physical sensations are only possible at
that stage of density. Alongside with and extending beyond all these
and other gratifications of the senses (which include not only those
things usually known as "vicious," but all those which, though
ordinarily regarded as "innocent," have yet the disqualification of
ministering to the pleasures of the body--the most harmless to others
and the least "gross" being the criterion for those to be last abandoned
in each case)--must be carried on the moral purification.

Nor must it be imagined that "austerities" as commonly understood can,
in the majority of cases, avail much to hasten the "etherealizing"
process. That is the rock on which many of the Eastern esoteric