Hatha Yoga of the
Body
Chapter 6 The Life Fluid
In
our last chapter we gave you an idea of how the
food we eat is gradually transformed and resolved
into substances capable of being absorbed and
taken up by the blood, which carries the
nourishment to all parts of the system, where it
is used in building up, repairing and renewing the
several parts of the physical man. In this chapter
we will give you a brief description of how this
work of the blood is carried on.
The
nutritive portions of the digested food is taken
up by the circulation and becomes blood. The blood
flows through the arteries to every cell and
tissue of the body that it may perform its
constructive and recuperative work. It then
returns through the arteries, carrying with it the
broken down cells and other waste matter of the
system, that the waste may be expelled from the
system by the lungs and other organs performing
the "casting-out" work of the system. This flow of
the blood to and from the heart is called the
Circulation.
The
engine which drives this wonderful system of
physical machinery is, of course, the Heart. We
will not take up your time describing the heart,
but will instead tell you something of the work
performed by it.
Let
us begin at the point at which we left off in our
last chapter—the point at which the nourishment of
the food, taken up by the blood which assimilates
it, reaches the heart, which sends it out on its
errand of nourishing the body.
The
blood starts on its journey through the arteries,
which are a series of elastic canals, having
divisions and subdivisions, beginning with the
main canals which feed the smaller ones, which in
turn feed still smaller ones until the capillaries
are reached. The capillaries are very small blood
vessels measuring about one three-thousandth of an
inch in diameter. They resemble very fine hairs,
which resemblance gives them their name. The
capillaries penetrate the tissues in meshes of
network, bringing the blood in close contact with
all the parts. Their walls are very thin and the
nutritious ingredients of the blood exude through
their walls and are taken up by the tissues. The
capillaries not only exude the nourishment from
the blood, but they also take up the blood on its
return journey (as we will see presently) and
generally fetch and carry for the system,
including the absorption of the nourishment of the
food from the intestinal villi, as described in
our last chapter.
Well,
to get back to the arteries. They carry the rich,
red, pure blood from the heart, laden with
health-giving nutrition and life, distributing it
through large canal into smaller, from smaller
into still smaller, until finally the tiny
hair-like capillaries are reached and the tissues
take up the nourishment and use it for building
purposes, the wonderful little cells of the body
doing this work most intelligently. (We shall have
something to say regarding the work of these
cells, bye-and-bye.) The blood having given up a
supply of nourishment, begins its return journey
to heart, taking with it the waste products, dead
cells, broken-down tissue and other refuse of the
system. It starts with the capillaries, but this
return journey is not made through the arteries,
but by a switch-off arrangement. It is directed
into the smaller veinlets of the venous system (or
system of "veins"), from whence it passes to the
larger veins and on to the heart. Before it
reaches the arteries again, on a new trip,
however, something happens to it. It goes to the
crematory of the lungs, in order to have its waste
matter and impurities burnt up and cast off. In
another chapter we will tell you about this work
of the lungs.
Before
passing on, however, we must tell you that there
exists another fluid which circulates through the
system. This is called the Lymph, which closely
resembles the blood in composition. It contains
somec of the ingredients of the blood which have
exuded from the walls of the blood-vessels and
some of the waste products of the system, which,
after being cleansed and "made-over" by the
lymphatic system, re-enter the blood, and are
again used. The lymph circulate in thin vein-like
canals, so small that they cannot be readily seen
by the human eye, until they are injected with
quick silver. These canals empty into several of
the large veins, and the lymph then mingles with
the returning blood, on its way to the heart. The
"Chyle," after leaving the small intestine (see
last lesson) mingles with the lymph from the lower
parts of the body, and gets into the blood in this
way, while the other products of the digested food
pass through the portal vein and the liver on
their journey—so that, although they take
different routes, they meet again in the
circulating blood.
So,
you will see the blood is the constituent of the
body which, directly or indirectly, furnishes
nourishment and life to all the parts of the body.
If the blood is poor, or the circulation weak,
nutrition of some parts of the body must be
impaired, and diseased conditions will result. The
blood supplies about one-tenth of man's weight. Of
this amount about one-quarter is distributed in
the heart, lungs, large arteries and veins about
one-quarter in the liver; about one-quarter in the
muscles, the remaining quarter being distributed
among the remaining organs and tissues. The brain
utilizes about one-fifth of the entire quantity of
blood.
Remember,
always, in thinking about the blood, that the
blood is what you make it by the food you eat, and
the way you eat it. You can have the very best
kind of blood, and plenty of it, by selecting the
proper foods, and by eating such food as Nature
intended you to do. Or, on the other hand, you may
have very poor blood, and an insufficient quantity
of it, by foolish gratification of the abnormal
Appetite, and by improper eating (not worthy of
the name) of any kind of food. The blood is the
life-and you make the blood—that is the matter in
a nut-shell.
Now,
let us pass on to the crematory of the lungs, and
see what is going to happen to that blue, impure
venous blood, which has come back from all parts
of the body, laden with impurities and waste
matter. Let us have a look at the crematory.
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