Chap.XIV.]
SUTRASTHA'NAM.
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born in its origin, and hence an intelligent person should carefully preserve his bodily Rasa (lymph chyle) by adopting a proper regimen of diet and conduct.
The term Rasa is derived from the root "Ras", to go, and the substance is so called from the fact of its continually flowing through and permeating every vital principle of an animated organism.
The Rasa is successively transformed into each of the six remaining fundamental principles of the body, and continues in the shape of each for the period of three thousand and fifteen kalas five days according to our modern computation . Thus the Rasa is converted into semen, or into the menstrual blood (ovum) in women, in the course of a month.*[1]
- ↑ * The successive development of the fundamental or root principles of the body follows a distinct order. The essence of the assimilated food-matter under the heat of digestion goes towards the formation of chyle, and is ultimately transformed into it, its excreted and effete residue being passed out of the organism in the shape of stool, etc. The chyle thus produced is called the immature Rasa, or the Rasa in its nascent stage. Subsequently it enters into the bodily principle of Rasa, becomes matured by the native heat of the latter, and is resolved into three factors, or in other words, its excreted matter is transformed into phlegm, its thick or condensed portion is transformed into and assimilated in the matured Rasa of the body, whereas its subtile essence is metamorphosed into blood. The blood, thus newly generated, is merged into the fundamental organic principle of blood; and there by the heat of the latter it is again resolved into three factors, viz., its excreted portion is transformed into bile, its thick or condensed portion is transformed or assimilated into the fundamental organic principle of blood, and its subtile essence is metamorphosed into flesh. The flesh, thus newly formed, is merged into the fundamental organic principle of flesh, and there, by the native heat of the latter, it is resolved into three
