“A very important role in the human machine is played by a certain kind of accumulator. There are two small ACCUMULATORS near each center filled with the particular substance necessary for the work of the given center. Fragments: Eleven

“In addition, there is in the organism a large accumulator which feeds the small ones. The small ACCUMULATORS are connected together, and further, each of them is connected with the center next to which it stands, as well as with the large accumulator.” Fragments: Eleven

G. drew a general diagram of the “human machine” and pointed out the positions of the large and small ACCUMULATORS and the connections between them. Fragments: Eleven

“In the first instance the intellectual center, and in the second the moving center, draw the energy necessary for their work from the small ACCUMULATORS. When an accumulator is nearly empty a man feels tired. He would like to stop, to sit down if he is walking, to think of something else if he is solving a difficult problem. But quite unexpectedly he feels an inflow of strength, and he is once more able to walk or to work. This means that the center has become connected with the second accumulator and is taking energy from it. Meanwhile the first accumulator is refilling with energy from the large accumulator. The work of the center goes on. The man continues to walk or to work. Sometimes a short rest is required to insure this connection. Sometimes a shock, sometimes an effort. Anyway, the work goes on. After a certain time the store of energy in the second accumulator also becomes exhausted. The man again feels tired. Fragments: Eleven

“Having become reconnected with the first accumulator the center begins to draw energy from it, while the second accumulator becomes connected with and draws energy from the large accumulator. But this time the first accumulator was only half full. The center quickly exhausts its energy, and in the meantime the second accumulator has succeeded in getting only a quarter full. The center becomes connected with it, swiftly exhausts all its energy, and connects once more with the first accumulator, and so on. After a certain time the organism is brought to such a state that neither of the small ACCUMULATORS has a drop of energy left. This time the man feels really tired. He almost falls down, he almost drops asleep, or else his organism becomes affected, he starts a headache, palpitations begin, or he feels sick. Fragments: Eleven

“Small ACCUMULATORS suffice for the ordinary, everyday work of life. But for work on oneself, for inner growth, and for the efforts which are required of a man who enters the way, the energy from these small ACCUMULATORS is not enough. Fragments: Eleven

“This however is possible only with the help of the emotional center. It is essential that this be understood. The connection with the large accumulator can be effected only through the emotional center. The instinctive, moving, and intellectual centers, by themselves, can feed only on the small ACCUMULATORS. Fragments: Eleven

In addition to what he had said about ACCUMULATORS G. made some very interesting remarks about yawning and about laughter. Fragments: Eleven

“There are two incomprehensible functions of our organism inexplicable from the scientific point of view,” he said, “although naturally science does not admit them to be inexplicable; these are yawning and laughter. Neither the one nor the other can be rightly understood and explained without knowing about ACCUMULATORS and their role in the organism. Fragments: Eleven

“You have noticed that you yawn when you are tired. This is especially noticeable, for instance, in the mountains, when a man who is unaccustomed to them yawns almost continually while he is ascending a mountain. Yawning is the pumping of energy into the small ACCUMULATORS. When they empty too quickly, that is, when one of them has no time to fill up while the other is being emptied, yawning becomes almost continuous. There are certain diseased conditions which can cause stoppage of the heart when a man wishes but is not able to yawn, and other conditions are known when something goes wrong with the pump, causing it to work without effect, when a man yawns the whole time, but does not pump in any energy. Fragments: Eleven

“Laughter is also directly connected with ACCUMULATORS. But laughter is the opposite function to yawning. It is not pumping in, but pumping out, that is, the pumping out and the discarding of superfluous energy collected in the ACCUMULATORS. Laughter does not exist in all centers, but only in centers divided into two halves — positive and negative. If I have not yet spoken of this in detail, I shall do so when we come to a more detailed study of the centers. At present we shall take only the intellectual center. There can be impressions which fall at once on two halves of the center and produce at once a sharp ‘yes’ and ‘no.’ Such a simultaneous ‘yes’ and ‘no’ produces a kind of convulsion in the center and, being unable to harmonize and digest these two opposite impressions of one fact, the center begins to throw out in the form of laughter the energy which flows into it from the accumulator whose turn it is to supply it. In another instance it happens that in the accumulator there has collected too much energy which the center cannot manage to use up. Then every, the most ordinary, impression can be received as double, that is, it may fall at once on the two halves of the center and produce laughter, that is, the discarding of energy. Fragments: Eleven