XXXIII. RESOLUTION OF DUALITY INTO UNITY…

XXXIII. RESOLUTION OF DUALITY INTO UNITY

Argument.--Unity, the source, substance, and ultimum of plurality, which is resolved to unity. The Doctrine of monotheism. One in all and all into one.

Vasishtha said:--Tell me, my lord, that bearest the crescent of the moon on thy fore-head, how the pure and simple essence of the intellect, which is an infinite unity and ever uniform and immutable in its nature, is transmuted to the finite dualities of the variable and impure soul and mind. (Moreover the whole equal to a part is quite absurd and impossible).

2. Tell me, O great god! how this uncaused prime cause, becomes diffused in endless Varieties, and how can we get rid of the plurality of our creeds by our wisdom, for putting an end to our miseries. (By means of our belief in the true unity).

3. The god replied--When the omnipotent God (sad), remains as one unity of immensity (Eka Brahma); it is then of course absurd, to speak of his duality or plurality, and of the manifestation of a part or minim of himself. (The whole cannot be a part).

4. Taking the monad for a duad, is to ascribe duality to unity; and the imputation of dualism or bipartition to the simple intellect, is wholly futile from its nature of indivisibility. (So says the sruti: The one is no dual nor a bipartite thing. In Him there is no plurality, diversity or any particularity whatever. [Sanskrit: natu taddvitíyamasti tati-nya hvibhaktam | nanuneha nánástikincana.])

5. The want of the number one, causes the absence both of unity, duality; because there can be no dual without the singular, nor a single one unless there be the number two above it. (i.e. There can be no duality without the prime and preceding unity; nor even the unity unless it is followed by duality; because the prime number would be indefinite and indetermined without the succeeding ones).

6. The cause and its effect being of one nature (or essence), they are both of the same kind, as the fruit and the seed contained in it. The difference which is attributed to them from the change of one thing to the other, is a mere fiction of imagination.

7. The mind itself evolves in its thoughts at its own will; the changes occurring in itself, are no way different from its own nature; as the mutual productions of seed and fruit, are of the same nature, the same fruit produces the same seeds, and these again bring forth the same fruits &c. (So the mind and its thoughts, are the same things and of the self-same nature).

8. Many modifications incessantly rise in the infinite mind of the almighty Maker as its eternal will, and these taking place in actu in positive existences, and substantive forms bear the relation of causes and their effects in this world.

9. These productions are likened to the waves of waters in the sea, and mirage to the progeny of a barren woman, and the horns of a hare--all which are nil and not in being. They are all as negative as the water on the mountaintop, and as the barley corn growing on the head of a hare. (In all these instances the producer or container is a reality; but the produced or contained waves etc. are false; and so is Brahma the producer and container of all as positive entity, but the production of the world is null and void).

10. Herein enquiring into the real truth, we must refrain from logomachy; and find that though all things tend to stablish the unity, yet it is difficult even in thought to do away with the difference of things, as that of words and their senses. (that is to say, though unity is the result of right reason, yet duality is inseparable from common sense).

11. The essence of divine omnipotence, is not divisible into portions or their fractions, like the waves of the sea, that are broken into bubbles and particles of waters.

12. As the leaves and stalks and branches and flowers of trees, are no other than the same substance; so unity and duality, meity and tuity and the objectivity of the phenomenal world, are not different from the essence of the subjective intellect, which contains and puts forth itself in all these forms.

13. All time and place and variety of figures and forms, being but modifications of the intellect, it is improper for us to question the reality of those, and assert the certainty of this intellect.

14. The entities of time and space, and the powers of action and destiny (divine ordinance), are all derived from and directed by the intellect and bear their intellectual natures also.

15. As the power of thinking, the thought and its object, jointly compose the principle of mind; so the whole universe and every thing that bears a name, are all included under the term chit or intellect; as the water and its rise and fall, are all included under the word wave.

16. The thoughts which continually rise and fall, in the great ocean of the intellect; are like the waves which heave and set down, on the surface of the boisterous sea.

17. It is this supreme intellect which is known by the various appellations of the Lord, God, Truth, Siva and others; as also by the various names of vacuum, unity and the supreme spirit.

18. Such is the nature of God, whom no words can express; and who is styled the Ego or the subjective "I am that I am" and whom it is beyond the power of speech to describe.

19. All that is seen all around, are but the leaves, fruits, flowers and branches of the all creeping plant of the intellect; which being diffused in all, leaves nothing that is different from it.

20. The divine intellect [Sanskrit: chit] being omniscient [Sanskrit: mahávidyá] has the great nescience or ignorance [Sanskrit: mahá avidyá] underlying it (as the lighted lamp is accompanied by the shadow under it); and then looking at this side of itself it takes the name of the living soul, and beholds this shadowy world stretched outside the divine mind, as we see another moon in the reflexion of that luminary, cast upon a nebular circle beyond it.

21. Then thinking itself as another or a living being Jíva, and other wise than what it is (i.e. the immortal spirit paramátma); it becomes just of the same nature, as it thinks and forms itself by its own will.

22. Being thus transformed from its perfect and immaculate state, to that of an imperfect and impure nature; it is made to wade amidst the stream of this world, without ever thinking (of its fall from the state of original purity).

23. The intellectual form being then assimilated with the elemental (puryashtaka) body, receives its vital or mortal life and living soul, which lives by reflexion of the essence of the supreme intellect.

24. The spiritual body is also transformed to the frail living body, which being joined with quintessence of quintuple elements, comes to know itself as material substance (dravymas miti).

25. This substance being next infused with the vital breath, receives soon after its vigor and strength like the seed of a plant; and then it feels itself to be endued with life, and to be conceived in the uterus in its own conception.

26. The same erroneous conception of its gross materiality, misleads to the belief of its own egoism and personality. It conceives also its state of a moving or unmoving being, and this conception of it converts it instantly into the like form. (We have the forms, as we picture to ourselves in our minds).

27. Again the simultaneous meeting of former reminiscence with the later desire of a person, changes its former habitual and meaner form, to that of a larger and grosser kind. (Thus one that had been a contemptible gnat in its previous state of existence, is come to a big elephant in its next birth, not from its remembrance of its former state of life, but from its settled desire of becoming the would be being in the next. So it is the will [Sanskrit: vásaná] that supersedes the former impression [Sanskrit: samskára] of what one had been before, and transforms it to what it wishes to be afterwards. Hence the will is the parent of thoughts).

28. The difference and duality of one from its identity and unity, are results of one's thinking himself other wise than what he really is; as a man becomes a devil by thinking himself possessed by a ghost.

29. The thought of the duality of one self-same soul, in its two aspects of the supreme and human souls; is driven away by the persuasion that I do nothing, and the agency of all actions rests in the great God himself.

30. The unity is considered as a duality, by the dualistic opinions of men; while on the other hand the belief in unity, destroys the conviction of dualism and plurality from the minds of men.

31. There is no duality or secondary being in the soul, which may be regarded as the supreme soul, because there is but one soul only, which is unchangeable and unperishable at all times and every where. (All other changing and finite beings, are but reflexions of the supreme).

32. All works of imagination are dispersed, with the dispersion of the fumes of fancy; as one's aerial castle and the fairy city, vanish after the flight of the phrenzy and the visionary dream.

33. It is painful to raise a fabric of imagination, but there is no pain whatever in breaking it down; because the chimera of imagination is well skilled in building the aerial cities, and not in demolishing them. (Which belongs to the province of reason only).

34. If the fullness of one's desires and fancies, is fraught with the pains and troubles of life, it must be the want of such wishes and views, that will serve to set him free from these pains for ever.

35. If even a slight desire is enough to expose a man to many cares in life, then its utter privation must afford him complete rest and quiet, in his transient state of being.

36. When your mind has got loose, from the manifold folds of your serpentine desires; you will then come to enjoy the sweets of the garden of paradise. (Had it not been for the serpent's insinuation to taste the fatal fruit, our first parents would be left to enjoy all the sweets of Paradise).

37. Drive away and disperse the clouds of your desire, by the breeze of your reason; and come and enjoy your rest, under the calm and clear autumnal sky of your indifference--nonchalance.

38. Dry the impetuous current of your rapid desires, by the charms of amulets and mantras; and then restrain yourself from being borne away by the flood, and restrict your mind to its dead inaction.

39. Rely thy trust in the intellectual soul chidátmá, seated in the cavity of thy heart, and look on mankind driven to and fro by the gusts of their desire, like fragments of straw flying at random in the perturbed air.

40. Wash out the dirt of thy desires from thy mind, by the pure water of thy spiritual knowledge; and after securing the perfect tranquillity of thy soul, continue to enjoy the highest bliss of a holy life.

41. God is all powerful and omnipresent, and displays himself in all forms every where (He is seen in the same manner as one desires to behold him in a temporal or spiritual light. [Sanskrit: vrashma káranena bhogmakáranena bá yathá bhávayate tatha pashyati]).

42. It is the thought or imagination, that makes the false world appear as true; and it depends upon the thought also, that the world vanishes into nothing. (The existence and inexistence of the world; depend alike on the thoughts of divine and human minds; the positive and negative are all creations of the mind).

43. It is the net work of our thoughts and desires, that is interwoven with the threads of our repeated births; but the winds of our apathy and indifference blow off this web, and settle us in the state of supreme felicity.

44. Avarice is a thorny plant, that has taken deep root in the human heart; it is fostered under the shade of the arbor of desire, root out this tree of desire, and the thorny bush of avarice will fade away of itself.

45. The world is a shadow and a pseudoscope, and rises to view and disappears by turns; it is an error of the brain that presents the sight of the course of nature (sansriti), like that of the fairy land presented to us in a dream.

46. The king that forgets his nature of the Lord, mistakes himself for a prince, or that he is born or become the ruler of the land; this concept of his which springs from ignorance of his divine nature, vanishes soon after he comes to the real knowledge of himself.

47. The king in possession of his present royalty, has no reminiscence of his past and former state; as we do not recollect the foulness of the past rainy weather, in the serenity of the present autumn.

48. The thought that is predominant in the mind, naturally prevails over the fainter and weaker ones, as the highest pitch in music suppresses the bass tones, and takes possession of the ear.

49. Think in yourself that you are one (unit or the unity), and that you are the soul (or supreme soul); keep this single reflection before you, and holding fast to it, you will become the object of your meditation. (This is called [Sanskrit: átmapújá] spiritual adoration, or assimilating one's self to the supreme soul).

50. Such is the spiritual meditation of spiritualists like yourself, who aspire to the highest felicity of the supreme Being; while the external form of worship, is fit only for ungoverned minds, that rapt only for their temporal welfare. In formal worship composed of the worshipper, the formalities of the ritual and the articles of offerings, are symbolical of ignorant minds, and too insignificant to the wise.

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XXXIV. SERMON OF SIVA ON THE SAME SUBJECT

Argument.--The divine state, above the quadruple conditions of waking, sleeping, dreaming and profound sleep.

The god continued:--Such is the constitution of this world, composed of reality and unreality, and bearing the stamp of the almighty; it is composed both of unity and duality, and yet it is free from both. (To the ignorant it appears as a duality, composed of the mind and matter; but the wise take it neither as the one or the other, but the whole to pan--the root of pantheism).

2. It is the disfigurement of the intellect by foul ignorance, that views the outer world as distinct from its maker; but to the clear sighted there is no separate outer world, but both blend together in the unity.

3. The perverted intellect which considers itself as the body, is verily confined in it; but when it considers itself to be a particle of and identic with the divine, it is liberated from its confinement. (In the mortal and material frame).

4. The intellect loses its entity, by considering the duality of its form and sense; and be combined with pleasure and pain, it retains no longer its real essence.

5. Its true nature is free from all designation, and application of any significant term or its sense to it; and the words pure, undivided, real or unreal, bear no relation to what is an all pervasive vacuity.

6. Brahma the all and full (to pans plenum), who is perfect tranquillity, and without a second, equal or comparison, expands himself by his own power as the infinite and empty air; and stretches his mind in three different directions of the three triplicates. (Namely 1 of creation, preservation and destruction of the universe--2 the three states of waking, sleeping, and dreaming--3 the union of the three powers--the supernal, natural and material agencies. [Sanskrit: srishti, sthiti, pralaya, jágrat, nidra, sapta | ádhidaiva, ádhibhautika, ádhibhauvikanca].)

7. The mind being curbed with all its senses and organs in the great soul, there appears a dazzling light before it, and the false world flies away from it, as the shade of night disappears before the sunlight. (This verse is explained in the gloss to refer both to the supreme spirit before creation, as also to the yogi who distracts his mind and senses from the outer world, and sees a blazing light stretched over his soul).

8. The imaginary world recedes from view, and falls down like a withered leaf; and the living soul remains like a fried grain, without its power of vegetation or reproduction.

9. The intellect being cleared from the cloud of illusion, overhanging the deluded mind, shines as clearly as the vault of the autumnal sky; and is then called pashyanti or seeing from its sight of the supernatural, and utsrijanti also from its renunciation of all worldly impressions. (This is called also the cognoscent soul, from its cognition of recondite and mysterious truths).

10. The Intellect being settled in its original, pure and sedate state, after it has passed under the commotions of worldly thoughts; and when it views all things in an equal and indifferent light, it is said to have crossed over the ocean of the world. (The course of worldly life is compared to a perilous sea voyage, and perfect apathy and indifference to the world, is said to secure the salvation of the soul).

11. When the intellect is strong in its knowledge of perfect susupti or somnolence over worldly matters; it is said to have obtained its rest in the state of supreme felicity, and to be freed from the doom of transmigration in future births. (The perfect rest of the next world, is begun with one's ecstasis in this).

12. I have now told you, O great Vipra, all about the curbing and weakening of the mind, which is the first step towards the beatification of the soul by yoga; now attend to me to tell you, concerning the second step of the edification and strengthening of the intellect.

13. That is called the unrestricted power of the intellect, which is fraught with perfect peace and tranquillity; which is full of light, clear of the darkness of ignorance, and as wide stretched as the clear vault of heaven.

14. It is as deep as our consciousness in profound sleep, as hidden as a mark in the heart of a stone; as sweet as the flavour in salt, and as the breath of wind after a storm. (All these examples show the strength of the soul, to consist in its close compactness).

15. When the living principle comes to its end at any place, in course of time; the intellect takes it flight like some invisible force in open air, and mixes with the transcendent vacuum.

16. It gets freed from all its thoughts and thinkables, as when the calm sea is freed from its fluctuation; it becomes as sedate as when the winds are still, and as imperceptible as when the flower-cup emits its fragrance.

17. It is liberated from the bonds and ideas of time and place (by its assimilation to infinity and immortality); it is freed from the thought of its appertaining to or being a part of anything in the world; it is neither a gross or subtile substance, and becomes a nameless essence. (The intellect or soul bears distinctive mark or peculiarity of its own, except that it is some thing which has nothing in common with anything in the world).

18. It is not limited by time and space, and is of the nature of the unlimited essence of God; it is a form and fragment of the quadruple state of Brahma or Virát [Sanskrit: túryya túryyamása], and is without any stain, disease or decay.

19. It is some thing witnessing all things with its far seeing sight, it is the all at all times and places, it is full light in itself, and sweeter far than the sweetest thing in the world. (Nothing sweeter than one's self).

20. This is what I told you the second stage of yoga meditation, attend now, O sage! that art true to your vows, and dost well understand the process of yoga, to what I will relate to you regarding its third stage.

21. This sight of intellect is without a name, because it contains like the Divine Intellect all the thinkables (or objects of thought) within its ample sphere, as the great ocean of the world, grasps all parts of the globe within its spacious circumference. It extends beyond the meaning of the word Brahmátma or the ample spirit of the god Brahmá in its extension ad infinitum. (It resembles the comprehensive mind of God).

22. It is by great enduring patience, that the soul attains in course of a long time, this steady and unsullied state of its perfection purushártha; and it is after passing this and the fourth stage, that the soul reaches to its supreme and ultimate state of felicity.

23. After passing the successive grades and until reaching the ultimate state, one must practice his yoga in the manner of Siva the greatest of the yogis; and then he will obtain in himself the unremitting holy composure of the third stage.

24. By long continuance in this course, the pilgrim is led to a great distance, which transcends all my description, but may be felt by the holy devotee who advances in his course.

25. I have told you already of the state, which is beyond these three stages; and do you, O divine sage! ever remain in that state, if you wish to arrive to the state of the eternal God.

26. This world which seems as material, will appear to be infused with the spirit of God when it is viewed in its spiritual light, but upon right observation of it, it is neither the one nor the other (but a reflexion of divine mind).

27. This what neither springs into being nor ceases to exist; but is ever calm and quiet and of one uniform lustre, and swells and extends as the embryo in the womb. (The embryo is to be understood in a spiritual sense from God's conception of the world in his mind).

28. The undualistic unity of God, his motionlessness and the solidity of his intelligence, together with the unchangeableness of his nature, prove the eternity of the world, although appearing as instantaneous and evanescent. (The solid intelligence is shown in the instances of solidified water in ice and snow, and in the froth and salt of sea water).

29. The solidity of the intellect produces the worlds in the same manner as the congealed water causes the hail-stones, and there is no difference between the existent and nonexistent, since all things are ever existent in the divine mind. (Though appearing now and then to me or you as something new).

30. All is good (siva or solus) and quiet, and perfect beyond the power of description; the syllable om is the symbol of the whole, and its components compose the four stages for our salvation. (All is good. And God pronounced all was good. See the quadruple stages comprised in the letter om, in our introduction to the first volume of this work).

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XXXV. ADORATION OF THE GREAT GOD MAHÁ-DEVA

Argument.--Of Mahádeva, the father of Brahmá, Vishnu and Siva and the manner of his worship.

Vasishtha said:--Then Hara, who is the lake of the lotus of Gaurí (i.e. her husband), being desirous of my enlightenment, glanced on me for a minute, and gave utterance to his lecture.

2. His eyes flashed with light under his heavenly forehead, and were as two caskets of his understanding, which scattered its rays about us. (The eyes are the indexes of men's understanding in Physiognomy).

3. The god said:--O sage, call your thoughts home, and employ them soon to think of your own essence; and to bring about your ends, as the breezes of heaven convey the fragrance to the nostrils. (The mind is usually compared in its fleetness with the winds, and therefore the task of the breezes is imposed upon the thoughts, which are as vagaries unless they answer one's purposes).

4. When the object long sought for is got in one's possession, what else is there for one to desire any more. I who have known and come to the truth, have nothing to expect as desirable nor any thing to reject as despicable. (When one is possest of his sole object, he is indifferent about all others, whether they be good or bad).

5. When you have got your mastery over yourself, both in the states of your peace and disquiet; you should apply yourself to the investigation of yourself or soul, without attending to any thing besides. (Nothing better than self-culture, and the advancement and salvation of one's own soul).

6. You may at first depend on your observations of the phenomenal, (as preparatory to your knowledge of the noumenal), which you will now learn from my lecture, if you will attend to it with diligence.

7. After saying in this manner, the holder of the trident told me, not to rely on my knowledge of the externals, but to attend to the internal breathings, which move this abode of the body, as the physical forces move a machine.

8. The lifeless body being without its breathing, becomes dull and dull and dumb as a block; its power of movement being derived from the air of breath, but its powers of thought and knowledge are attributed to the intellect.

9. This intellect has a form more rare and transparent than the vacuous air, it is an ens which is the cause of all entities; and is not destroyed by destruction of the living body for want of vital breath.

10. The intellectual is more rarefied and translucent than the ethereal air, and never perishes with the body; because it remains as the power of intellection, in the mental (percipient) and living body. (The sruti says: it is the life of life, and mind of the mind).

11. As the clear shining mirror, receives the reflexion of external things; so the mind of God reflects all images from within itself, and from nothing situated without.

12. As the soiled glass receives no reflexion of outward things, so the lifeless body has no reflexion of any thing, though it is preserved to our view. (And so are all thoughtless persons considered as dead bodies).

13. The all-pervasive intellect, though it is formless itself, is yet prone towards the movement of sensible objects owing to its sensuous perceptions; but coming to the pure understanding of its spiritual nature, it becomes the supreme Siva again.

14. The sages then called this immaculate intellect by the several names of Hari, Siva, Brahmá, and Indra, who are the givers of the objects of desire to all living beings.

15. It is also styled the fire and air, the sun and moon, and the supreme Lord; and it is this which is known as the ubiquious soul and the intellect, which is the mine of all intelligence.

16. It is the lord of gods, the source of celestials, the Dháta or Brahmá, the lord of gods, and the lord of heaven. Any body who feels the influence of this great intellect in himself, is never subject to illusion.

17. Those great souls that are known in this world, under the names of Brahmá, Vishnu, Hara and others, are all but offspring of the supreme Intellect, and endowed with a greater portion of it.

18. They are all as sparks of hot iron, and as particles of water in the immense ocean of creation; so all those that are mistaken for gods, have sprung from the source of the supreme Intellect.

19. As long as there exist the seeds of error, and the sources of endless networks of imagination; so long the arbour of gross illusion does not cease, to sprout in endless ramifications.

20. The veda, its exposition and the vedic literature, are but tufts of the tree of ignorance for the bondage of men; and these again produce many other clumps, to hold men fast in their ignorance.

21. Who can describe the productions of nature, in the course of time and place; the gods Hari, Hara, and Brahmá are among the number, and have all their origin in the supreme Being--their common father. (So says the Atharva Sera Sruti: [Sanskrit: sarvvamidram brahmávishnurudrendráste sampamúyate sarvvani cíndráyánisahamúteh sakáranam káranánáma.])

22. Mahádeva the great god is the root of all, as the seed is the source of the branches of trees; He is called the All (sarva), because He is the essence of all things, and the sole cause of our knowledge of all existence. (The Purána says to the same effect). [Sanskrit: trayaste káranátmánah játáh máhámaheshvarát | tapasá topathitvá tam pitaram parameshvaram |]

23. He is the giver of strength to all beings, he is self manifest in all, and is adorable and hallowed by all. He is the object of perception to them that know him, and is ever present in all places. (The word Mahádeva commonly applied to Siva, originally meant the great god, as in the definition of the term in the gloss. [Sanskrit: mahatyaparicchinne átmajnána yogaishvartye mahíyate pújyate iti mahádevah] So the sruti also: [Sanskrit: yo átmajnána yogaishvaryye mahati mahívate tasmáducyate mahádevah].)

24. There is no need of addressing invocatory mantras unto the Lord, who being omniscient and omnipresent, knows and sees all things as present before him at all places and times.

25. But being always invoked (or prayed unto) in the mind, this god who resides in every thing is attainable by us in every place; and in whatever form doth one's intellect appear to him, it is all for his good. (This passage means the visible form in which the deity makes his manifestation to the devotee).

26. He takes upon him the visible form, according to the thought in the mind of the worshipper, and this form is to be worshipped first of all with proper homage, as the most adorable Lord of gods.

27. Know this as the ultimate of the knowables of the greatest minds; and whoso has beheld this self-same soul, is freed from fears and sorrows and the complaints of old age, and is released from future transmigration, like a fried grain which vegetates no more.

28. By worshipping this well known and unborn first cause in one's self and at ease (i.e. without the formal rite); every one is freed from his fears, and attains his supreme felicity, why then do you bewilder yourselves amidst the visible vanities of the world.

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XXXVI. DESCRIPTION OF THE SUPREME DEITY PARAMESWARA

Argument.--Description of god as the Producer of all, and present in every form; his purity from his intangibleness and his great grandeur.

The god added:--Know now the lord god Rudra, who in the form of one self-same intellect, is situated within every form of being, as is of the nature of self-conscious (Swanubhiati) in every one.

2. He is the seed of seeds, and the pith and marrow of the course of nature; know it also as the agent of all actions, and the pure gist of the intellect also.

3. He is the pure cause of all causes, without any cause of himself; he is the producer and sustainer of all, without being produced or supported himself by another.

4. He is the sensation of all sensible beings, and the sense of all sensitive things; he is the sensibility of all sensuous objects, and the highest object of our sensuousness, and the source of endless varieties.

5. He is the pure light of all lights (of the sight, luminaries &c.), and yet invisible by all of them. He is the increate and supernatural light, the source of all sources of light and the great mass of the light of Intellect.

6. He is no positive (or material) existence, but the real (or essential) entity; he is all quiet and beyond the common acceptations of reality and unreality (Being no absolute or relative entity or non-entity). And among the positive ideas of the great entity &c. (mahásattwádi), know him as the Intellect alone and no other. (Many kinds of Entities are enumerated in Indian philosophy, such as:--[Sanskrit: matyena chávahárikena | satyena prátibha sikenábasthátva yena |] Again [Sanskrit: mahásatta, jagat satta, ádisattá karana vyáktatasattá |])

7. He becomes the colour, colouring and colouror; He becomes as high as the lofty sky, and as low as the lowly hut. (The colour--rága means the passion and feelings also; and the sky and hut mean the empty space and decorated cottage).

8. There are in the expanded mind of this Intellect millions of worlds like sands in the desert, likewise many of these like blossoms of trees, have blown away, others are full blown, and many more will come to blow here after.

9. It is ever burning, as an inextinguishable flame by its own inherent fire; and though it is ever emitting innumerable sparks of its essence all about, yet there is no end of its light and heat and fire.

10. It contains in its bowels the great mountains, likening the particles of dust (or rather as the roes of a fish); it covers also the highest mountains, as the lofty sky hides the dusts on earth. So the sruti--Greater than the greatest and smaller than the smallest. [Sanskrit: aníraníyan mahatimahiyát]

11. It comprehends the great--mahákalpa millennium, like a twinkling of the eye; and is also contained in a kalpa age, in its quick motion of a twinkling. (i.e. He is eternity as well as jot of time).

12. Though minuter than the point of a hair, yet it encompasses the whole earth (as its boundary line); and the seven oceans that encircle the earth with their vests, cannot gird the great Infinity.

13. He is called the great creator of the universe, though he creates nothing (Like the makers of other things); and though he does all actions, yet he remains as doing nothing (by his calm quietness).

14. Though the deity is included under the category of substance, yet he is no substance at all; and though there be no substantiality in him, yet his spirit is the substratum of all things. (All along he is the figure of vaiparitya or opposition, which well applies to Brahma who is all and nil or the omnium et nullum, Sarvamasarvam. (Though bodiless, he is the great body of the universe corpus mundi--viswarúpa or virát).)

15. He is adya--(hodie) today, and prátar--practer tomorrow, and though the preter and future, yet he is always present. Wherefore he is neither now or then, but sempiternal and for ever.

16. He is not in the babbling and prattling of babes and boys, nor in the bawling of beasts and brutes, nor in the jargon of savages; but equally understood by all in their peculiar modes of speech. (This is the interpretation of the gloss; but the words of the text are unintelligible and meaningless).

17. These words are meaningless and are yet true, like the obsolete words occurring in the vedas. Therefore no words can truly express what is God, because they are not what he is (but mere emblems). These difficult passages are not explained in the gloss and left out in the Calcutta edition.

18. I bow down to him who is all, in whom all reside and from whom they all proceed, and who is in all place and time, and who is diffused through all and called the one and all--to pan.

19. In this verbiology of obscure words, there will be found some fully expressive of the meaning, as in a forest of thick wood we happen to fragrant flowers, which we pluck and bear with us in handfuls. (The entangled phraseology of the stanza will bear no literal translation).

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XXXVII. THE STAGE PLAY AND DANCE OF DESTINY

Argument.--Of the endless powers or saktis of Siva, among whom the power of Destiny is described in this.

The God joined:--The beauty of the words said before is palpable, and their senses all allude to the truth, that the Lord of all is the rich chest of gems of all things in existence. (The gloss is too verbose in the explanation of this passage).

2. How very bright are the rays of the gems contained in the receptacle of the supreme Intellect, that shines forth with the collected light of all the luminous worlds in it. (It means to say, that the Divine intellect must be brighter far than all the orbs of light contained in it).

3. The essence of the intellect flies in the air in the form of the granular farina, and becomes the embryotic corpuscula; which in the manner of the vegetable seed, sprouts forth into the germ in its proper time, soil, moisture and temperature. (The gloss explains the essence satta to mean the energy--sakti, which is represented as the female attribute of the Divinity).

4. This power of the intellect, moves in the forms of froth and foam, and eddies and whirl pools in the sea; and rolls its waters against the hard stones of the beach. (The liquid waters are moving things that are hard to touch).

5. It is settled in the form of flavour in the clusters of flowers; it makes them full blown, and carries their fragrance to the nostrils.

6. Seated on bodies of stone (stony rocks), it makes them produce unstone-like substances (as the trees and their foliage and flowers of various hues); and makes the mountains to support the earth without their actually upholding it. (The mountains are called bhudharas or supports of the earth.)

7. The intellect takes the form of the air, which is the source of all vibrations, and touches the organ of touch (skin); with as much tenderness as a father touches the body of his child.

8. As the divine power extends itself in every thing, so it contracts the essences of all things in a mass within itself; and having absorbed the whole in the divine entity, makes all nature a vacuous nullity.

9. It casts the reflexion of its own clear image, in the transparent mirror of vacuum; and takes upon itself the pellucid body of eternity, containing all divisions of time.

10. Then there issues the power of Destiny, which predominates over the five principal divinities; and determines the ultimate fate of all that "this is to be so, and this other wise."

11. It is in the presence of the bright light of the all witnessing eye of the great God, that the picture of the universe presents itself to our sight; as the presence of the lighted lamp in the room, shows us the lights of the things contained in it.

12. The universal vacuum contains the great theatre of the universe, wherein the Divine powers and energies are continually playing their parts, and the spirit of God is the witness there of.

13. Vasishtha asked--What are the powers of that Siva (Jove), my lord! who are they and where are they situated; what is number, and how are they employed and who is their witness.

14. The god replied--The god Siva is the benignant, incomprehensible and tranquil supreme soul; He is gracious and formless and of the nature of the pure intellect only.

15. His essences are volition, vacuity, duration and destiny; and also the qualities of infinity and fulness.

16. Beside these he has the properties of intelligence and action, as also of causality and quietude; and there are many other powers in the spirit of Siva, of which there is no reckoning nor end.

17. Vasishtha rejoined--Whence came these powers to him, and how had they their variety and plurality; tell me, my lord! whence they arose, and how they were separated (from omnipotence which comprehends them all).

18. The god replied:--The god Siva who is intellect only of himself, has endless forms also (according to his endless attributes), and the powers that I have said to belong to him, are little and no way different essentiality. (The properties that are predicated of god, belong to his intrinsical nature and not derived from without).

19. It is the discrimination of the powers of intelligence, action, passion, vision and others; that the powers of God are said to be many and different from one another, like the waves of the sea (which appears in the different shapes of billows, surges &c.).

20. Thus do those different powers act their several parts for ever, in the grand stage of the universe; as the ages, years, months and weeks and days, play their parts under direction of time--the manager of the stage.

21. That power which appears as the one or another, is called the divine powers of destiny; and is distinguished by the several appellations of action, energy or will of God, or the dispensation of his Time. (Time is said to be the producer, sustainer and leveller of all things. [Sanskrit: kálí prabhavati dháryyte, pralíyate sarvvam tasmát kálí hi valavattarah]).

22. That power which determines the states of gods, and those of the great Rudras as so and so, and what regulates the conduct of all things from a mean straw to the great Brahmá, is called the predominant doom or destiny.

23. This destiny continues to dance about the great arena of the universe, until the mind is cleared of her bugbear and freed from anxiety by the knowledge of truth (that it is the Divine will which destines the destiny).

24. The play of destiny is very pleasing to behold, owing to the variety of its characters and contrivances, and the quick changes of the scenes, and the repeated entrances and exits of its players and actors. It is conducted all along with the music of the drums and trumpets of the roaring clouds of the Kalpánta-doomsday. (i.e. On the last day of universal dissolution, when the dance of destiny and her play are over).

25. The vault of heaven is the canopy over this stage, the season flowers are its decorations, and the showers of rain serve for the sprinkling of rose waters in it.

26. The dark clouds hung about the heavens are, the blue hanging screens around this stage, and the sexcentenary as of the earth with the shining gems in their bosom, serve for the ornamented pits and galleries of this playhouse.

27. The shining sky with its sight of the days and watches, and its eyes of the twinkling stars; is witnessing the continual rise and fall of all being, and the plunging and up heaving of mountaintops at the great deluge.

28. The revolving luminaries of the sun and moon, and the rolling currents of the Ganges, appear as the pearly jewels on the person of this actress, and the lustre of the twilight seems as the red red-dye of her palms.

29. The incessant motion of the upper and nether worlds, with the continued gingling of their peoples; resemble the footsteps of this dancing destiny, with the ringing trinkets and anklets fastened to her feet.

30. The sunshine and moonbeams, represent the lustre of her smiling face; and the twinkling stars in the sky, resemble the drops of sweat trickling on her face.

31. These very many worlds are supposed as so many apartments of this great theatre.

32. The two states of pleasure and pain or joy and grief, which are destined to the lot of all living beings, show the different shows of comic and tragic representations.

33. The changing scenes, that are always seen to take place in the play of destiny, at the great stage of this world; are continually witnessed by the great God himself, who is neither distant, or distinct from this, nor is this so from that.

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XXXVIII. ON THE EXTERNAL WORSHIP OF THE DEITY

Argument.--The External worship of God in his outward temple, with bodily acts and service. And also of Internal adoration in spirit or the Way to Liberation.

The god continued:--This god who is the supreme Lord, is the adorable one of the wise; in the form of the intellect and conscious soul, and as all pervading and support of all.

2. He is situated alike in the pot and painting, in the tree and hut, in the vehicle and in all men and brute animals; under the several names of Siva, Hara, and Hari, as also of Brahmá, Indra, Agni, and Yama.

3. He is in the inside and outside of all as the universal soul, and always dwells in spirit and in the soul of every wise person. This Lord is worshipped in various forms by different people in the many modes as described below.

4. Hear me first relate to you, O great sage! how this god is worshipped in the outward form and formulas; and you will next hear me relate unto you, the inward form in which he is worshipped in spirit.

5. In all forms of worship you must cease to think of your body, and separate your mind from your person, however purified it may be (By your ablution and the like). You must then apply your mind diligently to think of the pure and bodiless soul, which witnesseth the operations of the body from its inside.

6. His worship consists in his inward meditation only, and in no other mode of outward worshipping, therefore apply your mind in the adoration of the universal soul, in its meditation in your soul only.

7. He is of the form of the intellect, the source of all light and glorious as millions of suns; He is the light of the inward intellect, and the receptacle (origin) of egoism and tuism. (i.e. of the subjective and objective).

8. His head and shoulders reach above the heaven of heavens, and lotus like feet descend far below the lowest abyss of vacuity.

9. His arms extend to the endless bounds of all sides and space; and hold in them the many worlds in the infinite firmament as their wielding weapons and arms.

10. The worlds rolling over one another, rest in a corner of his capacious bosom; His effulgence passes beyond the limit of the unlimited vacuum, and his person stretches beyond all imaginable bounds. (Extends through all extent, Pope).

11. Above, below, in all four quarters and in all sides of the compass, he extends unspent and without end; and is beset in all sides by the host of gods, Brahmá, Rudra, Hari and Indra, and the demi gods also.

12. These series of creatures are to be considered as the rows of hairs on his body; and the different courses of their actions, are as the strings binding the machines of the world together.

13. His will and destiny are powers proceeding from his person, as his active agencies in nature, such is the Lord--the supreme one, who is always to be worshipped by the best of men.

14. He is the intellect only and the conscious soul, the all pervading and the all supporting spirit; and resides alike in the pot and painting, as in the moving car as also in living animals.

15. He is Siva, Hari, and Hara, Brahmá, Indra, Fire, and Yama; He is the receptacle of endless beings, and the aggregate body of all essences or the sole entity of entities.

16. He contains this mundane sphere, together with all the worlds with their mountains and all other contents in himself; and the all powerful time which hurls them ever onward, is the warder at the doorway of his eternity.

17. The great god Mahádeva, is to be thought upon as dwelling in some part of this body of eternity and infinity, with his body and its members, and with a thousand ears and eyes. (This is same with the macrocosm of virát in the vedas).

18. This figure has moreover a thousand heads and a thousand hands with their decorations. It has as many eyes all over its body with their powers of sight and so many ears also with their power of hearing.

19. It has the powers of feeling or touch and taste all over its person, as also, the power of hearing in the whole body, and that of thinking in its mind within.

20. It is however wholly beyond all conception, and is perfectly good and gracious to all. It is always the doer of all things that are done, and the bestower of every blessing on all beings.

21. It is always situated in the inside of all beings; and is the giver of strength and energy to all. Having thought upon the Lord of Gods in this manner, the devotee is to worship him in the usual method of the ritual.

22. Now hear me tell you, that are best acquainted with Brahma, of the mode of worshipping him in spirit; which consists only in adoring him in the conscious soul, and not in presenting offerings unto him.

23. It requires no illumination nor fumigation of incense; It has no need of flowers or decorations, nor does require the oblations of rice or sprinkling of perfumes or sandal paste.

24. It needs no exhalation of saffron or camphor, nor any painting or other things (as chouriflappers and the like); nor has it any need of pouring the water, which is easily obtainable every where.

25. It is only by effusion of the nectareous juice of the understanding, that the god is worshipped; and this is styled the best kind of meditation and adoration of deity by the wise.

26. The pure intellect which is known to be always present within one's self, is to be constantly looked into and sought after, heard about, and felt both when one is sleeping or sitting or moving about.

27. By constantly talking on the subject, and resuming the inquiry after leaving it off, one becomes fully conscious of himself; and then he should worship his lord the self-same soul in his meditation of it.

28. The offering of the heart in meditation of the Lord, is more delectable to him than the sweetest articles of food, offered with the choices and most fragrant flowers.

29. Meditation joined with self-consciousness or contriteness of soul, is the best pádya and arghya water and offering that is worthy of the Lord; because the best meditation is that which is accompanied with the flower--self offering to the Lord. (For naught avails the most intense meditation of the mind, when the heart and soul are not devoted to the service of the Lord).

30. Without this kind of meditation, it is impossible the supreme soul in one's self; and therefore spiritual meditation is said to abound with the grace of God and the greatest enjoyment of happiness and prosperity. (So the sruti:--Meditation in spirit is attended with all enjoyment and felicity).

31. As the animal or irrational soul enjoys all its pleasures, in the abode of its body; so the rational and spiritual soul derives all its happiness from meditation. (Because the Lord being full of felicity, pours out the same into the spirit of his devotee).

32. The ignorant man that meditates on the Lord, for a hundred twinklings of the eye; obtains in reward thereof, the merit of making the gift of a milch-cow to a Brahman.

33. The man who worships the Lord in his soul, for half an hour in this manner; reaps the reward of making a horse sacrifice (according to law).

34. He who meditates on the Lord in spirit and in his own spirit, and presents the offering of his reflections unto him, is entitled to the merit of making a thousand horse sacrifices.

35. Whoso worships the Lord in this manner for a full hour, receives the reward of making the Raj sacrifice; and by worshipping him in this form in the midday; he obtains the merit of making many thousands sacrifices of such kind.

36. The man who worships him in this way for a whole day, settles in the abode of the deity.

37. This is called the superior yoga meditation, and the best service of the Lord, as also the external adoration of the soul.

38. This mode of holy adoration destroys all sins; and whoso practices it for a minute with a steady mind, he is certainly entitled to the venerations of gods and demigods, and placed in the rank of emancipated spirits like myself.

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XXXIX. MODE OF THE INTERNAL WORSHIP OF THE DEITY

Argument.--The inward form in which, He is worshipped in spirit.

The God resumed:--I will now relate to you, the form of the inward worship of the spirit in spirit; which is reckoned as the holy of holies, and dispeller of all darkness.

2. This mode of worship depends also on mental meditation, and is conducted in every state of life, whether when one is sitting or walking, or waking or sleeping.

3. It requires the supreme Siva, who is always situated in the body of man; and who is the cause of the perception of all things, to be worshipped in spirit and in the spirit of man.

4. Whether you think him, as sleeping or rising, walking or sitting; or whether conceive him touching or intangible contact with any thing, or quite unconnected and aloof from every thing about him.

5. Or whether you take him as enjoying the gross objects, or shunning them all by his spiritual nature; or as the maker of all outward objects, and the ordainer of all forms of action.--

6. Or whether you consider him as remaining quiescent in all material bodies, or that he is quite apart from all substantial forms; you may worship him in whatever form your understanding presents him to you, or what you can best conceive of him in your consciousness.

7. Whoever has fallen in and is carried away by the current of his desires and who is purified from his worldliness by the sacred ablution of his good sense; should worship the Siva lingam as the emblem of understanding with the offering of his knowledge of it. (The Lingam is the type of unity, represented by the figure, as the syllable om is the type of trinity expressed by its three letters).

8. He may be contemplated in the form of the sun, shining brightly in the sky; as also in that of the moon, which cools the sky with its benign moon beams. (Because the sun and moon are included under the eight forms of [God] as we see in the Prologue to Sakuntala. [Sanskrit: ye he kálah vidharttah] etc.).

9. He is always conscious in himself of all sensible objects, which are ever brought under his cognizance by means of his senses, as the breath brings fragrance to the nostrils.

10. He gives flavour to all sweets, and enjoys the sweetness of his felicity (ánanda) in himself; and employs the breathings as his horses, and borne in the car of respiration, sleeps in the cell of the heart.

11. Siva is the witness of all sights, and actor of all actions; he enjoys all enjoyments, and remembers all what is known.

12. He is well acquainted with all the members of his body, and knows all that is in existence and inexistence; he is brighter than all luminous objects, and is to be thought upon as the all-pervading spirit.

13. He is without parts and the totality of all parts, and being situated in the body, he resides in the vacuity of the heart; he is colourless himself and yet paints all things in their variegated colours, and is the sensation of every member of the body.

14. He dwells in the faculty of the mind, and breathes in the respirations of the beings; he resides within the heart, throat and palate of the mouth, and has his seat amidst the eyebrows and nostrils (as intelligence and breath of life).

15. He is situated beyond the limit of the thirty six categories of the saiva sástras, as also of the ten saktis ([Sanskrit: dashamahávidyá]) that are known to the saktas; he moves the heart and gives articulation to sounds, and makes the mind to fly about as a bird of the air.

16. He resides both in equivocal and alterative words, and is situated in all things as the oil in sesame seeds.

17. He is without the blemish of parts (being a complete whole in himself), and is compact with all the parts of the world taken together. He is situated alike in a part of the lotus-like heart of the wise, as well as in all bodies in general.

18. He is as clear as the pure and spotless intellect, and the imputation of parts to him is the work of mere imagination only. He is as palpably seen in everything at all places, as he is perceptible to us in our inward perception of him.

19. Though originally of the nature of universal intelligence yet he appears in the form of the individual soul according to the desire of men; and residing in every individual, he is divided into endless dualities (of universal and particular souls).

20. Then this God (the intelligent individual soul) thinks himself as an embodied being, endued with hands and legs, and the other parts and members of the body, with its hairs, nails, and teeth.

21. He thinks of being possest of manifold and various powers and faculties, and is employed in a variety of actions according to the desires of the mind. He feels glad on being served by his wives and servants (and thinking himself as their master).

22. He thinks the mind as a porter at the gate, and conductor of the information of the three worlds unto him; and his thoughts are as the chambermaids, waiting at his door with their pure attires.

23. He believes his knowledge of egoism as his greatest power and consort (sakti), and his power of action as his mistress; he thinks his knowledge of various lores to be his decorations only.

24. He knows his organs of sense and action to be the doors of the abode of his body, and is conscious of his being the infinite soul and inseparable from the same.

25. He knows himself to be full of the universal spirit; filled by and filling others with the same; and bears his admirable figure of the body, by his dependance on the Divine spirit.

26. That he is filled with the god-head within him, and is therefore no contemptible soul himself. He never rises nor sets nor is he glad or displeased at any time. (But enjoys the serenity of the Eternal soul).

27. He never feels himself satiate or hungry, nor longs after nor forsakes anything; he is ever the same and of an even tenor, temper and conduct and form at all times.

28. He retains the gracefulness of his person, the clearness of his mind, and the calmness of his views at all times; he is ever the same since his birth, and the equanimity of his soul never forsakes him at any time.

29. He is devoted to the adoration of his God, for longsome days and nights, and the mind abstracted from his body, becomes the object of his worship. (The gloss explains it otherwise, and makes the mindless body the worshipped object).

30. This God is worshipped with whatever offerings are available by the devotee, and with all the powers of the understanding, employed in the adoration of the sole Intellectual spirit.

31. He is to be worshipped with all things agreeably to the received ritual, and no attempt is to be made to make any offering, which was never made at any time before.

32. Man being endued with the body, should worship the Lord with his bodily actions (as prostration, genuflexion &c.); and with all things that conduce to bodily enjoyment.

33. So is Siva to be worshipped with eatables and victuals, food and drink of the best and richest kind; and with beddings and seats and vehicles as one may afford to offer.

34. Men must also entertain their souls, which are the abodes of the Divine spirit in their bodies; with all kinds of things that they think pleasurable to themselves; such as excellent food and drink and all things affording enjoyment and pleasure.

35. They must diligently serve the supreme soul in their souls, under any calamity, difficulty, danger or disease that may befall on them, as also when they are overtaken by illusions of their understandings.

36. The ends of all the attempts of mankind in this world, being no more than life, death and sleep, they are all to be employed in the service of the soul of nature.

37. Whether reduced to poverty or elevated to royalty, or carried by the currents of casualty; men must always serve their souls, with the flowers of their best endeavours.

38. Whether overwhelmed by broils, or buffeting in the waves of mishaps, whether undergoing the troubles or enjoying the comforts of domestic life, men must serve their souls at all times.

39. When the gentle beams of fellow feeling, overspread the breast of kind hearted men, and when the sweet influence of sympathy melts the heart, it is then must meet to serve the soul seated in it.

40. When a man has restrained the turbulent passions of his breast, by the power of his right judgment; and spread the vest of soft tenderness and sweet content over his heart and mind; let him then worship in its serene aspect within himself.

41. Let men worship the soul, on the sudden changes of their fortunes; both when they come to the possession, or loss of their enjoyments. (Because the Lord gave and the Lord hath taken them away).

42. The soul should be adhered to and adored, both when you lose or abandon your legal or illegal possession and enjoyment, of anything on earth.

43. Isha--the lord of wealth is to be worshipped with relinquishment of all wealth, which one may have got by his own exertion or otherwise. (Give your all to the giver of all).

44. Regret not for what is lost, and make use of what you have got; and adore the supreme soul without any inconstancy in your mind and soul.

45. Retain your constancy amidst the scene of the wicked pursuits of men, and maintain your vow of the holy devotion of the supreme spirit at all times.

46. Every thing appears as good in the sight of the Godly, who view all things in God; and they all seem to be mixed with good and evil to the worshipper of God and Mammon. Therefore look on all things as situated in the divine spirit, and continue in your vow of the adoration of the supreme soul.

47. Things which appear as pleasant or unpleasant at first sight, are all to be taken in an equal light, by those that are firm in their vow of the adoration of the one universal soul.

48. Give up thinking yourself as such or not such a one, forsake all particularities, and knowing that all is the universal One, continue in your vow of adoring the supreme soul.

49. Worship the supreme spirit as it always resides in all things, in their various forms and multifarious changes, and that it is all and all in their modifications also.

50. Forsake both your pursuit after or avoidance of any thing, and remaining in your indifference of both extremes, continue in your adoration of the soul at all times.

51. Neither seek nor forsake any thing, but receive what comes to thee of itself or by thy own lot; and enjoy all things as the sea does the streams of water, which fall to it of their own accord.

52. Fallen (placed) in this wide world of misery, man should take no heed of the lesser or greater sights of woe, that incessantly present themselves to his view. They are as the fleeting tincts and hues that paint the vacuous vault of the skies, and soon vanish into nothing.

53. All good and evil betide us by turns at the junction of their proper time, place and action; therefore take them with unconcern to you, and serve your own soul. (Which is same with the soul of souls).

54. Whatever things are mentioned as fit offerings of the service of the supreme spirit, it is the equanimity of your soul which is deemed the best and fittest offering. (A contrite spirit is most acceptable unto the Lord).

55. Things of different tastes, as the sour, bitter, acid, sharp and pungent, are useless in the service of the spirit; it is the calm and sweet composure of the soul, which is delectable to the holy spirit.

56. Equanimity is sweet to taste, and has the supernatural power of transforming every thing to ambrosia. (The man of an even mind, enjoys the sweetness of contentment in every state of life).

57. Whatever a man thinks upon with the ambrosial sweetness of his disposition, the same is immediately changed to ambrosia, as the nectarious dew drops under the moon beams.

58. Equanimity expands the soul, and gladdens the minds, as the sunlight fills the vault of heaven; and it is the unchangeable sedateness of the mind, which is reckoned as the highest devotion.

59. The mind of man must shine with an even lustre, as the bright moon beams in their fullness, and it must blaze with the transparent light of the intellect, as a bright crystal in the sunlight.

60. He who is employed in his outward actions of life, with his mind as bright as the clear sky; and which is freed from the mist of worldly affections, is said to be the full knowing devotee.

61. The true devotee shines as brightly, as the clear autumnal sky, when the worldly impressions are quite effaced from the heart, and are not seen even in dream, when the cloud of ignorance is cleared away, and the fog of egoism is utterly scattered.

62. Let your mind be as clear as the moon, and as spotless as the blazing sun; let it hide the thoughts, of the measurer and measured (i.e. of the creator and created) in it; let it have the simple consciousness of itself, like a newborn child (without its innate ideas); and perceiving only the steady light of the intellect the seed of all intelligence; you will then come to attain the state of highest perfection in your life time.

63. Living amidst the fluctuations of pain and pleasure, attending on the lot of all living beings, and occurring at their fixed times and places and actions of man, do you remain in the steady service of your soul--the leader of your body, by tranquilizing all the passions and desires of your heart and mind.

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XXXX. INQUIRY INTO THE NATURE OF THE DEITY

Argument--That the God Siva is beyond his formular adoration and his nature as that of the pure Intellectual soul.

The God continued:--It is of no consequence, whether the spiritualist observe formal adoration in its proper time and manner or not; it is enough if he adore Siva in his form of the intellect within himself, which is equivalent to the worship of the átmá or soul. (i.e. Worshipping the spirit in spirit).

2. This is attended with a delight, which becomes manifest within himself; and thus full of spiritual light and delight, the devotee is assimilated to and self same with his God. (This is the state of ecstacy, in which the adept loses himself in his God).

3. The meanings of the words affection and hatred, do not belong to the holy soul as separate properties of it; but they blend together and die in it as sparks in fire.

4. The knowledge that the dignity and poverty of men, as also the happiness and misery of one's self or others, proceed from God, is deemed as the worship of the supreme spirit, which ordains them all. (The gloss explains, that the attribution of all accidents of life to God, in his adoration also, as it is done by the offering of flowers unto him).

5. The consciousness of the world as manifestation of the Divine spirit, is reckoned as his devotion also, as a pot or other taken for the spirit of God, owing to its residence in it, forms his worship also.

6. The quiet and lightless spirit of Siva, being manifest in his works of creation, the whole sensible world is believed to be the form of the supreme spirit.

7. It is astonishing that every soul should forget its own nature, and think itself as a living soul residing in the body, as they believe the supreme soul to be confined in a pot or painting.

8. It is astonishing also, how they should attribute false ideas of worship, worshipper and the worshipped to the god Siva, who is the infinite soul of all and a pure spirit.

9. The ritual of worship and adoration, which applies to the finite forms of gods (their idols); cannot be applied to the worship of the infinite spirit of God.

10. The pure spirit of the eternal, infinite and all powerful, cannot be the object of ritualistic worship, which relates to finite gods or idols.

11. Know, O Brahman! that the spirit of God, which pervades the three worlds, and is of the nature of pure intellect, is not to be circumscribed by any form or figure. (As that of an idol or any natural object).

12. Know, O wisest of the wise! that those that have their god, as circumscribed by time and place (i.e. represented as limited and finite beings), are not regarded by us among the wise.

13. Therefore O sage! retract your sight from idols and idolatrous worship, and adopt your view to spiritual adoration; and be of an even, cool and clear mind, be dispassionate and freed from decay and disease.

14. Do you continue to worship the supreme spirit with an unshaken mind, by making him offerings of your desires, and all the good and evil that occur to you at any time. (i.e. submit to the dispensations of Providence).

15. O sage, that art acquainted with the sole unity, in the one uniform tenor of thy soul and mind, thou art thereby set above the reach of the miseries attending his frail life, as the pure crystal is clear of the shade and dross of all worldly things.

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XXXXI. VANITY OF WORLD AND WORLDLY THINGS

Argument.--Refutation of Received Doctrines.

Vasishtha asked:--What is called the god Siva, and is meant by supreme Brahma; and what is the meaning of soul, and what is its difference from the supreme soul?

2. That the tat sat--Id. est is the true entity, and all else is non entity; what is vacuum that is nothing, and what is philosophy that knows everything. Explain to me these differences, for thou lord! knowest them all.

3. The god replied:--There exist a sat ens, which is without beginning and end; and without any appearance, or reflexion of its own; and this entity appears as a non entity, owing to its imperceptibility by the senses.

4. Vasishtha rejoined--If this entity, lord! is not perceptible by the organs of sense, and unknowable by the understanding, how then, O Isána! is it to be known at all.

5. The god replied:--The man that desires his salvation, and yet sticks to his ignorance, is a sage by name only; and such men are subjected to greater ignorance, by the sástras they are guided by.

6. Let one ignorance removes another, as washerman cleanses one dirt by another. (i.e. Let the erroneous and mutually discordant theories of the sástras, refute the errors of one another).

7. When the error of ignorance, are removed by the opposition to each other; it is then that the soul appears of itself to view as a matter of course.

8. As a child daubs his fingers by rubbing one piece of coat against another (so is a man darkened the more by the tenets of contradictory sástras); but gets them cleansed by washing off his hands from both of them.

9. As they examine both sides of a question in a learned discussion, and the truth comes out from amidst them both, so the knowledge of the soul, appears from midst of the mist of ignorance.

10. When the soul perceives the soul, and scans it by itself; and as it comes to know it in itself, it is said to get rid of its ignorance, which is then said to be utterly destroyed.

11. The paths of learning and the lectures of a preceptor, are not the proper means to the knowledge of the soul, until one comes to know the unity of this thing by his own intuition.

12. All the preceptors of sástras, place the soul amidst the bodily senses; but Brahmá is situated beyond the senses, and is known after subjection of sensible organs. So the thing which is obtainable in absence of something, is never to be had in the presence of that thing (such is the antipathy of the soul and senses against one another).

13. It is seen however, that many things are used as causes of what they are no causes at all; as they make use of the lectures of the preceptor and the like, as means for the attainment of spiritual knowledge.

14. A course of lectures is of course calculated, to throw light on the student's knowledge of the knowables; but in matters of abstract knowledge and invisible soul, it is the soul itself that must throw its own light.

15. No explanation of the sástras, nor the lectures of the preceptor, are calculated to give light on spiritual knowledge, unless it is understood by the intuitive knowledge of the spirit itself.

16. Again the soul is never to be known without learning and lectures, and therefore both of them must combine with our inquiry to bring us to the light of the soul.

17. It is therefore the combination of bookish knowledge with the instruction of the preceptor, joined with the investigation of the inquirer, that is calculated to enlighten us on spiritual knowledge, as the appearance of the day with the rising sun and waking world, gives an impetus to the rise of duties of the rising world.

18. After subsidence of the senses and actions of bodily organs, together with the imperceptibility of our sensations of pain and pleasure; that we come to the knowledge of Siva, other wise known as the soul, the tat sat, He that is, and under many other designations.

19. When there was not this plenum of the world, or it existed in its spiritual or ideal forms; it is since then that this infinite entity has existed, in its vacuous form which is rarer than the ether.

20. Who is continually meditated upon by the nice discernment of the seekers of salvation, and is variously represented by the pure minded and those of vitiated minds.

21. There are others who are situated in the sight of, and not far from the path of living liberation, who are employed in leading others to salvation, and in the exposition of the sástras in their works.

22. There have been many thinking and learned men, who have used the words Brahmá, Indra, Rudra, and the names of the regents of worlds (for God), in order to justify the doctrines of the Puránas, Vedas and Siddhántas.

23. Others have applied the fictitious titles of chit or intellect, Brahmá, Siva, Átmá the soul or spirit, Ísha--the Lord, the supreme spirit and Íshvara-god, to the nameless god head that is apart and aloof from all.

24. Such is the truth of nature and of thyself also, which is styled the siva of felicitous; and which always confers all felicity to the world and to thyself also. (The word siva means jovus or solas and is meant to express the joviality and soliety which always attends on all beings).

25. The words siva, soul, supreme Brahmá and some others, have been coined by the ancients to express the supreme being; and though they differ in sound, there is no difference of them in sense and signification.

26. Know, O chief of sages! that wise men always adore this god whom we serve also, and unto when we return as the best and ultimate states of all. (Siva is a hypostasis of the infinite deity).

27. Vasishtha said:--Please Lord! explain to me in short, how the ever existent Deity remains as non-existent, and could it come to existence from its prior state of nihility?

28. The god replied:--Know the meaning of the words Brahmá &c. to bear relation to our consciousness only, and this though it is as clear as the sky, and as minute as an atom, has the great bulk of the mount Meru contained in it.

29. Although this is unintelligible to us, and far beyond our conception and comprehension of it; yet it becomes intelligible to us when we take it the form of our intellect.

30. By taking it objectively, it becomes intelligible to us in the manner of our Egoism; and by thinking on its personality we have the same idea of it, as one has of a wild elephant from its sight in a dream.

31. These ideas of its egoism and personality, being limited by time and space, give rise to many aerial forms as attendants upon it. (These aerial forms are the different attributes of God).

32. Accompanied with these, there proceeds the entity called the Jíva or living spirit, which is conversant with its oscillation and respiration, in the form of a pencil of air.

33. After the power of vitality is established and has come in force; there follows the faculty of understanding; which remains in utter ignorance at first.

34. It is followed by the faculties of bearing, action and perceptions; all of which operate inward by without their development in outward organs.

35. All these powers uniting together, conduce to the excitement of memory, which exhibits itself soon in the form of the mind; which is the tree of desires.

36. Hear now what is called the spiritual body by the learned, it is the inward power of God of the form of the conscious soul, and seeing the divine soul in itself.

37. There rise afterwards the following powers in the mind; which develop themselves in the outer organs, although their powers may be wanting in them. (Such as the blind eyes, deaf ears &c.).

38. These are the essences of air and motion, and of feeling also, together with the senses of touch and heat emitted by the eyes.

39. There are the essences of colour, water and taste also, and likewise the essences of smell and flavour too.

40. There are the essences of earth and gold, and the essences of thick mass; and also the essences of time and space, all of which are without form and shape.

41. The spiritual body contains all these essences in itself as its component parts, as the seed of a fruit contains the leaves and germ of the future tree in its cell.

42. Know this to be ativáhika or spiritual body, and containing the eight elementary senses, wherefore it is called the puryashtaka also; and these are developed afterwards in the organs of sense.

43. The primary or spiritual body which is formed in this manner, is actually nobody at all; since it is devoid of understanding, intellect, senses and sensibility.

44. It is the supreme Being only, which contains the essence of the soul, as it is the sea which contains the limpid waters.

45. The soul is that which is possessed of its consciousness and knowledge, all besides this is dull and insensible matter; and which is viewed by the soul, as the sight of a fairy land in the dream.

46. It is therefore by consciousness and knowledge that Siva can be known, and what is not to be known by these can be nothing at all.

47. The supreme soul sees all things within itself, as parts of itself (produced from its will of becoming or dividing itself into many); and beholds particles of his atomic self, formed into innumerable bodies.

48. These soon increased in bulk and became big bodies, and bore the marks of the organs upon them.

49. Then it became of the form of a man, from his thought of being so; and this soon grew up in its size of a full grown man.

50. So do our bodies appear to us in our living state, as the fairyland appears to one in his dream.

51. Vasishtha said:--I see the appearance of the human body, to resemble the vision of the fairyland in the dream; and I see also the miseries awaiting on human life in this world. Now tell me, my Lord! how all this misery is to be removed from it.

52. The god replied--All human woe is owing to their desires, and belief of the reality of the world; but it must be known to be all as unreal, as waves of water seen in a sea in the mirage.

53. There why such desire, and for what good and use, and why should the dreaming man be deluded to drink the show of water in the mirage?

54. The viewer of truth, who is freed from his views of egoism and tuism, and has got off from the deluded and its delusive thoughts, doth verily behold the true entity of God in his presence, in the utter absence of all worldly thoughts from his mind.

55. Where there is no desirer or desire or the desired object, but the only thought of the one unity, there is an end of all error and misery.

56. He whose mind is freed from the true and false bugbears of common and imaginary error, and is settled in the thought of one unity alone, sees nothing but the unity before him.

57. The desires of the mind, rise as goblins in the midway sky; and the thoughts of the world rove about the sphere of the mind, as the numerous worlds revolve in the sky hence there is no peace of the soul, unless these subside to rest.

58. It is useless to advise the man to wisdom, who is elated by his egoism, and is deluded by the waters of the mirage of this evanescent world.

59. Wise men should advise the prudent only, and throw away their instruction to boys that are wandering in error, and are shunned by good people. To give good counsel to the ignorant, is as offering a fair daughter in marriage to the spectre of man seen in a dream.

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XXXXII. THE SUPREME SOUL AND ITS PHASES AND NAMES

Argument.--The various Processes whereby the supreme soul becomes the animal soul; and this again extending in all beings.

Vasishtha said:--Tell me Lord! what is the state of the living soul, after its situation in the open air, and its observation of the vanity of the elemental and material body on its first creation.

2. The god replied--The living soul having sprung from the supreme, and being situated in the open firmament, views the body formed in the aforesaid manner, as a man sees a vision in his dream.

3. The living soul being ubiquitous, enters and acts in every part of this body, according to the behest of the embodied intellect, as a sleeping man acts his parts in a dream, and bears his body still.

4. It was the indiscrete infinite soul before, and then became the discrete spirit called the first male, and this spirit was the primary cause of creation in itself.

5. Thus this animated spirit became as Siva, at the beginning of the first creation; it was called Vishnu in another, and became the lotus born Brahmá or the great patriarch in the other.

6. This great progenitor of one creation, became the intellect in another, this became the volitive male agent of creation afterwards, and at last look upon it a male form according to its volition.

7. The primary volition of ideal creation becoming compact in time, it takes the form of the mind; which feels itself able to effect in act, whatsoever it wills in itself. (This form of the Mind is called Hiranyagarbha or Brahmá--the creative power of God).

8. This creation of the world by Brahmá is mere visionary, as the sight of a spectre in the air or in a dream; but it appears as a positive reality, to the erroneous sight of the realist. (i.e. The world is ideal to the idealist, but a sober reality to the positivist).

9. The prime male agent that becomes the beholder of his creation, retains in him the power of exhibiting himself (or displaying his will) in the empty air every moment, or to retract them in himself into time.

10. To him a Kalpa or great Kalpa age, is a mere twinkling of his eye; and it is by the expansion or contraction of himself, that the world makes its appearance or disappearance.

11. Worlds come to appear and disappear at his will, at each moment of time, in each particle of matter, and in every pore of space, and there is no end of this successions in all eternity.

12. Many things are seen to occur one after another, in conformity with the course of our desires; but we never find any thing to take place, in concurrence with our sight of the holy spirit. (i.e. Nothing is both temporally as well as spiritually good).

13. All things are created (and vanish) with this creation, which do not occur to the unchanging Siva; and these are like the shadowy appearances in empty air, which rise of themselves and disappear in air.

14. All real and unreal appearances vanish of themselves, like mountains appearing in dreams; all these creations have no command over their causality, space or time.

15. Therefore all these phenomenals are neither real, potential or imaginary or temporary appearances; nor is there any thing, that is produced or destroyed at any time.

16. All these are the wondrous phenomena of our ideas and wishes (sankalpas), exhibited by the intellect in itself; and this world is like the appearance of an aerial castle in the dream, and subject to its rise and fall by turns.

17. The visible which appears to be moving about in time and space, has actually no motion whatever in either; but remains as fixed as an ideal rock in the mind for ever. (The unreal world can have no actual motion).

18. So also the extension of the unreal world, is no extension at all; as the magnitude of an ideal rock has no dimension whatever. (Things in the abstract, have no imaginable measure).

19. The situation and duration of the unreal world, conform exactly with the ideas of its time and place, which exist in the mind of the maker of all (or the great Archetype).

20. It is in this manner that he is instantly changed to a worm (from his idea of it), and so are all the four orders of living beings born in this world.

21. Thus the curative power becomes all things, from the great Rudras down to the mean straws in a minute (from his ideas of these); and even such as are as minute as atoms and particles of matter (i.e. in the forms of the protozoa and small animalcula).

22. This is the course of the production of the past and present creations, and it is the reminiscence of the past, which is the cause of the delusion of taking the world for a real existence.

23. After giving away the thought of the difference between the creator and the created, and by the habit of thinking all as the unity, one becomes Siva in a minute, and by thinking so for a longer period, one is assimilated to the nature of the supreme Intellect.

24. The intellect proceeds from the original intellect (of God), and rises without occupying any place. It is of the nature of understanding, and resides in the soul in the manner of empty air in the midst of a stone.

25. The soul which is of the manner of eternal light, is known under the denomination of Brahmá and the intellect which seated in this (soul), becomes weakened as the creative power increase, and strengthens in it. (i.e. The power of the thinking intellect decreases in proportion, as the power of the creative mind is on its increase).

26. Next the particles of time and place, join together in the formation of minute atoms; which by forming the elementary bodies, have the living principle added to them. (These are called the protozoa or animalcules).

27. These then become vegetables and insects, and beasts, brutes and the forms of gods and demigods; and these being stretched out in endless series, remain as a long chain of being, connected by the strong and lengthening line of the soul, (called the sútrátmá).

28. Thus the great god that pervades over all his works in the world, connects all things in being and not being, as pearls in a necklace by the thread of his soul. He is neither near us nor even far from us; nor is he above or below anything whatever. He is neither the first nor last but ever lasting (having neither his beginning nor end). He is neither the reality or unreality, nor is he in the midst of these.

29. He is beyond all alternatives and antitheses, and is not to be known beyond our imaginary ideas of him. He has no measure or dimension, nor any likeness, form or form to represent him. Whatever greatness and majesty are attributed to him by men, they are all extinguished in his glory as the fire is cooled in the water.

30. Now, I have related to you all what you asked me about, and will now proceed to my desired place. Be you happy, O sage, and go your way; and rise, O Párvatí and let us take our way.

31. Vasishtha said:--When the god with his blue throat had spoken in this manner, I honoured him with throwing handfuls of flowers upon him. He then rose with his attendants, and pierced into the vacuity of heaven.

32. After departure of the lord of Umá, and master of the three worlds, I remained for some time reflecting on all I had heard from the god, and then having received the new doctrine with the purity of my heart, I gave up the external form of my worshipping the Deity.

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XXXXIII. ON REST AND TRANQUILLITY

Argument.--Ráma admits before Vasishtha the removal of his doubt in dualistic doctrine.

Vasishtha said:--I well understand what the god said, and you too, O Ráma! know very well the course of the world.

2. When the false world appears in a false light to the fallacious understanding of man, and all proves to be but vanity of vanities, say what thing is there that may be called true and good and what as untrue and bad. (There is nothing what ever which is really good).

3. As the alternative of something is not that thing itself, so the optional form of the soul, though not the soul itself, yet it serves to convey some idea of the soul. (As the explanation of the gloss is;--The similitude of a thing though not the thing itself, yet it gives some idea of the original).

4. As fluidity is the nature of liquids, and fluctuation is that of the winds, and as vacuity is the state of the sky, so is creation the condition of the spirit or divine soul.

5. I have ever since (hearing the lecture of Sivá), betaken myself to the worship of the spirit in spirit; and have since then, given up my eagerness for the outward adoration of gods.

6. It is by this rule that I have passed these days of my life, though I am tamely employed in the observance of the prescribed and popular ritual.

7. I have worshipped the Divine spirit, in all modes and forms and offering of flowers, as they presented of themselves to me; and notwithstanding the interruptions, I have uninterruptedly adored my god at all times, both by day and night.

8. All people in general, are concerned in making their offerings acceptable to their receiver (god), but it is the meditation of the yogi, which is the true adoration of the spirit.

9. Having known this, O lord of Raghu's race, do you abandon the society of men in your heart, and walk in your lonely path amidst the wilderness of the world, and thereby remain without sorrow and remorse.

10. And when exposed or reduced to distress, or aggrieved at the loss or separation of friends, rely on this truth, and think on the vanity of the world.

11. We should neither rejoice nor regret, at the acquisition or loss of friends and relations; because all things almost are so frail and unstable, in this transitory world.

12. You well know, Ráma! the precarious state of worldly possessions and their pernicious effects also; they come and go away of their own accord, but overpower on the man in both states (of prosperity and adversity).

13. So uncertain are the favours of friends and fortune, and so unforeseen is their loss also, that it is no way possible for any body to account for them. (i.e. to assign any plausible cause to either).

14. O sinless Ráma! such is the course of the world, that you have no command over it nor is it ever subject to you; if the world is so insubordinate to you, why is it then that you should be sorry for so unmanageable a thing?

15. Ráma! mind your spiritual nature, and know yourself as an expanded form of your intellect. See how you are pent up in your earthly frame, and forsake your joy and grief at the repeated reiterations and exits of your corporeal body.

16. Know my boy, that you are of the form of your intellect only, and inherent throughout all nature; therefore there is nothing that you can resume to or reject from you in the world.

17. What cause of joy or grief is there in the vicissitudes of things in the world, which are occasioned by the revolutions of the mind on the pivot of the intellect; and resemble the whirling waters of the sea, caused by an eddy or vortex in it.

18. Do you, O Ráma! betake yourself to the fourth stage of susupta or hypnotism hence forth, as the even tenor of the intellect, is attended by its trance at the end.

19. Be you as cold and composed with your placid countenance and expanded mind, as the quiet spirit of God is diffused and displayed through out all nature; and remains as full as the vast ocean, in the contemplation of that soul, whose fulness fills the whole.

20. You have heard all this already, Ráma! and are fraught with the fulness of your understanding, now if you have any thing else to ask with regard to your former question, you can propose the same. (This was a question regarding the observance of ceremonial rites).

21. Ráma said:--Sir, my former doubts are all dispersed at present, and I have nothing more to ask you regarding the same (i.e. the dualistic doctrine that raised the doubts).

22. I have known all that is to be known, and felt a heartfelt satisfaction at this, and now I am free from the foulness of the objective, and of dualism and fictions. (Knowledge of the objective being unspiritual, the dualism of matter and mind as unscriptual, and the fictions of the gods etc., as mere vagaries of imagination).

23. The foulness of the soul, proceeds from ignorance of the soul; and this ignorance (of the subjective self), which had darkened my soul, is now removed by the light of spirituality.

24. I was under the error (of the mortality and materiality of the soul), which I have now come to understand, is neither foul matter, nor is it born or dies at any time. (i.e. It is immaterial, unproduced and immortal).

25. I am now confirmed in my belief, that all this is Brahmá diffused through out nature (in his all pervasive form vivartarúpá); and I have ceased from all doubts and questions on the subject, nor have I the desire of knowing any thing more about it. (He desires to know nothing, who beholds the lord in every thing).

26. My mind is now as pure, as the purified water of filtering machine; and am no more in need of learning any thing, from the preachings and moral lessons of the wise.

27. I am unconcerned with all worldly affairs, as the mount Sumeru is insensible of the golden ores in its bosom and having all things about me, I am quite indifferent to them; because I have not what I expect to have, nor do I possess the object of my fond desire.

28. I expect nothing that is desirable, nor reject any thing which is exceptionable; nor is there a mean in the interim of the two in this world, because there is nothing that is really acceptable or avoidable in it, nor anything which is truly good or bad herein.

29. Thus, O sage, the erroneous thought of these contraries, is entirely dissipated from me; wherefore I neither care for a seat in heaven, nor fear the terrors of the infernal regions.

30. I am as fixed in the selfsame spirit, as the mount Mandárá is firmly seated amidst the sea, and which scatters its particles throughout the three worlds, as that mountain splashed the particles of water in its state of churning the ocean.

31. I am as firm as the fixed Mandárá, while others are wandering in their errors of discriminating the positive and negative and the true and false, in their wrong estimation.

32. The heart of that man must be entangled with the weeds of doubts, who thinks in his mind the world to be one thing, and the Divine spirit as another. (This duality is the root of doubts in the one ultimate unity).

33. He that seeks for his real good in any thing in this world, never finds the same in the unsubstantial material world, which is full of the confused waves of the eternity.

34. It is by your favour, O venerable sir, that I have got over the boisterous ocean of this world; and having the limits of its perilous coasts, have come to the shore of safety and found the path of my future prosperity.

35. I am no more wanting in that supreme felicity, which is the summum bonum of all things; and am full in myself as the lord of all. And I am quite indomitable by any body, since I have defeated the wild elephant of my covetousness.

36. Being loosened from the chain of desire, and freed from the fetters of option, I am rich and blest with the best of all things, and this is the internal satisfaction of my soul and mind, which gives me a cheerful appearance in all the triple world.

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XXXXIV. INQUIRY INTO THE ESSENCE OF THE MIND

Argument.--On the means of forsaking all connections and desires, and the subjection of the mind by spiritual knowledge.

Vasishtha said:--Ráma! whatever acts you do with your organs of action and without application of the mind to the work in hand, know such work to be no doing of yours. (An involuntary action is not accounted as the act of one, in absence of his will in it).

2. Who does not feel a pleasure at the time of his achieving an action, which he did not feel a moment before, nor is likely to perceive the next moment after he has done the work. (Therefore it is the attention of the mind which gives pleasure to an action, and which is not to be felt in absence of that attention, both before and after completion of the act).

3. The pleasure of a thing is accompanied only with the desire of its passion, and not either prior or posterior to the same; therefore it is boyish and not manliness to take any delight in a momentary pleasure. (All pleasure and pain are concomitant with their thoughts only; and these being fleeting there is no lasting pleasure or pain in anything).

4. Whatever is pleasant during its desire, has that desire only for the cause of its pleasantness: hence the pleasurableness of a thing lasting till its unpleasurableness is no real pleasure; wherefore this frail pleasure must be forsaken together with its temporary cause of desire by the wise.

5. If you have arrived to that high state (of knowing the universality of the soul); then be careful for the future, and merge yourself no more in the narrow pit of your personality.

6. You who have now found your rest and repose, in being seated in the highest pinnacle of spiritual knowledge (by cognoscence of yourself); must not allow your soul any more, to plunge in the deep and dark cave of your egoistic individuality.

7. Thus seated on the pitch of your knowledge, as on the top of the Meru mountain; and remembering the glorious prospect all around you; you cannot choose to fall down into the hellpit of this earth, and to be reborn in the darksome cave of a mother's womb. (Because the living soul is doomed to transmigration and regeneration until its final liberation).

8. It appears to me, O Ráma! that you are of an even temperament, and have the quality of truth (satyaguna) full in your nature; I understand you have weakened your desires, and have entirely got over your ignorance.

9. You appear to be settled in your nature of purity, and the temperament of your mind appears to me to be as calm and quiet as the sea, when it is full and untroubled by the rude and rough winds of heaven.

10. May your expectations set at ease, and your wants terminate in contentment, let your dementation turn to rightmindedness, and live unconnected with and aloof from all.

11. Whatever objects you come to see placed before you, know the same as full of the Divine intellect, which is consolidated and extended through all, as their common essence. (The solid intellect forming the body, and its rarity the mind. "That extended through all yet in all the same; great in the earth as in the etherial frame", Pope).

12. One ignorant of the soul, is fast bound to his ignorance; and one acquainted with the soul, is liberated from his bondage. Hence, O Ráma! learn to meditate constantly and intensely, the supreme soul in your own soul.

13. It is indifference which wants to enjoy nothing, nor yet refuses the enjoyment of whatever presents of itself to any body; and know inappetency to consist in the cool calmness of the mind, resembling the serenity of the sky. (Insouciance is the want of desire and renunciation of prurience and not the abdication of enjoyment).

14. Preserve the cold listlessness of your mind, and discharge your duties with the cool application of your organs of action; and this unconcernedness of your mind, will render you as steady as the sky at all accidents of life.

15. If you can combine the knower, knowable and the knowledge (i.e. all the three states of the subjective, objective and the intermediate percipience) in your soul alone; you will then feel the tranquillity of your spirit and shall have no more to feel the troubles of sublunary life.

16. It is the expansion and contraction of the mind, that causes the display and dissolution of the world; try therefore to stop the action of thy mind, by restraining the breaths of thy desire in thyself.

17. So it is the breath of life, which conducts and stops the business of the world, by its respiration and rest; restrain therefore the breathing of the vital air, by thy practice of the regulation of thy breathing (as dictated before).

18. So also it is the act of ignorance to give rise to ceremonious works, as it is that of knowledge to repress them; Do you therefore boldly put them down by your own forbearance, and the instructions you derive from the sástras and your preceptors.

19. As the winds flying with dust, darken the fair face of the sky; so the intellect being daubed with the intelligibles (the subjective soiled with the objective), obscure the clear visage of the soul.

20. The action of the relation between the vision and visibles (i.e. the mutual of the eyesight and outward objects on one another), causes the appearance of the world and its course; as the relation that there exists between the solar rays and formations of things, makes them appear in various colours to the eye. (Neither the course of the world, nor the appearance of colour is in real being, but is owing to the relative combination of things).

21. But the want of this relativity removes the phenomenals from sight, as the want of light takes away the colours of things. (The former is an instance of the affirmative kind (anvayi); and the latter a vyatireki or negative one).

22. The oscillation of the mind causes the illusions, as the palpitation of the heart raises the affections, and they are all at a stop at the suspension of the actions of these organs. So the waves raised by motion of waters and action of the winds, subside in the deep, by cessation of the actions of these elements. (The question is whether the affections are not causes of the palpitation of the heart?).

23. The abandonment of every jot of desire, the suspension of respiration, and the exercise of intellection, will contract the actions of the heart and mind, and thereby prevent the rise of the passions and affections and of illusions also. (Entire dispassionateness is the perfection of yoga asceticism).

24. The unconsciousness which follows the inaction of the heart and mind, in consequence of the suspension of the vital breath is the highest perfection (of yoga philosophy).

25. There is a pleasure in respect to the vision of visibles, which is common to all living being; but this being felt spiritually, amounts to holy pleasure paramánanda. But the sight of God in one's consciousness, which is beyond the province of the mind; transcends the mental pleasure, and affords a divine ecstacy, called the Brahmánanda.

26. The mind being dormant and insensible, affords the true rapture of the soul; and such as it is not to be had even in heaven, as it is not possible to have a refrigeratory or cooling bath in the sandy desert.

27. The inertness of the heart and mind is attended with a delight, which is felt in the inmost soul and cannot be uttered in words; it is an everlasting joy that has neither its rise nor fall, nor its increase or decrease. (It is the lasting sunshine and unchanging moonlight of the soul).

28. Right understanding weakens the sensuous mind (by the blaze of rationality), but wrong understanding serves to increase its irrational sensuousness only. It then sees the thickening mists of error, rising as spectres and apparitions before the sight of boys.

29. Though the sensational mind is existent in us, yet it seems as quite inexistent and extinct before the light of our rationality, as the substance of copper appears to disappear by being melted with gold. (The carnal mind is converted to the rational understanding by its association with it).

30. The mind of the wise is not the sensuous mind, because the wise mind is an essence of purity by itself; thus the sensible mind is changed in its name and nature to that of the understanding, as the copper is converted to the name and nature of gold.

31. But it is not possible for the mind to be absorbed at once in the intellect, its errors only are moved by right understanding, but its essence is never annihilated. (As the alloy of copper in gold).

32. Things taken as symbols of the soul, are all unsubstantial as the mind and vital principle; all which are as unreal as the horns of a hare (which are never known to grow). They are but reflexions of the soul, and vanish from view after the soul is known. (The mind is said to be an expansion of the soul [Sanskrit: átmanívivartta rúpam|]).

33. The mind has its being for a short time only, during its continuance in the world; but after it has passed its fourth stage of insensibility, it arrives to the state of comatosity which is beyond the fourth stage.

34. Brahmá is all even and one, though appearing as many amidst the errors that reign over the world; He is the soul of all and has no partial or particular form of any kind. He is not the mind or any thing else, nor is He situated in the heart (as a finite being). (Gloss:--The Divine Soul like the human mind has conceptions of endless things, which are neither situated in it nor parts of itself, but are as empty phantoms in the air).

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XXXXV. STORY OF THE VILVA OR BELFRUIT

Argument.--God represented as the Belfruit or Wood apple; containing the Worlds as its seeds.

Vasishtha said:--Attend now, O Ráma! to a pleasant story, which was never told before, and which I will briefly narrate to you for your instruction and wondrous amusement.

2. There is a big and beautiful vilva or bel fruit, as large as the distance of many myriads of miles, and as solid as not to ripen or rot in the course of as many many ages.

3. It bears a lasting flavour as that of sweet honey or celestial ambrosia; and though grown old yet it increases day by day like the crescent new moon, with its fresh and beautiful foliage.

4. This tree is situated in the midst of the universe, as the great Meru is placed in the middle of the earth; it is as firm and fixed as the Mandara mountain, and is immovable even by the force of the diluvian winds.

5. Its root is the basis of the world, and it stretches to the distance of immeasurable extent on all sides.

6. There were millions of worlds all within this fruit as its un-countable seeds; and they were as minute in respect to the great bulk of the fruit, that they appeared as particles of dust at foot of a mountain.

7. It is filled and fraught with all kinds of delicacies, that are tasteful and delicious to the six organs of sense; and there is not one even of the six kinds of savoury articles, that is wanting in this fruit.

8. The fruit is never found in its green or unripe state, nor is it ever known to fall down ever over-ripened on the ground; it is ever ripe of itself, and is never rotten or dried or decayed at any time by age or accident.

9. The gods Brahmá, Vishnu and Rudra, are not sempiternal with this tree in their age, nor do they know aught of the origin and root of this tree, nor anything about its extent and dimensions.

10. None knows the germ and sprout of this tree, and its buds and flowers are invisible to all. There is no stem or trunk or bough or branch, of the tree that bears this great fruit.

11. This fruit is a solid mass of great bulk, and there is no body that has seen its growth, change or fall. (It is ever ripe without ripening or rotting at any time).

12. This is the best and largest of all fruits, and having no pith nor seed, is always sound and unsoiled.

13. It is as dense as the inside of a stone in its fullness, and as effluent of bliss as the disk of the moon, drizzling with its cooling beams; it is full of flavour and distils its ambrosial draughts to the conscious souls of men.

14. It is source of delight in all beings, and it is the cause of the cooling moon-beams by its own brightness; It is the solid rock of all security, the stupendous body of felicity, and contains the pith and marrow that support and sustain all living souls, which are the fruits of the prior acts of people. (i.e. The souls of all beings are as fruits formed according to the nature and merit of their previous acts--karma, and all these souls are filled with delight by the great soul of God).

15. Therefore that transcendent pith which is the wonder of souls, is contained in the Infinite spirit of God, and deposited and preserved in that auspicious fruit--sriphala--the bel or wood apple.

16. It is deposited with its wondrous power in that small bel fruit, which represents the human as well as the divine soul, without losing its properties of thinness and thickness and freshness for ever. (i.e. All the divine powers--of evolution are lodged in the soul).

17. The thought that 'I am this', clothes the unreality with a gross form (as the thought of a devil gives the unreal phantom a foul figure); and though it is absurd to attribute differences to nullities, yet the mind makes them of itself and then believes its fictitious creatures as real ones.

18. The Divine ego contains in itself the essential parts of all things set in their proper order, as the vacuity of the sky is filled with the minute atoms, out of which the three worlds did burst forth with all their varieties. (So the substance of the bel fruit, contains the seeds of the future trees and all their several parts in it).

19. In this manner there grew the power of consciousness in its proper form, and yet the essence of the soul retains its former state without exhausting itself. (It means that notwithstanding the endless evolutions of the Divine soul, its substance ever continues the same and is never exhausted).

20. The power of consciousness being thus stretched about (from its concentration in itself), makes it perceive the fabric of the world and its great bustle in its tranquil self. (It means how the subjective consciousness is changed to the objective).

21. It views the great vacuum on all sides, and counts the parts of time as they pass away; it conceives a destiny which directs all things, and comes to know what is action by its operation.

22. It finds the world stretching as the wish of one, and the sides of heaven extending as far as the desires of men; it comes to know the feelings of love and hatred, and the objects of its liking and dislike.

23. It understands its egoism and non-egoism or tuism, or the subjective and objective and views itself in an objective light, by forgetting its subjectivity. It views the worlds above and being itself as high as any one of them, finds itself far below them. (The human soul though as elevated as the stars of heaven, becomes as low as a sublunary being by its baseness).

24. It perceives one thing to be placed before, and another to be situated beside it; it finds some thing to be behind, and others to be near or afar from it; and then it comes to know some things as present and others as past or yet to come before it. (The soul losing its omniscience has a partial view of things).

25. Thus the whole world is seen to be situated as a play house in it, with various imaginary figures brightening as lotuses in a lake.

26. Our consciousness is seated in the pericarp of the lotus of our hearts, with the knowledge of our endless desires budding about it, and viewing the countless worlds turning round like a rosary of lotus seeds.

27. Its hollow cell like the firmaments is filled with the great Rudras, who rove about in the distant paths of the midway sky, like comets falling from above with their flaming tails. (The vedas describe the Rudras as blue necked &c. (nílagríváh). These worshipful gods of the vedas are found to be no other than wondrous phenomena of the vacuity which are deified in the Elementary religion of the ancients).

28. It has the great mount of Meru situated in its midst, like the bright pericarp amidst the cell of the lotus flower. The moon capt summit of this mount is frequented by the immortals, who wander about it like wanton bees in quest of the ambrosial honey distilled by the moon beams on high. (The gloss places the Meru in the northern region of the distant pole, while the Puránas place it in the midst of the earth). It was the resort of the gods as also the early cradle of the pristine Aryans, who are represented as gods.

29. Here is the tree of the garden of Paradise with its clusters of beautiful flowers, diffusing their fragrance all around; and there is the deadly tree of the old world, scattering its pernicious farina for culling us to death and hell. (The gloss explains rajas or flower dust as our worldly acts, which lead us to the hell torments of repeated transmigrations).

30. Here the stars are shining, like the bright filaments of flowery arbors, growing on the banks of the wide ocean of Brahma; and there is the pleasant lake of the milky path, in the boundless space of vacuity.

31. Here roll the uncontrolled waves of the ceremonial acts, fraught with frightful sharks in their midst, and there are the dreadful whirlpools of worldly acts, that whirl mankind in endless births for ever more.

32. Here runs the lake of time in its meandering course for ever, with the broad expanse of heaven for its blooming blossom; and having the moments and ages for its leaves and petals, and the luminaries of sun, moon and stars for its bright pistils and filaments.

33. Here it sees the bodies of living beings fraught with health and disease, and teeming with old age, decay and the torments of death; and there it beholds the jarring expositions of the sástras, some delighting in their knowledge of spiritual Vidyá, and others rambling in the gloom of Ignorance--Avidyá (which leads them from error to error).

34. In this manner doth our inner consciousness, represent the wonders contained in the pulp of the vilva fruit; which is full of the unsubstantial substance of our desires and wishes, and the pithless marrow of our false imagination.

35. It sees many that are tranquil, calm, cool and dispassionate, and who are free from their restraints and desires; they are heedless of both their activity and inactivity, and do not care for works whether done or left undone by them.

36. Thus this single consciousness presents her various aspects, though she is neither alone nor many of herself, except that she is what she is. She has in reality but one form of peaceful tranquillity; though she is possest of the vast capacity of conceiving in herself all the manifold forms of things at liberty.

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XXXXVI. PARABLE OF THE STONY SHEATH OF THE SOUL

Argument.--The divine mind is the substratum of the totality of existence.

Ráma said:--Venerable sir, that knowest the substance of all truths; I understand the parable of bel fruit which you have just related to me to bear relation to the essence of the compact intellect, which is the only unit and identic with itself.

2. The whole plenitude of existence together with the personalities of I, thou, this and that form the plenum (or substance), of the intellect; and there is not the least difference between them, as this is one thing and that another. (All this is but one undivided whole, whose body nature is and God the soul. Pope).

3. Vasishtha answered--As this mundane egg or universe is likened to a gourd fruit, containing the mountains and all other things as its inner substance; so doth the intellect resemble the bel fruit or the grand substratum, that contains even the universe as the kernel inside it.

4. But though the world has no other receptacle beside the Divine intellect, yet it is not literally the kernel inside that crust (i.e. the substance of that substratum in its literal sense). Because the world has its decay, decline and dissolution also in time, but none of these belong to the nature of the everlasting mind of God.

5. The intellect resembles the hard coating of the pepper seed, containing the soft substance of its pith inside it, and is likened also to block of stone, bearing the sculptured figures peacefully sleeping in it. (All things are engraven in the divine mind).

6. Here me relate to you, O moon faced Ráma! another pleasant story in this place which will appear equally charming as well as wondrous to you. (It is the story of stone like Brahma).

7. There is a huge block of stone somewhere, which is as big as it is thick and solid; it is bright and glossy, and cold and smooth to touch; it never wastes or wears out, nor becomes dark and dim.

8. There are many full blown lotuses, and unnumbered buds of water lilies, growing amidst the limpid lake of water, contained within the bosom of this wondrous stone. (It means that the mind of God has all these images of things engraved in it as in a stone).

9. There are many other plants growing also in that lake, some with their long and broad caves and others with their alternate and joint foliums likewise.

10. There are many flowers with their up lifted and down cast heads, and others with their petals hanging before them; some having a combined or common footstalk, and others growing separate and apart from one another; some are concealed and others manifest to view.

11. Some have their roots formed of the fibres of the pericarp, and some have their pericarps growing upon the roots (as orchids), some have their roots on the tops and others at the foot of trees, while there are many without their roots at all: (as the parasite plants).

12. There are a great many conch shells about these, and unnumbered diseases also strewn all about.

13. Ráma said:--All this is true, and I have seen this large stone of sálgráma in my travels; and I remember it to be placed in the shrine of Vishnu, amidst a bed of lotus flowers. (The sálgráma stone is perforated by the vajra-kíta, and contains many marks inside it, resembled to the map of the world in the mundane egg of the divine mind. See vajra-kíta in the works of Sir William Jones).

14. Vasishtha replied:--You say truly, that you have seen that great stone and know its inside also; but do you know the unperforated and hollowless stone of the divine mind, that contains the universe in its concavity, and is the life of all living beings (and not the dull, lifeless and hollow sálagráma stone which they worship as an emblem of the divine mind).

15. The stone of which I have been speaking to you, is of a marvelous and supernatural kind; and contains in its voidless bosom all things as nothing. (i.e. the ideas and not substances of things).

16. It is the stone like intellect of which I have spoken to you, and which contains all these massive worlds within its spacious sphere. It is figuratively called a stone from its solidity, cohesive impenetrability and indivisibility like those of a block.

17. This solid substance of the intellect, notwithstanding its density and unporousness, contains all the worlds in itself, as the infinite space of heaven is filled with the subtile and atmospheric air. (The divine mind like external nature, is devoid of a vacuity in it, according to the common adage: "Nature abhors a vacuum").

18. The mind is occupied with all its various thoughts, as the world is filled by the earth and sky, the air and atmosphere, and the mountains and rivers on all sides, there is not hole or hollow, which is not occupied by some thing or other in it.

19. The solid soul of God which resembles this massive stone, contains in it all these worlds which are displayed (to our deluded sight), as so many beds of lotuses in their blooming beauty; and yet there is nothing so very pure and unsullied as this solid crystalline soul. (The soul like a crystal, reflects its light in various forms).

20. As it is the practice of men to paint blocks of stones, with the figures of lotuses, conch shells and the like images; so it is the tendency of the fanciful mind, to picture many fantastic of all times in the solid rock of the soul. (The soul like a crystal stone is wholly blank in itself, it is only the imaginative mind, that tinges it in different shades and colours).

21. All things in the world appear to be situated exactly in the same state, as the various figures carved on the breast of a stone, seem to be separate though they are bellied in the same relief. (All distinctions blend in the same receptacle).

22. As the carved lotus is not distinct from the body of the stone, so no part of existence is set apart from the substantiality of the divine intellect; which represents its subtile ideas in their condensed forms.

23. This formal creation is as inseparable from the formless intellect of God, as the circular forms of lotus flowers which are carved in a stone, are not separate from the great body of the shapeless stone.

24. These endless chains of worlds, are all linked up in the boundless intellect of the Deity; in the same manner as the clusters of lotus flowers are carved together in a stone; and as a great many seeds, are set together in the inside of a long pepper.

25. These revolving worlds have neither their rise nor fall in the sphere of the infinite intellect, but they remain as firm as the kernel of a bel fruit, and as fixed as the fidelity of a faithful wife.

26. The revolution of worlds and their changing scenes, that are seen to take place in their situation in the Divine Intellect, do not prove the changeableness of the all containing Infinite Mind, because its contents of finite things are so changeable in their nature. (The container is not necessarily of the nature of its contents).

27. All these changes and varieties subside at last in the divine intellect, as the waves and drops of water sink down in the Sea; and the only change which is observable in the Supreme Intellect, is its absorption of all finite changes into its infinity. (All finite forms and their temporary transformations, terminate finally into infinity).

28. The word (Fiat) that has produced this all, causes their changes and dissolutions also in itself. Know then that Brahma from whom this fiat and these changes have sprung, and all these being accompanied with Brahma and the original fiat, the word change is altogether meaningless. (There is no new change from what is ordained from the beginning).

29. Brahma being both the mainspring as well as the main stay of all changes in nature; He is neither excluded from or included under any change, which occur in the sphere of his immensity (i.e. the spirit of God being the unchanging source of all phenomenal changes, is not exempted from the mutations that occur in his infinity. So says the poet: "These as they change are but the varied God &c." Thompson).

30. And know this in one or other of the two senses, that the change of the divine spirit in the works of creation, resembles the change or development of the seed into its stem, fruits and flowers and other parts; or that it is a display of delusion máyá like the appearance of water in the mirage. (Here the changing scenes of nature, are viewed in both lights of evolution and illusion).

31. As the substance of seed goes on gradually transforming itself into the various states of its development, so the density of the divine intellect (or spirit) condenses itself the more and more in its production of solid and compact world, and this is the course of the formation of the cosmos by slow degrees.

32. The union of the seed with the process of its development forms the duality, that is destroyed by the loss of either of these. It is imagination only that paints the world as a dull material thing, when there is no such grossness in the pure intellect. (The gloss explains this passage to mean that, It is the doctrine of dualists to maintain the union of the productive seed or spirit of God, with the act of producing the material world to be coeternal, and the one becomes null without the other, but this tenet is refuted on the ground of the impossibility of the Combination of the immaterial with the material, whence the material world is proved to be a nullity and mere illusion).

33. The intellect and dull matter cannot both combine together, nor can the one be included under the other, therefore the ideal world resembles the marks inscribed in the stone and no way different in their natures.

34. As the pith and marrow of a fruit, is no other than the fruit itself; so the cosmos forms the gist of the solid intellect, and no way separable from the same; which is like a thick stone containing marks, undermarks, underlined under one another.

35. So we see the three worlds lying under one another, in the womb of the unity of God; as we behold the sleeping and silent marks of lotuses and conch shells, inscribed in the hollow of a stone.

36. There is no rising nor setting (i.e. the beginning or end), of the course of the world (in the mind of God); but every thing is as fixed and immovable in it, as the inscription carved in a stone.

37. It is the pith and marrow of the divine intellect, that causes the creative power and the act of creation; as it is the substance of the stone, that produces and reduces the figures in the stone.

38. As the figures in the stone, have no action or motion of their own; so the agents of the world have no action of theirs, nor is this world ever created or destroyed at any time (but it continues for ever as carved in the mind of God).

39. Every thing stands as fixed in the mind of God, as if they were the firm and immovable rocks; and all have their forms and positions in the same manner as they are ordained and situated in the Divine Mind.

40. All things are filled with the essence of God, and remain as somnolent in the Divine mind; the various changes and conditions of things that appear to us in this world, are the mere vagaries of our erroneous fancy; for every thing is as fixed and unchanged in the mind of God, as the dormant images on a stone.

41. All actions and motions of things are as motionless in mind of God, as the carved lie asleep in the hollow of a stone. It is the wrong superfluous view of things, that presents to us all these varieties and changes; but considered in the true and spiritual light, there is neither body nor any change that presents itself to our sight.

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XXXXVII. LECTURE ON THE DENSITY OF THE INTELLECT

Argument.--Interpretation of the Intellect compared with the Belfruit and carved stone and its further comparison with the Egg of a Peahen.

Vasishtha continued:--The great category of the Intellect which is compared with the bel fruit or wood apple, contains the universe as its own matter and marrow within itself; and it broods upon the same: as in its dream (by forgetfulness of its own nature of omniscience before which everything is present).

2. All space and time and action and motion being but forms of itself, there can be no distinction of them in the intellect. (Hence every part of creation and all created things, are but composite parts of the intellect).

3. All words and their senses, and all acts of volition, imagination and perception, being actions of the intellect, they can not be unrealities in any respect. (Nothing proceeding from the real one is ever unreal).

4. As the substance contained in a fruit, passes under the several names of the kernel, pith and marrow and seeds; so the pith and marrow of the solid intellect being but one and the same thing, takes many names according to their multifarious forms.

5. A thing though the same, has yet different names according to its different states and changes of form; and as it is with the contents of a fruit, so it is with the subjects included under the intellect.

6. The intellect reflects its image in the mirror of the world, as these sculptured images are exprest in a slab of stone.

7. The brilliant gem of the supreme intellects produces myriads of worlds in itself; as the gem of your minds casts the reflection of every object of our desire and imagination.

8. The casket of the intellect contains the spacious world, which is set in it as a big pearl of vast size; it is but a part of the other, though appearing as distinct and different from the other.

9. The intellect is situated as the shining sun, to illumine all things in the world; it brings on the days and nights by turns, to show and hide them to and from our view.

10. As the waters of an eddy whirl and hurl down into the vortex of the sea, so do these worlds roll and revolve in the cavity of the intellect; and though its contents are of the same kind, yet they appear as different from one another as the pulps and seeds of fruits.

11. The body of the stone like intellect contains the marks of whatever is existent in present creation; as also of all that is inexistent at present (i.e. the marks of all past and future creation. The omniscience of the divine intellect has all thing present before it, whether they are past and gone or to come to being hereafter).

12. All real essence is the substance of the apple-like Intellect, whether it is in being or not being and all objects whether in esse or non esse, obtain their form and figure according to the pith and marrow of that intellectual fruit. (All outward forms are the types of the intellectual archetype).

13. As the lotus loses its own and separate entity by its being embodied in the stone, so do all these varieties of existence lose their difference by their being engrossed into the unity of the intellectual substance.

14. As the diversity of the lotus changes to the identity of the stone, by its union with and entrance into its cavity; so the varieties of creation, become all one in the solid mass of the Divine Intellect.

15. As the mirage appears to be a sheet of water to the thirsty deer, while it is known to the intelligence to be the reflexion of the solar rays on the sandy desert; so does the reality appear as unreal and the unreal as real to the ignorant; while in truth there is neither the one nor the other here, except the images of the Divine Mind.

16. As the body of waters fluctuates itself (owing to the fluidity of the element); so is there oscillation in the solidity of the Divine Intellect (owing to its spiritual nature).

17. The lotuses and conch-shells are of the same substance, as the stone in which they are carved and engraved; but the world and all its contents that contained in the intellect, are neither of the same substance nor of the same nature (because of their perishableness).

18. Again the big block of stone which serves for the comparison of the divine Intellect, is itself contained in the same; and while the figures of the former are carved out of its body, those of the latter are eternally inherent in it.

19. This creation of God is as bright as the autumnal sky, and it is as fair as the liquid beams of the moon. (It means to say, says the gloss, that God shines in his form of the world jagat-Brahmá or God identified with the world which is the doctrine of cosmotheism).

20. The world is eternally situated in God, as the figures in the stone which are never effaced; the world is as inseparably connected with the Deity, as the god head of god with himself.

21. There is no difference of these, as there is none between the tree and its plant; all the worlds that are seen all abouts, are not disjoined from Divine Intellect.

22. These as well as the Intellect have neither their production nor destruction at any time, because of their subsistence in the spirit of God, which shows them in their various forms, as the heat of the sun exhibits a sheet of water in the sandy desert.

23. The world with all its solid rocks, trees and plants, dissolves into the Divine Intellect at the sight of the intelligent, as the hard hail stones are seen to melt into the liquid and pure water. (All solids vanish into subtle air).

24. As the water vanishes into the air, and that again into vacuum, so do all things pass away to the supreme spirit; and again it is the consolidation of the Intellect, that forms the solid substances of hills, plants and all tangible things. (Condensation as well as rarefaction, are both of them but acts of the great mind of God).

25. The pith that is hidden in the minute substance, becomes the marrow in its enlarged state; so the flavor of things which is concealed in the atoms, becomes perceptible in their density with their growth.

26. The power of God resides in the same manner in all corporeal things, as the properties of flavours and moisture are inherent in the vegetable creation. (Hence Brahmá is said to be the pith or moisture of all--rasovaitata).

27. The same power of God manifests itself in many forms in things, as the self same light of the sun shows itself in variegated colours of things, according to the constitution of their component particles.

28. The supreme soul shows itself in various ways in the substance and properties of things, as the Divine Intellect represents the forms of mountains and all other things in the changeful mind.

29. As the soft and liquid yolk of the egg of a peahen, contains in it the toughness and various colours of the future quills and feathers; so there are varieties of all kinds inhering in the Divine Intellect, and requiring to be developed in time.

30. As the versicolour feathers of a peacock's train, are contained in the moisture within the egg; so the diversity of creation is ingrained in the Divine mind (as it is said in the parable of the Peahen's egg).

31. The judicious observer will find the one self same Brahmá, to be present every where before his sight; and will perceive his unity amidst all diversity, as in the yolk of the peahen.

32. The knowledge of the unity and duality of God, and that of his containing the world in himself; is also as erroneous as the belief in the entity and nonentity of things. Therefore all these are to be considered as the one and same thing and identic with one another. (This is cosmotheism).

33. Know him as the supreme, who is the source of all entity and non-entity, and on whose entity they depend; whose unity comprises all varieties, which appear as virtual and are no real existences. (Hence the gloss deduces the corollary, that the unreal or negative is subordinate to the positive, and the variety to the unity).

34. Know the world to be compressed under the category of the Intellect, as the Intellect also is assimilated with the works of creation; in the same manner as is the relation of the feather and moisture, the one being the production and the other the producer of one another.

35. The mundane egg resembles the peahen's egg, and the spirit of God is as the yolk of that egg; it abounds with many things like the variegated feathers of the peacocks, all which serve but to mislead us to error. Know therefore there is no difference in outward form and internal spirit of the world, as there is none in the outer peacock and the inner-yolk.

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XXXXVIII. ON THE UNITY AND IDENTITY OF BRAHMÁ AND THE WORLD

Argument.--He whose essence is the source of all our enjoyments; is ascertained as the Sachchidánanda or Entity of the Felicitous Intellect or the blissful spirit of God.

Vasishtha continued:--That which contains this wide extended universe within itself, and without manifesting its form unto us, is very like the egg of the peahen and contains all space and individual bodies in its yolk. (The mind of God contains the mundane egg).

2. That which has nothing in reality in it, appears yet to contain everything in itself; as the spotless mirror reflects the image of the moon, and the hollow egg bears the figure of the future peacock.

3. It is in this manner that the gods and sages, saints and holy-men, the siddhas and great Rishis, meditate on the true and self subsistent form of God, as find themselves seated in their fourth state of bliss above the third heaven.

4. These devout personages sit with their half shut eyes, and without the twinkling of their eyelids; and continue to view in their inward souls, the visible glory of God shining in its full light.

5. Thus enrapt in their conscious presence of God, they are unconscious of any other thought in their minds; though when employed in the acts of life, remain without the respiration of their vital breath.

6. They sit quiet as figures in a painting, without respiration of their breath, and remain as silent as sculptured statues, without the action of their minds. (They forget themselves to stones in their excess of devotion).

7. They remain in their state of holy rapture, without the employment of their minds in their fleeting thoughts, and whenever they have any agitation they can effect anything, as the Lord God works all things at the slightest nod.

8. Even when their minds are employed in meditative thoughts, they are usually attended with a charming gladness, like that of the charming moonbeams falling on and gladding the leafy branches of trees.

9. The soul is as enraptured with the view of the holy light of God, as the mind is delighted at the sight of the cooling moonbeams, emitted afar from the lunar disc. (The gloss explains the distant moonlight to be less dazzling than the bright disc of that luminary).

10. The aspect of pure conscience is as clear, as the fair face of the bright moon; it is neither visible nor in need of admonition, nor is it too near nor far from us. (The gloss is silent on the inappropriateness of the simile).

11. It is by one's self cogitation alone that the pure intellect can be known, and not by the bodily organs, or living spirit or mind, or by our desire of knowing it.

12. It is not the living soul nor its consciousness, nor the vibrations of the body, mind, or breath. It is not the world nor its reality or unreality, or its vacuity or solidity, or the centre of any thing.

13. It is not time or space or any substance at all, nor is it a god or any other being, whatever is quite free from all these and unconfined in the heart or any of the sheaths inside the body.

14. That is called the soul in which all things are moving, and which is neither the beginning nor end of any thing, but exists from eternity to eternity, and is not characterised by any of the elementary bodies of air and the rest.

15. The soul is an entity that is never annihilated in this or the next world, though the sentient bodies may be born and die away a thousand times like earthen pots here below.

16. There is no removal of this vacuous spirit from its seat, both in the inside and outside of every body; for know, O thou best of spiritualists, all bodies to be equally situated in the all pervading spirit.

17. It is the imperfection of our understanding, that creates the difference between the spirit and the body; but it shows the perfection of our judgement, when we believe the universal soul, to be diffused throughout the universe.

18. Though warmly engaged in business, yet remain unaddicted to worldliness by your indifference to the world, and to all moving and unmoving things that there exists on earth.

19. Know all those as the great Brahma--the immaculate soul, that is without the properties and attributes of mortal beings; it is without change and beginning and end, and is always tranquil and in the same state.

20. Now Ráma! as you have known by your spiritual vision (clairvoyance), all things including time and action, and all causality, causation and its effect, together with the production, sustentation and dissolution of all, to be composed of the spirit of God, you are freed from your wanderings in the world in your bodily form.

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XXXXIX. CONTEMPLATION OF THE COURSE OF THE WORLD

Argument.--Consideration of the changes in the state of things; and their origination from Ignorance and extinction in the true knowledge of their nature.

Ráma said:--Sir, if there is no change in the immutable spirit of God; say how do these various changes constantly appear to occur in the state of things in this world. (Because it is the change of cause that produces a change in the effect, as also a change in the state of any thing, argues a change in its cause likewise).

2. Vasishtha replied:--Hear Ráma! that it is the alteration of a thing that does not revert to its former state, that is called its change, as it occurs in the instance of milk, and its conversion to curd and butter, which never become the pure milk again.

3. The milk is converted to curd, but the curd never reverts to its former state of milk, such is the nature of change in the state of things; but it can never affect the great God, who remains alike all along the first, intermediate and last states of things.

4. There is no such change as that of milk or any other things in the immutable Brahma, who having no beginning nor end, can neither have any age or stage of life assigned to him. (i.e. The Infinite God is neither young nor old as any finite being).

5. The states of beginning and end which are attributed to eternal God, are the false imputations of ignorance and error, as there can be no change of changeless one. (To say therefore that God is the first and last, the alpha and omega of all, means that the beginning and end of all things, are comprised in his everlasting existence).

6. Brahma is not our consciousness, nor the object of our consciousness. He is as unconnected with us as our soul and intellect, and is only known to us by the word.

7. A thing is said to be the same, with what it is in the beginning and end; the difference that takes place in the form is only a mist of error, and is taken into no account by the wise. (The identity of a thing consists in its unalterable part).

8. It is the soul only that remains self same with itself, both in the beginning, middle and end of it, and in all places and times, and never changes with the change of the body or mind and therefore forms the identity of the person.

9. The soul which is formless and self-same with itself, forms the personality and individuality of a being, and because it is not subject to any modality or mutation at any time, it constitutes the essential identity of every body.

10. Ráma rejoined:--If the divine soul is always the same and perfectly pure in itself, when proceeds our error of its changeableness, and what is the cause of the avidyá or ignorance that shows these changes unto us?

11. Vasishtha replied:--The category of Brahma implies that, He is all what is, what was, and what will be in future; that He is without change and without beginning and end, and there is no avidyá ignorance in him.

12. The signification that is meant to be expressed by the significant term Brahma, does not include any other thing as what is inexistent, or the negative idea of ignorance under it (i.e. God is what is and not what is not).

13. Thyself and myself, this earth and sky, the world and all its sides, together with the elementary of fire and others, are all the everlasting and infinite Brahma, and there is not the least misunderstanding in it.

14. Avidyá or Ignorance is a mere name and Error, and is but another word for unreality; nor can you Ráma, ever call that a reality, which is never existent of itself. (The words ignorance and error are both of them but negative terms).

15. Ráma said:--Why sir, you have said yourself of Ignorance in the chapter on Upasama or Tranquillity, and told me to know all these as products of error.

16. Vasishtha answered:--Ráma! you had been all this time immerged in your ignorance, and have at last come to your right understanding by your own reasoning.

17. It is the practice of glossologists and men of letters, to adopt the use of the word ignorance, living soul and the like, for awakening the unenlightened to their enlightenment only.

18. So long as the mind is not awakened to the knowledge of truth, it remains in the darkness of error for ever; and is not to its right understanding; even by its traversing a hundred miles.

19. When the living soul is awakened to its right sense by the force of reason, it learns to unite itself to the supreme soul, but being led without the guidance of reason, it is successful in nothing with all its endeavours.

20. He who tells the unenlightened vile man, that all this world is the great Brahma himself, does no more than communicate his sorrows to the headless trunk of a tree. (A lecture to the listless man, is not listened to).

21. The fool is brought to sense by reasoning, and the wise man knows the truth from the nature of the subject; but the ignorant never learn wisdom, without the persuasion of reason. (The wise learn by intuition, but the unwise by no instruction).

22. You had been unwise so long as you depended on your own reasoning (judgment); but being guided by me, you are now awakened to truth. (No body is wise of his own conceit without the guidance of his preceptor).

23. That I am Brahma, thou art Brahma, and so the visible world is Brahma himself; know this truth and naught otherwise, and do as you please. (All inventions and imaginations of Him are false).

24. Inconceivable is the conception of God, and the visible world is all that is known of him; know him as one, and the infinite, and you will not be misled into error.

25. Ráma, think in yourself whether when you are sitting or walking, or waking or sleeping, that you are this supreme spirit, which is of the form of light and intelligence, and pervades all things.

26. Ráma! if you are without your egoism and meity or selfishness, and if you are intelligent and honest, then be as oecumenical and tranquil as Brahma himself, who is equally situated in all things.

27. Know your self as the pure consciousness, which is situated as one in all; which is without beginning and end, and is the essence of light and the most transcendent of all being.

28. What you call, Brahma the universal soul and the fourth or transcendent state; know the same to be materia or matter and natura or nature also. It is the inseparable one in all, as the mud is the essential substance of a thousand water pots.

29. Nature is not different from the nature of the soul, as the clay is no other than the pot itself; the Divine essence is as the intrinsic clay, and the divine spirit extends as the inward matter of all things.

30. The soul has its pulsation like the whirling of the whirlpool, and this is termed Prakriti force or matter, which is no other than an effort of the spirit.

31. As pulsation and ventilation, mean the same thing under different names; so the soul and nature express the same substance, which are not different in their essence.

32. It is mere ignorance which makes their difference, and which is removed by their knowledge; as it is sheer ignorance which represents a snake in the rope, and which is soon removed by knowledge of their nature.

33. As the seed of imagination falls in the field of the intellect, it shoots forth in the sprout of the mind, which becomes the germ of the wide spreading arbor of the universe.

34. The seed of false imagination (of avidyá or personified Ignorance), being scorched by the flames of spiritual knowledge; will be able to vegetate no more, though it is sprinkled with the water of fond desire. (i.e. Fancy is fed by desire, but fly away at the appearance of reason).

35. If you do not sow the seed of imagination in the soil of your intellect, you will stop the germination of the plants of pain and pleasure in the field of your mind. (Pain and pleasure are imaginary ideas and not really so in their nature).

36. Ráma! as you have come to know the truth, you must forsake your false conception of such a thing as ignorance or error existing in the world; and know that there is no duality in the unity of God. Being thus full with the knowledge of one supreme soul, you must repudiate your ideas of pain and pleasure in anything here below. Pain turns to pleasure, and pleasure to pain, know them both as unreal, as they are vain.

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L. ON SENSATIONS AND THE OBJECTS OF SENSES

Argument.--The production of the eight signs or senses in the vital soul, and their development into the External organs for the perception of outward objects.

Ráma said:--Sir, I have known whatever is to be known, and seen all that is to be seen; I am filled with the ambrosial draught of divine knowledge, which you have kindly imparted to me.

2. I see the world full with the fulness of Brahma, I know the plenitude of God that has produced this plenary creation; it is the fulness of God that fills the universe, and all its amplitude depends on the plenum of the all pervading Deity.

3. It is now with much fondness that I like to propose to you another question, for the improvement of my understanding; and hope you will not be enraged at it, but communicate to me the instruction as a kind father does to his fondling boy.

4. We see the organs of sense, as the ears, nose, eyes, mouth and touch, existing alike in all animals (whether when they are alive or dead).

5. Why is it then that the dead do not perceive the objects of their sense, as well as the living who know the objects in their right manner?

6. How is it that the dull organs perceive the outward objects, as a pot and other objects of sense which are imperceptible to the inward heart, notwithstanding its natural sensibility and sensitiveness.

7. The relation between outward objects and the organs, is as that of the magnet and iron, which attract one another without their coming in contact together. But how is it that the small cavities of the organs could let into the mind such prodigious objects that surround us on all sides.

8. If you well know these secrets of nature, then please to communicate them to me in a hundred ways, in order to satisfy my curiosity regarding them.

9. Vasishtha answered--Now Ráma, I tell you in short, that neither the organs nor the heart and mind, nor the pots and pictures, are the things in reality; because it is impossible for any thing to exist apart and independent of the pure and intelligent spirit of God.

10. The Divine Intellect which is purer than air, takes the form of the mind by itself; which then assumes its elemental form of the organic body, and exhibits all things agreeably to the ideas which are engraven in the mind.

11. The same elements being afterwards stretched out into matter or máyá and nature or prakriti, exhibit the whole universe as its ensemble, and the organs and their objects as its parts. (This passage rests on the authority of the sruti which says--[Sanskrit: máyántu prakritim vidyánamáyinantu maheshvaram | ashábayavabhutestu váptamsarvva midamjagat]).

12. The mind which takes the elemental form of its own nature, reflects itself in all the parts of nature in the forms of pots and all the rest of things. (It is repeatedly said that the mind is the maker of all things by reminiscence of the past).

13. Ráma rejoined--Tell me sir, what is the form of that elementary body, which reflects itself in a thousand shapes on the face of the puryastaka or elemental world, as it were on the surface of a mirror.

14. Vasishtha replied--This elementary body which is the seed of the world, is the undecaying Brahma, who is without beginning and end, and of the form of pure light and intellect, and devoid of parts and attributes.

15. The same being disposed to its desires, becomes the living soul; and this being desirous of collecting all its desires and the parts of the body together, becomes the palpitating heart in the midst of it. (The word heart hrid is derived from its harana or receiving the blood and all bodily sensations into it; it, is called the chitta also, from its chinoti or collecting and distributing these in itself and to all parts of the body).

16. It becomes the ego from its thought of its egoism, and is called the mind from its minding--manana of many things in itself; it takes the name of buddhi or understanding from its bodha or understanding and ascertainment of things, and that of sense also from its sensation of external objects.

17. It thinks of taking a body and becomes the very body, as a potter having the idea of a pot forms it in the same manner. Such being the nature of the soul of being and doing all what it likes, it is thence styled the puryashtaka or manifest in its said eight different forms.

18. The Intellect is also called the puryashtaka or octuple soul, from its presiding over the eight fold functions of a person; as those of perception, action and passion and inspection or witnessing of all things and the like; as also from its inward consciousness and the power of vitality. (The gloss gives the following explanations of these words, viz.--Perception of what is derived by the organs of sense. Action of what is done by the organs of action [Sanskrit: karmendriya]. Passion or the feelings of pleasure or pain that is so derived. Inspection or the silent witnessing of all things by the isolated soul. And so on).

19. The living soul takes upon it different forms at different times, according as it is employed in any one of these octuple functions; and also as it is actuated by the various desires, that rise in it by turns.

20. The octuple nature of the soul causes it to put forth itself, in the same form, as it is led to by its varying desire at any time; in the same manner as a seed shoots forth in its leaves, according to the quantity of water with which it is watered.

21. The soul forgets its intellectual nature, and thinks it's a mortal and material being, embodied in the form of a living creature or some inanimate being, and ever remains insensible of itself under the influence of its erroneous belief.

22. Thus the living soul wanders about in the world, as it is dragged to and fro by the halter of desire tied about its neck; now it soars high and then it plunges below like a plank, rising up and sinking below the waves and currents of the sea.

23. There is some one, who after being released from his imprisonment in this world, comes to know the supreme soul, and attains to that state which has neither its beginning nor end.

24. There are others also, who being weary and worried by their transmigrations in multitudinous births, come after the lapse of a long period to their knowledge of the soul, and obtain thereby their state of final bliss at last.

25. It is in this manner, O intelligent Ráma, that the living soul passes through many bodily forms, and you shall hear now, how it comes to perceive the outward objects of the pots &c. by means of the external organs of perception--the vision and others.

26. After the intellect has taken the form of the living soul, and the same has received its vitality; the action of the heart sends its feelings to the mind, which forms the sixth organ of the body.

27. As the living soul passes into the air, through the organs of the body it comes in contact with the external objects of the senses; and then joining with the intellect it perceives the external sensations within itself. (The gloss says--The organs of sense like canals of water, carry the sensations to the seat of the mind).

28. It is the union of the living soul with the outward objects, that causes and carries the sensations to the mind; but the soul being defunct and the mind being dormant, there is no more any perception of the externals.

29. Whatever outward object which is set in the open air, casts its reflexion on the subtile senses of living beings, the same comes intact with the living soul which feels the sensation; but the soul being departed, the dead body has neither its life nor feeling of aught in existence.

30. When the form of the outward object, comes in contact with the gemming eye sight of a person; it casts its picture on the same, which is instantly conveyed to the inward soul.

31. The image that is cast on the retina of the eye, is reflected thence to the clearer mirror of the soul, which perceives it by contact with the same; and it is thus that outer things come to the knowledge of the living soul.

32. Even babes can know whatever comes in taction with them, and so do brutes and vegetables have the power of feeling the objects of their touch; how then is it possible for the sensuous soul to be ignorant of its tangible objects?

33. The clear rays of the eyesight which surround the soul, present to it the pictures of visible objects which they bear in their bosom, and whereby the soul comes to know him.

34. There is the same relation of sensuous contact, between the perceptive soul and the perceptible objects of the other senses also; the taste, smell, sound, the touch of things, are all the effects of their contact with the soul.

35. The sound remaining in its receptacle of the air, passes in a moment in the cavity of the ear; and thence entering into the hollow space of the soul, gives it the sensation of its nature.

36. Ráma said:--I see that the reflexions of things are cast in the mirror of the mind, like the images of things carved on wooden tablets and slabs of stone; but tell me sir, how the reflexion of the image of God is cast on the mirror of the mind.

37. Vasishtha replied:--know, O best of gnostics that know the knowable, that the gross images of the universal and particular souls, which are reflected in the mirror of the mind, are as false as the images of God and deities which are carved in stones and wood.

38. Never rely, O Ráma, in the substantiality of this false world; know it as a great vortex of whirling waters, and ourselves as the waves rolling upon it.

39. There is no limitation of space or time or any action, in the boundless ocean of the infinity and eternity of the Deity; and you must know your soul to be identic with the Supreme, which is ubiquitous and omnipresent.

40. Remain always with a calm and quiet mind, unaddicted to anything in this world; know the vanity of worldly pleasures and pains, and go on with a contented mind where ever you will. Preserve your equality, and commit yourself to an indifferent apathy to every thing.

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LI. ON THE PERCEPTION OF THE SENSIBLE OBJECTS

Argument.--Erroneous Belief in the Reality of the Body and Mind; instead of believing the unity and Entity of Brahma as All in All.

Vasishtha resumed:--Ráma, you have heard me relate unto you that, even the lotus-born Brahmá who was born long before you, had been without his organs of sense at first (i.e. Brahmá the creative power of God, was purely a spiritual Being, and had necessarily neither a gross body nor any of its organs as we possess).

2. As Brahmá--the collective agents of creation was endued only with his consciousness--Samvid for the performance of all his functions; so are all individual personalities endowed with their self-consciousness only, for the discharge of all their necessary duties.

3. Know that as the living soul, dwelling in its body in the mother's womb, comes to reflect on the actions of the senses, it finds their proper organ supplied to its body immediately.

4. Know the senses and the organs of sense to be the forms of consciousness itself, and this I have fully explained to you in the case of Brahma, who represents the collective body of all individual souls.

5. At first there was the pure consciousness in its collective-form in the Divine Intellect, and this afterwards came to be diffused in millions of individual souls from its sense of egoism. At first was the Divine soul "the I am all that I am" and afterwards became many as expressed in the Vedic text "aham bahusyam".

6. It is no stain to the pure universal, undivided and subjective Divine spirit, to be divided into the infinity of individual and objective souls; since the universal and subjective unity comprises in it the innumerable objective individualities which it evolves of itself. (in its self manifestation in the universe).

7. The objectivity of God does not imply his becoming either the thinking mind or the living soul; nor his assuming upon him the organic body or any elemental form. (Because the Lord becomes the object of our meditation and adoration in his spirit only).

8. He does not become the Vidyá or Avidyá--the intelligible or unintelligible, and is ever existent as appearing non-existent to the ignorant; this is called the supreme soul, which is beyond the comprehension of the mind and apprehension of the senses.

9. From Him rises the living soul as well as the thinking mind; which are resembled for the instruction of mankind, as sparks emitted from fire.

10. From whatever source ignorance (Avidyá) may have sprung, you have no need of inquiring into the cause thereof; but taking ignorance as a malady, you should seek the remedy of reasoning for its removal.

11. After all forms of things and the erroneous knowledge of particulars, are removed from your mind; there remains that knowledge of the unity, in which the whole firmament is lost, as a mountain is concealed in an atom. (The infinity of Deity, envelopes all existence in it).

12. That in which all the actions and commotions of the world, remain still and motionless; [as] if they were buried in dead silence and nihility; is the surest rock of your rest and resort, after feeling from the bustle of all worldly business.

13. The unreal or negative idea of ignorance, has also a form, as inane as it is nothing; look at her and she becomes a nullity, touch her and she perishes and vanishes from sight. (Avidyá like Ignorantia is of the feminine gender, and delusive and fleeting as a female).

14. Seek after her, and what can you find but her nothingness; and if by your endeavour you can get anything of her, it is as the water in the mirage (which kills by decoying the unwary traveller).

15. As it is ignorance alone that creates her reality, her unreality appears as a reality, and destroys the seeming reality at once. (Avidyá or Ignorance is the Goddess of the agnostic sáktas, who worship her, under the name of Máyá or Illusion also).

16. Agnosticism imputes false attributes to the nature of the Deity, and it is the doctrine of the agnostics to misrepresent the universal spirit, under the forms of the living soul and the perishable body. (from their ignorance of the supreme).

17. Now hear me attentively to tell you the sástras that they have invented, in order to propagate their agnostic religion or belief in this avidyá, by setting up the living soul and others in lieu of the supreme spirit.

18. Being fond of representing the Divine Intellect in a visible form, they have stained the pure spirit with many gross forms, such as the elemental and organic body, which is enlivened by the vital spirit dwelling in it.

19. Whatever they think a thing to be, they believe in the same; they make truth of an untruth, and its reverse likewise; as children make a devil of a doll, and afterwards break it to nothing.

20. They take the frail body formed of the five elements as a reality, and believe its holes of the organs as the seats of the sensuous soul.

21. They employ these five fold organs in the perception of the pentuple objects of the senses; which serve at best to represent their objects in different light than what they are, as the germ of a seed produces its leaves of various colours. (This means the false appearances which are shown by the deceptive senses).

22. They reckon some as the internal senses, as the faculties of the mind and the feelings of the heart, and others as external, as the outward organs of action and sensation; and place their belief in whatever their souls and minds suggest to them either as false or true.

23. They believe the moonlight to be hot or cold, according as they feel by their outward perception. (i.e. Though the moon-beams appear cooling to the weary, yet they seem to be warm to the love lorn amorosa).

24. The pungency of the pepper and the vacuity of the firmament, are all according to one's knowledge and perception of them, and do not belong to the nature of things. For sweet is sour to some, and sour is sweet to others; and the firmament is thought to be a void by many, but is found to be full of air by others, who assert the dogma of natures abhorrence of vacuum.

25. They have also ascertained certain actions and rituals, which are in common practice, as the articles of their creed, and built their faith of a future heaven, on the observance of those usages.

26. The living soul which is full of its desires, is led by two different principles of action through life; the one is its natural tendency to some particular action, and the other is the direction of some particular law or other. It is however the natural propensity of one, that gets the better of the other.

27. It is the soul which has produced all the objective duality from the subjective unity only; as it is the sweet sap of the sugarcane that produces the sugarcandy; and the serum of the earth, that forms and fashions the water pot. (The objective is the production of the subjective.)

28. In these as well as in all other cases, the changes that take place in the forms of things, are all the results of time and place and other circumstances; but none of these has any relation in the nature of God, in his production of the universe.

29. As the sugarcane produces its leaves and flowers from its own sap, so the living soul produces the dualities from sap of its own unity, which is the supreme soul itself. (The spirit of God that dwells in all souls. (Swátmani Brahmasatwa), produces all these varieties in them.)

30. It is the God that is seated in all souls, that views the dualities of a pot, picture, a cot and its egoism in itself; and so they appear to every individual soul in the world.

31. The living soul appears to assume to itself, the different forms of childhood, youth, and age at different times; as a cloud in the sky appears as an exhalation, a watery cloud and the sap of the earth and all its plants, at the different times of the hot and rainy seasons of the year.

32. The living soul perceives all these changes, as they are exhibited before it by the supreme soul in which they are all present; and there is no being in the world, that is able to alter this order of nature.

33. Even the sky which is as clear as the looking glass, and is spread all about and within every body, is not able to represent unto us, all the various forms which are presented to the soul by the great soul of souls (in which they appear to be imprinted). Here Vasishtha is no more an ákása-vádi--vacuist, in as much as he finds a difference in the nature and capacity of the one from those of the other or the supreme soul.

34. The soul which is situated in the universal soul of Brahmá, shines as the living soul (Jíva) of living beings; but it amounts to a duality, to impute even an incorporeal idea of Avidyá or Ignorance to it; because the nature of God is pure Intelligence, and cannot admit an ignorant spirit in it (as the good spirit of God cannot admit the evil spirit of a demon in itself).

35. Whatever thing is ordained to manifest itself in any manner, the same is its nature and stamp (swabháva and neyati); and though such appearance is no reality, yet you can never undo what is ordained from the beginning.

36. As a golden ornament presents to you the joint features of its reality and unreality at the same time (in that it is gold and jewellery, the one being real and the other changeable and therefore unreal); so are all things but combinations of the real and unreal, in their substantial essence and outward appearance. But both of these dissolve at last to the Divine spirit, as the gold ornament is melted down to liquid gold in the crucible.

37. The Divine Intellect being all-pervasive by reason of its intellectuality, it diffuses also over the human mind; as the gold of the jewel settles and remains dull in the crucible.

38. The heart having the passive nature of dull intellectuality, receives the fleeting impressions of the active mind, and takes upon it the form that it feels strongly impressed upon it at any time. (The heart is the passive receptacle of the impression of the active mind and reverberates to the tone of its thoughts).

39. The soul also assumes many shapes to itself at different times, according to the ever changing prospects, which various desires always present before it.

40. The body likewise takes different forms upon it, according to its inward thoughts and feelings; as a city seen in a dream varies considerably from what is seen with naked eyes. So we shape our future forms by the tenor of our minds (because our life is but a dream and our bodies but its shadows--prathibas).

41. As a dream presents us the shadows of things, that disappear on our waking, so these living bodies that we see all about, must vanish into nothing upon their demise.

42. What is unreal is doomed to perish, and those that die are destined to be born again, and the living soul takes another form in another body, as it sees itself in its dream.

43. This body does not become otherwise, though it may change from youth to age in course of time; because the natural form of a person retains its identity in every stage of life through which it has to pass.

44. A man sees in his dream all that he has seen or heard or thought of at any time, and the whole world being comprised in the state of dreaming, the living soul becomes the knower of all that is knowable in his dream. (The sruti says, the soul comprises the three worlds in itself, which it sees expanded before in its dream).

45. That which is not seen in the sight of a waking man, but is known to him only by name (as the indefinite form of Brahma); can never be seen in dream also, as the pure soul and the intellect of God. (Abstract thoughts are not subjects of dream).

46. As the living soul sees in its dream the objects that it has seen before, so the intellectual part of the soul sees also many things, which were unknown to it.

47. Subdue your former desires and propensities, by your manly efforts at present; and exert your utmost to change your habitual misconduct to your good behaviour for the future.

48. You can never subdue your senses, nor prevent your transmigrations, without gaining your liberation; but must continue to rise and plunge in the stream of life forever more and in all places.

49. The imagination of your mind, causes the body to grasp your soul as a shark, and the desire of your soul is as a ghost, that lays hold on children in the dark.

50. It is the mind, the understanding and egoism, joined with the five elements or tanmátras, that form the puryastaka or ativáhika body, composed of the octuple subtile properties.

51. The bodiless or intellectual soul, is finer than the vacuous air; the air is its great arbor, and the body is as its mountain. (i.e. It is more subtile than the empty air and sky).

52. One devoid of his passions and affections, and exempt from all the conditions of life, is entitled to his liberation; he remains in a state of profound sleep (hypnotism), wherein the gross objects and desires of life, lie embosomed and buried for ever.

53. The state of dreaming is one, in which the dreamer is conscious of his body and self-existence; and has to rove about or remain fixed in some place, until his attainment of final liberation. Such is the state of living beings and vegetables (both of which are conscious of their lives).

54. Some times the sleeping and often the dreaming person, have both to bear and carry with them their ativáhika or moveable bodies, until they obtain their final emancipation from life.

55. When the sleeping soul does not rise of itself (by its intellectual knowledge), but is raised from the torpor of its sleep by some ominous dream, it then wakes to the fire of a conflagration from its misery only. (Here waking to a conflagration is opposed to the waking to a seas of woes of Dr. Young. The gloss says, that it is a structure on the unintelligent waking of the Nyáyikas).

56. The state of the unmoving minerals, including even that of the fixed arbor of the Kalpa tree (that is in its torpid hypnotism of susupti), exhibits no sign of intelligence except gross dulness.

57. The dull sleep of susupta being dispelled by some dream, leads the waker to the miseries of life in this world; but he that awakes from his trance with full intelligence, finds the perfect felicity of the fourth (turya) states open fully to his view.

58. The living soul finds liberation by means of its intelligence, and it is by this means that it gets its spirituality also; just as copper being cleansed of its rust by some acid, assumes the brightness of pure gold.

59. The liberation that the living soul has by means of its intelligence, is again of two kinds, namely;--the one is termed emancipation from life or Jívan mukta, and the other is known as the release from the burden of the body or deha mukta.

60. Emancipation from life means the attainment of the fourth state of perfection, and intelligence signifies the enlightenment of the soul, and this is obtainable by cultivation of the understanding.

61. The soul that is acquainted with sástra, and knows the supreme spirit in itself, becomes full of the Deity; but the unintelligent soul sees only horrors rising before it, like spectres of his troublesome dreams.

62. The horrors rising in the heart of man, serve only to disturb the rest of the breast; or else there is nothing in the heart of man, except a particle of the Divine Intellect.

63. Men are verily subjected to misery, by looking at the Deity in any other light, than the Divine light which shines in the soul of man, and beside which there is no other light in it.

64. Look at the world whenever you will, and you will find it full of illusion everywhere; as you find nothing in a pot full of foul water except the sediments of dirt.

65. In the same manner you see the atoms of human souls, full with the vanities of this world; it is by the fetters of its worldly desires, and gets its release by the breaking off those bonds of its desire.

66. The soul sleeps under the spell of its desires, and sees those objects in its dream, it wakes after their dispersion to the state of turya-felicity. The spell of gross desire, extends over all animate as well as in-animate creation.

67. The desire of superior beings is of a pure nature, and that of intermediate natures is of less pure form. The desires of inferior beings are of a gross nature, and there are others without them as the pots and blocks.

68. The living soul (passing through the doors of bodily organs) becomes united with the outward object, when the one becomes the percipient and the other the object of its percipience; and then the entity of both of these, namely of the inward soul and the outward object being pervaded by the all pervasive Intellect of God, they both become one and the same with the common receptacle of all. (I.e. All things blend in the Divine unity).

69. Hence the belief of the receiver, received and reception, are as false as the water in the mirage; and there is nothing that we can shun or lay hold upon as desirable or disgusting, when they are all the same in the sight of God.

70. All things whether internal or external, are manifested to us as parts of the one universal and intellectual soul; and all the worlds being but manifestations of the Divine Intellect, it is in vain to attribute any difference to them. All of us are displayed in the Intellect, which contains the inner and outer worlds for ever.

71. As the ocean is an even expanse of water, after the subsidence of all its various waves and billows, and shows itself as clear as sky with its pure watery expanse to view; so the whole universe appears as the reflexion of one glorious and ever lasting Deity, after we lose sight of the diversities that are presented to our superficial view.

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LII. STORY OF ARJUNA, AS THE INCARNATION OF NARA-NÁRÁYANA

Argument.--The Narrative of Arjuna given in Illustration of the truth, that the world is a dream and unworthy of our reliance.

Vasishtha said:--Know Ráma, this world to be as a dream, which is common to all living beings, and is fraught with many agreeable scenes, so as to form the daily romance of their lives, which is neither true nor entirely false.

2. But as it is not likely that the living souls of men should be always asleep; therefore their waking state is to be accounted as one of dreaming also. (Life is a dream. Addison).

3. Life is a longer dream than the short lived ones in our sleep; and know it, intelligent Ráma, to be as untrue as it is unsubstantial and airy in its nature.

4. The living souls of the living world, continually pass from dream to dream, and they view the unrealities of the world as positive realities in their nature. (The unreal is thought as real by the Realists).

5. They ascribe solidity to the subtile, and subtilty to what is solid; they see the unreal as real, and think the unliving as living in their ignorance.

6. They consider the revolution of all worlds, to be confined in the solar system; and rove about like somnambulists and fleeting bees about the living soul, which they differentiate from the supreme.

7. They consider and meditate in their minds, the living soul as a separate reality, owing to its ubiquity and immortality, and as the source of their own lives. (This is the living liberation--Jívanmukti of Buddhists, who consider their living souls as absolute agent of themselves).

8. Hear me to relate to you the best lesson of indifference (i.e. the unattachment to the world and life), which the lotus-eyed lord (Krishna) taught to Arjuna, and whereby that sagely prince became liberated in life time. (Here is an anachronism of antedating Krishnárjuna prior to Ráma).

9. Thus Arjuna the son of Pandu will happily pass his life, and which I hope you will imitate, if you want to pass your days without any grief or sorrow.

10. Ráma said:--Tell me sir, when will this Arjuna the son of Pandu, come to be born on earth, and who is this Hari of his, that is to deliver this lesson of indifference to the world to him?

11. Vasishtha replied:--There is only the entity of one soul, to whom this appellation is applied by fiction only. He remains in himself from time without beginning and end, as the sky is situated in a vacuum.

12. We behold in him the phantasmagoria of this extended world, as we see the different ornaments in gold, and the waves and billows in the sea. (Identity of the cause and effect of the producer and produced).

13. The fourteen kinds of created beings display themselves in him; and in him is the network of this universe, wherein all these worlds are suspended, as birds hanging in the net in which they are caught.

14. In him reside the deities Indra and Yama and the sun and moon, who are renowned and hallowed in the scriptures; and in him abide the five elemental creation, and they that have become the regents (of heaven and earth).

15. That the one thing is virtue and therefore expedient, and the other is vice and therefore improper, are both placed in him as his ordinances (or eternal laws); and depending on the free agency (sankalpa) of men, to accept or reject the one or the other for good or evil. (Hence there is no positive virtue or vice, nor God the author of good and evil; but it is the obedience or disobedience to his fixed laws, that amounts to the one or other).

16. It is obedience to the Divine ordinance, that the gods are still employed in their fixed charges with their steady minds.

17. The lord Yama is accustomed to make his penance, at the end of every four yugas (or kalpa age), on account of his greatness in destruction of the creatures of God. (Yama the Indian Pluto and god of death.)

18. Sometimes he sat penitent for eight years, and all others for a dozen of years, often times he made his penance for five or seven years, and many times for full sixteen years.

19. On a certain occasion as Yama sat observant of his austerity, and indifferent to his duty, death ceased to hunt after living beings in all the worlds.

20. Hence the multitude of living beings filled the surface of the earth, and made ground pathless and impassable by others. They multiplied like the filth born gnats in the rainy weather, that obstruct the passage of elephants.

21. Then the gods sat together in council, and after various deliberations came to determine the extirpation of all living beings, for relieving the over burdened earth. (This was to be done by the Bharata war celebrated in the great epic of the Mahábhárata).

22. In this way many ages have passed away, and many changes have taken place in the usages of the people, and unnumbered living beings have passed and gone with the revolutions of the worlds.

23. Now it will come to pass, that this Yama--the son of the sun and the lord of the regions of the dead; will again perform his penance in the aforesaid manner after the expiration of many ages to come.

24. He will again resume his penitence for a dozen of years, for the atonement of his sin of destroying the living; when he will abstain from his wonted conduct of destroying the lives of human beings.

25. At that time, will the earth be filled with deathless mortals, so as this wretched earth will be covered and overburthened with them, as with dense forest trees.

26. The earth groaning under her burden, and oppressed by tyranny and lawlessness, will have recourse to Hari for her redress, as when a virtuous wife resorts to her husband from the aggression of Dasyus.

27. For this reason, Hari will be incarnate in two bodies, joined with the powers of all the gods, and will appear on earth in two persons of Nara and Náráyana, the one a man and the other the lord Hari himself.

28. With one body Hari will become the son of Vasudeva, and will thence be called Vasudeva; and with the other he will be the son of Pandu and will thereby be named the Pándava Arjuna or Arjuna the Pándava.

29. Pandu will have another son by name of Yudhisthira, who will adopt the title of the son of Dharma or righteousness, for his acquaintance with politics, and he will reign over the earth to its utmost limit of the ocean.

30. He will have his rival with Duryodhana his cousin by his paternal uncle, and there will be a dreadful war between them as between a snake and weasel.

31. The belligerent princes will wage a furious war for the possession of the earth, with forces of eighteen legions on both sides. (Those of Duryodhana were eleven legions, and Yudhisthira were seven).

32. The God Vishnu will cause Arjuna to slay them all by his great bow of Gándíva, and thereby relieve the earth of her burden of riotous peoples.

33. The incarnation of Vishnu in the form of Arjuna, will comprise all the qualities incident to humanity; and will be fraught with the feelings of joy and vengeance, which are connatural with mankind.

34. Seeing the battle array on both sides, and friends and kinsmen ready to meet their fate, pity and grief will seize the heart of Arjuna, and he will cease from engaging in the war.

35. Hari will then with his intelligent form of Krishna, persuade his insensible person of Arjuna, to perform his part of a hero for crowning his valour with success.

36. He taught him the immortality of the soul by telling him that, the soul is never born nor does it die at any time, nor had it a prior birth, nor is it new born to be born again on earth, it is unborn and ever lasting, and is indestructible with the destruction of the body.

37. He who thinks the soul to be the slayer of or slain by any body, is equally ignorant of its nature, never kills nor is ever killed by any body.

38. It is immortal and uniform with itself, and more rare and subtile than the air and vacuity; the soul which is the form of the great God himself, is never and in no way destroyed by any body.

39. O Ráma, that art conscious of yourself, know your soul to be immortal and unknown, and without its beginning, middle and end; it is of the form of consciousness and clear without any soil, so by thinking yourself as such, you become the unborn, eternal and undecaying soul yourself.

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LIII. ADMONITION OF ARJUNA

Argument.--Abandonment of Egoism, knowledge of the Adorable one and its different stages.

The Lord said:--Arjuna, you are not the killer (of any soul), it is a false conceit of yours which you must shun; the soul is ever lasting and free from death and decay.

2. He who has no egoism in him, and whose mind is not moved (by joy or grief), is neither the killer of nor killed by any body, though he may kill every one in the world. (This is an attribute of the supreme soul).

3. Whatever is known in our consciousness, the same is felt within us; shun therefore your inward consciousness of egoism and meity, as this is I and these are mine, and these are others and theirs.

4. The thought that you are connected with such and such persons and things, and that of your being deprived of them, and the joy and grief to which you are subjected thereby, must affect your soul in a great measure.

5. He who does his works with the parts or members of his body, and connects the least attention of his soul there with; becomes infatuated by his egoism and believes himself as the doer of his action. (here is a lesson of perfect indifference enjoined to any act or thought that a man does by or entertains in himself).

6. Let the eyes see, the ears hear, and your touch feel their objects, let your tongue also taste the relish of a thing, but why take them to your soul and where is your egoism situated in these?

7. The minds of even the great, are verily employed in the works that they have undertaken to perform, but where is your egoism or soul in these, that you should be sorry for its pains. (The soul is aloof from pain).

8. Your assumption to yourself to any action, which has been done by the combination of many, amounts only to a conceit of your vanity, and exposes you not only to ridicule, but to frustrate the merit of your act. (So is the assuming of a joint action of all the organs and members of the mind, and the achievement of a whole army to one's self. So also many masters arrogate to themselves the merit of the deeds of their servants).

9. The yogis and hermits do their ritual and ordinary actions with attention of their minds and senses, and often times with the application of the members and organs of their bodies only, in order to acquire and preserve the purity of their souls.

10. Those who have not subdued their bodies with the morphia of indifference, are employed in the repetition of their actions, without ever being healed of their disease (of anxiety).

11. No person is graceful whose mind is tinged with his selfishness, as no man however learned and wise is held in honour, whose conduct is blemished with unpoliteness and misbehaviours.

12. He who is devoid of his selfishness and egotism, and is alike patient both in prosperity and adversity, is neither affected nor dejected, whether he does his business or not.

13. Know this, O son of Pandu as the best field for your martial action; which is worthy of your great good, glory and ultimate happiness. (War in a just cause is attended with glory).

14. Though you reckon it as heinous on the one hand and unrighteous on the other; yet you must acknowledge the super excellence and imperiousness of the duties required of your martial race, so do your duty and immortalize yourself.

15. Seeing even the ignorant stick fast to the proper duties of their race, no intelligent person can neglect or set them at naught; and the mind that is devoid of vanity, cannot be ashamed or dejected, even if one fails or falls in the discharge of his duty.

16. Do you duty, O Arjuna, with your yoga or fixed attention to it, and avoid all company (in order to keep company with the object of your pursuit only). If you do your works as they come to you by yourself alone, you will never fail nor be foiled in any. i.e. thy object thou canst never gain, unless from all others you refrain.

17. Be as quiet as the person of Brahma, and do your works as quietly as Brahma does leave his result (whether good or bad) to Brahma (because you can have no command over the consequence), and by doing so, assimilate thyself into the nature of Brahma (who is all in all).

18. Commit yourself and all your actions and objects to God, remain as unaltered as God himself, and know him as the soul of all, and be thus the decoration of the world. (The gloss says, it is no blasphemy to think one's self as God, when there is no other personality besides that of Deity).

19. If you can lay down all your desires, and become as even and cool mind as a muni--monk; if you can join your soul to the yoga of sannyasa or contemplative coldness, you can do all your actions with a mind unattached to any.

20. Arjuna said:--Please lord, explain to me fully, what is meant by the renunciation of all connections, commitment of our actions to Brahma; dedication of ourselves to God and abdication of all concerns.

21. Tell me also about the acquisition of true knowledge and divisions of Yoga meditation, all which I require to know in their proper order, for the removal of my gross ignorance on those subjects.

22. The Lord replied:--The learned know that as the true form of Brahma, of which we can form no idea or conception, but which may be known after the restraining of our imagination, and the pacification of our desires.

23. Promptitude after these things constitutes our wisdom or knowledge, and perseverance in these practices is what is called Yoga. Self dedication to Brahma rests on the belief that, Brahma is all this world and myself also.

24. As a stone statue is all hollow both in its inside and outside, so is Brahma as empty, tranquil and transparent as the sky, which is neither to be seen by us nor is it beyond our sight.

25. It then bulges out a little from itself, and appears as something, other than what it is. It is this reflexion of the universe, but all as empty as this inane vacuity.

26. What is again this idea of your egoism, when every thing is evolved out of the Supreme Intellect, of what account is the personality of any body, which is but an infinitesimal part of the universal soul.

27. The Egoism of the individual soul, is not apart from the universal spirit, although it seems to be separate from the same; because there is no possibility of exclusion or separation of anything from the Omnipresent and all comprehensive soul of God, and therefore a distinct egoism is a nullity.

28. As it is the case with our egoism, so is it with the individuality of a pot and of a monkey also. (i.e. of all insensible and brute creatures too), none of which is separate from the universal whole. All existences being as drops of water in the sea, it is absurd to presume an egoism to any body.

29. Things appearing as different to the conscious soul, are to be considered as the various imageries represented in the self-same soul (like the sundry scenes shown in the soul in a dream).

30. So also is the knowledge of the particulars and species, lost in the idea of the general and the summum genus. Now by sannyása or renunciation of the world is meant, the resignation of the fruition of the fruits of our actions. (The main teaching of Krishna to Arjuna in the Bhagavadgítá, tends to the renunciation of the fruits of our actions).

31. Unattachment signifies the renunciation of all our worldly desires, and the intense application of the mind to the one sole God of the multifarious creation, and the variety of his imaginary representations.

32. The want of all dualism in the belief of his self-existence as distinct from that of God, constitutes his dedication of himself to God; it is ignorance that creates the distinction, by applying various names and attributes to the one intellectual soul.

33. The meaning of the word intelligent soul, is undoubtedly that it is one with the universe; and that the Ego is the same with all space, and its contents of the worlds and their motions.

34. The Ego is the unity of Eternity, and the Ego is duality and plurality in the world, and the variety of its multifarious productions. Therefore be devoted to the sole Ego, and drown your own egoism in the universal Ego. (Here the purport is given instead of the literal version of the too verbose tetrastich verse).

35. Arjuna said:--There being two forms of the Deity, the one transcendent or spiritual and the other transpicuous or material; tell me to which of these I shall resort for my ultimate perfection.

36. The lord replied:--There are verily two forms of the all pervading Vishnu, the exoteric and the other esoteric; that having a body and hands holding the conch-shell, the discus, and the mace and lotus, is the common form for public worship.

37. The other is the esoteric or spiritual form, which is undefined and without its beginning and end; and is usually expressed by the term Brahma--great.

38. As long as you are unacquainted with the nature of the supreme soul, and are not awakened to the light of the spirit; so long should you continue to adore the form of the God with its four arms. (or the form of the four armed God).

39. By this means you will be awakened to light, by your knowledge of the supreme; and when you come to comprehend the Infinite in yourself, you shall have no more to be born in any mortal form.

40. When you are acquainted with the knowledge of the knowable soul, then will your soul find its refuge in eternal soul of Hari, who absorbs all souls in him.

41. When I tell you that this is I and I am that, mind that I mean to say that, this and that is the Ego of the supreme soul, which I assume to myself for your instruction.

42. I understand you to be enlightened to truth, and to rest in the state of supreme felicity; and now that you are freed from all your temporal desires, I wish you to be one with the true and holy spirit.

43. View in yourself the soul of all beings and those beings themselves; think your own self or soul as the microcosm of the great universe, and be tolerant and broad sighted in your practice of Yoga. (The word Sama darsi, here rendered broad sighted, means one who sees every[one] in one and [the] same light; whence it is synonymous with universal benevolence and fellow feeling).

44. He who worships the universal soul that resides in all beings, as the one self-same and undivided spirit; is released from the doom of repeated births, whether he leads a secular or holy life in this world.

45. The meaning of the word "all" is unity (in its collective sense), and the meaning of the word "one" is the unity of the soul; as in the phrase "All is one" it is meant to say that the whole universe is collectively but one soul. (The soul also is neither a positive entity, nor a negative non-entity, but it is as it is known in the spirit. (of the form of ineffable light and delight).)

46. He who shines as light within the minds of all persons, and dwells in the inward consciousness or percipience of every being, is no other than the very soul that dwells within myself also.

47. That which is settled in shape of savour in the waters all over the three worlds. (i.e. in the earth, heaven, and underneath the ground); and what gives flavour to the milk, curd and the butter of the bovine kind, and dwells as sapidity in the marine salt and other saline substances, and imparts its sweetness to saccharine articles, the same is this savoury soul, which gives a gust to our lives, and a good taste to all the objects of our enjoyment.

48. Know your soul to be that percipience, which is situated in the hearts of all corporeal beings, whose rarity eludes our perception of it, and which is quite removed from all perceptibles; and is therefore ubiquitous in every thing and omnipresent every where.

49. As the butter is inbred in all kinds of milk, and the sap of all sappy substances is inborn in them, so the supreme soul is intrinsical and immanent in every thing.

50. As all the gems and pearls of the sea, have a lustre inherent in them, and which shines forth both in their inside and outside; so the soul shines in and out of every body without being seated in any part of it, whether in or out or where about it.

51. As the air pervades both in the inside and outside of all empty pots, so the spirit of God is diffused in and about all bodies in all the three worlds. (This is the meaning of omnipresence).

52. As hundreds of pearls are strung together by a thread in the necklace, so the soul of God extends through and connects these millions of beings, without its being known by any. (This all connecting attribute of God, is known as sútrátmá in the Vedánta).

53. He who dwells in the hearts of every body in the world, commencing from Brahma to the object grass that grows on the earth; the essence which is common in all of them, is the Brahma the unborn and undying.

54. Brahmá is a slightly developed form of Brahma, and resides in the spirit of the great Brahma, and the same dwelling in us, makes us conceive of our egoism by mistake of the true Ego.

55. The divine soul being manifest in the form of the world, say what can it be that destroys or is destroyed in it; and tell me, Arjuna, what can it be that is subject to or involved in pleasure or pain.

56. The divine soul is as a large mirror, showing the images of things upon its surface, like reflexions on the glass; and though these reflexions disappear and vanish in time, yet the mirror of the soul is never destroyed, but looks as it looked before.

57. When I say I am this and not the other (of my many reflexions in a prismatic glass, or of my many images in many pots of water), I am quite wrong and inconsistent with myself; so is it to say, that the human soul is the spirit or image of God, and not that of any other being, when the self-same Divine spirit is present and immanent in all. (The catholic spirit of the Hindu religion, views all beings to partake of the Divine spirit, which is in all as in a prismatic glass).

58. The revolutions of creation, sustentation and final dissolution, take place in an unvaried and unceasing course in the spirit of God, and so the feelings on surface of the waters of the sea. (Egoistic feelings rising from the boisterous mind, subside in the calmness of the soul).

59. As the stone is the constituent essence of rocks, the wood of trees and the water of waves; so is the soul the constituent element of all existence.

60. He who sees the soul (as inherent) in all substances, and every substance (to be contained) in the soul; and views both as the component of one another, sees the uncreating God as the reflector and reflexion of Himself.

61. Know Arjuna, the soul to be the integrant part of every thing, and the constituent element of the different forms and changes of things; as the water is of the waves, and the gold is of jewelleries. (The spirit of God is believed as the material cause of all).

62. As the boisterous waves are let loose in the waters, and the jewels are made of gold; so are all things existent in and composed of the spirit of God.

63. All material beings of every species, are forms of the Great Brahma himself; know this one as all, and there is nothing apart or distinct from him.

64. How can there be an independent existence, or voluntary change of anything in the world; where can they or the world be, except in the essence and omnipresence of God, and wherefore do you think of them in vain?

65. By knowing all this as I have told you, the saints live fearless in this world by reflecting on the supreme Being in themselves; they move about as liberated in their lifetime, with the equanimity of their souls.

66. The enlightened saints attain to their imperishable states, by being invincible to the errors of fiction, and unsubdued by the evils of worldly attachment; they remain always in their spiritual and holy states, by being freed from temporal desires, and the conflicts of jarring passions, doubts and dualities.

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