RELATION OF THE CAUSE OF LONGEVITY.
Argument.--Reflection and Restraint of Respiration leading to the
tranquillity of the soul, and the steadiness of the _spirit_, conducing
to long life and felicity on earth.
Bhusunda continued. This is the tranquillity of the mind, which I have
attained by degrees, by means of my meditation of the nature and course
of the vital breath in myself.
2. I sit quiet at all times, with view fixed at the movement of my
breath; and never stir a moment from my meditative mood, though the
mount Meru may shake under me.
3. Whether I am awake or asleep, or move about or remain unmoved in
my seat, I am never at a loss of this meditation even in dream, nor
does it slide a moment from my steadfast mind. (For who can ever live
without breathing, or be unconscious of its ceaseless course, or that
the breath is both the cause and measure of life).
4. I am always calm and quiet and ever steady and sedate, in this ever
varying and unsteady world; I remain always with my face turned inward
in myself, and fixed firmly in the object I have at heart. (This is the
soul--the life of the life situated in the heart).
5. The breeze may cease to blow, and the waters may stop to flow but
nothing can prevent my breathing and meditation of them, nor do I
remember ever to live without them. (The gloss explains by metonymy
the air to mean the planetary sphere, which rests and moves in it,
the _waters_ as the ever flowing [Sanskrit: váyu] currents of rivers,
and the _samádhi_ [Sanskrit: jyotichakraha] meditation as composed of
breath and thought, to be in continuous motion and resistless in their
course).
6. By attending to the course of my inhaling and exhaling breaths of
life, I have come to the sight of the soul (which is their life), and
have thereby become freed from sorrow by seeing the prime soul of all
souls. (_i.e._ The highest soul of God).
7. The earth has been sinking and rising repeatedly, since the great
deluge, and I have been witnessing the submersion and immersion of
things, and the perdition and reproduction of beings, without any
change of the sedateness of my soul and mind.
8. I never think of the past and future, my sight is fixed only on the
present, and my mind sees the remote past and future as ever present
before it. (Meditation makes a man a seer of all time).
9. I am employed in the business that presents itself to me, and never
care for their toil nor care for their reward. I live as one in sleep
and solely with myself. (This is the state of Kaivalya or solity).
10. I examine all what is and is not, and what we have or have not,
and consider likewise all our desires and their objects; and finding
them to be but frailties and vanities, I refrain from their pursuit and
remain unvexed by their cares for ever.
11. I watch the course of my inspiration and expiration, and behold the
presence of the super excellent (Brahma) at their confluence; whereby I
rest satisfied in myself, and enjoy my long life without any sorrow or
sickness.
12. This boon have I gained this day, and that better one shall I have
on another, are the ruinous thoughts of mortal men, and unknown to me
whereby I have so long living and unailing.
13. I never praise or dispraise any act of myself or others, and this
indifference of mine to all concerns; hath brought me to this happy
state of careless longevity. (Platonic imperturbability).
14. My mind is neither elated by success, nor it is depressed by
adversity, but preserves its equanimity at all times, and is what has
brought this happy state on me. (A sane and sound old age).
15. I have resorted to my religious relinquishment of the world, and to
my apathy to all things at all times; I have also abandoned the desire
of sensuous life and sensible objects, and these have set me free from
death and disease.
16. I have freed my mind, O great muni! from its faults of fickleness
and curiosity, and have set it above sorrow and anxiety, it has become
deliberate calm and quiet, and this has made me longlived and unsickly.
17. I see all things in an equal light, whether it be a beauty or a
spectre, a piece of wood or stone, a straw or a rock, or whether it is
the air, water or fire, and it is this equanimity of mine that has made
me sane and sound in every state of life.
18. I do not think about what I have done today, and what I shall have
to do tomorrow, nor do I ail under the fever of vain thoughts regarding
the past and future, and this has kept me forever sound and sane.
19. I am neither afraid of death, disease or old age, nor am I
elated with the idea of getting a kingdom in my possession; and this
indifference of mine to aught of good or evil, is the cause of my
length of my life and the soundness of my body and mind.
20. I do not regard, O Brahman! any one either in the light of a friend
or foe to me; and this equality of my knowledge of all persons, is the
cause of my long life and want of my complaint.
21. I regard all existence as the reflexion of the self-existent one,
who is all in all and without his beginning and end; I know myself as
the very intellect, and this is the cause of my diuturnity and want of
disease and decay.
22. Whether when I get or give away any thing, or when I walk or sit,
or rise and breathe, or am asleep or awake; I never think myself as the
gross body but its pure intelligence, and this made me diuturnal and
durable for ever. (The intelligent soul never dies).
23. I think myself as quite asleep, and believe this world with all its
bustle to be nothing in reality (but the false appearance of a dream);
and this has made me long-lived and undecaying.
24. I take the good and bad accidents of life, occurring at their
stated times, to be all alike to me, like my two arms both of which are
serviceable to me; and has made me longeval and imperishable.
25. With my fixed attention, and the cool clearness of my mental
vision, I see all things in their favourable light (that they are all
good, and adapted to their various uses); I see all things as even and
equal, and this view of them in the same light, has made me lasting and
wasteless. (So says the Bharata: "All crookedness leads to death, and
evenness to the one even Brahma").
26. This material body of mine to which I bear my moiety, is never
viewed by me in the light of my ego; and this has made me undying and
undecaying. (The deathless soul is the ego, and the dying body the
non-ego).
27. Whatever I do and take to my food, I never take them to my heart;
my mind is freed from the acts of my body, and this freedom of myself
from action, has caused my undecaying longevity. (Because action
being the measure of life, its want must make it measureless and
imperishable).
28. Whenever, O Sage, I come to know the truth, I never feel proud of
my knowledge, but desire to learn more about it; and this increasing
desire of knowledge, has increased my life without its concomitant
infirmity. (Knowledge is unlimited, and one needs be immortal in order
to know all).
29. Though possessed of power, I never use it to do wrong or injure to
another; and though wronged by any one, I am never sorry for the same;
and though ever so poor, I never crave any thing of any body; this hath
prolonged my life and kept me safe and sound. (It is the Christian
charity not to retaliate an injury, but rather to turn to him the right
cheek who has slapped on the left).
30. I see in these visible forms the intellect that abides all bodies,
and as I behold all these existent bodies in an equal light, I enjoy an
undecaying longevity.
31. I am so composed in my mind, that I never allow its faculties, to
be entangled in the snare of worldly desires and expectations; nor
do I allow these to touch even my heart, and this conferred on me the
bliss of my unfading longevity.
32. I examine both worlds as two globes placed in my hands, and I find
the non-existence of the visible world as it appears to a sleeping man;
while the spiritual and invisible world appear full open to my view,
as it does to a waking person, and this sight of mine has made me as
immortal as the world of immortality.
33. I behold the past, present and future as set before me; and I see
all that is dead and decayed, and all that is gone and forgotten, as
presented anew in my presence. This prospect of all keeps me alive and
afresh to them alike.
34. I feel myself happy at the happiness of others, and am sorry to see
the misery of other people; and this universal fellow feeling of mine
with the weal and woe of my fellow creatures, has kept me alive and
afresh at all times.
35. I remain unmoved as a rock in my adversity, and am friendly to
every one in my prosperity; I am never moved by want or affluence, and
this steadiness of mine is the cause of my undecayed longevity.
36. That I am neither related to nor belong to any body, nor that any
one is either related or belongeth to me; is the firm conviction that
has laid hold of my mind, and made me live long without feeling sick or
sorry for another.
37. It is my belief that I am the one Ego with the world, and with all
its space and time also, and that I am the same with the living soul
and all its actions; and this faith of mine has made me longeval and
undecaying.
38. It is my belief that I am the same Intelligence, which shows itself
in the pot and picture; and which dwells in the sky above and in the
woods below. That all this is full of intelligence is my firm reliance,
and this has made me long abiding and free from decay.
39. It is thus, O great sage! that I reside amidst the receptacle of
the three worlds, as a bee abides in the cell of a lotus flower, and am
renowned in the world as the perennial crow Bhusunda by name.
40. I am destined to dwell here forever in order to behold the visible
world, rising and falling in tumultuous confusion, in the infinite
ocean of the immense Brahma, and assuming their various forms like the
waves of the sea at their alternate rise and fall for all eternity.